OK, the Super Bowl. See, I toldja the Patriots were gonna win, didn't I? And that it would be a very close game too, right? So, smart guy, I hear you saying, why was your postseason prediction record 5-6? Uh...well...y'see....aw, to heck wit'it. Wait till next year.

Favorite Super Bowl commercial (and bear in mind that I turned to Carnivale at 8 CST, then back when it was over, so I missed a few): the FedEx spot with Burt Reynolds. The rest I saw were a boring, derivative lot. The FedEx spot was derivative by design, though, so that's OK. I guess.

Paul McCartney was pretty good at halftime, too, performing on an elaborate stage that reminded me of a high-tech version of something that some network would have cobbled together for the Fabs around 1965 or so. Pretty routine run-through of familar tunes, but the band was tight and the songs were fine. I was gratified to see that he has retained many of the members of his Driving Rain tour band; I think they've spurred him to his best music since the mid-70s. Just wish he'd get around to doing a new studio record with them soon. We were fortunately spared the sign of his undoubtedly wizened teat, but I wish that he would have worn a Janet Jackson t-shirt or something equally cheeky. But "cheeky" and Paul really don't go together very well, do they?

And this concludes what will most likely be the last football-related post for a good long while. Almost time for pitchers and catchers to report!

BEST OF THE WEEK

COMICS COMMENTARY!
What I bought and what I thought, week of February 2!

CONCRETE: THE HUMAN DILEMMA 2
Uh...is it just me, or does Concrete, standing in the distance all pensive and stuff, look like a big gray penis on that cover? Anyway, it's kinda appropriate given the theme of this miniseries, namely global overpopulation. After a rather clumsy and forced sermon on that very subject, we then get a little fatal road rage action then a surprisingly erotic scene which, despite the strangeness of the whole thing, works very well. It also promises something which, I suspect, will be more significant to longtime readers than neophytes. You just never know what you're gonna get with this book sometimes. A-

ADAM STRANGE 5
Adam gets another step closer to finding out what has happened to his adopted homeworld in another solid, if not especially remarkable one way or the other, chapter. About the only thing I knew about the L.E.G.I.O.N. concept and book, which I didn't buy back in the day, was that a Braniac ancestor/descendant named Vril Dox is in charge, and sure enough, here he is. The Omega Men return, and provide effective comic relief and plot threads, Pascal Ferry still can't draw figures that aren't coiled, tense and ready for action, even when standing still, and I actually thought the coloring was better than last issue. I don't know whether it's Ferry or the colorist who's responsible for putting such a soft-focus edge on everything, but I wish he'd stop. Makes me want glasses. B+

MONOLITH 12
For those who complain about decompressed storylines in ongoing comics. With the black dog of cancellation nipping at their heels, writers Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray squeeze about four issues' worth of story into one as we see the resolution of the Alice kidnapping, her second detox in one comics year, belated Christmas gifts, and a reveal we already knew was coming in a sappy ending conveniently titled "The Sappy Ending". Despite the supercompression, this was actually a better read than the last three issues, and a fitting farewell for a title that had potential in equal measure to the total weight of its protagonist. B+

THE QUESTION 4
Recalling instances in the past when Tommy Lee Edwards drew Superman, and liking those (as I tend to do with fave Edwards), and also recalling writer Rick Veitch's take on the Supes legend, Maximortal, I was anticipating the much-hyped guest appearance by the Man of Tomorrow in this issue. Well, so much for anticipation. Supes' appearance is little more than a finger wagging cameo, and Edwards chose to hide his features behind the Photoshop "find edges" filter which is supposed to represent the Question's "shaman sight"...so it was more frustrating than anything. Veitch and Edwards fare better when giving us Q running around messing up the underground operation of villain Minos, and advancing the whole Science Spire/buried ghosts thing, which has me curious to where it's going. Could have been better, could have been worse. B+

JUSTICE LEAGUE ELITE 8
You know, if you want spandex action, you could do a lot worse than this title. Of course, the dark shadings will repel some, but writer Joe Kelly, resisting his well-known penchant for convolution, is doing some great character stuff and for once the sci-fi plot doesn't strain credibility, either, if you accept the whole multi-dimensional travel aspect of the thing. We even get this tied in to Kirby's Fourth World towards the ending, and a faint sense of wonder in even invoked. Of course, if not for the art of Doug Mahnke and Tom Nguyen, I wouldn't even be buying this in the first place, and they don't disappoint. For them that likes, here it is. B+

MIA: Shanna The She-Devil 1, because my shop sold out. More copies are coming from another store, they tell me.

And now. What you've all been waiting for:
JOHNNY B DOES MANGA!

Japanese culture is very seductive. The art, the films, the language and customs- some people get obsessed by it, and while I'm not exactly there I've enjoyed my share of Japanese films, took a language course in college (retained very little, thank you), and hold out a faint hope that someday I'll visit that tiny island nation before my time is done. I have fond, faintly fleeting memories of watching Astro Boy cartoons on the Bowling Green TV station (and there's no WAY that dreadfully stodgy station would show that sort of thing now) in the early 60s, as well as Tobor, The Eighth Man on one of the Louisville stations. Guess I wanted to establish that I'm open, receptive, and friendly to the culture, which would seem to clash completely with my stance so far on manga.

Right now, Japanese comics aka manga are all the rage, not only with the Comics Blogosphereiverse, but surprisingly with the general populace, especially kids and teens. Me, I remember the prehistoric era of manga over here, in the late 70s-early 80s, when we were introduced to such titles as Barefoot Gen, Lone Wolf and Cub, and Mai The Psychic Girl. And while some of it was skillfully done, I just never warmed to it. There was just a monotony to the subject matter and art style that didn't, and still doesn't, appeal to me. Add to that the fact that all Western manga are by necessity translated from the original katakana or whatever they're written it in, and frankly the dialogue in nearly every manga I've read (and I'll be the first to admit that there is a LOT that I haven't sampled) scans as flat, awkward, matter-of-fact and dead, and reads like it's a translation- and something's getting lost. There's no flow, no poetry, none of the idiosyncratic personality that can (not always, but can) be found in Western comics. I'm sure many of you out there can cite me dozens upon dozens of examples of exceptions, and I kinda hope you do, but right now I'm just callin' 'em as I see 'em. Recently, I decided that since it's a well-established fact that I don't know everything, and have been known (believe it or not) to be absolutely wrong on more than one occasion, that I should listen to the multitude of voices of those whose opinions I respect and dip my toe back into the mangapool. Trying to decide what to buy, I kept seeing one title mentioned over and over again: the four volume series from Tokyopop, Planetes, written and drawn by Makoto Yakimura.

First of all, what or who or why is a/the "Planetes"? How is it pronounced? Plan-et-EES? Plan-etts? Plan-ett-us? Planuties? I'm confus-ed. It's certainly never mentioned in the first volume. Now, all facetiousness aside, I gotta say that in spite of my reservations, I got really caught up in the exploits of the three garbagemen in space, set in the year 2074. All three characters got lots of screen time, so we could find out what drives each of them. First up was Yuri, who we see lose his wife in a space shuttle accident, who is quite understandably scarred by this and is seeking to lose himself in his work. The pages that depicted the shuttle accident were in color, even though the rest of the book was in black & white; I wondered why this was. Hachimaki Hoshino, the rookie of the group, dreams of becoming a rich and famous astronaut and sees the garbage detail as a necessary step towards realizing his ambition. Hotheaded, chain-smoking, impulsive Fee (and I'm sorry, but I kept thinking of the Tubes' Fee Waybill) is the pilot of the ship and probably gets the least development, at least this time out. In this volume, we also see Yuri get a measure of peace with the tragedy in his life and befriend Hachi's young, rocket-building brother in an interlude on Earth, probably the best chapter; Fee gets an amusing, action-filled showcase when an eco-terrorist group prevents her from finding a place to smoke; Hachi meets a young girl who was raised on the moon and has never been to Earth; and in the final story has to cope with isolation therapy in the aftermath of an accident in space in which he was exposed to radiation, and realizes if he can't overcome his fears he'll never get to go back in space, let alone become an astronaut.

Yukimura's art is great. He especially excels at depicting the majesty and beauty of outer space, the shots of Earth below as the astronauts float in the emptiness and so on. It's nicely detailed, and he does action very well, too, especially in the aforementioned Fee showcase story. There were many scenes that were staged in a fashion that reminded me of work I've seen by John Cassaday and Warren Ellis on Planetary, especially in the opening color sequence. Guess we know what Cassaday probably referenced, huh! One thing I can't help but wonder, though, and bear in mind that this is an uninformed question: why do manga artists, almost unanimously and without fail, draw their characters with Western, or at least race-neutral, features? None of the presumably Japanese people look even remotely Asian! I'm sure the desire not to be race-specific and the desire to appeal to a world audience as opposed to a Japan-centric one is the key there, but why is this, I wonder?

Well, all things considered, I liked the first volume of Planetes, and I can certainly see me picking up the next four books in the series one of these days. I still can't see a time when I'll become a regular reader of manga- there just aren't enough colors for me in the palette- but as long as I can keep finding solid reads like this I'll certainly try a few more titles before I'm done.

