Remember this?

Haha, so I just signed in to update my design blog and saw this. We should post again or something.

It's been since May?

Wow, I was the last person to add an entry on May 20th? Where has everyone been?

Well, I have to keep this short, but I thought I would talk about the WizardWorld Chicago Con this year. This was my 6th or 7th time I have gone since 1997 (1997, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, and 2007). I don't really remember if I went in 2001 or 2002. I have always enjoyed going to the Con. You can't beat the people and the deals there.

This year I went to find a few items. I don't buy much for comic books anymore and what I buy are usually trades or graphic novels. I went looking for Clerks series Inaction Figures, namely the Chasing Amy series, Futurama Tin Toys and signs, and some other random items.

I found the Inaction Figures at the View Askew booth, but at $10 it is hard to just snatch them up so I walked the whole area looking for some of them at the normal booths. I found 1 that I bought for $6. All of the rest nowhere to be found. I did snatch the other at the View Askew booth and paid $46 dollars for the set instead of $50. I stsill couldn't find Randall from Series 1 though. I still can't believe that I passed up Randall in 2005 for $5 because I thought I needed Dante and instead bought him for $5.

As for Futurama stuff, I found a couple of places that was selling Futurama stuff by Rocket USA, but it was either really overpriced or stuff I already have. I am only looking for the Nibbler Tin Wind-up and some of the original Tin Signs. I have yet to ever see any of the signs at the Con.

Guess who I saw there this year...Rocket USA. For the last 4 or so years I have been waiting for them to have a booth at the Con because they are based in Chicago. I have been looking for their items for at least 4 years, and they have never had a booth. Now that they have discontinued the signs and Nibbler they have a booth which means I couldn't even buy from them directly.

Either way the Con was great again this year. I am already looking forward to next year.

I won't name names, but...

It seems to me like this reminds me of somebody who posts in this blog. This another typical occurance at game nights.

Kingdom Come Reviewed

Lately I have been expanding my comic horizons. Since my interest in comics really began about five years ago I've found my niche to be mostly in non-superhero and non-traditional superhero stories. The big exception to this is Marvel's Ultimate Spiderman run by Brian Michael Bendis of which I own all the available trades. But by and large the classic DC Justice League materials really haven't been a draw for me, nor have Mavels staples like the X-Men.

Recently I found myself with growing curiosity and interest in the Green Lantern, which I've started reading. Along with that I decided to pick up DC's Kingdom Come. I have heard many good things concerning this title and I felt it was time to give it a read.

As a relative newcomer to the JLA, Kingdom Come was an interesting story to jump into and somewhat overwhelming. With little comic knowledge of the actual history of the major players (Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Batman, etc.) in many ways I felt as though I were jumping in mid-stream even though it is a stand alone story. However, a working knowledge really isn't requisite because the themes of the story are easily accessible. All you need to understand (and most people do I have a feeling) is that Superman and the rest of the Justice League have superhuman powers that they use for the cause of peace and justice on Earth. Or at least they used to before they stepped away from their roles.

Kingdom Come is a story that examines what their role really is, what their responsibilities are and how their actions ultimately impacts the course of human affairs. What we learn early on in the story is that many years prior Superman decided to walk away from his role as a protector of the innocent and champion of peace after a series of incidents soured public perceptions of his role. Due to his position of leadership in the JLA, the rest of the league followed suit, awaiting the day they would return to action.

In the interim, meta-humans rose up to take the place of the absent heroes. This new breed of "supers", led by a character names Magog, started out with the best of intentions but soon lost their way turning their focus on fighting amongst themselves leaving a path of destruction and suffering in their wake. The rest of humanity was powerless to stop them. Desperation reaches it peak when an incident in Kansas results in the complete desolation of the Great Plains and food production center of the United States. Is there anything or anyone that can persuade Superman to return to his duties as protector of humanity?

The heart of Kingdom Come is story of Superman, Wonder Woman, et al's decision to return and try to convince (or force) everyone to live in peace and pursue the cause of justice. With the Justice League returned, in some form or another, Superman and company wage an epic struggle to corral the renegade meta-human population while fighting their own personal demons. The central question: What is the cost of their noble pursuits?

In their telling of this story, Mark Waid and Alex Ross draw heavily on biblical references, specifically that of Revelations. It is therefore fitting that we experience the story through the eyes of a character who is a preacher and struggling with his own fears and doubts about humanity and it's uncertain future. The scope of this story was epic! Everything from the over-arching themes to the conflicts to the characters themselves was presented through beautiful illustration (Alex Ross) and on a grand scale making for an immersing read. While very much its own story, Kingdom Come drew many similarities to two other classic super hero tales with its subject matter, namely to Alan Moore's Watchmen (the examination of the role of the superhero) and Mark Millar's Superman: Red Son (Superman's personal struggle with tyrannical control in forcing peace on Earth).

