World's Finest #2 (Sterling Gates/Ramon Bachs/Rodney Ramos; DC)

Many a long year ago, I saw this movie based on the TV series Dragnet. The movie featured Dan Ackroyd and an up-and-coming(ish) Tom Hanks, along with Ally Sheedy, playing Connie Swale, a person whom Ackroyd's Joe Friday Jr and Tom Hanks' character need to protect. Friday winds up introducing her to his mother with a line something like, "Mom, this is the virgin Connie Swale." His mother responts with a very fixed smile, saying, "...You're joking." If you have ever read Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, or seen the recent animated film made from that story, then when you reach the end of this issue, you're going to have the exact same expression on your face, and the exact same phrase running through your head. (And no, I can't be more specific than that.)

The general shape of this edition of World's Finest seems to be to show a type of Superman/Batman adventure, entirely eithout either Superman or Batman. Instead, we get a Superman/Batman adventure filtered through their sidekicks -- or, more correctly, through their affiliates, since Superman can't reasonably be said to have sidekicks, and three of the four Bat people we're going to get are only somewhat affliated with the Bat currently, although all of them have been closer than they are now. Which makes the revelation of the broader story at work make a great deal of sense.

As far as the story goes, it's interesting enough. The Guardian (apparently no longer limited to Mahnattan) and Damian's Robin team up -- if that's quite the right word for it -- to thwart a plot by Dr Freeze and Parasyte. The plot itself is very lean, allowing the story to focus on the characters' interaction. The Guardian treats Damian like a snot-nosed upstart, refusing to call him "Robin" because he feels that it's a title you have to earn. (One wonders how he feels about the new Batman.) Damian, rather understandably, does not take this terribly well. It's very good character work. But still, almost all of that gets swamped by the last page revelation of ... well. Like I said, fixed smile and "you're joking" just about covers it.
Good; Recommended.

The Web #3 (Angela Robinson/Roger Robinson/Hilary Barta and Walden Wong; DC)
"Spinning the Future, part 3", in which the Web's roast chickens come home to roost, and he gets lodged firmly within the Bat corner of the DC universe. And, really, pretty much anyone with a quarter of a functioning brain cell could have told the Web that franchising his suit and his powers would not work out well. In fact, it works out Very Badly Indeed. Badly enough that he gets a visit from the Oracle and Batgirl, telling him to cease and desist. He doesn't, quite, but he gets close enough that Oracle significantly upgrades his computer capacity -- while also landing him with all sorts of spyware and the like that he seems not to know about. (Which, seriously, if he really doesn't know about or expect exactly that outcome, the man is too stupid to do what he does. Which he very well may be. The software also contains a rather painful, if alarmingly functional, version of Facebook.) The Web also winds up getting exactly what he thinks he wants, only to discover that it may not be quite what it appears to be. In the backup story, "The Hangman: The roar of the sea" (John Rozum/Tom Derenick/Bill Sienkiewicz), The Hangman investigates the unusual occurence of a person that appears to have drowned in a flood in the middle of dry land.
Good; Recommended

Detective Comics #859 (Rucka/Williams III, with "special thanks to 1Lt Daniel Choi for his generous assistance in research for this issue"; DC)

"Go, part 2: Seven Years Ago", in which we catch up with Kate several years after the attack in London, as a cadet at West Point. And pretty much the first thing she does is almost alarmingly stupid; we see her kissing her then-girlfriend while still apparently on the West Point campus grounds, out in the open. This, not surprisingly, results in her being called up on charges for a violation of the military code -- though, interestingly, her girlfriend is quite specifically not charged -- and as Kate refuses to lie, she's summarily drummed out of the army. We also see her telling her father -- and his reaction, frankly, is really wonderful (though his choice in engagement rings for his new fiancee turns out to be utterly misguided, though that's a side point).

We also see Kate's first meeting and subsequent relationship with Renee Montoya back in her pre-question days -- They meet very very cute -- as well as the issues that drove them apart. Interspersed through this story is Kate dealing with the apostates from the Religion of Crime, realizing that the prophecy was in fact very specific about what they were looking for, while seeming to be very confusing, and getting her blood and Alice's tested to see if her sister really was still alive. And finally, we see some of what inspired Kate along her current path. Overall, it's a very interesting story, although her inspiration to become Batwoman seems a bit ... shallow, honestly. Or if not precisely shallow, then at least not very well considered.

As usual, Williams' artwork is superb. The really fascinating moment comes when we see, graphically, the situation that partially inspired Kate to become Batwoman; the artwork goes slightly toward the unusual layouts that characterize the modern part of the story ... but only slightly, showing that the decision hasn't quite been made yet.

In the backup story, "Pipeline, Chapter 2" (Rucka/C. Hamner), Montoya starts investigating the bacground of the human trafficking group that she broke up the previous issue. She quickly discovers that it's a much bigger thing that it first appeared, and calls in the Huntress to help her. (Huntress, for whatever reason, has gone back to the costume that doesn't make her look like a stripper in waiting, which is appreciated.) Again, the brevity of the chapter makes it a bit frustrating; just when things get going good, it's over. The battle sequence is kind of awesome, though. Hamner does very good work, as usual; the last page is oddly much more stylized than what comes before -- though with that villain, I suppose you have to go for some sort of stylization.
Very Good; Highly Recommended

Madame Xanadu #17 (Matt Wagner/Amy Reeder Hadley/Richard Friend)
"Broken House of Cards, chapter 2: Popular Satanics"
In which Madame Xanadu winds up investigating a suburban Satanic circle wanna-be group, in her quest to help Elizabeth Reynolds, whose body is doing some really alarming things beyond her control. (The plagues of insects coming from her mouth would be the most appalling, I'd think.) She also runs into another detective -- not for a wonder, the Phantom Stranger -- who seems to be somebody that we're supposed to know, but who just isn't that familiar to me. In the end, the villain stands revealed, along with the reason that Madame's working ... well, didn't work. I have to admit, I really do enjoy how Wagner has taken this character out of the DCU and made her work on her own.
Good; recommended

So, yeah, you remember that list that I was going to do way way way way back when of interesting queer comics of 2008? Well, here it is! Finally! Only a few months late!