Fairy tales can come true, it can happen to you
If you're young at heart
For it's hard, you will find, to be narrow of mind
If you're young at heart

You can go to extremes with impossible schemes
You can laugh when your dreams fall apart at the seams
And life gets more exciting with each passing day
And love is either in your heart or on it's way

Don't you know that it's worth every treasure on earth
To be young at heart
For as rich as you are it's much better by far
To be young at heart

And if you should survive to 105
Look at all you'll derive out of being alive
Then here is the best part
You have a head start
If you are among the very young at heart

"Young at Heart" by Carolyn Leigh and Johnny Richards

As of last January 16, I am 45 years of age. I say this not for your sympathy, but to establish a point early on, nothing more. There's method to my age and song-quoting madness, bear with me.

Right now, there is nobody with more hype and buzz than Bryan Lee O'Malley, the fellow responsible for the much-talked-about Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life Vol.1, as well as his debut effort Lost at Sea. Again, I know that most of you reading this already know that, so again bear with, OK?

I read Lost a couple of weeks ago, and Pilgrim a couple of days ago; I wanted to wait until I had finished them both before holding forth. And I had two initial reactions, one after the other: this guy's art is deceptively great; and I am nowhere near the target demographic for either of these stories. I felt like I was trying to hang with my daughter's friends, another pathetic old man trying to be (Dr. Evil voice here) all "I'm hip, I'm with it!".

It strikes me as odd that in a field which is concerned constantly with writing "comics for adults", and is often preoccupied with not seeming juvenile or childish, how few graphic novels are actually written for adults. And by "adults", I'm saying people in that over-30 years of age bracket, not the young, trendy, edgy, advertising-dollar-friendly 18-25 bracket. In most comics, especially Indie books, that I run across- all the protagonists are twentysomething or younger, like (in most cases), their author/artists, with that sexy "alternative" look, all baseball-sleeve shirts, black-rimmed glasses, choppy/long straight hair, belly shirts on the girls, lots of barrettes, clunky heels, all of them pretty as sin and most of them preoccupied with the very sort of thing that trendmakers and MTV mandate that one must be preoccupied with. And yes, I know, I'm simplifying and generalizing, and I could probably use better examples to make my point, but Jesus, Mary and Joseph, do I feel old and in the way after reading a lot of Indie output these days, and that extends to webcomics like Scary-Go-Round, Diesel Sweeties, Girls With Slingshots, Wapsi Square, and others. This is nobody's fault, creators are just doing what they know best, which is kind of the number one rule given to aspiring writers and artists. But I can't help but wonder- who's doing the comics for people in my age group and older? A cynic would answer that Marvel and DC are perpetuating their corporate trademarks with its hidebound continuity concerns for the aging fanboys out there, but what of those of us who don't particularly want to read Thomas/Conway/Wolfman-style comics until they're dead? The only Indie graphic novels or comics that featured older people as the main characters that I can think of offhand were Paul Grist's Kane (and he may have been in his twenties), and AiT/PlanetLar's Last of the Independents. I'm sure there are others, but they don't come to mind easily and for every one of them there are three DEMOs, Blankets and Couriers. DC, more so than Marvel, seems to feature more, shall we say, "mature" characters; scanning a recent issue of Justice League Elite, to name one of many, I get the idea that Green Arrow is probably in his mid-thirties, Flash in his early thirties, and over in Superman and the Batman books, especially Gotham Central, the title characters appear to be in their mid-thirties and some of the members of the GCPD older than that. And don't get me wrong here- identifying with the main characters is not absolutely essential for me to enjoy a story; one of my favorite comics series of recent memory is Courtney Crumrin, fer Chrissakes.. I try to maintain an interest in the new, and I haven't closed myself off to youth culture, film, books, music- at least not as much as many of my peers in the ordinary run of life have. Hence the song lyrics up top. Maybe I'm an arrested adolescent, who can say. But like I said earlier, ofttimes I read a lot of what is most hyped in Indie comics circles these days and feel like I'm trying to run with my son's buddies. I don't belong, and I can't relate.

So, long-winded rant aside, what did I think of Lost at Sea and Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life Vol. 1 ? I liked them. With reservations. Lost is the story of a self-absorbed, spacey young girl named Raliegh (age 18, but O'Malley draws her as if she was 12) who is traveling back home with some friends she met in college. Shy, self-conscious Raliegh is convinced that she has no soul, that cats stole it. Actually, Raliegh is suffering from a broken home (she has a silly, ineffectual, arrested-adolescent dad and a driven career Mom who are divorced) and is crushing on a guy she met online, and once met in person as well, and had a brief relationship. Raliegh keeps seeing cats, and eventually persuades her friends to catch some of them in hopes of getting her purloined soul back. Everybody has a lot of self-revealing scenes, they all bond, and Raliegh decides perhaps her life isn't so bad after all, because she has friends and they make her feel good about herself. And here's where what I said earlier comes into play; as a parent of two grown children, and as someone who went through a sizable amount of adolescent angst myself, I just wanted to sit her down and say "Raliegh, this, too will pass. When you get older, you'll look back and see how trivial your problems were and regret spending so much time being preoccupied with yourself". And perhaps this is what she realizes at the end, anyway- but it takes a fair amount of time to get there. On a craft level, O'Malley has a nice knack for writing dialogue, especially humor. Even though I never was comfortable being privy to the journey of Raliegh and her friends, I admired the natural, relaxed storytelling style O'Malley has. In lesser hands, this could be unbearably pretentious, but O'Malley never gives in. I like his art a lot more than his writing, even, and more on that after I've held forth on Precious Little Life.

I enjoyed Scott Pilgrim a lot more than its predecessor; it was a lot more lively and fun. It's about 3/4 rock 'n' roll romantic comedy, then (as I'm sure most of you are aware, so hopefully I'm not dropping spoilers here) it makes an abrupt, jarring switch into superpowered video-game style fighting which would be completely offputting if not for the fact that O'Malley builds up such goodwill with his note-perfect relationship stuff that he can hand this to us with a smile on his face, and we nod and say "that's pretty cool". It's very hard to resist that panel with them all standing in unison, pointing, towards the end. O'Malley has the stones to make his title character a bit of a self-absorbed dick; but he still somehow makes him likeable enough to where we hope Scott ends up with his literal dream girl Ramona, even though we develop an attraction to the high school girl named (for no apparent reason that I could ascertain) Knives Chao that he takes up with first. It's a neat trick. As with Lost (I'm gonna talk about art now), O'Malley has a deceptively simple art style, with his elastic-limbed, Lego-headed figures...but he can take his endearingly sloppy fat ink line and grant them all expressiveness to burn, plus he is outstanding at staging, composition, spotting blacks, and all that good old technical stuff. Like Andi Watson, whose work hums a similar tune, he is very good at saying a lot with little more than a few brush strokes. It's a nice ability to have.

So yeah, I liked both these books, Pilgrim more so than Lost. I'd give the former an A, the latter a B+. I will, of course, be right there with most of my Comics Blogosphereiversal peers when Pilgrim Vol. 2 comes out. And I hope nobody says "Go home, Grandpa, this is NOT FOR YOU!!".

Heh- Eddie Vedder reference.

Time now for the season finale of JOHNNY B'S FEARLESS NFL PIGSKIN PLAYOFF PROGNOSTICATIONS!

You all remember that two weeks ago I said that the LOSERS of the conference championships would be Pittsburgh and Atlanta, right? Right? Oh, all right. I laid an egg. Screwed the pooch. Missed the boat. Was WRONG. Philly simply never let my Falcons get anything going on offense, and it didn't help that when Atlanta finally DID get down at the end zone late in the first half, and could have closed to within a field goal, they opted to kick the give-up FG instead of trying to punch it in with the league's best running attack. Bojemoi. The whole second half was just an exercise in futility after that three-pointer, which won the battle but lost the war. And I STILL maintain that Chad Lewis's first TD was bogus- it sure looked like he had his LEFT foot on the sideline...but the TV announcers and everyone else were focused on his RIGHT foot, with which he barely grazed the ground- but he was OUT OF BOUNDS. NO CATCH. It's beside the point now, but a score here and a score there affects momentum, which is important. Oh well. Wait till next year! In the other game, let's face it- the Patriots played a perfect game, closed down the Steelers running attack which was crucial for them to control the clock, and made Ben Roethlisberger look like the rookie he is. So I went 0-2 two weeks ago, and ensured that I have a putrid 4-6 losing record in my playoff predictions.

But, there's still one more chance for me to go out on a positive, and that's tomorrow's Super Bowl game. Of course, it's no easier to pick than any of these have been this year. Both teams are exceptional and solid. Philly's defense is quick enough to hold their own against the precise Patriot offense, and Donovan McNabb is crafty and skilled enough to make things happen on offense. Bryant Westbrook, not Terrell Owens, is key if the Eagles are to win the first franchise championship of any kind since the year I was born. I think Owens will contribute, maybe even catch a TD pass- but Westbrook is gonna have to make things happen himself for the Eagles to be victorious. So enough already, Dave, who's gonna WIN?

The New England Patriots.

I've picked against them for the last two months, it seems, and they've punked me every time. I'm tired of being punked. I go with the Pats to win their third.

And it wouldn't surprise me at all if I was wrong again.

Lots of stuff to write about, and I'm off work and home alone so watch out.

