newuniversal 1959
You know, aside from the fact that they killed Tony Stark, it was a little bland. I know it was there to explain the history and go into all of this baby killing nonsense, as well as delve into the paranoia of the powers that be and all that, but it just felt a little bland somehow. Like they could have done a lot more with it and they cheaped out. But I do like Tony's head being blown off.
Oh, and the parallels to what's happening now. That part was pretty cool too.
Shrugged #7
Hey, guess what finally came out! Actually, lookit what I finally got. The story isn't spoiled on the cover for once, which was nice, and it moves a little slowly. It was nicely enough don, though, with the somewhat predictable progression happening and all hope appears lost. Better, it seems the entire earth now gets shoulder angels and devils, which is great. I look forward to watching people go nuts until that's resolved in this big flashy finish.
And there will be a finish. Turner may be dead, but he was co-writing and not drawing the book. And the cover art is already done. And dammit, even for a mediocre story I want closure!
Teen Titans #61
It's a cute team up issue and very little else. Beetle and Devil get to work together, work out their differences, come to terms with one another's feelings about Ravager and eventually kick some butt. But outside of that, there's really not much else going on. Sure, they get a new costume and some forced foreshadowing, but really, we all already knew about that if I'm not the only one paying attention to the kid's inner monologue.
Also, I managed to read 7 books on my shift yesterday. So I'll go over those too.
Bone Vol 1 - 6
Actually, I started these on the weekend and wow they're fun. Really, it's a great thing to check out. The story of the three Bone cousins is delightful, adorable, and at times you forget that it's meant for kids. Heck, when I described it to a co-worker, she had to ask if it really was or not. It's really that much fun, but still totally kid friendly.
Wild Adapter Vol 1 - 3
Highly amusing but dark. Wild Adapter is a deadly drug that gives you a high and reverts you back to a carnal state before it makes you explode. The main characters are a guy who has no real humanity to him whatsoever and a guy who is way too honest. They make a lovely team and the writer knows just what to do to make the fangirls squeal. Or in my case, laugh.
There's a great scene in the third volume. The two of them find a bug in their apartment planted by some of the dealers to make sure they weren't onto them. Across the street the guys liten in as the two of them have sex. Thing is, they're sitting next to one another, fully clothed on the couch, totally messing with them. And it sounds like the orgasm breaks the bug. And I immediately said (after the laughter subsided), "I have to use that somewhere."
Wallflower Vol 16
For a formula story, this is a pretty fun book anyway. It may be the same thing every book with absolutely no character progression, but I watch episodic cartoons and they don't bother me. Gotta hand it to the girl writing it, she isn't running out of strange situations to put them in yet. Reactions, they're predictable, but I'm still amused, dammit.
So I read a lot of webcomics. One of those is Comedity, which had pre-orders in for the book ages ago and I finally got my copy yesterday. And I'm all happy, because it's a fun comic. But on to the actual book.
Rather than talk about plot and such, I'll let you go and see the comic for yourselves. It's a fun read. Highly recommended.
The book itself is nicely printed. Garth has done a lot of things right with this one that many other webcomics have done wrong. The cover is a nice weight with a gloss over it, a simple cover design with an idea of what's on the inside and a simple logo that doesn’t demand too much attention. Nicely balanced and not too busy. The second cover on the inside is nice too. Either would have worked.
There is a table of contents for some perplexing reason, though. Most of the pages have no numbers on them, so that was a little perplexing. Needless addition, but it the page was nicely designed.
Introduction by someone else was a nice touch too. Not essential, but it gives it a bit of a professional air about it.
The art on the inside of the comics themselves I have to give a nod to because that’s where so many people go so horribly wrong. Print resolution is 300 dpi, and considering there is no pixilation from what I can tell on the inside, I am so ecstatically happy that he seems to realize this. The art itself is very nicely done from beginning to end and I love being able to see the artistic progression throughout. And using not comic sans for text. Glee!
The extras at the end are interesting too. Updated character pages from what’s on the site, for one. And the random trivia following it was a great addition to the book. It filled you in on a bunch of smaller jokes in the comic as well as gave me a nice mental image of the character, Random Trivia, telling me all these things. And, of course, the pinups at the end were beautiful.