(NB: the link to Media Relations is included below purely for the sake of completeness; the article is posted here and in its entirety.)

Media Relations: the fun queer comics of 2008: the honorably mentioned

Looking back at notable queer comics published, either in print or on the web, in 2008. The criteria for "queer" is relatively loose, but relates only to content: some sort of relevant appearance by/use of queer characters and themes -- lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgenter, etc. It had to mean something to the story, but it didn't have to be about any given queer aspect. It didn't have to be about coming out, or angsting over being or not being gay, or anything like that. As you'll see, the main characters didn't need to be the ones who were themselves queer. And people didn't have to be uplifting or relentlessly honorable -- some of them are not at all nice.

For this first part, we have the honorable mentions, or, Stuff that didn't make the main final list, but is still worth a look:

Adam and Andy by James Asal:

As the title states, it's about Adam and Andy, long time partners (... Who may have last names, but I don't have the slightest idea what they are.) They have a house in the suburbs (...I think), and seem to be living the gay American Dream. We see them at work, at home, at play, their friends and neighbors. We see how they've been changing -- one of the running jokes is about how they're no longer the hardbodies they used to be, despite the workout equipment in the basement. It's a sweet, gentle story.

Structurally, more or less a weekly gag strip. Asal's been expanding the strip in different directions over the past year, so the story has been flexing and changing quite a lot. Updated weekly, the continuing storylines move veeeerrrry sloooooowly. It's fun and it's a good read, it just takes a while to get where it's going. It's not terribly difficult to keep track, in part because Asal has relatively few characters and keeps the focus on an individual storyline until it's run its course. (That said, long-running storylines per se are a fairly new thing to this particular strip.)

The Alcoholic (Jonathan Ames/Dean Haspiel; DC/Vertigo)

In which we learn about the life and times of Jonathan A, who may or may not be Ames. It's basically the story of A's life in alcoholic fits and starts. We start in 2001, where A comes out of an alcohol blackout in a car with a much older woman, with whom he may or may not have had sex. We then flash back to the beginning of his drinking days as a teenager, when he used to hang out with his best friend Sal. They loved each other, in that intense and romantic way that adolescents do, and eventually more or less accidentally have sex with each other. Unfortunately, it seems to throw both of them off balance; Sal reacts by pushing A to the margins of his life, and A reacts by drinking to bury the pain of being pushed away from his closest friend. And somehow ... he just never really stops drinking. He goes into rehab, but that doesn't quite stick. He has some spectacularly disastrous relationships with women -- there was never any particular doubt that he's more or less straight, after a certain amount of understandable early floundering. And eventually -- far too late -- he meets Sal again, under some very changed circumstances. But this isn't a story about that meeting, particularly; that's just one event in a very appallingly eventful life. It's really the story of A and his addiction to alcohol -- and later, other drugs -- and how that wreaks havoc on the rest of his life.

I really love Haspiel's art. It's a bit less angular, I think, than his style for his Billy Dogma stories, and a bit more detailed. There are places where I'm not entirely sure it's a fit for the story as a whole -- frankly, there are several times where it seems more interesting and dynamic than the story it's helping to tell.

As a whole, The Alcoholic is an interesting story of a life gone out of balance. It does leave you wondering if A can ever permanently dig himself out of the morass he's made for himself ... and, to the extent that A is or is not based on Ames himself, how much of all of that really happened.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Various writers and artists; Dark Horse)

I actually thought the storyline in which Buffy winds up sleeping with Satsu was pretty well handled. Buffy tried to avoid her, knowing that Satsu was quietly in love with her and that she couldn't return Satsu's feelings, but then winds up falling into bed with her mostly because she's desperately lonely, and Satsu cares. Given that she got involved with Spike, who should have been staked seasons ago, and with Riley who got himself involved with vampires, a one-night stand with Satsu really barely registers on Buffy's bad romantic/sexual decisions index. And the part where they decide not to tell anyone, followed almost immediately by a parade of people with urgent business coming into Buffy's bedroom, was well-done comedy. The part where Willow grilled Satsu on Buffy's bedroom skills, not so much. Satsu eventually -- eventually -- winds up coming out of the relationship just fine, once she accepts that she and Buffy Will Never Be.

In more fun tales of lesbians elsewhere, we discover that we haven't seen Kennedy because Willow's been trying to keep her out of the way, someplace where she won't get captured or killed ... well, on the one hand, given Willow's romantic history, it's understandable. On the other, given that Kennedy's a slayer who was in on the last apocalypse, it's kind of unbelievable, as well, both that Willow would do that, and that Kennedy would tolerate it as long as she does. So something good, something not so good, but as a whole, still noteworthy.

Kyle's Bed and Breakfast by Greg Fox:

basically a soap opera, telling us of the lives of the many people who flow in and out of Kyle's Bed and Breakfast. I really like this strip. It has a fairly diverse cast, and the artwork is generally very good -- though the art can get a bit strange. (Seriously, this strip just looks odd. Breyer's not-really-sleeping position looks weirdly stiff -- though I think that may be deliberate -- and in the final frame, his head looks like it's about to come right off. I'd also note that the entire strip is about an argument that we never saw, which is awkward storytelling for characters you don't see that often.)

