It Could Have Been A Lot Worse

I debated whether or not to do this, but what the hell. I now offer to you my real time reactions to the season premier of Smallville. I have an alcoholic beverage this time, so I think I'm ready.

Previously on Smallville, nothing entertaining happened. Also, please note that the guy who claims to be "[Clark], only a little more bizarre" is very much not Bizarro, so I will be calling him George. That's bound to be important.

Oooo, water pretty. Cute dog.

Yep, that's a broken dam.

Clark and George have a deep philosophical discussion. Then Clark punches George. That's what I like to see. Maybe we're off to a good start.

Oops, except that's followed by Clark evaporating all the water with his heat vision, which is cheesy. He should have used his re-build-o-vision. I like Clark acting heroic, and towards people he doesn't know even, so points for that, even if it is lame.

Shiny new credits. Michael Rosenbaum finally replaces Kristin Kreuk in the number two slot, where he always should have been, and Allison Mack finally gets the bump up she deserves as the only other cast member in all 22 episodes. Much better Smallville. Unfortunately, Erica Durance has added more fetish-ware to her two credits shots. It was probably hard to find her wearing anything else. They're not even pretending that anyone died by adding the new credits now though. It would have been pointless anyway.

Well there's Kara. If Jeph Loeb was still writing for this show, she'd be naked.

The suck thing about network television is that we did not get to see that beam, or whatever, get run through George or a really good look at the guy burning after he needlessly heat visioned him.

The entire silver hot pants army has drowned! I am so disappointed. I think I will cry.

Lionel's not there Clark he's on Broadway...or washed up somewhere to be saved by some faceless guy.

Uh, how does everyone not know he has superpowers? So dumb. And just stand there and stare at dead Chloe. Good job guys.

Woohoo! Shirtless Tom Welling, and it looks like he's been working out.

One of Supergirl's many powers: having perfectly dry and bouncy curls immediately after getting out of the water. That is impressive.

Shouldn't Lois at least still have blood on her shirt and a hole in it. Wait. Did she change clothes?

1) I still hate Lois. 2) I really hate the word "cuz." Who the fuck says that?

Lex has a female minion. Please be Mercy.

Blah, blah...angel...blah, blah...Lana. I hate that I don't care about Lex scenes.

Lois' ass makes George's face go cracky. Her ass is like the sun. Also, how did that slap not break her hand? And ewww. Why do they have to have scenes like that all the time? What purpose does sexual harassment serve? Couldn't we have just not have had a scene where George grabs Lois' ass and she kind of likes it? That's just so degrading and inappropriate. Oh, and completely pointless.

OH NO! Chloe's dead....or not. Moving on.

That was quick. She's already in the morgue? Also, that had to be freaky to film. Miss Sullivan's immediate family? Like her cousin? Not her dad. Couldn't have that. Nobody would call someone's parents at a time like this.

I have no idea what that spinning thing was. I would have thought there would be more emotion to that scene. Dying did no favors for Chloe's hair.

A person of color! And he's dead. I am so surprised. The phantom is all about the guts, isn't he?

George has all of Clark's twisted thoughts and memories and knows that what Clark and Lex really want is to run away together and rule the world.

I like the deeper voice on George. Is that Tom Welling doing that, or is it digital? It sounds much better than when they deepened Justin Hartley's voice. I like it. Very sexy.

Transformers on DVD October 16th! Awesome!

She was a suck friend, Chloe. She's not worth your tears.

I love Chloe telling him he has to get on with the flying.

Yay, Martian Manhunter! He knows everything about you, Clark. He can read your mind.

Clark has faith in humans? Kidding. I actually liked that little talk they had. Conversations like this between these two are long overdue.

Also, I'm pretty certain whatever the sun can do to George, a good moisturizer would clear it up.

Aww, poor Lex gets knocked out again.

Seven years and they are just addressing the fact that he gets his powers from the sun.