The major downside with it? The same as a lot of other webcomic books I’ve come across. It just doesn't fit on my trades shelf! I'm going to have to make a webcomic trades shelf if I keep buying these.
In short, if you're a fan of the series, the book is worth it.
Thanks to Shazzi for sending this! I've been waiting for it since I heard about it. I wanted to see my Deadpool.
Only problem is he doesn't look hideous. Which makes me sad. But I will survive as long as he's funny. Or, you know, becomes hideous later on. Call him Hugh Jackman!
And that's enough of me going crazy. Watchmen in March, this one in May... next year is looking good for movies.
I have a killer case of creative block right now for some reason. Because of this, hey lookit! I'm reviewing early!
Angel Revelations #3
You know, the art in here is really growing on me. More than that, I’m really enjoying this from issue to issue. This time around, we finally get to see him flying around with his wings, and his wings are wonderfully done too. They’re absolutely huge. And Warren, well, apparently he’s an awesome character. A little bit of a Sue, but nice of him to want to protect his friend.
Can’t wait until he gets caught, though. It’s going to be wonderful.
Liberty Comics #1
Yay. I had to go to another shop in order to get this, since we didn’t get it at our own shop for some obscure reason. First thing I saw when I opened this was The Boys and I was in love. Granted, the book is nothing but an ongoing ad to give to the Comic Book Legal Defence Fund, but dammit if I didn’t like some of the stuff in there.
Aaaand now I get to try and get back to that novel writing. Wish me luck!
So I’ve been away a while. No surprise, I’ve been having trouble with my homework and that has kept me increasingly busy. I’m left with two weeks to come up with a novel proposal and revise the bible now, but that makes me a little more at ease. There’s less work in that. And I have more time. I think.
On top of that, I’m going to be finished with all my credits for school in two weeks. I will never have to go to another class again. On the one hand, I’m elated. I’m going to be done forever. On the other hand, I’m completely terrified that I was right about the degree being useless and that I’m not going to be able to find a job. So I started panicking a bit.
In that panic, I remembered something rather important. I always wanted to do a little writing on the side. Granted, the plan had been to do short stories, which I’m still going to do, but there was nothing saying that I couldn’t do some articles online. So I started looking around at sites that would take articles and give me money. Helium, Associated Content and Triond all came up on the research list and all had similar problems with them. Firstly, there was the problem with the whole not paying Canadians the same. Screw that. Second was this profit sharing model whereby they split the proceeds with you.
And then I thought: I have my own damn website. I’ll take 100%, thanks. Now, maybe they could get me more exposure. Maybe I don’t really care all that much because, you know, these aren’t going to be high traffic articles anyway. I wanted to write about transmedia, media appropriateness and silly things like not fearing fanfiction.
Now, fears subsided a little, I have come to a conclusion. I’m posting more often and I’m posting more than just reviews. I’m going to start talking about all this other stuff I’m looking up online and other things I’m interested in too. Maybe practice writing a lot more. And, you know, hopefully cutting down all these excuse and life rants in the process. With a little luck.
So that’s the explanation. There are now ads on the sidebar and I’ll be making more content once the semester ends. Oh and the Scrap Paper entries should start up again after my projects are done, because dammit those take a while. Have fun everyone.
I know I haven't been around much. Updates on that tomorrow maybe. And possibly later than that. As well as some explanations.
Until then, reviews of a different sort. VIDEOS!
Batman
I don't actually know what it was really called. I've been calling it Batman and no one's bothered to correct me. I have also not bothered to read the titles when other people have posted about it. It was a Batman movie and that is all anyone needs to know, neh?
So I saw it at midnight with a bunch of other fans and it was... fun is the wrong word. Good. I didn't see much of the hype leading up to it, so I didn't have my expectations built up to the point that some did. I rather enjoyed it. Yes, Heath Ledger put up a great Joker, and it bothers me that I can now associate an actor's name to the character, but I was more enamoured with Harvey Dent throughout the movie. I'll be honest; I enjoyed his character progression far more than any other story element in the movie.