The comic updates once every two weeks, more or less, and it's got a cast far too large for its update frequency. (Understand that I am not saying, "Oh, woe is we! Why doesn't he do that five days a week? Then we could have all the comic goodness we want!" Seriously, the guy's got a life, and this don't pay the bills. I get that, really.) The cast page doesn't include most of the characters and the older archives were taken offline to put into the book, so you have no real way of figuring out who people are in context, no way to quickly remember, "Oh, yeah, that's how the guy in the wheelchair came into the story." Especially given that it does take place in a bed and breakfast -- you have both a certain amount of regular cast, but also a reasonably high rate of turnover, because that's what a B&B does -- it can be very difficult to figure out who's connected to who, who's permanent and who's a guest, what the heck is going on, and who is that guy in the green sweater on the far right, anyway?

Punch an' Pie by Aeire and Chris Daily:

I wanted to include this one on the main list, so, so much. I really like this series, primarily about a young woman learning to be on her own and her varied and sundry friends and their lives. But ... but there really wasn't any technically appropriate content in 2008. In 2007, yes. That year, Angela and Heather had a relationship that eventually came a-cropper over Angela's persistent and unwarranted jealousy issues. In 2008, however, while neither of them was precisely over the relationship, they didn't really gotten involved with anyone else, either; the storyline focused on friends and jobs and other things. They're just getting on with the rest of their lives. Plus, to the extent that anything seems to be happening, Heather's had a couple of apparent rebound flings with Aiden, which is, you know, all heterosexual and stuff.

Shortpacked by David Willis:

fun and wacky hijinx of a retail toy store, featuring a gay guy who only figured that out a couple of years ago, the virgin and "my lesbian", and an apparently bisexual asshole. Oh, and Faz. It's fun to read, it's just ... well. One could send the "Mike sleeps with everyone for revenge over uncommitted slights" storyline to GLAAD and watch their heads explode. (Oh, the temptation...) And yet ... it does have its weirdly sweet moments, every now and again. Of course, they never end well...

Sleazy Pizza (Ryan Roman; act-i-vate.com; adult and NSFW due to depictions of sex and nudity)

Originally, I was going to put this on the main list. I really do think it's a facinating, trippy, well-drawn comic. That said, it's hard to disagree with the author's assertion that it became "chaotic and disjointed" near the end of what I think of as the first volume. (I liked it anyway. In part because I just plain like Roman's artwork, but in part because I wanted to see where he was going to take it next, and how it could possibly work.)

Sleazy Pizza tells the story of Nolan and J.J., starcrossed lovers if ever there were any. Though it doesn't seem that way at first. They find each other, they start a relationship ... and then it goes bad, and they break up. Nolan realizes that he's made a horrible mistake and tries to find J.J. again, but all of J.J's friends are hiding him from Nolan. Eventually, Nolan gets someone to tell him where to find J.J. -- at a certain cost to Nolan and the other guy both -- and their relationship begins again. And then it suddenly veers and turns into a sort of sequel to Roman's earlier comic "Kid Zero". ("Kid Zero" has the most fascinatingly grand guignol ending -- and middling and occasional other goriness -- of a superhero comic that I've ever seen. I'd link to the ending, but unfortunately, it's on act-i-vate's livejournal site, and act-i-vate's LJ archive is a mess. This is the last part I can find, with links to all the earlier parts, but I'm not sure it's the actual end, as I remember it. But I digress.)

Seriously, though, some of the places where you can see it kind of heading into odd territory are really interesting and well-done. You even got occational outbreaks of Meat Loaf, sort of. Any road, Roman seems to be reeling the comic back in -- sort of -- with the current volume, and, weirdly, has maintained the fascinatingly trippy tone even though the story is more grounded so far. The current volume seems to be about actions that have consequences, even though you may not have been in full control of your actions at the time. It'll be interesting to see where it goes.

Coming up next: the main list! (Do not even think about asking when "next" is.)

Information about the New York ceremonies (first of three -- insert eyeroll ... here) can be found at at the bottom of this post on the GLAAD website. I'm glad to see that Suze Orman, Noah's Arc and LZ Granderson won awards. Most of the film and television awards still remain to be announced. The Los Angeles ceremonies promise to be positively littered with celebrities. I will admit that I'll be astonished if anything but Milk wins the best film award. I'm also a bit puzzled at East Side Story being in this year's television awards, since I first saw it in a theater -- admittedly, at a film festival -- two years ago, in a slightly different form.

Robot 6 @ Comic Book Resources - Covering Comic Book News and Entertainment » Buffy the Vampire Slayer wins GLAAD award:

Dark Horse’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer has received a GLAAD Media Award honoring its representation of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

The 20th annual Media Awards were presented Sunday at a ceremony in New York City.

The award lists Drew Goddard, Jeph Loeb and Joss Whedon, who wrote the 2008 stories “Anywhere But Here,” “A Beautiful Sunset,” “Wolves at the Gate,” “Time of Your Life,” and “After These Messages … We’ll Be Right Back.” The artists were Georges Jeanty, Karl Moline, Cliff Richards and Eric Wight.

Other nominees in the comic-book category were: The Alcoholic (DC Comics/Vertigo), Final Crisis: Revelations (DC Comics), Secret Six (DC Comics), and Young Avengers Presents (Marvel).

Given the nominees, probably the best of the choices for this category. Which reminds me...

Originally published 15 July 1999 in a slightly different version; content has been edited to remove dated references and links

---

Bread and Wine: an erotic tale of New York
story by Samuel Delany; art by Mia Wolff
Juno Books (March 1, 1999)
80 p.
$14.99, if you can find it.


I've just been reading the most remarkable book.

Comic book, actually.



Samuel Delany is an author of many acclaimed works, in several genres, including science fiction, biography and essays, among others. He also happens to be gay and black.

