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Norm Macdonald

By now, most of you have probably heard about Norm Macdonald’s passing.

This shocked and saddened me, as he was one of my favorite comedians. His sense of humor was often way out there, in that he’d often take you on a journey with a hilarious left turn at the end.

On stage, he played it as if he was a bit dim, but he was usually the smartest guy in the room. Well read, incredibly knowledgable about a wide variety of subjects. A sharp mind that would constantly surprise you.

He was fearless. No topic was off-limit when there was an opportunity to show how hypocritical we are about some topics, a more intrusive style of observational humor that was always very clever and laugh out loud funny.

He was extremely religious, which always surprised me, as it seemed at odds with his usual way of thinking and attitude in general. If I didn’t know otherwise, I’d have assumed he was an athiest, if anything. But there again, he surprised. I really do get the feeling that we only scratched the surface on this guy, and we’ll likely never know any more.

Because he was an extremely private man. He had cancer for nine years, and never told a soul. Not his closest friends, not even his family. Everyone’s different, and I get not wanting to broadcast something like that to the world for a variety of reasons, but to not tell his family, especially his son? Best thing I could say here is that he was a complicated dude.

I wouldn’t dare try and tell any of his material because I don’t have his delivery, timing or talent, and would be doing him a disservice. But do yourself a favor and go down a YouTube rabbit hole and look up some of his stuff. The “moth story” when he was on Conan, or his last stand-up set he did as Letterman’s final guest before his show went off the air. Plenty more out there, so go explore. Rest in peace, Norm.

The Doom Patrol

A couple years ago, the pilot episode of Doom Patrol was streamed for free. I watched it, and frankly, I wasn’t impressed for a number of reasons. I *might* have continued watching it, but only the first one was free, man, then you had to buy another streaming service to watch the rest of the season. I HATE that tactic and on general principle, I don’t give in on it. Same for the Paramount + service. CBS actually showed the first ep of Star Trek Discovery and then nu uh, ya gots to buy another streaming service to watch it, suckah! Didn’t give in then either.

The Doom Patrol was streaming on the now defunct DC streaming service, but has since migrated over to HBOMAX. Which my daughter subscribes to, and thus, so do I. So, in the name of boredom viewing, I finally tried episode 2. I wasn’t sold, but it was enough to make me watch ep 3, and within a short amount of time, I was hooked and binging.

The DP is a group of screwed ups who obtain abilities and try to do the right thing. The powers, or curses, of these individuals are not what made them screw ups. They started out that way. The powers just exacerbated their issues. It’s a hell of a character study. And it’s weird. Very possibly the weirdest, most screwed up show in the history of television. Me trying to describe some of goings on would fall short and do the series a disservice. Instead, I’ll just mention some of the key players.

Niles Caulder is the Chief, a reforming manipulative mad scientist. He provides a home for the Patrol.

Rita Farr was a ’50’s Hollywood actress before being exposed to marsh gas in the Congo, which causes her to have elastic flesh when she can control it. When she can’t, it’s much like the Blob.

Larry Trainer was a test pilot in the ’60’s who flew into a space anomaly which irradiated him and created a negative spirit that lives within him. Larry has to wear special bandages which contain the radiation, while trying to live in peaceful coexistence with negative spirit within him, allowing it to burst forth from his body in times of danger.

Kay was a girl with 64 separate personalities, each with a different power, when Caulder rescued her from an institution in the late ’70’s.

Cliff Steele was a race car driver who was driving home one night with his wife when they were in an accident that killed her. Cliff’s brain survived and was placed in a robot body.

Victor Stone, Cyborg, who had about 40% of his body replaced by tech after an horrific lab accident.

There are other highlights such as Flex Mentallo, he of the powerful mystery muscle manipulation. Danny, the gender queer sentient street that can teleport anywhere in the world. The Beard-Hunter, who’s fairly self explanatory. Then there’s Mr. Nobody…. I won’t even try.

There’s some heart to the show if you can get past the characters that keep getting in their own way. The Doom Patrol is loaded with interesting characters, but then the parent DC comic always had plenty of interesting characters as well. Premiering on the comic stands in the early ’60’s right around the same time as the premiere of Marvel’s X-men, this was an unusual book for DC that broke the mold as far as DC heroes went.