Yay! Punchy! Was that Martian Manhunter flying George out into space or something? Clark looks so proud of himself. I like that.

They really need to stop with the Superman wanting to kill everyone.

Yes, a perfectly natural reaction to the woman you love dying is grabbing your ass, Lois. It combats grief and cures world hunger.

I don't even know how to feel about all this "embracing my destiny" talk now. Last season I loved it, but there's so much back tracking and stalling that it's hard to take seriously.

Musical montage! With FIRE! Eww...and Lana moping. OK, that wig is hilarious. Oh, and Kara found pants. I'm very happy for her.

Well, that was better than expected, and certainly much better than the season finale. Maybe it was the alcohol. It still had crappy pacing though.

Stream of Consciousness

This morning I past by a newsstand in the train station and was confronted with Smallville's Lois Lane and Supergirl on the covers of Maxim and Stuff respectively. They were in their underwear, heavily airbrushed, and very vapid looking. I was disturbed, but not surprised.

One of the many things I love about Manhunter is that Kate Spencer wears sensible pants suits. Comic books need more sensible pants suit wearing type women.

I liked that Lois Lane wore pants suits in Superman: Birthright, which is probably my favorite Superman story ever. However, when I flipped through it last night I noticed that when Lex threw her out the window she was wearing a skirt. Ordinarily I wouldn't think twice about that sort of thing, but since I was specifically thinking about sensible pants suits, I was left wondering if there was a reason for the change.

Not that a woman can't wear a pants suit one day and a skirt the next. Personally, I would rather wear a skirt as long as I don't have to wear stockings.

I've never actually wrote about Manhunter on this blog, which is a huge oversight on my part. I've read the first three volumes and they are awesome.

I never write about Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane or my love for all things written by Jeff Parker, especially X-Men First Class. I should do that too. They are also awesome.

I planned out a series of posts on the top 10 reasons why I love X-Men First Class during lunch. Well, sort of. I figured out what the 10 reasons were. Hopefully I will actually get around to posting that one.

I plan a lot of posts that I never get around to. I am lazy.

CBR has an X-Men First Class #4 preview. Isn't Bobby Drake from Montauk? I don't remember Montauk being overrun with rednecks.

I didn't realize how much I loved Jean Grey until she was gone...again. I'd be willing to give that crappy looking, 90s-esque X-Force with Wolverine a try if Marvel would bring Jean back.

They'd have to promise never to tell another Phoenix story again though. There's no point bringing her back if they're just going to pull that crap again.

I'd probably hate Emma Frost a lot less if Jean was still around. Well, that and if she dropped the faux-British thing. The X-Men didn't need a Madonna wannabe.

I haven't done a comic book review in a while. The comics just keep piling up. I should probably just go back and review Buffy #6, except all I really have to say is that, while I think Whedon tells better stories, Brian K. Vaughn is a better writer for comics. The end result is a better comic that I care less about.

Or I'm just not as enamored of Faith as everyone else seems to be.

Faith is cool. Buffy is better.

Sugarshock is the awesomes, craziest thing ever.

I was going to write a review of "One More Day," but "slightly more readable than the previous issue" and "this still doesn't make much sense" is getting repetitive and I am bored with it.

I definitely don't feel the need to review the Green Arrow/Black Canary Wedding Special, as the internet has seen plenty of those since last Wednesday.

For the record, I found the opening scene far more troubling than the end, even though the end was pretty sucky as well. The middle was highly enjoyable though. I especially liked Superman.

I hate the fact that I am going to buy Green Arrow/Black Canary #1, just to get the explanation for what happened, even though I thought the end was fucking stupid and Judd Winick is a terrible writer, at least based on the three issues of Green Arrow I read.

I like Green Arrow and Black Canary better when written by anyone but Winick. I even like the Black Canary mini-series that everyone else seemed to hate, so why can't Tony Bedard write the Green Arrow/Black Canary series?