Bread and Wine: an erotic tale of New York constitutes the most recently published chapter of Samuel Delany's autobiography, published as a full graphic biography, rather than as a prose book. Of course biographies frequently have photos, pictures, other things, but these are always either publicity photos, or other things that are somehow public moments, family photos or school photographs and the like. Oh, maybe your mother delights in showing that picture of you running naked down the street when you were two, or maybe you're having a bad hair day in that picture, or you've got teminal red-eye, but still and all, those photographs, even the very personal ones, are still somehow of public moments. Sometime when others were looking at you.

The drawings in this book are frequently of much more intimate moments.



The general synopsis of it would be: college professor meets and befriends homeless man and they eventually become lovers. But the synopsis would leave out just about everything important: the feel of the book, how well the emotions come through.

Delany notes that his publisher didn't quite understand why he wanted to make it into a comic book. I confess, in some ways, it does seem like an odd choice. However, there are moments illustrated in this book--moments where, one assumes, no photographs exist or would exist--that somehow gain power from being forced to see them in exactly the way that the author sees them. (Or rather, the artist's rendering of the author's memories, but still, I think it works out the same way.) Some of the drawings are thoroughly surreal, as in Dennis' (the homeless man) view of Central Park. Some of them are fairly straightforward. There's also the plain fact that a straight-ahead prose retelling of just the time when he met and fell in love with Dennis would be, frankly, terribly short.

What startled me, what seems to be the most powerful, were the moments showing him and Dennis when they first go to a hotel, when they first make love. I mean, in a more conventional autobiography might have used the same words he used to describe it, but your concept of what Dennis looked like, what the bath was like -- Dennis, having been homeless and on the street for a while, was staggeringly filthy -- it would all have been more of a hybrid of what you brought to it and what he gave you. Doing it this way forces what he gives you and your impressions into consonance in a way that simply might not happen.

The book is, as noted, billed as an erotic tale, and there's certainly sex in it, but it's not simply erotic as in "boy, that gets my engine running!" It's erotic as in, it's a love story with sex in it.

Another odd bit is the interview at the end, where the artist, Delany, Dennis, and Delany's now-adult daughter talk about the book, and what some of the events were like, how their memories differ. That's when you realize that his daughter has actually read this, that she's seen those drawings of her father and his lover together. It's a very strange moment for the reader; I can't imagine how strange it would have been for his daughter.

For those of you who might have read Delany's The Mad Man, reading this will bring one of those great moments of enlightenment, when you realize where at least some of it came from. (I don't know if all of it came from this relationship, and I don't want to know, thank you very much. I don't know how much his life informed his writing in that case.)

I suppose, if I were talking about this to someone (as I guess I may be, right?) I'd say: I recommend it, but know that you may not actually like it. It's fascinating and it's interesting, and if you like Delany and his work, it's certainly illuminating.

---

At the recent 2008 Reeling Chicago Lesbian and Gay International Film Festival, I saw a screening of The Polymath, or the Life and Opinions of Samuel R. Delany, Gentleman (I'll note that the Frameline site has a better description; "highly sexually active", inDEED!). A short clip from the documentary is available at the filmmaker's website (NOT WORKSAFE! NOT EVEN VAGUELY WORK SAFE AUDIO! ... unless your workplace is entirely comfortable with hearing a gentleman talk about the perigrinations of his sex life, in which case, go right ahead!) As far as I could tell, the relationship in Bread and Wine is never explicitly referenced, though there may be some more oblique mentions.

Comics Should Be Good! » A Month of Good LGBT Comics Archive

So far, they've got a very interesting list. Oddly enough, I've only reviewed one of the items previously, although I've read most of them.

I meant to do a big Year in Gay Comix entry last year, to match the SH "Fun Stuff What I Read Last Year" entry, but somehow never got around to it. Maybe I'll just try to do a one-at-a time retrospective entry, like theirs. (Hey, I'm not at all averse to stealing ... er, that is, creatively adapting very good ideas.)

Interesting things afoot.

Showtime enlists gay superhero - Entertainment News, TV News, Media - Variety:
Showtime is developing an hourlong project from comicbook icon Stan Lee that tracks the life of a gay superhero. Project is being exec produced by Lee and the president and CEO of his Pow! Entertainment banner, Gill Champion. Story, which focuses on an up-and-coming superhero who struggles to hide his secret identities, is based on the book "Hero" by Perry Moore. Moore is penning the script and also exec producing along with Hunter Hill.

Previous series television produced by Lee includes whimsical reality-competish skein "Who Wants to Be a Superhero?," which ran on the Sci Fi Channel from 2005-07. The comicbook maven is in development on several features for Paramount, including "Thor," "The First Avenger: Captain America" and a sequel to last summer's "Iron Man." Project joins more than a half-dozen others in development at Showtime, including a series retelling of "Camelot" from "Tudors" creatives Michael Hirst and Morgan O'Sullivan.

I'd heard about this, but I wasn't sure it was ever going to happen. Showtime is probably the right place for it, either that or HBO, since that will allow them not to pussyfoot around more adult themes the way, say, NBC's Heroes would have to. (If it were telling stories relatable to anything remotely resembling a human being these days, which it isn't, but that's a story for another rant.) I have to admit to being fascinated to see how Stan Lee is going to develop this. (And, as a side note, it's interesting to get confirmation of the apparent cancellation of SciFi's "Who Wants to Be A Superhero", albeit in an impressively backdoor sort of way.) I suppose Showtime is going to use it as their Big Gay Series centerpiece for the near future, replacing "The L Word" which replaced "Queer as Folk", which followed, many many years later, Showtime's comedy series "Brothers".