The show borrows from the early days of the comic by Arnold Drake, Bob Haney and Bruno Premiani, as well as from the later Grant Morrison issues from the ’90’s. Thankfully, the show does a much better job scripting a coherent story than Morrison ever did, so bonus there.

I suppose if you’re looking for a little bit of super, a decent amount of fun, and a whole metric ton of WEIRD, then this is the show for you. Unless you’re a kid. This show is not for kids.

So far, there’ve been two seasons, with the third premiering on September 23rd. Considering that I just binged the first two, my timing couldn’t have been better. I’m ready for series three.

SLIDERS

I can not believe I didn’t devote one of last year’s 366 blog posts to the mid 1990’s sci fi series, SLIDERS. Of all the tv shows, binging, you name it, why did I not slide this in?

Created by Robert K. Weiss and Tracy Torme, SLIDERS follows four travelers as they travel from one parallel to another trying to get home.

While trying to invent an anti-gravity device, Quinn Mallory (Jerry O’Connell) accidentally creates a portal to other dimensions, controlled by a hand held timer. After a test run where he actually experiences a parallel world where red lights mean go, green means stop, and a bill board promoting Elvis “LIVE” in Vegas, Quinn realizes he succeeded in reaching a parallel earth.

Returning to his earth when the 15 minute timer was up on the device, he invites best friend Wade Wells (Sabrina Lloyd) and his physics professor Maximillian Arturo (John Rhys Davies) to observe the portal in his basement at home.

**John Rhys Davies as Professor Maximillian Arturo**

They decide to take a journey. But fearing the device might not have enough power for all three, Quinn goes full power, which promotes the portal to suck in them, move outside, and mistakenly absorbs a Cadillac driven by singer Rembrandt Brown (Cleavant Derricks).

**Cleavant Derricks and Rembrandt Brown**

All four are plunged into an earth during an ice age. With death imminent, they have to make an emergency jump, disrupting any control over where they go. And so they become unwilling SLIDERS.

This is a workshop on how to build a good, solid, sci fi series. You start with a concept where there really are no limits, and explore as many as you can.

Then you put together a team of four actors, different sexes, ages, ethnicities, but they have great chemistry together, as they are forced together in a very special bond. The mix and match overlap is wonderful.

Quinn and Wade are each maybe 20, 21 years old. Yet Quinn and Arturo are the brilliant scientists. Arturo and Rembrandt are in their 40’s. While Remy and Wade are the regular, fun loving people who the audience can also relate to easier than the brainiacs. Basically this quartet has something for everyone, and some excellent characterization.

Quinn’s the stand up guy, while Arturo is a kind soul, but has an ego and a short temper. Remy is sometimes the comic relief, but is as brave as they come. Wade’s the heart of the group. Watching these four come together and grow as a close knit group is great. It’s very rare that you can make a group of four leads work so well together.

It’s a very special show and I can’t recommend it enough. Now, the caveats —

Required viewing is Season one, consisting of ten episodes and season two, which is 13 eps.

Season 3 is where things got dicey. The Fox network started trying to exert more influence on the scripts, and basically, the quality started to plummet. Torme and Weiss departed, and Rhys Davies had absolutely enough of the new scripts in S3, and departed mid season. Most of the original cast had left by the time the show ended with the 5th season, where it had been airing for the past two years on the Syfy channel, shifting there after cancellation from Fox after season 3.

You can watch episodes streaming on Peacock now, and like I say, dive into the first two seasons. Maybe stick around long enough in S3 to watch Arturo’s departure.

AND, while doing a but of research, I found that Torme is currently pitching a reboot of SLIDERS. He’s looking to get the original cast involved as much as possible, which is great. I don’t know if there’s a deal in place, or what the odds are but if Torme is involved, I’m hopeful.

Actually, if it *doesn’t* work out, you know, Doctor Who IS looking for a showrunner….

Just sayin’…..

