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DrAwkward

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Reviews

“The Traveler” makes me mad for a petty reason.  This is Mark Waid writing some of his best work on…

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After the action and trauma of the events leading up to this issue you need a character issue to reflect…

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DrAwkward's Recent Comments
June 16, 2011 11:26 am A couple of these have confirmed via social networking that they have DC projects they can't talk about (including Kolins and Nguyen).  Barring an announcement that they're NOT working for DC- like the vocal creators who saw the announcements as pink slips- you can bet they're on something and under NDA.
June 8, 2011 2:36 pm @Haupt  I think equivocating quantum mechanics with magic is boring and lazy, if you understand the math and physics of it there's plenty of reasons quantum phenomena are more likely to occur with respect to the mind and conscious thought than, say, a radioactive spider.  It's not like you're throwing around the words "nanotechnology" or "molecules" (as they would in the Silver Age) arbitrarily, there is tons of scholarship linking consciousness with quantum theory.
June 8, 2011 1:13 pm I can't believe you're discussing signal transmissions when quantum entanglement provides a perfect vehicle for psychic paranormal phenomena.  Although comic book psychics often deal with "range" or "amplitude", transmission time and physical barriers (barring specific counter-measures) are rarely ever considered a factor, behaving much more like an ansible than a radio.  When you have a quanta with mixed properties- be it particle or wave; or signal or entanglement- it's better not to assume it is one over the other.
May 31, 2011 6:17 pm

Been calling this one for a while now.  DC wrote themselves into a corner by telling the stories you can only tell once... literally telling the story of prophecized GL Ragnarok, Flash taking on every one of his Rogues simultaneously, Batman dying and being succeeded, Superman's race and planet returning to be wiped out yet again, and so on.  I'm not saying that those stories were bad, necessariy, but what you get in climax and effect you lose in sustainability... where do you go after you've overcome Armageddon?  After you've shot and killed a god, died and returned?  Etc.

Flash is now the Herald of the Digital Age as it should be... and, on paper, I'm all for it.  It's about time.  My only issue is that I honestly don't trust Johns/Lee to execute.  I think their high concept is fine, but like many of their recent creative endeavors, things sound better on paper than in practice.

They need to be iconic- distinctive, marketable, elegant (rather that trivia muddled this early on), rich interactive possibilities playing off each other as characters, power-types, and silhouettes- but they also need to be progressive- pushing forward into the future, not simply rehashing the past, but making the brave and bold moves necessary to define a new Age.  Race is one place I'd like them to make that move (rather than return to an all white-skinned JLA for another two decades), but it could also be only the beginning- considering the diversity brought by differing political views, religion, culture, views on force/magic/science, etc.  Deconstructing the League has been a powerful creative impetus (ex: Authority; Supreme Power), let's hope they can deliver something equally enduring.

April 28, 2011 6:27 pm To illustrate, this is like someone saying: "I'm tired of reactionaries construing my Muslim faith as a threat of terrorist action so come next Friday, I'm going to renounce my religion."

The renouncing of citizenship or faith could be done for hypothetical right reasons, but the reasons given here are poor writing, characterization, and logic. 
April 28, 2011 6:11 pm @josh, still the leap of logic in his intent- even if not his action- shows a bit of bad characterization on the part of Superman.

The reason "Truth" is in tagline is because the classic Superman ideal stands for immutable propositions and convictions as opposed to mere perception.  Superman declares his intent based on the fact he's "tired" and fears how his actions will be "construed".  I'm sorry, but that's not classic Superman.  The Man of Steel who fights The Never Ending Battle is not supposed to get "tired".  The man who wears trunks outside his tights and a red cape is not supposed to care about how he's FALSELY "construed".

Worse yet, the action that spurs the intent was admittedly foolish and the reaction provoked would not have changed not matter what Superman declared to be his citizenship, the exact same foolish action done by a "world citizen" would STILL have been condemned as American aggression specifically BECAUSE it was "construed"... an issue of appearances not fact- legal, techical, or otherwise.

I'm not saying there isn't interesting story potential or that reactionaries aren't mixing other agendas into their condemnation of the panels, but as far as tight plotting or characterization, it's poor and it's stupid.  It's like Superman getting completely rattled by an insane woman slapping him for his absence and walking the nation because of it.... oh darn.
April 11, 2011 11:34 am The casting is fine, but Zod as the primary villain is disappointing.

Styles make fights.  For Kryptonians, powers = fighting style.

Mirror matches aren't as exciting, lose a lot of the narrative and characterization in the choreography, and are harder to write well tending to turn on some ambiguous and arbitrary surge to victory rather something logically based on their strengths, tactically calculated, or thoughtful.  Likely we'll get showy displays of power, but since it's a mirror, we're seeing their joint power... not Superman's.  The fighting will only convey that there are MEN of Steel not a singular powerful MAN of Steel.  Granted, there might be differentiation between a farmer's fighting prowess and a general's but since we know Superman will ultimately win that suggests some sort of gimmicky win- so Superman isn't super- he'll just squeak by.

