Off the Shelf: White Death

Posted on September 20, 2014 by Denise

white death(NOTE: I received a copy of this book through NetGalley.)

Publication 411: Hardcover edition of the original 1998 title (though the info page is confusing as it lists the copyright as 2014.)

Story:  WWI was supposed to be “the war to end all wars”.  Certainly that level of destruction and death was seen at the Italian Front, where both sides used nature against the other.  Causing avalanches — called “white death” — to decimate troops on the other side, soldiers tried to stay alive though one barrage after another.  When young Pietro Aquasanta returns to his homeland to fight for his country, he finds more than he bargained for.  A look at this piece of WWI from many different angles, with no happy endings in sight.

Thoughts: Based on historical research, White Death blew me away.  Writer Robbie Morrison (Nikolai Dante, 2000AD) focuses on “The White War”; the battle of the Alighieri Plateau.  Teaming up with Charlie Adlard (The Walking Dead)  was a shrewd move; Adlard wanted to try a “new style”; charcoal and chalk on grey paper, and it works perfectly here.

The first three pages knocked my socks off.  Plus, Adlard’s use of paper and charcoal gives the artwork a texture and depth that adds to the story.  The silouettes convey more here than many other comics manage in entire runs.  Perhaps that’s due to the subject matter — military history has it’s own emotional baggage we all have a share in — but it’s also Adlard’s ability to know when to shove it in your face, and when to pull back and let you fill in the blanks.  I wanted to stare at the individual lines and shadings, and in doing so I got swept into the thick of the story.  The Nice trick, Adlard.

Morrison balances historical accuracy with riveting storytelling.  Front line horrors and off-the-line daily life in wartime share the stage and paint a picture of the world they lived in.  Hospitals where men are patched up and sent back to the Front, prostitutes who seem to be a soldier’s only comfort, days of inactivity and crazy ways to blow off steam; it’s all here.

Script-to-art pages at the end of this book show the detail that went into both the writing and art in this book. I’m a sucker for that sort of thing, and anyone else who is will definitely eat this up.

Nutshell: right up there with Shigeru Mizuki’s Onward Towards Our Noble Deaths, White Death is a must read for anyone who loves military history, history, or just plain-old good storytelling.  I’m cheap selective in what goes onto my shelves, but there’s definitely a space carved out for this book.  From me, that’s about the highest praise I can deliver.

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Off the Shelf: Hatsune Miku Graphics Vocaloid Comics & Art Vol 2

Posted on September 19, 2014 by Denise

(Image: UDON Entertainment)

(NOTE: I received a copy of this book via NetGalley)

Though “Virtual Pop Star” Hatsune Miku (and the Vocaloid voice synthesizer in general) may not be widely known in the USA, the singing voice synthesizer with a groovy anime look has a huge fanbase, with manga (Maker Hikōshiki Hatsune Mix, Hatsune Miku: Unofficial Hatsune Mix), games, anime, and of course tons of YouTube music videos.  With a performance on Late Night With David Letterman scheduled for October, I’m betting more folks will get bit by the bug.  So why not take a look at the latest offering from UDON Entertainment, a collection of “tribute art” (aka fan created pieces), comics and more?  Gotta say that HMGVC&A2 packs a whole lot of stuff in a little over 100 pages.  Perfect for people who’d like to take a look at all the fuss.

Thoughts: To be honest, I hadn’t heard much about Hatsune Miku before I looked at this book.  Sure, I’d seen her image at conventions, but hadn’t thought much about the fandom.  There’s already a ton of anime and manga on my plate, yada yada.  But this is manga eye-candy at it’s best y’all.  No matter what style you’re into, there’s bound to be someone who has plopped Hatsune into it.  And with each artist comes a very brief — think Twitter-worthy — thank you and “why this matters to me” tidbit.  And also, there are webpage links to check out for folks who like a particular artist.

Fine.  A few of my absolute favorites here?  meola’s (yes, the m is lower case) gorgeous work that looks like Pollock got his hands on some manga.  Nagimiso, who draws a more mature Hatsune Miku.  Arisaka Ako, whose Vocaloids remind me of Black Butler. Hakone, whose colors are soft and shaded.  Milo, and the “just so crazy it works” Busby Berkley style.

