Saturday, September 01, 2007

I need HBO

I haven't had much opportunity to catch Flight of the Conchords, but I need to see more of it.

From Nicole


And from Jim, I believe

HOT! HOT! HOT!

Hey, remember these guys? Famous for the worst promotional video everywhere?



They just beat Univ. Michigan. Ranked No. 5 Univ. of Michigan.

It all seems like fun and games, this business of bringing in a sucker team to stomp in in your first game to get the alumni pumped up for your billion dollar football program. Until the rubes from Appalachian State accidentally screw up and beat you.

Ah, this football season is already off to an interesting start.

Thursday, August 30, 2007

Too Many Comics, once again

Sweet Mother of Moses.

I just got back from the "super secret sale" at Austin Books. Leaguers, $1 back issues are a dangerous, dangerous thing. Anyway, I think I just filled in a pretty good chunk of missing Detective Comics issues from the 80's by the Grant/ Breyfogle creative team, a bunch of 70's era Superman issues, some George Perez Wonder Woman comics and a few other gems. I also got some half-off issues of Jimmy Olsen. All in all, a successful venture in some ways, in other ways, its going to be embarrassing when I can't afford heat this winter.

Here's the kicker:

Jason and I were in line checking out and the owner/ proprietor of Austin Books, Brad, stopped me and said "Hey, you're the Melbotis guy." I am, indeed, the Melbotis guy. You may recall Brad has commented on this very blog before when I wrote about the hall of wonders that is Austin Books. Well, I guess he put my name on my credit card with my grinning face and realized the guy buying too many 70's era Superman books was yours truly.

So that was kind of awesome. Leaguers, the power of my golden retriever pal is the glue that holds this crazy world together.

Anyhow, Austin based Leaguers or mere hangers-on would be interested to know that the sale continues thru Sunday. I sort of thought that unless I got to Austin Books during the super-secret sale, a lot of good stuff might be gone. I'm not sure that's exactly accurate, but it was fun being there with all the rest of the comic geeks on the hunt for deals.

I just got home and the three stars of "Superbad" are on Leno. Jonah Hill was wearing an Alamo Drafthouse shirt with the tell-tale Pam Grier "BadAss Cinema" logo.

Huh.

And, seriously... WHAT?

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Superman/ JLA Rumors

I do not understand how Hollywood works. I don't. I'm an armchair spectator of the entertainment industry no more nor less than your average joe.

But one thing I do keep an eye on are rumors of Superman movies.

Recently, the Superman Homepage ran several items regarding a potential Justice League of America movie. Rumors ran from the notion that Christian Bale and Brandon Routh would not appear as Batman and Superman to the movie being an entirely CGI operation.

Now, whenever rumors like this begin to swirl, it can always be some ill-informed dork or some prankster pulling everyone's leg, but...

Superhero movies cost lots and lots of money. More than the GDP of most countries kind of money. When rumors as various as the ones I've been seeing flying all over the place begin to occur with no confirmation from the studio, it usually means one thing:

Someone is floating an idea to see how the fans respond

Hollywood's recent attention to events like Comic-Con and their slow realization that a reasonably close adaptation of comic book properties can lead to huge ticket and DVD sales has quickly led to the entertainment industry using message boards, websites, etc... as sounding boards for concepts before more than a few dollars are spent.

Now, sites like IESB.net seem to bite on these rumors hook, like and sinker, most likely knowing the rumors are false, but in this world, you have to drive up your hit count if you want ad revenue. There's, no doubt, a lot of mutual scratching of backs going on in there somewhere.

It's not necessarily diabolical. Before I spent $2 million dollars putting Jeff Goldblum into Joker make-up on the tip from the suits at my studio that Goldblum is HOT! right now, I'd want to see if anyone actually agrees. So, you float an unconfirmed studio rumor to IESB.net, and in 24 hours you have enough information to tell you how an audience is going to take to a person in a role. Or, indeed, how folks would like their JLA made up of polygons and gradients.

Alternately, some agents float similar rumors in order to get their client's name in the ring for a "coveted" role like Wonder Woman. (I can't tell you how many e-mails I get per year from various folks telling me who the next Wonder Woman is going to be in the not-even-in-pre-production WW flick).

