WAYWARD #1 (Review)–The Best Anime Not On TV

Source: Image Comics

A couple months ago, when the big hype machine was worming its way around, I preordered the first issue of the new Batgirl run from Cameron Stewart, Brenden Fletcher and Babs Tarr that begins in October. It was the first time I’d ever explicitly called a store and placed a preorder, and I did it mostly because I want this run to succeed for a lot of reasons (which I’ll discuss when my actual review goes up).

That was all I was planning to preorder, but then I read the preview of the first issue of Wayward, a new creator-owned series from Image by Jim Zub (Samurai Jack, Skullkickers) and Steve Cummings (Flash, Deadshot) and I was intrigued by what I read. Intrigued enough to order that too.

I arrived back in Michigan last Saturday–the first issue came out last Wednesday–and after getting settled into my apartment, I went down to my comic shop and picked up. I wasn’t disappointed; having read it through twice, I can honestly say Wayward is a great new series and I look forward to seeing where it goes.

The story, like the headline says, reads like it came straight from an anime fan’s mind. Half-Irish, half-Japanese high schooler Rori Lane, sick of living with her Irish dad, moves to Tokyo for the first time to be with her mother. Besides the usual cultural adjustment, Rori suddenly begins seeing red pathways pop up that no one else can that tell her where she needs to go. And things get even weirder when she discovers that there are monsters walking the streets of Tokyo.

One thing I can say about this first issue is that it gets to the point. While a whole opening arc could be built out of Rori adjusting to life in Japan, Zub and Cummings get right down to business. It’s refreshing and very gripping. Zub is very good at taking these characters we’ve seen a ton of times–teenager in a foreign place, workaholic mom and so on–and really making them worth knowing.

Cummings is not an artist whose work I’ve seen before, and that’s a shame because he’s great. It’s very easy to imagine his designs popping up in an anime and his work is crisp and clear. John Rauch’s coloring  further enhances the book’s appealing nature. It’s lovely stuff and it’s a good touchstone to turn manga fans onto American comics.

Even cooler is that the two men–of whom Cummings actually lives in Yokohama, Japan–have enlisted the help of Japanese scholar and translator Zack Davisson to write a series of essays about “Weird Japan,” exploring the country’s deep supernatural lore, and encyclopedia entries on all the monsters Rori seems to encounter. The entry here is on kappas, and it’s thought-provoking stuff that further adds to the series’ appeal.

Bottom line: if you know someone who prefers manga over Western comics, have them check this out. It’s a great bridging point between the two styles, and it’s wonderful stuff all on its own. Image has been promoting this book by saying it’s for Buffy The Vampire Slayer fans and while I don’t fully get the comparison, I get the spirit of it and I would agree in that respect. I’ll be sticking with this for as long as it’s out there.

 

SAILOR MOON CRYSTAL and Thoughts on Animation and the Internet

Wikipedia

So like every other ’90s kid, I’ve been watching Sailor Moon Crystal, the anime that isn’t so much a remake of the beloved ’90s anime, but rather a reboot designed by Toei Animation to be more faithful to Naoko Takeuchi’s original manga. Because the series is only 26 episodes long, Toei has decided to air new episodes on a biweekly basis to sustain interest.

I say “air” even though the series is what the West knows as a webseries and what Japan knows as an Original Net Animation (ONA, derived from Original Video Animation, the term for direct-to-video anime) because the series is still very much structured like a television show. It’s two acts broken up by one commercial break, although Hulu (where I view it, although the show also airs on Crunchyroll and NicoNico, which livestream the premiere of every episode), adds more commercials because it’s Hulu’s way, and every episode thus far has been rather self-contained. The series’ 4 episodes have thus far been about Usagi (Kotono Mitsuishi) finding out she’s Sailor Moon, the recruiting of Ami (Hisako Kanemoto) and Rei (Rina Sato) as Sailor Scouts Mercury and Mars respectively, and a team-up episode where they wind up learning more about the nature of the villains they’re facing, the forces of Dark Kingdom.

Watching the show has been a rather unique experience, as I feel it’s my first real exposure to the material. Like all other people my age who had cable, I watched the ’90s version as a kid, but was never super-invested in it; largely, then, Crystal feels like my proper introduction into this particular story (I never read the manga or Codename: Sailor V, which came before it). That might be true for a lot of people, I suspect, but for a lot of anime fans I know personally, it’s the polar opposite.

