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REVIEW: Legend of Tarzan

The Legend of Tarzan_3DWhen Warner Bros announced they were making a new Tarzan film, the first question among fans was, “Do we really need another Tarzan movie?” The character has had more interpretations and reboots than just about any other pop culture figure from the 20th Century and it felt that his relevance has passed. The answer, surprisingly then, is that yes, we needed this one.

The Legend of Tarzan, out now from Warner Home Entertainment, is very faithful to Edgar Rice Burroughs’ creation, honoring the time-honored story of the infant raised by apes, who just happened to be an English lord. The cleverness in the script from Craig Brewer (Hustle & Flow) and Adam Cozad (Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit) which picks up eight years later, after Lord John Greystoke (Alexander Skarsgård) has returned to England with Jane Porter (Margot Robbie) as his bride. They also steep the story in events that were contemporary at the time, things ERB usually avoided in favor of the fantastic.

The plight of the African tribes as the Dark Continent was seen as increasingly valuable and the slaughter of animals for their horns, tusks, and pelts started to shift the ecosystem’s balance. It took the efforts of an American, George Washington Williams (Samuel L. Jackson), to bring the world’s attention to these problems. The man was real and not just added for a token black role and thankfully, Jackson was the right figure to bring the character to life. Williams comes to England to ask Parliament to invite Greystoke to accompany him to Africa to investigate.

_B4B2657.dngEngland is cold, gray, and dreary, stifling John and Jane so the decision is fairly easy and director David Yates does a masterful job contrasting civilization with the simpler, happier tribal life. Still, they’re there for a reason who is made manifest by Léon Auguste Théophile Rom (Christoph Waltz), another historically accurate figure and said to be the model for Joseph Conrad’s Colonel Kurtz. Rom is there to tilt the balance of African power toward King Leopold in Belgium, fueled by stealing a cache of diamonds deep in the Congo. In exchange for helping Rom, Chief Mbonga (Djimon Hounsou) has demanded Tarzan with whom he has a grudge.

And off we go. There are plenty of fine set pieces here that honors the traditions of Tarzan movies, along with winks and nods to the character’s worldwide legend. We have flashbacks to fill in the details of Tarzan’s past and have an over-the-top animal stampede in the third act. It’s far from a perfect film with Waltz playing a now stock villain complete with a dinner scene that seemed lifted wholesale from Raiders of the Lost Ark. The Mbonga subplot was thoroughly unnecessary and was more of a distraction since the theme of Great White Hero versus Great White Exploiter of the Natives was a clearer narrative.

legend-tarzan-conquer-trailerThe film is lush with the jungle life and great attention to the animal and tribal life helps ground the story. Skarsgård and Robbie have a wonderful chemistry and you believe in their bond and faith in one another. Jackson adds just enough comic relief to be an able sidekick along with representing the audience in his awe of the life he finds deep within the trees.

The film’s 1080p, AVC-encoded transfer to Blu-ray is sharp, clear, and helps convince you we are in 1890 Africa. Slightly better is the Dolby Atmos soundtrack.

The Blu-ray, DVD, Digital HD combo pack comes with a handful of special features although it is noteworthy that commentary, deleted scenes, and the like are absent in favor of Electronic Press Kit-worthy featurettes. The lack of cool features here is an example of Warner’s disappointment at the film’s undeserved failure at the box office. There’s Tarzan Reborn (15:10), an overview of the thinking behind this production; Battles and Bare-Knuckle Brawls, which examines three action scenes –Tarzan vs. Akut (5:15), Boma Stampede (4:53), and Train Ambush (4:57);  Tarzan and Jane’s Unfailing Love (6:01); Creating the Virtual Jungle (15:16); Gabon to the Screen (2:28) which stood in for the Congo; and, Stop Ivory (1:30), a PSA with the stars.

 

Michael Davis: Those MOFOs

cac-cmThe Dream Killer series continues next week.

