The Mix : What are people talking about today?
REVIEW: Matthew Holness’ “The Reprisalizer” a sad mirror of Garth Marenghi
Matthew Holness first rose to notoriety with his character of  Garth Marenghi; author, dream-weaver, visionary, plus actor.  He’s a perfect creation, all the insufferable genre authors boiled down to one.  Holness has returned with another author and another genre, and takes the story in the opposite direction.  A Gun For George, available for viewing at Britain’s Film4 website, is a short film featuring a down on his luck author who’s angry at the world for the loss of his brother, and his popularity.
Terry Finch is the author of the (once) popular Reprizalizer series, a two-fisted vigilante, taking to the criminals of suburban England. Â He’s self-deluded, down on his luck, and angry at the world about it. Â While you laugh at garth and look forward to someday seeing his head trapped in farm equipment, Matthew makes you feel for Terry. Â His books are clear Mary Sue fiction, but with the world of Men’s Adventure series as their base, series like the Mack Bolan books that emerge from Gold Eagle press with astonishing regularity. Â Terry is hanging onto life by his nails, trying to sell his books door to door to make enough to repair his car, George, named after his brother. Â But when an old fan bequeaths him the contents of his council flat, including a loaded revolver, the implication is that Terry may finally erase the line between reality and fantasy.
Holness is a contemporary and collaborator with the gang from The Mighty Boosh, as well as popular comedians Richard Ayoade ([[[The IT Crowd]]]) and Matt Berry ([[[Snuffbox]]]).  It’s a darker comedy than the Marenghi work, and features none of his past collaborators.  Marenghi is an ego-trip on two legs, while Finch is a poor and desperate man, unwilling to admit that his books are a thing of the past, if indeed they were ever much popular at all.  The film switches between modern day reality and Finch’s revenge fantasies, filmed in the style of a seventies “One man against crime” film trailers.  Terry’s past is only alluded to, but it can be easily inferred that his books are an impotent strike back against the real assault of his brother George, which is why they are so important to him.
Holness is representative of a lot of British humorists who don’t feel the need to crank out non-stop product of questionable quality, preferring to take their time a craft the work to perfection. Â This short film is an example of why that can be a very successful process. Â No news on if we’ll see any more of Terry Finch in the future, but what we have seen here was well worth the wait.
Martha Thomases: Breaking The Four-Color Wall — Comics About Cartoonists
Comics About Cartoonists • Edited by Craig Yoe • 192 pages • $39.99 retail in hardcover • IDW Publishing, on sale January 22nd
The creative life has its own circle of hell. The blank page, the blank canvas, the empty stage, all exist to remind us of our failure. When one is a professional with a deadline, the taunting is even more painful.
For those of us in the audience, it can also be excruciating. I don’t like songs about how difficult it is to be a rock star. I don’t like novels about how misunderstood teaching assistants can’t get laid.
But then it can also be fun. The Stunt Man is a wonderful movie about making movies. My Favorite Year is a laff riot about writing television shows, and it’s one of my favorites. All That Jazz? It’s show time!
And now, Craig Yoe has put together an anthology of comics about creating comics, Comics About Cartoonists. It collects sketches and finished stories, newspaper strips and comic book covers from some of the most celebrated creators of the last century.
The book has comedy, horror, and romance. It has work by Jack Kirby, Winsor McKay, Steve Ditko, Ernie Bushmiller, Jack Cole, Al Capp, Milton Caniff, Jerry Siegel, Joe Shuster, Will Eisner, Harvey Kurtzman, Charles Schulz and lots, lots more. It has deep personal insight into the real lives of working stiffs, and also what happens to cartoonists when aliens attack.
To meet this deadline, I read the whole thing in one sitting, and that’s not something I would recommend to you, Constant Reader. There are only a few plots. Cartoonist has no idea, so he fells asleep and his characters have an adventure. Cartoonist isn’t appreciated by his editor. Cartoonist stumbles on plans for an alien invasion. Beautiful girl doesn’t realize that the dumpy guy who looks like the cartoonist is beautiful on the inside. I’m sure I would have enjoyed these stories more if I read them one at a time, instead of in a lump.
And then, it has Basil Wolverton, with a story that not only exhibits his energetic wit and exuberance, but dialogue that is so much fun it should be read out loud. I would pay for Childish Gambino to record it.
My favorite comic stories about comics were the ones Cary Bates and Elliott S. Maggin wrote themselves into with the Justice League. Yoe also doesn’t include Grant Morrison’s appearances in Animal Man. The rights were most likely not available, and all of these are too self-consciously meta for the book’s shaggy-dog aesthetic.