To this group of fans, it’s more of having the material they loved properly realized in a way they can visibly see. See, while the North American dub–done by DIC Entertainment–was incredibly popular in syndication and on Cartoon Network, it was full of bizarre censorship (like two Scouts who were also lovers, Uranus and Neptune, being called cousins), Westernized name changes and other oddities like educational segments. A full breakdown of the adaptation can be found here.

Crystal, then, can be seen as an attempt to properly show American fans the sort of thing they should’ve gotten back in the day, with modern anime storytelling. Of course, there’s one big risk attached to that. That is, Toei and Viz Media (the new American licensor for Sailor Moon) have to take the chance that old and new fans will check out Crystal rather than the original anime, which is being released uncut and in subtitled Japanese for the first time on Hulu, with two episodes going up every Monday (a ridiculously lavish DVD/Blu-Ray set by Viz, with a brand new, more accurate dub, will be released in the fall). The risk of people flocking to see the better version of the old stuff rather than the brand new stuff is present and, while noteworthy, it doesn’t seem to have affected Crystal‘s reception.

The response to Crystal has been, while not entirely tepid, rather mixed. I mean, a lot of people have seen the show, obviously–the first episode has now been streamed over a million times on Crunchyroll alone–but critical reception has been rather mixed, with many citing the show’s hyperdetailed animation as stiff, particularly in the CGI transformation sequences. For some reviewers, the faithful recreation of Takeuchi’s original art, enormous eyes and all, is also a problem.

Personally, I don’t think the animation is that bad; I actually find it smooth and fluid, although I do find character faces a little stiff. Still, I’m not the target audience here–that would be diehards as well as young kids–and I’m okay with that.

It’s interesting that Crystal is Internet-only, as opposed to airing on a Japanese network firsthand. There are quite a few web-first anime, but most of them tend to be series of shorts, like the somewhat infamous Hetalia. Economically, I understand the impulse; most 20-somethings and kids watch more things online than on TV, after all, and the livestreaming of episodes allows for them to be disseminated quicker among the Internet. But seeing as how web-first programming is usually reserved for programs that wouldn’t stand a chance on regular TV, it’s odd to see a new Sailor Moon show–which is as close as you can get to a sure success–being given this treatment.

Still, this appears to be working so far, so maybe more full-length anime shows will get this kind of treatment. Who’s to say? In the meantime, I’ll keep watching Crystal and taking it all in.

Grant Morrison Week #2: JLA

NOTE: This was meant to be posted yesterday, but I’ve been really sick and exhausted, so I had to postpone it. Also, this was meant to be about another one of Morrison’s DC works–which I’m still planning to review–but I didn’t get it done in time. So instead, this.

Source: Wikipedia

One of the things I talked about on Wednesday was about how Morrison’s writing is full of incredibly big ideas, some of which pay off, others don’t. Morrison’s 41-issue tenure on JLA, the Justice League comic that ran from 1997-2006 (with Morrison kicking the book off), is full of ideas that do. Even better, they manage to feel completely true to the spirit of all these iconic characters while incorporating their history and their (then-current) status quo.

I haven’t finished the full run yet–at present, I’m halfway through the famous “Rock of Ages” story–but I like a lot of what I’ve read so far and Morrison’s go-for-broke plotting, along with the dynamic artwork of Howard Porter and Oscar Jimenez, are the reason why.

Basically, the setup behind this version of the Justice League–something stated explicitly in the first story arc–is that the League–which here has Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Martian Manhunter, Green Lantern (Kyle Rayner), The Flash (Wally West), and Aquaman, with Green Arrow (Connor Hawke) and Aztek joining later on–only meets up in response to bombastic, large-scale threats.

Accordingly, every issue is full of gigantic, crazy stuff. For example, the first arc has the League facing off against the Hyperclan, a group of proactive superheroes from space who win over the public with their grand gestures but (of course) turn out to have sinister motives. A two-part story, which introduces the one-time DC Universe mainstay of Zauriel, involves Superman, who at the time had electric powers (it’s complicated), wrestling an evil angel named Asmodel who looked like a giant bull.

I repeat: Electric Superman wrestled a bull angel. How do you not want to check that out?

Basically, it’s everything I love about old-school comics–the crazy ideas, the weird stuff just tossed at the reader without any rationalizing other than “because”–combined with that punk rock energy Morrison always has, a reverence for and understanding of these characters and a lot more literary pizazz.

Of course, a comic book writer is only as good as his artist, and Porter (with Jiminez subbing in at some points), delivers the goods in droves. His characters and backgrounds are big. It’s been said that the DC heroes are gods, and Porter underlies that assumption with art that is energetic, bombastic and pleasing. He’s great fun.