Caught an episode of the WB's Batman about an hour ago. I realize that it's "supposed" to be for kids, but geez- the Joker, in his new (Matsuda-designed, I assume) all-wrong feral look, has a big ray gun that can create, apparently out of thin air, a huge plastic (or something) faux playing card in which the target is encased, presumably able to breathe but nothing else. This little device, which might have gone over in a Bridwell or Fox 1964 DC story, might, completely blew the episode for me. Not to mention the horrible, cliche-filled dialogue, full of "Easy, partner, don't do anything rash" and "Joker, you maniac" pronouncements. Ugh. I haven't been able to catch many episodes of this new series, because of work and Saturday morning errands and odd jobs which always seem to pop up- and while I like most of the character designs, Joker excepted, and art style in general, so far I'm not impressed. Dini, Murakami and Timm have nothing to worry about.

Ooh! Ooh! Music meme! Found at Bill Sherman's, from Beaucoup Kevin.

1. Total amount of music files on your computer:
I'm at work, and my iTunes tells me I have 1307 songs, 5.57 GB. Mostly, it's CD's I bring from home and rip so I can listen to them here and not have to carry my CD's around so much. On the mighty mighty indigo iMac here at Casa Bacardi, 483 files, 1.9 GB. I seriously need to burn some CDs and get these off my computer.

2. The last CD you bought was:
Neil Young's On The Beach, purchased last Saturday. I had put it off long enough.

3. What is the song you last listened to before reading this message?
"Morning Glory", Tim Buckley. From the 2 CD career retrospective of the same name. I'm still warming to Buckley, whose singing style is an acquired taste but the man could write a melody when he was inclined...

4. Write down 5 songs you often listen to or that mean a lot to you.
There are so many candidates for this, it's not even funny. Here's a list off the top of my head, mostly in the "mean a lot to me" category:

"What He Doesn't Know"- Lloyd Cole, from Don't Get Weird On Me Babe
"Anastasia" by Elliott Murphy, from Just A Story From America
"Glad And Sorry"- Faces, from Ooh La La
"The Lottery Song"- Nilsson, from Nilsson Schmilsson
"So Young"- Ron Sexsmith, from Other Songs

5. Who are you going to pass this stick to? (3 persons) and why?
Brendan! You, definitely. Dave Puckett! I still have many, many fond (if somewhat foggy) memories of listening to a lot of great music at his basement apartment circa 1977. And I would have said Bill S, but he's already done it, or Sean Collins, who doesn't blog anymore...if anybody else wants to take a crack at it, cool, but let me know if you saw it here first, 'kay?

Oh, what a difference a year makes.

The text of an online article at Comics World News, dated February 4, 2004:

Palmiotti, Gray & Winslade Sell Out
The debut issue of the new series THE MONOLITH has sold out at DC Comics.

DC COMICS SELLS OUT OF THE MONOLITH #1

The debut issue of the new series THE MONOLITH (DEC030283) has sold out at DC Comics. The issue, written by Jimmy Palmiotti ( recently interviewed here at CWN) & Justin Gray with art and cover by Phil Winslade, arrived in stores on February 4.

"This is great news and a real solid sign that people are interested in experiencing new and exciting concepts," say Palmiotti & Gray. "We cannot thank the wonderfully talented crew at DC Comics enough for their hard work in making THE MONOLITH a hit!"

"We printed this issue substantially beyond retailers' orders," says Bob Wayne, DC's VP - Sales & Marketing. "Between advance reviews and word of mouth, this series has momentum. We suggest retailers increase their orders now on upcoming issues."

Well, what did you expect him to say?

Well, hello there! Busy busy today, so precious little bloggy goodness from me. Just thought I'd post a little somethin-somethin while I was monitoring the high school ballgame (I play the commercial spots, and get the announcers on and off. Fun.) here at the radio station.

So, here's a better-late-than-never BSBdG to:



The lovely Latina lady with the revolving pelvis, the Charo of the Aughts...Shakira Isabel Mebarak Ripoll aka Shakira! I liked what little I heard from her Laundry Service CD, just not enough to take the plunge and buy. Sure liked that "Whenever, Wherever" video, though...

Oyasumi Nasai, y'all!

Hey! New webcomic from none other than Hope Larson, who, along with Kean Soo, will be posting dueling comics- Larson's on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and Soo on Tuesday and Thursday. It's called The Secret Friend Society. The secret is out!

I like Larson's style, and I've never seen her sequential work before so I'm looking forward. Her story's titled Salamander Dream. Soo's- titled Jellaby- also looks cool, judging by the splash page anyway. Go! Check it out!

Wow- a new Christgau's Consumer Guide (I'm thinking I should check out the Arcade Fire) and a new Tuesday Morning Quarterback column in the same day! Sweet!

Back about a million years ago, in the 1980's, my good friend Dave Puckett got me interested in a comic published by Aardvark-Vanaheim (and doesn't THAT take you back) called Journey. Its writer/artist, William Messner-Loebs, told a remarkably detailed and fascinating account of the adventures of the frontier scout Wolverine McAlistair in the post-Revolutionary War era USA, and while I will guiltily admit I never bought it myself but read Dave's copies, I thought it was a great series and wouldn't mind having a collection, if one existed. After Messner-Loebs wrapped it up and started working for DC on their corporate trademarks, it seemed to suck all the vitality out of his work and after being curious at first about how he would work out with these superhero characters, I soon lost interest and moved on, and forgot all about Mr. Messner-Loebs. I barely noticed, several years later, when his byline gradually stopped appearing...I figured he had gone on to bigger and better things or had retired to pursue other interests.

Turns out this is not the case- Mr. Messner-Loebs has been dealing with a lot of bad fortune over the years, as pointed out by the Detroit News. And now, the fellas at Mercury Studios have decided to try and help out by putting a bunch of art up on eBay to try and raise some fundage for him. If you've got the cash, why not go bid something up?

THE COURIERS 3: THE BALLAD OF JOHNNY FUNWRECKER is the latest from AiT/PlanetLar and Brian Wood, and it's pretty much on a par with the first three in the series. This time out, we get a look at those deadly and efficient (not to mention street-smart and potty-mouthed) mercenary couriers, Moustafa and Special, in the dim and distant days of 1993, when they got their gangbanging start with the organization of Chinese crime boss Johnny Funwrecker. Isn't it neat how you can stick "Johnny" in front of almost anything and it sounds cool? Ha. Anyway, we get a look at how M and S first met, are introduced to Moustafa's not-so-nice Mom, and the beginnings of how they established their urban merc delivery service...kinda like Kevin Bacon in Quicksilver, except if he carried an AK-47. There's even a funny scene in which they watch that very film. We also get a quick glimpse of Moustafa's girlfriend Olive, star of Couscous Express, as a little kid. Eventually, the duo decide they've had enough being in Johnny's employ when the Feds threaten to bust the operation, and decide to take over- which, as you may imagine, doesn't go over very well at all with Mr. Funwrecker. Much fast-paced mayhem ensues, and the resolution won't come as much of a surprise, especially since this takes place, after all, twelve years ago. Even as teenagers, Moustafa and Special (and Johnny F) have charisma to burn, and Brian Wood writes them with snappy dialogue. Rob G. is once again back on art duties, and while I still find his style crude and sketchy in places, especially on the figure drawings, this issue shows a lot of improvement from his previous Couriers outings, and he's even learned to lay off the Photoshop "blur" filter a bit.

Also as with the previous books in the series, I like the characters and the concept a lot more than the execution, no pun intended. These Couriers stories work best if you turn off your brain and don't think about them very hard. This being said, if you're looking for fast-paced action-movie thrills, and don't particularly want to worry about such trivialities as cause-and-effect and realism, Ballad will certainly satisfy.

Time now for that weekly look into what I'll have waiting for me at the comics shop on Wednesday, courtesy the Shiamond dipping list!

CONCRETE: HUMAN DILEMMA #2
ADAM STRANGE #5
JUSTICE LEAGUE ELITE #8
MONOLITH #12
QUESTION #4
SHANNA THE SHE DEVIL #1

And I'm pretty sure I ordered the BILL & TED'S MOST EXCELLENT ADVENTURES VOL 1 TP, but I'll have to put that one back for a while. No can afford at this time! Which brings me to my latest tentative attempt to free myself from the drive-across-town-in-5:00-traffic, no-fricking-discount comics shop. I was all set to order my March books from the Discount Comic Book Service site, had already selected all my titles, and was in the process of arranging payment when I happened upon the section which explained that I would be charged on February 14th, instead of as they shipped, which was my mistaken notion. And frankly, kids, since I will still have to shop the shop to get the titles that come out between this month's and March/April's books, I can't afford to pay for 2 months' worth of comics in one month! So...I placed an order for two trades that I had been coveting and didn't want to pay full price for: 100% (even though I have all 5 singles- it's such a great book that I want it collected, and hopefully there will be some extras to compensate for it taking so sprocking long!), and the Flight Vol. 2 compilation. So now I have an account set up at the DCBS, and if I come into some money in the near future, either from my tax refund or the payment for the magazine article I did a month or so ago (and I'm still not sure will actually see print, let alone get paid for), I'll see about taking that next step.

Stay tuned!

Sorry to read about the death of Traffic drummer Jim Capaldi last Friday from stomach cancer. As someone who lists Traffic's 1974 album When The Eagle Flies among his all-time favorites, it's sad news indeed.

Found at sweet Susan's.