I watched the Legion of Superheroes and The Batman premiers this weekend.

I wasn't thrilled with The Batman's interpretation of Superman. He was kind of a dick. I liked bumbling, Christopher Reeve inspired Clark though, as well as the fact that they had George Newbern and Dana Delaney provide the voices for Clark and Lois. I was especially happy to hear Clancy Brown voicing Lex Luthor. Best Lex Luthor ever.

The redesigns for Legion of Superheroes are going to take some getting used to. I likes the young, cute versions. The episode was pretty kickass though. I can't wait for next week.

Could Brainiac 5 be any gayer for Superman? That went way beyond text. I haven't watched Superman: Doomsday yet. I look forward to really getting a feel for which is more homoerotic. Given the fact that James Marsters sexes up even non-sexual sounding stuff, I'm guessing Lex Luthor has a slight edge.

Smallville is premiering this week, but I don't think Supernatural is premiering until next week. That sucks because after sitting through Smallville, one really needs to watch something that is actually enjoyable.

No, I don't know why I still watch Smallville. I suspect there is some self-loathing involved.

I'm psyched about Heroes premiering tonight. Can't wait to see how the Petrellis make their return.

Is Kristin Bell going to be in the premier? I'm psyched about her too. Oh, and Sark from Alias is going to be on. Love him.

I love Adam Baldwin too. I hope Chuck is a great show and huge success.

I'm still mad at Nathan Fillion for signing on to do Desperate Housewives. I don't want to watch that show.

I'm going to watch Journeyman also, because Vorenus was my favorite character on Rome. I read a rumor somewhere that he might play Thor. That would be cool, as I think he can be badass and pull of the goofy language.

I have a strong suspicion that the JLA movie is going to suck. Also, I don't think Tom Welling is going to be in it, which sucks too.

Brandon Routh might be in it, which would be OK, but I'm upset that there isn't going to be a Superman Returns sequel. I wanted to see where Singer was going to take it. If this is true, then I really hope Brandon Routh is in the JLA movie, because I loved him. I might even like him better than Tom Welling.

Damn You Brian K. Vaughn!

Marvel Knight's next big miniseries the three-issue "Logan," starring Wolverine and written by Brian K Vaughan and drawn by Eduardo Risso. "I'd expect first quarter of 2008," Alonso said of the series' debut. "Eduardo's just about done."

What happened to only doing creator owned stuff from now on, huh? Why you gotta go and write a Wolverine story? I don't wanna read a Wolverine story, but now I have to. Don't I? Not cool, BKV. Not cool at all.

Spidey Cartoon!

Blog@Newsarama has some stuff on the upcoming Spectacular Spider-Man cartoon, like Sean Galloway's character designs from his blog (above). (There's a link to an interview with director Victor Cook.) Pretty cool looking, right? I'm super excited about this cartoon. Yay! for new Spidey cartoon. Okay, I'm calming down.

Anyway, I think they all look really cute. Peter's possibly too cute, but it's so hard to make guys look geeky anymore. If they put him in a sweater vest, like Ditko did, he'd look like a hipster. I'm guessing his geekiness will come across more in how the character is written. Harry's got Osborn hair. I'm very happy about that. Osborn hair makes the character. I would believe anyone who had that hair would go insane. His pant legs are too baggy at the bottom though.

It looks like, in the latest attempt to reinvent Gwen Stacy so that she doesn't completely suck, they've turned her into a geek-girl. I guess that works. Actually, since I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that Mary Jane is going to be the primary love interest as that's just what people are more familiar with, I wonder if they aren't going to go with characterizations similar to those in Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane for Gwen and MJ. That would work, I think. I hope we won't get a movie-MJ characterization. That MJ sucks. Also, I hope Liz Allen, Flash Thompson, and Betty Brant are going to be in the cartoon. I want to see as much of the supporting cast as possible.