And that’s just the first half of the book.  There’s extras, tons of character-specific pages, and even a few comics at the end.  I’m guessing this is just the start of a full-on manga (and maybe anime?) rollout. Though I’m hoping Western dub-y musicians will start sampling her tunes; that’d be cool.

Nutshell:  HMGVC&A2 is like a book of fannishness, with ways to contact/get more stuff IRL from the featured artists.  Gorgeous high-quality artwork, and lots of information on on the fandom as well as Hatsune “herself”.  This book has me wanting to add a Hatsune Miku playlist to my Spotify.  Banzai!

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Review in a Flash: The Maze Runner

Posted on September 19, 2014 by Denise

the maze runner onesheetSometimes I’m too lazy for a full-out piece. Sometimes everything I’ve got to say about a film can be summarized in a sentence or two. Sometimes it’s both. So herewith, a quick-n-dirty on The Maze Runner!

Nutshell:  I’d give The Maze Runner a B.  It’s an interesting spin on the deluge of post-apocalyptic YA that’s been coming down the pike, and the kids all deliver fine performances.  But I couldn’t shake the “Lord of the Flies meets The Hunger Games” mishmosh out of my head, nor the feeling that the filmmakers could have gone beyond the stock character parade.

Before: YA!  Whoop!  I’ve heard good things about this series of books, so I’m looking forward to this.  Sign me up for any and all apocalyptic storytelling y’all.  Plus, who doesn’t love Stiles (Dylan O’Brien, Teen Wolf)?  The maze itself reminds me of Hogwarts, with it’s ever-shifting staircases.  I hope this story isn’t just a compilation of greatest hits that the genre has seen before.  Especially since a group of boys living in nature away from everything else feels like Lord of the Flies.  Wonder if there’ll be devolution?

During:  Nicely done opening scene, with the POV of Thomas (O’Brien) coming up into the maze world.  Instant understanding of the confusion and fear these kids must have felt.  So this is really a reverse Lord of the Flies; everyone is getting together very well thanks to a “we’re all in this together” code taught to them by teen leader Alby (Aml Ameen, turning in a thoughtful and nuanced performance).  Wonder how long that’ll la…oops.  Enter Thomas, the latest kid sent up to this forced paradise from the depths of…who knows where.  New guy = big changes.  Kinda wish director Ball and actor Will Poulter (We’re the Millers) would give antagonist/freakout aficionado Gally more than just knee-jerk reactions to everything.  Because right now Gally is just a cardboard cutout typifying fear of the unknown.  And that’s gonna get old after awhile.

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Elsewhere Review: This is Where I Leave You

Posted on September 19, 2014 by Denise

Nutshell:  I’d give This is Where I Leave You at B.  The Altman family may be dysfunctional, but the film is a well-oiled machine.  Funny, inappropriate as hell, and so much like real life it’s oftentimes uncomfortable.  Luckily the cast excels at screenwriter/novelist Jonathan Tropper’s witty banter, and director Shawn Levy nails the “we are family” vibe of the original novel.

Movie Review: This is Where I Leave You

Jason Bateman, Tina Fey, and Jane Fonda walk into a movie.  Wait wait, there’s more; Connie Britton, Rose Byrne, Corey Stoll are there too.  Punch line?  Tons of ‘em.  There’s also plenty to squirm over, as the cast has no problems showing you their characters good and bad sides.  I found myself disgusted and hilariously amused by this family; it’s like the family down the street that are definitely hipper than thou, but that you’d never switch places with in a million years.  In the end This is Where I Leave You left me with more laughs than pauses.  That’s thanks to the brilliant work of the cast, and director Shawn Levy’s easygoing but well-timed pacing.

