According to Blastr, this thirteen-minute short film was made for $300 bucks, and they describe it as a combination between “Scott Pilgrim” and “Heroes”.  And that’s pretty much what you get.

The story stars Tyler, a non-powered nobody as he moves in with his three friends– a telikinetic psychic, a Hulk-like, superhealing tank, and an electrokinetic playboy. Together they sort of fight crime while taking part in their typical teenage slacker antics. Overall it’s pretty darn funny and entertaining, and the special effects are well done for the budget. It’s a well-done short film that shows you don’t have to be a Hollywood hotshot to get stuff done.

Check it out:

I’m a big fan of webseries, and I would definitely watch this if they turned it into one.  According to Michael Ashton, creator of the short film, there are plans for more episodes, so I’ll be looking forward to it.

I do. Let’s see if we can’t break that habit now that I’ve graduated.

That, my friends, is the new Scott Pilgrim trailer.

When the first trailer came out I was more or less sold. I love Edgar Wright, and I knew the film had Bryan Lee O’Malley’s blessings and that he had even been on set to help out a little bit, giving the actors “secret information” on their characters that only they would know (which is awesome, by the way). I also know that O’Malley has been a big proponent of Michael Cera’s casting, and I took that to heart. I admit, I was one of the people severely worried that maybe Cera was a little /too/ meek for a character that I always saw as pretty kick-ass, if a little dense. But when O’Malley said not to worry, I tried not to worry. And the first trailer helped that. But this has sealed it.

Everything about this looks perfect so far. I love the comic book-esque onomatopoeia (Ding Dong and Bang), and I’m surprised at how natural it looks in the film medium. Along the same lines are the hearts that flutter about whenever Scott and Ramona kiss and the video game elements. I am so happy to see these in the movie and working so well. Things like bad guys bursting into pile of coins whenever they’re struck with a flaming sword. What more can you ask for in a movie?

And Michael Cera is definitely Scott Pilgrim. I know there are still some naysayers but I’m actually really confident about the choice now. Hearing Cera actually give a few more lines has cemented it. For me, he speaks them almost exactly how I heard them in my head. I am really excited now to see him play the part. And really I think all the castings were great, especially the Seven Evil Exes. Jason Schwartzman as Gideon is the best call I could have asked for.

The movie comes out in August, but not before the final volume which debuts July 20th. I am salivating.

Basically I’m really friggin’ excited and you should be too.
I’m gonna try to get more updates in once I get back to the States and we’ll see how that goes. Things I want to cover include The Kickass Comic, Mouse Guard, X-Men First Class, and whatever else I can get my dirty hands on. And expect an update on Super Mario Crossover in the next few weeks: I’m waiting for the update with Ryu Hayabusa.

(tell me that doesn’t look awesome.)

The cover features Biagi, the Italian radio operator and one of the major characters

“Painted Smiles; Written Words” was not made for ‘comics’ in the most typical sense of the word. It was made specifically for one shots or miniseries, for stories that break the mold of what you typically think comics to be. Nevertheless, I recognize that lately the posts have been Marvel and Superheroes and everything you immediately think of when you think ‘comics’. And I’ll tell you right now that the next three updates are likely to be Batman story arcs, because I just read them and I am incredibly impressed with them. But they’re not really why I created “Painted Smiles; Written Words”.

“Midnight Sun” is.

Ben Towle’s “Midnight Sun” is a small, short graphic novel. It is centered around the airship Italia which attempts a trek to the North Pole from Italy. Once reaching the pole, however, the ship crashes, stranding its crew on the ice. Once their home country, among others, receives news of the crash via radio, a rescue mission is sent out on board a Russian ice breaker— that though there was only one Russian aboard the airship, their rescue team is made up primarily of Russians is interesting and worth noting. The story takes place in the year 1928. Prohibition is in force in the States, Mussolini is in power in Italy, and the Soviet Union’s communist ideals are clashing with the capitalist ways of the United States. Thus, when the alcoholic reporter known only as H.R. boards the Russian icebreaker the Krassin in an attempt to save a crew of Italians, a Czech, a Swede and a Russian, led by an Italian who’s ideals and very mission disobey the fascist government itself, the story begins to speak volumes about political and social interactions.

