Tonight at 7 PM at the The Lee Strassberg Theatre, 115 E 15th St. in New York City, there will be a staged reading of True Believers, a new play by Thom Dunn, directed by Matthew A.J. Gregory.
True Believers tells the epic tale of star crossed lovers, aspiring comic book artists, women in refrigerators, psychotic fanboys, and girls who dress like Princess Leia as their lives intertwine over a weekend at a comic book convention.
Admission is free, which is more than you can say about most comic conventions nowadays. If you’re in town, give it a shot.
UPDATE: Round 4 has ended. Check back soon for the Quarterfinals Round!
Here we go again… it’s Round 4 of the Mix March Madness 2013 Webcomics Tournament!
Now… it starts to get brutal.
We’ve gone from over 300 webcomics down to the Sweet 16. We’ve raised over $750 for the Hero Initiative in this round alone, so far you’ve bought over $1500 in votes. Voting for this round lasts until 9PM EDT on Wednesday, March 20, so get your votes in.
Today is Saint Patrick’s Day, a day to celebrate all things Irish, a day when real Irishmen and women hide in their homes while Amateur Irishmen take to the streets and the pubs. It’s a day when the city of Chicago – no lie – dyes the mouth of the Chicago River green… or even greener than usual. Given that this year Saint Paddy’s day occurs on a Sunday, I suspect that the celebration has been going on since at least Friday and may well last into next Thursday what with the whiskey and the beer and the general all around vomiting. Ah, glorious!
Since we’re celebrating things that are Irish, I’ll be mentioning some of me own favorite Irish films. You may have different ones and I’ll drink to those as well (it’s a day for it) but these are my particular favorites.
[[[The Quiet Man]]]
Classic. John Ford directed, John Wayne and Maureen O’Sullivan star, Victor McLaughlin, Ward Bond and Barry Fitzgerald co-star with a spectacular cast in this 1952 film about a retired American boxer who returns to the wee Irish village where he was born, finds love with a tempestuous redhead and a feud with her ill-tempered bully of a brother.
If there is one Irish themed film that most Americans know, I bet it would be this one. I love it, too, but there are things that bother me about it. First – I can’t really determine when it happens. Given what the characters say in the movie, I’m assuming it’s set before the establishment of the Republic of Ireland but I’ve never been sure. Secondly – there’s a casual and accepted treatment of women (“Here, sir – a stick with which to beat the lovely lady.”) that is a little hard to take. Lastly, the characters are all colorful but they’re stereotypes.
For all that, I love the film. John Wayne gives a fine performance and there are really romantic moments where he’s very tender. Barry Fitzgerald was never more of an Irish leprechaun than here and says one of my favorite lines; on looking at the wreckage of Wayne and O’Sullivan’s wedding bed the day following the wedding night, he murmurs, “Impetuous! Homeric!” Makes me laugh every time.
[[[The Commitments]]]
Alan Parker’s 1991 film about the formation of a Dublin-based soul band features largely a cast of unknowns taken from the Irish music scene. Why soul? The band’s organizer, Jimmy Rabbitte (played memorably by Robert Arkins) puts it this way: “The Irish are the blacks of Europe. And Dubliners are the blacks of Ireland. And the Northside Dubliners are the blacks of Dublin. So say it once, say it loud: I’m black and I’m proud.” Hard to argue with logic like that.
You get the feel that this is far more the real Ireland than with The Quiet Man. It also has an incredible score; the soundtrack of new versions of classic soul and R&B is itself now classic. Andrew Strong who plays the band’s lead singer, Deco Cuffe, could give Joe Cocker a run for his money. Funny, revealing, and you can dance to it. What more do you want from a movie?
This is a weird damn movie from the year 2000 filled with the very best of black Irish humor. I don’t think I can improve on IMDB’s pithy description: “A woman becomes furious when her husband arrives home from the local pub and turns into a rat.” It stars Imelda Staunton and Pete Postlethwaite and focuses on the family, none of whom seem all that surprised that the man of the house has turned into a rat. One of the taglines for the movie is “He might eat maggots and live in a cage but he’s still our Dad.”