JOHNNY B HEART NETFLIX PART 4

Films viewed on cable are marked with an asterisk (*). Ranked one * to five ***** stars.

GREENDALE ***
If you've cared to follow the career of Neil Young in the last ten years or so, you pretty much know what you're getting, especially when he hooks up with Crazy Horse- roughly eight songs per album, two shortish acoustic ballady type things and the rest plodding 10 minute long extended jams. Young hasn't completely lost his knack for melody, so this helps keep things from becoming a total waste of time, but the man seems to be on autopilot and after a while it becomes tiresome- I didn't even pick up his 2002 effort Are You Passionate?, because I had simply grown bored with his output. 2003's Greendale, on the other hand, looked promising because it wasn't "just another Young record", but a couple of less-than-enthusiastic reviews dampened my interest. Fortunately, a friend came to my rescue and sent me a copy, and I was able to listen for myself...and my initial suspicions were sadly founded. Nearly every song clocks in at no less than 5 minutes, they all meander, and the CD sounds like essentially every other Young CD since, oh, Ragged Glory. My favorite cut was the quiet, mostly acoustic "Bandit", in which Young seems to be reflecting on his life and is kinda touching. Difference is that unlike previous efforts, Greendale is a concept album, or to be precise (and as Young is quick to let us know in the bonus features of the DVD) not so much the dreaded "C" word as a group of songs with recurring themes that tell a story of sorts. Apples, oranges. First came Greendale the CD, then Greendale the elaborate stage performance, and finally Greendale the movie...and I suppose they all compliment each other well enough...oh yeah, there's also Greendale the trade paperback, which I haven't seen yet so I really don't know how well that ties in. Anyway, "Eco-fable" Greendale is essentially the story of the Green family, who lives in a fictional Greendale, California. There's a Grandpa (boy, is there ever- Young mentions him in almost every song, constantly), a Grandma, Mom, an adopted son, another son who's an artist, a daughter who starts out as a cheerleader and becomes an eco-activist, a guy running around in a white hat, red coat and red shoes who's supposed to be the Devil, and selected other residents of the town. Adopted son Jed accidentally shoots a city policeman, which causes an uproar and brings newspeople to the Green's Ranch, where they cause Grandpa to confront them, suffer a heart attack, and die, daughter Sun (Sun Green, geddit?) starts her activism and eventually hooks up with a strapping young hunk named "Earth Brown" and heads for Alaska, with the FBI on her heels, the Devil dances around a lot, and Jed waits in prison for his fate. Directed in grainy Super-8 by Young, using his "Bernard Shakey" pseudonym that he also used for previous efforts Journey Through The Past, Rust Never Sleeps and Human Highway, it's sloppy, self-indulgent and goofy as hell- the actors, which include longtime pedal steel player Ben Keith as Grandpa, longtime Young album cover designer Gary Burden, longtime Young illustrator James Mazzeo (The Zuma album cover, among other works) as the artist Green and Young's wife Pegi as Mother Green, don't act so much as they lip-synch the words Young is singing in the soundtrack. The film's broken up into chapters which correspond with each Greendale song, which makes this a long-form music video. It does ramble, but after a while I got interested in the characters and wanted to see how it turned out. Can't say that I got any satisfaction on that count, either- at the very end we get a reprise of the very theatrical stage presentation, in which Young and the Horse perform the embarrassingly earnest album closer "Be The Rain", with the sexy young Sun lip-syncing ecological catchphrases that Young sings in the chorus, dressed in camo fatigues, as the Horse choogles along. Despite the fact that this is really a mess, like many of Young's best songs there's something just under the surface, an honesty of imagination if you will, that makes this watchable in spite of itself. I don't know if I would care to see this again anytime soon, but I'm glad I got to see it just the same.

THE CORE* **
WHOO-hoo-hoo! Y'know, there are just some films that you just have to throw your hands up and go along for the ride, and The Core is a great example of that. This movie showed such a blatant disregard for the laws of physics and science as we know them, that the website Intuitor: Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics named it the "Worst Physics Movie Ever", and added "This movie is so bad we finally had to force ourselves to quit writing and post the review." So I thought, what the heck- I'll check this out. May be good for a giggle. Well, actually, I didn't get so many laughs, but I was never bored. Even though very little of what actually happens here makes a whole lot of sense, they do everything with a sense of purpose and the actually pretty good (Hilary Swank! Delroy Lindo! Stanley friggin Tucci!) cast wisely kids the material. Reminded me a lot of those great old drive-in Sci-fi flicks of yore, which set out to entertain and nothing else. Man has bollixed upthe Earth's core, throwing the "electromagnetic field" off-kilter and causing chaos and carnage. The government recruits a group of scientists and military personnel to take a specially designed ship that can burrow through the Earth like a mole, in order to set off atomic charges at certain points around the Earth's core, theoretically correcting the planet's rotation. Whew! Like I said- dumb movie, but it was fun to watch, and not always for the wrong reasons!

RESIDENT EVIL: APOCALYPSE**1/2
Speaking of dumb movies, here's the sequel to the not-terrible 2002 video-game-inspired flick Resident Evil. You can tell from the title. Heh. Anyway, zombies are running wild, the shady super-secret Hive, acting in tandem with the government, seals off "Raccoon City" (what names...) and it's up to JB Show fave Milla Jovovich, along with a motley crew of police and special forces soldiers left stranded, to rescue a scientist's daughter and get out of town somehow- or just stay alive. Complicating matters is the fact that the Hive did some sort of enhancement surgery on Milla; now she's a superhuman ass kicking machine of destruction. Even though it's not as bad as the run-of-the-mill video game movie, it's still nowhere near as good as the first Evil flick- and that one wasn't all that good. Of course, I always like to watch Ms. Jovovich go through her paces, but your mileage may vary.

HAROLD AND KUMAR GO TO WHITE CASTLE ****
By now, I'm sure you're thinking "God, JB, don't you watch any good movies? Not bad good, but good good?" And all I can say is "Sure"...but this isn't quite it, although I will say that I had a great time watching this good-natured, often clever and inventive stoner buddy comedy. Harold is an uptight, anal Asian junior investment banker, Kumar is an east Indian med school prodigy who has absolutely no interest in becoming a doctor like his dad and brother. They share an NYC apartment, and a love for the ganja- and it's while sitting around smoking weed and dealing with the munchies that they see a commercial for White Castle hamburgers...and decide right then and there that they want some sliders more than anything in the world. So, they set out, but problem is that the nearest White Castle is miles away, in New Jersey. Lucky me, I've got a Castle only about 10 miles away. Anyway, undaunted, they set out on an veritable odyssey, vowing not to give up until they get some square burgers. Of course, frequent, often surreal hilarity ensues. See, I liked the equally dopey, but equally clever and often unfairly maligned Dude, Where's My Car?, and this is the follow-up from its director Danny Leiner, and you can tell- it has an almost identical tone, combining weird animal stunts (the pair ride a cheetah, comparable with the ostrich hijinx in Dude) with animated sequences and a lot, but not too much, low-grade fratboy humor. Probably the worst offender on that score is the "Battleshits" game which Harold and Kumar are forced to endure from two lovely Princeton students, as they hide out in the women's restroom from the campus police. Gross and disgusting, but at least it's new to me and it was funny because of that. I really enjoyed the performance of Kal Penn as Kumar; he has an easygoing, laidback goofiness, reminiscent of Owen Wilson, but he's also capable of firing off a sharp, funny line or facial reaction. Like Dude, it's no landmark in cinematic comedy, but it is a fun romp and I liked it a lot. You'll never see Neil Patrick Harris in the same light after viewing this, I'll tell you that!

Almost finished! More later, including at least one bona fide classic.

Art Appreciation Time!


First, found from A.V. Phibes.com, the website of David Stoupakis.


A.V. not only has a cool name but is a pretty good artist in her own right- above is one of her e-cards you can get at her site.


Also, poached from Warren Ellis, the turn-of-the-century-ish stylings of Molly Crabapple, aka Jennifer Caban.

Finally, the website of John Leavitt.

Ah, the Manga meme. It's sweeping the Comics Blogosphereiverse like virtual wildfire!

I'll play! Here's mine!

1. ...

uh...

1. ...

Aw heck. I can't play. Maybe that will change soon.

Sendin' out Bacardi Show Birthday Greetings today to the mighty mighty Fred Hembeck!

As someone who's been a fan since the long-ago Fantaco days, I'm happy to know ya, Fred. You're a nice guy and hella-clever and talented cartoonist.

BEST OF THE WEEK
COMICS COMMENTARY!
What I bought and what I thought, week of January 26

I'm tellin' ya, comics-wise, weeks like this one- in which everything I read was good-to-great-to-phenomenal- are few and far between. Kinda makes up for the last few, which have had more than a few disappointments.

