Avatar photo

koryrosh

Name:

Bio:

Twitter:


Reviews

Every time I finish a comic like Rocketeer, Black Beetle, or pretty much anything by Darwyn Cooke, I just want…

Read full review and comments

Gage does a great job in this issue of commenting on the big AvX event while telling his own story,…

Read full review and comments

The latest issue of Supergirl gave me everything I could ask for in a great story. The memories Kara experiences…

Read full review and comments
koryrosh's Recent Comments
December 14, 2015 9:37 pm My top 5 books of the year (in no particular order): Ms. Marvel; Wicked + Divine; The Tithe; Prez; Tokyo Ghost. There's a whole bunch of stuff that just started in the last month or two that I'm super excited about but don't have enough yet to make it a top 5 book of the year. I debated about Tokyo Ghost for a bit, but what put it over the edge is Sean Murphy's art. I've always enjoyed his art, but for a while I felt like lot of it looked too much the same (particularly with faces). This really marked a point where I can see how much he's developed as an artist since Joe the Barbarian.
December 14, 2015 1:06 pm Hey guys, I've been meaning to mention this for awhile. A couple of weeks ago I listened to another comic book podcast (I'll leave it unnamed). It made me appreciate the iFanboy podcast all the more. Your format is much tighter, your comments and thoughts on the books are so interesting and insightful, and the overall level of quality is much higher than anything else I tried to listen to. I've been listening for several years now, and I know all the inside jokes and love all the tangents. But, your podcast is really new listener friendly -- other podcasts I've tried listening to gets way too weighted down with that kind of stuff. I remember listening to one particular other podcast where I got so frustrated after listening for about 10 or 15 minutes and not having heard a damn thing about comics! Long and short, your show is hands-down the best out there. It's where I got my "comics education," and it continues to be the one I recommend. Feliz Navidad!
November 24, 2015 10:42 am re: comics renaissance. You point to 1986 as the last big moment and that while there are good things here and there these days, there's not much that stacks up to 1986. One question I have about this (which comes from complete ignorance), how many other things can you point to from the 1986-ish era beyond Frank Miller and Alan Moore? Those are the two I always hear being talked about, but how much more was there really? Or is it that there really were only those two authors who represented the renaissance, and everything that followed were poor imitations? In my limited view, I agree that DC and Marvel have been largely lackluster. Where I see a renaissance is in the proliferation of non-superhero comics, which is something the industry hasn't seen in quite some time. The sales of the issues might not be great, but single issue sales are in general low. Much more is being sold through the trades. When was the last time comics had sci-fi (Black Science, Descender), horror (walking dead, wytches, afterlife with archie), romance/slice-of-life (sex criminals), historical/war (rebels), comic (chew) ---and other things that blend genres (saga, invisible republic). That seems to be something special that's going on that does represent a kind of rebirth.
September 8, 2015 10:08 am The fact that you guys have fun doing this is what makes it such a great show. I can tell how much joy there is in this, and having Ron back (and Josh's ability to make him laugh maniacally) has made it all the better.
August 5, 2015 10:04 am Regarding comics and academia. It's a growing field, but it's still pretty marginalized. Academics who do work on comics tend to have to do a lot of apologizing. I have a position in classics and religious studies and try to incorporate them wherever I can. In a course on ancient magic, I always have my students read the first volume of Promethea and watch the "Mindscape of Alan Moore" documentary. This fall, when I'll be teaching an introductory course on religious studies, I'll have my students read the first volume of Wicked+Divine for a unit on religion and popular culture. There are some publications I can recommend. A. David Lewis edited a volume called Graven Images: Religion in Comic Books and Graphic Novels. He also recently published a book called American Comics, Literary Theory, and Religion. In the field of Classics, there has been two volumes edited by George Kovacs and C.W. Marshall: Classics and Comics. A second volume, Son of Classics and Comics, has recently been published. The last work I can recommend is edited by Peter Coogan, What is a Superhero? The books I recommend above are probably the more "academic" books of "comic studies." There's a whole cottage industry of essayists and amateur academics who write on various topics of comics and religion, Judaism and comics, comics and mythology (and by "amateur academics," I'm only meaning that these are works not written by academics but have academic merit --- not a disparagement on the works themselves).
