SUMMER OF SUPERMAN: GO SEE THE MOVIE!!!

Reviews are trickling in of press screenings of the upcoming Superman Returns film.

There's a bit of weirdness in that the official release date of Superman Returns is Wednesday the 28th, but we've got listed screenings starting AZ time at 10:00pm on Tuesday. I did my best puppy-dog eyes last night to try to convince Jamie we NEEDED to go to the 10:00 Tuesday show, but
1) Lucy and Mel both do better puppy-dog eyes
2) Jamie has stupid dialysis at 5:00 Wednesday morning. Apparently she needs it to survive and that trumps her ability to stay up until 1:00 or 1:30 on Wednesday morning.

So, we're now going on Wednesday.

I will probably be writing a summary of my experience. I will not be writing a review. To write a review, one must be objective. I find it unlikely that I will be objective.

We are then slated to head to Houston the week of July 4th, and if I know my folks, we'll be seeing the movie there as well. Possibly on the IMAX. Cousin Susan will be joingin us in Houston and will be fitted with an appropriate muzzle as she likes to let you know when a movie is not meeting her criteria. Susan does not like the superheroes.

Mom and Dad will ALSO be fitted with muzzles. Apparently around 1999, they decided casual conversation was okay in the theater, officially getting that one step closer to becoming crazy old people. KareBear is all about refusing to follow a movie. The Admiral likes to point out things in the movie and try to tell you then and there how "that type of radio was decommissioned from submarines in 1967. There's no way any self-respecting vessel would have a junky old radio like that" in the middle of Crimson Tide.

Steanso is quiet. Sort of. He just tends to knock over Cokes.

Jamie is the perfect movie partner. She's tiny, so I can share an armrest with her, and she is usually willing to do a candy swap in the middle of the movie.

Will Steanso like Superman? The answer is almost certainly a "yes". I know this, because the movie will contain loud, large explosions.

Anyhoo, what are you guys doing? Anyone else have plans to see the movie?

Summer of Superman: Pimping the Man of Steel

You know, in the comics, practically everybody in Metropolis has at least one Superman t-shirt. To be without is like living in NYC and not having a Mets or Yankees shirt. Of course Superman doesn't make any money off of the shirts, mugs, etc... and asks only that proceeds go to charity.

We've also seen the dark side of all of this in an issue where DCU huckster Funky Flashman set up a Superman shop in Metropolis, and as he wasn't sharing the wealth with charity, Lois more or less tricked him into bringing the wrath of the supervillain underground down on his head. The moral: share the profits with Captain Cold.

This summer has seen Superman's face or emblem pastered onto cereal boxes, toothpaste tubes, ice cream pops, and all manner of product in between. Part of me is wildly amused. Part of me is a little overwhelmed. And, in fact, I'd say Jamie is beginning to reach Supersaturation. I'm now making a conscious effort not to pick up Superman-hyping products into the house, turning down items like Superman electric toothbrushes, partly because the vibration from electric toothbrushes makes me want to vomit and partly because I want to stay married to the very sweet lady who has been oh, so patient thus far.

With every product, I sort of stop and think: Gee, would Superman REALLY want his face on that?

For example, would Superman want to contribute to childhood obesity by having his symbol on fatty cheeseburgers at a fast-food chain? I think we can assume he would not.

Would he want kids to drink Pepsi? How about adults? Apparently WB studios thinks so, because Superman and the Daily Planet are adorning bottles of Pepsi at Target.

Bottled water? I guess so.

This summer the AMF Bowling Leagues are putting together "Superman Bowling Leagues". I don't know what that's about, but I think you get a Superman bowling ball when you join. And while a Superman bowling ball is tempting, it's just an odd thought to imagine the most powerful man on Earth hanging out and trying to break 200. But maybe, just maybe, it's at least an activity to get kids away from the Playstation for twenty minutes.

I don't mind a fad of Superman stuff. After all, the Superman emblem has been a bit of a fad with college kids for the past few years, appearing on all kinds of stuff.

I guess I'm just concerned about two things: 1) the cheap and shoddy product that WB will agree to in order to make money now on Superman which may not really support the franchise identity, and 2) the oversaturation of Superman, a la Star Wars Episode 1. Remember not being able to hit a fast food joint without Jar-Jar being printed on your napkins?

Simultaneously, Superman should be out there for the kids. I'd love nothing more than for a dozen Supermans to hit my house this Halloween, to see kids runnign around the park in $4.00 capes and blasting one another with imaginary heat-vision. The cost of keeping those kids in capes can be a bit pricey, so, yeah, sometimes I don't mind the cheaper products.

In two months, Superman Returns will have come and gone from theaters (barring any surprising Titanic like success, which I am not anticipating) . The Superman product will stick around for a while, see a resurgence at Christmas, and then disappear until the inevitable sequel.

