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Interview: Steven Moffat – No Sheets for Companions

In a recent interview with Steven Moffat, I had the opportunity to discuss The Doctor’s companions with him.  He shared his opinions on whether or not we always need to have a dramatic departure for his friends, and whether or not we couldn’t see a more polite and happy departure where his friend says “Thanks for the fun, I’m off to buy new sheets now”. His response was rather emphatic:

“Yes that would be the least talked about moment in television history wouldn’t it? I mean really if you did a scene ‘I’m going to buy some sheets now,’ no one is ever going to write a fan letter about that one. So no, we’re not going to do that”.

He also called foul on the popular thought about The Doctor’s companions always ending up worse for the wear.  “I mean, that’s not true about all the Doctor’s companions. It’s maybe what the Doctor thinks in his darker moments and when he’s dying in “Let’s Kill Hitler.” He worries that he might’ve done them terrible harm.  But Rose is off in a parallel universe. She’ll be with her – with a human version of the Doctor. She’s fine. Martha learns to stand up for herself and got over her crush on the Doctor and she soars off. Yes Donna has a more miserable thing. But she doesn’t know she’s miserable. She ends up actually quite happy and married to a good bloke. Rory and Amy are perfectly happy in New York. They’re dead, but, you know, everyone from that year is dead so that’s all right. They lived to a ripe old age and had a lovely time.

“The Doctor – so he’s not – they all don’t leave under terrible circumstances at all. I think the tragedy when Amy and Rory went was the Doctor lost them not – and that in the end they, you know, of course that, you know, Amy would choose Rory over the Doctor in a heartbeat. And he actually had some trouble quite dealing with that.   But the fact is, no he doesn’t ruin their lives. He can induce a certain amount of trauma, it must be said. But no they’re not all destroyed by any means. And no, every time, every time the Doctor loses a regular character from this show it will happen in a moment that makes people talk. Because the episode that you described no one would talk about that. That wouldn’t be thrilling.

“If a friendship is severed for good or for bad reasons, that’s a big moment in your life. And if you walk away from a great friend but then you’re not crying a little then you’ve not been reading the memos frankly. You’ve not been paying attention. So, no, Doctor Who will not take the un-dramatic path because we’d like to stay on television and popular.”

So far in the new series, all the Companions have been from modern day Britain.  That wasn’t always the case in the old series. You’ve got Leela. You’ve got Dodo. You’ve got folks from different places, different times. Still human looking so you save money on the makeup. But how likely or how perhaps harder or different to write is it to write for a companion that isn’t just from modern day Earth?

“Well if we found that difficult,” he replied, “then we’d have tremendous difficulty writing the main character wouldn’t we? It’s not a question of whether it is difficult to do or not. It’s a question of whether it’s the right thing to do or not. Now in fact, the old series doesn’t do a hell of a lot of it. If you looked at the vast majority of the companions come from contemporary era. Even the ones who don’t come from contemporary era are pretty much normalized ones like with Jamie and Victoria. Then it’s hardly any time at all before Victoria is wearing short skirts. No Victorian would actually do that. You know, so the problem is – and I don’t say it’s an unsolvable problem, but the majority solution will always be a contemporary companion. But the problem is you need an anchoring point for the audience. You need someone who represents their world and their point of view. And the simplest, purest and best answer to that is somebody from their world.

“Now somebody who’s watched Doctor Who for an unseasonably long time like I have, like possibly you have, I don’t know, might get bored of that and say ‘I wish it was, you know, a two headed alien from the planet Prang’. The new audience don’t think that. They want an anchoring point on that mysterious alien the Doctor. Doesn’t mean we’ll always do it this way. But the reality is it’s always going to be somebody from contemporary era or somebody who ends up being very like somebody from contemporary era.

“I think it was great – the one that broke the mold really I would argue was Leela. We actually went for somebody who was quite different. I would sort of say that Jamie and Victoria ended up – when I was a kid watching I wasn’t particularly aware that they were historical characters. And I do remember watching them. And Romana just came across as, you know, in the end like a very, very clever young woman. She wasn’t that different from Liz Shaw. It’s going to be – it’s going to be the relatable half of the partnership. Keep in mind Doctor Who has to not just appeal to sci-fi fans, it has to appeal to a huge mainstream audience who dwarf the sci-fi audience. You sort of need that way in for them. Having said that, you know, who knows maybe there’ll be a robot dog next. I don’t know.”

One thing that has changed about the companions in the new series is we’ve seen much more about their family lives.  Time was they’d be whisked away and dropped off with nary a word about who they left behind, save for the odd joke about a maiden aunt of perhaps a pot on the stove.  Clara doesn’t even travel with The Doctor full time.  Is that the “New Normal” as Peter Pachal from Mashable asked, or will we see a more traditional companion relationship in the future?

“Well, I mean there’s never going to be a ‘new normal’. Everybody who comes aboard the TARDIS will have a different story and do it a different way. You know, it’s not a dictate of any kind it’s just – Clara’s personality did not suit the idea of simply abandoning everything else she does and running off with the Doctor. I mean you wouldn’t believe it if I wrote that scene. Yes I’ll just go move into the TARDIS with you and I’ll keep in the spare room and you tell me where to go and you drive. That’s just – Clara’s never going to do that in a million years, just wouldn’t.

