Saturday, January 17, 2004

   Here comes the twister, love, here comes the twister...
I've got so much to talk about that I don't know where to start.

The beginning is a good place to start; I am drowned in a sea of newness, after a month and a half of nothingness. Tis a beatiful thing.

First, on Wednesday night:

Smallville:......that's it? That's it? That's kinda' sad....

After so much build up, I expected a defenitive and long-reaching ending. While the ending was defenitive, the status-quo was almost exactly the same was when we started. Guh.

It was nice to see the return of some of the previous freaks of the week, but the further straining of Lana and Clark's already ridiculously complicated relationship was just lost on me. And Lex got screwed, badly.

So Lionel Luther is evil? We've known that from day one! What a waste of potential this episode was...

Angel: ^____^ The funny/irreverant episodes of Angel and Buffy are always the best, and this was no exception. It was nice to see things from Harmoney's POV, and it was cool that she resolved her own problems, instead of getting bailed out by the others.

Also, while true, and a bit humerous, Spike's reasons for not returning to Buffy are a bit weak to me. He died for her; why wouldn't he want to be with her?

For that matter, where the heck have the Buffster and crew been ever since Sunnydale was destroyed? I want to see Andrew come back!

Friends: Oh, hell no. It's way too late in the game for a clip show! They've got two months in which to bring everything to a staisfying conclusion, and they give us a clip show! Big rip!!

What happened? Monica and Chandler bought a house. Nothing funny or worth repreating happens. Waste.

Scrubs: My TV guide said there'd be Scrubs, and there was no Scrubs!!

Comics:

My friends, the comic gods have smiled upon me. My local comic haunt (Millenium Comics, off of state road sixty in Brandon, next to Fameous Tate's,), has added a $1 section.

^_________^

I got a huge load of new comics, and a few treasures.

Spider-Girl #68: Well, Brad's a bigot and a cretin; this ish pretty much seals it. Meanwhile, May/Spider-Girl's classmate and ex, Jack Jameson (Also the costumed crimefighter the Buzz), is seriously stressed. His girlfriend was outed as a mutant and left town, and now the mysterious Dr. Jade has returned.

Apparently Dr. Jade was instrumental to the Buzz's origin, and killed one of Jack's close friends. The Buzz is determined to track her down and bring her to justice, but all his leads get him nowhere. Jack's rready to take his anger out on Brad, knowing that he's one of the punks that scared Nancy into leaving.

You know, I think May should have just let Jack beat the crap out of Brad. I know she can't let on that she saved Nancy as Spider-Girl, but she knows Brad's a creep; why protect him?

This ish felt kinda' filler-y, at least until the appearance of Dr. Jade's associate at then end. Now it feels kinda' foreshadow-y.

Venom #8: Sweet Lord, would someone teach Daniel Way how to pace a story?! "Shiver" started really excrutiatingly slow but got faster in the last two parts, and now "Run" has gone from a great first two issues to mindless comic rehetoric.

There are too many characters with agendas not explained, too many leaps in logic, and the questions I had from the first issue still haven't been answered! This is like a bad X-Files riff. The conclusion is next month; if I'm not 'wowed', I'm ditching this series.

Man...I wanted Venom to have a cool solo series for once....

Spectacular Spider-Man #9: Doctor Octopus has issues. Seriously messed-up issues. However, I'm not sure who's more messed-up: the good Doctor, or the mysterious new super hero known as the Kiwi Kid?

Well, actually, Kiwi Kid is Peter's neighbor, Big John, whom Spidey has enlisted to keep taping the action at Octavios's hideout for some reason. Meanwhile, Detective Garret and the Isralei servicemen are ready to storm the place, but all attention is actually turned to Times Square.

Spider-Man, right on schedual, has arrived in front of the assembled world community, is about to unmask himself. Ock, of course, also shows up.

I really like what Octavious says to the crowds: "I want you to take a good look at your hero. I want him to be famous, and I want his family to spend the rest of their lives explaining away his actions. I want him to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, to become mired in a legal morass until the end of his days. But most of all, I want you to see the difference between us: I will retain my status after today, and he will become nothing but a man."

