The Nerdmudgeon Podcast
Three middle-aged nerds (including yours truly!) review all of the MCU movies in chronological order. Short, funny, and full of good vibes, check it out and let us know what you think!
Nerdmudgeon.com
Batman never let the Robins party when he was alive, thus …
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Posted in Daily Random Panel
Pop Quiz 24 Results
We had some great entries in our Rag Doll Pop Quiz, and here they are:
Those are all great, but among my very favorites were Atomic Punk, Barbario, Keric, Livewyre, Scatman, SprocketSauce, and Worf. And if I have to go with just one to put up on my wall, I'd go with ... Atomic Punk!
There aren't any crazy, out of control special effects here, just a great concept executed very well. I love the colors, the little embellishments, and just the overall look and feel of the whole design. It's fun and cool at the same time. Great job, sir!
Congratulations to everyone who entered, you all did a wonderful job.
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Posted in Challenge Favorites
A super power we all have, but rarely use
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Posted in Daily Random Panel
Truth of the New Guardians Revealed
Truth of the New Guardians Revealed!!
By: Andrew Hines
Before I get into the writing and artwork, which is good, I feel like I have to give you full year's synopsis. Okay, so a ring from each Corps was stolen and its wearer basically left to die. They all got sent to Kyle Rayner who then looked like a "ring thief" despite having no idea what was going on. An uneasy alliance was formed by Rayner along with Munk, Saint Walker, Fatality (Star Sapphire), Bleez, Glomulus (Orange Lantern construct), Arkillo and eventually the weaponer of Qward. So they get duped by Larfleeze to do his dirty work and whack this Invictus dude who's the sole protector of a giant solar system/space ship. Then Kyle gets recruited by Invictus to kill Larfleeze. That obviously ain't gonna work so Invictus follows them and decides to take on Agent Orange and that brings us to the here and now. Any questions?
Tony Bedard has done a passable job on this one. There's too much expository dialogue and not enough real interaction. It was a very slow beginning and the biggest action sequences took way to long to round out. I'm all for some good old fashioned ring slinging, but come on. It was a decent ending, but at the same time, it was way too clean. The title in general has been far too slow paced.
Tyler Kirkham's art is good and all but at the same time, he often makes the characters' necks far too veiny. With one exception (page 18) I never really got the feeling that Kyle was an artist, which typically shows through his constructs. It looked a lot like Hal's stuff, just beams of light and very run-of-the-mill. Batt's inks on the other hand have been good. Nei Ruffino and Wes Hartman's colors were pretty good and fit what the effects were trying to portray.
I have to give this one a "B-". I want to love it because Kyle is one of my favorite characters, but the writing didn't work out as well as I wanted it to. It was wrapped up a little too neatly. I'm just hoping that better things happen after the 0 issues.
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Posted in Super-Hero Stuff
Pop Quiz: Rag Doll
Happy Saturday, folks! School is starting, and with that comes the heartbreak of leaving behind childish things. Thus your one-day quick-fire challenge today is to create an image that uses the rag doll from ItemRight-Miscellaneous (pictured above). You can make her huge (tip: manually enter a number in the Scale control to get past the drag-control's limit) and dress her up, or you could have someone holding her, or you could make a tea party, whatever you like. But the rag doll must be visible and relatively prominent. In other words, don't open your Captain Awesome illustration and drop her in the background!
You only get one entry -- that's right, just one! So make it your best. Most of the other rules are the same as for a regular challenge, but instead of a whole week I'll announce my favorites either tonight or tomorrow morning. Elaborate backgrounds aren't necessary, though if you've got one it's fine.
- All entries must be in JPG or PNG form (BMPs are too big), posted to a publicly accessible website (like ImageShack, PhotoBucket, the HeroMachine Forums, whatever);
- Entries must be made as a comment or comments to this post, containing a link directly to the image and the character name;
- Please name your files as [your name]-[character name].[file extension]. So DiCicatriz, for instance, would save his "Bayou Belle" character image as DiCicatriz-BayouBelle.png.
