Mikester

Last night’s episode of Justice League Unlimited was so-so…it featured Booster Gold, who was never a favorite of mine (though I did buy his first issue, and even got the free “Go for The Gold – BOOSTER GOLD” pin that came with it). The premise of the episode revolves around Booster’s quest for recognition from his peers and the public, which, in a nice touch, reflects the character’s lack of recognition from the majority of the cartoon’s non-comic reading viewing audience. The voice acting seemed a little off to me, and the writing was not nearly as amusing as it thought it was, though Booster’s robot companion Skeets did get the funniest line of the episode (“I got nuthin'”). What did work for me was how the threat the rest of the Justice League was dealing with (while Booster was stuck on crowd control duty) actually felt like something really dangerous and world-threatening. More so, in fact, than in other Justice League episodes where the danger is the main focus of the show, rather than relegated to the background as in this installment.

There were more nice cameos, mostly of characters we’ve seen before. Elongated Man gets a speaking role in this episode, though his stretching power is accompanied by an unfortunately-annoying sound effect. Plastic Man gets name-checked, but not shown. And, if I may nitpick for a moment, I think the producers of the show may have confused EM’s abilities with PM’s…a reference is made to EM being on a stakeout disguised as a vase – aren’t EM’s powers more limited to just stretching, while Plastic Man is the fella what can change his body into various objects? Yeah, I know, the things I worry about.

EDIT: Chris is right…Elongated Man claims he disguised himself as a vase for three days, Booster calls him on it, and EM says, “okay, maybe not.” So anyway, ignore what I said, and go look at the screenshots Chris posted of this episode.

So after all the brouhaha regarding Fallen Angel, guess which comic I forgot to buy this week? Don’t worry, I remembered today. Sheesh.

Speaking of which, the pencils for the autographed bookplate (original offer here) are posted on Peter David’s website.

Jog has a nice review of In The Shadow of No Towers, and a lot more informative than my “well, I’m not sure about the quality of the spine” review.

Would you hate me if I said that the stills from the Sin City movie haven’t exactly reassured me about the film?

Remember that Bush vs. Jesus ad from Mad Magazine I mentioned this morning? Well, apparently it’s taken the internet by storm…I’ve seen it referenced, or outright scanned-and-posted, in about a dozen places so far (like here). If you haven’t got your copy of Mad yet, go take a look.

I find myself with very little to say about this week’s comics. Well, Fables gave us a werewolf fighting Frankenstein’s monster, we got some time-travel shenanigans (and another appearance by my favorite Golden Age villain) in JSA, and the relationship between Lana and Superman goes in a direction I really wasn’t expecting in Action.

The highlight of the new issue of Mad Magazine, #446, aside from the excellent-as-usual contribution by Sergio Aragones (“A Mad Look at Paparazzi”) is “The Bush Campaign’s TV Commercial If He Was Running Against Jesus.” Obvious, yes, but still amusing. Also good is “Your Candidate and My Candidate” (“Your candidate waffles on the issues. / My candidate sees the merits of both sides of the argument.”) All in all, another fine issue of this American institution. Some of the jokes have a little dust on them, but hey, so do I.

There was also a new volume of the Fantastic Four Marvel Masterworks series, which I can’t afford at the moment, but will buy eventually since this is the only Masterworks series I’m following. It reprints issues 61 to 71 (and Annual 5) — a little past the peak of the Lee/Kirby collaboration on the series, but still great stuff. It’ll be nice to have on good paper. I don’t get the “variant” covers on these…there’s the new trade dress, and then there’s the variant “classic” look of the dustjackets, hearkening back to the original appearance of the Masterworks line all those years ago. Well, I do get why they’re doing it…for those fans who want their new volumes to match up with the old volumes, but why are they five bucks more? Are the print runs on the variant covers that much smaller that they have to bump up the price to cover costs? They’re already fifty bones as it is. (We ordered equal numbers of each cover, by the way.)

Newest self-contradicting title: Essential Super-Villain Team-Up. Gives me an excuse to link to this old post of mine, though. I jokingly suggested at work yesterday that Marvel should do an Essential Marvel’s Greatest Comics, just to screw with people.

Additional linkage:

Chris Karath has one of my favorite comics/media weblogs, but since it’s not on the Comics Weblog Update-A-Tron 3000, I’m afraid some comics weblog fans may be missing it. So go take a look, won’t you?

Also, I finally added The Sock Drawer to the weblogroll.

Long day at work (what with it being comic book day and all), and I haven’t even had time to read any of my new comics yet. I’m writing this weblog entry instead…see what I do for you people? Anyway, I’ll probably have some kind of comics overview tomorrow.

We did get in Art Spiegelman’s new book In The Shadow of No Towers, and I can say it’s a very nice-looking package. The first half of the book, which relates Spiegelman’s reaction to the 9/11 attacks and the country’s response, is visually very compelling, looking for all the world like one of his old RAW magazines. The second half is classic comic strips from the beginning of the last century, thematically linked to Spiegelman’s observations in the first half. I haven’t had a chance to read and see for myself if it deserves the mixed critical reaction it appears to be receiving, but at the very least it’s visually appealing. My one concern is that the book’s spine may not be up to the job of repeated readings…it feels awfully darn fragile.

In other news:

• Beaucoup Kevin relates what comic creators he would shag if he were gay. Representative quote: “BENDIS! I’d lick his head and send him on his way….”
• AiT/Planetlar honcho Big Larry continues his examination of the comicsweblogosphere at Comic Book Resources. Against Lar’s better judgment, I’m sure, he continues to include comments from me.
• Okay, who wants to go in with me on bidding on Crossgen? (PayPal donations gladly accepted.) Related is this story about the creators of the fine Abadazad Crossgen comic trying to get back the rights to that series.
• Found out from a customer today that cartoonist Jack Lawrence is off the Darkham Vale book he created for AP Comics. However, he has a new forthcoming book entitled Lions, Tigers, And Bears that should appeal to his fans.
• Just added Jason Kimble’s Trickle of Consciousness to the weblogroll, which I probably should have done a long time ago.
  

Found via my referral stats: my favorite page linking to the Seven Deadly Harveys.

Milo George, who always delights and baffles, presents The Greatest Flash Gordon Daily Strip Ever.

In case you missed this link at the end of my interminable Superman post from yesterday, you’ve gotta see the Superpup page. No, it’s not a hoax…I’ve actually seen the show in question. (EDIT: Just noticed that pal Andy has linked to the page as well…so you better go see it fast, just in case bandwidth issues knock it out! Just in case, here’s an Angelfire page with more stills.)

For Scott Saavedra: more Space Canine Patrol Agents info here, here, here (warning: gnarly pop-ups), here, and, because God is good, Space Canine Patrol Agents fan fiction (with special guest-star, Ace the Bat Hound)!

If you like the old comic covers, get yourself over to the Viper Comics Raw Feed for some of Greg Gatlin’s spicy delights. I have no idea why I just typed the phrase “spicy delights.” I apologize.

To steal an observation from pal Dorian, everybody may be talking about Amazing Fantasy, but has that translated to sales?

The first issue of the British comic Dandy sells for £20,350 (just over $36,000, to us Colonials).

You can find the cover and 5 pages from the Cure issue of Rock ‘n’ Roll Comics on this Cure fan site.

Just added to my weblogroll: the mighty Mae Mai, the unique Utopia Moment, and the crispy Christopher Butcher.