News of the Right

Detective Comics #854: Finally Batwoman! I have to admit I was a little nervous to get this comic at first because it’s written by Greg Rucka. 52 Greg Rucka (though to be fair, he wasn’t alone in that mess. Still, once bitten, twice shy.). Rucka’s story is lyrical, almost a song or part of an opera. If the art were in anyone else’s hands besides J. H. Harrison’s, the book would totally fall apart like a cheap red wig. For now, I’m hooked. A

Wonder Woman #33: I’m running dangerously close to giving Gail Simone Rachel Ray Face, so all I’m going to say is that this was another excellent read except the end was a bit to abrupt for me. One more issue to resolve the Genocide threat (or at least make its whereabouts more clear) and to really let Zeus and Ares’ plans unfold into a HUGE (well, HUGE-er) mess! Ah, well. B

Madame Xanadu #12: Matt and Michael’s Exodus Noir reminds me of the old Sandman Mystery Theatre – sort of dark, sort of sketchy, sort of fun, but always heading towards a horrible end for the titular character. Oooh, foreshadowing. A

Thor #602: Gods are strange creatures of inertia and folly, like really big rocks rolling down a hill. Or across the bottom of a river. I’ve yet to see any compelling evidence that they think anything through before they go off half-cocked and do it (yeah, I’m looking at you, too, Genesis!). Even the “good” ones let their goodness get in the way of accomplishing anything truly “good”. For example, moving all the Asgardians to Latveria – totally poorly planned. Keeping Loki around when no one trusts him/her – well, that just defies wisdom. Weird that the one mortal in the company of the gods is the only one who wants to actively squelch evil. A

Uncanny X-Men #512: My so far least favorite aspect of the team – The X-Club – heads back to the turn of the 20th century to find the parental DNA of the original Mutant X, and as it turns out, I didn’t want to burn pictures of Matt Fraction at midnight. If I had one complaint, it would be the “Hey, things in the past are just like they are in the present!” parallelism. One would think that someone would have known about an earlier Shaw who ran the Hellfire Club 100 years ago, but such is the spurious logic of comic book and time travel. In Fraction’s defense, even Joss Whedon screwed it up in Runaways. B+

Dark Avengers/Uncanny X-Men Utopia: About two months ago, Ben and I went to go see X-Men Origins: Wolverine, not because we had to but because we needed a mental vacation after a particularly stressful week. We were holding hands, waiting for hte movie to begin when six guys filed into the row behind us, sat on my far left and started speaking in Spanish about “the fucking fags over there.” Myself being half-deaf didn’t hear a word of it, but Ben did, and he was extremely uncomfortable. He wanted to move. I didn’t. And, long story short, I got my way. When the movie started these guys shut up, watched the film and left moments after the credits started rolling. Reading Utopia was kind of like that experience. For no really good reason, bigots feel it’s their right (or, Heaven help us, their god-given duty) to expunge “the Other”, demonize them, make them unwelcome. There are also assdancers like Norman Osborne who feel that they deserve to rule and have no compunction against throwing up (natural) “law and order” to get their way. I find this lack of Justice unsettling, which in turn makes me angry. Then I think about those guys at the movie theatre and wonder if they realized they were cheering for “the Other” to win, and if they know that they are seen as “the Other” just as Ben and I. Probably not. More’s the pity. And to Matt Fraction: the descriptive caption boxes are past their prime. A

Barack the Barbarian #1: Terribly unsubtle, but was a fun read. Lord knows that satire doesn’t have to be an épée, but more often than not, it’s a blunt and forceful cudgel. I have my own parody of Marriage Equality coming out soon, and it’s also terribly unsubtle (i.e., doesn’t follow the rule that the best parody is transparent), but in my own mind it could have been better. Next time. B-