Recently, the JLA and Superman camps have been floating rumors with an added sense of urgency to drum up some interest in their projects. This week rumors floated regarding the next Superman movie (supposedly titled "Man of Steel", probably to match "The Dark Knight"). Clearly the folks working on the JLA movie would like to just get going on their JLA movie and do not wish for a second Superman movie to get rolling, so wouldn't it behoove them to get folks talking about how absolutely great it would be to see a JLA movie?

There is a point to all this:

For the love of mike... unless you see something in an article with a studio exec going on the record regarding casting, start dates for filming (actors, producers and directors do not count as studio execs), do not believe the articles. People are attacked to projects all the time that never occur (I never got my mid-90's remake of "Harvey" featuring Tom Hanks or my "King Conan" with Gov. Arnold).

WB is trying to move carefully as they work on their potentially lucrative film projects. This includes Superman and JLA, as well as any member of the JLA in a spin-off flick.

So, you know... settle down. It's all hearsay until you see the first set picture.

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Happy 90th Birthday, Jack

Update: an article from the New York Times
credit for link to Jeff Shoemaker



Reading Comics

Nothing is more dull than reading blogging about blogging, but...

So after six weeks or so of consideration, I've decided to pull the plug on my participation with the Fodder Network/ Comic Fodder.

You have to understand that Comic Fodder was a great experience, but... I love my comics. What with a job, friends and family I want to spend time with, and a whole lot of other factors, reviewing up to ten comics in a week can get to be a bit of a grind. I love my comics, and worrying about getting the blogging done every week was making me feel a bit guilty, which sort of makes reading the comics a commitment. And that's sort of always been the opposite of what I had in mind when it came to reading little stories about aliens with an overinflated sense of justice.

I think I gave it a good run. An article I wrote on "what do women want in comics?", which was really just a question more than an article, continues to get hundreds of hits per month. And that's kind of cool. It's nice to know you're giving folks something to read, and it certainly was getting more hits than The League ever receives.

But I was also losing a good chunk of every weekend writing about what a swell comic I find Blue Beetle. Life isn't quite the same here as it was in PHX. I actually have stuff to do here, and I kind of want to enjoy it. And my comics.

There's other stuff I want to try, too, you know. I once wrote some prose stuff. I'd like to finish that. I have stuff I'd like to try to draw myself and try out the Comic Creator software Jason got me for my birthday. I'd like to work on my choreography for "Steanso: A Rock 'n Roll Dance-Splosion!".

Anyhow, it was fun. I gave it a shot. Maybe someday again. In the meantime, you can probably expect to see an increase of comic-related blathering here at the League.

Saturday, August 25, 2007

Just some stuff

Wagner is in town, but she's headed for the Flugtag (sp?). I was not terribly tempted to show up. Anything before the 1st week in September is always dicey as per heat index.

In the meantime, here's some stuff.

The Top 10 Poor Man's Versions

Goth's Invade Disneyland.

From the "Bats Day at Disneyland" slideshow at LA Weekly: When the Happiest Place on Earth plays host to the saddest people on Earth ­ and the line for the Haunted Mansion is longer than ever



I'm ditching MySpace as soon as I can bother to find a way to alert folks. I'm moving to Facebook. Hopefully I'll get less spam and fewer ads featuring girls giving me a come-hither glance.

Eric Trautmann, the co-writer on last week's issue of Checkmate, showed up to in the comments section at Comic Fodder and was incredibly gracious. Of course, I heart Checkmate, so it was a lot nicer than had many other writers shown up.

You should read Checkmate, btw. And Blue Beetle.

Josh sends along this:



Nothing better than Finn-language YMCA. Some Leaguers may know, the Steans boys are of 1/2 Finn stock. Watching this video, so much becomes clear.

And the following video is exactly like dinner time at JimD's house.

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY, ADMIRAL



Happy Birthday to the greatest Dad. Ever.

Sorry I posted on it so late.
Thanks to Steven and Lauren for joining us this evening for dinner. I still need a mint.

Anyway, looks like we may be teaming up to watch the first game of the UT season. Any and all Leaguers are welcome to join us at League HQ for kick-off on September 1st at 6:00 PM. Well, come before that.

We won't provide dinner, but we will provide TV, chips and a maybe a six-pack of beer.

I shall wax rhapsodic upon the arrival of football season soon.

What else?