I was attending The Pratt Institute and needed all the bank I could get. Pratt’s one of the world’s great art schools and cheap it was not. I had to come up with most of the tuition because no one talked to me about how financial aid went away if grades fall below a C.

I was a poor black kid from the projects talks like that rarely happen in inner cities. Those lucky enough to raise above our assigned station in life have to fend for ourselves. Our talks revolve around staying away from drugs, gangs, and cops.

American families middle class or above think nothing of seemingly little things like dad or mom talking to them at dinner about their college life.

Mum: My dear sweet Reginal you’ve many things to look forward to while at college!

Reginal: What were some of your favorite things? Do tell mummy!!

Mum: Why raindrops on roses and whiskers on kitten’s bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens brown paper packages tied up with strings don’t drop below a C, or you’ll have none of those things.

My freshman year I had no idea what to expect there was no “when I was in college” talk. For most poor people there is no talk of college, period. Most of the people I grew up with had no father in the house. My older sister, mother or grandmother – none of those people went to college.

“I can’t believe he’s related to you.”

Betty Blayton Taylor said to my cousin William T. Williams. They were on a phone call discussing my employment. He politely listened as Betty told him how I jetted at 4 pm on the nose from the Children’s Art Carnival how loud I was and assorted other things she saw as problems.

Betty, an acclaimed artist, co-founded the Children’s Art Carnival (CAC) where thanks to my cousin I was working that summer. Her partner at the Carnival? The Museum of Modern Art (MOMA).

Betty was a young, black woman and that, dear friend, is a triple minority. Yet by sheer force of will and a real life super power, she created a life experience in the arts for thousands of children of color. She did that with the full ($) weight of one of the most prestigious arts institutions on the planet.

Then she convinced them to set the school up in Harlem.

To do such in the late 60s early 70s when being black and a woman was second only to being black and a man on the “your name is Toby” list was an unheard of achievement.

The odds of a pulling that off today?

Doable… but so is Salma Hayek but try as one might the closest they will ever get is cosplay… alone. Back in the day and all through her life Betty Blayton was gangsta. Betty’s superpower?

Information and access.

If made aware of the C rule there would have been no need for a second job so no need to leave at 4 pm every day. Betty didn’t like clock watchers, nor did she think I was funny. She thought I was annoying and wanted me gone.

During her call, Betty told my cousin she was going to fire me.

She didn’t.

Not because my cousin asked her not too but because he gave me the information and access to such that allowed me to make a convincing case to stay.

When Betty asked me what I had to say for myself, I used my cousin’s advice, I told her the truth. We had a come to Jesus moment (ask someone black) and although she dropped the hammer on my ass, I kept my job and came away with a friend.

A few years after graduating from Pratt I returned to the Carnival. I wrote the curriculum for what would become the Communications Arts Department and was made its director. That became the foundation for my Bad Boy Studio Mentor Program.

Coming back to the Carnival Betty still couldn’t stand my swagger, but she grew to love it after I made the Communications Arts Department a success. “Keep doing what you do.” Betty said; “It’s ridiculous but I can’t deny it works.”

It worked so well that Betty put my name up to become a board member. Betty now loved me. Her follow board members, not so much.

She was met with such vile feedback I asked her to withdraw my name.

“Michael!” She yelled when I picked up the phone. I’d often get late night calls during what I called her whine moments. “These motherfuckers don’t like you but have no problem using what you’ve done when asking for funding! It’s just ridiculous!!”

FUN FACT: ‘Motherfucker’ and ‘Ridiculous’ were two of her favorite words. This from the woman who not only founded the Art Carnival but co-founded The Studio Museum in Harlem.

The More You Know…

“They keep asking me why do you have to be so loud?”

She said this raising her voice mid-sentence to imply loudness. This cracked her up. Me? Not so much. I was miserable, having already told my cousin I was going to be on the board.

You know what I told them?” Betty said.

“What Betty?”

“He’s loud so those kids can hear him!”

She hung up but two days later a vote was taken, and I became a board member.