Like many books that capture my heart, however, this is not a story that blatantly points these issues out. Despite fear of sounding like a broken record, this bears repeating: “Midnight Sun’s” strength lies in its simplicity.

The story is not a mystery, though that’s not to say it isn’t suspenseful. There is no espionage, nor backstabbing, or double-crossing. There is no sex, or gunfights, or shoot-outs. There are only two groups—a group of men trying to stay alive, and a group of people trying to save them—and the story centers around how the people in these groups interact with one another, and what happens when the groups finally cross paths.

The art is beautiful but simple, done with black and gray ink, the pages reflect the bright, vast nothingness of the snowy desert beneath a gray and foreboding sky. The characters are easily identified, detailed just enough so that they are distinguishable from one another, but not too much—though they all come from a variety of very different backgrounds, you never forget that they are all united.

I read the story in a little over fifteen minutes- that is to say, it wasn’t a long read. I picked it up on my break at work, and when my break was over… Well, I couldn’t get it out of my head. It was a struggle, if not nearly impossible, to put the book away in my backpack, knowing there were so few pages left, that I was so close to reaching the end. I was so anxious to finish it, I felt as I imagined the crew of the Italia must have felt, just as they saw the Krassin approaching on the horizon. So close, out of reach, the end…

Needless to say I finished the book as soon as I possibly could, eating up those last few pages with excitement.

In the end, Ben Towle gives a short epilogue on the difference between “fact” and “truth”. “Midnight Sun” is based on true events, and many of the major details are true to life. However, he admits that, for the sake of the art form, other details were given creative license. But for that reason, he says (and I agree), perhaps it lends a bit more truth to the story. It is just a story, yes, but if they facts had been given to you straight, if you knew every little detail, if everything had happened in this story the way it happened in real life, would you really care as much as you did? I have to be honest; I don’t think I would. Ben Towle did a terrific job of making me care for these characters in a way that made this a powerful story.

The book is short, but strong. I’d recommend checking for it at your library before buying it, simply because of its brevity. I got it at my library, and the verdict is still out on whether this will be in my next amazon.com cart. Check it out.

“Midnight Sun” by Ben Towle

(Edit: With a “Used” price at $0.85, it is definitely worth picking up)

That someone is me.

I’m excited to start working on this blog again. I’m especially excited to start buying even more comics to write about– I do so very much love buying comics. I’m looking at some excellent new comics to talk about, I’ve got a lot of comics that I read over the semester to write about, it’s all very exciting. So the blog is back, updates will (hopefully) be more frequent, I have a lot of stuff I can’t wait to get into, yadda yadda yadda.

Now, onto business.

Joss Whedon's Dollhouse

Raise your hand if you love Joss Whedon.

If you’re not raising your hand, there are a few things you need to do.
1.)    Read about Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along-Blog here and watch it here.
2.)    Check out Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, or Firefly.
3.)    Come back here.

Everybody raising their hand now? Good.

If you don’t know, Whedon had a new show on Fox last season called Dollhouse
starring Eliza Dushku. If you haven’t seen any of it, look it up online. Hulu has the last five episodes of the season, if you don’t mind missing out on the very beginning. In a nutshell, “Dollhouse” is about a secret organization called the Dollhouse in Los Angeles, that wipes people’s minds and turns them into blank slates known as Dolls. These Dolls can then be reprogrammed with any personality, to be rented out by any of the Dollhouse’s very wealthy clients. Aka, they’re very often used for sexy times. But that’s besides the point. Specifically, the show centers around the Doll Echo, played by Eliza Dushku, who from time to time glitches slightly and remembers things that should have been wiped clear. It also deals with the Dollhouse as a whole, and the FBI agent searching for the house.