Interesting casting leak (?) for the MCU Fantastic Four movie…

YouTube has gobs and gobs of channels that try to bait you in with phony claims, announcements, etc., and over the years, I’ve taken note to bypass the biggest offenders, as 99% of the time, it’s a waste of time. They say they have BIG news, when in fact they have nothing.

Such is the way with the endless speculation on the casting of the MCU Fantastic Four movie. For months and months, fan theories, predictions, speculations, usually settling on a certain few choices so often, some people start to believe the rumor is fact.

Minor rumblings in Marvel were also rumored to be looking at race swapping the entire team for the sake of diversity, but at least keeping the Storm siblings same race. These same rumblings were talking about going with a comedy actor for Ben Grimm like Seth Rogan or Jonah Hill. Honestly, none of that interests me.

I came across one channel that had what it said was a halfway credible leak from a good source that’s been right before, giving out accurate Endgame spoilers well in advance. I’m not going to bother mentioning the channel, as the well meaning, but clueless narrator obviously doesn’t know much about the FF, and I’m giving all the pertinent info here, anyway. To be clear, this wouldn’t be anything official but this particular “leak” has the virtue of naming a very interesting set of actors that, for the most part, I think would be ideal, if true.

So, let’s look at these possibilities…

James Wolk as Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic

This took me by surprise and delighted me at the same time. I’ve seen Wolk perform in Madmen and the HBO Watchmen series. I think he does a very good job. His look, his age (36), seems a pretty good fit for the leader of the FF.

Lucy Boynton as Susan Storm/The Invisible Woman

No idea who she is but she evidently appeared in Bohemian Rhapsody, is in her late 20’s, which would jibe with age range between Reed and Sue, is blonde, attractive, and I have no qualms about this choice.

Thomas Brodie-Sangster as Johnny Storm/The Human Torch

This one really shocked me, but again, a good, interesting choice. Sangster has been in a ton of stuff, Game of Thrones, Love actually, Phineas and Ferb, etc. Johnny Storm is supposed to be younger than Sue by a few years, and although Sangster is actually 31 (!), he still looks like he’s 16. I actually saw him in Doctor Who 14 years ago when he was 17 and looked 12. He’s got the same baby face thing working as Holland does for Peter Parker. My only caveat would be he hits the gym and beefs up a tad.

Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Ben Grimm/The Thing

Another mind blower. Morgan’s been featured in the Watchmen movie and The Walking dead amongst other projects. Terrific actor. He is 55, which I was surprised to learn. He usually sports a grey beard but shave that off and he looks 40. I *suspect* that if any of this cast leak is true, that we might only see him as Ben Grimm in the beginning or in flashback, depending on how the team enters the MCU. He might just be doing the voice and wearing the mo-cap suit for the CGI Thing the rest of the time, like Ruffalo now with the Hulk. Either way, another interesting choice.

Will this be the way Kevin Fiege goes? I don’t know, but of all the choices talked about so far, this crew would be the one and only that gets a thumbs up from me so far. When WILL there be an official announcement about an FF cast?

Well, this year IS the 60th anniversary of the Fantastic Four, so what better way to celebrate than with an upcoming announcement at some convention? Is that Disney “D23” thing happening this summer or did it already happen? Between Disney events and Marvel events, there must be SOME big stage on which to break the news.

And really, come on, the movie’s actually due in theaters two years from NOW. Let’s get a move on, Kev. Listen, to me, the entire MCU so far has just been the lead in to the most important gem in the crown. Don’t **** it up.

James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad — a review

Long being a fan of his work on Guardians of the Galaxy, I very much looked forward to James Gunn’s take on the Suicide Squad.

I figured we’d get the same type of fun, with a distinct musical bent that we’d grown accustomed to with his work. Add in the wide variety of third and fourth rate villains who were most certainly going to die at some point, I figured we’d have a winner.

Bottom line, I didn’t think this through to its logical conclusion.

See, I’m not fan of gore, and the voluminous gut’s worth of gore in this flick kept taking me out of the movie. I quickly realized the reason for the R rating. Honestly, I miss the days when an R rating meant tons of gratuitous nudity– but this would never be that type of film. It is a bunch of assassins killing people after all. Chopping, shooting, slicing, chewing, etc.