If you liked the two Justice League cartoons–my friend at Critical Hit! wrote a great post about them which reminds me I really should get back into those at some point–and you want to know where the go-for-broke stuff came from, this entire run has been collected in trade and is really easy to find. Check it out.

Grant Morrison Week #1: TALKING WITH GODS (Review)

Source: grantmorrison.com

When I was in high school and The Dark Knight came out, like millions of other people, I got excited about Batman. Unlike most people, I actually tried to get into current Batman comics. However, while Warner Bros. had a certified monster hit on their hands, getting millions upon millions of people excited about a guy named Bruce Wayne who dressed up as a bat and punched criminals in the face for the first time or the first time in a long time, DC Comics, their subsidiary that had originated the character had done perhaps the worst possible thing they could do for this moment:

They killed Batman.

Ok, to be fair, he was actually zapped back in time by the Omega Beams of the omnipotent despot Darkseid, but we found that out later. Now, Batman was definitively dead, with former Robin Dick Grayson forced into taking up the mantle instead.

These circumstances were due, I was told, to writer Grant Morrison, who had killed Batman off in the pages of the big “crossover event” of the year, Final Crisis, while simultaneously driving Bats crazy through the psychological torture of the evil Black Glove organization in the concurrent “Batman R.I.P.” storyline in the pages of the eponymous comic. I read both those storylines and came away very, very confused.

Final Crisis was bursting with an insane amount of ideas–the most prominent of which involve the superhero/New God Orion dying and Darkseid finally obtaining the “Anti-Life Equation” by unlocking the components in people’s minds through the Internet and gaining complete control over every sentient being in the universe–but it’s a fevered mess that resolves in a really trippy, goofy way. (I should stress that I haven’t read the story in years, but it still leaves a bad taste in my mouth).

“Batman R.I.P.” felt similarly muddled and rushed; I felt like I had wandered in late to something. It turns out I had. Beginning with the introduction of Bruce’s biological son, Damien, in the “Batman and Son” storyline, Morrison–across multiple titles and with the help of various artists including Frank Quitely, Cameron Stewart, Andy Kubert and Chris Burnham, among others–embarked on a gigantic story putting Batman through hell and back. One of the big things Morrison stressed was that every Batman story ever written–going all the way back to 1939–had actually happened to the character.

Again, that’s a hell of an idea. The kind of big, showy thing that Morrison–who crossed over into American comics in the 1980s as part of the vaunted “British Invasion,” alongside Neil Gaiman and Alan Moore–has spent his entire career doing. But excised from the whole, “R.I.P.” confused the heck out of me, although I have gone on to read some more of his Batman run and enjoyed it immensely (particularly his amazing Batman & Robin run). Whether I just got bad advice or DC’s marketing department didn’t clarify well enough, I was left cold on Morrison.

But then when I turned 18, I received both volumes of his amazing, transcendent, lovely All-Star Superman for my birthday and fell in love with his reverent-but-not-too-reverent approach to comics history and his optimistic, awe-struck view of the Big Blue Boy Scout. The following year, I asked for his memoir/superhero comics history Supergods. Again, I was swept away by his captivating, bombastic prose and rock-and-roll personality (although his more out-there views I was a little less than sold on). His Action Comics run in DC’s New 52 reboot was something I also enjoyed, and I’m looking forward to his long-awaited The Multiversity series when it comes out in trade.

I tell you that rambling to tell you this: if you’re in a similar place where I was with Morrison, you owe it to yourself to check out the Respect Films/ Sequart documentary Grant Morrison: Talking With Gods, released in 2011 and available on Hulu.

Constructed chronologically through several interviews with Morrison himself–shot in several locations, as indicated by the sudden changes in background and outfits he undergoes–as well as his friends and fellow industry pros, Gods is a brisk eighty-five minutes. No particular area of Morrison’s life and career feel shafted. Director Patrick Meaney shoots his subject in straightforward ways, and isn’t afraid to make the images on screen abstract–whether it be a shot of Morrison walking or a strange panel from one of his comics–when Grant’s voiceover goes into the obtuse range.

Meaney and DP Jordan Rennert–who, I must add, are delightful gentlemen in person–construct and compose their talking head shots with maximum clarity. While Morrison is the foremost voice on display here, he’s not the dominant one. Having so much outside perspective allows the viewer some distance from the more hard-to-take anecdotes Morrison offers, such as his claim that a visit from fourth-dimensional beings where he was shown the true nature of the universe inspired his Vertigo series The Invisibles. Conversely, in Supergods, readers had to take Morrison’s claims at face value.