Staunton, who some may recognize as Dolores Umbridge from some of the Harry Potter films, is simply superb. The Irish accents are a bit thick and may take some getting used to but there are moments of jaw dropping comedy in this. For all its surreal premise, this also seems to capture something very real in the Ireland in which its set. Not for everyone, I think, but I loved it.
[[[Waking Ned Devine]]]
Not only my favorite Irish film but one of my favorite films of all time – period. The 1998 film, written and directed by Kirk Jones, stars Ian Bannen, David Kelly, and Fionnula Flanagan and is set in the small town of Tullymore. Someone there has won the Lotto; Jackie O’Shea (Bannen) and Michael O’Sullivan (Kelly) are determined to find the winner before anyone else knows and help them spend their winnings. The winner, they discover, is Ned Devine of the title and the shock of learning he’s won has killed him. Jackie, after a dream – a “premonition” – decides that Ned’s spirit wants Jackie to claim the prize by pretending to be Ned so it doesn’t go to waste.
It doesn’t go quite as planned.
To be honest, after first seeing the trailer I wasn’t sure I wanted to see the film. For reasons I won’t try to explain here, there were glimpses of a naked David Kelly on a motorbike rushing around. Aged male backsides are not an inducement to me. However, My Mary really wanted to see it so we went.
There are some impeccably timed moments in the film and none greater than the climax. All I’ll tell you is that it is a very dark Irish joke and the first time I saw it in a movie theater, I literally nearly fell out of my seat, laughing hysterically. The row of seats we were in shook because I was laughing so hard. I tried to smother my laughter but people were turning to look at me. I couldn’t help myself. I have it on DVD and I laugh just as hard every time I see that climax. I know its coming, I know it by heart, and it shouldn’t affect me like that but it does.
Over repeated viewings I’ve become aware of story flaws and inconsistencies here and there but I just don’t care. I adore this film. It also has one the best movie soundtracks that I know and I play it often by itself.
So, this Saint Patrick’s day, you can go out and drink yourself into oblivion or until you see all the snakes St. Patrick drove out of Ireland but I’m going to stay in and watch one or all four of these films. Just be sure to get home safely so you can be around for St. Patrick’s Day next year and watch ‘em yourself.
Were we about to pitch this book as a possible movie to a Hollywood studio, we would present it as a super amalgamated cross between Stephen King’s “Salem’s Lot” and Lawrence Kasdan’s “Silverado.”
If you are an avid reader, then we no need to tell you that the new pulp genre known as the Weird Western is extremely popular these days. From anthologies and novels, it is a fantasy theme that has captured the fancy of readers everywhere. “The Six-Gun Tarot” is the best Weird Western book on the market today.
The setting is post-civil war in a Nevada mining town called Golgotha. For reasons known only to a select few, it is the nexus of good and evil at the heart of the universe. Locked up its mountains lies an ancient evil that existed before creation and here Belcher dives into Lovecraft territory head-on setting forth the book’s primary plot conflict. The beast, known as the Black Wurm, is about to be released from captivity and if it succeeds it will destroy the world.
Thus is falls upon a handful of truly memorable characters to save creation. These include Sheriff Jonathan Highfather, a man who cannot be killed; his deputy, a half-breed Indian coyote-changeling called Mutt, a young fifteen year old boy, Jim Negrey, on the run from the law who possesses a mysterious all-powerful eye said to contain unimaginable power and the beautiful but deadly Maude Stapleton, a Southern Belle secretly trained in ancient martial arts and occult practices.
That is only a sampling of some of the fantastical citizens of Golgotha that play an active part in this cataclysmic battle between light and dark, good and evil. There’s also Auggie, the local shop merchant who keeps his dead wife alive in a vat of chemicals put together by the town’s eccentric inventor and Malachi Bick, the saloon owner who just may be a fallen angel sent to protect mankind at the beginning of time.
“The Six-Gun Tarot” is one of those rare books that kept surprising us from chapter to chapter. Just when we thought it couldn’t get any weirder, it did just that until we became totally enraptured by Belcher’s daring and exuberant imagination. It certainly has no bounds. This is a book we recommend to all lovers of fantastic fiction and assure you once you’ve ridden into Golgotha, you won’t want to leave.
A few weeks back, an esteemed colleague of mine (oddly enough this time, not Mike Gold…) pitched a debate for my podcast: “Have nerds won? And if they have… is it a good thing?” Well, it was a great idea, and the debate on my show was fairly one sided. Now, after plenty of time to steep on the topic, I can plainly state my opinion; we have, and it is.