AND, I’m reminded that Gun started off his career doing splatter flicks for Troma films, so there should have been no surprises here. I guess I just expected more laughs and music than gore, but that’s on me and my preconceived notions after GOTG. I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of people went in with a similar mindset though.

It did have good stuff in it though.

It’s a better film than the first movie, although that is an incredibly low bar.

Idris Elba was good as Bloodsport–but he’s good in everything. Peter Capaldi was excellent as the Thinker –I didn’t realize he’d have such a big part. Polka Dot man was a pleasant, quirky surprise. Ratcatcher 2 was okay. Harley was Harley–take that as you’d like it.

Really, the only character I felt some compassion for was King Shark. He was about the most cuddly and adorable man-eating shark ever.

Amanda Waller was still the Queen Asshole, but spot on, as that’s her to a T.

Special kudos to the usage of Starro the Conqueror– inventive use of a silver age DC villain, well done! Great special effects.

Weasel was great! Could have used more of him.

As to the bad….

I kind of need someone to root for in a film, and this movie doesn’t quite provide much in the way of that. Bloodsport is an assassin who’s a bit sympathetic, but I find I didn’t care too much about him, or the rest of the core squad. I guess I felt sorry for Polka Dot Man and King Shark, as there’s really no way they’re not all just in a horrible, ongoing situation, working under threat of death from Waller, who’s really a piece of work.

Peacemaker was awful. An over the top cartoon of a douchebag, which is a shame, as I thought he’d be one of the highlights. I guess to some, he will be. I shudder to think how huge a fan base this guy is going to get but stupid sociopath who delights in gratuitously violent, bloody kills? Oh, he’s going to be KING.

This film wasn’t great, wasn’t horrible, but it was a bit of a let down that left a bad taste in my mouth. I expected better –maybe unfairly–from Gunn based solely on his later works, and was –again, maybe unfairly–disappointed when he lived up to his credentials from his earlier stuff.

I’ll be curious to see how the film does with box office — I watched it on HBOMAX, which probably doesn’t help it, but I’ll sleep at night.

Rewatchability factor: I don’t know if I’ll bother to watch it again.

James Gunn’s Suicide Squad: 5 of 10.

Visiting the Marvel Exhibit

Since we bought tickets ages ago, we decided to laugh in the face of the Delta variant of Covid and wade into the partially masked crowds at the Museum of Science and Industry. Actually, they had reservation times spread out probably every ten minutes, so the crowds were fairly spread out and there was plenty of room to breathe. I’d say half the crowd was masked.

I tend to keep track of these things. Especially since the edict had already come down from on high that everyone entering buildings in Chicago has to mask up. but crowd wise, it wasn’t bad.

We did see some cool stuff, a mix between comic books, with write ups on the past, framed original artwork, and tributes to creators…

…plus several life size statues of characters to pose with…

…and of course several characters displayed as their Marvel Cinematic Universe versions.

I think the main representative thrust of the exhibit does focus more on the MCU/movie versions of the characters. This probably explains why there’s very little X-men to be had. In fact, if you’re mostly an X-men fan, and don’t care about much else, you probably wouldn’t get a lot out of the exhibit.

I think the only reason the Fantastic Four are featured as much as they are is because of their being right there as the first comic in the Marvel age of comics in the 1960’s.

Sadly, this is probably as close as we’ll ever get to my long standing wish for a superhero museum, but it’s a fun diversion on a Saturday afternoon.

The Time has Come for the Black Widow (a spoiler free review)

You’ve got Ike Perlmutter to blame for the delay, far more than the pandemic.

See, Kevin Fiege –the commander in creativity that’s shepherded the MCU into legendary status — wanted the Widow to have her own film years ago, but Perlmutter –chief penny pinching creep for years before being declawed– vetoed a BW movie saying female lead superhero movies don’t sell.

Mmm.

I just wanted to address the inequities in the system, and god knows there are still plenty. There *is* a certain section of the fan base who indeed do NOT like female lead superhero films in general. That seems to be faulty thinking, considering there are different productions, directors, actors, etc. in each, yet this group automatically dislikes them all, perhaps thinking that any such production is too “woke” or “progressive”. Yeah, I don’t know, I just want a good movie.