The one fault I have with this movie is something I suspect the filmmakers had no control over. When Morrison’s wife, Kristi, enters the narrative, she’s praised by all who talk about her as an overwhelmingly positive influence on Grant’s life and work (she also acts as his manager). It’s bizarre, then, that she’s never seen outside of photographs and not even interviewed. Maybe she declined to be on camera, which I can understand, but her importance to Morrison that the film stresses is undercut by her absence.

Regardless, this is a well-done independent film and a good documentary that will make you sympathetic to someone who’s a rather polarizing figure in comics culture. It is very much worth your time.

NOTE: As the header says, this is the start of Grant Morrison Week. We’ll be back Friday with a look at one of Morrison’s most famous works.

Guardians of the Galaxy–Review

Source: Wikipedia

It’s become sort of a hallmark of the Marvel Studios films to toggle back and forth between using original material and incorporating wholesale storylines from the comics canon. Barring the S.H.I.E.L.D.-heavy connection, Captain America: The Winter Soldier was basically a straight version of the Winter Soldier’s introductory storyline. Iron Man is essentially a feature-length version of the character’s updated origin from the “Extremis” story by Warren Ellis and Adi Granov.

With Guardians of the Galaxy, things are different. Here, writer-director James Gunn–rewriting an earlier script by Nicole Perlman–is taking the incarnation of the team put together by Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning in the past few years and giving them a wholly original story to play around in. There’s backstory, sure, but the specifics are brand new.

After a heart-rending prologue in which a young Peter Quill (Wyatt Oleff) loses his mother to cancer and is then abducted by a group of alien thieves called the Ravagers, the present day of the film finds an adult Quill, going by the name “Star-Lord” (Chris Pratt), sashaying and sliding his way across an abandoned alien temple to ’70s music from a Walkman while retrieving a mysterious orb on behalf of his boss/surrogate dad, Yondu (Michael Rooker) so it can be sold for a heavy price. However, he’s accosted by Korath the Pursuer (Djimon Hounsou), who tries to steal the orb from him for his boss, the fanatical Kree warlord Ronan the Accuser (Lee Pace).

Quill escapes and tries to sell the orb directly to the buyer on the planet Xandar, home of the Nova Corps. The buyer refuses once he learns that Ronan–who’s threatening to destroy Xandar despite a Kree-Xandarian peace treaty–wants it and Quill winds up being pursued by Gamora (Zoe Saldana), who’s been loaned out to Ronan, along with Nebula (Karen Gillan) as muscle by her adopted father Thanos the “Mad Titan”(Josh Brolin, going uncredited). Gamora, Quill and bounty hunters Rocket Racoon (Bradley Cooper) and Groot (Vin Diesel)–who try to capture Quill for the huge bounty Yondu has placed on his head for muscling him out of his share of the orb–all wind up being thrown in jail by the Nova Corps.

There, they run into Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista), a morose musclebound giant who dreams of killing Ronan as vengeance for his murdered family. The group reluctantly bands together and breaks out, with Gamora–wanting to break away from the grip of Thanos and Ronan–leading them in a plan to sell the orb to someone else and split the money 5 ways. Of course, things go wrong.

What follows is perhaps one of the best movies of the year. It’s definitely in the top tier of Marvel Studios films–stronger, I’d dare to say, than The Avengers, if not quite as great as Winter Soldier–as well as being one of the best sci-fi/action movies of recent vintage.

It’s a funny thing. Despite coming from a superhero studio, this really isn’t a superhero movie. What it is is perhaps the best example of post-Star Wars SF filmmaking yet. The world and tech is lived in; big, crazy concepts are introduced and mostly brushed aside. In short, it’s easygoing and loose, something that a lot of blockbusters miss.

Key to the film’s joyful, groovy atmosphere is the cast, particularly Pratt. The Lego Movie might’ve been the first sign, but this film proves that without a doubt, he is a goddamn movie star. He’s charismatic, he’s goofy and he can shift to serious when it calls for it. In short, it’s like watching Firefly, but if the cast was one person. Trust me when I say that his work alone sells this movie.

However, he’s not the only draw, cast-wise. Everyone involved does outstanding work, from Pace’s over-the-top villainy as Ronan (which straight up nails the bombast of the character’s original appearances) to the soulful melancholy of Bautista as Drax. Also, all one needs to do is look at any given fight scene with Drax to wonder just why a major movie studio put a pro wrestler in its space movie.