HBO orders fantasy pilot 'Thrones'
(the Live Feed, November 11, 2008)

HBO has given a pilot order to fantasy project "Game of Thrones." The program is based on George R.R. Martin’s bestselling series of novels "A Song of Fire & Ice" and executive produced by David Benioff ("Troy"), D.B. Weiss ("Halo") and Guymon Casady ("Hope & Faith"). The title “Game of Thrones” is from the first novel in the series.

If greenlit, “Thrones” would represent the rarest of TV genres: a full-fledged fantasy series. Though broadcasters have embraced sci-fi-tinged shows in recent years following the success of ABC’s “Lost” and NBC’s “Heroes,” and supernatural themes have been given a spin by CW’s “Supernatural” and HBO’s own “True Blood,” high fantasy is nearly nonexistent in primetime TV history -- and “Thrones” is an unabashed member of the genre. The books have swords, dragons, magic, the works. “Fantasy is the most successful genre in terms of feature films given the incredible popularity of ‘Lord of the Rings’ and Harry Potter movies,” Benioff said. “High fantasy has never been done on TV before and if anybody can do it, it’s HBO. They’ve taken tired genres and reinvented them -- mobsters in ‘The Sopranos’ and Westerns with ‘Deadwood.’”

The cost of producing a fantasy series is usually a big factor that deters networks. The producers note “Thrones” is written as a character drama and major battles often take place off stage. “It’s not a story with a million orcs charging across the plains,” Weiss said. “The most expensive effects are creature effects and there’s not much of that.”

Martin plans seven books in the series. The producers intend for each season to span one novel. But before the series can get on the air, the producers first have to slay a more formidable threat than any dragon: pilot competitors. HBO has 10 other pilots in contention for series orders. Though the network declines to project how many shows will receive an order since HBO doesn’t need to fill a specific number of time-periods like broadcasters, at least six are expected to get a pickup.

...Eeergh.

OK, look. I know that there are billyuns upon billyuns of people out there who think this series is the greatest thing since sliced bread. I mean, hey, five books in the series to date, I think, and they all sell well. Nonetheless, A Game of Thrones remains one of only four books I have ever thrown, or wanted to throw, across a room. (I heard it as an audiobook, which may have contributed to my dislike of it. Not only was there the strange skeeviness of having Roy Dotrice precisely narrate unexpected sex scenes into my brain, but the inconsistent characterization and plotting drove me mental, and since it was an audiobook, I couldn't skim to get the gist without absorbing all the maddening detail.) The characters were actually well delineated, but then they would do clearly plot-driven things that were entirely against the character as established to that point -- in at least one case, within pages of arguing against precisely that sort of action with someone else. It also, for me, ran into a very common problem with very big fantasy books -- and this is entirely idiosyncratic and not really a knock against the book -- that he kept needing to spend time, for story purposes, with characters about whom I cared not even a little. But you'd have to go through all this stuff with these people, because it was going to be important later, and it would be important later, but it was still aggravating.

Given that they're probably going to have only 7-13 hours worth of television to give the story per season, I hope that HBO can make it work better. They'll certainly need to cut out quite a lot, so that should streamline the story, hopefully not overemphasizing the action at the expense of the character development. I'd like to see an interesting costume drama where I don't have a parallel track in my head about what really should be happening. I mean, don't get me wrong, Showtime's "The Tudors" is sexy anachronistic popcorn fun, but even apart from the fact that Jonathan Rhys-Meyers does not look remotely like the historical Henry, I actually studied a bit of Tudor-era history, so I keep getting jarred out of the show by knowing that particular events simply did not happen as shown. But I digress.

You know ...this would actually kind of ... work. "Ragdoll" for childhood. (Oh. Er ... OK, perhaps not for childhood. Maybe for the unfortunate things that happen before the next song.) "Janie's got a gun" for a really harsh adolescence. A medley of "Dream On" and "Pink" for a burgeoning realization; perhaps the first act close. "Livin on the Edge" for that first disillusioning trip to the Big City. "Crazy" and "Fallin' in Love (is hard on the knees)" as the great declarative love songs. "Fly Away from Here" for when harsh reality fought back. And, of course, the title song for the big second act close production number.

If it's true, that's just goddamn depressing.

Ha!

That's the question, you know. If this is actually true, how many people would still want to go?

This here comic is in reference to the artist's first sighting of this here building. Can't say I disagree all that much. " The design concept is based on the globe, broken into three fragments to depict the shattering effect of war on the history of the world. These three fragments, or "shards", are structurally interlocked to represent world conflict on land, water and in the air." ...All-righty, then!

THAT is worse than a pirate buggerer? Well, who knew? (...OK, almost everyone. But still.)

The Dark Knight is getting a certain amount of commentary about the violence inherent in the execution of this concept. Sometimes very odd comentary. (Almost, but not quite, entirely unlike this. Or possibly this, either. Or maybe even this. Or just maybe this. Or even this one. Or even this one. There's a whole lotta Dark Knight going on is what I'm saying.)

Somehow, I'm pretty sure that the even less PC meaning was what was being referenced. (See comment below strip.)

Hmm. Well, that was unexpected. As was this.

And in conclusion, first read this article from Newsweek. Then start here and read the next six strips. (For extra credit, you can also hit up the last item in Savage Love podcast 91.) Any questions?

So this and this all turned out to be over this. I think I'd love Charlie's mother, too.

"Probably", inDEED. This is distinctly not where I was expecting this story arc to go. (Actually, "probably" not. Just ask Dan Savage! or rather ask the person who wrote to Dan in a VERY NOT SAFE FOR WORK LETTER)

Awww... No, really, Awww...

...Awww?

Eeeuuuww.

Well, that's certainly a very vivid dream. Very.

...No. Just ... no.