Is it any wonder I love Paul Jenkin's writing? If you only buy one Spider-Man book, buy Spectacular. Hell, if you only buy one comic book period, buy Spectacular. unless Mark Millar's Marvel Knights title blows me away this March, this is my favorite stint of writing on a Spidey book by far. If only I could say the same of the art.

Spider-Man Unlimited #1: What? Another Spider-Man book? Yes, but this one is different. You see, the premise behind this (And its sister title, X-Men Unlimited), is that it is the first exposure for the particular writers/artists in the book. It's their way to "Break in" to the business. I love the idea of the book, and think we need more books like it.

However, the constantly rotating team means that quality will be on a stoey-by-story basis. (There are two stories in each issue.) Nonetheless, I will support this title as long as I am financially able.

The first story....ehhh.... If youv'e ever heard of or read the classic story "The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man", you've basically read this story. If you haven't, this might seem touiching, but to most Spiderfans, it's a retread. The art's none too great, either.

The second story makes this issue, and was worth the price of admision alone. I'm not going to really reveal all that much, lest I run the risk of spoiling the punch-line, but even if you just see this issue on the stands, read the second story. The art's pretty good too. ^__^

Transformers G1 #0: Well, I keep hearing good things about the Dreamwave Transformer comics, so I checked this one out.

Big mistake. I want my $3 back.

Trigun vol 2: We certainly aren't in Kansas anymore. After the first volume was incredibly similar to the anime, I kind of expected more of the same here.

Nope. Everything old is new again. There's way too many differences between the manga and anime to count at this point, but one thing I noticed is that everything is more intense. Legato is more bloodthirsty. Monav is more determined. Knives is more sadistic. Wolfwood is more enigmatic.

I am in awe. If you're a fan of Trigun, read this. If you're a f an of manga, read this. If you're niether, at least borrow it from someone that has it. ^_^

And, my back-issue treasures....

The Exile Returns parts 1 and 4 (Web of Spdr-Mn 118 and Spider-Man #53): Waaay back in '94, when the now-hated Clone Saga began, there was a second Spider-Man by the name of Ben Riely. Sice this is around wghen I started reading, I don't hate the CS, although I can easily see its flaws. However, in its beginnings, it was'nt that bad. This was one of its earliest stories, and it's prewtty good.

Basically, Ben returned to New York because Aunt May was sick (being a clone of Peter, he has all of Peter's memories up until the point of cloning; he also has Peter's emotions.). However, now in New York, a city he left years ago after disappearing, he finds that even with one Spider-Guy in town, there's still a lot of heroing to do.

So, when he hears that Venom's back in town, he decides to bring him to justice. Can't accuse him of being a slow starter.

Even though Venom beats the crap out of him, Ben (Now nicknamed the Scarlet Spider) manages to beat Venom single-handedly. Sure, Venom almost killed him, but in the end, the bad guy was thrashed. Nice.

The back issue $1 bin also had "The Child Within", "Shrieking" and "Exiled", but I left those for another day. I'm comiced-out.

Anime:

Astro Boy: Yuck. I mean, really. tHe animation was bad, the plot was bland, and the characters were shallow. And they ran *this* over Megaman NT Warriors?

Jackie Chan: Finally, the big question is addressed: Jade, a help or hinderance? I don't recall JCA having a clip show before, and for a clip show, this was nicely done. Some of the dialogue was bad, IMO, but it was still a nice episode.

What happened to Dao Long Wong, anyway? Is he lost in time?

Yu-Gi-Oh: Boy, Nesbitt got screwed, didn't he? I guess it'll be neat to see Joey and Yugi take the five down once and for all, but for some reason, this episode lacked drama.

Static Shock: Man, this show is bland....

I also saw the movie Big Fish. If you like movies, see Big Fish. It kicks arse.

Whew....

Thought of the moment: I got my siggy all nice. ^__^ Just needs a banner.

Quote of the moment: "Soon, twelve assassains will appear. The very wickedest men. I'll delight if they give you even a tenth of the Hell you deserve." -Legato Bluesummers, "Trigun, vol 2"
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