The Anchor, Superman Earth One, Namor: the First Mutant –or- Things I Don't Need to See in Comics Anymore.

I finished two of these three. Bonus points to whoever guesses which one I couldn't slog through.

Let's start with the Anchor –or- Thing #1 I Don't Need to See in Comics Anymore

The Anchor is out of Boom Studios, and I'm enjoying most of the stuff they've put out, although it is of note that the Anchor is one of the titles not written by Mark Waid.

The art I like. It's not my favorite on the planet, but it's the same dude who does BPRD, and after reading a handful of those you start to appreciate it a little. He does great steampunk contraptions, good monsters, and although it has a cartoon-y element to it, his art has the range to do everything from humans to homunculi and to put them in the same room.

The problem I have with the Anchor is that it's a story about a guy who stands around at the gates of hell and keeps demons from escaping hell. They attack him over and over, and he single-handedly fights them all off.

Why demons are trying to escape hell is a little beyond me. I thought that was the place for them. Also, if demons are spending all their time trying to get out of hell, wouldn't that mean the humans sent to hell are just sort of wandering around, not getting tortured and shit? Maybe it's only the strongest demons sent to break out of hell, so all the humans are left with these half-assed, middle manager demons.

Anyway, while the Anchor is guarding hell, he's also on Earth fighting giant monsters. Whatever happens to the part of him that's in hell also happens to the Earth version, so if someone stabs him in hell a wound opens up in the Earth version's chest.

I know, Why?

Well because, dummy, when the Earth version is fighting an ice demon the version that's in hell can grab a demon, get attacked by hellfire, and then when the hellfire heats up the earth version's hands it'll be easy to kick the shit out of the ice demon. Naturally, this idea was brought on by Helpful But Fairly Powerless Human Sidekick (I might need to add a fourth thing I never need to see again).

The story is a little all over the place. You have Hell Anchor, Earth Anchor, some kind of demon rebellion, a ghost boy, a science lady, a general, all this stuff going on, plus getting slow pieces of the Anchor's backstory, which doesn't seem terribly important as I can't really imagine the relevance of a backstory that started and ended before the existence of hell.

Although it might be a stretch, I believe with all my heart that the problem can be traced back to Thing I Don't Need to See in Comics Anymore #1: Religious Stories.
Let me clarify this just a bit by saying that stories can have religion in them. I don't mind if Huntress is Catholic. I don't mind if Daredevil is...also Catholic. In fact, I don't care if they're all hugely Catholic. But Santeria, that crosses the line. You hear me, Spawn?

In all seriousness, religion isn't a big deal. The problem is that once you create a heaven and a hell in your universe, one that can be definitively proven to be real, you completely change the rules of your universe.

I don't care who you are, once a crazy demon man comes out of nowhere and starts fighting a gigantic ice monster, and once you have a hell of a lot of good reasons to believe him when he says he's from hell, your days of being a sassy, glasses-wearing scientist who hasn't been to church in a couple decades are over.

People, if hell is real, you are headed to a place that is going to be torture for all eternity. That's forever, for longer than you can possibly fathom. So why you wouldn't drop everything and devote your life to god at that point is beyond me.

It creates a character motivation problem, in short.

Secondly, when the Fantastic Four travel to heaven to get back the Thing, guess what? Nobody has to die anymore. Okay, we're talking about a universe where the record for most permanent death is given to Bucky, and only as an honorary title, but the idea that you can walk on over to heaven, pluck somebody out and come on back to fight the Mole Man feels a little pointless.

And again, once the Thing comes back, I think his days of banging blind babes out of wedlock are over, right?

Once a character or a group of characters prove the afterlife to be 100% certain, things on the entirety of the planet are different. That's a game-changer, friends.

My advice, stick to your Mephisto and your Black Racers. Maybe not as much your Black Racer, but you get the point.


Part 2: Namor: the first Mutant –or- Twilight, the Namor Files

I don't even really want to discuss this other than to say it's clear from page –1 (the page with the backstory) that this all involves vampires, both the regular and underwater variety.

Thing I Don't Need to See in Comics Anymore #2: Vampires

Enough, okay?

What is the fascination with these things? They're strong? They live forever? They are weaker depending on the light?

My question is, in a world where Wolverine is an actual guy, how amazing is a vampire, really? I find a short, hairy Canadian with retractable claws and a metal skeleton to be pretty goddamn fascinating, so to have guys who bite people and don't like the sun...well, the bloom is already off the rose there.

And even in this comic, this being made in the last few years, there's some stupid old woman who has to convince Namor that vampires are real, not just things of legend. What the fuck?!

Enough, okay? I fucking hate, absolutely hate that part of the movie where nobody in the movie seems to have heard of any sort of supernatural shit ever. It's like they all live in an alternate universe where Stephen King was wiped out by that van before he ever touched pen to paper. No, wait. It's not like they live in that world. It's like they want to convince me that I live in that world.