Oh, I watched this really depressing episode of Nova about Typhoid Mary.

It was an interesting look at the social conditions, class warfare, living conditions and emergence of science in America as a force which could now touch and greatly change people's lives in ways we're still struggling with today. In short, how much liberty DO you have to give up when suddenly confronted with the knowledge that you're a carrier for a disease? Is getting a disease a crime?

Anyhow, there were some re-enactments, which were brief enough that they didn't seem to repaint the picture, and which did a bit more for illustrating the points than a graying talking head re-telling the events. Plus, for some reason, they had Anthony Bourdain as one of the experts. Very odd.

Also did some comic blogging, but most of you guys arent dorky enough to read that, anyway.

Monday, August 20, 2007

If the League were super...





from the Caption Contest currently running at the Superman Homepage

Sleestak Art

Probably because I hit Lady, That's My Skull every day, I had the image of Sleestaks on the brain.

Anyway, hopefully this is something we can all enjoy. Especially candidate Sleestak.

Sunday, August 19, 2007

A nice, slow weekend.

I needed a slow, quiet weekend this weekend, though. Having a job, I find, does that to me.

Friday night we never made it out of the house except for an early dinner. I'd managed to leave work at a reasonable time, so it was a nice change of pace, given how the rest of my week had gone. We watched "Batman Begins", and after Jamie went to bed, I watched "When Worlds Collide". I think it's an interesting movie, but I somewhat question some basic premises of the film.

"When Worlds Collide" is a 1950's movie about what happens when astronomers figure out a huge planetoid is headed towards Earth, and when it hits, we're all gonna die. The gameplan is to put people on a giant rocket and shoot them out into space to find a habitable planet.

Now, there's some talk of the financing that would need to occur to make this work, and that strikes me as something sort of odd. I suspect that with the world about to blow up, somehow money really wouldn't be a huge focus. I suspect some folks would try to do the right thing and do everything they could to assist the space ark to give humanity one tiny chance at survival, and a whole lotta other people would go berserk and do a lot of really despicable junk. Because the movie takes place in the 1950's, everyone stands around in suits and talks things through with a lot of product in their hair.

Saturday Jamie went with Carla to a dance class somewhere. I believe they did a lot of arm swinging and hopping, but I'm not sure. All I know is that Jason and I headed to Gus Frugh and floated with Mel and Cassidy (Lucy has an ear infection, so no swimming for her). It was really nice out, and the $10 floating fisherman's hat I recently picked up at Academy worked like a charm. Plus, I could throw it and Mel would retrieve it out of the water.

Late Saturday we saw "Superbad", which was better than I expected. I don't recommend it for the parents, but I thought it was funny, and the story was a good "one night in the life of high schoolers" first spawned with American Graffiti. While as raunchy in its way was "American Pie", the characters feel far more believable than the Tommy Hilfiger models of American Pie (that Apatow touch of casting believable looking actors) as well as not dumping too many over the top stereotypes on the audience (ie: No Stifler, no sexy foreign exchange students).

Today I was worthless. We ran some errands and ate lunch at the charming French stereotype, La Madeline over in Brodie. I don't really get la Madeline. It's incredibly complicated just ordering your food, and then it's kind of expensive for what you get. And, of course, where there was a field a few weeks ago, you're now in a rustic French cafe. Manned by surly high schoolers who take an insane amount of time putting together a cup of French Onion soup. Seriously. Speed it up.

I came home from errands and promptly fell asllep on the couch for over an hour, got up and FINALLY got to the task at hand (which I had planned to do all weekend), and began sorting comics from my downstairs bins in order to bag and board them for entry into Comicpriceguide.com and then filing in a long box.

This, sadly, was the task which was why I asked Steven and Lauren to meet us for dinner Tuesday rather than this evening. I'm a sad, sad dorky man.

Speaking of:

Thursday at work we were working on a course which features a "wizard" who guides learners through a lesson. A media developer, who is a long-time acquaintance of mine, said, "Ryan, you know the difference between a wizard and a sorcerer, right?"
"Man, I don't know." I paused and considered the question. "Why," I finally asked, "do you think I know that?"
"Because you're the dorkmeister."

I am the dorkmeister. Even at work.