Yes, it DOES! IT DOES! Fear the email! FEAR IT!

But all the best people are, too!

Today's title quote from an old Lily Tomlin routine, if you were wondering. From "Appearing Nitely," I believe.

Yes, I'm beating a dead horse.

No, it's not the dead horse you think it is. Or not just that particular dead horse, anyway.

And it's entirely not my fault! Really! You'll see!

Today's reviews include: Batman, All-Star Superman, Boy Meets Hero, Corridor and others, including the one which inspired today's title.

By the by, being told that you have by far the most esoteric pull list in the store is quite the experience. Consider that a warning...

Batman 677 (Morrison/Daniel; DC): In which the Black Glove unleashes its attack on Bruce, and Jezebel Jet tries to get Bruce to see what she thinks is reason. Honestly, the story as a whole baffles me a bit, in part because there are gaps in my Batman knowledge. For example, when did Gordon come back to be Commissioner again? The last I heard, he'd retired, went off somewhere, divers villains killed his new wife and he moved back to Gotham, but that other guy was still commissioner during the Gotham Central days ... and even in DC time, he's getting quite long in the tooth to be commissioner again/still. The Black Glove also clearly knows that Bruce Wayne and Batman are the same person. They set out to destroy not only Bruce Wayne, but Thomas Wayne and Alfred, of all people, knowing that if they strike at Bruce's identity and the one anchor in his world, they might be able to break him psychologically. In the meantime, Jezebel Jet begins to realize just who it is that she's fallen in love with, and all that it means. Of course, the structural problem with this story remains: we still don't have any reason to care about Jezebel Jet, and no reason to care what she thinks. We know both that she's quite right -- Bruce is obviously a few bats short of a full belfry -- and that it doesn't matter. After all, he couldn't function if he were sane, now could he? In any event, it builds to a compelling and interestingly gory end. The art's OK, although there's a moment of problematic artwork, when Alfred expresses concern over a wound he couldn't possibly have seen -- at this point, as weird as the second half of the issue wound up being, I wonder if maybe that was also A Clew, or if it was just bad art. Anyway, just OK; I'll still hang around to see what happens next.

All Star Superman 11 (Morrison/Quitely/Grant; DC): The first page is maybe the most awesome Superman page I've ever seen, even if you absolutely know that it's not going to stick. The second page is also terrifyingly awesome. And then you hit the middle of the story, in which the clearly unwell Superman sums up his life for himself and his robot, and in which Luthor makes his plans. And then superman battles Solaris, knowing full well that he's one of Luthor's allies. There's the rather peculiar moment when one of the Superman robots insists he must atone for a mistake, and the rather peculiar moment when Solaris starts speaking binary--I thought it was supposed to be alive. And then, of course, that final, awesome, peculiarly iconic final image. Honestly, the middle of the story is perfectly serviceable, if maybe that's all it is; the problem is that it comes after those very very good first two pages, and you can't live up to a beginning like that. The story does tie together what had seemed to be random strands from the earlier issues, such as Superman's new powers that have been referenced but never really seen, and the robots, and Luthor in prison. I'm really looking forward to seeing what happens in the last issue, which I assume will be out ... someday. (Seriously, when DC rethinks the All-Star line, which they are allegedly doing, the one thing they need to focus on, aside from getting interesting stories, is timely delivery.)

Aletheia 1 (Bob LeFevre; Image): The story starts with the origin of the Greek gods Zeus, Poseidon and Hades, collectively known as Aletheia (the truth). Them we zip to Olympia, Washington, where we see a young black woman with purple-wrapped dreds working on her motorcycle. Judging from the license plate, her name is Thea. She gets a call from her boyfriend and decides to head to his place -- at which point all Hades breaks loose. And also all Zeus and Poseidon, as well. The Greek gods manifest on this plane of existence, after a very long time away, and immediately they notice Thea, who is apparently the "Formerly departed." The formerly departed whom, they do not say. Thea evades the attacks of the gods and reaches her boyfriend's apartment (or her biggest fan's apartment, as she describes him, which opens the question of why she'd have fans), only to discover that he's been attacked, and he dies in her arms. Then the gods and their agent, whoever the brown thing is, attack her again, and then ... something happens. I'm not trying to be coy -- although, given that it's the ending of the issue, I should -- but I simply have not the slightest idea what she does. On the one hand ... I do like the story well enough to see what happens next. On the other, the story is perhaps not well served by its highly stylized art -- as I say, I really don't have a clue what happens in the last four pages. I hope LeFevre gets rid of most of that clearly deliberately ponderous narration for the next issues. It sets the mood and is well used in the beginning, but during the chase and in the boyfriend's apartment building, it just gets in the way and annoys. Having set up the big emotional moment, you need to trust the reader to know when it arrives. All that said, I'm curious enough to stick around for at least the next issue; I'd really like to know who she is and why the gods are so afraid of her when she quite clearly has no idea. Recommended.

Dan Dare 6 of 7 (Ennis/Erskine; Virgin): I have to admit, Ennis kind of astounds me from time to time. His bread and butter is stuff like Punisher or The Boys or Chronicles of Wormwood, titles clearly meant for adults, dealing with sex and violence and being exuberantly foul-mouthed. And then he comes out with something like Dan Dare, which I wouldn't hesitate to give to give to, say, a kid maybe 10, 12 years old, real boys-own adventure stuff, fun (if somewhat violent but surprisingly lacking in grue) space opera. Anyway, in this penultimate adventure, Dare gets rescued (of course), with everything going more or less as planned. The Mekon expresses his displeasure with his people in ways that ensure that one of the planets develops, at least temporarily, a thoroughly gruesome ring. And then the final confrontation commences. These are all -- well, except for that second thing -- thoroughly obvious beats that had to be hit in this story. It would not, after all, do to have Dare expire before the last issue of his own title, and there is also a last issue to come. (I think at some point this series might have expanded a bit; I'd have sworn that it was solicited as a six-issue mini, and now not only is it seven issues, but the last is to be double-sized.) To be sure, after the rescue, this issue is mostly, but not entirely, marking time; the "not entirely" bits are thoroughly entertaining. Really, the whole thing is just an amazing amount of fun. Buy all the issues, then find a kid and give something to read. And, really, who'd think you'd say something like that about recent Ennis work?