“But Amy the night before her wedding, all anxious about whether she’s getting married too young. She can run away from awhile. But once she gets married of course she’ll do that. I think you’ve got to look at the Doctor as somebody who’s got a fantastic car that likes to take you for a spin now and then. That doesn’t mean you move in.  Now Rose was in a very different place, wasn’t she? She lived in a council estate. She didn’t like her job. She had a vexed relationship with her mother. She had a, you know, she had a boyfriend she wasn’t sure of. She ran away because that was right for her character. It’s purely whether or not you want to run away. And whether or not you might need the idea that you might be number two in this particular relationship.

“Clara is never going to – from the first moment you meet her she’s never going to be somebody who thinks that they live in the spare room while his nibs drives the TARDIS. That’s just not what she’s like.

“Doesn’t mean that the next one won’t be like that. Who knows?”

 

Marc Alan Fishman: The Mystery of Crowdfunding

First thing is first: I hope you had a most festive holiday – be it Chanukah, Christmas, Festivus, Kwanza, or the Winter Solstice. Second thing is second (geez, now I sound like a Katie Cook Facebook post…): I’m truly perplexed over crowdfunding these days.

Recently I’ve backed a pair of Michigan-based Kickstarter campaigns that were right up my alley. The first was for a table at the upcoming Detroit Fanfare  comic book and pop culture convention. Unshaven Comics has attended this show several times, and we’re big fans. The show-runners are nice, honest, and bring a solid block of comic-focused attendees every year. But, as it would seem, their show is under some kind of duress. With a shorter runway then I’ve been privy to seeing prior, they launched a campaign seeking $10,000. The rewards range from tickets to the show for attendees (with optional collectible artwork, etc.), tables for creators, and then tables for vendors. As of my writing of this article, they are still about $4,000 shy of reaching their goal, with less than a week to go.

Note: Right prior to Christmas, the managing team behind Fanfare closed down their Kickstarter campaign. With only a few days to go, and thousands away from reaching their goal… they opted to simply end things, sadly.

The second project, The Luminous Firefly is a little indie book being put out some passionate fans-turned-creators. The fact that the creative team behind the book – Rapid Fire Entertainment – are big supporters of Unshaven Comics made my backing a no-brainer. Their concept is pretty straight forward, straight out of the Stan Lee-meets-Milestone playbook. They’ve spent considerable time and effort perfecting a memorable costume for their titular hero. Suffice to say, for what little they were seeking from the campaign – $2,000 – I figured supporting them would be a no-brainer. For such a little amount being sought after, all things considered, I’m apt to join the rank and file of those who support the arts and artists who are trying to succeed and do so modestly. Sadly, they too are not close to completion of their goal. With about two weeks left, they are still shy upwards of $1500.

What has me confused, to a point, is how crowdfunding seems easy-peasy one minute, and dreadfully impossible the next. In the day and age where a person selling potato salad can see over 6,000 backers, and a check upwards of $50,000 – all when the initial project was literally meant as a joke… and legit creators and passionate artisans can’t scratch the surface with actual projects? It’s enough to cross the eyes of any Gen Xer (or am I a millennial?).

As a point of reference, my own brother-from-another-mother, Kyle Gnepper, is set to launch his own campaign for an upcoming project. He was all set to go, and then opted to wait until the new year – citing several sources that proved December crowd-sourced projects are less-likely to succeed due to people using their disposable income on holiday related purchases. Obviously, come January, we’ll see how good that knowledge is. Even more obviously, I’ll be likely to pimp Kyle’s project to see his success. But I digress. Actually kiddos, I don’t!

You see, that to me is exactly where I was headed when this piece began. Crowdfunding in the modern era (as opposed to what era, I don’t know) is really just an ongoing marketing experiment. How one chooses to shape their projects – from the goal amount, to the backer prizes, all the way through to the day-to-day promotion of the campaign – all becomes a massive undertaking that literally makes or breaks a creator’s livelihood.

I did my due-diligence and took Wesley Sun (a multiple Kickstarter funded creator) out to a nice dinner to pick his brain. Over sumptuous Chinese food, Wes was quick to point out all the common sense tactics I myself largely considered must be par for the course these days. Creating a pre-launch marketing plan. Building backer prize packs that are both affordable, and often built to up-sell to the next price point. Setting a goal that isn’t insurmountable, but does absolutely cover the costs necessary to complete the project… and to shamelessly promote it as if your life depended on it.

Of course, when one does all of these things and one still comes up short? That leads to sobering conclusions. Especially when Wes’s biggest successes came in part to being promoted by Kickstarter itself, in “picks of the week” e-mail blasts. How one gets on said blasts? To quote Two-Face from the absurd comedy that was Batman Forever: “Blind, stupid, doo-dah lllllllluck.”