I actually brought it up again Friday, and Pat was able to explain that my dorkiness falls into very specific areas, and that my dorkiness doesn't spread to area involving wizards and warlocks. Actually, it kinda/sorta does, but Dungeons and Dragons was long, long ago.

I then found myself talking about how cool Nova is in front of this guy later, and I realized that my reputation is all too well earned.

Saturday, August 18, 2007

Dark Knight Photos

Jamie randomly wanted to watch "Batman Begins" this evening. Which reminded me of a link Randy sent me earlier today.

Photos from the new Batman movie, The Dark Knight

go here

The photos reveal that the Batsuit may be the first functional looking Batsuit in any live version of Batman I can think of. For once, Batman can turn his head, and he's not wearing an ill-fitting unitard.

Add in an oddly pragmatic looking Joker, and... yeah. Sure, why not.

Friday, August 17, 2007

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Stuck@Work

I am stuck at work.

I am waiting for other people to do things so I can see that they are done. When they are done, I can go home.

In the meantime, here I sit. Alas.

My job is sort of unpredictable that way. It makes for long days sometimes. Especially when i came in early to address other issues and never managed to see daylight at any point. Because its been that kind of day.

Also, Steven Harms has gone dark.

Es Muy Mysterioso.

Just want to go home. Please, co-workers, quit screwing around.

It's been a long week.

And I have another day of it tomorrow. The job is okay, it's just moments like these that I miss actually being somebody else's manager and being able to give my co-workers a moment of pause when I ask if we couldn't be doing something faster or better. Or, at least, quit screwing around and just finish the darn thing.

I am paid to keep things in line. This is something my family is shocked by. They tend to think of me as sorta screwy, so the idea that at work my job is keeping the ball rolling gives them a moment of disconnect.

hey, good news. Jonathan just fixed something for us and he wasn't even on our project. That's rad.

Stuff like that is why I dig working here. Everything is sort of a team effort. Everything at my last office was also a team effort, but we were mostly working on the same projects, as it was a smaller office. Here, you never know when one of 60-odd people is going to wander over and say "Hey, I'm going to fix that. I've got a few hours" when they could totally be heading home.

Still sitting here though. I just want to release the project.

Release! Release!

Monday, August 13, 2007

The New Flash Gordon on Sci-Fi

...totally sucks.

Wow. Monday evening I made poor Jason and Jamie sit through this no-budget train wreck.

Flash Gordon has successfully existed as a comic strip, 1950's TV show, radio serial movie serial, 80's camp classic, 90's cartoon, reprint series, whatever...

Yet somehow with a household name at their fingertips, untold hours of reference material and a public perception regarding the franchise, the geniuses behind this show decided that what they really needed to do was scrap all of that, make up a bunch of nonsense that's never plagued the concept before, and then spend most of the pilot in a Canadian suburb. It seems that, faced with a non-existent budget and a casting director with a pretty specific taste in women, the creators apparently had something other than Flash Gordon in mind and just borrowed the name of the property.

Seriously, nothing resembles anything you know about Flash Gordon.

A list of offenses includes:

-All of the women are thin brunettes with sort of almond eyes. I couldn't tell Dale, the princess or the bounty hunter apart in close-ups
-Flash's mom is, like, three years older than him and sort of uncomfortably attractive
-The show sorta takes a line on Latino immigrants that could be construed as racist
-Ming is the least threatening villain ever. Seriously. Ever. It's like having a record store manager mildly miffed with you.
-they've ditched the now well established, crazy, space opera look of Mongo for generic Sci-Fi channel BSG and Star Trek costuming rejects and bland hip design with no eye to the gilded age wonders of the comics and movies
-the pacing is glacial, nonsensical and meandering
-Flash is given a token black sidekick so someone can say "That's whack!" a lot
-The acting is uniformly awful
-Lines clearly intended to be played for laughs are played straight. Whether this is the director or actors' fault, I have no idea
-No Hawkmen
-No Lizardmen
-No awesome football game
-clearly filmed in a lush Canadian suburb
-Mongo: Also clearly the exact same suburb. Plus a water treatment plant possibly used in several "sci-fi" films from the 80's seen nowhere else but on MST3K
-Zarkov is now a quirky guy who will be play "The Professor" to Flash's "Gilligan"
-The girl who plays the princess seems puzzled as to what show she's on. Maybe the OC?
-absolutely no action to speak of
-And Flash can hop between a field near his house and Mongo at any time. pretty much defeating the point of the entire Flash Gordon concept

On every level possible, the program fails. If you're going to claim you're giving me Flash Gordon, Sci-Fi Channel, then give me @#$%ing Flash Gordon. Don't try to "update" a concept that's been honed and perfected over the better part of something like 70 years. You and your crappy budget are not smarter than the millions of folks who already passed judgment on the idea the way it was.