My relationship continued long after I left the CAC, no longer being able to justify spending so much free time away from my wife. On top of that, I stopped accepting a CAC paycheck insisting the money go to the programs. Try telling your wife that little tidbit. Ha! I never did. Ha!

She left me anyhow.

When I made the move to L.A, I’d speak to Betty often. Last night I talked to her for a few and remembered a call from about a year ago when Betty called about a young artist she met on the subway.

“She was reading a comic book so I asked if she knew who you were. She’s a big fan.” Betty said. “So.” I began. “That’s where my one fan is.” Betty took a second to get it then she laughed her infectious laugh. We agreed I’d call the young lady who Betty told me was having a hard time within her household. That often happens when poor kids (black or white) express interest in the arts as a career.

She and I went down memory lane until she asked how my mother was, unaware she had died. She was saddened at the news then she told me “She’s looking down at you very proud of you. You drive people crazy, but you have a good heart you’re a good man.”

Good man? I hope so.

Drive people crazy? Without a doubt.

Good heart? Some days, but not today.

Today my heart is broken.

Basil, one of Betty’s Carnival Kids, contacted me to tell me Betty died a few days ago.

What many don’t know is Betty has a comic book legacy. Brett Lewis, Shawn Martinbrough, Kevin McCarthy, John Paul Leon, Bernard Chang, Chuck Drost, Chris Sotomayor and countless others are Carnival Kids.

As I sit here sobbing, I realize so am I.

I have no doubt if I would have lost the CAC job Pratt would have followed. No CAC, no Pratt, Bad Boy Studios, Milestone or Black Panel. Odds are I would have returned to the projects. Best case scenario I’m a security guard. That was my second job in college. It gets a bad rap from some, but it’s noble career, and I loved it.

Worst case scenario, I’m dead or in jail. There but for the grace of God…

Betty was a mentor and a friend not just to me but to countless artists who found their voice because of Betty. She died over a week ago, but I still talked to her last night.

I said to say hello to my mother, sister, and grandmother. Look up Malcolm Jones, Dwayne McDuffie, Curtis Johnson, Marvin Haynes, Carol Kalish, Archie Goodwin, Kim Yale, Mark Gruenwald, Don Thompson and Linda Gold.

Betty loves to talk to great people, and she won’t find a better group of people than are on that bittersweet list.

Anyone who thinks otherwise all I can say is that MOFO is ridiculous.

Martha Thomases: Respect Is More Than Just A Song

90s-catwoman

You might be wondering what the ruckus raised by the release of the Access Hollywood Trump video has to do with comics.

As it happens, quite a lot.

You see, if you take the partisan politics out of it, if you don’t talk about what Democrats or Republicans think, the Trump video and the response to it gives you insights into what women in today’s America go through every single day.

I’m not saying that every single American man is as vulgar as Trump. I’m actually pretty crude myself, and have been known to engage in locker-room banter when I find myself among my fellow women in comics. In my experience (and I know I am not everyone), women’s locker room talk tends to be more about who has the worst cramps and not who is getting the most action. If there is a list of which men in comics are the most well-endowed or give the best head, it has not been shared with me.

However, using vulgar words is different from bragging about criminal conduct. When Trump talks about grabbing women by the pussy, he causes every woman in America to shudder. Being grabbed by one’s vulva is not sexy. It’s assault. It’s a man asserting dominance over a woman. And, as near as I can tell, all women have experienced it in some form or another.

Women are reminded on a daily basis that they are considered an assortment of body parts, not real people. As such, we are there for the taking, and grabbing is not the only way this happens. We are often physically threatened non-verbally, and accused of being “too sensitive” when we point out this behavior. If there was anything positive to say about Sunday’s debate, it’s that women called this out in public forums, and were believed.

This is not something that only happens to women running for president. It happens to every woman who tries to live publicly as a real person, not a beautiful object.