Although Joker's mannerisms were pretty nuts. Going to be sad that we'll never have another Joker, but I'm looking forward to [spoiler] Harvey coming back. Come on, he's not dead people. You can clearly see him breathing in the last scene and the end speech wasn't at a funeral. Entirely possible he's coming back in movie and comic terms. [/spoiler]
Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog
I caught all three acts before it became a pay for thing. For those who missed it, it was a three part miniseries about a villain, Dr. Horrible, trying to win the girl of his dreams (Who falls for a hero, his arch nemesis, Hammer) and trying to get into the Evil League of Evil all at once. It was so much fun and something I've always wanted to write, but without the music. Although, granted, the musical numbers in it were what won me over. If it were still free or I knew where to find it, I'd say go watch.
Oh, apparently it's available on iTunes. Meh, your choice then. If you put it out for free, keep it bloody free Whedon. It's still amazingly fun, but I think I shall wait for this supposed DVD release of it. Because, dammit, it was entertaining.
Wall-E
SO CUTE! I actually watched it this evening and it was a damn adorable movie. The lack of dialogue and staging and... aw hell, I love the adorable robots. I spent the movie laughing and squeaking and laughing again at the little things and at the bigger things. It sucked me in and, dammit, the graphics were good too.
Oh, and the opening animation from Pixar. Good form, guys. I freaking love that rabbit.
Watchmen Trailer
Can I just say how much I am in love with this? Because I have watched it over and over and freaking over again. I am so busy trying not to read into any of the hype, staying away from the website and all its special features and generally avoiding everything related to it. But dammit, the little things in the trailer have me hooked. The crystal palace on Mars looks dead on. Rorschach's mask shifting as he talks.
Online components paper done and handed in. My brain may explode. Hope to keep it off carpet.
Boys #19
You know, not much has been happening. It’s a lot of universe explanation and, while I laughed at the idea that George lopped off his own head with a chainsaw and the whole 9/11 thing happened very differently in this universe, it still didn’t have anything happen. Its back story and setup. I wish the story would come back.
Echo #4
Wow nice cover. And stuff happens on the inside. She’s finally decided to let it go and get on with her life as if she weren’t being slowly covered by metal and seemed to be doing a pretty good job until the army screwed it up. Paced better than the last one and, well, I felt for Dillon. Poor guy. But, you know, you can’t be asking questions. Thems is what gets you kicked out.
Squadron Supreme 2 # 1
Okay, so I read about half of the first run, plus a couple tie-ins. First run was all about DC characters being pulled into the world and how they’d interact with this world, how they were used and how they used the space. It’s Marvel now, I guess. I saw Spider Girl, Fantastic Four and Captain America, al in delightful perversions of themselves. Oh, and there’s Iron Man on the cover. Ultimate Power has given the Supreme universe Nick Fury and they’re using him, looks like. Let’s see if I keep up with the run.
Wanted
So I saw it. I don’t remember most of that when I was flipping through the comic, though. I got out and, well, I probably should have put my mind into complete shutdown in order to watch it. I was at adult level shut down, but damn, if that wasn’t catering to a younger audience that gets thrills from swearing. A lot of the movie felt gratuitous and done because it was cool rather than for any real point, though some of the cinematography was nicely played and the pacing was nice and fast. So I rate it a meh. See it if you want, but make sure your brain is off.
Now, this week's project. Am I supposed to be doing the comic or the game? Book's at the end, but what about the rest?
Ugh. Ever been creative brain dead? That was me most of last week trying to put together the television pitch. It HURT. And on with the comicses! Short ones, though.
Angel: Revelations #2
Because now I see it’s Angel revelations. Or that’s just what the second part is called. Don’t care. It was fun! It’s actually a surprisingly fun read. Well, it’s dark, but it was still a pretty good read.
Runaways #30
ABOUT GODDAMN TIME. And now he’s off the title forever, thank god. Nice to see Chase back in his old form, though. I thought he wrapped it up respectably so that it could be completely ignored by the new writers except for the new little girl who is there for some reason. Why is she there?
Secret Invasion: Runaways/Young Avengers #1
Read Runaways first. Looks like this is going to be Runaways heavy since a lot of the YA are a part of Fury’s secret squad. I don’t like the art and the story is a little scattered just yet. Hoping that it gets fixed for next issue because they seem to be doing the characters right. I think. I can’t tell after Joss.