Rocket and Groot, of course, are the big draws and they deliver on all fronts. Cooper–who provided the voice and was filmed gesticulating by the animators for reference, while the role of Rocket on-set was played by Gunn’s brother Sean–nails the wiseass tone of Rocket. And as the vocab-impaired Groot, Diesel turns in what is without a doubt his best performance since The Iron Giant. I’m not ashamed to say that I gasped and nearly cried at his big emotional moment; Diesel is that good.

Unfortunately, as they tend to be in this kind of movie, the women are sidelined. Saldana and Gillan are both great here, don’t get me wrong. But they get the shaft at points and it’s rather annoying, particularly with Nebula; I could sense that there was something we were missing and it kinda stank.

Now I’m not familiar with Gunn’s other work–although Super has been in my Netflix queue for a good long while–but as far as mainstream debuts go, this is a winner. I wrote on Twitter earlier after seeing this movie today that the little kids who see this today will be the George Lucas of tomorrow, creating whole new worlds out of cloth.

Reflecting on that, it seems like James Gunn was one of those kids. This was a long shot for a lot of reasons; the fact that millions upon millions of people now know who the Kree, the Celestials and Rocket Racoon are is mind-blowing. Folks: see this movie. You won’t regret it because there’s very little to regret.

In closing, let me just say that if you’ve already seen this movie and loved it like I do, please consider donating to the ongoing medical expenses and care of Bill Mantlo, the writer who co-created Rocket Racoon in the ’80s. Mantlo, a beloved comics writer, was in a near-fatal hit-and-run accident in 1992 and now requires round-the-clock help in an assisted living facility. You can find out more about his condition here; please consider donating a buck or two his way. Thank you.

 

 

Why You Should Watch BRAVEST WARRIORS

I think it’s safe to say at this point that if you have a kid or like cartoons or television in anyway, you’ve heard of Adventure Time. And that show is great and a full-blown cultural phenomenon for a reason. It’s incredible. Never has a cartoon taken such a simple premise–boy and dog wander through a post-apocalyptic wasteland–and turned it into a fully fleshed out world so expansive and real.

But besides Adventure Time , Pendleton Ward has another show to his name. This one is a little more obscure, but just as rewarding. I speak of Bravest Warriors.

Credit: Bravest Warriors Wiki

Bravest Warriors is by Frederator Studios–makers of Adventure Time, Fairly Oddparents and a bunch of other great shows–and is the flagship show of their original YouTube channel, Cartoon Hangover. The channel’s official description calls it the home of cartoons that are “too out there for TV [sic]” and that’s pretty true. None of their projects fit into easy categories to slot on cable, and Warriors is a good example.

With its teen-aged characters, the series is easily aimed at teens, but college-aged kids and adults can get a lot out of it too. The show’s more mature tone, as well as the fact that it doesn’t have any censorship other than what Cartoon Hangover dictates, make it a wild card.

But I get ahead of myself. What’s the story of the show?

Well, it’s the far future and in the city of Neo-Mars, there was a band of heroes called the Courageous Battlers. Two years ago, they all got sucked into another dimension, the See-Through Zone. In their absence, their children have taken up their parents’ stead as adventurers and defenders of peace.

As the Bravest Warriors, leader Chris Kirkman (Alex Walsh), inventor Danny Vasquez (John Omohundro), scientist Wallow (Ian-Jones Quartey) and Lone Girl/warrior Beth Tezuka (Liliana Mumy) travel through space “helping peeps” and righting wrongs. Along the way, they deal with the wacky antics of all sorts of aliens like unofficial team members Catbug (Sam Lavagnino), a childlike extra-dimensional being and the rude, jerkish Impossibear (Michael Leon Woodley) and Beth’s friend Plum (Tara Strong), a merewif–she turns into a mermaid once she hits the water.

Across 2 seasons of YouTube shorts, they deal with every menace from the apocalyptic Aeon Worm to the Hardcore Hill Midgets, while also dealing with the mysterious, wacky Emotion Lord (Breehn Burns), who has a mysterious connection to Chris.

While the concept and characters were created by Ward, due to his involvement with Adventure Time, he left the running of the series to Breehn Burns, famed independent filmmaker and creator of the surrealist webseries Dr. Tran . If you think Adventure Time is trippy, this show will give you a run for your money. I mean, the third episode introduces a holo-john: a bathroom that is also a holodeck.

