Monthly Archives: January 2009

Comic book idea

Posted on January 19, 2009 by | Comments Off on Comic book idea

I had an idea the other day for a comic book while watching "The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly." You never get any kind of backstory for the victims in any of these stories, whether it's sombrero-wearing banditos in spaghetti Westerns or red-shirted security guys in Star Trek. They're just cannon fodder. But they've got friends, loved ones, and stories of their own. Someone somewhere is probably going to cry just as hard for them as we will when our hero gets it.

So I thought it might be interesting to have a comics series where every issue features a different story of someone who gets killed on the last page. Sometimes it may be a gladiator losing in the pits of Rome, sometimes it might be a Hydra henchman getting blasted by Iron Fist, sometimes it might be one of Brainiac's cyborg assistants getting evacuated into space by Superman because hey, it's just robots.

Clearly the meds are working today, because the ideas just keep flying!

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Posted in Randomosity

Poll Position: Batman vs. the Big Baddies

Posted on January 19, 2009 by | Comments Off on Poll Position: Batman vs. the Big Baddies

Since the Dark Knight proved so popular in our last question, let's raise the bar a notch by getting rid of all those pesky constraints the latest movie franchise puts on us, and get down to some real power-game silliness:

n

{democracy:66}

Discussion to follow.
Continue reading →

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Posted in Versus

HeroMachine 3.0 begins

Posted on January 19, 2009 by | Comments Off on HeroMachine 3.0 begins

Today I am officially starting on HeroMachine 3.0; I even created a folder for it on my hard drive, so you know it's serious!

It will be built on the same code base as the recent Warrior and Horror Minis, meaning it will have all of those features (scalability, custom colors, line colors, movable items, rotation, transparency, multiple items in a slot) and more. During the discussion of those minis, I kept a list of feature requests that seemed like particularly good ideas, and I am listing them below. Take a look and let me know any other stuff you'd like to see HM3 have.

  • Magnifying glass zoom feature
  • Pre-set pose/body style buttons to recreate classic builds.
  • Preview mode.
  • "clone" button
  • On the scaling tool, a button "keep proportion" would be useful.
  • Pop up asking if you really want to delete ALL items.

I've still got some work to finish on both the Zombie Mini and the general Horror Mini but hopefully that'll be done in the next two weeks, and can go on concurrently with the HM3 stuff.

I'm very excited, and I have high hopes that this will all come together very quickly!

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Posted in HeroMachine 3

Random Panel: Bygones

Posted on January 19, 2009 by | Comments Off on Random Panel: Bygones
skyman-1-brooding

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Posted in Daily Random Panel

Contest 41 Winner: Thunder

Posted on January 17, 2009 by | Comments Off on Contest 41 Winner: Thunder

John D and I have finished his commission for winning Caption Contest 41, of his character "Thunder":

You can get your own custom black and white illustration of whatever you like by winning Caption Contest 44, going on right now!

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Posted in Challenge Prizes, Challenges

Random Panel: I'll take "Subtle racial slurs" for $1000, Alex

Posted on January 17, 2009 by | Comments Off on Random Panel: I'll take "Subtle racial slurs" for $1000, Alex
indian-girl

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Posted in Daily Random Panel

Tell me how to spend my money

Posted on January 16, 2009 by | Comments Off on Tell me how to spend my money

My lovely and wonderful wife got a gift certificate to MyComicsShop.com for Christmas, and I have a bit of a problem -- I'm not sure what to spend it on. Two thirds of it I am generously donating to you, good blog reader. Sort of. I'm getting the complete run of the 1985 "Who's Who in the DC Universe" and subsequent updates so I can hunt down more ridiculous and mock-worthy characters for your belittlement and enjoyment.

But that leaves me with about thirty bucks to spend, and I can't figure out what I ought to do with it. I don't want to just get the current issues I get from my regular store, but I already have most of the "big" sets I'd want.

So I thought I'd ask you all -- if you were recommending a "must have" graphic novel or trade paperback to someone who loves comics, what would you recommend? Here are a few sets I have and love, if that helps:

(Edited to add: Those are ones I already own, not ones I am thinking of buying. Just to give you an idea of the kind of thing I like.)

Lay it on me, intelligentsia! Tell me what I need to buy with my remaining monies. Otherwise I might just say "Screw the blog readers and their 'Who's Who', I'm dumping all that and instead getting the 'Complete Calvin and Hobbes'"!

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Posted in Uncategorized

KARRUNT

Posted on January 16, 2009 by | Comments Off on KARRUNT

I'm not saying Adam Warlock is getting smushed by a giant stone vagina here:

warlock-4-karunt

I'm just saying, if you're NOT getting smushed by a giant stone vagina, you've got no business going "KARRUNT" with those kinds of visual effects on it.

Also, I would pay cash money for a comic book featuring as its main character a Thing-like ambulatory pile of hard-hitting stone genitalia. Because that would be awesome.

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Posted in OnomontoPOWia

Random Panel: I think "pull a hitler on the clown" is a great euphamism for something.

Posted on January 16, 2009 by | Comments Off on Random Panel: I think "pull a hitler on the clown" is a great euphamism for something.
mystery-v4-1-pullahitler

(Mystery Comics, vol.4, no. 1, 1941.)

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Posted in Daily Random Panel

Retroview: Comic Book Villains (2002)

Posted on January 15, 2009 by | Comments Off on Retroview: Comic Book Villains (2002)

Comic Book Villains DVD coverI recently rented 2002's "Comic Book Villains" and I hated it, not because I felt insulted by their depiction of anyone who loves comic books and super heroes as pathetic, anti-social losers, but because I think entertainment in any medium should be a) entertaining and b) not crap.

"Comic Book Villains" failed on both scores.

Poorly written, poorly plotted, haphazardly acted, and offensive when not insufferably stupid, I found very little to like in this movie aside from a couple of good performances from actors who, frankly, should have known better than to take this job.

The plot was insipid, as if the worst parts of super-hero villains were tossed into a blender and only the most inane of their world-beating schemes allowed to escape. Nothing anyone did at any point made sense if you thought about it for more than a second. The characters' motivations were confused and at times self-contradictory.

I got the feeling the director couldn't decide what this movie was supposed to be, whether it was a dark comedy or a drama or an outright farce or what. Ultimately I was left with a feeling like "Fargo" had gone under the knife for unsuccessful reconstructive surgery, and what I was left with was a shambling horror with awful bits of its predecessor grafted onto its grotesque corpse.

OK, that's probably a bit over the top, but I really found myself getting angry while watching "Comic Book Villains" because it had many elements of a good movie. And none of them ever bore fruit. It was a very frustrating experience, and I can't recommend this film to anyone. For any reason.

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Posted in Movies and TV, Retroviews