Crowdfunding largely remains a mystery in my mind. How success can be earned versus hitting the lottery is seemingly becoming a business unto itself. A new marketplace of analysts and marketers sprout up weekly boasting their ability to turn your campaign into a success. And my initial reaction to most of their pitches is akin to those attempting to sell me diets and exercise equipment at two or three in the morning: I don’t buy it, even if it sells me in my most desperate of moments. Seeing my Motor City cohorts grasping at air in the dead of December only compounds the feeling. Because at the end of the day, how often do people put aside money they don’t have to launch a successful crowd-funding campaign in the first place? The old adage of spending money to make money seems oddly inappropriate given the very nature of crowd-funding. But I could be wrong.

At the end of the day, the best chance one has at succeeding at crowd-funding is inherently tied to the ability to reach out in every possible direction with as succinct a pitch as possible. Much like selling at a comic-con, I’m apt to believe that creators only have 30 seconds to really grab someone by the brainstem, and make them pay attention. After that, they have minutes at most to then convince the would-be backer that they create a worthy product, can deliver said product on-time, and with proper quality for the price asked.

Beyond that, the project has to feel like it’s something someone won’t get otherwise. In few other cases could I say that part of what must make a crowd-funded campaign successful is the je ne sais quoi of the project itself. And even having to type that confounds me. I’m open to you, my faithful friends and readers… what your take is on all of this.

And in the mean time, I’m going to dump some potato salad down the garbage as a precaution.

 

The Law Is A Ass

BOB INGERSOLL: THE LAW IS A ASS #338: SHE-HULK IS TRYING MY PATIENCE

she-hulk_vol_3_9_textless-7490561I guess it’s just an occupational hazard with the lawyering game; assuming your clients are lying to you. Lord knows, I was guilty of it enough times. Of course, it’s easy to do that, when your initial conversations go something like this.

“I didn’t burgle that house, Mr. Ingersoll.”

“The police found your fingerprints in the house.”

“The police planted my fingerprints there.”

“The police found you in the house.”

“The police planted me there.”

Okay, that was a slight exaggeration. My clients don’t actually know the difference between burgle and rob. But you get the idea.

So, as I said, it’s an occupational hazard. And it affects all of us. Even Jennifer (She-Hulk) Walters. Even when her client is Captain America.

So, if you guessed today’s column is about Part 3 of “The Good Old Days,” from She-Hulk v.3 #10, you’re right. Now as this was part three of a three-part story, let’s get you up to speed.

In 1940, Harold Fogler left his home in Brooklyn and went out to Los Angeles http://www.discoverlosangeles.com to make his mark. He failed like a wino with bad bourbon. Largely because he hooked up with some “bad people,” who were planning to cause a riot on the Los Angeles docks. Harold’s younger brother, Sam, and a pre-Captain America Steve Rogers came out to LA looking for Harold. They found him. But the bad people found them.

The bad people ordered Harold to shoot Sam and Steve. Harold refused. Then Steve started telling the bad people how weak and cowardly they were. According to Harold, the leader of the bad people told Steve if he didn’t shut up, he’d kill Sam. Steve didn’t shut up. The leader killed Sam.

Seventy-four years later, Harold Fogler related this story for the first time while on his death bed. Then Harold’s heirs sued Captain America claiming that Cap wrongfully caused the death of their uncle Sam when he didn’t stop talking. Jennifer Walters represented Cap and Matt (Daredevil) Murdock represented the Foglers.

Matt introduced Harold’s deathbed statement as his main evidence. He also called Cap to the stand. Cap admitted that everything Harold said was true. And with that the plaintiffs rested their case. (And promptly lost, by the way, because the plaintiffs never introduced any evidence covering what damages Sam’s death caused his great-grandnewphews, so the jury couldn’t award them any money. But that’s another matter.)

Jennifer cross-examined Cap who told the jury his side of the story. It was basically the same as Harold’s side but it added two important things that Harold left out. First, the “bad people” were Nazi saboteurs and American fifth columnists working with the Nazis. Second, the leader didn’t threaten to kill Sam. He said, “Stop talking or someone will die.” Steve didn’t stop talking and the leader told Steve, “I should kill you.” But he didn’t want to kill Steve. He regarded Steve as weak and wanted Steve to marry and have kids so as to infect his country with his weakling genes. So the leader killed the “strong one,” Sam.

And there’s the difference: in Cap’s account, the leader didn’t threaten to kill Sam, he threatened to kill someone. Steve thought the leader was going to kill him, so didn’t know his talking would cause Sam’s death. That being the case, Steve didn’t act negligently in continuing to talk, so didn’t wrongfully cause Sam’s death.

The case became what, I used to call a swearing match when I was lawyering. No, I don’t mean the witnesses got on the stand and started cussing; although that happened often enough. No, it means one side’s witnesses testify and swear the events happened one way. The other side’s witnesses testify and swear they happened another way. Then it was up to the jury to decide which side’s swearing it believes.

She-Hulk was worried about the case. Steve couldn’t verify his version with any records because the matter had been classified. I think She-Hulk was over-thinking the case and worrying for nothing. Personally, I think it could have been the shortest closing argument in history. “Hey, jury, you have two versions of the story. One from a fifth columnist Nazi saboteur and terrorist, the other from Captain America. Who are you going to believe?” But She-Hulk worried. Probably because, lawyers believe their clients are lying, and she feared the jury would too.