WE3 3
I wonder if there has been a slight spike in pet toys and premium food since this issue was released? Anyway, it's been a while since I was put on the edge of my seat and moved to shed a tear by a funnybook, but this one did it, no doubt about it. For once reining in his tendency towards convolution, (which is not to say that there aren't more than a few layers with which to occupy oneself, if you're thataway inclined...) Grant Morrison has certainly succeeded in his stated intent to give us "Disney with claws", crafting an engaging, unpretentious (well, OK, maybe it's a smidge pretentious, but not in a bad way) action tale. He's aided in no small measure by Frank Quitely's dynamic, elegant action scenes and his solid layouts and pacing. We even get a laugh in the midst of the tension, courtesy of the damaged bunnybot Pirate. The full-page panel which showed Tinker leaping at the WE4 is flat out thrilling in its abrupt perspective and its timing within the story. I was shocked by the death of Dr. Berry- didn't quite see that coming. I could quibble a bit, I suppose- it's not totally clear how the animals survived once they shed their armor, or for that matter how they managed to do so in the first place since the homeless guy was interrupted before he could get his tools, nor does it seem likely that they could battle as savagely in the condition they were in...but then again, that's a staple of heroic fiction, isn't it- the valiant, "let's-give-it-all-we-got" last-gasp struggle. I'm also a little fuzzy on how Bandit and Tinker ended up with the homeless dude; it looked like they were found in the basement by a soldier, judging by the boots, and I would have thought the military would shoot first and ask questions later, not give them to a good home...but these are very minor things indeed. I had listed WE3 in my best of 2004 selections, and it's already secured a spot in the 2005 list as well. I never thought Morrison and/or Quitely would top Flex Mentallo, but this is as close as he's come since in my book. I just hope and pray Hollywood doesn't get their hands on this. A real winner, and it would seem to me that only the most heartless of cynics would fail to be moved. Too bad, their loss. For a couple of excellent, far-more-in-depth-than-I-could-provide reviews, visit Jog and Ian (Twice). A+ Entire series: A+.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go feed my dog and cat their steak and fresh fish. Back shortly.

LOSERS 20
If Jock has got to take breaks, it's nice that we FINALLY get a fill-in artist that's in his league. Ben Wilson is the guy's name, and he's very Jock-esque, not only in his figure drawings but his layout style as well. This time out, we get some real-time face-time with "Max", witness a surprising death that's bound to have repercussions (I would think), witness an equally surprising romantic liaison, and embark on a promising new story arc. Best of the week, if not for WE3. A.

SLEEPER SEASON TWO 8
We follow Miss Misery around in this issue, and see that our boy Holden's not the only one who is painted into a corner. One of the many things I love about Sleeper is how just when you think Brubaker's run out of plot twists and directions for the story to go in, he throws you yet another curve from a direction you never even considered. And y'know something else? Sean Phillips is real damn good. A

JLA: CLASSIFIED 3
Nice finale of the debut 3-issue story arc, in which Grant Morrison kicks back and knocks off a superhero story- and it's a corker with a nicely focused finish to balance out the incoherence of the first two. Morrison writes the JLA with a sense of grim purpose that's a few shades different from other writers, and in the context of this book I love the way he depicts Batman especially. I was pretty harsh on the art team of Ed McGuinness and Dexter Vines, with its busy layouts and hyper-muscled figures...and while I still think they didn't help us readers very much when it came to parsing the gnarly script I will say that I really like their rendition of Batman, their Aquaman's not bad either, and they weren't nearly as much of a distraction this time out. I also hope to see more of Beryl Hutchinson somewhere down the road. A-

PLANETARY 22
Warren Ellis takes the opportunity to re-think the Lone Ranger, and darned if I don't kinda like his take. I'm sure the old-school ranger fans won't approve, but really- are there any old-school Ranger fans, anyway? This story wasn't as lively as I would have liked, but it was still solid, and the standard raves about John Cassady's art in service of Ellis' scripts applies. Same as it ever was, as that Byrne fella once said. No, not that Byrne fella. A-

AMAZING JOY BUZZARDS 1
Seeing as how we never got a proper Gorillaz comic book, here's the next best thing, I guess. Ah, Maniaks, we hardly knew ye. The Adventures of Green Day? I dunno. The singer sure looks a lot like Billie Jo Armstrong. Anyway, this is right there in that nutty Scurvy Dogs-style groove and lots of fun, and while I wonder why the Pink Robot didn't just go get repainted, I dug it just the same. And the art, by Dan Hipp, reminded me a lot of Ted Naifeh by way of Mignola by way of Jamie Hewlett and was just fine. Isn't it about time we had a series from Jaime Hernandez featuring Ape Sex? No? Oh, all right. A-

HELLBLAZER 204
I don't ever think I'm gonna get used to Leo Manco's art on this title; it looks just enough like his work on Hellstorm and Druid to make me wish for more. It's damned distracting, it is! His stuff simply doesn't flow as well as it used to, even though he still can provide adequate mood when called upon to do so. Story-wise, it's a continuation of the "John deals with his demonic offspring" story, and it takes an interesting turn with an unexpected ally, whose identity continues to evade me, much to my annoyance. I'm in a kind of general funk with this title; I'm not bored, and I still want to see how this all turns out, but there's a slight feeling of deja vu going on with me here and I'm just not as excited as I want to be about it. Hope that changes soon. Maybe if Carey has John hunt down Keanu Reeves in the next arc and pull some sort of hoodoo con on him... B+

LEGION OF SUPER HEROES 2
In the last reboot, Dream Girl was a ditzy airhead who didn't even get to join the Legion until almost the very end; now, she's an ass-kickin' hottie who can foresee an opponent's moves way before he moves them and is right there at the forefront of the new Waid era. More Legionnaires get a showcase so we can see the new and presumably improved spins, and some are better than others- Brainiac 5 is as much of a stick as always, Karate Kid displays a bit more personality than I remember, Shadow Lass less so- plus we get a long look at Dream Girl's homeworld and while it all adds up to an extended stage-setting exercise, at least it kept my interest thanks to, as always, character interaction. I'm still not as crazy about Barry Kitson's stiff and fussy art as some are, and he falls into the trap many before him have run afoul of: the characters he draws look like grown men and women, not the late teens I understood they were supposed to be. I can live with it, though, if Waid keeps up his end of the deal. B+

M.E. Russell delivers another excellent CulturePulp feature, this time spotlighting Khris Soden and his City of Roses comic. Roses rings a distant bell; I had probably seen it mentioned on somebody else's blog sometime or another, but hadn't seen it until now. Looks really interesting!

Sorry it took me so long to get around to posting the link, M.E.!

Over at the Legion World message boards there's a fella who calls himself "Mystery Lad" who dissects each issue of The Legion as it comes out, and does so in insightful and entertaining form. Now that I seem to be back in the Legion saddle, I've been going over there to check out what he says over the last couple of weeks. You might want to as well. Here's his "Calling The Roll" for issue #2, which came out Wednesday. Here's his comments on issue #1.

Been another one of those days- busy squared. More later, hopefully...

JOHNNY B HEART NETFLIX Part THREE!
Yep, I'm finally getting around to posting a line or three about movies I've viewed while subscribing to that online service. There will probably be a couple more, then that will be it for a while since I cancelled my subscription yesterday. I loved the availability it offers- there's no way I could have found films like Lost in La Mancha or Girl With The Pearl Earring in my local Blockbuster. But at $19 a month, I just couldn't justify continuing with it, especially since I still get cable, and before Netflix I would maybe rent one or two DVDs max a month, sometimes not even that. Maybe someday I'll renew my subscription, but it won't be anytime soon, sorry to say. Anyway, here are some flicks I've seen lately. I'm giving them one-to-five star ratings.

WHALE RIDER ****
Whale Rider is the story of Pai, played by Keisha Castle-Hughes, part of the Maori tribe in New Zealand. The Maori claim to be descended from Paikeia, the Whale Rider, and in every generation for 1000 years, a male heir born to the tribe's chief has assumed the throne. When the current chief's son gives birth to twins, one boy and one girl, the boy dies in childbirth along with his mother...leaving Pai in the care of her father (who has ambitions towards an art career and doesn't want to live in New Zealand or be chief) and grandfather, who is quite unhappy that there will be no male to take his place. While her father travels the world, Pai lives with her grandparents and strives to prove that she can be worthy of chiefdom, against the wishes of her grandfather, who loves her even though he is determined not to allow it. Whale Rider reminded me a lot of those foreign children's films they used to show on Saturday mornings all the time in the 60s and 70s; very earnest and centered on its young star, who manages to play her part with passion, yet maintains a sense of detachment which makes her come across as enigmatic. It's a bit of a "female empowerment" story, documenting her struggles to prove what we find out early on- she is indeed the rightful chief, and she can summon whales to prove it...as well as swim like a fish and hold her own in battle with the village boys. The film effectively shows the contrast between modern-world sensibilities and old-world native superstition and ritual, and the conflicts that brings. We are never allowed to get away from the family-bonds message that is the center of the thing; despite being the nominal heavy of the film, we are still shown how the grandfather/chief likes to give Pai rides home from school on his bicycle and the inner conflict he himself feels, torn between love for his granddaughter and his concern for the continuation of his tribe and the way of life he's determined to protect. Nice performances, gorgeous scenery, and really the only negative I can cite is that the actors' accents were so thick that it was hard for me to follow conversations all through the film. Despite this, Whale Rider was a fascinating look into a culture and a locale of which I knew nothing, and an appealing drama.