I said this would have something to do with comics, and it does. Comics, now more than ever, are part of show business. As you could see on the Access Hollywood tape, show business in this country, despite a reputation for “liberalism,” is in fact quite patriarchal, racist and sexist. Straight cis white guys, especially when they are celebrities, feel pretty much entitled to their positions at the top of the heap. And, because our industry is so small, it’s easier to be a celebrity in comics than almost any other field.

In my experience, this meant that my opinions were not seriously considered at meetings. My objections to particular characters or storylines were dismissed. My suggestions for how to grow the market were ignored. And when I needed to go to the bathroom, the women’s facility was identified by a life-size illustration on the door of a version of Catwoman who was as anatomically impossible as a Barbie doll.

Traveling for business was even more fraught with peril. My husband and son came with me a few times, when I had to go to someplace really nice, but most of the time, I was on my own. I could listen to conversations at the convention booth or at the hotel bar, and find out which of my female colleagues were considered the most attractive and/or the most attainable. No one ever made a move on me. I tend to go to bed early, so I might have missed the more drunken revels. Maybe I wasn’t ever enough of a threat to need conquering. Or maybe I’m so unattractive that I’m beneath contempt. Whatever the reason, I’m grateful.

This isn’t to say that every straight man who works in comics is a rapist, nor even a sexist. You don’t have to commit heinous acts to be part of the problem. You simply have to know about them and do nothing. You simply have to dismiss the experiences of your female colleagues as overreacting. You simply have to excuse a person with a known problem because he is popular or talented.

Just as African-American men must consider, every day, what they have to do to avoid getting shot by police, women (of all colors, nationalities, and affectional preferences) have to consider what they will do, or wear, or where they’ll go, and if any of those things will get them raped. All this mental and emotional energy could be better used at work, or in the kitchen, or on the playground with our kids. We could turn these energies to more creative pursuits.

If we treated each other with respect, as people, and not as stereotypes, we might get better comics out of it.

Tweeks Review Raina Telgemeier’s Ghosts

As you know, we’re HUGE Raina Telgemeier fans! Last month, her latest graphic novel, Ghosts was released by Scholastic and it really should be on everyone’s reading list this October!

Ghosts is about Catrina whose family moves to Northern California because her sister has Maya’s cystic fibrosis. As the sisters try to adjust to their new town, they meet Carlos who teaches them all about the ghosts who reside there too. Maya’s down with meeting ghosts, but Cat not much. Read the book to find out how it all goes down.

We also talk about how we feel about ghosts and about where this book rates with among our other Raina favorites!

Dennis O’Neil: More Mighty

superman_mightymouse

So here I am, this slightly chilly afternoon in October, Columbus Day, as a matter of fact, not celebrating slavery, racism, the exploitation of indigenous peoples, imperialism – those are the values the sailor man represents, aren’t they? – just sitting in my (as always) messy office, thinking about Mighty Mouse.

marvel-mighty-mouseGuess we didn’t finish with the Mouse last week.

Maybe I’ll never finish with the Mouse, though I have no intention of writing a story about him nor will I be buying a DVD that presents his adventures, assuming such a thing exists. I mean, I can still remember him after all these years, so why would I forget him now?

Maybe it was his costume that drew my approval. It was pretty generic – tights, cape, little under pants worn on the outside, just like Superman and Batman – but it was the suit sported by an animal and, to my seven year old self, that made it special.. Oh, I enjoyed the other talking animals that cavorted across my neighborhood theater’s screen – Bugs and Daffy and Woody and Porky and Donald (the duck, not the politician) and another mouse, Mickey and maybe some others. But Mighty Mouse was something different: I might have called him, a bit inaccurately, sui generis, if I‘d ever encountered the term and had any idea what it meant.

I must have been aware that the costumed rodent was very, very similar to another kids’ entertainment, the comic book heroes. That caped clothing – it could have been an early version of what Superman wore. One way in which MM differed from Superman: the mouse’a outfit costume was restyled at least twice… although Superman’s threads did, in fact, change over time, I think we weren’t supposed to notice.