Cap had anticipated She-Hulk’s doubts. But he needed She-Hulk to believe in his veracity, so that she could convince the jury of his veracity. So he had She-Hulk’s investigator, Hellcat, break into a government facility and steal the classified documents. He gave them to She-Hulk to prove he was telling the truth. But he told She-Hulk she couldn’t use the documents in trial.

Let me get this straight. Cap had no problem with Hellcat breaking into a government facility and stealing classified documents, but had qualms about introducing them in court? Hey, Cap, I have a suggestion for you. Should this happen again, call your contacts at S.H.I.E.L.D. or the White House and have them declassify the documents. They were seventy-four years old, for crying out loud, and had only been classified because back in the 40s, the government didn’t want the American people to know that “Nazis were working on U.S. soil.” Seventy-four years later, the government wouldn’t even care about this secret anymore. They would have declassified the documents for you in a second. Then you could have used them at the trial.

Anyway, armed with her new-found confidence in Cap’s veracity, She-Hulk gave an impassioned and convincing – because she was convinced herself – closing argument. She said exactly what I said in my version of the closing argument. Only longer. And the result was …

Actually, I don’t know the outcome of the case. Right as the forewoman of the jury was saying “We find the defendant…” the story cut to a new scene. I can’t tell you whether the jury found the defendant guilty or not guilty. Which is good. That way I don’t have to issue a spoiler warning.

So, I can’t tell you what the jury decided. I can, however, tell you this; despite what the forewoman started to say, the jury didn’t find the defendant either guilty or not guilty. This was a civil trial, remember. Juries don’t find defendants guilty or not guilty in civil cases. They either find for the plaintiff or find the defendant. But guilt doesn’t enter into their deliberations.

One little follow up and for this I do have to issue a

SPOILER WARNING!

Cap deduced that someone was behind this plot against him. Someone who wanted to discredit Cap and tarnish his reputation. Someone who convinced Harold to come forward after all this time, then convinced Harold’s heirs to sue Captain America, and leaked other evidence in the case. That someone was Dr. Faustus. So Cap, She-Hulk, and Daredevil fought their way past Dr. Faustus’s guards and into Dr. Faustus’s hideout, where Cap punched out Faustus cold.

Which created a whole new problem for She-Hulk. Cause when Dr. Faustus sues Cap for assault and She-Hulk represents him, if Cap denies his involvement, she won’t just assume he’s lying, she’ll know.

New Who Review – “Last Christmas”

This day has been an emotional rollercoaster.

The facts and details of the Christmas episode have been kept strictly secret, and for good reason.  Rumors flew that Jenna Coleman was leaving the series just as the new season was a-borning, and her go-to answer for the events of the special was “If you know if I’m staying with the series, it’ll ruin the ending”.  A spectacularly surprising cameo, a hilarious guest star, and a plot that keeps unfolding like a fried onion makes for a ripping yarn for the holiday.  But for most of the year, we were never sure or not if this was to be Clara’s…

LAST CHRISTMAS
By  Steven Moffat
Directed by Paul Wilmshurst

Clara and The Doctor team up again after Santa crashes on her roof. You heard me – Sweet Papa Chrimbo himself appears atop Clara’s home, and before any sense can be made of that, The Doctor reappears and snatches her away.  They arrive at a mysterious science base where the scientists are combating Dream Crabs, an alien species that lull their victims into a peaceful dream-state while they quietly eat their brains.  Clara is attacked by one, and “awakens” at home on Christmas morning, met by Danny Pink, inexplicably hale and hearty.  It’s only when she properly awakens does she, The Doctor, and the scientists realize that they may well be all still asleep.  Oh, and Santa Claus keeps appearing to help.

Moffat took full advantage of the rumors surrounding Jenna Coleman’s status on the show to deliver a series of heart-gripping false moves that left the viewer exhausted, but fully entertained.  Moffat has always been good at creating characters that you immediately feel for, and this is no exception.  Even when it’s eventually revealed that we actually knew nothing about the people, we’re happy to see them survive.

THE MONSTER FILES –  The Dream Crabs are based on a very common concept, the idea of dreams being used to cloak a slow death.  Comics fans will likely already thought of the Alan Moore story For the Man Who Has Everything, which featured Mongul using an alien plant called a Black Mercy to place Superman in a dream state where he believes he had grown up on Krypton with his loving family.  It was even adapted into an episode of Justice League Unlimited, adapted by J. M. DeMatteis.

Fans of Red Dwarf will also recall the despair squid, a being that takes the opposite tack – inducing dreams to make its victims despair, causing them to take their own lives in the dream.  The female of said species follows more the standard trope, causing a happy dream from which the victim(s) from which would be loath to awaken. The Dream Lord tried the same thing in Amy’s Choice –  Heck, you could even argue that the Master’s plan with the Nethersphere was the same scheme – a artificial reality to keep the victims placated and off-balance until they were needed.  Moffat takes a page from Inception as well, folding in the idea of multi-layered dreams, resulting in never being sure if they were truly awake.