Beyond (Deepak Chopra/Ron Marz/Edison George): We start with a man pushing through a crowd going the other way. Behind him, the dome of the Taj Mahal has been blown up. He walks past television where we see something in Karachi and Tel Aviv and somewhere in Palestine have also gone kaboom. Then we leap back three months in time to Benares, India, where Michael, his wife Anna and his son Ty are on vacation, a gift from Michael's mother-in-law. It's a working vacation for Michael, and he's an entrepreneur of sorts, which means that he doesn't really see much point in vacations and is constantly working. Suddenly, Anna disappears, and moreover, Ty discovers that he's been slipped a magic comic book called "The Rishi" (published by Virgin. Arf arf, even) in which the story of their trip is being told ... right up to the point they're actually at, after which the pages are blank. There are magic doors, and signs and symbols and ... honestly, it's interesting enough, and I do like the art, but since it's a four issue mini, I'd just as soon wait for the trade. It's not quite that gripping.

Corridor (Sarnath Banerjee; Penguin, 2004); An interesting mostly black-and-white graphic novel, telling the story of a group of friends and their various obsessions, centered around Jehangir Rangoonwalla and his bookstore and his tea. Brighu has a thing about Ibn Batuta and obsessively collects various things, none of which he can allow himself to use or enjoy, because doing so would ruin them. Digital Dutta -- with the longest full color segment in the volume -- is obsessed with the pursuit of an H-1B visa; why, we never really learn. He also gets periodically obsessed with Karl Marx and/or Chris Evert. Newly married Shintu, whose story has a few full-color pages, is obsessed with sex and aphrodisiacs. Strangely enough, he actually finds one that works, more or less. (The advice he gets from the guy who gives him the aphrodisiacs is hysterically funny. For example, did you know that frequent nocturnal emissions are a sure sign of impending impotency? And impotence can be prevented by frequent kegeling -- which, if not quite true, is certainly useful -- and eating curried goat's testicles -- which isn't particularly true or useful.) I really like Corridor; the artwork is stylized without being so much so that it overwhelms the writing. There's no overarching story being told; we're just learning about this group of men and certain aspects of their lives. Periodically very funny, periodically touching, and always interesting. Highly recommended, if you can find it (and it may be difficult, given its age). Sarai currently hosts a 24-page preview.

Boy Meets Hero (Chayne Avery and Russel Garcia; Bruno Gmunder):

A hardback compilation of the former webcomic, Boy Meets Hero tells the story of Derek -- secretly Blue Comet, superhero -- and Justin -- secretly in love with Derek. The latter secret constitutes one of the major difficulties for our guys; Justin wants to be out and proud, while Derek fears losing his job -- in their world, being a superhero is a paid position, just as in the Luna Brothers' Ultra -- and his reputation. To keep the public off guard, Derek is participating in a phony romance, orchestrated by the public relations department, with his superhero partner Sunstar, who also happens to be Justin's sister Jillian. The villains are, of course, conspiring to bring Blue Comet and Sunstar down in revenge for having been beaten in the past.

The artwork is comparatively simple, but mostly works for the story. There is a certain amount of comic-book nudity -- no full frontal (not even in the panel where Justin is told that his junk is hanging out), a bit of buttock here and there -- and romantic sex of the sort you'd see in any mainstream superhero book. The main characters kiss, and we see them on the way to sex, but nothing explicit. And we actually see black gay guys in this story! who get put into peril, but live through it! Granted, they're purely incidental characters, but still.

Those incidental characters bring up one of the few things that annoy me a bit. The story does lean a bit on stereotype here and there. Not a lot, but when it happens, it's somewhat jarring. For example, deeply closeted Derek says at work at one point, "You go, girlfriend!" To his theoretical girlfriend, for that matter, in front of pretty much everyone he works with. It's just hard to believe that someone that deeply closeted would make that sort of mistake in that situation; moreover, he doesn't say anything like that through the rest of the story.

The other issue with the story as a whole is that the guys kind of ... talk too much. The two of them are just spritzing angst everywhere over Derek and his closet and talking about it to each other, to Jillian, a lot. Almost the only frames with the guys that don't contain great whacking chunks of dialogue or narration are those in which they're making love, and it's not as though there are more than a couple of those frames scattered in the story. The villains also have to acquaint us with their unfortunate past with a great heaping hunk of dialogue -- and the curious thing there is that in one case, we actually get thrown into a more effective flashback, with a bit less dialogue. Granted, you don't want to be flashing backward and forward all that much in a 120 page book, but it points out that the authors are entirely capable of showing and not telling quite so much.

Anyway, those flaws aside, it was still a very entertaining and worthwhile read. Recommended.

Jimmy Zhingchak, Agent of D.I.S.C.O. (Saurav Mohapatra/Anupam Sinha; Virgin/UTV-Spotboy Motion Pictures)

And at last we reach the titular ... er, title. Surely you understand now why, especially after the previous poster entries, the title for this review entry had to be what it is. Honestly, although I'd bought the issue before the posters, I hadn't looked at it all that closely. Then, after the posters, I finally got around to reading the stuff I hadn't gotten through yet, and well ... there it was.