Leave it alone. Sometimes aliens just need to dress like color blind Prussian generals, weird Eastern stereotypes, pirates and barbarians.


The show is crap in a hat.

Slacker Cats

ABC Family, the network which was originally a religious network, then owned by Fox, before ABC bought it out.... is putting on a cartoon about two sex crazed, drug using cats. In prime time.

The League is no prude, but... I guess ABC means it when they brand their programming with "A New Kind of Family".

Anyhow, it appears to be in the mode of Family Guy or perhaps some of the Adult Swim programming on Cartoon Network. And it is on kind of late.

Nonetheless, there's something almost oddly meta-satirical in the commercials, as if these spots are meant to exist as part of the background in some film about a dystopian future more than actually pitching ABC Family's new Fall line-up.







I have a bad feeling about this.

Maybe it'll be great. Who knows?

Child-Free American

So the other night we were at dinner with Steven and Lauren and were seated across from Steven's friends Forrest, Marina and their kid, Blaze. Blaze, you must understand, looks like he should be in grape juice commercials, is talkative without being annoyingly precocious and had not an ounce of bratty in him. In short, a good kid.

Unsure of what else to chat about, Blaze seemed like a good option. And in the course of the discussion someone accurately described Jamie and I as "childless". But that person was quickly shot down in favor of what must be a new term: Child-Free.

Apparently this term was cooked up to spare the feelings of those who would like to have children, but do not. I am both amused and horrified that, for the first time in my life, as a middle class white male I've had a PC label applied to me. My feelings must be mitigated through semantics. I am to be described in a way that suggests I have made a valid choice of alternative lifestyle, and that choice is recognized and appreciated by all.

Were Jamie and I the same age we were when we left for Arizona, the question of the number of children we had left behind with Gorton's fish sticks and Kraft Mac'n'Cheese would never be addressed. Young, recently married, we'd be expected to be having a great time, going to shows, travel the world, etc...

But now...

Now we are in our 30's. In March and April, it will be semi-accurate to describe us as being in our mid-30's. We are past the age when we've gotten our careers going, have had our youthful fun, and its time to bring the next generation of Leagues into existence. For the rest of my life, it will be presumed I'm hiding a couple of fishstick-eaters somewhere.

For anyone who has followed this blog, its not a secret that this is not going to happen. I like kids. Despite all the jokes I make at the expense of folks who are now wrestling with sleepless nights, dirty diapers and paying for college in 17 years... And as much as I like sleeping in, not having dirty diapers and spare money enough to buy Jimmy Olsen comics... Having kids just isn't in the picture. We didn't make the choice, but it's also never been in the cards, and so was never been given much consideration any more than "wouldn't it be neat if we had hands where our ears are".

I want to be very clear here: In no way am I offended by assumptions that we should have kids. I don't think folks who have kids are suckers. I was just left reeling at the idea that I had moved into a category which I had not been aware existed.

Now, here's what I dig about my valid lifestyle choice as a Child-Free American... It may keep me from going through the battery of questions all child-rearing folks (AKA: Breeders) have:
-when we plan to have kids
-why we don't plan to have kids
-why we don't press on and adopt, because, you know, we'd make swell parents (a topic which is sorely up for debate, and would require experiments that no western government would allow. Jason's hypothesis: Feral Children.).

As Child-Free Americans its like we decided on a different path in life. Like, say, we decided to live in a dymaxion home or done something else slightly unconventional, but, you know, it's just something you let slide.

As a Dog-Saddled/ Child-Free American, unfortunately, you have a great love for your pets. And people really, really do not like you matching their stories about how their kid smiles when he farts with how your dog wakes you up in the morning when she's hungry, or how your cat has figured out how to open the pantry door. Still, I must remind everyone that your kid will be in diapers for years and my dog learned to go to the door before she was six months old when she had to pee. I'm just saying.

Pretty sharp, my dogs.