GUEST STAR REPORT –

Nick Frost (Santa) is best know in the US for his frequent collaborations with fellow Who-lumnus Simon Pegg and director Edgar Wright.  But he’s got a long list of solo projects in the UK as well.  He starred in the Sci-Fi comedy Hyperdrive, which also starred Kevin Eldon and the delightful and huge Miranda Hart. He hosted a mock “worst case scenario” style show called DANGER! 50,000 Volts! and worked with Daisy Haggard (Sophie from The Lodger and Closing Time) on the sketch show Man Stroke Woman.

Michael Troughton (Professor Albert) is the son of Patrick Troughton, the second Doctor.  He has quite a respectable acting career in his own right, including a regular role on Rik Mayall’s The New Statesman.  He took several years off from acting to care for his ailing wife, who passed away recently.  This episode is the second acting role he’s taken in his return to the boards.  He and his father are far from the only actors in the family. His brother David played King Peladon in the classic series Pertwee adventure The Monster of Peladon, and Professor Hobbs in Tennant’s Midnight. His nephew, Harry Melling, played Dudley Dursley in the Harry Potter films.

Dan Starkey (Ian) is well known to Who-fen as Strax the Sontaran, not to mention practically every Sontaran to appear in the last few years of the show.  They chose to have him play an elf in this episode because as Moffat explains in a recent interview, “we thought it would be nice for him not to have to wear so much rubber. And I’m talking about his professional rubber not his personal life”.  

Natalie Gumede (Ashley Carter) is known in England for an extended run on Coronation Street, and is currently starring in a web comedy called Sally the Life Coach. Her biggest mass media appearance was a tie for second-place showing in Strictly Come Dancing, the original British version of what came over here as Dancing with the Stars.

BACKGROUND BITS AND BOBS –

SHOULD I STAY OR SHOULD I GO – Apparently Jenna Coleman did initially plan to leave the show at the end of the season – the original ending of the special was for Clara to really be 80-odd years old, and would die in bed after a long-awaited reunion with The Doctor.  She had a change of heart (much like Clara did mid-season) and the ending was hastily amended.  It’s one of the few times where “it was all a dream” was a perfectly logical progression of the story, and not merely a desperate hat-pull.

dwnobody-300x219-2059186SET PIECES – The unnamed planet upon which The Doctor was attacked by the Dream Crabs looked remarkably similar to the planet that Clara attempted to threaten him into saving Danny in Death in Heaven.  That that version of that world was also only a dream only makes it more fitting that the same set be used again when it isn’t…IF it isn’t/

“It’s time to start living in the real world” – It’s always fun when one of the first things said in an episode turns out to be the solution all along, and you never notice. See also Clara’s line shortly after re-entering the TARDIS, “This is real, yeah?”

“Clara Oswald…mostly favors travel books” – When we first meet (this) Clara in The Bells of St. John, her room is filled with travel books, starting with the one she got from her mom.

“Don’t think about them…don’t look at them” – Once again, Moffat takes a commonplace thing and makes it scary.  The old joke “try not to think about a tap-dancing elephant” comes to mind here – it’s almost impossible NOT to think of something once it’s been brought to your attention.  Trying to keep your mind blank was also touched on in Time Heist as well as a way to stay clear of The Teller.

“They can only see you if you see them” – The idea of a being that hacks into your senses to get a look at where they are is a neat idea, but I couldn’t keep from thinking of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal, “a mind-bogglingly stupid beast; it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you” from Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

“Three hundred and four minus seventeen” – The Doctor would often start asking his Companion maths questions as a method of getting them to concentrate, and keep from being distracted by the wild situations they were in.  He once asked Sarah Jane Smith to recite the alphabet backwards.

“It’s Christmas Eve ; early to bed” – Santa speaks to the Sleepers like children, a trick that that worked very well for The Doctor in The Doctor Dances, written by…Steven Moffat!

“It’s a long story” is right up there with “I’ll explain later” as a standard hand-wave to get past having to provide a large amount of exposition to cover a point that really doesn’t need explaining.  Moffat simply uses the cliché as an actual plot point, confounding expectations.

“That’s a bit rude, coming from a magician” – Moffat does love his callbacks.  That’s a reference from Time Heist, where The Doctor says his new look “was trying for minimalist, but ended up with magician”.

“They’re a bit like face-huggers, aren’t they?” – Professor Albert points out the similarity to the egg-laying form of the Xenomorph from Alien, but did you notice that when Shona awakens at home, one of the things on her Christmas To Do list was to watch not only Alien, but The Thing from Another World?

“Four manuals” – In yet another example of the “dream trap” genre, Batman is trapped in an electronic dream by the Mad Hatter in Perchance to Dream.  Books play a role in his realization of his predicament – Dreams are generated in another part of the brain than the ability to read, so when Bruce opens a book, it’s filled with illegible gibberish.

dwfeels1-300x336-5092624“Time travel is always possible…in dreams” – It’s the method Madame Vastra used to have a quorum across several centuries, with one person that was already dead, albeit electronically saved, in The Name of the Doctor.

“About sixty-two years” – The Doctor has shown up late for more than a few of his friends.  He was too late to see the Madame du Pompadour in The Girl in the Fireplace and he missed The Brigadier.