A person looking at Mighty might also be reminded of Captain Marvel and his family which included a creature mighty close to Mighty, Hoppy the Marvel Bunny. But the young me probably considered Hoppy a second stringer; he didn’t have his own comic book and he never made it into the movies. Yeah, nice enough but definitely an also ran.

Like his human counterparts MM eventually had a secret identity – Mike Mouse. He also had, over the years, three girlfriends, though I’m sure he saw only one at a time and accepted blame for the breakups. (Heroes are not cads.)

He was never a superstar, our Mouse, but he was fairly long-lived. He bopped around pop culture for decades in diverse venues: there were the 80 or so movie shorts, beginning in 1942 and ending in 1961 and a comic book, and in 1987 a Saturday morning television series. I assume that MM’s image also graced lunch boxes, maybe t shirts and pajamas, but I don’t really know – I was never lucky enough to own such treasures, if they existed.

Will Mighty again come to save the day? I guess it’s possible. But let’s agree that we can let him rest in limbo, at least for now.

 

Mike Gold: Hogan’s Weirdos

hogans-heroes-2We could spend the rest of this year debating which American teevee show has been the weirdest, but Hogan’s Heroes has got to make the top 10 list.

The high-concept: Hogan’s Heroes is the story of a group of Allied prisoners-of-war who operate a highly effective spy and sabotage operation from a bunker beneath their prison building during World War II. Okay, that’s kinda weird. It’s also kinda in bad taste. Its weirdness is abetted by several additional factors, not the least of which is… there’s some truth behind the laughs.

There really was a WWII POW named Robert Hogan who did time in a place called Stalag 13. He was Lt. Robert Steadham Hogan, a B24 pilot who was shot down on January 19, 1945 in while on a mission over Yugoslavia. Because he was an officer, Hogan was incarcerated in the Oflag 13 camp outside of Nuremberg because the Stalags were for enlisted men only. However, Oflag 13 was next door to Stalag 13, or, to be overly specific, Stalag 13D. He and his fellow prisoners had a contraband radio that was discovered by the Germans… but they were allowed to keep it because that’s how the Germans got their unfiltered news as well.

HOGAN'S HEROES, Bob Crane with thermos, lunchbox and comic book all product spinoffs from the show,Given that it was 1945, Hogan was a POW for a “mere” six months. The television show ran for six years, which, for you young ‘uns out there, was longer than the American participation in the War. Then again, Sgt. Rock fought that same conflict for about 35 years, give or take.

After the war, Hogan became a doctor in the Birmingham Alabama area. He enjoyed the teevee series, and, with his sons, met Bob Crane in 1966. However, the producers – obviously – maintain that all of this is a mere coincidence, albeit a fantastic coincidence.

Perhaps. But Hogan’s Heroes is weirder for other reasons as well.

Werner Klemperer, who played the notoriously bumbling commandant Col. Klink, fled Nazi Germany along with his father Otto, a famous orchestra leader in Germany. Werner also was classically trained, playing violin and piano and leading the Buffalo NY orchestra. Klink wasn’t Werner’s only Nazi role: he was a Nazi judge in the movie Judgment at Nuremburg, and he played the lead role in the movie Eichmann. According to IMDB, his last role was as the voice of Col. Klink in a 1999 episode of The Simpsons.

hogans-heroes-2-clipRobert Clary, who played Cpl. Louis LeBeau, was a French Jew (original name: Robert Max Widerman) who was incarcerated in the Nazi concentration camp at Ottmuth and was later sent to Buchenwald. Twelve other family members died in the camps. Like Klemperer, he had no problem performing in the Hogan’s Heroes series.

However, Leonid Kinskey did. He appeared as Russian POW Vladimir Minsk in the show’s pilot. When the show was picked up by CBS, Kinskey bailed. Upon reflection, he thought there was nothing funny about POW camps. He had a long and rich career in both movies and television, and is perhaps best known for his performance in Casablanca.

