Remember the comic buying craze in the 80s/90s where fanboys buy comics in bulk to collect the ultra rare variant covers? Those were the days of gimmicks such as holographic covers, die cut covers, fold out covers, pencil sketches covers, and my favorite the “combine our 1000000000 difference covers to form a hug-eass awesome poster” covers.
Marvel has done it again with Siege… Apparently the variants of Siege combine to form this little treasure… The look on Norman Osbourne’s face is priceless!
And now that they just announced the offshoots for Siege (namely Siege: Captain America, Siege, Spider Man, Siege: Loki, Siege: Young Avengers and Siege: Secret Warriors), they decided to follow up with the announcement of the 5 variant covers by the super talented Marko Djurdjevic. The covers for the issues will form the panorama below.. Simply awesome…
While we are on the subject of variant covers, I decided this to be one of the best I’ve seen in recent times… For Blackest Night #3
Speaking of the ongoing feud between Siege and Blackest Night, Marvel just issued this little press release to comic book retailers…
In an effort to provide assistance to comic retailers in 2010, Marvel is offering retailers an opportunity to turn unsold comics into an extremely rare Siege #3 Deadpool Variant!
Retailers – for every 50 stripped covers of the following comics sent to Marvel, you will qualify to receive one FREE Siege #3 Deadpool Variant.
Is it any wonder most of the listed titles are Blackest Night Tie ins? Apparently, retailers had to order large quantities of these Blackest Nights Tie Ins in order to get super rare limited editions of Green Lantern power rings.
And said Deadpool Variant?
Not much activity on the Blackest Night front this week, so I just swinged (swung?) in on the other company’s major event – Siege… again. With issue 2, we are officially halfway through this event… *celebratory cheers for short events*
Being such a short event, things have to move fast.In this issue, we see the fall out of the Take Down of Thor. Captain A.. I mean Steve Rogers rallied the troops (All versions of Avengers, except “Dark”, for obvious reasons, along with Nick Fury’s Secret Warriors) and they prepare to deliver the Mother of all Ass Whoppings on Norman Osbourne.
With all the space in this issue used up for the rallying and the ass kicking, who has space for pansy stuff such as character development? Siege #2 is just a candyfloss issue of big fight scenes, violent explosions, bone crunching takedowns and Mortal Kombat worthy fatalities (ok.. fatality). Yup.. “Fatality”. Marvel wasn’t kidding when the publicity material of this issue reads “An Avenger dies”.
While the “Branded”-ness of said Avenger is debatable, it does pave the way for something big later on in this event. I know Marvel is trying to establish this death as “significant” but I think someone in the bullpen probably missed the irony when they effectively *spoiler alert* reinstated Steve Rogers as Captain America in this issue.
The death of Steve Rogers and the establishment of the Winter Soldier as Captain America was THE Significant fallout from their “Civil War” only 2 years back. They’ve easily wipe away any impact of THAT event with this move… (along with the re-masking of Peter Parker, of course)
Dubious though the death was, it was definitely one of the bloodiest death scene I’ve seen in comics. Pretty damn awesome. Say what you will about “Siege”, the art work is really something you’ll want to write home about.
What I am more personally invested in, for this issue is the involvement of the New Warriors… I’ve been a big fan for the longest time and it was really quite a trip to watch these “Warriors” grow… The last few pages of Siege were dedicated to a “conversation” between Nick Fury and his New Warriors just prior to Cap’s rally. It is just text but the dialogue is sharp and, along with the Death of The Avenger, and a plot development in Siege #2, Bendis seemed to be setting things up for a major plot line for at least one of the New Warriors…
I am suddenly reminded of this scene waaaaay back in New Warriors #2.
I am excited to see if any of these comes to pass in the pages of Siege.
And the final word that I have for this entry?
“Incoming”
The Beatles are cool… Charts are cool.
So some genius decided to mix the 2 together and came up with charts for Beatles Songs. We all know the Beatles have an almost unhealthy obsession for Walruses, and Lucys, an Strawberry Fields and “Yah Yah Yahs”, the charts let you see where they appear in each of the songs.
