Captain Marvel, Mary Marvel, Captain Marvel, Jr. and Hoppy all want you to subscribe to Mechanix Illustrated
Super-powered beings who can fly and plow through any obstruction known to man aren’t the most obvious spokes-people (and spokes-bunnies) for a mechanical magazine, one dedicated to hard labor and its fruits, but here we are: Captain Marvel et famille, desperate for your Mechanix Illustrated subscription dollars. Read more…
Dubble Bubble tastes great because a fat kid can do a WIlliam Tell and shoot an arrow at his friend’s head
This is a fine candidate for a “Kids, don’t try this at home” disclaimer. Read more…
Loch Ness + Cape Fear + Hulk = Loch Fear (and goofiness)
Several months ago we looked at an Incredible Hulk comic in which the titular big guy, in what surely set a new land speed record for comic book pathos, was betrayed by his own shadow. Granted, it was his shadow possessed by an evil alien from a long-forgotten Marvel mag, but still — it was an indicator of just how miserable the life of a Green Goliath can be. Today’s comic, roughly contemporaneous, sets no marks in this field, nor does it try to. Instead it vaults our child-like hero across the Atlantic Ocean and deposits him amongst the Scottish moors, where he encounters an ersatz Loch Ness Monster, lairds and beans. Lots and lots of beans. Read more…
Nothing says “Twinkie” like Joe Rudi of the Oakland A’s
Man, Joe Rudi had the prototypical 1970s ballplayer aesthetic, didn’t he? Like an avatar of groovy baseball. Read more…
I was all set to make fun of this stuff. Marvel has purveyed a lot of garbage over the years, and one could only expect no less from them when it came to their 1975 in-house Marvel Comic Con and its associated souvenir junk. (Even if conventions can produce some amusing mementos.) But the above wares are the finest sort of ephemera: things you wouldn’t mind having almost forty(!) years in the future, i.e. things not trashed immediately upon exiting the convention hall. Read more…
Half in the Bag: Guardians of the Galaxy
http://blip.tv/redlettermedia/episode-7004078
For a counterpoint/reiteration of this site’s recent Guardians of the Galaxy review, here are the boys from Red Letter Media to give you the Half in the Bag take. Beware potential foul language, and ignore the stuff about Boyhood, some dopey movie which, unbelievably, contains no special effects shots. (Michael Bay isn’t dead, so he can’t roll over in his grave, but right now he’s probably rolling over in his giant bed filled with blonde hookers, cocaine and cash.)
We’ve seen candy advertisements make specious claims about the nutritional and energy-boosting qualities of their products before, even their value for, of all things, paratrooper training. But never have we had one like we see above, which posits a dubious connection between Baby Ruths and naval warfare. Read more…
Hooked on a feeling or no? – Guardians of the Galaxy
Three years ago saw the film advent of the God of Thunder, Thor, in all his mailed and flaxen-tressed glory. In my review for that film, which I liked quite a bit, I focused a lot on how it was the one big element of the Avengers build that could have gone horribly, horribly wrong. It would have been easy for Asgard, with all its mix of science and magic and Rainbow Bridges and highfalutin talk, to come across as untenably silly on the big screen, and it could have been a hellish two-hour exercise in trying to cover both your eyes and your ears with your hands — you know, like any Michael Bay Transformers abomination. (Well, maybe not that bad.) Yeah, Captain America could be stiff (and had his own dreadful adaptations to overcome) and the Hulk could be one-dimensional, but Thor was voted Most Likely to Bomb Spectacularly in that high school yearbook.
But it worked out. Kenneth Branagh and his committed cast held it together, despite said director’s fetishistic obsession with Dutch angles that lasted throughout. It wove the mystical, deified aspect of Marvel’s rich fictional history seamlessly into the Cinematic Universe narrative. It was fun, and it promised that this unprecedented franchise-melding flower was just beginning to blossom.
I dredge all this up because Guardians of the Galaxy feels a bit like Thor, but without the august pedigree. It’s a team movie that bears no relation to the original comic book team (well, mohawked Yondu is in it), and no one cares about that because no one apart from the most devoted Trivial Pursuit Marvel nerds can name the original Guardians roster off the tops of their heads. It’s a team with CGI trees and raccoons. But if it works? If it works, there’s not just a team-up movie for the ages in store. No, we have the great treasure-trove of cosmic Marvel at our very fingertips. High stakes indeed.
So how is it? Read more…
Jeffrey Dahmer, Redux – My Friend Dahmer
Several years ago this blog looked at a brief, 24-page comic that dealt with aspects of notorious serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer’s teenage years. Entitled My Friend Dahmer, it was told from the perspective of a childhood acquaintance of his, writer/illustrator John Backderf, better known by his pen name, Derf. The comic was thin but searing, a haunting window into a tormented soul, one twisted and warped in an excruciatingly isolated adolescence. One day Dahmer’s name would become synonymous with necrophilia and cannibalism, but there was a time he was simply Jeff. A loner. A kid. Despite the grim subject matter, that slim book was superb, an exemplar of all that unshackled independent comics can be.
Two years ago Derf published a refined and vastly expanded version of this story (which itself built upon brief strips published over the years), once again entitled My Friend Dahmer. And its nigh-unbelievable level of quality demands that we finally take a look at this second tome. Like Derf, we can’t stop grappling with the infinite waste and what ifs of a deranged murderer’s teenage forge. Read more…
With NFL training camps about to open and the regular season within shouting distance, here’s an odd little remnant from the 1990s to whet your whistle. Read more…
Sunday Stupid: Carl Lewis Sings!
For a while I’ve wanted to start a new feature here, something called — as you can see — Sunday Stupid. Just random dumb stuff found on the web, which may or may not be related to comics, but is undeniably moronic. I don’t know if this will be every Sunday, or it will be as irregular as the Trading Card Set of the Week, but we’ll give it a shot.
Up first: Olympic track and field legend Carl Lewis doing his damnedest to disgrace himself in the most embarrassing music video ever committed to tape and/or a blocky 240p YouTube embed. Read more…
Half in the Bag: Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
http://blip.tv/redlettermedia/half-in-the-bag-dawn-of-the-planet-of-the-apes-6996915
Here’s some brief weekend viewing for you, another opinion on Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (which I liked quite a bit), from our friends over at Red Letter Media. Skip a few minutes ahead if you’re not interested in the running storyline of the Half in the Bag series, and just want to get to Mike and Jay’s discussion. (And beware of occasional foul language.)
There are times when companies are all half-assed with their sweepstakes, making contestants jump through dopey hoops for prizes of dubious value. Then there’s what Revell does in this one: says “Screw the models, let’s give away the real things!” Finally, a sweepstakes we can all rally behind. Read more…
Your soul will never recover after its encounter with the “Tarantula Hawk” – Walt Disney’s Secrets of Life
Disney is the standard-bearer for family friendly entertainment. We can quibble that their output is all too often saccharine and sanitized, but for big eyed animorphs and cloying tugs at heartstrings, you don’t have to go far beyond the Magic Kingdom’s catalog. Your Thumpers, your Shaggy Dogs, et cetera, et cetera. And then you have something like today’s comic, which is nature at its ickiest and grodiest. Bugs! Read more…
Jared
blog into mystery 