We'll be the house still sporting the Superman toys scattered about, the comics littered across every flat surface, and the mvoies and DVD's filling the shelves. So I guess I'm trying to enjoy it while I can. Without driving Jamie insane.

NEW ITEMS IN LoM STORE

Hey, Leaguers. If you go to the League of Melbotis store at cafepress.com, you will see a few items have been changed to include the official LoM artwork.

We suggest you get an item for every single person you know.

Go to the store now.

Go Maroons!

I was going to post on this and forgot. See, I took the GRE on Friday, so most everything else sort of dripped out my ears from Thursday until Friday night.

Austin High Teacher in trouble for topless internet photos.

Front page of CNN, man. It's hard to keep that kind of stuff on the QT when CNN is splashing it across the front page out of prurient interest. The Statesman ran an article on this last week and included pictures of the teacher. I think it's worth noting that Ms. Hoover appeared qualified to pose topless.

Art and high school are an odd combination. Despite all evidence to the contrary, high school administrators are in a never-ending battle insisting that they are in charge of children, not young adults with working brains. Parents would like for art classes to be all clay ash-trays and pictures of posies in a vase. The students, meanwhile, are in a crucial stage of self-discovery and expression. We had a photo of a skinny male torso taken down out of our display case at KOHS because a caoch deemed it "gay".

Now, you sort of have to have a background in art in order to teach art in high school. And that may mean that the teacher may have had an educational background not steeped in the education department while receiving their degree. It may also mean that the teacher has a life outside of the classroom.

I'm not exactly certain what's contained in the photos of Ms. Hoover, but the description was "topless". At no point was "simulated sex acts" or anything of that nature brought up. Further, according to the Statesman's article, Hoover had no idea the artist would post the photos online.

I know I know I know... we must protect the children. Whatever. Those kids are going to be adults someday. In fact, the day they turn 18 and/ or graduate from high school, expectations sure do change, don't they?

I think it's absolutely worth noting that Ms. Hoover was not the one who showed the photos to her students, nor did she participate in them in order for her students to see them. She was a model. It was, in fact, a different teacher who viewed the photos in the classroom with other students present.

In viewing art, even in public school, students are exposed to nudity. Whether viewing slides of The David or Venus de Milo. And, no, the argument that those are "classic" works doesn't hold up. You either accept all of it as art or you accept none of it.

Now, with national attention, the district is going to find itself at the center of a lot of controversy regarding the private lives of underpaid school teachers. No doubt, the district's decision to quickly slap Ms. Hoover with her scarlet letter and get her out the door will be applauded by the PTA. I think it's kind of sad that they're quick to fire someone so quickly when they did nothing wrong in the classroom or on school grounds, and which, in all fairness, probably had no adverse effect on any student.

AISD has been a problem school district for well over a decade, and has much bigger fish to fry than a couple of photos. I'm sure they know this. What I find interesting is that you really didn't hear much about people in the district getting fired for manipulating TAKS scores, but this firing wasn't even in question.

Still, you gotta protect those innocent, innocent kiddies from the preeeverts.

Saturday

Well, the KareBear and Admiral are off to Italy for several days. The Admiral has some sort of business meeting there, and then they're headed to Rome. I managed to call to wish the Admiral a Happy Father's Day, so I guess I've done my sonly duty for the year.

Two big items:

1) Jim D. got the Site Feed going. You can now get an Atom or Feedburner link. Just look over in the chaotic space on the left for the Site Feed links.
<---------------------------------------------------------- 2) Jim also sent a 30 pound box to the house full of comics, magazines, a CD, flyers, his old driver's license (now available to any TX kids who need a fake ID), and an autographed picture of Noel Neil.

Noel Neil is the woman who played Lois Lane in the original Superman serials and in the Adventures of Superman TV series. She later appeared as Lois's mother in a cameo in Superman: The Movie. This summer she will appear in Superman Returns as an aging millionaire.

As you can imagine, for The League, having a signed picture by Ms. Neil is huge, especially as Jim D. secured it for me on his recent trip to Philadelphia. Ms. Neil was signing photos at Wizard World Philly where Jim wound up the day after he saw Radiohead play. According to Jim (I've been waiting years to use that) Ms. neil is a little hard of hearing, which is indicated by the fact that the picture is addressed to "Bryan". You know what? I could care less. I'm just pumped to have the photo and autograph.

That said, I now have 30 pounds of stuff to sift through. However, Jim did include some issues of DC Presents I'm excited about (including Superman assisting Santa) and the only issue I was missing of the current run of JSA.


I've been watching World Cup all day. The Italy v. USA game was pretty brutal, and I think is aw my first instance of really biased reffing in a game. I saw a BS red card go against the US and a goal called back that probably should have counted. That said, I am impressed with the Italian team. They aren't the bunch of whining babies I remember from the past World Cups.