It’s an ongoing project. Charts that have been made so far include one that shows the keys of the songs that the Beatles have played. Trust me, it’s cooler than it sounds. Kinda like Emma from “Heroes”… for those that are still watching. It makes for really cool visual effects on TV, but if you ask me, it is a pretty useless power… personally of course..
You want to know the amazing thing?
Being able to see sound might not be as far fetched as you might think. Scientists (who are, surprisingly, not quite mad) have actually been able to do it for some time. Who knows? In the not so distant future, we would have a new way to experience the world.
On an not altogether unrelated note, I heard you can achieve the same effect from ingesting certain not so legal pharmaceuticals…
Rumor has it… of course… all from hearsay
I am sensing a conspiracy…. or very brilliant marketing people.
Marvel kickstarted their new mega event on the rare week when there is not much activity from DC’s Blackest Night.
Siege, like all Mega events promised to have far and long reaching consequences in the Marvel Universe, much like the Skrull (I mean Secret) Invasion last year, World War Hulk the year before that, Civil War the year before and the House of M nonsense the year before that. The list goes on…
The series will (presumably) chart Norman Osborne’s descent into madness (again) and possible fall from grace. Much as I want to see the series crash (I am very fatigued by these Mega Events, especially when this seems to be an extension of Secret Invasion), it is actually off to a good start. The main books for Siege is promised to be limited to only 4 books, so the actions come fast and furious.
Just check out them apples.
All this within the first issue!! Good break from the trend of Mega Events building up for 2 to 3 issues before the action starts flying. Naysayers might say that the whole Dark Reign of last year was ALREADY the buildup to this event, but I say Nay. I mean you’ve got to love Brian Michael Bendis. He seems to write action sequences as well as he does Tarentino-esque dialogue sequences.
The sad fact is, good though Siege might be, I sense that it would continue to live in the shadows of Blackest Night. Pun fully intended, baby.
I have to admit, the spin off series from Blackest Night are starting to… lose their novelty and charm. It reached a point where they are mainly issues in and issues out of DC heroes getting shocked at their closest friends and family members coming back from the dead, they get mocked, they get taunted, they get into a fight, DC heroes win. Wash, rinse, repeat.
The main series and the 2 core Green Lantern titles however, are going VERY strong, and… I didn’t think this was possible, picking up the pace and growing deeper than I could possibly fathom at the start of the event. I am genuinely excited to see what comes next after each and every issue. Geoff Johns has this ability to sweep the rug from under my feet with every twist that he introduce.
Case in point… *SPOILER ALERT*…
That has got to be one of the biggest “HOLY CRAP” moment I’ve had in a long time. Simply awesome.
Couple that with the fact that the mainstream media is piling on the coverage and upping the profile of Green Lantern (prob as a build up to the movie) (Did I mention they seemed to have very good marketing people?), GL seems poised to be the next Dark Knight.
For one thing, I want to have a limited edition Green Lantern lantern (LEGLL), like Sheldon does.
While Big Bang Theory has always been full of comic references, they went all out this week. Sheldon actually managed to SCORE a not bad looking girl with this LEGLL.
Awesome.
As 2009 draws to a close, it is time to look forward. The movie going experience seems to only get better. In 2010, I predict movies featuring bigger explosions, more boombastic CGI effects, men with bigger guns and gals with bigger… fun.
A shortlist of what I think are Hollywood’s most promising trailers for 2010 so far…
I’ve already spoke about Iron Man 2. The trailer does not disappoint. It is as loud and just as flashy as I expected it to be.
I am a SUCKER for greek mythology so Clash of the Titans is definitely up there on my “Must watch” list. Of course, there is also that ripped off sound bite of “UNLEAAAASH THE KRAKEN”! Somehow, the voice of Aslan makes it sound slightly more authoritative than Bill Nighy’s rendition in Pirates of the Caribbean.
Prince of Persia – Loved the game, have some doubts about the show. Trailer looks promising though… Has a very… Pirates of the Caribbean (again) feel to it, doesn’t it? Might just be the show to prove that shows based on games need not necessarily suck… Also, it’s done by Disney… that must mean something…
And finally, what I think might be the underdog comic movie of the year.
KICKASS!!
The trailer looks to be an ALMOST exact panel by panel port from the comic book, a la Sin City, 300 and Watchmen. Good call… except for the slight “ALMOST”. Probably due to rating issues, it does not seem as… gory as the original. Shall have to see how this works out…
I know… it’s been too long since the last updates.