THE PUNISHER **1/2
I've probably mentioned before at some point that I've never really been a fan of this character; not that I have anything against killing-machine heroes, but there's just something about the Frank Castle character, in all his many incarnations since 1975, that has failed to grab me. Heck, I bought his second appearance in the 1976 B&W Marvel magazine Marvel Super Action for Chaykin's Dominic Fortune back-up. I later picked up his first appearance in Spider-Man, because I found it for a buck or two (before the character really got popular), but let it go when I sold my original collection back in 1987. I did pick up the first dozen or so Garth Ennis/Steve Dillon Marvel Knights issues, because I loved Hitman and Preacher so much, but soon grew tired of the juvenile groove that Ennis has found himself in, so I moved on. So what I'm trying to say is that I have no vested interest in seeing Punny done right; I watched the first attempt at filming his adventures, with Dolph Lundgren in the role, with a shrug even though I didn't think it was as bad as its detractors claimed. Not all that good, either. I was in no hurry to see this supposedly superior, "this-time-we're-gonna-do-it-right" version, and in fact, when I saw the early advance pics of Thomas Jane as Frank, I thought they were putting us on- he looked skinny and blonde! That's why I'm just now getting around to seeing this- I just couldn't be arsed, as Garth would say. And it's funny- my opinion of this new Punisher is about the same as it was after viewing the Lundgren Punisher...it's not all that great, but it's certainly no disaster. The performances are a lot better, for one thing- Jane is great, and John Travolta used his still-flickering charisma to enliven the role of the pussy-whipped mob boss that orders Frank's family killed. It was cool to see Jaws' Roy Scheider in the role of Frank's dad. The scriptwriters wisely resisted the urge to camp things up, and remained mostly faithful to the character, the Ennis/Dillon version in particular. The production values leave something to be desired- this thing looks like your basic late-night Cinemax "erotic thriller"-style time waster, and I question the need to replace the mousey Joanie character of the comics with Rebecca Romijn-Stamos' hard-luck horny junkie. But at the end of the day, after all the shooting and grimness and explosions and so on, I was still shrugging my shoulders when it was over. Guess there's just no way I'm gonna get worked up over the Punisher and his world. My loss, I guess.

I had more, but my computer crashed and I lost it. Oh well, I'll try again later.

Cover gallery!

The fine folks at Burlyman Entertainment sent me some cover scans yesterday, and I thought I'd pass 'em on to you. Yeah, I know, most of you probably got them too, but just in case.



The alternate cover to Doc Frankenstein #2. I don't buy Doc, but it still looks kewl. Same for the finished one, below:



Finally, here's the new cover for what I gather is the second printing of DF #1, this time by Geoff Darrow.



Domo arigato to Burlyman for sending them to me. Publishers, send me covers as often as you like, preferably with comics attached to them!

Just busy enough at work today to keep me from gearing up to write anything significant...but I just wanted to make a statement.

Just finished reading We3 #3. All I can say right now is WOW. Wow wow wow. Rest assured I'll say more later.

I noticed where Stan Lee's production company has reached some sort of agreement with Ringo Starr for an animated cartoon featuring Mr. Starkey with super powers. Oh, brother. But I suppose it's appropriate- Ringo has always been a bit of a cartoon anyway, hasn't he?

Anyway, here's the skinny.

Been spending some time today checking out Girls With Slingshots, by Danielle Corsetto. You should do the same sometime!

Lots of things are cyclical, apparently- day and night, the seasons, death and taxes...and established, for-pay print writers cutting on blogs. Today's example comes courtesy of Joe Casey and Matt Fraction at CBR in their Basement Tapes column.

When will we ever learn our place? Sigh.

You'll all be happy to know that I have just made my first tentative step to become assimilated into the Mangaborg by placing an order from Amazon last night for Planetes Book 1. I have also ordered Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life Volume 1 and Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. Happy birthday to me!

HELLBLAZER #204
JLA CLASSIFIED #3
LEGION OF SUPER HEROES #2
LOSERS #20
PLANETARY #22
SLEEPER SEASON TWO #8
WE 3 #3
AMAZING JOY BUZZARDS #1

My haul Wednesday, according to the new Diamond shipping list.

I'm stoked for the finale of We3, am guardedly looking forward to JLA Classified, and the Amazing Joy Buzzards will hopefully be fun. Always nice to see Planetary on the list, too. If I was a rich boy, la-da-da-da-da-la-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da...I'd pick up the NEIL YOUNG GREENDALE TP, which I knew nothing ab out previously. I've had the CD for a while now, just viewed the film Young made (more on that later, I hope), and wouldn't mind having this to finish the trifecta. If I liked the album, I'd really be jonesing for it...

The trickle-down theory in effect!

Artist Steve Sanders sent me a page from his upcoming Five Fists of Science with Matt Fraction, so I thought I'd pass it on to all of you. No, I have no idea what's going on here but I like that octopus suit. I couldn't post it here at 100% due to size limitations, and I don't know how to make one of those nifty "click here for a larger image" links, so I hope it's legible...!

Well, y'see, I noticed somewhere where someone had written about Marvel's April solicitations, and since I'm a good l'il comics blogger I thought I'd do the same. I clicked on the link provided (since the site in question only skimmed the highlights, and didn't provide the whole list) to go to Marvel.com and read them for myself- only I couldn't find a solicitation list anywhere. Befuddled, but not too disappointed since I don't really buy that many Marvel comics anyway, I decided to click around on the site, just to see what I could see. I ended up in their wallpaper section, and while scrolling down my eye was not merely caught, but GRABBED by the wallpaper created from the above cover illustration by one Jo Chen, from Thor, Son of Asgard 8, which apparently came out back last September. I suppose this is "Amora the Enchantress" (So THAT'S what her real name is). Anyway, this is a hell of an illustration, in my opinion of course, especially the upper 3/4. The legs look a bit under-rendered, but it's still a very eye-catching cover. Not that I would buy this, but I just wanted to bring it to your attention; do with it what ye will. And click on Chen's name a line or three back to visit his/her website, lotsa nice stuff there.

Had to work Saturday night at the radio station, engineering a high school basketball game. It's damn near impossible to monitor the sportscasters for timeouts and watch TV at the same time, as I kept finding out a couple of years ago as I attempted to catch Buffy and Firefly on Tuesdays and Fridays. So, I didn't bother turning the TV on, and had assumed that the Justice League Unlimited was yet another rerun anyway, SO...I MISSED the BRAND NEW EPISODE that aired with BAT LASH! DRAT! Or should I say "consarn it!"? Anyway, hopefully it will be rerun soon 'cos I really want to see the first animated appearance of one of my favorite DC characters. I've read a bit about the episode since, and it sounds OK if a bit contrived, as most time travel stories are, and like Tom the Dog I wonder how Chronos (why oh why wasn't he in his green-and-gold striped-pants uni, or at least why couldn't they have made him the 90's Chronos?) didn't notice that Bruce Wayne was Batman.

After the pilot I have some ideas for future episodes like something with President Harrison, who died from the flu one month into office, it turns out he didn't?t die from pneumonia. The fluid in his lungs was part of a genetic experiment to give him everlasting life so he could be president forever but instead it turned him into a frog creature so now he lives at the bottom of the Mississippi and launches an attack on the nation with his frogmen.?

From a recent Newsarama piece on Bryan (Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls) Fuller's announced intent to make a TV movie of Mike Mignola's weird and wonderful Amazing Screw-on Head one-shot for the Sci-Fi network. I would have been interested enough, but then he had to go and name-drop William Henry Harrison, the ninth president of the US, and the one prez that fascinated me when I was a weird little kid with a big book of presidential biographies. Apparently Harrison, who made his name as an Indian fighter and rode this fame to the White House in those less-than-PC days, chose to walk to his inauguration on a bitter cold March day, got sick, and died from pneumonia less than a month after taking his oath of office. I am, to this day, at a loss to explain what it was about this man that fascinated me so, but there ya go. I'm at a loss to explain a lot of what fascinates me so. Anywho, just wanted to share, and you can go here for more on the unfortunate Mr. Harrison.

RIP Johnny Carson, who died today at age 79. When I was growing up, the Carson Show was THE late-night show to watch.

He sits behind his microphone
John-ny Car-son
He speaks in such a manly tone
John-ny Car-son

Ed McMahon comes on and says "Here's Johhny"
Every night at eleven thirty he's so funny
It's (nice) to (have) you (on) the (show) tonight
I've seen (your) act (in) Vegas out of sight

When guests are boring he fills up the slack
John-ny Car-son
The network makes him break his back
John-ny Car-son

Ed McMahon comes on and says "Here's Johhny"
Every night at eleven thirty he's so funny
Don't (you) think (he's) such (a) natural guy
The (way) he's (kept) it (up) could make you cry

Who's a man that we admire?
Johnny Carson is a real live wire.
Who's a man that we admire?
Johnny Carson is a real live wire.
Who's a man that we admire?
Johnny Carson is a real live wire.
Who's the man that we admire?
Johnny Carson is a real live wire.

-"Johnny Carson" by Brian Wilson, on The Beach Boys Love You.

BEST OF THE WEEK

COMICS REVIEWS!
What I bought and what I thought, week of January 19!