On the other hand, the book’s endpapers are old ads promising to teach you — yes, you! — how to make big money and attract beautiful women as a cartoonist. “Cartoon Your Way to Popularity and Profit” says one ad that goes on to promise you a “Laugh Finder.” That ad alone is darker and more meta than anything on the market today.
SATURDAY: Marc Alan Fishman
THE NEW ADVENTURES OF THE GRIFFON TAKES FLIGHT FROM PULP OBSCURA!
ÃÂ ÃÂ THE MASKED MANHUNTER OF THE SKIES RETURNS!ÃÂ
àâ¨Pro Se Productions, a leader in Genre Fiction and New Pulp adventures, proudly announces the long awaited newest volume of its Pulp Obscura line! àTHE NEW ADVENTURES OF THE GRIFFON!
Pulp Obscura, an imprint of Pro Se Productions in conjunction with Altus Press, brings yet another rare and classic Pulp Character back to life from Pulp’s Golden Era!àâ¨àâ¨Kerry Keen is a young millionaire playboy by day to hide his nocturnal adventures as a costumed airborne crime fighter! From a secret underground hangar on his Long Island estate in the Graylands, The Griffon takes to the skies in the Black Bullet, his supercharged and heavily armed seaplane on missions of justice and vengeance!àâ¨ÃÂ
The Griffon was created by Arch Whitehouse and appeared in Flying Aces MAgazine, his adventures beginning in the June 1935 issue. ÃÂ
These new tales take Kerry and his companions, Barney O’Dare and Barbara “Pebbles” Colony back into the skies for six terrific flights of danger and intrigue!
â¨This stunning collection features an incredible cover by Mike Fyles as well as fantastic format and design by Sean Ali! Six Tales of Action, Excitement, Mystery and Amazing Arial Adventure take flight in this collection from writers Van Allen Plexico, Chuck Miller, Phil Bledsoe, S. E. Dogaru, Don Thomas and R. P. Steeves!ÃÂ
Beware THE VENGEANCE OF THE VIPER! àFight alongside The Griffon against THE DEVIL AND THE BLOODY BARONESS! àFly into the HELL ABOVE US! àEncounter TERROR OVER THE PACIFIC! àSolve THE CASE OF THE DANGEROUS DIRIGIBLE! Uncover THE CLOCKWORK PLAN OF HERR DROSSELMEYER! àAll in THE NEW ADVENTURES OF THE GRIFFON!â¨àâ¨Climb into the cockpit of the Black Bullet with Kerry Keen and fly off into THE NEW ADVENTURES OF THE GRIFFON from PULP OBSCURA!
Get your print copy today from AmazonÃÂ HEREÃÂ or from Pro Se’s own Createspace storeÃÂ HERE!ÃÂ for $15.00! ÃÂ Coming soon for your Kindle, Nook, and Ebook Readers!
For more from Pro Se-www.prosepulp.com! ÃÂ
Watch “Red 2” new trailer
A sequel to the original sleeper hit movie Red, based on the DC Comics comic by Warren Ellis and Cully Hammer, Red 2 has come out with a new trailer today.
In Red 2, retired black-ops CIA agent Frank Moses reunites his unlikely team of elite operatives for a global quest to track down a missing portable nuclear device. To succeed, they’ll need to survive an army of relentless assassins, ruthless terrorists and power-crazed government officials, all eager to get their hands on the next-generation weapon. The mission takes Frank and his motley crew to Paris, London and Moscow. Outgunned and outmanned, they have only their cunning wits, their old-school skills, and each other to rely on as they try to save the world—and stay alive in the process.
The movie stars Bruce Willis as Frank Moses, John Malkovich as Marvin Boggs, Mary-Louise Parker as Sarah Ross, Brian Cox as Ivan Simonov, and Helen Mirren as Victoria. They’re joined this time around by Anthony Hopkins, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Byung Hun Lee, and Neal McDonough. It’s being directed by Dean Parisot, and written by Jon Hoeber and Erich Hoeber, based on the comic by Warren Ellis and Cully Hammer.
Watch the new trailer now:
Four Smurfs Arrested In Crime Spree
Proving that comics lead to juvenile deliquency, we have proof of the amazing things Smurfs will do to keep Smurfette in Smurfberries. And you thought Gargamel was in the wrong…
Four men dressed as Smurfs were arrested after attempting to steal a car and beating a man in Melbourne, Australia.
According to police reports, a 37-year-old man was walking out of a 7-Eleven just past midnight when he was approached by a man that looked like Papa Smurf, who asked for a cigarette. But the victim refused to light the cigarette before handing it over, and had to endure Papa Smurf’s wrath. He had also noticed that three other men, all similarly dressed as Smurfs, were attempting to simultaneously hotwire a car.
