Up On The Download: Downloading Avenging Spider-Man, Part 1

Okay, so: digital comics! I think I’ve established that I’m not really a fan of the concept of digital comics. I like my weekly Wednesday trip to my local comics store, where my local comic store owner, who knows me by name and asks me if I’ve ever been told that pants are an always choice, hands me my books and recommends new ones for me.

However, Marvel was good enough to give those of us who bought Avenging Spider-Man #1 last week a code we could use to redeem for a free digital copy of the book. And as much as I like my stack of books every week, if I’m honest with myself, I’ve always considered myself an early adopter. And while I might be lurching into middle age, I like to believe it’s not so far in that I’m unwilling to try new things. Because if I am, it’s time to scratch “threesome” off my list and tag the list’s title with “bucket.”

So let’s download us a comic!

Myopia, or: Frank Miller Serves The Assbug

Hey, didja know Frank Miller has a blog? Me neither! I bet it’s just chock full of little tidbits about Frank’s creative process, how he works, what he’s working on next, and a million other juicy insights that would excite the comics enthusiast! Let’s tune in, shall we?

The “Occupy” movement, whether displaying itself on Wall Street or in the streets of Oakland (which has, with unspeakable cowardice, embraced it) is anything but an exercise of our blessed First Amendment.

Wow! I feel like I have an insider’s view into… Wait, what?

This is no popular uprising. This is garbage. And goodness knows they’re spewing their garbage – both politically and physically – every which way they can find.

Oh, Frank. Who hurt you? Grab a glass, pour a drink, and tell your Uncle Rob –

Maybe, between bouts of self-pity and all the other tasty tidbits of narcissism you’ve been served up in your sheltered, comfy little worlds, you’ve heard terms like al-Qaeda and Islamicism.

Oooookay…

Doctor Who Season Six in Review – Can we go back to having fun now?

Okay, the dust has settled, the TARDIS has stopped making that WHIRR-CHUNK noise, and River Song and the Doctor are apparently hitched. So I’ve been considering the most recent season of Doctor Who, and I have a few thoughts that I’d like to share. First off – Can River Song go away now? She’s gone from an interesting and mysterious character to a sort of creepy MILF, and not in that fun Stiffler’s Mom way.

Alex Kingston is a talented actress, but hearing “Hello Sweetie” is beginning to remind me of my time as an altar boy. This season, with episodes like “The Girl Who Waited” and “The Wedding of River Song”, feels like the cast of Doctor Who desperately wanted to prove that THEY. CAN. ACT. “I emote! Feel as my character feels! My Hamlet was the toast of RADA!” and so on. I don’t think that they recognize that a show with murderous rolling salt shakers isn’t going to ever win anyone a BAFTA award.

Quick Hits: Princess Koriand’r Has Her Priorities Straight

Yep. Kori knows what she wants and it ain’t under the Red Hood:

via Tumblr

Well...duh.

Mark Hamill Will Not Continue To Dress Up Like Your Slave Joker. No, Seriously.

Here – look at this, from, well, here. No, I’ll wait.

Also available for children's parties.

I’ve seen a wide variety of cosplay in my day. I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack Japan-o-philes on fire off the shoulder of Kotobukiya. I watched promo Green Lantern rings glitter in the dark near Entertainment Earth. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die. And stuff.

Cognitive Dissonance: An Open Letter to Alan Moore

Alan Moore is doing a reading of one of his non-comic things on Saturday, so he did an interview with a UK… tabloid? I think it’s a tabloid. Then again, I thought English tabloids were supposed to have titty shots, which I couldn’t find. But it’s not like I looked hard; after all, all I had access to was their Web site, and I’m not gonna spend time figuring out where “Page 3” is when I can smack my head against the keyboard, press the Enter key and get thousands of pages of hardcore pornography. But I digress.

The point is that Alan Moore did a short interview with this thing, and used the opportunity to talk about how awesome Alan Moore is:

At the moment I feel an awful lot of my comic career is behind me, particularly all of the superhero stuff – the stuff that’s owned by American corporations. I want to distance myself from that, so the stuff I’m proudest of is what I own: From Hell, Lost Girls, The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen. I don’t read my earlier work because there are too many unpleasant associations with it. I don’t have a copy of Watchmen in the house. I’m glad the work is out there in the world, having an effect, but it’s like I’ve gone through a messy divorce.

Oh, Alan… let’s start with the obvious stuff.

I Don’t Have To Listen To You; You’re Not My Real Dad!

"Diana, please, I just want to get to know you." "Screw you, man! You're not my real dad!" "But, I have *alimony*..."

Look, frankly I was going to go to bed but, as I take after my own dad, I have an affinity for Scotch and rolling into work egregiously hungover. My liver knows its place and will do as its damn told. Now, what was I talking about…? Oh, yeah, Wonder Woman.

See, here’s the thing, today Josh Kushins posted this on the DCU Blog:

In DC COMICS-THE NEW 52, Wonder Woman will have a new origin, in which she is the daughter of Hippolyta … and Zeus! In recent interviews, writer Brian Azzarello and artist Cliff Chiang have teased that readers should expect the unexpected in this edgier, horror take on the superhero genre ­and the king of the gods will ensure that nothing goes as planned for his defiant daughter.

Originally created by the goddess Aphrodite and raised to perfection on the Amazon island of Themiscyra, the newest incarnation of Wonder Woman has a new costume and now a new origin ­ but she remains Wonder Woman. Strong. Proud. Fearless. WONDER WOMAN is the 12th title in DC COMICS-THE NEW 52 to sell more than a 100K copies.

Sometimes You Need Detergent And Elbow Grease; Sometimes You Need An Exorcism – Hellblazer #283

This isn’t a review. This is what happens when I’m left alone in a room with a packet of Sudafed, a bottle of Scotch, and a stack of comics and start to free associate. You’ve been warned.

Menthols? What alternate reality is this?

In addition to John Constantine’s sizable, nay, myriad tragic flaws as a human being, in John Constantine: Hellblazer #283 – “The Devil’s Trench Coat Part 1” we learn that he also doesn’t do laundry. John Constantine would have been that guy who lived on your floor in your college dorm who deposited all his athletic wear on the carpet of the hallway outside his doorway after sports practice and just left it there, stinking up the joint until a squadron of RAs was dispatched to enforce a cease and desist – that is, if Constantine actually went to college. Constantine’s aversion to even hitting his trench coat with the occasional blast of Febreeze is so bad that the coat has, apparently, gained sentience and gone on walk about. Then some hapless chump buys it on Ebay:

Bad Spread: An Open Plea to Brian Michael Bendis

I will be reviewing the new Ultimate Spider-Man #1 later on today, but before I do, I’d like to address something that has nothing to do with the quality of the story or art in the new Ultimate Spider-Man, but is instead a humble entreaty to writer Brian Michael Bendis:

For the unholy love of jabbering FUCK, would you PLEASE stop writing two-page paneled story spreads?

If you’ve read pretty much any Bendis book ever in the past ten years, you know what I’m talking about: other than widescreen splash pages, most comic stories unfold one page at a time. You look at the left-hand page, read to the right-hand edge of that page, then down. When you reach the bottom, you then jump to the top of the right hand page, repeat, then turn page. It’s the common language of reading comic books. Hell, it’s the common language of reading ANYTHING published in the ENTIRE WESTERN WORLD, from Dick and Jane to Jane and Dick: An Erotic Adventure.