Stranded #5
Well, that was cute. And still with the following along with the fast pacing that didn’t allow for any real explanation. Seriously, this was not meant for comics. TV can accommodate this kind of thing, but they needed to slow this comic the hell down. It’s okay, it’s over now.
Young Avengers Presents: Hawkeye
It’s the only one, I think, that didn’t feel quite so after school special-ish. The writing was fun, delightfully awkward and used the characters and the team dynamic pretty well to tell the story. Definitely a fun read. Even though I’m not a Kate fan. Well, I guess I am a little now.
Teen Titans #60
You know what? I feel gypped. A damn lot happened in the issue, which was great, but I didn’t feel any real sense of resolution with the storyline. Actually, I mostly had this “RAVAGER HAS SUPERPOWERS?!” thing running through my head after that point and it rather annoyed me. She doesn’t need them, dammit.
Teen Titans: Year One #5
Remember when I said I didn’t know how they were going to do after the third issue? Here’s the answer. BADLY. Should have stopped at three.
Vix #1
I’m getting a 100 Girls feel from this title. Which is good because I liked that series. Unfortunately, I don’t think anyone’s going to be ordering in the rest of them for me. One month, I go hunting.
Also, damn you Michael Turner for dying. You made me spend Saturday digging up everything you’ve ever done for a guy who now wanted to buy everything you’ve ever done. On the bright side, I no longer have to puzzle over where you learned anatomy.
Booster Gold #10
Well, that was a little anticlimactic. Good to see Beetle dead at last too, since they’ve been drawing it out. As for the rest of it, it felt a little eh. I kind of wanted him dead at the beginning because the anticipation for it was killing me. Might have something to do with the whole sense of the issue going out the window, though. Because, damn, that might have made sense if I were still battling that cold I had earlier this week.
Eternals #1
I think I need to reread the original story. I can’t remember what’s happening and the celestial they were talking to seems awfully reminiscent of the newuniversal thing. Actually, the two stories have pretty much the same style, flow and slow pacing to them, don’t they? But damn don’t remember what happened.
newuniversal #2
Well, still no word on what part of Vancouver that was. Or why there are more of them now showing up. Or why there’s weird mentions of Marvel characters scattered around the news. I’m guessing to show it’s parallel. Does this mean that the newuniversal kids are parallel to the Eternals kids?
Titans #3
And now I ask myself, is this in continuity? Really, I gotta know. Because I have no idea where the current titans or any of the other titans are, though apparently they’re all out of the picture and not helping out with this whole matter, and yet that’s what I keep wondering throughout this whole thing. They all got taken out? And that makes Nightwing horny. And, well, I didn’t really pay much attention to the rest of it. They’re looking for other Trigon children, right?
Things I also read: Skarr Son of Hulk: Got as far as “The puny humans” and put it down. That’s three words in. Huntress: Year One #3: I’m liking her. This year one series is fun. Secret Invasion #3: I’m actually going to dedicate a whole post to the series so far.
And a movie: Kung Fu Panda
DAMN this was a fun movie. If you don’t mind a fun kids movie that was designed for kids (I mention the kids thing because that’s all the critics had problems with that I could tell) then go see it. The dumpling fight had me laughing, as did the vast majority of the movie and it was just so much damn fun. Scenes from the commercial were even funny despite having seen those bloody things over and over. It was… just go see it.
Okay, since some high profile (for Canada) marketing campaign done in the form of an alternate reality game was released, I figure I should probably take a good look at it and think about it in terms of my project. Things like what I’d do different and how to improve on the design and what not.
For those uninitiated, and for my own reference, Much Music had someone slipping weird, static-y videos into their feed at random intervals. They were very carefully placed, though at the time it was so weird to see something interrupting the regular broadcast that you weren’t sure what was going on. The shock factor was so bizarre that people didn’t do much more than speculate.
Then the link showed up. Good move. It was a blogspot blog. Really, would have been better if they hadn’t bought the domain then set up the blog. The blog with a blogspot url would have worked pretty well to establish credibility too.
The problems also started with the blog, though. It was clear that this guy was doing it for shits and giggles and had no point to it. One of those going out with a bang quitting interns. Yet he called himself an activist fighting the power without any goal, rhyme or reason behind his actions. The attacks were random.