Now, if you are familiar with Whedon, you know that Fox just adores canceling his shows. So it wasn’t even five minutes after the season finale before fans started shouting about petitions and annoying Fox into keeping the show. Now, I personally thought the call to arms was ridiculous. Fox hadn’t even mentioned dropping the show, and why would they? The show is awesome. But, after doing some more research on the potential threat, it turns out Dollhouse really does appear to be fighting for survival.

Now, will annoying the producers really do anything? Probably not.
But it occurs to me that I would be so incredibly annoyed with myself if the show ended up getting cancelled and I had done nothing about it. So consider this my personal, whole-hearted, if not somewhat cynical push to save what is probably the best show on T.V. I think my friend Alisa put it best in her own push:
“Dollhouse deserves a second season because of all the things it is NOT… it’s NOT a show about doctors, lawyers, wealthy housewives or whiny teenagers.”

So! Despite feeling like you probably don’t have a voice, you really do, and even if it’s just going to annoy them, you might as well try, right? Turns out, there’s a lot you can do!

Things you can do to help out Dollhouse:

• Tweet! Spread the word! Blog about it! Tell people about Dollhouse and that it’s endangered. The more people that know, the more people can do.
• Talk to Fox! Really! Even if we don’t keep it alive, at least Fox will know Dollhouse fans are the most annoying. You can Tweet at Fox Broadcasting about keeping Dollhouse by tweeting @FoxBroadcasting, simple as that. You can also email them at “askfox@fox.com” or leave a message for Peter Rice, the Chairman of Entertainment for Fox, at 310-369-3066.
  
• Annoy people some more, and keep track of what’s going on! Follow @miraclelaurie on Twitter, google Dollhouse news, preorder the dvd. Make Fox know we’re interested in the series.
  
• Check out this site.

So there you have it, kiddos! Listen, I have full faith that the show is coming back next season, with or without us. But it really can’t hurt to show our support for Whedon and the rest of the cast of Dollhouse, can it? Let’s do it, alright?
Cool.

By the way, I was finally convinced to talk about this on my blog by THIS interview with Nathan Fillion in which he talks about Dollhouse. However, I have to admit: The most impressive thing about this interview?

DR. HORRIBLE SEQUEL? WHAT? More research is necessary!

Plus– and I almost forgot about this– if you didn’t notice, there’s a poll on the right-hand side of the main page. I’ve decided I’d like to subscribe to a serial comic, and I was wondering if there was one comic in particular my readers, few as they may be, would like to get updates on. So, let me know, vote in the poll!

- Your Honored Host

Farm Town... Eff yeah.

So, at first my major qualm against reviewing Farm Town was that it’s a Facebook app. And at first I was worried that that might exclude people– I mean, you can’t exactly play it if you don’t have a facebook. But then I realized that nowadays everyone and their grandmother has a facebook, so I felt that a review—or at least rant—about one of facebook’ most rapidly-growing apps was fairly warranted.

Before I started playing Farm Town, it was described to me as Harvest Moon Lite. Now, I’ve never played Harvest Moon, and I’m aware I missed out on a crucial facet of childhood, but I must imagine this is a pretty fair assessment.

The basic concept of Farm Town is… well, um… it’s a town of farmers. And you’re among them. When you first start you get to make an adorable little avatar that looks… well, probably nothing like you, since it’s pretty limited…

Should I make the obvious joke about the ridiculously large head, or a joke about the awkard-green Fauxhawk option?

But, once you’ve decided on exactly how you’re going to falsely portray yourself in-game, you get to start farming! You start off with a few modest potatoes fields and a plot of land, and through hard work and determination (not really) you too can have your own beautiful farm, complete with horses and cows and whatever vegetables and trees you want to decorate it with.

This isn't my farm. My farm is better. Why? Shut up, that's why.

The point? … Well, uh… there isn’t one.