Burns, who has written and directed every single episode (although he has since stepped down), is an inspired choice for this series. His constant presence–he also voices basically every character that’s not the main four or Catbug or Impossibear–helps ground the series in a consistent viewpoint. It’s a demented, nutsy viewpoint. Yet, it’s also a really authentic, believably teenage viewpoint.

Chris is attracted to Beth and that forms the emotional crux of the series. Underneath the goofy slang and wacky situations, there’s a real heart at the bottom of this show. Being that each episode runs from 5-10 minutes, everything has to be expressed directly and quickly. Burns’ experience with webseries formats helps that work.

Key of course is the wonderful animation. Frederator doesn’t pull any punches; this is as detailed and rich as an episode of Adventure Time. There’s some truly awesome, cool images in there. The fact that the series is willing to turn the reins over to famed animation and comics folk like Ryan North, Noelle Stevenson, Niki Yang and Jhonen Vasquez only solidifies its uniqueness and expressivity.

The core cast ties it all together. Walsh, a virtual unknown, is fantastic as the naive, tentative Chris. Omohundro sells the macho cockiness of Danny. Mumy brings layers and layers to Beth beyond “just the girl.” As the goofy, upbeat Wallow, Quartey, a non-professionnal actor, is a delight. Strong, voice acting goddess, makes Plum an intriguing ingenue.

Impossibear doesn’t show up that much, but Wooley is fun in the role. As the breakout catchphrase machine, Catbug, Lavagnino–a little kid–is silly and fun and the episode “Catbug’s Away Team” is one of my favorites.

The show can easily be binged in an hour or two and is very much worth your time. If you want a great cartoon that doesn’t speak to any one audience and can do whatever it wants because the Internet, then check it out.

If you like it, I strongly suggest checking out the tie-in comic from Kaboom, which tells an alternate, but equally fascinating, story of the characters–for example, Plum has a second brain and personality belonging to an ancient woman and switches beneath the two seemingly at random.

Basically, if Adventure Time is a fantasy-loving kid, Bravest Warriors is that kid’s SF-loving older brother. Check it out. You’ll love the moop out of it.

LAST STAND OF THE WRECKERS (Review)

(TFWiki)

So this past weekend was Botcon, the annual Transformers convention. Given that the new film, Age Of Extinction, hits today, there was naturally a lot more excitement than usual. Judging from the reports I’ve read, that excitement was due and well-deserved (barring the occasional ugly snafu).

I couldn’t attend–not that I ever have been able to–and while some friends of mine held their own “Notcon” to make up for it, I stayed home and weathered the death of a close family member.

In between the various businesses of grief, I found comfort and escape in rereading the opening arc of the always-excellent More Than Meets The Eye, one of the two current ongoing Transformers comics, and reading the prequel to this current era of Transformers comics, the 2010 miniseries Last Stand Of The Wreckers.

Essentially, this is an action movie in comics form. Taking place after the All Hail Megatron event, which saw the Decepticons become rulers of Earth after destroying San Francisco, the story opens with Autobot Springer recruiting four new members–war hero Rotorstorm, Optimus Prime wannabe Pyro, gun nut Guzzle and genius weapons inventor Ironfist–to join the Wreckers, basically the Autobots’ answer to Seal Team 6 and Blackwater.

Their mission? Take back the Autobot prison planet Garrus-9, which has been ruled for 3 years by the sadistic Decepticon renegade Overlord. The Wreckers, plus human stowaway Verity Carlo ( a holdover from previous Transformers comics by IDW), land on the planet. But what they find is worse than they could’ve ever imagined…

The wonderful thing about this series–and there are many–is that it mashes up familiar characters (Springer and fellow Wreckers Kup and Perceptor date back to the ’80s) with the ultra-obscure (all the new guys are European exclusive toys who had never been used in fiction before). Writers James Roberts, currently writing More Than Meets The Eye, and Nick Roche (who also draws with Guido Guidi) bring these disparate types together and make them all fully fleshed out, interesting characters.
For example, Ironfist is a die-hard Wreckers fanboy who writes famous stories about the team under a pseudonym. That’s pretty neat.

I should also add this story is full of carnage. Bots die left and right and far from being meaningless, Roberts and Roche make us all care. That’s not easy to do.

Key to it all is Roche’s and Guidi’s art. The two mesh together beautifully and, with the amazing coloring of Josh Burcham, create vibrant, poppy artwork that could easily be the basis for an animated film.