And frankly, if any of these stubborn idiots *don’t* think the character of Natasha Romanov has earned her own movie by now, well, they’re hopeless.

This IS a good movie. In fact, I’ve already watched it twice.

This film has been such a long time coming, yet I worried that a flashback film might undercut her fate in Endgame. Here, I think, oddly enough, that the pandemic delay may have helped. Instead of the fresh, raw sadness we might have felt revisiting Nat’s past, I was now eager to just see a familiar face after all this time. After a disquieting MCU absence in 2020, being able to settle in for a major film again was nice. I’ll be honest, I expected a solid entry just on the performance of ScarJo, but I didn’t know what else to expect. I was pleasantly surprised, and then some.

First, Scarlett Johansson is a welcome, familiar, commanding presence in this, her *eighth* MCU film. Her supporting cast is impressive–far more entertaining than one could hope. Florence Pugh as Yelena steals most of the scenes she’s in, when David Harbour’s Alexi/Red Guardian isn’t busy stealing his. This “family” dynamic plays to the heart of the characters and their relationship, while set square in the midst of bone crunching action, and spectacular fight choreography.

As for villains, I shouldn’t say too much except Ray Winston delivers nicely, and Taskmaster takes the comic character in unexpected directions, while maintaining the established abilities.

Now, I was totally unfamiliar with director Cate Shortland, but she’s easily the most impressive of the new crop of MCU directors in recent years. She knows how to handle heart, drama, comedy, and *proper* superhero action, all mixed together. This is not easy to do.

The director’s of Thor Ragnarok, Black Panther, Captain Marvel, Spider-man: Far from home and Dr. Strange sometimes fell short in certain areas, couldn’t quite get that perfect mix, but Cate Shortland does. This reminded me more of some of the Captain America movies, and any comparison to the Russo bros. is as good as gold in my opinion.

Rewatchability is a big quality factor for me with these films. All the above films I mention that fall short? It took me ages and ages before I rewatched them. I just didn’t care. My friend Eric had to do a special edit of Ragnarok to take some of the stupid out. But Black Widow, twice in six days.

Now the next bit is how to watch the film. Some controversy here.

Kevin Fiege is all about people going to see the films in the theater and is almost dismissive about viewing it on Disney +. I don’t know if Kevin is just a theater elitist, or maybe has his head up his ass, but someone should remind Kev that not *everyone* is salivating to get back to packed movie houses yet.

Many people have good home theaters that serve perfectly well. Oh, of course not in the opinion of those who live and die by IMAX but just the same, I appreciate the writing, direction, action and score, more than having perfect surround sound tickling the back of my head.

Full disclosure: some of you already knew that I have a low opinion of going to the theater anyway, and have for years. Idiots with cell phones, chattering crowds, wrappers crackling, popcorn munching, etc. many people put up with humanity in these scenarios and even revel in it. I do not.

Disney + was made for me. Really, one $30 payment, the four of us watching it last Friday, … good lord, a family of four pays at least triple that going to a theater, then they have to sit through an hour of commercials and previews. No thanks.

You might wonder, how much money did Black Widow make on her opening weekend in this still partially pandemic influenced climate?

Well, the domestic box office was $80 mil, the added international was another 75 mil, and Disney + added another 60 mil! Usually, Disney never puts up their streaming numbers but did so this time. I must conclude that this was way more than they’d ever gotten before in an instance like this. Good!

Mind you, I have no idea what this means going forward — if people prefer + to theaters more and more, or if folks are just not ready to return to theaters yet. Hard to even say if + actually *stole* any butts from the movie seats, but I kind if doubt it. I think anyone who was going to see it in theaters anyway, SAW it in theaters. I think adding + just allowed more people to see it, along with those who were not inclined to head back to theaters yet.

We have no idea how bad the Delta wave of Covid’s going to get this fall, but the numbers are already growing. I think having Disney + as an option for the MCU films is probably very very smart, and obviously a money maker too. DC comics movies are relying on HBOMAX for the same reason, and I’m very much looking forward to James Gunn’s Suicide Squad next month.