I cannot wait for this cartoon, and it's gotten picked up for 26 episodes already. Saturday morning is going to be so awesome, with Legion of Superheroes, The Batman, and Spectacular Spider-Man. It'll be like the '90s when FOX had Spider-Man, X-Men, and The Tick, except, I actually think Spectacular Spider-Man is going to be better than the '90s cartoon. I've read a bunch of interviews and stuff and the creators say all the right things and really seem to get it. I hope I'm not disappointed. I can't take any more Spidey related disappointment.

Peter Parker Was A PIMP

THE WIZARD RETROSPECTIVE: SPIDER-MAN AND MARY JANE:

JOE QUESADA (Marvel Comics editor-in-chief 2000-present): I liked MJ being the girl out of [Peter’s] league. That’s something we can all identify with at some point or another.

Couple of Quick Questions:

How many girls did Peter date that weren't out of his league?

• Betty Brant - the older woman
• Liz Allen - the popular girl dating the quarter back
• Gwen Stacy - scientist/beauty queen
• Mary Jane - model/actress
• Felicia Hardy - the Black Cat. You've seen her. I don't think I have to say more than that.
  
• Deb Whitman - OK, I'll give you this one. She was normal.
  

And the kicker, they fought over him! That was despite the fact that most of them were being chased by guys who, at least on the surface of things, had a lot more to offer them, like actual time to go out on dates and stuff. So, I guess this is my follow-up question:

If a girl actively pursues a guy, is she really out of his league?

Basically, Peter Parker got any girl he wanted once he bothered to show them a little attention, and MJ may have actually pursued him more than most (aside from Felicia, who was needy an obsessive), as she continued to flirt with him even after he and Gwen became a couple and she started dating Harry. The fact that she got all commitment phobic later on is a separate issue.

I'm just getting really confused over where this idea that he was some sort of sad sack who couldn't get a date has suddenly cropped up from. Dan Slott mentioned it in an interview too. Sometimes I get the impression I read different comics than these guys did. Did they change something when they reprinted them? Is there some version out there where Peter was the Urkel to MJ's Laura?

Also From the Retrospective:

BENDIS: I was a youngster when the marriage took place and I received an invitation drawn by Bill Sienkiewicz in the mail from Marvel. I didn’t send [Peter and Mary Jane] a present, but it was marketing gold.

I want it! It's so 80s, with MJ's frosty blue eye shadow. Now I'm upset that my Mary Jane Barbie, who is sportin' the wedding gown, doesn't have frosty blue eye shadow. The irony, of course, is that I hate weddings in real life. Comic book weddings are fun though, probably because there are super villains and I don't have to buy a new dress for them.

Ah, well, I will probably have more to say on this at a later time, because I am me, but I'm done for now.

HBO Is Showing X-Men 3 Right Now

Cyclops has this reaction:



I think my hate of this movie has slightly subsided. It's still really awful though. They couldn't even be bothered to come up with an original title sequence.

No...no...still hate it.

How do you craft a film that makes me hate Hugh Jackman? I don't even know how that's possible.

Well, Scott's dead now, so I better turn this thing off before I start getting angry.

It's Probably Because I Am Such A Big Geek

Which Heroes character are you? Your Result: Hiro Nakamura   You are Hiro Nakamura. You can bend space and time with your mind. You always try to do what is right and you are very innocent. Maybe too innocent. You took a trip to the future and saw NYC blow up. Now you are focused on saving the world. You also love sci-fi.
Issac Mendez
Claire Bennet
Peter Petrelli
Nathan Petrelli
Sylar
Matt Parkman
Niki Sanders
Which Heroes character are you? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Scout Attacks! Amazing Spider-Man #543 and Sensational Spider-Man #40

I'm finally getting around to some reviews that I found really difficult to write. There's this one, and, hopefully, an Astonishing X-Men #22 one coming up soon. We'll see.