“I travelled” – This may be the closest we’ll see to a clean break between The Doctor and Clara, and it’s a good look at how being a Companion changes people. After only dreaming about seeing the world as a younger girl, she up and did it in this dream-version of her time after The Doctor.

Also note that When The Doctor has to help Clara pop the cracker, it’s a mirror of Clara having to help her Grandmother pop the poem-filled cracker in The Time of the Doctor.

NEXT TIME ON DOCTOR WHO – This is a very unique scenario, in that we actually DO know what’s up next time.  If only to drive home the fact that Clara (and through her, Ms. Coleman) was staying, they’ve actually given us the title of next season’s first episode – The Magician’s Apprentice. Whether that’s yet another reference to The Doctor’s new look is something we can only guess.

Jenna Coleman has been confirmed for the full series, and Peter Capaldi for the next two, so we’re in a position where we don’t have to worry about anyone leaving for at least a little while. But I must admit, as well as Jenna and Peter work together, I don’t know if the ending of Death in Heaven wasn’t the right “out”. A bittersweet ending that left both characters sad at their parting, but both feeling that they’d done something good for the other, to let them move on with their lives. Much as with  Amy and Rory’s first farewell at the end of The God Complex, everybody lives.  But Steven had to bring them back that last half-season and give them a more dramatic and sad finish (for The Doctor, anyway), not to mention more final departure.  Not to mention that to a degree, Clara has lost a bit of her independence – the overly emotional realization of how much she’s missed the sound of the TARDIS, and yet another overly sappy statement of what she thinks of The Doctor.

When we call back to the description of wanting to keep traveling as an “addiction” – even though she was allegedly asking it about The Doctor, it’s clearly a question that could be asked to, and about Clara.  I can but hope that come the end of next series, we aren’t debating whether Clara overstayed her welcome.

Martha Thomases: And Today’s Holiday Is…

Today is Boxing Day. According to Wikipedia “Boxing Day is a holiday traditionally celebrated the day following Christmas Day, when servants and tradespeople would receive gifts, known as a ‘Christmas box’ from their bosses or employers… in the United Kingdom, Canada, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, Kenya, South Africa, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica and other Commonwealth nations, as well as Norway, the Netherlands and Sweden.”

Which is, as the British say, bollocks. With no history or evidence whatsoever, I consider Boxing Day to be the holiday in which we put all our unwanted gifts into a box they came in and return them to the , store for something we want. And since that works better as a premise for this column, that’s what I’m going with.

Here are some trends from 2014 popular culture that I would like to see returned and exchanged for something better:

  • The new Wonder Woman team. I don’t know anything about the strategy that involves putting a married couple to work on the same book at the same time. Perhaps the editors thought everything would flow more smoothly if the writer and artist were in the same house. However, in the case of Meredith and David Finch, I think they made a poor choice. Finch’s art is too reminiscent of the kind of T&A that passes for story-telling these days, and Meredith’s words and plots don’t help any. I don’t think I would enjoy their characterizations of any super-heroines, but certainly not Wonder Woman. She is supposed to be strong and independent and a peaceful warrior, not armored eye candy.
  • Making trilogies into four parts. I understand that movie studios want to get every last penny they can from the ticket-buying public (and, later, the video-on-demand buying public and the DVD buying public). I understand that lots of people get jobs from making an extra movie. Unfortunately, they don’t take the epic and re-divide it into four parts. They take the first two parts, then split the third in two. The first part of the third book ends on a cliff-hanger and is not in the least bit satisfying. That’s not how story structure works.
  • Incompatible media. I’m old enough to remember the conflict between Beta and VHS. More recently, I remember the conflict between Blu-Ray and HD. It was incredibly aggravating and stressful to want new technology, but to also know that picking the wrong format would cost thousands of dollars.

The problem this year is not the machines, but the purveyors. I enjoy lots of streaming services, especially Netflix and Amazon Prime. Unfortunately, my Apple TV won’t let me watch the latter on the big TV in my living room. I could buy the plug-in that Amazon makes, but that way lies madness. I don’t want a bunch of little plastic devices sticking out of my television set. I want one that lets me access whatever I want.

  • Intolerant fan bases. I never thought I would live to see the day when my beloved comic books would be an important part of the popular culture. Not only do they inspire movies and television shows that win awards and top the ratings charts, but they earn spots on top-ten lists. It’s really great. People I know from the non-comics parts of my life read graphic novels now.

Unfortunately, not everyone is happy to see nerd culture in general, and comics in particular, become popular. Gamergate is still an issue. Women at comic conventions still get hassled, especially (but not only) if they are cosplayers. Twenty years ago, when a bunch of us started Friends of Lulu, we were harassed by those who were threatened by our involvement in the industry>.

I think the reactionary voices are louder now than they have been because they are on the way out. I think the capitalist glee at the new customer dollars will eventually overcome the boys club (and the white club, and the straight club and the Christian club etc. etc. etc.).

Here’s wishing you more and better in 2015.