I think guys like Fiege are going to have remember the common folk may have to seek more alternatives in the current situation.

But do I recommend Black Widow? Definitely. See it however you can!

8.5 out of 10.

Excelsior!

I was going to put up competing lists of popular catch phrases and well known sayings from both DC and Marvel characters. And to my surprise, DC had very few of note. I mean sure, Perry White was always yelling “Great Caesar’s Ghost!” And there were some exclamations like “Great Krypton!” and “Great Scott!” but not really a lot to sink your teeth into. I suppose there’s always “Shazam”, but that’s a whole other kettle of fish. About the greatest written addition to the DC pantheon is the Green Lantern oath:

“In brightest day, in blackest night,

No evil shall escape my sight,

Let those who worship evils’ might,

Beware my power, Green Lantern’s light!”

—It’s a helluvan oath. The best, as far as oaths go.

No, for battle cries and rallying cries, really, just about *any* dialogue with zing, one must turn to Marvel and Stan Lee in the 1960’s. Right off the bat with the Fantastic Four, whenever the chips were down, Johnny Storm shouted “Flame On!” and became the Human Torch. Whenever the Thing was mixing it up, he’d usually yell “It’s Clobberin’ Time!” and take care of business. Both battle cries still in use to this day, in fact.

And maybe the mother of them all, only strengthened by the MCU films, even after 60 years….”Avengers Assemble!”

Even now, a couple years after Endgame, when the gang’s all together, Cap gets the hammer, and utters those magic words……..Oh, I’m just feeling waves of chills and tingles just thinking about it. For a non comic fan, it’s difficult to explain just how huge, how all encompassing that moment is. Jeez, I gotta watch that again. Here, you can watch it NOW…

LINK!

Where was I? Yes, memorable battle cries, etc. Yeah, DC never really nailed a good one. In the early ’80’s, Teen Titans comic, Wolfman and Perez tried out “Titans Together!”, but honestly, it always kind of fell flat for me. Didn’t have that flow.

Sometimes, maybe it’s down to syllables. Avengers Assemble is 3 and 3. Titans Together is a 2 and 3. For some reason, it doesn’t mesh as well. I would have gone with a 2 and 2, like say, bad guys are coming, Robin’s in the forefront, and issues the order–“Titans: Take ’em!” Him giving the command is more like Cap giving the Avengers Assemble call, as opposed to all the Titans screaming Titans Together!

They *could* have gone with “Teen Titans Together”, but that sounds a bit unwieldy and even more like a kid’s show and they were trying to play down the “Teen”.

Stan really had a way of picking out just right power words to suit the needs of the story. With a character like Thor, who was very much in the Shakespearean speech mode, Stan really went nuts with little ditties like “For Odin, for Asgard, for the REALM ETERNAL!” Because the almost operatic scenario could warrant that.

He could also go hog wild with Dr. Strange as well, making up sorcery stuff:

By the Hoary Hosts of Hoggoth!

The Flames of the Faltine!

The Crimson Bands of Cytorrak!

It sounded so important, so official!

Sometimes, it was the little bits, like the Silver Surfer summoning his other half “To me, my board!” The Surfer was another case of Kirby coming up with a crazy character that shouldn’t have worked but did. That was a particular talent Stan had — some silver nut on a surfboard sounded like bad fan-fic by a 9 year old, but somehow, Jack’s images and Stan’s dialogue turned him into one of the most nuanced, tortured, powerful characters in all of comics.

It really makes you wonder how the New Gods would have been received if Jack had done them with Stan. But I digress…

And of course, there was the casual, familiar end of Marvel, where Stan came up for nick-names for the heroes to call each other. “Wing-head, Shell-head, Goldilocks, Web-head, Stretch-o, Match-head, Horn-head, Green-jeans, High-pockets”, etc. These guys battled in the trenches together and this was an excellent way of showing they were comrades. It was about a decade after Marvel was outselling DC when they decided to try and loosen things up by having Green Arrow get a radical redesign and started calling his JLA teammates by nick-names like “Supes” and “Bats”.