Writers, none of you are going to make me unsure about what's going on when I see a guy in moonlight biting a chick in a bustier. When a dude turns into a wolf and howls at the moon, I'm not going to be all that surprised. When your old buddy from works turns into a zombie, blow his head off or run away. Whatever you do, don't just stand there saying, "Todd....Todd....Todd....Todd...Are you alight, man?....Dude?.....

Readers have been introduced to these characters many, many times. So don't give me that shit where you don't believe in vampires. Just get that out of the way fast so we can do other shit.


Part #3: Superman Earth One –or- The Origin Or-Again

So it's a retelling of the Superman origin. Everything's basically the same, but Pa Kent is dead and Jimmy Olsen and Perry White have an argument about uploading 20 MB pictures and crashing a server, which I'm sure will hold up well with the slow pace of today's tech.

Here's the thing: Of the three, this one was not bad. It had some nice, tender moments. It had some heroic stuff. Basically, it had everything that a Superman fan is looking for in the story.

It also had the advantage of not being a typical DC story which seems to require 20 years of backstory running across various titles to understand. This would be a good jumping-on point for someone who'd never read a Superman comic before.

But guys, enough with the goddamn origin stories already. Seriously, enough. I just don't need it anymore. Even Irredeemable, published by the aforementioned Boom Studios, has a good deal of backstory, but you get it in pieces as the story progresses. In other words, the backstory matters, but it's not all of the substance.

I'm sure every writer and every artist wants to take a crack at the Batman origin. Who doesn't? If you did a look back at Batman comics and how many featured a splash page or a background piece with the words, "No matter how he tries, he'll never forget that night..." over the top, you might find more in your pile than out.
I'm just ready for new shit. Do a new Superman story or do an origin story for a new character, but let's not worry about making sure that Superman comes into a world where newspapers are a dying industry and Jimmy Olsen shoots on digital.

At the Movies!

Thor

Well, it's already out, so I guess I could just go see it.

The -'s:

-I fear a slow discovery of the fact that Loki is evil, which will be annoying.

-The politics of Asgard are about as interesting to me as the politics of Hogwart's.

-I never thought I would say it, but I'm a little Natalie Portman'ed out.


The +'s

+This trailer actually made me MORE excited to see the movie rather than less (see below).

+Giant robot shooting fire means there will be at least ONE fight in the movie, which puts it above Iron Man 2.

+What can I say, Gentlemen prefer blonds.



Green Lantern

The -'s:

-I preferred Ryan Reynolds when I knew him only as the funny guy from 2 Guys, a Girl, and a Pizza Place. It's unfair, but true.

-In a movie where there would be limitless opportunities to utilize CG, why create a human body out of pixels? Unless we're going to see the outline of a dong, count me out.

-Whenever a movie seems like it might involve being in space for no real reason, I start to get nauseous.


The +'s:

+I'm pretty sure there was a Kilowog of sorts in the preview.

+Perhaps we'll get some nice Kilowog-shaped pink bubble gum in the stores.

+Um...third Kilowog-related thing.



Captain America

The -'s:

-Why would you superimpose the head of a mid-range actor on a smaller body? Couldn't we just hire a regular guy and then assume that as he grew 2 feet and put on 50 lbs of muscle that his face changed as well?

-How many scenes of puny Steve Rogers demonstrating his puniness in several different ways are we going to have to see before he just gets in the damn Captain America machine already?

-Hoping that he will punch Hitler in the face is probably setting myself up for disappointment.


The +'s:

+Hugo Weaving is back from a brief stint pretending to be good and is once again evil as fuck!

+They may see a spike in ticket sales based on deeply confused elderly who don't really understand what they are seeing and leave the theater disturbed that this is the first time they are finding out about this Crimson Skeleton fellow.

+It will give me a good reason to re-watch Band of Brothers after I hate this one.



X-Men: First Class

The -'s:

-Cold War = Least exciting war. Nobody cares about what the temperature was if there was actual fighting with flips and shit.

-Professor X with hair seems like a cheap ploy to not shave James Mcavoy's head.

-Screenplay written by the folks who brought us the Sarah Conner Chronicles, Andromeda, and Agent Cody Banks.


The +'s:

+Period piece means they have the green light for really stupid outfits.

...wait a minute, no Wolverine? Fuck yourselves with your shit movie!


Dark Knight Rises

The -'s

-There is a point where we get too much Batman. Previously, it was about 4 minutes into Batman Forever and lasted for years following Batman & Robin.

-There is a point of diminishing returns on villains. Usually that point is right about the time we use up the Joker.

-Let's look at other 3rds: Spider-Man 3 (terrible) X-Men 3 (worse?) Batman Forever (nipples).


+'s

+The other ones were good, so why not this one?

+Returning cast and director is usually a good sign.

+Because he's dead we won't have to live through another Halloween where every goddamn person dresses like the Joker.

Reasons You Should Not Give a Fuck That Superman Renounced His American Citizenship

Every so often the regular news starts paying attention to a comic book story arc. Usually this is the "Death of..." type of story. You know, Superman, Captain America, uh...Ch'p, the Green Lantern who was run over by a yellow truck.