Let’s get one thing straight: I play Farm Town. I log on every day and check up on my crops, make sure the horses haven’t hopped the fence (they can’t do that), and that my grape fields haven’t shriveled into grotesque monster-vines (they can do that). So yes, I play Farm Town. But I don’t really like Farm Town.  I mean… why should I? There’s really no reason to play Farm Town. It’s monotonous, it’s boring, it’s dumb… Why in God’s name do I keep playing? Sure, I could divide my plots up into different fruits and vegetables, grow some wheat here and some tomatoes and grapes… but why do that when I can grow 95 fields of Sunflowers, which yield the most profit? And why am I trying to get the most profit? I don’t know. I… I really don’t know. To buy better crops? Why, when I’ve already unlocked over half of the available crops and sunflowers are still the best crops? To buy trees? Bah, trees just encroach on my sunflower fields! Animals? My designated “Animals” bin is already full. There is no more room. I could use the proceeds to purchase a bigger farm, and then I could stop worrying so much about cash and instead focus on aesthetics… but… why?

I don’t know.

I don’t know why I continue to log on and play this game. It’s pointless, it’s not all that much fun, and my fellow inhabitants are not exactly company I enjoy.

I hate the people that play this game.

Regardless, I continue to find myself logging on, planting seeds and hiring crazy people to farm my crops so that I can sell them at even higher prices. I don’t even know what I’m saving up for, I’m just saving it.

So, my recommendation? Stay the hell away from Farm Town. Don’t even get involved. It’s like cocaine: Sure, it might seem kind of fun at first, but then the next thing you know you keep swearing it off, coming back for it time and time again even though you’re not even deriving any fun from it anymore.

Stay the hell away from Farm Town. Trust me. Now if you’ll excuse me, I believe I have some sunflowers that need harvesting…

Seriously, I hate these people.

The Cover of Issue 1

It’s not exactly a secret that one of the major influential factors in making this blog was the excuses it would provide me for buying comics that I could otherwise never justify buying for myself. So when I went into the comic shop the other day and found the complete series of the Secret Invasion: Runaways and Young Avengers serial for only four bucks, it didn’t take some convincing to shell out the cash. After all, I’ll deal with the ads to save a couple bucks.

The first thing that you notice when you pick up this arc of Secret Invasion is most certainly the artwork. The art for this storyline is done by Takeshi Miyazawa, and has a noticeably more cartoonish, even manga-like feel to it than many of the original Runaways arcs. For some people, this might be an attraction, but others like myself might be a bit turned off by the style, which feels noticeably simpler than other issues. Also, where previous arcs –including the Civil War team up arc– are noticeably dark and gritty, this arc is surprisingly bright and colorful. The combination of the colorful panels and the manga-ized character designs make much of the comic feel immature — despite being a comic that’s always been around kids, this arc was the first time I’ve always felt like the story itself was childish. There were also some issues with the character designs; Hulkling looks incredibly awkward in every single panel he’s in, and it gets incredibly frustrating. On the other hand, all of the enemy Skrulls look fantastic, even if I did mistake them for Namekians at times.

Seriously, there's got to be some shared ancestry here.

The Skrulls look more cartoony (and thus a little bit less frightening), but they look in no way less badass. The designs of their clothes, tattoos, facial expressions, and especially shapeshifts, give each individual invader a different, impressive personality. Though both the Runaways and Young Avengers look even more youthful than in other incarnations, the viciousness of the skrull invaders creates a contrast that makes the fight scenes – (which are well choreographed, if short)—even more intense.

The story for the Runaways and Young Avengers arc of Secret Invasion is done by Chris Yost, and is met with mixed results. The only main problem I felt lay in the story was that, once again, I felt like both the Runaways and Young Avengers grew backwards a few years before the invasion hit. The same teams that were fueled with rage and dealing with torture and violence during Civil War are suddenly fighting a battle more out of Saturday morning cartoons, and it’s really just harder to take seriously. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing: sometimes you want something less intense.

Once again, though, where the humans begin to fault, the Skrulls shine. And not just the badguys, here. Both young teams, Runaways and Young Avengers, have their own resident Skrulls: Xavin, the gender-bending Super Skrull of the Runaways and Hulkling, the half-Skrull, half-Kree prophesied prince. Though I can’t speak for Hulkling, Xavin is one of the less-focused on characters in the Runaways stories, so it’s kind of cool to have a story that has him stepping up to the plate in. He takes charge of the situation and gets to show off his Super Skrull training, though it is admittedly—like everything else—significantly more G-rated than the occurrences in Civil War.