My perfect excuse? I was busy.
Anyway, updates on the world of comics – Blackest Night continue to kick serious ass. It has officially passed comfortably over the hype bump and slide easily through the mid season fatigue that most hyper series face and zombie fatigue that most… ermm.. zombie series face.
Case in point – Blackest Night #5.
Normally, I am not a very big fan of splash pages. The reason is simple. Using 2 pages out of a 24 page comic book to “showcase” a scene just does not make much sense to me. It’s simple mathematics really, there’s less story to tell. Especially if said splash page consist of 2 characters punching the nuts off each other with one gigantic “POW” plastered across the centre of the page.
Blackest Night #5 shows how splash pages should be used. It contains no less than FOUR (count them, baby) splash pages and an almost equal amount of full page panels in a 27 page comic book, and my only reaction was… WOW. Each of the splash pages are effectively and efficiently employed, drawn to milk the most emotional response out of you. Bile spewing Batman, anybody?
I really could not wait for more!
Anyway, a synopsis of Blackest Night 5 using 2 of the splash pages… for anyone who’s interested.
The rainbow brigade has finally been formed and they are out for some black lantern payback.
Of course, Zombies being Zombies, the Black Lanterns are not taking this sitting down and has recruited some truly badass new members to the ranks.
Need I say it? SPOILER ALERT.
Cliff hangers like this made me really glad that Blackest Night is a series that I did not trade wait. It is full of these “dangle your balls on a string “kinda endings that is so masochistically fun.
A long time ago, in a galaxy far far away, the Girlfriend bought me my first TV console for the modern era, the Xbox.
The pride of this console is an offering from a relatively unknown team called Team Ninja and their gem of a game Ninja Gaiden. A re-imagining of the classic NES title, the gameplay was simply leap (pun fully intended) years beyond its time.
Ryu Hayabusa, the protagonist of the series jumped about like the Energizer Bunny on crack, and the pornographic amount of blood and gore flying on screen as Hayabusa slashes through the numerous grunts puts Kurosaki and Tarantino to shame.
In one word, it was – AWESOME!
Fast forward a decade (yes, it is that long).
Team Ninja put forth the newest Ninja Gaiden title in the series for the “next” generation of consoles – namely the Xbox 360 and the PS3.
Having been converted to the Ninten-cult, courtesy of the Fiance (again), I will not be able to play this game.
Nonetheless, I still check out the promos and previews for the games from the other consoles. After all, you never know what (consoles) tomorrow might bring. (*nudge nudge hint hint*)
The first teaser was… amusing and I couldn’t help but break into a chuckle.
You see, some of the playable characters in Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 are female “ninjas”. Beside having almost the same agility as Ryu Hayabusa, one of the USP of the game is that the game features, I kid you not, “physically realistic breasts movement”.
Then along came the second teaser trailer and I cannot help but wonder if something went wrong somewhere in the promo department for Team Ninja.
Before I go on any further, I must make a disclaimer..
I Trade wait.
And I suppose this is the only reason why Fables and Ex Machina had not made their appearances on this list yet. I try very hard not to get any spoilers, so yes, I don’t read the individual issues.
Having said that, brilliant though Fables and Ex Machina might be, I’m wondering if they would be good enough to unseat the best books the awesome Blackest Night and the sometimes brilliant Dark Reign had been serving up so far.
Blackest Night has yet to hit a false note (discounting Blackest Night: Teen Titans, but Teen Titans had not been a heavyweight contender for a very long time), serving up suspense, horror, mystery and superb story telling in fell swoop.
Dark Reign, no matter what critics had been saying, managed to massively shake up the status quo in the Mar-verse. The sheer volume of work and the number of characters shaken up by the mega event is truly mind blowing.
True, some of the not so good (ok, horrible) issues of this mega cross over stinks strongly of geek-xploitation, but even the staunchest critics have to admit that the best issues of Dark Reign features some of the best story telling and intriguing character development in the medium for a very long time.
Which brings us to the 2 contenders for the Comic of the week for the week of 17 Sep.