At one point it struck me that for the last several decades, we’ve lost a lot of that magic. Basically, all the best sayings, catch phrases, etc. the best stuff with built in longevity, were created by Stan and his style of writing. Things like “Friendly neighborhood Spider-man” and “With great power, there must come great responsibility” and “Avengers Assemble” have really stood the test of time.

All this is not to say Stan was perfect as a writer. Many a time, he’d throw in a lot of unnecessary dialog to explain actions we could plainly see happening in the panel. A lot of it was who he was working with — I think he’d get inspired by the pencils he’d receive. When you already know the basic plot, then you get 20 pages of art by Kirby, it would definitely get your scripting juices flowing, and you’d want to deliver words to match the visuals.

I know times, themes and the world itself changes and there’s perhaps a level of corniness to Stan’s style–his stuff was absolutely perfect for maybe only the ’60’s. But there was an energy to those words, a power there, that was every bit as potent as Jack’s pencils. And sometimes, it was just top notch, amazing literature.

Sometimes it’s just nice to look back.

True believer.

Anatomy of a Busy Cover

Over the years, it’s been common practice by DC and Marvel to supplement the covers of their books with ads, sweepstakes, blurbs, etc. Although it is a business, sometimes these ads or gimmicks detract from the beauty, power or importance OF the cover.

A good example is X-men 137 and the fate of Jean Grey. This was the finale of a huge story, and the top of the cover was designated for some big, screwy sweepstakes ad. This was commonplace back in the day, and we were ravenous to grab the book anyway but looking back all these years later, we’ve still got a great cover marred with a now irrelevant ad. Shame.

And look, I think I’ve made my stance on covers quite clear over the years. No one appreciates a good, powerful, well done cover more than me, so, of course, I have to pipe up about the following mess.

There are bad examples out there, where a good artist is attempting to draw a good cover, but corporate gets in the way. So…..Ladies and gentlemen, I present DC’s All Star Comics #61 from 1976.

Yes, it was our country’s bi-centennial. It was just one of the many bits of information that management felt was needed on this superhero comic cover. Now, I don’t know WHO in DC was technically in charge of covers during this particular time period. I’m pretty sure it was *after* Carmine Infantino’s time as top dog\art director. He was designing covers for DC in the mid to late ’60’s and knew what he was doing as far as design. Example:

This… has none of that solid design magic. No…. it has the feel of a clueless committee of creatively brain dead suits trying to put out the best (needlessly complicated) cover of all time and failing miserably.

The unfortunate soul who was tasked with trying to illustrate an engaging cover to draw in the readers was Ernie Chau (or Chan, depending upon the company, book, month or signature.) Ernie was a good artist, I think known more of his work on Hulk and inking John Buscema’s Conan stuff from my POV, but a solid artist.

At some point, the Clueless Committee–let’s call them Suit, Tie and Vest— had to brief Ernie on what he had to draw– and more importantly, what he had to draw *around*. I imagine the meeting might have gone something like this:

Suit: take a seat Arnie.

Ernie: that’s Ernie

Tie: okay first, this is going to be a great cover

Vest: I’m excited! we need to get just a couple things added in here.

Suit: Arnie, we need this incredible, amazing battle scene happening over this majestic cityscape.

Ernie: …..

Tie: yes, it’s got to feature the entire Justice Society battling this villain called Vulcan! Green Lantern is subduing him, but Vulcan has to be killing Dr. Fate too! Maybe some of the JSA are riding into the scene in some majestic sky-car! And remember, lots of majestic city with the majestic battle against Vulcan, who has an axe and is incredibly…

Ernie: majestic?

Tie: yes!

Suit: right, now we’re going to need some stuff complimenting the trade dress. You know, make sure there’s no wasted space.

Tie: GAH! Hate wasted space!

Ernie: well we already have a lot going on with the majestic battle, city, the entire JSA, the…

Suit: no, it’s okay, I’ve been told I’ve got “an artist’s eye”– I can only improve this, and, I’ll make you a better artist too! So, for instance, we should definitely put a big banner across the top to tell people it’s the bi-centennial, so they don’t forget.