I’d highly recommend this storyto anyone with even a minor interest in Transformers. No prior knowledge is required. I’d especially recommend getting the deluxe hardcover. It has all the covers, character profiles, a wonderful short story written by Roberts and supplemental sequel comics (full disclosure: my friend lettered two of them).
Even if you removed the giant robots, this is a solid military scifi story
If Roberts and Roche were to work on an original work, it’d be as great as what we see here. Check it out.

Once More Unto the Bleach BONUS #1: MEMORIES OF NOBODY

Like most shonen animes, Bleach had feature film spinoffs during its run. Most film spinoffs of anime aren’t really well thought of. For shonen, it’s mainly seen as a cash-grab, offering up a chance to see the characters you already know and are invested in partake in a self-contained adventure that, in the series proper, will never be mentioned again. Add to that, a lot of shonen films are produced rather fast and tend not to run that long. For example, most Dragon Ball Z movies tend to be about an hour because they were produced as part of a double feature for kids released in summer in Japan and came out on a yearly basis.

If not stand-alone adventures, then most tie-in anime films tend to be side stories, like the two movies made for both versions of FullMetal Alchemist. The first Bleach film, Memories of Nobody, is a little bit of both. Released in 2006, it’s stand-alone, with the end making it clear that this won’t affect the show. It’s also a side story, as it clearly takes place at some point after the Soul Society arc. (I’m not going to try and slot this into the series’ timeline because  that would be nuts.) With those qualifications, it’s still an engaging story in its own right.

In the Research and Development Institute in Soul Society, a lieutenant in the 12th Division enters and asks a technician what the status is of the space that’s developed between the human world and the world of Soul Society. The technician replies that the space–another dimension–is about to be investigated by troops from the Onmitsukido, the military branch of Soul Society. One of the troops then signals the Institute, saying the exit from the Dangai–the dangerous dimension that allows travel between worlds–has been sealed. The Institute says that they’ll send backup, but as they prepare to do so, the troops start screaming and, as the technicians listen in horror, are all killed by some unseen force.

Meanwhile in the human world, at a park on a beautiful fall day, a ghost runs through the trees, followed by a giant Hollow that the humans around can, of course, hear but not see. Ichigo (Masakazu Morita) and Rukia (Fumiko Orikasa), with Kon (Mitsuaki Madono) in tow, run up. Ichigo changes into his Soul Reaper film and dispatches the Hollow pretty easily. More than anything, this is a showcase for the improved, feature-length budget animation. This fight scene is awesome; the look is stunning, the action is crisp and it’s propulsive, which carries over to the rest of the film.

After the ghost is purified and sent to Soul Society and a good gag where Ichigo’s careless discarding of his body while in Soul Reaper form leads to paramedics performing CPR on his seemingly lifeless corpse, Rukia receives a message from Soul Society about what seems to be a huge infestation of Hollows. They head to the location and switch to Soul Reaper mode, but see nothing but mysterious white creatures roaming around.

Ichigo tries to purify one but it doesn’t work and the creatures start swarming him and Rukia. Just then, a mysterious girl appears, changes into a Soul Reaper and starts cutting down the creatures left and right. Kon, meanwhile, is in Ichigo’s body trying to avoid the creatures when he suddenly sees a strange man in armor. The girl finishes off the creatures by rising into the air in a tornado and unleashing her Zanpakuto, lands, then turns into a human and prepares to leave.

Ichigo and Rukia stop her, confused as to who she is. If she’s a Soul Reaper, Rukia wonders why she hasn’t seen her before. The girl (Chiwa Saito) simply says that she’s a Reaper, says her name is Senna and dashes off. Meanwhile in Soul Society, a large portal appears in the sky showing the human world, something that’s not supposed to happen.

Who is Senna? What are those white things? Who did Kon see? And how does this all tie back to the space between worlds? Memories of Nobody answers all these questions in a perfunctory, crisp fashion–the better to get to the fighting–but it doesn’t skip out on making sure all threads are connected.

The amount of new characters and information introduced could easily have filled an arc of the show. To his credit, writer   makes it all understandable, mostly thanks to a helpful, funny montage from Urahara, and coherent. Additionally, the relationship that develops between Ichigo and Senna over the course of the film is pretty special, and what ultimately happens to Senna at the end of the film is touching and effective. Bleach creator Tite Kubo actually wrote the story for this and all the other Bleach films–a rarity with anime adaptations of manga in general, let alone movie spinoffs–and his presence and weight is felt in the way things come together.