By diluting Superman's uniqueness with another Kryptonian, some of the magic of Superman is lost and the powerset is less readily part of the power-fantasy that is integral to the genre.  You want kids to want to be the one and only Superman because those powers set him apart.  Excalibur wouldn't be as compelling a sword if every villain and knight of Camelot had their own magical equivalent.  Batman versus Joker is always compelling because Joker will NEVER be a stealthy gadget oriented ninja.  Luthor- the classic brain versus brawn.  etc.

As an example, another series framed by action sequences: The Matrix.  The most compelling fights matched the impossibly powerful meaning to kill against the agile meaning to flee, the stiff and robotic against the fluid and graceful, the one against the many, etc.  Its most boring fight was the Super Brawl, which had bland choreography (characterization was muted since they two were identically powered), but was VFX heavy, and required that trick ending to resolve.

A strong script, of course, can save it from these cliche pitfalls but Snyder's strength as a director is undoubtedly visuals and action as opposed to providing convincing, empathetic, human characters and storytelling, so with a hurdle set up against his main strength already, I'm concerned.

With all the talk of how this script makes Superman more relevant, I wonder how Zod accomplishes that?  (Again, it can happen outside of the fights, but I'm addressing Snyder's strength)  With a Kryptonian hero versus a Kryptonian threat upon resolution the conclusion the audiences reaches isn't that Superman is relevant to our problems... it's that we'd be better off without any Kryptonians in the first place... and given the real world doesn't struggle with Kryptonians, it's something of an irrelevant non-issue.  We might get some sort of ideological battle that's quasi-relevant... but without Kryptonian powers to give such ideals force of will, they're not relevant.

Instead of tackling a nearly identical opponent from beyond the stars, this real world has more than enough trouble to challenge a Superman in a relevant manner or speak to some relevant issue.  Luthor can represent anything from the folly of science unchecked, corporate corruption, or disenfranchised public from the justice system... Metallo, the military-industrial complex, the real meaning of humanity, the role of information technologies / virtual / net IDs... Doomsday, Parasite, etc.  Again, a good script might do it, but superficially, what does the Kryptonian General Zod from another era and world have to say about us that's at all relevant?

Man of Steel was the landmark reboot of Superman seeking to make him more realistic, rationalized, grounding, and identifiable / clearly characterized.  It make Clark the primary identity to give the audience something human to grasp and made him the Last Son of Krypton in order to emphasize his special role in the story and the DCU.  By bringing Zod into the picture, I can't help but feel they're using the "Man of Steel" title without capturing its intentions.  As a title, it would've been the perfect platform for a Metallo film contrasting different takes on what it is to be man and steel, providing ideological, character, style, and power differences that play out relevantly on the screen.

Honestly hope for the best with this film regardless, but disappointed we're not using the title to set Superman against Metallo who can be adapted to film so many interesting ways from being, essentially a shape-shifter (just different "Mission Impossible" face masks), to T-888, to giant mecha, to a cyber-presence hacker/controller, and so on... if this film does well, hopefully in the sequel?
February 25, 2011 12:56 pm Definitely an "evergreen" film, good job there.

I'm a huge fan of commentary tracks and a little disappointed they had Grant on with Bruce because so much of the commentary became about the book rather than the film... and between the Absolute edition, CBRs exhaustive interview series, other Grant Morrison All Star interviews, and the other two extra mini-documentaries featuring Grant, I feel like the book has more than enough exhuastive analysis into its creation (including Grant Morrison explicitly denying that Quintum was intended to be Luthor, despite the popular online speculation).  Not saying, I don't want to hear Morrison's thoughts but I was really looking forward more to Timm talking about the film process, adaptation, etc.  Additionally, being in the same room with someone he once wrote a fan-letter to did mean that Timm was probably a little more self-aware and unable to speak completely freely about the adaptation process.  Sadly, I think we got more insight from NYCC panel than this commentary track.

Regarding the Batman Year One animation including a short, Sam Liu said that was because Year One was such a short graphic novel and that rather than injecting new material into the story they wanted to adapt it faithfully and give us a short to make up for the short run-time.  That suggests that the short is folded into the Year One production budget rather than being sort of an add-on meant to be subsidized by a later disc collection.  Since the Shazam Showcase didn't seem to do well, added-on shorts are probably out of the picture which is a pity (I was happy to buy it because it was the return of commentary tracks).

Regarding Timm tiring, I think the CGI GL series has presented him with a new learning curve to master and keep his job fresh while these direct-to-disc projects still allow him to see classic 2D hand animated projects.  So he'll probably find the job rewarding for some time to come.