I won't go about spoiling the ending for potential readers who haven't paged through this story. I will, however, highly recommend it. While I didn't like this story quite as much as either Watchmen or Red Son it is certainly worthy of the praise it has garnered since its publication. One of the aspects I really appreciated was its more serious and thoughtful approach to super heroes that it took. That is not to suggest that all other super hero runs are simply silly and poorly thought out. Hardly. But Kingdom Come certainly did present itself a cut or two above the norm.

Ladies love the 'Stash....

Ok here's one for the ladies because I am doubting the guys will enjoy this one much. For Valentines this year my lovely husband got me the Essential "The Savage She-Hulk," a message in disguise? Who knows, but my reaction was naturally "What the...?" I didn't know too much about the She-Hulk and my previous Hulk experience was limited to the Lou Ferrigno version so I had no preconceptions about this title. So I buckled down and read it cover to cover in two days or less because that is what I do.

She-Hulk is actually criminal lawyer Jen Walters who is shot by enemies of her defendant (some goons working for Nick Trask) while being visited by her cousin Dr. Banner (the Hulk of course). Like many superhero origins the perfect set of circumstances come together at the perfect time and Whalla! A Hero is born. So in order to save her Banner gives Jen a blood transfusion (he is of course the same blood type and somehow knows that off hand) and then runs off when the police come. Well this transfusion takes effect at the perfect time for Jen because while recovering in the hospital she is once more attacked by Trask's goons and is saved by her transformation into She-Hulk!

She-Hulk appears under similar circumstances as the Hulk=when Jen gets pissed. But the transformation is painful and traumatic to Jen. At least one transformation is nessesary per issue, but its usually when Jen really needs an escape plan or just a powerful fist. As a Criminal lawyer Jen gets into all sorts of trouble and as She-Hulk she is hunted down by her own father, Sheriff Walters who believes that Jen is dead after her friend Jill is killed by Trask's men (they cut the brakes on Jen's car). She-Hulk attempts to stop the runaway car but is blocked by Jen's courtroom advasary and is subsequently blamed for "Jen's" death.

Among her other problems, Jen has trouble with love. This is the part where I expect the gents to loose interest. Jen's neighbor Zapper is totally into her, and since he is the only one to learn her secret identity early in the book, he falls for She-Hulk as well. Jen on the other hand thinks of him as a little mustashioed brother whose bad fro and 70s pants are totally unappealing; she digs this cat named Richard Rory. Rory is in town after a string of good and then really bad luck taking him from the Florida everglades to Hells Kitchen to Nevada and then LA where Jen resides. His only real friend is Man-Thing so he gets the She-Hulk thing. After knowing him two days they go to Florida together--Zapper is not happy. Later in the book Zapper and She-Hulk start dating, he is apparently undaunted by her huge greeness.

The interesting thing about this book is how Jen balances her two lives, something always comes up where she needs to be one identity or the other and sometimes both! It gets to the point where Jen doesn't want to deal with it anymore and retreats entirely into the She-Hulk. If you like chick flicks with some random violence thrown in I would give this a read but for girl-power read Wonder Woman's "The Hiketeia" or Catwoman's "Selina's Big Score."

Until It Becomes Like A Thing Unto Iron...

Aside from Kung-Fu movies, blaxpoitation movies and horrible pants, the seventies gave us comic companies trying to cash in on these fads (unfortunately that includes the horrible pants). One way Marvel worked all of this into one comic title was with the mysterious Iron Fist.

First off, I have to say whatever you may think about the costume, I think this character is great. He's hokey, he's got some corny dialogue (the stories are told in the third person, either by Iron Fist or someone else...sometimes it's hard to tell), but there's a brutal honesty to the character which wasn't/still isn't available in most other titles.

I've just finished the Essential Iron Fist and I've got to tell you, It's only convinced me to continue looking for more Iron Fist material.

The book starts out with Iron Fist's origin. Danny Rand was taken with his mother-by his father a wealthy business man who also was an heir/citizen of the fabled Tibetan city of K'un-Lun-to find the lost city. It appears on the mortal plane every ten years. The Rands also have their father's partner Harold Meachum along, who, it turns out came along just to make sure that the Rands never came back so he could keep the business for himself.

Well Danny's father is helped off a cliff by Meachum and after Danny and his mother flee, she is killed by wolves. Danny alone makes it across the bridge to K'un-Lun. There he is trained to become the Immortal Iron Fist. He basically goes through a rigorous training course that ends with him facing a dragon (which, through some weird ritual where he hugs the dragon gives him the dragon brand on his chest). After defeating the dragon he plunges his fists into a pot filled with the dragon's molten heart. This gives him his Iron Fists.