LOVE FIGHTS Vol 2
Like Johanna Draper Carlson says in the afterword, this 12-issue series is the culmination of Andi Watson's career so far. It's got all the themes he's dealt with in previous efforts like Breakfast After Noon and Geisha, and he blends them skillfully as always with his typically clever, distinctive art style and design sense. If Watson's art gets any more minimal, he'll be doing Matt Feazell-type stick figures! Anyway, Love Fights succeeds as a romantic comedy/drama as well as superhero pastiche or even superhero satire, story types I usually just don't go for as a rule. He even gives us an fanciful and open-ended resolution, but it rings true to life and is free of contrivance, so it satisfies immensely. Another outstanding example of what can be done with the medium; I don't know whether it will become a landmark in comics history or anything, but it is an extremely solid work from a consistently innovative and accomplished creator, and these days who could ask for more? A+

POWERS V2 8
Bendis is propelling Walker and Pilgrim from one situation to the next at rapid speed; no sooner than we got a resolution of sorts to the kidnapping and torture of Deena than we get right in to the murder of the covert hero Blackguard, or someone masquerading as him anyway, and the disappearance of the power gem which gave him his abilities. Those of us who have been reading for a while have invested enough emotionally into these characters where we understand and care about what goes on; others who are newer may feel differently. As always, be it nifty message-board satire or intense, dark and angularly expressionistic action scenes, Mike Avon Oeming turns in another outstanding art job. A

TRIGGER 2
John Watkiss's art, with its sloppy inks and constant flat-plane three-quarters perspective, is as ugly as a dog's hindquarters, but he does a good job of telling a story and that's what gets this Blade Runner-by-way-of-Franz Kafka future fantasy by. It's fairly obvious what's happening to our protagonist, and you can make an educated guess as to where this is all going, but writer Jason Hall and Watkiss are pacing it nicely, so I'm engaged, for now. A-

DEMO: THE TWELVE ORIGINAL SCRIPTS
With publications like his Making of Astronauts in Trouble, Proof of Concept, and now this, Larry Young seems to be taking a keen interest in playing Toto to our Oz company and pulling back the curtain to reveal the Wizard pushing buttons and turning wheels...and the looks we're getting are very interesting. Just like the title says, this is each of Brian Wood's original scripts for the recently concluded limited series, and to be honest I didn't spend a lot of time re-reading them since I know how they turn out but it is interesting, though, to read his scene and character descriptions and then go refer to how artist Becky Cloonan interpreted them. And speaking of Cloonan, she contributes new single illustrations for each individual script, and they're wonderful, almost worth the price of admission themselves. A-

LUCIFER 58
We get a fill-in artist this time out, name of Ronald Wimberly, and while his stuff is still kinda rough and unpolished, I liked it- reminds me a bit of people like Kaluta, Wrightson or Jeffrey Jones when they were just getting started. He does a nice job on the interludes which depict the events on the world which Elaine Belloc created for "practice", they look at first like Native American art, then resemble, oh, Byzantine or somesuch...but they're all imaginative. Good thing, too, Writer Mike Carey is advancing this storyline along at a snail's pace. B+

B.P.R.D.: THE DEAD 3
Actually, as an actual story this isn't all that bad- in this issue, we get more emphasis on the mystery of what's in the basement at the BPRD's new Colorado digs and a bigger spotlight on Johann, the ghost in the containment suit, who I kinda like, and less of the new Captain Scarface Zombie guy, who curiously doesn't get listed in with the gang on the inside front cover. It's just presented in such a straightforward, bland way that it just doesn't grab me where I like to be grabbed, and while I realize that Mignola himself is often deadpan script-and-dialogue wise, this is different, and I really can't explain why. I know John Arcudi can do better (or at least did with Major Bummer, a long time ago now), and the lettercol goes out of its way to describe how tight he is with Hellboy's creator...but he's gotta shoulder the blame for this being such a flat read. No blame to artist Guy Davis, though, who gives the proceedings what life it has, especially the scene towards the end where Johann gets the computers going down below and unleashes a gang of ghosts. Not a disaster, but not a real success yet either. I'm holding out hope for a satisfying ending, which is is short supply around comics these days. B+

DAREDEVIL 69
God, Bendis, will you get on with it? I liked the business with the new White Tiger, but I'm really wishing that he would wrap up this thing with the hopped-up former Kingpin Bont, the Gladiator, and DD in chains because it seems like it's been going on for about 25 issues now. Of course, it's well-drawn as always, but my patience is wearing thin. B

WANTED 6
Revised. After having thought the matter over and having re-read a few issues, including this one, I've decided that I was a bit too harsh on this. And since this is a blog and not a print review, I can exercise my freedom of choice and rethink my position a bit. I'm still not completely happy with this whole series; Millar shouldn't be so eager to bite the hand which feeds him, and as someone who has a life, thank you, I nether want nor appreciate yet another "get a life" message from someone whose makes his living writing the very same object of scorn that he chastises his readers for embracing. But after all is said and done, Millar ended this with the same tone that he bagan it, and except for the Killer, kept his characterizations pretty consistent throughout- and the ending would have certainly been more of a copout if Wesley had repented his evil ways...so mission accomplished, I suppose. And of course, there's one opinion I haven't rethought: J.G. Jones's art is as always a joy to behold. This issue: C+. Entire series: B-.

PLASTIC MAN 14
Despite the fact that I did get a laugh out of the last page and Kyle Baker at least remembered this time to put a ink line around his figures so we could distinguish them from the cut-and-pasted pastel backgrounds, this was tiresome. If I wanted to watch Tom and Jerry cartoons, they're airing the real thing every day on Cartoon Network's Boomerang channel for free, or at least as part of my cable package and I don't need to drop three bucks a pop on them. While his Plas take was fun at first, apparently Baker has no ideas left and is wasting his time as well as ours. C-

Time once more for JOHNNY B's FEARLESS NFL POSTSEASON PIGSKIN PROGNOSTICATIONS!

As always, the standard disclaimer:

These picks are FOR ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES ONLY. I'm not betting illegally with these, and NEITHER SHOULD YOU...and I take no responsibility if you lose your house.

Okay. Last weekend was difficult to pick, but I managed to go 3-1, which got me back to .500 at 4-4 on the postseason. If not for Indy totally crashing and burning, thanks to a remarkable boneheaded defensive strategy, I would have been 4-0. Problem is, this weekend is even tougher than last! I can easily see any of the four remaining teams advancing to Jacksonville. I've been listening to the "experts" on ESPN, and have deliberated all weekend, and I'm no closer now to having a good feel for my picks than I was on Monday. After a while, ya just gotta say the hell with it and make your picks...and here's mine.

ATLANTA over Philadelphia. I picked the Eagles to go to the Super Bowl (along with Indy, ha ha) when the season started, but I just gotta go with my guys. I can name you a dozen reasons why the Falcons should lose this game, but I think they match up well with Philadelphia, and if the weather lets them establish enough of a ground game to set up the pass, they have a chance. Plus, this team has a similar vibe to the one that went into Lambeau Field and upset the Packers two years ago to me, so I'm taking the A-T-L. There will be standing room only on the bridges around Philadelphia on Monday. That being said, I will not be a bit surprised if the Falcons bog down in the predicted blizzard and the Eagles massage the battered ego of all Philadephians. It should be a low scoring game, I think, so you might want to take the Falcons and the points regardless.

PITTSBURGH over New England. Boy, New England looked real good against the Colts, didn't they? Of course, Indy helped by constantly playing passing defense against the Patsies, allowing Corey Dillon to run wild, and control the clock. That won't happen against the Steelers. The Steelers should pound, pound, pound the ball with Jerome Bettis and Duce Staley, and hopefully get a turnover or two on defense...and return to the Super Bowl, setting up a matchup of two teams who didn't appear on Monday Night Football this year. That being said, Belichick should never be underestimated, especially when dealing with a rookie quarterback.

This is going to be one of those long rambling posts which, I've found, that people usually read about half of then move on, missing something important or interesting (unlikely, I know, but even a blind squirrel finds a nut...) that appears about 3/4 of the way in. So pay attention, whydoncha? Here's my State of My Union address.

No time to write anything all day today, so sumimasen, everybody. Like I'm sure you were concerned. Anyways, I've been keeping my eyes and ears immersed in something for quite some time now! Of course, there was my usual Wednesday haul, along with the second Love Fights trade and AiT/PlanetLar's Demo Scriptbook, all of which shall be reviewed in due time. I'm sorry to report that I didn't get to finish Cryptonomicon; I had to return it to the library and I just wasn't getting enough quality serious reading time. I intend to pick up a paperback copy someday. I've also been reading the two Fantagraphics Peanuts collections I got for Christmas, and have been digging the hell out of them. I had forgotten how edgy and clever Schulz's work was back then, and how deft and tight his ink line was as well...decades of moribund, by-the-numbers 70's, 80's and 90's strips will do that to ya, I guess. And no, thank you, I wasn't around to read them back in 1952. I also recently completed Bryan Lee O'Malley's Lost at Sea; commentary will be forthcoming.

Musically, I got David Bowie's most recent release, Reality, and I gotta say that it's amazing. And wonderful. And wonderfully amazing. I thought 2002's Heathen was his best in over 20 years, and this one's every bit as good. I've also been listening a lot lately to Roger Glover's Butterfly Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast, the CD of which I purchased for Mrs. Bacardi for Xmas. There are two instrumentals on that album that tend to get stuck in my head: the string-heavy "Dreams of Sir Bedivere" and the lovely "The Feast", a piano interlude before the big grande finale of the Dio-sung "Love Is All". It's a great little album, full of imagination and whimsy. I've written about it before, but I forget when. I've also had the Pentangle's Bert Jansch-sung version of the old traditional ballad "The Snows" in constant rotation in my cerebral iPod, as well as Bowie's "Everyone Says Hi" from Heathen and Slade's "Miles Out To Sea" from their Clap Your Feet, Stomp Your Hands elpee. And for some reason, I never get tired of listening to the Flaming Lips' Soft Bulletin, which is beginning to creep up on my Top 25 list that I've been threatening to lay on you, my wonderful readers, for nigh two years now.