This is Where I Leave You deals with the pain and strangeness of losing your dad, and how families that are prickly can have surprising tenderness for each other.  At least when they’re not titty-twisting the younger kids.  I mean c’mon, sweet is all well and good but let’s be real.  Middle kid Judd Altman has just found out his wife has been cheating on him with his boss.  While in his funk of self-pity, sister Wendy calls to tell him that their father has died.  As they come together with their brothers Paul and Phillip, momma Hillary tells them their father’s final wish; for them and their families to all sit Shiva for a week in the family home.  Wendy’s picture-perfect marriage is seen to have problems that aren’t helped by her reunion with former boyfriend Horry (Timothy Olyphant).  Paul and wife Alice are desperately trying to conceive, and the fact that Alice and Judd used to date isn’t helping things.  Phillip, the baby of the family and lifelong screwup, brings home fiancee Tracy (Connie Britton), who used to be his therapist but can’t seem to help him rein in his destructive behavior.  And Judd gets a visit from his ex telling him that she’s pregnant…and it’s his. Got all that?  Good.  Surprisingly, all that plays out easily, and TIWILY has an ensemble feel that’s in no small part due to the chemistry between the leads.

this-is-where-i-leave-you-tiwily-wide-poster
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So. Z Nation happened.

Posted on September 18, 2014 by Denise
Lucille! Not. (Image: SyFy)

Lucille! Not. (Image: SyFy)

As I don’t have cable, I’m missing my usual campy genre awesomeness.  Oh, don’t worry; I take advantage of friends and family by parking my keister on their couch for extended marathons of The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones and Doctor Who.  I have my priorities. (And no sense of pride or common decency.)

So when Google Play made the pilot episode of Z Nation a free download?  Hello!  I should have known better.  Here’s what happened:

The Good:  DJ Qualls!  Harold Perrineau!  Tom Everett Scott!  I love that I get to see Garth, Augustus Hill & Andy McDermott in one show!  Qualls, as a left-behind soldier stuck waaaaaay up north.  Boyfriend doesn’t realize how good he’s got it, until he decides to just hang it up and go all pirate radio.  I’m sure he’ll be the voice/connection for all the other folks running around with the zombies.

There’s a baseball bat in Z Nation, and it’s not Lucille (though I’m sure somebody here has read TWD and thought a spikey bat would be teh kewl.)  But it gets points for looking like something that someone would actually be able to cobble together.  Plus, it’s pretty sweet.  Oh, and there’s a zombie baby that I’m sure you’ve seen in the trailer.

Gotta love the eyebrows. (Image: SyFy)

Gotta love the eyebrows. (Image: SyFy)

The Bad:  See: zombie baby.  Great idea at the start, but the idea that the little posthumous punkin’ can zoom around at light speed just because it’s undead?  Nup.  Also, the dialogue made me weep.  “Let him go or I will send you to walk among the dead.”  Yeah, poor Harold Perrineau had to deliver that clunker.  And that’s only one of many tidbits scattered all over Z Nation.  But you can forgive bad dialogue when the FX are so amazing…sike!  The makeup and CGI here is nothing less than subpar.  Again, this is from SyFy, the station whose catchphrase seems to be “SyFy: Getting RTVF Majors To Do Our FX Since 2009”.

But the main thing that makes me shake my head in sadness is that the plot seems to have no idea where it’s going.  It’s as if whoever pitched this decided that zombies were awesome (that’s not an incorrect assumption), and that simply throwing a few rotting undead on the small screen would be enough to have genre fans a’runnin’ (that’s the incorrect assumption right there.)  The Walking Dead delivered action, gore and character development in it’s pilot ep.  Z Nation delivered…a zombie baby.

The Result:  Think of this not as competition for The Walking Dead, but as something zombie fans can watch/make fun of while they wait for their Darryl fix.  (What?  Who doesn’t love a man with a bow?)  I’m not gonna lie, I’d love to see another ep to find out if this first episode was a hiccup.  Considering this is from the folks that gave us Sharknado — yep, this is a The Asylum joint — I’m thinking there’ll be more of the same sad dialogue, strange pacing and hiccupy continuity.  Ah well.  But it could be fun for a drinking game Netflix night a year from now.