The Iron Fist is allegedly NOT a super-power, but it might as well be. His fist glows as he centers all of his body's chi in his hand and it allows his fist to become indestructible, impervious to harm and can even bust metal. Unfortunately since it's his chi-or his body's energy-he can't use it whenever he wants. He has to allow himself about a full day to recharge.

When Danny finally returns to Earth to get revenge he finds some strange twists in the plot that lead up to his parents' deaths. In fact little bits and pieces keep revealing themselves throughout the entire book which reprints like 30 or 40 issues, so it took awhile for the readers who read month-to-month to get the whole story (for about 3 years).

Basically the entire run of Iron Fist (until the end when the title merges with Power Man and they become a duo) focuses in on Danny/Iron Fist reclaiming his inheritence from his father's business and taking revenge on the people who killed his family. He faces many martial artists (as one would expect) and a series of increasingly ridiculous villains like The Wrecking Crew and Batroc the Leaper. He even has a run in with the Avengers (well, Captain America) when battling the Wrecking Crew who are trying to get Thor's hammer to kill Thor. Iron Fist also has a battle (of sorts) with the X-Men and Iron Man.

Wolverine is stalking Jean Grey by standing outside her appartment brooding over the fact that she loves Scott Summers, when he sees Iron Fist sneaking in through the roof. Well Jean's roommate is Misty Knight, Iron Fist's love interest. Wolverine goes into a rage, wears the stupidest costume I've ever seen, and starts a scuffle with the kung-fu master. Then Colossus and Nightcrawler appear on the scene to try and bring some rationale to the matter and divulge that Iron Fist isn't an enemy but a friend (Storm still gets a face full of potato salad though).

The thing that seems much different about Iron Fist than other comic titles being published at the time, is the degree of violence he's willing to resort to. Iron Fist is not above busting skulls, literally. Most of the time the people he battles are hopped-up ninjas or androids or super-powered rednecks; but when he's battling murderous street thugs he doesn't pull a Captain America and just bandies about, sweeping the legs and tossing them about.

He actually kills one of his opponents- The Warhawk-a dillusional Vietnam vet who still thinks he's in the jungle. He opens fire in a sniper position on a busy park and takes out civilians including two parents, leaving their child in his scopes before Iron Fist intercedes. All through the story Warhawk has had the upper hand because apparently he wasn't even human. There's some quality about him (never explained) that makes him like steel. He's basically a Punisher with a different costume. Well Iron Fist crosses the threshold of his anger and snaps, releasing his chi and knocking Warhawk into the ocean. At the time he was dead. Then for some reason Marvel needs to constantly re-use every shitty one-spot supporting character to confuse continuity and can't let sleeping dogs lie. So they said later that he actually wasn't dead.

Whatever.
One of the reasons I hate Marvel.

We learn as the title progresses that the Iron Fist has other applications aside from beating the hell out of people. He can use it to heal himself, and apparently he can do a mind-meld sort of thing. He does this once to both life-saving and yet a sort of lingering uncomfortable effect.

The title has some other things about it which should probably make it more popular than it was/is. It gives us the first appearance of Sabretooth. And, though we don't learn til decades later...Iron Fist actually, during the battle with Wolverine, makes the father/son connection of Sabretooth/Wolverine and even thinks it out loud. Apparently no one read it so it took Marvel another two decades of playing the is he/isn't he thing off its readers until they confirmed it.

There's a steady dose of martial arts action. One of the strange things, probably limited by the number of ways you can draw a punch or kick, is the fact that every issue gives us like thirty new "styles" when Iron Fist pucnhes someone. One time it will be the "monkey fist" or the "crane fist" or the "tiger fist" or something. Yet every panel looks like the same fist and fight. So I guess it was probably implemented to break up monotony.

This character, as Shang-Chi, was hinged on the increasing popularity of kung-fu and martial arts films in the mid seventies. The fad was short-lived and when it died down, the title lost its audience and was forcesd to merge with another failing title, Luke Cage/Powerman (based on the Blaxpoitation fad at the same time). The two actully did quite well for a duo and have had lasting effect on the industry. They are still referenced (even in an episode of Reno 911!) by other comics, including the Simpsons which did a parody of Iron Fist and Power Man with Lenny Leonardson and Carl Carlson who became Iron Foot and Nuclear Power Man.

In closing, this is, once again as with everything, not everyone's cup o' tea. Some of the story seems ultimately forced and the potential of such a characters, could be said to have limited potential. Nontheless it was entertaining and worth my time so if you're a fan of action and martial arts movies this will probably be up your alley.

Hard Bastard!