First up, we have Dark Avengers #9. Nick Fury and his “Caterpillars” seems to be everywhere this month.And in Dark Avengers #9, they had a confrontation with Phobos’ Dad, Ares, the @#$% God of War with his “No @#$%” Axe given by Zeus.
By all accounts, it is an inevitable face off. I mean, Nick Fury all but kidnapped his @#$% kid and pitted him against the Dad. What would’ve turned out to be a mindless slugfest in lesser hands became a real character exploration of the various (ok, Ares and Phobos) characters featured in the issue.
Quite a lot of people had been complaining about how the Dark Avengers series had been missing one crucial ingredient, namely…. The Dark Avengers. The Dark Avengers rarely feature in their own monthly, preferring to pop up in other Dark Reign Titles – to the extend of seeming to have the ability to be at multiple places at the same time ( I am looking at you, Dakan). But I prefer to think of each issue so far as Bendis adding layers to each of the Dark Avengers individually.
Dark Avengers #9 certainly shows Ares to be more than a mindless war mongering piece of meat at Norman Orsbornes’ beck and call.
Contender 2 for this week, is of course, Blackest Night #3. Besides continuing the slug fest between the Black Lanterns with Hal Jordan and Barry Allen, (adding the Ray and Firestorm to the lineup for good measures), this issue shows the first movement of the mysterious Indigo Lanterns.
Below is the cover for Blackest Night #3.
With this, I declare Blackest Night #3 the winner of the Comic of the Week for the week of 17 Sep.
No, you did not miss any paragraphs.
The cover is that Awesome.
Out.
Again, another week without any real Blackest Night installments… hell, there aren’t even any Amazing Spidermans
Good news from last week is that my Secret Warriors finally came in. The great news is that it looks like it is all leading up to a throwdown with the THUNDERBOLTS! Boo yeah!
The bad news is that Bendis is no longer doing the writing for #7. And the most gawd awful news is that the art duties has been taken over by a new guy who seems to be having problems with rendering body proportions and yet, in a seeming attempt to flaunt this deficiency, uses a pornographic amount of extreme perspective angles in the book.
Enough of last week. Let’s catch up to the present with this week’s runaway winner.
Chew #3 by John Layman and Rob Guillory.
Chew is a comic that I have been watching for some time. (I know, it’s only at #3, but one day I’ll like to be able to say, HA I was there since the beginning)
The concept of a CIBOPATH, someone who is able to get psychic imprints from the food that they eat is one of those quirky little “I should have thought of it myself” ideas. I started reading #1 out of curiosity to see how far this little idea can be played out and was seriously grossed out and supremely impressed by what I saw.
I was drawn in by the portrayal of a near-apocalyptic future where chicken is banned (and hence a premium black market item) for fear of Bird Flu and a “Big Brother”-ish FDA that stakes out illegal chicken selling outlets.
Tony Chu (Chu – Chew… geddit?), the protagonist, a “by the book and to the letter” paper pusher is not exactly my idea of a “hero”.
But in the first issue, Layman managed to throw enough of a candlelight on Chu’s personality quirks and possible complex family background through the smoke and mirrors to keep me intrigued. The last few pages of the first issue were particularly chilling and it shows how far someone who follows the book would be willing to go for what they deem as “justice”.
Fast forward to #3. Possibly due to the developments in #2, Chu is now quite a badass of an FDA officer himself.
Let’s just suspend our disbelief on the speed of Chu’s personality change from a pencil pusher to a bona fide foul mouthed gun slinger, I personally think it is a jump in the right direction. Now this is a protagonist I can root for.
#3 finally introduced the reader to Amanda Mintz, the lady that’s been prancing around the frames of the earlier issues and quite possibly the love of Tony’s life.
The introduction of the Saboscrivner proves that Layman and Guillory has more than a one trick pony on their hands. The possibility of other pseudo personality disorders and, well… for lack of a better word, Powers reminds me of the moment when I first discovered the X-Men… only, possibly… better.
And the one thing that possibly makes Chew better than the X-Men?
The humour. The Cartoon Network-ish artwork by Guillory suits the feel of the book to a T. The book mixes equal parts of gore, gross out moments and laugh out loud humor to produce a high energy recipe rarely seen in other books today.
I mean, the book is… FUN!! Something a lot of the “darker” offerings from the Big 2 are sorely lacking in these days.