To be honest, I could not even finish reading Amazing Spider-Man #543. It just becomes increasingly obvious that the people at Marvel have not even been trying to tell good Spider-Man stories in years. They have been intentionally driving the character into the ground so that when the inevitable reboot happens, we will cheer and thank them for getting rid of this crap.

So, the blood transfusion that Peter gave Aunt May didn't work and a reverend is coming around asking MJ if any thought has been given to what arrangements May would want made if she died. This is the first thing that pissed me off, because Peter's reactions to all this were completely selfish. For starters, I find it hard to believe that, as practical, not to mention old, as May is, she would not have let Peter know what she wanted when she died. What would Aunt May want done if she died, Peter? Well, what about whatever you did the last time she died? (As an aside, I wonder if they ever did anything about the fact that they buried an actress as Aunt May.) Also, considering the fact that Aunt May has been shown to be a Church-goer within the pages of JMS scripted comics, the whole conversation about what May believed in was just really bad.

Then we get to the part where the detective is investigating May's shooting. This is where Peter's actions went from selfish to nonsensical. It was just a lot of overreaction. For starters, I don't understand how knocking the police officer out so that he and Mary Jane could get away didn't still fall firmly into the category of breaking the law but knowing that he was right. It was tying the cop up that really crossed the line. Also, why the hell did he take May? If he had left her there, the hospital would have had to continue to give her medical attention. She might have been transfered to a cheaper hospital, but since he's transferring her anyway, it doesn't really make a difference. Anyway, it was when he started counting off his felonies that I had to stop reading. I tried going back to it later, but the best I could do was skim through the last few pages. When I first read this issue, or part of it, I was really upset. How could they do this to Spidey? Thinking about it now though, I realize that really, all these lines that he's supposedly crossing is just a huge overstatement of what is actually happening. This storyline just grows increasingly idiotic with each issue.

I enjoyed Sensational Spider-Man #40 a lot more. It's really just another story just another story where Peter realizes that for all the bad things that have happened, being Spider-Man was ultimately worth it because of all the good he has done helping others, this time by having a little chat with God in the guise of a homeless man who looks like an uglier Iggy Pop. I liked when Peter asked if he had really saved thousands upon thousands of people and God answered "Well, I'm counting team-ups, but...yeah. At least." (If God's counting team-ups, then Peter's helped save the entire world as recently as the Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four miniseries "The Silver Age.") This issue also began with a nice little recap of Spider-Man's history. Bonus points for remembering Liz Allen's existence and having Peter count Harry among all the people that he has lost. I could have done without the "His first, and some say truest love, Gwen Stacy" line though, and not just because of my personal feelings about Gwen Stacy. The story is being narrated by God. If Gwen Stacy was Peter's truest love, he would know. He wouldn't need to comment on what "some say," and since it is narrated by God, and not just an anonymous narrator, it makes it sound like people within the world of the comic book, as opposed to the readers, are sitting around debating the point. What do I know though. Maybe that's how Betty and Flash spend their dates. (I now realize that I just devoted several lines to a very minor quibble, but it's like they can't mention Gwen Stacy in a comic book without saying "his first, and some say truest love" like it's her full name. It's irritating, and especially so when it doesn't belong.) This issue also gets points for the fact that Clayton Crain made Peter Parker look like Billy Crudup. Looking like Billy Crudup is never a bad thing.

Peter and MJ make for a ridiculously hot older couple.

What I liked most though was that this issue left us off with some hope for Peter's future. That's not something we get a lot of in Spider-Man comics anymore, and it was certainly something I needed after Amazing Spider-Man #543. All in all, this was a nice wrap up for what has been a pretty uneven series.

I Am So Proud of My Italian Heritage

Scientist suggests super-sticky Spidey suit

Also, I so want one of these things. Next, these Italians need to apply their magnificent brains to creating some web shooters. Or would I have to come up with that myself, y'know, like Spidey did?