Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Lying Cat, my hero

Damn.

Brian K. Vaughn might not necessarily be the best writer ever in comics, but he's sure trying his best.  And his best is fucking good.  Better than most of the crap out there.

Today brought issue 18 of SAGA, which I thought was kind of a pompous name until I read the first issue.  There are almost no comics I can name besides this one and maybe V for Vendetta, and okay The Sandman that I read one issue of and was immediately hooked (mind you, the first two were #1s and The Sandman was issue #8, which was the intro issue for Death and anybody who wasn't hooked by that issue has no soul).  No concept of what the story was about, just looked interesting, picked it up because it was a number one, BAM, addict.  I've mentioned in my last post what all makes SAGA special, but, like Pam Poovey on Archer, it seems the fan favorite breakout character is an unlikely choice:

lying...
 
The apparent death of Lying Cat in a recent issue nearly had fans doubled over in nauseous shock and wanting the head of BKV on a pike in Times Square so that we might pelt it with rotten tomatoes.  That's the sign of a good storyteller, I think, somebody who can make you care so much that you go apoplectic with rage when you even think that character might die.
 
I first encountered this with Douglas Adams when he killed off Marvin, the Paranoid Android.  I think now, looking back, it was because I identified with Marvin so much.  I was always paranoid, trying to hope for the best in life but totally expecting the worst.  And of course, making everybody laugh along the way, no matter what I really felt.  Kind of... he was killing off the only character I'd ever really bonded with.  And it was obvious that he was doing it just as a fan-service, because he was very caustic in stating Marvin's death... The lights went out in his eyes for absolutely the last time ever.  Not as big a "fuck you" to Hitchhiker's fans as the comedy-less ending of Mostly Harmless, but enough to make a very young version of me hand-write a letter to this author I revered and tell him that he, in fact, should be the one fucking himself, after fucking all of Marvin's fans like that.
 
Your plastic pal who's fun to be with!
 


So while I was picking up SAGA, I made sure to pick up the next reprint issue of....


 
...Miracleman #2.  I forgot how vicious and death-lusty Kid Miracleman was until I saw this pic...
 
sup bitchcakes
 
And it was just as shocking and scary as the first time I read it.  So yeah, good day for comics and memories.


Monday, January 27, 2014

Fiction Friction

I admit to being lax in not only updating this blog, but in most of my former habits.  Seeking out new music, I just don't know how without a Tower Records listening station.  Writing for my self... I guess this is part of it, but it's not what's roaming about inside my head, which currently includes a mermaid family and a teen superhero story.

Comic books are waning once again, with really only Brian K. Vaughn's SAGA series, which has all sorts of interesting bits, such as interplanetary wars, giants with big nasty testicles, assassins, spider-women, drugs, gay sex, robot royalty with TVs for heads, two people in love, blowjobs, visions of gay sex, and a cat that can detect lies.  It's pretty awesome.

Other than comics, however, I've really slacked off on reading.  I'm trying to fix that, but I'm finding it harder than it used to be.  Used to be, I could just zone out for hours on a weekend afternoon, nothing else to do, lose yourself in a good book.  Like with music, it's getting harder to find good fiction, or even nonfiction for that matter.  Take for example this book:


I made a stop at B&N recently, the first in a long while, and this is the only thing that leapt out at me, begging to be bought.  Written by a fairly accomplished author, it is literally a handbook on how to invade planet Earth.  Hysterical idea, right?  Almost worthy of Douglas Adams praise.  If only it were actually... well, funny.

It's not.  The author certainly did his research... the first few chapters talked about how since the Moon is tidally-locked to Earth and has one side that always faces away, perfect for an invasion base, and explaining Lagrange points enough that I actually understand why the Moon and Earth share five of them, and only one is good to hide from Earth's prying eyes.... but it's so fucking boring.  I'll keep giving it a shot but I'm not holding out much hope, as this guy is not even as affable a writer as Michio Kaku.  Speaking of which...



This book straight up must have been fun to write.  It's just taking research on things like life and death, the missing universe, cold fusion and The Wow! Signal, and other things science really doesn't understand, and it speaks in a tone that I first found with Kaku's Visions.  It's fun to re-read it again, and pretty shocking to realize that after five years since its publication, we really don't understand these mysteries any better.

And this, one of my two favorite bathroom books.  The other is Stewart's Wicked Bugs, which tells the encyclopedic tales of these plants wicked counterparts in the insect world.  It's entirely fascinating reading, unlike her latest volume, The Drunken Botanist, which I bought sight unseen only to find it's basically a bartender's handbook for how to get lit off of, like, daisies and stuff.  I really don't need help in that area nowadays.  

But regardless, I am going to make a concerted effort to write for myself more, and read more, like I used to do in both camps.  I need new hobbies between DLC for Dead Rising 3 and XBox One releases.


Thursday, January 23, 2014

KIMOTA! Here's my junk.

 
Seriously, Quesada?  Do we need to have the center focus of this on Miracleman's junk?
 
MM has a long, troubled path to re-publication, for good reason.  The Dark Knight and Heath Ledger's turn as The Joker is very much owing it's life to Miracleman.  Comic books simply didn't know they could be "dark and edgy" until Miracleman.
 
Of course, you wouldn't recognize it at first.  It's only after Young Miracleman comes back (sorry... spoilers) that you get the full picture.  The logical extension of a God among mortals and what would happen, as much as just Alan Moore's regular deconstruction of the Uberman stereotype, comes into play front and center.
 
But most know this already... we're all just wanting to enjoy these stories like we did back then.  I was lucky in that I was able to read the original run as it was reprinted.  And then as the new stories began.  I hope Gaiman doesn't screw this up like he did the Sandman prequel, which I'm also wanting to read, and now.