Lunch at work has turned into World Cup central. We've set up a laptop in the conference room and spend lunch every day watching a good chunk of the 3rd game. We occasionally go a little long on lunch, depending on how exciting the game turns out.


I've been trying to add the "League of Melbotis" image to Cafepress for T-Shirts, but cafepress has me in some kind of legal limbo. Apparently they think the picture may pose some sort of copyright violation. I'm not entirely certain why that's the case, but it's been going on since Thursday. In the past my pictures were approved almost immediately, so something odd is going on. I assume it's that the "SteanzMan" colors are a little close to the official Man of Steel. HOWEVER, you will notice I am wearing gloves, have goggles and gold trim on my outfit. VERY different from Superman. Different enough, indeed, that no jury would ever believe this to be copyright infringement.

SUPER BROTHER-IN-LAW

Special congratulations and thanks are in order for LoM's Bay Area rep, Doug. Doug once again took to the winding roads of California, peddling his way into our wallets as he rode for charity.

The past few years Doug has participated in the AIDS LifeCycle charity bike ride. He rode from San Francisco to LA. All on a unicycle. No, not really.

Here is Doug standing beside a really large pond.



Well done, Doug. I hope you kept the chafing to a minimum. We are infinitely more proud of you than Steanso, who spent last week trying to see how many saltines he could eat before drinking a glass of water.

The Secret Identity Post

Well, if you hadn't heard by now, a fairly popular comic book character unmasked himself in the Marvel comic "Civil War #2" yesterday. It's been in the papers, and I went ahead and showed Jamie the page last night (I know! I'm totally reading a Marvel comic. Go figure. Plus, I'm a becoming a big fan of McNiven.), so you'll probably know who the person was who unmasked themself on TV. But, given the hoo-hah that's gone on around here in the past, I didn't really want to spoil it for you guys who did the unmasking.

Since Superman first hopped over a building in a single bound, a dual identity has been key to the basic format of the superhero comic. When Superman first appeared, we were to understand that he was working outside the law, and for that reason above probably any other, he didn't give away his civilian identity. It's fairly well documented that the original take on Superman (pre-heat vision and flying) is most an amped up version of the lead character form the novel Gladiator, by Philip Wylie, mixed with some Tarzan and Amazing Stories features.

The conceipt of Gladiator is that the character can't live a normal life thanks to his power and others' knowledge of that power. Taking a page from the popular Zorro pulps and films, as well as The Shadow, and teaming that with the interest in the business of journalism. Siegel and Shuster came upon the idea of seeming weakling Clark Kent.

As any Zorro fan can tell you, the idea behind Don Diego's dual personality (perhaps, in itself lifted from The Scarlet Pimpernel) was to give our hero a way of moving about in society without constant fear of arrest, as well as being able to gather information that others might not readily hand over to Zorro. In that manner, Superman's early stories centered on his ability to be first to hear of disasters or potential good locations for a character of his abilities. To this day, Clark Kent still disappears abruptly when there's trouble on the wire or coming in online.

Moreover, there is the notion that Superman cannot have a private life, but Clark Kent very much can. From his earliest appearance, Clark Kent was hitting on Lois while Superman acknowledged her only with a wink and a nod, but a promise that he was there to help. As the comics progressed, the idea grew that Lois was in enough danger just being associated with Superman (while simultaneously also being someone crooks wanted to avoid lest they tangle with Superman). Meanwhile, Superman carefully guarded his secret identity in order to maintain a basic life among other human beings, rather than being basically exiled to the Fortress of Solitude.

Batman, upon the character's premier, established Bruce Wayne as having a fiancee and other trappings of a normal life, giving Bruce Wayne a bit more of a split personality. As Batman was a mere mortal, the suggestion in the comics seemed to be that the secret identity (a) kept the cops off his back, and (b) helped Batman maintain the element of suprise. It's sort of tough to get the jump on crooks if they know every time you leave the house. As the rogues gallery grew, it was logical enough to understand that Batman didn't really want these guys to be able to ring his doorbell while he was in the tub.

Of course the exposure of a character's secret identity has always been a mainstay of superhero comics, especially going back to Silver-Age Superman comics where it seemed every fourth story was dedicated to the topic. A good chunk of Superboy stories were centered around nosy Lana Lang trying to prove that Clark Kent was the Boy of Steel.

Some characters have famously not bothered with secret identities. For example: Aquaman is pretty clearly Aquaman as he lives in the sea. For years, at least the government has known Banner is The Hulk. The Fantastic Four have always had public identities (and are regularly attacked in their home). At one point Wally West's persona of The Flash was public, but they reversed that decision (see Flash: Blitz and Flash: Ignition) when terrible consequences befell The Flash's family. The prime example of late, of course, is Ralph and Sue Dibny from DC's Identity Crisis.