Finally, Hogan’s Heroes was so successful it fostered a Dell comic book of the same name. The artist on many issues was the co-creator of Spider-Man, Doctor Strange, and many other great comic books.

Yep. Steve Ditko drew Hogan’s Heroes!

Box Office Democracy: The Birth of a Nation

I don’t particularly like movies that are graphic depictions of historical atrocities. I don’t like movies about the Holocaust or particularly gritty war movies or, as in this case, slavery. I don’t have a problem learning about troubling historical periods through nonfiction, but there’s something that feels exploitative about going over human misery so exhaustively. I get that there are probably people learning about these things for the first time any time one of these movies comes out; someone is undoubtedly seeing The Birth of a Nation and only now seeing how brutal slavery was. It feels unendingly elitist to say that this potential educational value is useless, or exceptionally privileged to say that a African-American writer/director shouldn’t tell a historical story of his people’s suffering, but I don’t have to want to watch it.

While I find it unpleasant, there’s a lot of good film-making in here. Nate Parker has a command as a director that belies his relative inexperience. He gets the best performance out of himself, but Aja Naomi King and Armie Hammer are both doing work deserving of high praise. Moreover there are so many small, practically speechless, parts that feature exceptional facial expressions, the kind of subtle things that I don’t associate with novice directors. With the exception of the assault on the armory, which I found confusing and a tad muddled, the shot composition is uniformly excellent. I particularly liked the way they frame the various plantation houses to quickly convey information about the inhabitants; I didn’t realize I knew so much about architecture and maybe I don’t, but Birth of a Nation sort of convinced me I do.

I don’t have the historical background to get in to the accuracy of the movie with any authority at all. I’ve read a few articles about it and rather than attempt to get into detail I will just say that there are a lot of things that happen in the film that have no relation to contemporary accounts. I don’t believe that films have an obligation to be accurate to real life but there are a few choices that damaged the narrative for me a little bit. They got out of their way to show Turner’s master becoming a more cruel man as time goes on and that cruelty inspiring Turner to begin his revolt. This is apparently not backed up by historical fact, and sort of makes the case that it’s this mistreatment that justifies the revolt rather than the general horribleness of slavery. This is the cinematic equivalent of the “most slaves were well-treated and provided with food and shelter” argument you see from gross historical revisionists. Owning another human being is terrible enough to demand retribution without any other extenuating circumstances. The other thing that jumped out at me were the pair of sexual assaults that also seem to be unsupported by the records. At best it feels like taking agency away from female characters and imperiling them to give motivation to the male characters, a practice we should discourage. At worst we could look in to Parker’s past and draw a number of unspeakable conclusions. I wish someone had talked them into cutting this way down.

I’m thrilled that Hollywood is starting to let people of color make movies about their histories of oppression. It’s strongly preferable to the previous policy of letting white people tell everyone’s story for them. I don’t want these opportunities to dry up (but maybe Parker is revealing himself to be a kind-of gross person who should not be benefiting from this) but this isn’t a movie for me. It’s heavy-handed and overwrought and while there are some amazing moments they all feel too isolated to constitute a fulfilling moviegoing experience.

Star Trek’s Jaylah Makeup Techniques Revealed in Video

Star Trek’s Jaylah Makeup Techniques Revealed in Video

stb_bd_oslv_3dJust in time for Halloween, Paramount Home Entertainment has released a video on the makeup effects employed by Star Trek Beyond‘s Makeup Designer Joel Harlow and Lead Makeup Artist Richie Alonzo created for Jaylah. The film is now available via Digital HD and hits disc on November 1.

The Justin Lin-directed feature earned an 84% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes and although it under performed at the box office compared with its preddcessor, Star Trek Into Darkness, thew film was certainly better received by the fans.

Still, the $185 million production earned only $337,896,789 worldwide, probably making it a loss for beleaguered Paramount, which did not have a good summer season. Thanks to licensing and ancillary sales, the film will probably eke out a profit.