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Wayback Review: Real Steel

Posted on September 16, 2014 by Denise

Watching Shawn Levy’s This is Where I Leave You last night made me think back to the last movie of his I’d caught at the ol’ multiplex.  Herewith, my review from Atomic Popcorn of Levy’s Real Steel.  *theatrical bow*

Nutshell: I’d give Real Steel a B+.  It’s a sweet but satisfying romp in a near-ish future just cool enough to have robots.  Come for the cool CGI, stay for the touching father/son bonding tale.

As always, clicky on the hypertext for the original piece!

***

Movie Review — Real Steel

“Rock ‘em Sock ‘em Robots” get their day on the big screen in Real Steel, a movie that transcends the one-joke premise and is instead a heartwarming, fist-pumping mechanized fairy tale of a father and son coming together amid some of the baddest technology you’ll ever wish was really available.  Not to bad for a few plastic robots from the 60s.

Okay, so Real Steel isn’t based on the old game you played with and trashed back when you were a kid, it’s actually based on the story “Steel” by the amazing and incredible Richard Matheson (I Am Legend, Hell House, Nightmare at 20,000 Feet).  But the storyline sure quacks like a toy robot: it’s sometime in the not-too-distant future, a time where boxing has ditched humans and amped up the amazeballs factor by using robots.  Big, powerful, amazing robots, that are controlled/worked by human handlers and treated like superstars.  Robotics engineers are the new cool kids on the block, and as with all types of fighting there’s the legal big-leagues, and the shady underground scene.

Cue Charlie Kenton (Hugh Jackman, looking scruffy but gorgeous; does the man ever look bad?), a poor schmuck whose every decision seems like the wrong one.  After hurting himself in human boxing, he’s a robot boxing promoter, but he’s been reduced to staying one step ahead of the law and his myriad of creditors.  When Charlie finds out that he’s the father of 11-year-old Max, his son from a girlfriend he only barely remembers, having to take care of a kid puts a cramp in his style.  So he makes a deal with his dead girlfriend’s sister Debra; Charlie will watch Max over the summer so Aunt Debra and Uncle Marvin can go away to Europe, then Deb and Marv will take Max off Charlie’s hands for good.  But when Max, a kid who’s already a huge robot boxing fan, gets his first taste of competition, he decides to try his hand at the sport himself, along with a robot he finds in a spare-parts dump.  If you think Charlie and Max don’t bond over this, you obviously don’t get out much.

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Off the shelf: Harbinger #25

Posted on September 15, 2014 by Denise
image

Image: Valiant

(Note: I received a free copy of this comic from creator Vivek J. Tiwary.)

Story: Think Misfits with a dash of X-Men & Babylon 5‘s Psi Corps. Peter Stanchek is a kid with psionic abilities that looked to Toyo Harada for guidance. Bad move: Harada is a power mad loon with the usual “must control the world” agenda Harada builds through his Harbinger Foundation. Peter has banded together with other teens with similar skills…but so far even their successes are of the two-steps-back variety.

Thoughts: I’m iffy on superhero stories, unless they involve snark or mythology. The Harbinger series has neither, but the world building here is impressive. Being as this is my first dip into the storyline, I’m pretty lost; though the basics are clear, the sub-plots and character tics are lost on me.

What hits home is Barry Kitson’s gorgeous two-page spread at the end of the issue, and the one-page “sizzle reel” on the inside cover by Joshua Dysart, Khari Evans and Brian Reber. All I needed know, beautifully drawn and simply described. “Into Memory” by Vivek Tiwary (The Fifth Beatle) has the same type of groovy color focus found in Beatle, but this time it’s artist Lewis LaRosa doing the art. It’s beautiful and touching, but again, without knowing the back story? I stared at the last panel hoping I’d gotten the gist, but figuring I hadn’t. “Fan Fiction” by Justin Jordan and Rafer Roberts is a hoot, and I liked the way he pictured the teen heroes’ reactions to what’s on the interwebs.