Or rather, they were. Until I saw two episodes of Video on Trial in one day with the exact same interruption in them at the same time. I’ll admit, I’m very slow. This was the thing that tipped me off first. Granted, I hadn't found the blog yet.
And then I saw the explanation for the hacks on his site. And they did not coincide with what I saw. Worse, I saw a screenshot of an alert sent out to the Much employees to proceed as if nothing was happening. First off, his default is Arial while the email is in trebuchet (which bothered the crap out of me for some reason. Come on, Courier is more credible!) and if he’s a tech genius WHY IS HE USING OUTLOOK?! And no Firefox either. I disbelieve him completely.
It also raises the question very plainly of why the VJs didn’t react to it in the first place. Why NO ONE reacted.
Started paying a little more attention at this point. Meaning I actually checked the site once a week to see what was going on and I was happy listening to people point out that it was a fake. Also, noticed that the username was exactly what they were going to do. Phreak the MMVAs (Much Music Video Awards) on June 15. Original. Name him after the marketing campaign. Woot?
Might have worked better if you were clear on the intent right off the bat. Suddenly he has a motive way too late in the game.
A good while later, they release the Find the Phreak contest on Much. It’s cheesy, it’s a pain in the ass and it sounds like management talking to a tech team trying to sound like they know what they’re doing. In short, it pissed me off.
Some time in here they started randomly putting Phreak masks in random indie hipster emo clothing stores that were well out of reach of the Phreak’s location. Nice to see them getting into the audience participating in the game physically. Fail for not adhering to the geographic limitations.
And then they stop pretending that it was anything but a marketing campaign. All of the MMVA commercials have those Youtube videos from the camwhores who believe it or think that they can get their half second of fame. Embedded into the video. Overtop of cheap and cheesy videos that go against their branding for the MMVAs at perfectly timed intervals.
And no more phreaks of the shows. It turned into an outright marketing thing, contained entirely in the commercials.
Way too long after that, Phreak shows up in the commercials for the contest. Sorry, buddy, way too late given your character. Not believable. But that does bring us to the present state of affairs.
So first they needed a reason for the Phreak to stick to. Putting the reason into his name, fine. Not announcing the reason outright, fail.
No one reacted. Don’t tell the VJs what’s going on and see how they react. It makes it feel more legitimate when someone on air, especially live, acknowledges that something’s happening and they don’t know what’s happening.
Embedding it into the video. BAD IDEA if you’re going to explain it like that. Instead, play the little phreaked video once and only once. And don’t perfectly time it either. Have it actually overlap some stuff. Cut off the end of a VJ throwing and over the front end of a video. Hang off a video and into commercial. Make it seem like he’s trying out something.
Video quality. Lower it. The video itself is low (better if it looked like cam work), but the production looks a bit like Video on Trial. And some of those clips are expensive to get. I know from trying to find stock video for my project last semester. And a little less audio production too.
If it built UP to that quality based on suggestions from users, that might have worked better.
Youtube and Blogspot involvement were good. Be better if they knew how to use their involvement there, but still a good idea.
Don’t post screenshots of your character’s computer to people who might be familiar with the demographic. Or, at least, install the right programs. Honestly, how many techs still use Outlook when they can get stuff forwarded to anywhere else that’s not a Microsoft product?
I don’t know enough about the physical aspects of ARGs to comment much, but it seems like posting a map and saying “Go here” is a shitty way of going about things. How about clues? Hints rather than outright, “If you live in the area, visit this trendy clothing store and get the mask.”
You know, what might have salvaged this was making it not a marketing campaign. The relation to the MMVAs made the whole thing very cheap and the phreaks were all so pointless before the connection. They had the potential to gain some potency over time when he found his legs, but now it’s just a pain in the ass. Doesn’t even phreak the shows anymore. It’s all part of the commercials. No point.
Want some semblance of decent? Hint that they should watch during one of the popular much countdown shows and give the viewers the gift of the Hamster Dance. Or maybe some Thrice. Get some exposure to the lesser played and forgotten. Play all of Thriller over a commercial break and into a show. Video from the 70s. You know, something that might have a point to it. Tell the world he wants to help Canada by forcing his music tastes on them.