That is why Chew #3 is my Comic of the week for 3 Sep 09.
The Fiance introduced the concept of literal videos to me a while back.
What are literal videos? Takes too long to explain, just click on the dang video below.
This was the first that I was shown and it remains one of the best I’ve seen.
Another video just begging to be turned into a literal video?
No, I’ve not slacked off for the past 3 weeks. I was away for work.
I’ve been catching up on the previous few weeks of comics and not surprisingly, Blackest Night continues to be brilliant.
Even the side series such as Blackest Night: Superman and Blackest Night: Batman impressed, which is much more than what can be said for the side series of other Mega Crossover events these days.
The inclusion of the crap talking Deadman to the uneasy alliance between the new Batman and Robin is simply… awesome. I was going to complain that too many of the classic Batman Rogue Gallery seemed to be dead, maimed or rendered lame these days, then along came this little ditty…
Brrrr…. what is it? Chills running down my spines is what it is.
Blackest Night: Superman took a very different direction from the other Blackest Night books so far. At the core of it all, Blackest Night is a book about zombies, and conventional wisdom dictates that zombies are commonly associated with… slasher flicks. And what would be a better place to base a slasher flick than the small American cornfield town of Smallville?
Also, it’s the first time I’ve seen an individual running so many colors on the emotional spectrum as seen by Black Lantern Kal L.
As for this week’s entry… to be honest, I am still waiting for my Secret Warriors to come in. I was very sure that THAT or Green Lantern #45 (being a Blackest Night book. Did I mention I adore the series right now) would be the books to top the charts this week. So before, I procrastinate any longer with this week’s entry, I decided that we should just move on.
Green Lantern #45, while good, focused too much on the War of the Lights in space. While it fleshes out Sinestro even more (if you can believe it. The guy has a Corp named after him) as a character, not much happened on Earth, which I felt was where the real fun is.
My problem with the War of the Lights is that there is too much baggage. Too many characters running around that is simply over the head for casual (really) fans like myself. There is too much history to catch up on that I simply cannot be bothered for the moment.
Ditto for Batman and Superman. I just know that the new Batman *spoiler alert?* is Dick Grayson and the new Robin, Damien Wayne. Superman’s New Krypton is a story line that I have not even begin to wrap my brain around.
Don’t even get me started on the X family of books. I cannot get who’s dead and who’s not anymore.
That is the reason why those books have not been on the Comic of the Week list so far. Though to be fair, Detective Comics this week is kind of brilliant. Like the continuation of the Dark Prophecy for Batwoman.
That is why I’ve decided to cheat a bit and put a Trade Paperback as my Comic of the Week.
Presenting Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead.
Yes, it’s another zombie book but an uber brilliant one. It is not so much the brain eating brain-dead-guys or the hack-slash gore (I hate gore) that are cool, as the interactions between the various survivors of the zombie apocalypse. Kirkman just uses the scenario his exploration into the (sometimes dark, somewhat hopeful, always… human?) human psyche in this ongoing soap opera series.
The TPB is at its 10th volume right now, and I think we have just began to comprehend how far this rabbit hole really goes. By this volume, the main protagonist, Rick is not so much an anti hero anymore. He is just a Survivor like everyone in the book. Nothing more. Nothing less. As the world continues to trudge around knee deep in zombies, we began to see, through Rick’s interactions with new found Survivors and his current crew, what being a Survivor truly entails. It is not a pretty sight. But one you cannot stop starring at.
Highly recommended for… well… EVERYONE. Even those that don’t normally like zombies. Trust me, it’s worth it.
And yes, I trade wait for this series. For one thing, I cannot justify the money output for a black and white series every month. For another, I am pretty sure the anticipation from the month to month cliff hangers will kill me.
Speaking of zombies, apparently Marvel decided to hop onto the bandwagon with this as well.
Apparently Dead Mutants will rise.
Wish we could say the same about originality…
Personally, I think it’s kinda brilliant, but I know of a few who would hiss and crawl my eyes out for even entertaining the thought.
This is the line that absolutely slayed me:
“There has been controversy over whether or not Jackson can really call himself a Black Lantern, when he appears to be a White Lantern.”