July 13, 2015 4:57 pm Ever since my LCS closed back in February, I haven't been able to listen to the podcast when it comes out (I'm getting my books through DCBS now, so I only get books every couple of weeks). In any case - just listened to the Howard the Duck #4 episode and wanted to tell Ron it's great to have you back. I've missed the maniacal laughter.
August 26, 2014 10:58 pm Thanks guys! I just went back and found the best of ifanboy podcast - thanks for mentioning it! So very funny. Ron laughed a lot. I miss that.
August 5, 2014 11:27 am I feel the same way about Star Wars/GOTG. I'm somewhat comforted that these characters can very well be what Luke, Han. Leia, Chewie, etc... were for us.
August 3, 2014 10:05 pm I love these review podcasts - nice to have Ron around! As I mentioned briefly above, I loved this movie. Of course the Star Wars allusions were fantastic. I also got a little Indiana Jones feel from the move. Chris Pratt was equal parts Han Solo and Indiana Jones - the loveable rogue character. And of course, Star Lord's theft of the orb was incredibly reminiscent of the opening of Raiders of the Lost Ark. What I found myself thinking about after the movie was over was how strong the theme of family played through the movie. Each of the characters had their own particularly experience with family that was very much the defining moment for the character. Drax is the most obvious. With Star Lord, I found it interesting that he loses his mother but gains a father-figure (of a sort) in Yondu. Gamora is the adopted (abducted?) child of an abusive and violent despot. Gamora and Nebula together seem to display two responses to growing up in an abusive (foster) family. Both of them want to see Thanos dead, but you get the sense that Nebula is a much more broken individual than Gamora. Ronan also, in addition to his religious zealotry, seemed motivated by what had happened to his father and grandfather (something he mentions a few times). And of course, John C. Reilly thanks Star Lord because he has a family, whom we see him coming home to in the end. I couldn't help but think of something from Timothy Zahn's The Last Command. I read this back in high school and haven't reread it since so the scene isn't quite exact in my mind. But, I remember a scene where Wedge talks about how the Republic has had to put their faith in the most unlikely characters, thinking back to the farm boy that Luke was when he destroyed the death star to the group of smugglers who went against Thrawn. Xandar was in the end saved by a similar group of unexpected heroes in Yondu and the Ravagers, and Star Lord and the Guardians. The only thing that I had some trouble with was Ronan. He was very mustache twirling, and I was really curious as to how much people unfamiliar with this material would have understood about him. But, as I thought about it, it seemed to me that we really don't need any more explanation of Ronan's motivation than the fact that he was a zealot and a fanatic. As with any zealot and fanatic, the underlying reasons for their actions really don't matter and tend to disappear. Or, at the very least, it's incomprehensible to anyone but themselves. In that sense, Ronan does work. He gives these little remarks about his fathers and Kree justice, which clearly make sense to him (pulled off by Lee Pace's acting) but are pretty much meaningless to everyone else. I cracked up with the post-credits scene. I took it as a little inside joke to people in the know but also a joke played against the normal Marvel movie expectation. This is really the first movie that comes outside of the Avengers universe, and as part of this new wave, the little post credits scene tells you not to expect what you've gotten used to with the other movies. Or maybe they just wanted to get Howard the Duck in. Of course, if and when they actually try to make a(nother) Howard the Duck movie, that's when all of this Marvel / comic book movie thing will have jumped the shark.
August 3, 2014 12:44 pm I'm really looking forward to listening to this podcast. I saw the movie on Friday and absolutely loved it and have been waiting to find people to talk to about it! But, I'll listen to what your thoughts before I add my own.