A fourth installment, with Chris Hemsworth returning as George Kirk, has already been announced as being in the works although the official green light has yet to be given. At the earliest, it won’t hit theaterrs before 2019, and more likely 2020.

Daredevil Season One Comes to Disc Nov. 18

daredevil-s1Netflix’s acclaimed first season of Daredevil, the first in their Marvel Cinemtic Universe offerings, has been announced as coming to home video on November 8 in a three-dsic set.

SYNOPSIS:

Marvel’s Daredevil follows Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox), attorney by day and vigilante by night. Blinded in an accident as a child, Murdock uses his heightened senses as Daredevil, fighting crime on the streets of New York after the sun goes down. His efforts are not welcomed by powerful businessman Wilson Fisk (Vincent D’Onofrio) and others whose interests collide with those of Daredevil. Though Murdock’s day job portrays a man who believes in the criminal justice system, his alter ego suggests otherwise, as he takes the law into his own hands to protect his Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood and the surrounding communities.

The complete first season of the Netflix Original Series Marvel’s Daredevil  is available to own on Blu-ray™ on Nov. 8. Season 1 of the action-packed drama was recently honored as Best New Media TV Series at the 42nd Annual Saturn Awards hosted by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films. The home release of Season 1 will thrill fans with all 13 episodes.

CAST:

Charlie Cox (Boardwalk Empire) as Matt Murdock/Daredevil; Deborah Ann Woll (True Blood) as Karen Page; Elden Henson (The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2) as Foggy Nelson; Vincent D’Onofrio (The Magnificent Seven) as Wilson Fisk; Rosario Dawson (Marvel’s Luke Cage) as Claire Temple

CREATOR & EXEC. PRODUCER Steven S. DeKnight (Spartacus: War of the Damned)

EXEC. PRODUCERS: Drew Goddard (The Martian), Jeph Loeb (Marvel’s Jessica Jones and Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.)

RELEASE DATE: Nov. 8, 2016

PACKAGING: Blu-ray (13 episodes)

EPISODES:

1. Into The Ring                                    8. Shadows in the Glass

2. Cut Man                                             9. Speak of the Devil

3. Rabbit In A Snowstorm                  10. Nelson v. Murdock

4. In The Blood                                     11. The Path of the Righteous

5. World On Fire                                  12. The Ones We Leave Behind

6. Condemned                                      13. Daredevil

7. Stick

RATING: TV-MA
ASPECT RATIO: 1.78:1
AUDIO: English 5.1 DTS-HDMA
LANGUAGES English SDH

Joe Corallo: Comic Con Narrowly Misses The Point

wonderwomen

This week’s column marks my one-year anniversary of doing this at ComicMix. Though I’m tempted to do a year in review, this past weekend was New York Comic Con so that idea is going to have to be put on hold for at least a week.

I started Thursday morning by getting to the Javits Center around 9:00 am. After going through a few different lines, getting my bag checked, getting my badge scanned, and waiting on another couple of lines, I was in by about 10:15 am. I hit the show floor and did the rounds. At 11:00 am I went to my first panel.

joegeeksoutBody of Evidence: How We See Ourselves in Comics had panelists ranging from librarians, comic creators, a performer and my friend David Baxter, as well as a physician discussing healthy body image in comics as well as touching on disabled representation. Most of the disabled representation revolved around the character of Oracle and a point that fellow ComicMix columnist Martha Thomases has made with me before: while it’s great to have disabled representation, why is it that a woman isn’t able to heal from her exploitive attack in a world where Batman breaks his back and recovers?

While the panel had passionate panelists making interesting points, the panelists were noticeably cis, able bodied, and white or white-passing (David is half Native American). That doesn’t take away from the points they were making, but seeing people of color, trans, and disabled people share their experiences would have been helpful and enlightening. Especially at a convention that ejected Jay Justice, a queer disabled person of color, from a panel because they couldn’t accommodate the scooter she needs to get around.