- Please make the link go directly to the image (like this) and not to a hosting jump page (like this). Here's a quick-start guide on how to do that for various image hosting services.
I'll pick one entry as my personal favorite, which will get to be featured in the side bar to the right for ultimate glory! As a bonus you're allowed to say you won the Internet for a few days.
Good luck!
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Posted in Challenges, Pop Quiz
Ready to board seamen, sir!
(From "Daredevil Battles Hitler", 1941.)
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Posted in Daily Random Panel
Rogues Get New Management
Rogues Get New Management
By: Andrew Hines
In the last year, the Scarlet Speedster's been hitting a few speed bumps (see what I did there?) From helping to plunge Central City into a full-on blackout, to getting himself, Iris West and several other stuck inside the Speed Force, he's been having a bad year. Add to that everyone in the city thinking he's dead and now being framed for murder, things just aren't going his way. Now, the Rogues are getting back together, albeit with new leadership. For the first time, the new master of the Rogues looks good in a dress. Glider's not only taking control of the Rogues, she's also putting her brother, Captain Cold out to pasture. I've always liked Barry, even though he died two years before I was born. There've been some interesting developments in the last year, but now it's just getting ridiculous. Thankfully this all leads up to Flash Annual #1 which comes out next week, along with Justice League #12, Green Lantern Annual and Superman Annual.
With Francis Manapul and Brian Buccelato rounding out a year of writing Flash, they're either getting tired or has something AMAZING up their sleeves. The pair have done a great job, not only staying true to who Barry is and distancing him from Wally a little bit, but digging deeper into his powers. The dialogue is great and fits each character pretty well. The pacing fits with a two-part story, assuming it ends with Flash Annual #1.
Manapul has done a great job over the last year of updating everyone's looks while keeping with the premise of each character. His style fits the pacing and the artwork in every panel is great. From the front cover to the last page, this is the most consistently awesome artwork in DC. I really can't think of anyone else' artwork I'd rather see in the pages of the Flash month after month. Then there's Buccelato's colors over Manapul's art. For my money, they're on par with the work and consistency of Jim Lee and Geoff Johns. Visually very different, but they do what best fits the characters and script. And to top it off, we get to see it twice in one month with next week's comic.
With this pairing, it's no wonder that there's really no end in sight for this title. They've earned themselves an "A".
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Posted in Super-Hero Stuff
Minor Victory!!!
So, it's true now that Rob "How Does He Have A Job" Liefeld has called it quits at DC. We no longer have to suffer through some of the worst art ever to be printed by a comic book company. It was apparently because of editorial battles. For more information, check out the Newsarama page: http://blog.newsarama.com/2012/08/22/rob-liefeld-quits-dc-the-0s-are-my-last-issues/
I'm mentally doing backflips, cartwheels and just generally jumping for joy! That's one less set of comics we have to endure Rob Liefeld working on.
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Posted in I Hate Rob Liefeld's Art, News & Updates
The beautiful synergy of comics
I am criticized from time to time for not doing more positive stories (a very fair criticism, I hasten to add), so I wanted to share this example of comics done exceptionally well. It's from a daily comic strip that predates even my ancient time called "Gasoline Alley" by Frank King. In its day it was as big as Spider-Man or Superman are today. But what caught my eye (thanks to a friend on Facebook) is the way the shadows define the forms here without requiring actual outlines:
The last two panels are just breathtaking in their elegance, simplicity, and effect. You barely notice that the figures are made of nothing but shadows and negative space, a wonderful rendering technique just on its own. But the magic of comics comes from the way the effect works with the dialog to enhance the sense of foreboding the creator is striving for. There is beauty in their upcoming marriage just as there is beauty in the forest, but some darkness awaits as well. Either the words or the art by themselves are still good, but when combined they achieve a kind of beautiful synergy that only comics can provide.
(Original artwork and a great essay are from "Hooded Utilitarian".)
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Posted in Randomosity, Retroviews, Things I Like