 

Tweeks: Christmas at the Movies with the Family

night-at-the-museum-3-2014-8231753Merry Christmas ComicMixers! After the presents have all been opened, dinners been eaten, and we’ve set the TiVo to record Doctor Who, we like to wrap up our Tweeks Christmas with a trip to the movies with our family. Sadly (and, well, we think weirdly) there are very few family friendly movies out in the theatres this holiday season (unless you’ve been under a rock & haven’t seen Big Hero 6 and Penguins of Madagascar — which in that case, go watch our reviews & go see those pronto!) In this week’s episode, we break down the family-friendly films you can see over Winter Break: The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb, Annie,  and Into The Woods.

Dennis O’Neil: The Big Christmas Movie

So here we are again, doing our annual dance with me on one side of the time gap and you on the other. For me, Christmas, 2014, is yet to occur – heck, I haven’t even seen Christmas eve yet – and you’re reading this on Christmas morning, at the earliest. Maybe you’ve gotten the big feast and the accompanying burps out of the way and you’re in the family room with the relatives watching the game (there’s always a game) or sulking in your room because you didn’t get the loot you were hoping for and you did get something you won’t take out of the box… Cripes, you haven’t worn spats in years. Or maybe you’re alone in a motel room wondering what skewed the universe.

What you probably aren’t doing is sitting in a theater watching one of the holiday offerings titled The Interview, starring those laughmeisters James Franco and Seth Rogen. By now, you know the story: someone did a monstermother of a computer hack on the Sony cyber equipment, saw the film, threatened unspecified acts of terror if it gets shown, anywhere, anytime.

It all seems to make cinema’s new best friends, the superheroes, as obsolete as Santa’s sleigh. It’s likely that you’ve seen a superhero flick or two, if you watch movies at all, because there are a lot of them out there. And there are a lot more to come – 30 in various stages of production for release over the next five years.

They’re kind of quaint. A villain menaces the common good, the hero responds, has problems, and then does some major league supering and the malefactor is vanquished and tranquility is restored, at least until the sequel. That, or some iteration of that, is usually the plot. Not always: for example, The Dark Knight was an exception. But usually.

Visible menace. Understandable problem. And victory by application of superior force. Satisfying entertainment because it absorbs us without straining our mental resources and pushes some emotional buttons. And the super feats are fun to watch. Good way to hide from your personal woes for an afternoon. I’ve seen most of these movies and I’ll see more and I’ll probably be satisfied when I do.

But with each passing year, they have less and less relation to real life, even metaphorically.. Who knows what’s in Kim Jung Un’s mind? Whatever it is, he isn’t trumpeting it in the media. Who knows who’s even a member of ISIS? Who could have guessed that persons unknown would attack the U.S. economy through an amusement owned by a Japanese corporation? The lines are rapidly blurring and the modern brand of treachery can’t be overcome by punches. Or bombs.

I wish our noble politicians would learn that, or at least be aware that there might be something to learn.

Meanwhile, we have the superheroes and, by golly, they are entertaining and at the end of the day, that’s all they have to be.

I wish you light and warmth.

(EDITOR’S NOTE: Since Denny submitted this column, Sony Pictures has changed their mind and allowed showings in some 200 theaters – possibly one near you. It’s also rentable and purchaseable through You Tube and other online streaming services. For the record, we will note that the major theater chains which refused to show The Interview continue to hold to that position.)

 

 

 

 

Mike Gold: Norm Breyfogle Needs Your Help – Now!

We are a community. We are fans, enthusiasts, historians, role players and practitioners of one of America’s true native art forms… and a member of our community needs a helping hand.

norm-breyfogle-5601604Over these many years, most of us here at ComicMix have worked with Norm Breyfogle. He’s best known for his work on Batman, although (since this is my column today) my favorite of his work was on Eclipse Comics’ Prime. He also co-created the award-winning Archie: The Married Life with our pal Michael Uslan and has tons of credits as an A-list comics artist.

Norm suffered a major stroke. He’s still with us, thankfully, but he’s paralyzed on his left side – of course, he’s left-handed. Norm spent a week in intensive care, which tapped out his savings, and he’s got months ahead of him in a nursing home getting physical therapy. It’s too early to tell if he’ll ever be able to draw again; my guess is, right now he’d settle for being able to walk again.

Like a great many comics freelancers, Norm had no insurance. I won’t get into the comics industry politics behind that; this isn’t the time for that. But needing insurance and being able to afford it are two different things, and I know from personal experience that for a guy Norm’s age – he’s 54 – adequate health insurance can run over fifteen grand a year, and that doesn’t count pre-existing conditions and that assumes your health record doesn’t make coverage impossible no matter what the price. I won’t get into the health care politics at this time either.

So I am asking you to help a good guy out. Yes, there are a lot of comics people who have found themselves in this position, and I know nobody wants to play pick-and-choose under such circumstances. You’ve got to take it one person at a time, one day at a time.

There’s a website called YouCaring.com that helps raise money online for people in Norm’s unfortunate situation. They’re trying to raise $200,000; as of this writing (Tuesday night), they’ve raised $26,000. That’s a good start. But if you’ve got an extra ten or twenty bucks, right now this would be the perfect home. The link is http://www.youcaring.com/medical-fundraiser/legendary-batman-artist-norm-breyfogle-stroke-fund/281723; click on it and do a solid for a real good guy. And tell your friends.