This has got to be one of the most innovative movie trailers I’ve seen recently…
My only complain is that the editor for this particular trailer, like a lot of other trailer editors in recent times, seemed to have an ingrained and deeply felt prejudiced against people who do not suffer from epileptic fits. It is really disconcerting watching fade to blacks at cut throat speed.
As a movie, District 9 is a bit hard to categorize.
I suppose it is considered more or less “mainstream Hollywood”, but it’s production budget is peanuts compared to the amount catered for brainless Hollywood “blow em ups” (I’m looking at you Transformers and GI Joe).
It’s an alien gore flick (think Predator, Mimic and…. ermm… yes, Alien) but the people running scared are the Aliens.
It’s a sort of apocalyptic disaster flick that is… *gasp* not set in America.
More importantly, it is one of those “multi layered” shows with a Message… yet… fun.
It’s one of those shows that everyone can find something to like or find something to hate.
Some “Critics”, which incidentally comes from the German words “cri” meaning “people who are” and “tics” meaning “blood sucking insects”, will no doubt scoff at yet another mainstream “brainless explosion filled” Hollywood flick being churned out of the mass production factory. Yet, some of them will rave about the “parallels to history” and the what a “dark satire” the film is.
Mainstream Hollywood flickers will hate the fact that there is a thinly veiled Message in the midst of their brainless explosions.
Regardless, I love the fact that even though Neill Blomkamp seems to have a Message to spread, the film does not take itself too seriously.
While it is no Iron Man, the special effects are pretty good given the (relatively) tight budget for the film. I HATE gore, but after getting used to the fun and innovative ways the show explodes people/aliens, it actually started becoming quite funny. The term “popping like popcorns” come to mind.
Best of all, I love its narrative structure. Just check out the first 20 minute of the film which sets up the rest of the show using purely “news footage”.
All in all, one of the best films I’ve seen this year.
ONE OF the best films, the other being Pixar’s Up, of course.
I don’t think the Girlfriend will ever forgive me if I did not at least give it a special mention. It’s sweet and, well… buoyant (pun TOTALLY intended).
I love how Pixar is able to tell a story and make you feel, really FEEL for the characters, even without dialogues. They have some master story tellers there that can tell a life’s tale in just 10 minutes. The story of Carl and Ellie has to be one of the most poignant and bitter sweet short films I’ve ever seen. I’m practically guaranteed buckets of tears every time she-who-shall-not-be-named watches it…. Much like the ending sequence for Tim Burton’s Big Fish.
Like District 9, the visuals were truly stunning. Watching it in 3D (yes, with the dorky glasses) makes the experience even more vivid. It makes you just wanna reach out and grab some of them balloons off the screen.
And these 2 films, when you put them beside some of the brainless explosion filled flicks (I’m looking at you, Transformers and GI Joe) just showed that awesome CGI is just a tool for superb story telling. You cannot have a hot bod without a soul.
It’s amazing how much special effects have improved over the past 100 years. It’s not readily apparent. It’s like watching a tortoise grow. And you don’t realize it’s a big turtle until you put photos of the turtles all side by side.
Stupid Roald Dahl reference…
But all the special effects in the world is nothing without heart.
So, here’s to more movies with heart and soul. Awesome visuals help too.
This is proof that good advertisements transcend languages. Do watch to the end. It’s worth it!
Of course, the ad looks suspiciously like this one…
Proving once and again that originality is overrated.
For the moment, my favorite comic related imagery is this…
What’s not to like? It features my favorite characters (Delirium, Dream, Death, Desire, Delirium’s flying goldfishes… if only they have Destruction) created by my favorite writer (Guess…), drawn by one of my favorite artist (Michael Allred), paying tribute to my favorite band (Beatles… that’s Abby Road for those of you who just came out from under the rock. Be careful of the sunshine).
Days like these, feels like someone up there wanna look out for me.
I take it as a sign.
Also… my favorite quote of the moment:
Penny: While you’re there, could you pick me up some comics for my nephew’s birthday?
Sheldon: I think you mean comic books. “Comics” are feeble attempts at humor featuring talking babies and anthropomorphized pets, found traditionally in the optimistically-named Funny Pages.
Thanks Jacq. Big Bang Theory rocks! Appeals to the inner (REALLY) geek.