Nutshell: #25‘s “Anniversary Celebration” feels like more of a love-letter to their fans rather than a jump-in point for newbies, with eight different sections instead of focusing on story arc continuation . (Granted, as this is my first look, this series may do this every issue. But I hope not; this format is fun as a one-off  but it’d definitely grate if I wanted story progression.) Some great, fun moments, but that’s it for this newbie.

Subscribe or Shelve?: Even though Harbinger looks like the winds of all-out war are blowin’ – the series spins off into Harbinger: Omegas next month – I’m not chomping at the bit. The characters are detailed just enough, yet I’m not connecting with them. Perhaps it’s because so much was crammed into a single issue. I would read it again if it was available, to see if the story would grow on me. But I’m not sure it’s currently my cup of tea.

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Off the shelf: Chastity #1

Posted on September 14, 2014 by Denise
(Image: Chaos!Dynamite/Bleeding Cool)

(Image: Chaos!Dynamite/Bleeding Cool)

Not only am I a sucker for horror comics, but I’ll read just about anything that’s free.  So when I saw that Dynamite was trotting out Chastity #1 (the Dynamite re-launch of the ol’ Chaos! Comics vampire assassin from the 90s) for a free look-see over at Bleeding Cool?  I looked, and I see’d.  Yeah I know it hit shops in July.  I’m slow.  So far?  Well…

Story: Chastity is a teen gymnast, or at least was until her ACL flipped her the bird.  Her mom had high hopes for Chastity’s Olympic chances, but now gives zero fucks about the poor girl.  So, what’s a teen to do but lose herself in the hottest new vampire fiction?  One thing though; it’s written by a real vamp, and that vamp wants Chastity.  For dinner.  Death’s a-knockin’, as Chastity’s origin story takes off.

Thoughts:  Fans of the original Chastity series at Chaos! will notice a BIG change in her origin story here, but with the whole YA Paranormal Romance thing that swept in like a plague of locusts is so popular now, I think it works well.  I saw the “twist” involving the author of the “Blood Rose” series a mile away — as anyone who loves vamps would — but I enjoyed the ride nonetheless.  Told in flashback, Chastity is no-nonsense and doesn’t veer off on tangents.  In fact, Chastity #1 felt a little choppy at times, but as this is an origin/Exposition Fairy issue, I’m okay with that.

Nutshell:  I’m not up on Chastity as much as I’d like — gotta admit I was more an Evil Ernie gal back then — but I love Dave Acosta’s pencils, and Thiago Ribeiro’s gorgeous (and gore-geous) colors.  Emanuella Lupacchino & Ivan Nunes bring on a hot-but-not-tacky Chastity pin-up-y pose that looks fantastic and lays out the basics of the character beautifully.  I’m liking the details and depth in this standard cover more than Tim Seeley’s subscription cover for this particular issue.

Subscribe or Shelve: Definitely looking forward to seeing where Marc Andreyko takes this character, and Ribeiro’s slaughter-riffic panels have me hooked.  I’m all in.  Off to grab #2 & 3!

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Supernatural Season 10 promises a “Dean-mon”…and karaoke?

Posted on September 12, 2014 by Denise
Supernatural-Season-10-poster-570x853

Image: The CW

SPOILER ALERT Y’ALL: if you’re all caught up on the Moose & Squirrel Show, you know that Dean has gone all black-eyed.  But what’s that gonna change?  Apparently not his love for porn, booty and…karaoke?

Check out the CW’s teaser trailer for the new season.  And if you really want to have some fun, Google “Season 10 Supernatural Poster” to see all the glorious fan art that has been making it’s way around the internet. (My favorite? No question: the “fangasm” faux-poster My Brother Is A Demon!) Let the mayhem begin!

 

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Baltimore Comic-Con 2014 Costume Contest winners!

Posted on September 9, 2014 by Denise

It’s official y’all!  There are some crazy talented folks in fandom.  I saw a few of these folks at the ‘Con (and snapped a pic of the Mothra/Mechagodzilla tag-team), but wowza.

Which reminds, me… here are a few Photos I Forgot To Post.  Enjoy, and read on for the winners (including pics!) after the jump.

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