I admit that it’s probably not best to start reviewing “Secret Invasion” storylines right in the middle of the story arc– or heck, before I’ve even touched on what happened in Civil War (which I promise to do as soon as I get the volume back in my hands). To be perfectly honest though, it’s just so much to keep track of. With every superhero and superhero team getting their own volume with each story arc, it’s hard to keep it all straight. And I promise, I want to get there, and I will soon, but when it comes to these story arcs I wanted to start with the heroes I love most and already know best (not that I don’t have an incredibly pathetic, encyclopedic knowledge of other Marvel characters—just ask the poor souls that had to see Wolverine with me) and that’s the Runaways. The Runaways will always have a special place in my heart, and even though this arc is significantly less serious than it could have been, maybe less serious than it should have been, and certainly less serious than it’s precedents, it’s still a fun romp with my favorite teenage superhero team. And well worth four bucks.

Final verdict: If you like the Runaways or Young Avengers, or are simply trying to complete your Secret Invasion collection, definitely check it out. But if you’re not a big fan, you might want to consider the possibility that you’ll be turned off by the manga-esque style and less than completely serious storyline.

Secret Invasion: Runaways and Young Avengers

The scene that should have been.

Last night, after much mental and physical preparation (practicing my groans of disgust), I set out to see the now infamous X-Men Wolverine: Origins. Between the leaked footage of the work-in-progress footage, and the perpetual torrent of negative reviews, the chances that I’d enjoy this movie looked bleak. To be honest, I was backing on the hopes that this film would pull what I’ve termed a “Step Brothers”– that is, that I would go in with such low, low expectations that I would be fantastically blown away by what is otherwise just a pretty okay film.
And this is pretty much what happened. Sort of.  (Warning, spoilers after the jump)

In order to deal with seeing this film, there were a couple of things that I did to prepare myself:

First, I convinced myself to take it at face value: as a fun, simple action film. And in this regard, it was pretty darn good. There was, without a doubt, plenty of explosions and hack ‘n slash fights. And, as a movie set around one of comic’s most violent, gritty superstars, there should have been more than enough explosions and hack ‘n slash fights to keep any action fan satisfied. The only problem is that… it kind of didn’t. Don’t get me wrong, there were some very cool fights, and some great action scenes. But when you’re not invested in the characters fighting, it’s just not that satisfying watches the fighting going on. Everything felt rushed and unexplained, you couldn’t even feel like you were backing Wolverine, even during his quest for revenge. Movies like “Taken”, that may have less intense special effects, can nonetheless cause you to jump out of your seat screaming simply because of how invested you are in their quest. With Wolverine, there’s none of that. It’s a fun action movie, but it doesn’t invest you in what’s going on.
Second, I reminded myself—constantly– that a film adaptation is not an attempt
to transfer the same  story into film, but instead a full re-imagining. I had to convince myself that, in the same way the ‘Ultimate’ story-lines in Marvel recreate a characters origins, I should look at this movie as a new beginning to a whole different story. After all, if I could accept that Scott Summers has died and resurrected fifty times in the comic, why shouldn’t I be able to accept that he was once kidnapped by the Weapon X program?
This worked out pretty well for the most part, but it made me feel like I was being teased the entire time. Don’t get me wrong, they did things right. The blob? Awesome. The blob is a boxer with an eating disorder? not… so awesome. Gambits introduction:
“Are you Remy LeBeau?”
“Do I owe you money?”
“No.”
“Then I am.”
And with that I breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Okay,’ I thought, ‘maybe they did Gambit right.’ Then, Gambit exhibited his powers. ‘Okay,’ I thought, ‘they made a very minor change to Gambit’s powers. I can deal with that.’ Then, suddenly, Gambit was causing earthquakes and climbing up the walls of buildings with his staff.
…What?
For every one thing that the movie got right about the Marvel universe, they decided to do two more things wrong. And every time it happened, I tried to remind myself that it’s just a movie, it’s okay. But regardless, the inner nerd in me just wouldn’t stop screaming at all of the things they got wrong.