Twice a week, I teach knitting to people with cancer and caregivers. Most of you probably think of knitting as something serene, a hobby for little old ladies (current and future). However, when I teach, my instructions are filled with images of guns and shooting, stabbing people with knitting needles, and when I make a mistake, I threaten my materials with unspeakably filthy and unnatural acts.
I do this when I teach for a couple of reasons. Most important, it makes the techniques easier to remember. However, for this group in particular, it gives a sense of control. These people have so little control in their lives that it’s great to have control over knitting needles and yarn.
It’s powerful. When you’re staring the possibility of dying in the face, it’s good to have something that makes you feel powerful.
This is a long, roundabout way of getting to the intersection of a couple of trends I see in our beloved graphic story medium. As I wrote last week, the industry has a sad tendency to throw away creative talent when it is deemed to be “old.” There is also a pathetic paucity of work by women, racial minorities, and people whose identify as queer.
Things are slightly better outside of the Big Two (Marvel and DC). but not much. Not really.
This is a problem. It’s a problem in many media (especially broadcast news, but that’s another rant) but it seems to me that comics is one of the worst. It seems like a paradox, but by appealing to a cultural ideal of straight, white young men, comics may be stuck in a closet of marginalization.
We all have impulses and emotions. Many of these are not welcome by the larger society in which we not only live, but rely on for daily support. I think it’s healthy and mature to work out inappropriate feelings with the vicarious experience of entertainment.
Specifically, when we feel angry at our lives and helpless within are mortal bodies, we need power fantasies. Hence, in other mass media, we get not just superhero stories. but police procedurals, sword and sorcery, House and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
There’s other emotions that are inappropriate to express in our daily, public lives. We don’t show grief or sadness or lust. Men don’t show nurturing. These feelings are for private time, or for working out with art.
There are books and movies for these feelings. Dreary foreign films about death, silly romantic comedies with Katherine Heigl or Kate Hudson. This movie, which is one of the most bleak, self-loathing things I’ve ever seen. Sometimes, I need Carey Mulligan to hate herself so I don’t have to hate myself.
There are some brilliant graphic novels that appeal to these audiences, but they are few and far between.
There is nothing wrong with having a target audience. That’s effective marketing (note: marketing is not the same as editing, or publishing). However, if one plans to have an entertainment conglomerate and see some growth, one needs to occasionally try for other audience segments, or at least other audience moods.
In the meantime, if you see any bald-headed women making socks, watch your ass.
This week, Earth station One podcast hosts Mike Faber, Mike Gordon, and the 2013 Pulp Ark Award-Winning Best Author Bobby Nash give the spinner rack a few turns and take a look at some of our favorite non-superhero graphic novels and collected trades – no capes allowed! Joining us for some comic chat are Doctor Q (The Rachet Retrocast), Jason De La Torre (Transmissions from Atlantis), and Josh Wilson (Mad Norwegian Press). We are also joined by New Pulp Author Mark Ellis, who discusses the very superhero-ish team, the Justice Machine. But can they save him from the dreaded fate that is The Geek Seat? Tune in for the answer, plus the usual Rants, Raves, Khan Report, and Shout Outs!
Next week, the Earth Station One crew enlists. That’s right, Mike, Mike, and Bobby report for duty as part of America’s highly trained special missions force, known as G.I. Joe. ESO takes down Cobra forces while looking back at the Joes’ history from comic books, the various cartoon series, the conventions, the toys, and the upcoming live action movie starring The Rock and Bruce Willis. Plus, the ESO Khan Report goes on the road to Joelanta, Atlanta’s premier G.I. Joe convention. And if that wasn’t enough, just wait until you see who we strap into The Geek Seat this week. Plus, we’ll have the usual rants, raves, shout outs, and ESO’s Khan Report! It’s going to be another fantastic episode next week at Earth Station One. Now you know.
And knowing is half the battle.
ESO wants to hear from you. What are your favorite G.I. Joe memories from the comics, TV show, movies, or the toys that started it all? Let us know at www.esopodcast.com, Facebook, Twitter, or Google+. We just might tread yours on the show.
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