Not to get too far off topic here, but if Green Lantern was a real guy don't you think we could all make an effort to reduce the amount of yellow on the planet? It seems that it would only take one school bus careening off a cliff before we all wised up and repainted shit, reserving a can of yellow spray paint in the basement just in case he went insane.

Anyway, I can't say exactly what it is that grabs people's attention. My guess is that DC hired someone who is good at giving blowjobs to people in charge of news outlets, because it sure as hell isn't the stories.

Recently, the big one everyone is talking about is the fact that Superman has renounced his American citizenship. This is idiotic, and here are a few reasons why:

1. This Entire Story is Based on a Misunderstanding.

The basis for this whole thing is that Superman was present at a protest in Tehran, which causes the Iranian government to think that the U.S. government sent him there. THEN, the U.S. government is pissed off for, apparently, the same reason. Finally, Superman says he's tired of people confusing his actions as being indicative of foreign policy, and so he's renouncing his citizenship.

Alright, this isn't goddamn Meet the Fokker 5. All you really have to do is explain yourself. Besides, who cares what the Iranian government thinks? Also, why would the government send Superman to a protest to stand around? Ooh, what a dangerous show of force. The whole premise could be solved by saying, "Oh, no. I just came because I wanted to." Idiots.

2. Is Superman Even American in the First Place?
Last time I checked, it doesn't really matter which country you belong to when you can be on the goddamn moon in 4 seconds. What are they going to do, stop him?

Clark Kent is American, I suppose. He must have a social security number and shit. But Superman is from Krypton. He's not even from goddamn Earth!

Let me put it this way: It doesn't seem to matter at all that Mike Myers is Canadian, so I think Superman being not American is pretty goddamn irrelevant.

3. There are multiple Superman stories featuring a superpowered dog who is his friend and wears a red cape.

I don't know how tight the connection is here, but somehow that takes away some of the story's punch.

4. Do the political views of someone who has no real frame of human reference even matter?

Politics are a fairly human endeavor. It would be like me getting really involved in dismantling the caste system in an ant hill. I get it, the idea is to humanize Superman. But maybe you'd have better luck involving him in human emotion as opposed to politics. People who are passionate about politics are people who I never want to end up next to at a party, and I damn sure don't want them in my comics.

5. It's really fucking annoying when comic books do this zeitgeist-y, news-attentive shit.

I really hate that crap. It works sometimes. Let's face it, how do you not write a 9/11 issue of Amazing Spider-Man? If you didn't it would be almost obvious in its attempt to pretend that it wasn't happening. But Tehran? C'mon. Sorry, but I don't read comics for a half-assed attempt to remind me that there are some shitty things going on. It doesn't have to be total escapism, but taking something going on currently and contorting it so that it fits a story where Superman makes an ultimately meaningless decision is pointless.

Plus, when you do this type of shit, you have to be either in or out of the pool. If Superman is existing in a world where there is a war going on in Iraq for a decade, why hasn't he done anything about it? Where is he when all these tsunamis an shit are going down? We've all heard the Phantom Zone excuse enough, alright?

6. Why is Superman calling a press conference?

Isn't that the kind of thing he should be trying to avoid? Isn't all that media shit what got him in so much trouble in the first place? And boy, nothing like a press conference to liven up a story. Press conference falls into that group of scenese that I never need to see again in media, along with courtroom, therapist's office, and skinny dipping in a lake.

Free Comic Book Day: How to not Do It

I love Free Comic Book Day.

All you have to do is show up, pick up something for free, and read it. It reminds me of being a kid when the only cost of comics was pestering a parent. It's also a great chance to try something new that maybe isn't worth a four-dollar risk. (I say that with no hint of sarcasm. There's plenty of good stuff out there, so it's hard to spend four bucks on a total gamble when you could buy something you know to be good).

That said, when this sort of event is put in the hands of multiple retailers, somebody is bound to fuck it up.

How about this post from a comic shop the FCBD Facebook page:

We are using this as an opportunity to raise money for charity. We are asking our customers to bring a canned good or $1.00 to donate to the local food bank for every 3 titles they want to pick up. Times are hard, so we are hoping to help tehm out. -Space Cadets Collection Collection

What the fuck? No.

You're right, you are "using" this. It's awfully easy to raise money on a day when all the stuff you're selling was free to begin with.

The point of FCBD is that it's free.

If you're really into charity, sell your shit that day and give a portion to charity, or do a separate charity drive in hopes that the increased number of people in the store will be a good opportunity to get cans of creamed corn into the mouths of bums.

I also don't care for the shops that make you really work for the books. I know they don't want people to come in and clean them out, but you don't need to keep them behind the counter, sighing every time someone asks which books you have the same way a waiter does at Applebee's when you ask about the different kinds of salad dressing. The whole point of this day is to drive business to your store, so if you don't feel like dealing with people you shouldn't participate.

It's pretty simple. Free Comic Book Day is great because it is exactly what it says it is. You walk up and get free comics, no problem. Once you take out the "free," whether it be by actually sort of making people pay, or by making them labor, or by forcing someone to deal with you, you ruin the whole damn thing.