And then there are the things that just didn’t make a lick of sense. Adamantium bullets, for one, and how their very shape defied their ability to hit an elephant from three feet away, and yet Stryker, and ordinary man, was able to hit a mutant with advanced speed square between the eyes. Or, why exactly such a bullet to the brain would destroy Wolverine’s memories, when it’s almost assured that over the course of half a dozen wars and fighting superhuman beings, Wolverine must have incurred some brain damage and never lost his memories before. Or, why exactly his perfectly reformed brain wouldn’t contain all of his memories. And I won’t even start on what they did to Deadpool, other than to point on that Deadpool is the merc with a mouth, and that physiologically I don’t even know how someone could perform those kinds of feats of acrobatics without the oxygen intake that a mouth provides.

All of this being said, I can also say that at least one of the alternate after-credit endings completely redeemed everything that the film did wrong. Five minutes of ranting during the credits turned into shouts of joy in a mere thirty seconds of redemption. Honestly, I can be pretty fickle with this kind of thing sometimes.

In summary, I’ll say this: I’m going to go see it again. I’m tempted to just look up the other endings online, but I think I’d rather go see it again. If you’re not as stubborn as I am, and you can deal with the movie being different then the comics (which I think most normal people can), then you will probably fully enjoy this movie, and find it worth the 9 bucks you shelled out to see it. And even if you are like me, go see it anyway. It’s worth seeing the new take on the Marvel Universe, and if not for that, at least go see it for the reason I am: If they get enough money, then they’ll make the Magneto Origins movie. Worst case scenario, I get to see them mess up my favorite villain’s origin. Best case scenario, Magneto killing Nazis.

And everybody would enjoy that.

It’s because I’ve been making my own.

Yes, Zachary G has been writing and creating his very own comic, which will be made available to you complete (complete with crappy, crappy scans) after the jump!

The comic was made for my Uni’s Honor’s College program, in which students have to do an intensive project complete with Mentor and everything. And for mine, I chose an obvious passion: comics. So I went and made one. For my mentor, I had the honor of the opportunity to turn to Jamar Nicholas, resident Art Director, cartoonist, and creator of Detective Boogaloo and plenty of comic blogs. Not to mention he knows Bryan Lee O’Malley, a fact that nearly made me faint. So in any case, a big thank you to him.
Also a big thank you to Mr. Michael of Music For Misanthropes, the costar of my comic. (The other one being myself.)

There we are! Look at us! Aren't we adorable?

So cute.

But the comic deals largely with our out uncomfortable, awkwardness, and with some serious situations, so I thank Bolton for letting me make it.

And so that’s what’s been taking up all of my time for the past few months. Expect real updates to start happening again real soon, now that I’ve got more free time to talk about comics. And hopefully, I’ll be able to work on some other comic projects with less stress and less of a time constraint. All in all, I think this was a pretty good first step into the world of comics- if I do say so myself.

And so, without further ado, I present to you the complete, albeit poorly scanned, “On Light and Dark”.

And if you’re interested, I’ve made quite a few print copies. So if you want a hard copy, well, just let me know.

I know, I know. It’s been like, a month and a half, or more, whatever, since you last heard from me.
I know I haven’t been keeping up on the latest, (Is Watchmen even still in Theaters?) or providing any new reviews or suggestions or anything.

And I know this must be terribly frustrating for you, but imagine how I feel. Remembering, every day, that I made a promise that I am continuously and without just excuse breaking.

I could tell you that college is beating me down, I could tell you that I’m too busy, I could tell you I have nothing to review, or I could tell you that my moonlighting as a vigilante has been keeping me too busy. Really, only a few of those are true.

But I will tell you that I’m working on it, and I’m trying to make some time for you, because you REALLY ARE that important.

But in the meantime, I can leave you with this, in the hopes that perhaps you will feel a little better about me.

I haven't seen Harold and Kumar 2, but that's f*cking NPH on a Unicorn.

See? Can you even be mad now?