That panel was far from the only one that suffered from some lack of diversity. Along with fellow ComicMix columnist Molly Jackson, I attended the Wonder Woman 75 panel on Friday. The panel was majority male, and almost exclusively white with the exception of the legendary Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez, who frustratingly talked the least during the panel. And despite Greg Rucka being on the panel, Wonder Woman being confirmed as queer was never mentioned. Perhaps it would have been during a Q&A, but the panel ended early without one. As one of I’m sure many queer people in attendance, saying that was disappointing would be an understatement. You’d think with Wonder Woman being on the cover of this year’s NYCC program for NYCC would have provided some motivation.

That night while waiting in line for another event, I was discussing the Wonder Woman 75 panel with a friend when two people on the line in front of me interjected. They told me how they attended the Queer Culture: LGBT Presence in Pop Culture panel and to their surprise the panel was exclusively cis white men, or at very least white-passing. Beyond that they discussed how that was a similar experience they had at other panels.

young-animalFriday was also the day of the DC’s Young Animal panel, and if you’ve been reading my column over the past year you could probably guess that was on the top of my list of panels to attend. The panelists included creators Gerard Way (Doom Patrol, Cave Carson Has A Cybernetic Eye), Nick Derington (Doom Patrol), Jody Houser (Mother Panic), and Marley Zarcone (Shade, the Changing Girl). This particular panel was packed and had a very enthusiastic crowd. Fans of Gerard Way hung onto his every word as he talked about how the Young Animal imprint came to be and gave previews of the books to come. They even handed out a cassette (you read that right) with a new song of his. The highlight for me was during the Q&A when someone asked about queer representation and Gerard discussed how he has been talking with Rachel Pollack about her run and Coagula in particular and bringing her back. When he had mentioned how Coagula was a trans superhero the packed panel room cheered. This goes to show how starved people are for trans representation and further pushes the point I and others have been making for some time now; reprint Rachel Pollack’s run on Doom Patrol.

While I did enjoy the DC’s Young Animal panel quite a bit, it was again an all cis white panel. For this particular panel, similar to the Wonder Woman panel, it was because of the creators that were available or asked. The only way to have more diverse panels is to have more diverse creators.

And they shouldn’t be limited to diversity specific panels. The goal of those panels is to raise awareness. The idea is for panels on diversity to be a starting point of a conversation, not the ending point. We can see that with panels like Marvel: 50 Years of Black Panther featuring different creative minds behind the character, as well as the panel on Luke Cage. When you have people of color working on comics, they get to be on the panels to discuss them. We desperately need more of that not just because it’s right, but to ensure a future for comics.

The future of comics does not encompass the same demographics as before. Women, people of color, queer people, disabled people, and people that cover more than one or all of the above are reading comics. They want representation, and they want a seat at the table. That’s not to say they never read comics before, but many didn’t because they didn’t see people that looked like them or they didn’t tell stories that were in any way relatable. Straight cis white guy with superpowers trying to get the girl doesn’t really speak directly to the experiences of many of the groups I mentioned even in metaphor. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve talked to in recent years who finally got into comics through small publishers and webcomics finally representing people like them because they honestly didn’t believe comics as a medium represented them.

new-york-comic-con-nycc-2016-featured-imageBefore I left NYCC on Saturday I got to be a guest at the Geeks OUT! Booth selling copies of my new comic as well as signing copies of their anthology I had been in last year. In the couple of hours I was at the booth, people of all different backgrounds came over and gushed over the items they were selling, like a t-shirt saying “Strong Female Character.” Many also stopped to take a preferred pronoun sticker from the table. They’d ask if they were free, and many asked if it would be okay to take an extra one for a friend. People were thrilled that a group like Geeks OUT! Was considerate enough to create stickers like these for everyone.

As comics fandom is becoming more mainstream and more diverse, comics need to keep up with these changes. NYCC 2016 is a good example of some efforts to keep up with those changes… but not getting there quite yet.

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