The back cover bills it as "the world's first Bollywood comic" and ... I kind of can't argue that point. Although I will note that there is a profound lack of entire cities suddenly bursting into song and mindnumbingly spectacular production numbers.

The story? Oh, yes, the story. We start in Mumbai in 1984, with later occasional excursions back in time and elsewhere in India. One of DISCO's operations has just been compromised by the Naada Ninjas -- who wear white and bright colors, for some reason. We jump to Jimmy Grover's residence, where he's yelling at his mother for spending his hard earned cash on that "foul Desi moonshine". Said "foul Desi moonshine" pretty much immediately puts her in the hospital. The doctor tells Jimmy that his mother's liver has failed, and she needs expensive drugs and an operation. He offers to drop the price if Jimmy will, shall we say, put out. Jimmy responds by slapping the doctor and declaring, "You should be ashamed of yourself trying to exploit a lachaar mazboor najuwan like me!" (According to the funny yet seriously incomplete glossary at the end, this means "helpless strapping young lad headed straight for Oprah".) To make money quickly, Jimmy heads for the DISCO Fights (no, really, that's what they're called) to take on all the DISCO champions (no, REALLY) at once. Suddenly, just as he's clearly about to get clobbered, a mysterious man's head appears in a cloud and tells him to use the zhingchak(TM). What, you might be wondering, is the zhingchak(TM)? And well might you wonder! In any event, Jimmy pummels the champions of DISCO, wins the money, pays for his mother's transplant, and is thereupon recruited immediately into DISCO, which turns out to be the Department of Internal Security and Covert Operations. (For reasons external to the story, I had a small hysterical fit when the chief said, "Jimmy, your country needs you.") Moreover, Jimmy's father was in fact one of DISCO's best agents, until he was killed by the dreaded FIRANG. Jimmy of course agrees to work with DISCO, and is thereupon given his father's DISCO Battle Suit ("100% polyester, machine washable"), keyed to his family DNA. There are, of course, all sorts of absurd twists, turns, gadgets and villains -- I suspect people may be particularly fond of Britney Hypnotits, as well as the Fabled Mithunkwalk (the pelvic thrust that really will drive you insane).

Essentially, the story aims for a sort of Indian Austin Powers vibe, Bollywood does Our Man Flint (much cooler and more mod than James Bond). Mostly, it gets there. Mostly. I suspect if you're Indian, it may get there much better than if you're American. There are chunks of ... um, language to deal with. Not a lot, and I don't think any of it's at all important -- but that's just it; I don't know that the ... er, language isn't important. (Seriously, Hindi? Bengali? Something else? No clue here.) Linguistic weirdnesses aside, it's funny and entertaining, and the artwork is highly stylized and insanely detailed. It's definitely a worthwile, fun read. Just, you know, periodically linguistically aggravating.

Given the Virgin/UTV coproduction, I expect that it will be a Bollywood movie for real any day now. Wonder if it'll make it here?

I wanted a cape so very very very much when I was younger. Or a cloak, whichever. Perfect for lurking, looking dramatic, possibly biting fetching people on the neck, and so forth. Now, I just have a full length duster that lacks only a bit of tailoring and some wide lapels from being the coat that the current Doctor wears. Now, I love me my duster (and other people -- usually around 20 years old, for some reason -- keep telling me that they love it) ... but it has almost, if not quite, broken me of the desire to have a proper Big Black Coat of Asskicking. (See also: Miranda Zero in the Global Frequency pilot, Cap'n Jack in Torchwood, etc.) The thing about full length dusters is ... they're full length. Hits me right at the ankles. Going up stairs gets you what I think of fondly as the "evening gown effect" -- if you don't pick it up and hold it, it's going to drag, and if you do, you go from looking mondo cool to looking way stupid. Occasional drag queens will tell you to be a man and get a real dress. (Seriously, they said that.) And if it's windy and dry, it's like wearing a couple flags. On the other hand, if it's raining, once it gets damp enough to stay down, you got some serious protection from the elements.

But I still think I'd like a Big Black Coat of Asskicking, some days. Purely for the drama of it all. Learning how to walk masterfully in slow motion while it flowed dramatically around and behind me would be a royal pain, though.


Awww. Now this is what you'd call "meet cute". Although I'm not precisely sure the "cute" is the right word.

Is it meeting cute if it's also meeting Naked? (There are another three chapters after that page, and another nine before it. Not pages, chapters.)

Well, that was unexpected. Though I haven't been reading this one very long.

And at last, the story continues...

...and another one stops, for the time being. (Further explanation.)

Hey, more Gun Street Girl! ... goodness. A lot more Gun Street Girl. "When you're up against Big Vermin, you need Big Guns."

You know ... If she were an actual person, and her thing was tall overweight men ... Well, OK, the Star Wars thing would still be something of a problem. Also the lack of penis and the presence of breasts. But we could still be buddies!

And now I have to hear this song. RIGHT NOW! And also possibly dance and party and pump it up like these folk here. (Aaahhh. The joys of the karaoke video. Here, have something else to make your day. And maybe also one of these ... whatever it is.)

Hey! Loren's back!


Oh, yeah. Even when it's only one letter off from what people expect, the fun just keeps coming!

There actually IS an ongoing retelling, in The Manga Bible ... No, really ... No. REALLY. Would I lie to you? (I seem to recall that in certain places, there actually are orgies. Usually followed by much smiting.)

Ain't that the truth.

You have to admit, it's a killer final line.

So apparently, a person works long enough for Disney and Scholastic and such places, you get the urge to do stuff for grownups ... No, no, not adults-only work, but work for adults to read and ... and ... and ... Oh. Well, then. Never mind. (So, looking at that hand on the first page ... God is apparently black AND a woman AND a pimp. My goodness! Who knew?)

HA!