Please don’t look at this as a guilt-trip. Lots of folks have the desire to help but not the financial wherewithal. And, of course, tomorrow is Christmas and with gifts, family functions, office parties and the like we’re all kind of tapped out. But if you’ve got something – anything – to help Norm out, please give it a thought.

 

 

REVIEW: Nnewts Book One: Escape from the Lizzarks

Nnewts Book One: Escape from the Lizzarks
By Doug TenNapel
186 pages, Scholastic Graphix, $19.99 (hc)/$10.99 (pb)

nnewts-206x300There is no doubt Doug TenNapel is a highly imaginative and creative storyteller. I look forward to the day when he works with an editor to bring out the very best in his worldbuilding and stories. After a series of one-off stories, including Cardboard, Tommysaurus Rex, Ghostopolis, and Bad Island, he embarks on a series set in a new reality.

In Nnewts, he pits amphibians versus lizards in a realm that is far from Earth and focuses on Herk, a young Nnewt who yearns for being fully amphibious but his weak legs, a product from birth, prohibit that. Still, when disaster strikes Nnewtown, he is the sole person to make it out and embarks on the Hero’s Journey to find help.

nnewts2-192x300At one juncture, he encounters the Lizard God and a few things are revealed including the god stole Nnewt’s proper legs to hamper him since he is the, gasp, “chosen one”. Nnewt manages to steal his true legs, attach them as if they were clip-ons and continues on his way, with one angry god in pursuit.

There’s a lot of charm to TenNapel’s designs and the color work from Katherine Garner, enhances the story’s mood and atmosphere. Once more, there remain storytelling gaffes that spoil the fun and adventure. Early on, two characters debate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches versus ham and cheese sandwiches. In another reality, neither would exist and feel thoroughly out of place. Other times, problems arise and are resolved a little too quickly for proper suspense.

When Nnewt finds out he’s the “one” there’s no pause for the impact of those words or that the Lizard God stole his legs years early. The emotional payoff is thoroughly missing throughout the story. At one point he meets the King of None who explains how they will stay in touch then the method is never used, even when it could have helped out plucky little hero.

The first volume draws to a close with the revelation that there may be one “other”, a brother he never knew. In fact, the story ends with a cliffhanger so it’s nearly 200 pages of setup and no delivery. There’s no satisfaction to reading what is essentially chapter one which is a shame because there is a lot of promise to this world.

Mindy Newell: Reflection In A Dark Pool

Through the mirror of my mind / Time after time, I see reflections of you and me / Reflections of the way life used to be / Reflections of the love you took from me • “Reflections,” by Lamont Dozier, Brian Holland, and Eddie Holland, recorded by Diana Ross and the Supremes, 1967, Motown Records

Like every other art form, comics – or more accurately, the creators of comics – reflect the times in which they live.

I started reading comics in the Silver Age, when superheroes were manufactured like products in factories, conveyed along conveyor belts of post-World War II American middle-class morality, which ensured that everything but the packaging was the same. Each hero kept their true nature hidden behind a pair of glasses, or a secretary’s typewriter, or a desk in a high school classroom. Each hero lived a lonely life, because to reveal their secret would only endanger their loved one. And each rose above their personal traumas and tragedies to fight for “truth, justice, and the American way.”

And we felt good about our heroes, and about ourselves.

Then, while Mississippi burned and Vietnam raged, “let it all hang out” and “tune in, turn on, drop out,” became the mantra of a generation. The real world intruded onto the four-color page as mutant X-Men fought societal preconceptions of race, religion, and gender roles, Speedy, Green Arrow’s sidekick, became a drug addict, and alcoholism consumed Tony Stark.

And even though our heroes suffered, they rose above their personal battles and we felt good about them, and about ourselves.

Then came the “Brit Invasion” of comics, and writers like Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Peter Milligan, Grant Morrison, and Jamie Delano turned comics inside out and upside down. Our heroes became just like us, only more so; questions about identity and debates about right and wrong plagued them. Nothing was black-and-white in the four-color world, anymore; doubts and uncertainty ruled decisions, and outcomes were often ambiguous.

But we still we rooted for our heroes, because through their problems, we understood our problems, and so we felt good about our heroes, and about ourselves.

But now I wonder… yes, comics still reflect the real world, but now it too often feels like I’m leaning over the railing of a ship and spitting in the wind. The realism flies back in our face.

The world seems to me uglier today than it ever was. The Taliban and Al-Qaeda and ISIS have made the Crusades and the Inquisition footnotes in a text on religion as an excuse for totalitarianism and war. Cyber terrorism raises the specter of a war between creative freedom and potential lawsuits, and creative freedom loses. Racism is alive and well again as acts of violence and death are perpetuated by those who wear a uniform that is supposed to stand for protection against such acts. The so-called leaders of our country are unfunny clowns in a thunderdome of viciousness and ugliness, and a vice-president, the man-who-would-be-king, defends torture as the American way. And hardly anybody votes, because hardly anybody cares.

And we no longer root for our heroes, who are us, but only more so, because, you know, all art is a product of its society, and comics are an art form, and comics are created by artists who are can’t be blamed for reflecting the society in which they live.

 

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