Australian police released the store’s surveillance video to find the four men responsible for the crimes. Three 19-year-olds and an 18-year-old came forward to admit to the crime and were promptly arrested.
via Australian Police Arrest Four Smurf Suspects for Crime Spree | TIME.com.
And it gets worse– Papa Smurf was arrested in New York.
Hat tip: Yog Sysop.
THE SHADOW FAN PODCAST TAKES ON THE DEVIL’S PAYMASTER!
The Shadow Fan podcast returns for Episode 15 and this time around, Barry Reese reviews “The White Legion” (radio episode 03/20/38) and “The Devil’s Paymaster,” which wraps up Theodore Tinsley’s epic Prince of Evil series. Barry then talks about the Prince of Evil storyline as a whole and why he thinks it ranks among the greatest Shadow stories of all time.
If you love the greatest pulp hero of all time, then this is the show for you! Proudly sponsored by Blue Coal Anthracite!
Join the conversation about pulp’s greatest hero today at http://theshadowfan.libsyn.com/the-devil-s-paymaster
THE GRIFFON SOARS!
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| Cover Art: Mike Fyles |
Pro Se Productions has shared a sneak peek of the cover to the upcoming Pulp Obscura title, The New Adventures of The Griffon by New Pulp Artist Mike Fyles.
From Pro Se Productions’ Tommy Hancock:
Flying Your Way, VERY SOON– From Van Allen Plexico, Chuck Miller, Rich Steeves, Don Thomas, Phil Bledsoe, S. E. Dogaru, Mike Fyles, Sean E. Ali, Russ Anderson, and edited by David White…. THE NEW ADVENTURES OF THE GRIFFON-From Pulp Obscura!
Dennis O’Neil: The Blame Game
Okay, who’s to blame? Somebody has to be responsible – stands to reason. I mean, it’s always somebody’s fault. We’re not that somebody, you and me, so it has to be one of them! The hippies. The nonconformists. The others. Them!
Take this nonsense about global warming or climate change or whatever they’re calling it this week. What a load! So the ice caps are melting. Even if that’s true, and as far as I’m concerned the jury’s still out, but even if it is true… So what? You telling me we can’t handle a little more water? What are we, sissies afraid to get our socks wet?
There’s a newspaper in London – I forget which one – that said that global warming stopped years ago. Sounds right to me.
But you know what I think? I think that under those ice caps there’s some kind of big furnace, maybe atomic powered, that’s causing the ice to melt. Who put it there? Maybe the commies. I personally believe that the International Communist Conspiracy is not out of business, not by a long shot. It’s just biding its time, waiting for the right opportunity.
But as much as I hate the commies, I don’t think they’re melting the ice. Ask yourself this – who stands to profit? Obvious, when you think about it. The liberals, or progressives, or whatever they’re calling themselves this week. Simple logic. They convince us that the climate’s changing and they say that’s bad and that gas and oil and factories and cars are responsible. Then, wham-o! They lead us to their buddies, the mooches and takers, the nonproducers, who try to sell us on the idea that we have to replace our fuel sources with sunshine and wind! Bottom line, they turn a nice profit while we work on our tans.
I’m telling you, something has to be done.
And that reminds me. Comic books! How long are we going to let this filth pollute the minds of our young? It’s been going on for…what? Ever since the end of World War II, maybe earlier. A real doctor – not one of your liberal pseudo-doctors, but a doctor with a medical degree and everything name of Doctor Fredrick Wertham wrote a book proving – I’ll say that again, proving! – that these comic books cause juvenile delinquency and sexual perversion – you know what I mean – and crime in the streets and disrespect for authority and who knows what else! Got so bad, a United States senator name of Estes Kefauver held hearings on the matter. Oh, he knocked the wind out of their sails, Senator Kefauver did, and a lot of these comic book publishers went out of business. But not all. Just the other day, I saw somebody on the bus reading a comic book. So we still got a big part of the job to do. We shouldn’t rest until nobody even remembers these comic books!
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Wayne LaPierre, of the National Rifle Association, blames gun violence on the media and the mental health care system. Sound right to you?
RECOMMENDED READING: The Ten Cent Plague, by David Hadju
FRIDAY: Martha Thomases Looks At Comics Creators Looking At Themselves
BLACK AMAZON OF MARS SNEAK PEEK
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| Pencils byÃÂÃÂÃÂÃÂ Reno Maniquis |
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| Art:ÃÂÃÂÃÂÃÂ Reno Maniquis |
Sequential Pulp ComicsÃÂâÃÂÃÂÃÂàMichael R. Hudson shared pencils from the upcoming adaptation of Leigh Brackett‘s BLACK AMAZON OF MARS, written by Mark Ellis with art by Reno Maniquis for Sequential Pulp/Dark Horse Comics.
Coming soon!