Had the above poster been the official one for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, I would have applauded it for its refreshing honesty, not only for the movie itself but for the state of high-action summer blockbusters dating back to Independence Day (yes, I know that wasn’t the original summer blockbuster, but it was about the time if ID4’s release that the “bigger, badder, louder” idiom took root). However, I would also say that the poster’s tag tag line – “More ALIEN ROBOTS, bigger EXPLOSIONS, and much much more MEGAN FOX” – unironically states exactly what’s wrong with the movie. But you don’t have to believe me. Here. This is the movie summary from where I found the poster (my suggestion is to NOT click on the link because it’s one of “those sites” that give off a bad vibe, like perezhilton.com or boysfrombrazil.com. I include the link only for citation purposes.), which I found to be just about as clear as the movie itself:

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This may be the most accurate portrayal of what it was like to watch ROTF I’ve come across. Yeah, yeah, Roger Ebert was pretty clever with his “choir of hell” analogy, but he didn’t really capture the sense of what it was like to be sitting in the theatre watching the mess that was ROTF unzip and shake its privates at us. Metaphorically speaking. Except when I’m speaking literally.

There’s nothing like standing next to a child to really throw a situation into sharp relief. Things that adults don’t think twice about – the little slights of daily life – suddenly become large and vulgar displays of callousness when a kid is in the picture. So, thinking “ROTF is only PG-13; there may be a few things we need to explain, but surely we (my brother and I) can take Dominic (my five-year old nephew) to see it.” Dominic loves Transformers, and this was my special treat to him before I left PA to go back to Texas. A “treat” for which I will feel forever guilty because of how MISLEADING the PG-13 rating is. I was genuinely humiliated to be there, thinking about how we were going to have to have a Talk with Dominic after the credits rolled. Frankly, if it weren’t for the fact that we suspected Dominic didn’t “get” some of the
things that happened and was there to see his favorite bots “live”, I would have walked out as early as Megan Fox’s first appearance: a completely unnecessary 20-second shot of her dry-humping a motorcycle.

Not that there is anything wrong with sex. Given a choice between sex and violence in movies, I’ll go with sex every time over violence. HOWEVER, the sex in ROTF was there to be sex in ROTF and served no other purpose than to be there on the screen, pandering to fanbois (as in “I’ve never known the touch of a woman and therefore have no idea what real skin should look like”) and those who like it gross (multiple shots of humping dogs, John Turturro’s fleshy ass, a bot humping Megan Fox). Lord knows I think that the ass-shot in Orgazmo was hilarious, so I’m not above this kind of thing, but Orgazmo was rated NC-17 and was not an action film with a toy line geared for kids.

Sex aside, what else made this movie an incomprehensible mess?

First, I cannot believe that the language in the movie (when one can understand it through the explosions and screaming) is pg-13. “pussy”, “asshole”, “shit”, and I SWEAR someone said “fuck” – these are now PG-13 standards? And while it’s not language per se, is there ever going to come a day when people stop using phrases like “Not on my watch!” and
“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!”?
Because, trite much?

Second, there are way too many bot on the screen, most of whom go unidentified. What’s the point of that?? I wanted to see the Autobots (yes, i’ll admit here that i was not dragged unwillingly to this film) and Decpticons go at it, but who were some of these guys? and why include new Minicons like the Pretender or the the kitchen appliances gone bad? Why does it seem that the Decepticon numbers flourished over the years, yet only a few Autobots made it to earth? And where the hell did Starscream find The Fallen after 19,000 years on earth??

Third, one cannot get from Giza to Jordan and back to Giza in under a day in foot. It even took the Israelites forty years. Also, one cannot see Giza from Petra. Nor should one be in CA in one scene and in Princeton two scenes later. It reads funny.

Fourth, it’s not just the racism which is a popular kvetch. It’s every ass shot, vixen is a baby-doll dress, scrotum joke, gay image, dog-on-dog action, famous midget cameo, and unfunny bit of toilet humor and crass imagery. And the mystery is, was this something the director did or was it something the writers did? I personally see Michael Bay’s handiwork in it (especially after watching Armageddon last night and realizing bay has become a WORSE director over the years, adding in nonsense that has nothing to do with the plot and certainly had nothing to do with good story-telling.