A few years ago, Marvel decided to reveal Captain America's identity as Cap took on Al Qaeda stand-in terrorists in the wake of 9/11. The decision was prompted by a narrative choice that neither the US nor Cap had anything to hide. I thought it was the right choice then, as I do now. Also, Cap doesn't really have a supporting cast and is more or less a career soldier, anyway. His real family is all dead and his line of girlfriends is mostly comprised of super-folk and SHIELD agents. In a story I didn't read, Iron Man revealed his secret ID.

But for some of these comics, it just didn't matter. Captain America is a perfect example. The character WAS Captain America. Steve Rogers was just a name. Other characters' dual identities are so integrated into the comics that the series would change not at all for the better if the identity were revealed. Fantastic Four has always done a good job of spinning the FF as superhero celebrities, like the Beatles living in Manhattanand they happen to have a dimensional portal to the Negative Zone (which may make a great name for a blog for Steanso or Jim D. I must pitch it.).

In my opinion, of late Brian Michael Bendis has had one of the firmest grasps on dual identities. With his excellent creator owned "Powers," featuring the homicide cops who show up when a "super" is found dead, Bendis has done a great job of exploring the dual face of celebrity and private life and public and private in a world where superheroes run rampant. Moreover, Bendis's Peter Parker in Ultimate Spider-Man is unmasked by his foes with alarming regularity. The joke being, of course, that nobody knows who the heck this fifteen year old kid might be. So why would he wear the mask? Because he doesn't want his Aunt to know what he's doing, and he wants, despite the fact that great power comes with great responsibility, to be able to escape from the insanity of being Spider-Man for most of the day. That, and when a super-villain figured out generally where he lived, they killed his best friend.

There's a sense in the Ultimate Spidey books that, eventually, all of this is going to catch up with Peter. He's one camera-phone away from having his picture plastered all over the internet.

The best look at all of this, of course, was Bendis's recently concluded run on Daredevil where Daredevil's identity was published in a tabloid paper. He managed to fill three years with that concept, and the idea never got old. But it also couldn't sustain a series forever.

So, why why why would Marvel choose to unmask this one when it's just been done?

The option that Marvel has given their heroes with Civil War is to either (a) be conscripted into SHIELD, give them your name and work for "the man", (b) sit home and don't use your darn powers, or (c) use your powers and go to jail.

I think thus far from the little I've read, Marvel has handled the topic more intelligently than I'd expected. They've started at a very good point, by demonstrating the negative side-effects that can befall the public when super heroes run around without any supervision or anybody they answer to. There's a legitimate argument to be made. On the other hand, there's a legitimate argument to be made for not wanting to be forced to do the dirty work of a government organization that doesn't have the best record of keeping the public's interest in mind.

A lot of things can be changed in comics. There's plenty of science fiction, magic and what have you. As was done in Flash, the memory of the character's public ID can be wiped from the mind of the public in general. But, as we saw in DC's stellar miniseries, Identity Crisis, all that mind-wiping and concern about loved ones can cause a lot of havoc.

Marvel is now looking at either a very large change in the structure of one of it's strongest properties, or else they're planning a "Death of Superman" style cop out. Either way, they're going to irritate a lot of readers. I'll be keeping my ear to the ground to see how this one pans out.

Personally, I find the idea of the secret ID to be a great element of comics. I dig the idea of the everyman having unknown potential. There's something a little liberating about the idea that a hero isn't, literally, a cop or a soldier (although comics are littered with their fair share of excellent versions of those as well). Perhaps it was my early take on a compromised Superman having to play the dutiful soldier against his will in Dark Knight Returns that made me see the potential issues with losing your identity. Or perhaps Batman's unwillingness to play along with any whim of others that had forced him to quit (and just as much to return) as seen in that same volume.

My concern is this: for all their bravado about their edginess, Marvel is married to the status quo in a way DC is not (with the exception of Superman and Batman). DC's recent mini-seires was about change, and real change took place. By creating the idea of legacy in the DCU, people DO, in fact, die. New characters come and go.

How far is Marvel willing to go with this idea for the sake of short term sales gains? Especially when they stand to risk alienating lifelong readers? It's just a bit difficult to swallow that this whole deal isn't a bait-and-switch for some other change Marvel is going to try to pull. I strongly suspect that they are not planning to follow Bendis's well-worn Daredevil track.

Marvel's given itself quite the job. We'll see how they deal with it as a company. At the end of the day, for me, it's about the company. Given how they wrapped up House of M, Age of Apocalypse, etc... and how often their sprawling mini-series/ cross-company events land the reader exactly where you started, something leads me to believe there's going to be a magic "reset" button somewhere.

All I'm saying is: I see one clone show his face and I'm out.