On TV, it's been Carnivale, Alias, and I tried to get interested in the new ESPN series Tilt, which features JB Show fave Michael Madsen, but just haven't been able to get into it. And movies- holy crap. I'm way overdue for a Johnny B Heart Netflix post. Recently I've seen Neil Young's Greendale, as well as Shrek 2, Gangster No.1 with Michael McDowell, Whale Rider, The Punisher, The Seventh Seal, The Core, and Resident Evil: Apocalypse, to name but a few. What? It has Milla Jovovich, OK? Gimme a break.

Personally, I'm still stuck at the ULPJ; however, I did get a small raise over the holidays. At this rate, in about eight years, I'll be back to where I was two years ago, wage-wise. No prospects for anything better on the horizon, either. I know, I know, "Thou Shalt Not Whine", that's a commandment, right? I did recently get the opportunity to write a freelance piece for a magazine which many of you are, I'm sure, familiar with...but after one round of rewrites, I submitted my work and have heard nothing since. I did see where the publication has been solicited for March, so all I can hope is that my rewrite was sufficient and my byline will be intact. Of course, there's always the possibility that they couldn't use what I did, had someone rewrite it, and I will have toiled for naught. I'm supposed to be paid upon publication; we will see what we will see. When I'm sure it will appear, I'll go into details- I don't want to get caught out. I did some interesting interviews with some interesting people in the course of doing the article, and I hope I get the chance to share. In other personal news, my son got a new car a while back, which has a CD player already installed, so the one he had in his previous vehicle is now mine, and I'm gonna get it put in tomorrow morning. I've been without a CD player in my Blazer for far too long now. Heck, it's where I get to do the majority of my music listening! I just hope the darn thing still works...

I got some cash for my birthday last week, and I've been giving a lot of thought to sampling some manga lately (gasp!), along with finally getting a copy of Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life. I've been eyeballing Planetes. Thoughts/comments/recommendations, anybody?

In norts spews, my Falcons prepare to go play in the Philadelphia snow on Sunday. My god, if they win, and they certainly have a shot, they'll be in the SUPER BOWL! Twice in my lifetime! Never thought I'd ever see the day. Anyway, my Fearless Predictions will be along tomorrow. I haven't posted too much about other sports I follow lately; it's just beginning to get interesting in college basketball, and fortunately the two teams I follow, the Kentucky Wildcats and the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers, are off to good starts. Pitchers and catchers report pretty soon, as well, so I'm kinda looking forward to that even though my White Sox will most likely stink. No hockey, so my fledgling love for the Calgary Flames has gone unrequited. Oh well.

OK, that's about all I can think of. Oyasumi nasai, y'all. More tomorrow, hopefully.

Via Tegan via Elayne, The website of artist Alan Davis.

Davis is a hell of an artist, with his Neal Adams-meets-Jim Aparo style, and while I absolutely hated his Killraven revival of a year or two ago, which he scripted as well as drew, I still like to see his illustrations wherever they may appear.

Over at the Andy Diggle Delphi Forum, Diggle has posted Jock's covers for The Losers #'s 20-24, two of which are above and one of which I posted yesterday. These two above rock my world.

Found via Chris Arrant.

Since all the cool kids are doing it, here's my look at DC's solicits for April!

Batman titles are listed first, so Batman titles it will be! Unfortunately, despite the presence of many fine artists like Sean Phillips, Jae Lee, Doug Mahnke and Tom Nguyen and Jeff Parker, I doubt I'll be picking any of them up.

Well, except for GOTHAM CENTRAL 30, which, God help us, may have finally jumped the shark if the description is any indicator: "Allen and Montoya have traveled to Keystone City to save Officer Andrew Kelly, who's been transformed into a terrible monster." Jesus wept.

I am amused to note one of the most creative, or is it desperate, spins on a creator's decision to bail on a book I've even seen: BATMAN: JEKYLL & HYDE #1, another (yawn) Two-Face story that was slated to be drawn by Lee but apparently he bailed and went back to Marvel or something, so they get Phillips to finish it up, then claim "Expressing the dual nature of the villain, the miniseries will feature visuals by two distinct artists: Jae Lee illustrates issues #1-3, while Sean Phillips draws issues #4-6". Ohhhh-kay.

Batman is probably my favorite DC character, but none of this is tempting enough for me to buy. C'est la vie.

Moving on to the Superman line, which you probably know by now that I don't buy anything from either, I still will admit to being impressed by the cover for SUPERMAN/BATMAN 20, by the very same art team that I have bitched long and hard about while they've been illustrating the first JLA: Classified story arc. I am consistently consistent in my inconsistency.

Moving right along, we come to the DC Universe titles proper.

ADAM STRANGE #8 signals the end to that not-bad limited series...but wait! There are those dreaded words: "Get ready for the opening salvos of the Rann/Thanagar War, which continues in a major miniseries later in 2005." Great. What we've been following is an eight-issue prologue.

DAY OF VENGEANCE #1 is another attempt to get people interested again in DC's vast stable of supernatural characters; I still remember another big company-wide event of a few years ago called Day of Judgement. Oh well, I for one like DC's magic-based heroes, and that sure looks like the Jim Corrigan Spectre, so I'm interested in this. The cover's kinda dull though- what has happened to Walt Simonson? When I first saw this I thought it was Jim Aparo...

BLOOD OF THE DEMON #2 has an interesting-looking cover. By John Byrne. There, I said it. Will Pfiefer's co-writing this, so it probably doesn't suck, but I don't know. Can't buy everything.

We already get the inevitable DC superhero guest spots in BREACH #4, as Superman, Batman, and Martian Manhunter walk on. I don't intend to keep buying this, despite the fact that I like the artists. I'll catch 'em on the rebound.

I suppose this applies more to the inevitable collection, but when I see the listing of the "Final Printings" of IDENTITY CRISIS, I feel like I should quote Dorothy Parker: "This novel is not to be tossed lightly aside, but to be hurled with great force."

Great cover to JLA CLASSIFIED #6, part 3 of "I Can't Believe It's Not the Justice League!", with Booster and Beetle serving burgers in Hell. I'm sure many of us can relate.

THE OMAC PROJECT #1, despite its pedigree as a spinoff of Identity Crisis and DC Countdown (which is unfortunately condemned, perhaps unfairly, by me due to association), looks intriguing. I read Kirby's creepy/cool OMAC series back in the day, y'know.

JB Show favorite Howard Victor Chaykin gets the spotlight in this month's SOLO #4 , and it's reet petite, daddy-o! Love that cover.

I suppose the biggest buzz is for Grant Morrison's Seven Soldiers event, and we get two more miniseries (Here's where I emit a Kif-like groan) this month. Fortunately, they look pretty good, especially SEVEN SOLDIERS: ZATANNA #1, with nice looking art by Ryan Sook and Mick Gray. There's a preview if you go over to DC's website. The only thing that raises a red flag for me is that Grant has Zee in rehab, apparently. What th-? Also coming out this month: SEVEN SOLDIERS: KLARION THE WITCH BOY #1, which gives us Jack Kirby's nasty little boy witch in a more modern light. In other words, he's wearing a lot of mascara around his eyes. I'm not so crazy about the pseudo-Corben art of Frazer Irving, which you can see here. Still, in for a penny, in for a pound, and I've always kinda liked the character.

In the WildStorm section, Howard Chaykin's really been stepping up the output lately, and he's back on art and script for a new 6-issue series called CITY OF TOMORROW. Sounds like a bit of a cross between American:Flagg! and Transmetropolitan, but I think it will be better than that.

OCEAN finishes up with #6, and RAZOR'S EDGE: REDBIRD and SLEEPER SEASON TWO continue. I haven't read a single issue of Redbird, but I'm really looking forward to the Brubaker/Jason Pearson teaming.

Down Vertigo way, skin is in- the first three covers shown, for 100 BULLETS 60 the BITE CLUB trade, and BOOKS OF MAGIC: LIFE DURING WARTIME 10 all feature females in various stages of undress. The poor young lady on the Books cover looks rather bruised, which doesn't exactly provoke my curiosity.

LOSERS 23 begins another new story arc by Andy Diggle and Jock. Let's hope it's not the last one. And look at that cover- more skin!

MNEMOVORE is an intriguing- if hard-to-pronounce- title, written by someone I'm not familiar with but drawn by Deep Sleeper's Phil Huddleston. Again, I can't buy everything, but that's a cool title.

VERTIGO: FIRST TASTE TP is a hell of a good idea, especially the price, but as someone who's been reading much of the imprint's output since day one there are no surprises for me. I wish they'd somehow managed to have a wider range of titles represented without having to fall back on ages-ago work like Death: The High Cost of Living; The Losers, definitely, Lucifer, perhaps, or even My Faith In Frankie. Oh well.

And that's it! Not the most exciting of months, but not a disaster either.