Vest: yes, that is now! That is exciting!

Tie: of course, we’ll the price point, issue no., month, comics code authority stamp…

Vest: and the DC button! With a big burst that says “the biggest and the best!” ‘cuz we are!

Suit: since we’ve got this second bar of info under the bi-centennial reminder, let’s add in some tiny figures of a few JSA members flying and running. This reenforces that this book features the JSA.

Ernie: well, we are going to have right there in battle…

Suit: yes, I’d say add three of them, oh, with Powergirl. Definitely Powergirl.

Tie: we’ll need details there.

Vest: let’s also put the All Star Comics logo up there small!

Ernie: ah, so to save space, you just want the comics masthead smaller and tucked up in there?

Vest: no, no, no, we’ll also have it repeated again large just below it, just so the fans realize that this is All Star Comics! That must also be reenforced!

Tie: we also need to add the JSA logo…

Vest: and the Super squad!

Ernie: who’s the Super squad?

Suit: the JSA of course!

Ernie: we’re calling the JSA the Super squad now? Why….

Suit: we’ve also got a couple word balloons to tell us what we’re already seeing, and another box to mention the theme and title!

Tie: very important

Vest: oh, and don’t forget to leave space for the bar code box!

Suit: great, all settled. OH! Don’t forget to add the number 17!

Vest: yes, vital!

Tie: we’re all very excited to see what you come up with!

Vest: we’re looking for something simple, pure, powerful…

Ernie: and majestic?

Suit/Tie/Vest: YES!

In the end, I think Ernie did the best he could, given the situation.

Had a revelation, so SHAZAM part 2!

Forgive the analogy but it hit me like a lightning bolt.

The biggest mystery to me was why the original CC Beck version of Captain Marvel has been the only one to really hit the towering heights of popularity?

Sure, you could SAY the style was very much of its time… but it really *wasn’t*. As I said in yesterday’s entry, Beck wanted to provide superior, clean, bold, simple, powerful illustrations to set Captain Marvel APART from its contemporaries.

One might also say, hey, there have been some great artists who’ve drawn the character in the decades since Beck left, and one would be correct.

Alex Ross, Jose Luis Garcia Lopez, Jerry Ordway, Don Newton, John Byrne, Gary Frank, just to name a few.

BUT BUUUTTT BUT….. here’s the thing….

Beck’s Captain Marvel wasn’t your typical superhero that could alter his look from artist to artist. Superman was still Superman after Wayne Boring stopped drawing him and Curt Swan started! Batman is still Batman whether he’s drawn by Dick Sprang, Neal Adams or Frank Miller.

***Beck treated Cap’s look like it was animation. There was a specific look, where the illustrations had to *on model* that all artists working with and under Beck had to adhere to!

And as wonderful as all those above mentioned DC artists are, ***They were simply OFF MODEL!***

Look at it this way — imagine Jack Kirby drawing the Simpsons in his style. Imagine Neal Adams drawing the Flintstones realistically. Imagine Frank Miller redesigning Family guy. With animation, if even ONE line is out of place from the established model, characters like Bart Simpson, Rick & Morty, or the Venture Bros. don’t really look like the characters you know. They look…”wrong”.

Part of the problem was DC not paying attention to the MODEL guide, and trying to treat Captain Marvel like any other DC hero. Big mistake.

But it was also the DC writers chosen to pen Cap’s new adventures in the ’70’s, like E. Nelson Bridwell and others. DC did finally hire Beck to illustrate the new series but he left not long after due to creative differences. Writers like Bridwell simply didn’t “get” the type of stories that fit Cap.

Beck had even said that back with the Binder stories, he could always work with the stories to build them up, do great things with them. In these new stories, there wasn’t much he could do to make them work.

For decades, everyone and their mother has thought they had a good, new take on the character, me included at one point, but it was all nonsense.

We never stood a chance, any of us, because we didn’t realize Captain Marvel was a very specific, whimsical, superhero fantasy that was an animated series masquerading as a comic book.

Well, *I* thought it was quite the revelation. 🙂