Fifth, when, oh when, will Sam just tell… uh… what’s-her-name that he loves his car way more than he loves her? And tha Bumblebee’s cooler in every imaginable way than she is?

And is it me, or is Megan Fox just. not. talented? At all. Not that Shia LaBoeuf is any better.

Sixth, say it with me a la Wanda Maximoff, “No mo’ slo-mo!”

I’m sure there’s more to kvetch about, but the horrible thing is that this could have been a better movie – one can see it in moments when the plot rears its enfeebled head between the crassness. Sadly, ROTF was “Bay-icized” before it would be that movie. I’m waiting for some talented SOB to re-cut ROTF into a watchable film a la “star wars: the phantom edit”, then show it to my nephew and hope he forgives me.

defecation reflex

adit

World of Krypton #3 and #4: Beyond the misleading covers. Beyond the non-surprise of Zod being a bastard. Beyond the attempts to make Alura sympathetic. Beyond the status quo changing event of a New Krypton. Beyond the Guardians wetting themselves in anxiety. Beyond all that, this is a Superman book. And wherever there is Superman, Superman is there. B-

Batman & Robin #1: After the whole Final Crisis extravaganza, I was more than a little unwilling to pick up a GMo book so soon, especially for a character I haven’t read since I was 11 or so. However, this seems to be the year when DC lures me into all of the Big Three books, as Batman (formerly Nightwing, formerly Robin) and Robin (formerly some bratty kid who needed a spanking way earlier in his life than he got one (there is a reason why it’s called “child-rearing”)) terrorize the poop out of Gotham City’s criminal element. And I like it. The characterizations are strong. The art.. well, let’s talk about the art. Frank Quitely’s style is immediately recognizable, even if you don’t know his name, and there are cams on the goodness and badness of this statement. It’s been said that his people are nothing more than sandbags topped by shrunken-apple heads. It’s also been said that he gives 3+ dimensions to otherwise flat pages. I’m in the camp of goodness. I haven’t been able to pinpoint what it is, but it is there. Seeing Batman and Robin leap out of a flying Batmobile, through the Bat-signal, and dazzle Commissioner Gordon as they land atop Police Headquarters was beyond “good enough” for me. A+

Ultimatum #4: I honestly cannot remember why I picked up this issue after calling the series “splatter porn” last month. I was so truly, deeply repulsed by the over-the-top imagery that I figured I was finished with it. Well, apparently not. And I truly don’t understand this purchase because I’ve never read any other Ultimates book in my life, so there’s no investment here. Maybe I’ve grown insensitive to it, or maybe I’ve become fascinated by it. Whichever the case may be, I’ll finish the series off next month. I will say this, though: in terms of multi-issue cross-over “events”, this is one in a great long while in which the core book is a perfectly clear story in and of itself. So, props on that. B

Uncanny X-Men #511: I knew I wasn’t going crazy with the rapidity of X-Men’s publishing. This issue comes out only two weeks after the last, which is great because I was eager to see how the cliffhanger would be resolved. Is Jean coming back? Is Maddie going to get her first? Will Greg Land’s characters ever express an appropriate emotion in-panel? The answers, while satisfying, do unfortunately underline Matt Fraction’s one problem as an X-writer: the appearing and disappearing cast. And with the addition of one more character – and a well-beloved one, at that – he’d better learn to juggle better. A-

X-Men Forever #1: X-Men forever is like a long-lost reunion with a beloved ex then realizing there’s a reason you’re exes. F

New Mutants #2: I don’t like where this is going. Say “NO!” to Legion being a new team member, and “YES!” to the return of Rahne Sinclair!! A

Buck Rogers #1: Yeah, you really can’t go back home even if home has righteous art and an otherwise tight story. This may be the antidote to Sci Fi’s Flash Gordon (gag), but it still didn’t do it for me. Sorry, guys! C-

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