Series director Noriyuki Abe knows he has a bigger budget here and he uses it. The characters pop with life, the animation gets stunning at moments, and the Bankai and Shikai attacks are amazing, particularly Hitsugaya’s (Romi Park). Rukia even unleashes her Zanpakuto during the final fight here and it’s the first time I’ve ever seen it at all; it’s a welcome addition.

Shiro Sagisu’s musical score, however, is a bit of a disappointment. Most of it is recycled straight from the show and what new portions of the score there are are weird. There’s an operatic theme, complete with soprano, that plays during a scene with Ichigo and Senna and it’s very ill-fitting and out of place.

The cast continues to sell it, with Morita, Orikasa and the rest doing excellent work as usual. But it’s Saito who makes the strongest impression here. Making a viewer of an established series care about a new character over all the other ones, particularly in a movie that won’t have any effect on the show proper, is really hard to do and she pulls it off with a mix of quirk and pathos. I observed while watching this film with a friend that, essentially, Senna is a Manic Pixie Soul Reaper, and he agreed. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself and the way Senna is pulled off here is good.

So despite the weak music, this film is good overall. If you’re a Bleach fan, you’re gonna find something to enjoy. I know I did. Even if this is ultimately disposable, that doesn’t mean you don’t have a good time while watching it.

(All images courtesy of Bleach Wiki.)

Star Wars: Splinter of the Mind’s Eye (Review)

(Via Wookieepedia)

As I’ve said on here previously, I’m not too much of a Star Wars guy. I get why people love it, and I understand the obsession. I also like it a good amount–I’ve seen all the movies multiple times and own a few of the comics and books–but by and large, it’s just not for me.

But what with the recent news of the Expanded Universe–the vast, interconnected network of Star Wars novels, games and comics–being declared noncanon by Disney and the need for me to ingest something else besides Star Trek this summer, I’ve gotten interested. Plus, I’ve rewatched this very entertaining video about the EU by Internet personality Nash about 5 times and it’s piqued my curiosity enough that I’m intrigued about the EU again (Video slightly NSFW).

With that in mind, I decided to check out from my library the first ever EU novel, Splinter of the Mind’s Eye. Written by SF legend Alan Dean Foster, it’s a gripping treasure hunt story that offers a fascinating glimpse into what the Star Wars universe was like in its early years, for good and for ill.

Set 2 years after the events of A New Hope, the story opens with Luke, Leia, R2-D2 and C-3PO on their way to the planet of Circarpous IV to secretly convince the inhabitants–and hopefully the inhabitants of another system–to join the Rebellion. Unfortunately, as they pass Circarpous V, Leia’s ship begins malfunctioning and she’s forced to make an emergency landing. Luke follows and they both crash in separate areas of the thick swampy jungle of the planet (which is called Mimban by its inhabitants).

Making their way towards each other and realizing that they’re on a mining planet, they begin to follow a beacon thinking it’ll lead them to an outpost station that they can call for help from, they instead come across a mining town. After stealing clothes to blend in, they enter an inn where an old woman named Halla approaches them. She quickly susses out who they are and forces them to, in exchange for getting off the planet, team up with her to find something called the Kaiburr crystal (the “Splinter of the Mind’s Eye”), a legendary gem hidden in a temple that is said to increase one’s Force power to 100 times its max. She shows them a small sliver of it she acquired. Luke realizes it’s the real deal and they agree to help.

However, Luke had earlier slapped Leia in the presence of natives as part of a ruse that she was his slave. Outside, they begin play fighting, which leads to a very real brawl with some miners. They’re arrested by Imperial troops, who take them to the noxious Captain-Supervisor Grammel. Grammel doesn’t buy the story about them being rogue thieves from Circarpous IV and proceeds to jail them. But not before he confiscates the crystal and contacts the Imperial Governor, who in turn contacts a certain Dark Lord…

It’s plenty odd to read this novel for a lot of reasons. For one thing, Imperial stormtroopers are described as being “both men and women.” which makes sense in context. But it’s mostly odd when one considers that, according to the prequels, all stormtroopers are clones. And male clones are that. Furthermore, the way the book ends is WILDLY contradictory to the way the rest of the original trilogy plays out.

But the big, awkward, banjo-playing elephant in the room is the sexual tension between Luke and Leia. On the one hand, it’s a natural growth of Luke’s feelings towards Leia in the first film and we get a more nuanced look at how both parties feel towards each other. But on the other hand, it’s REALLY awkward considering we learn the two are siblings by the end of Return of the Jedi.

That unpleasantness aside, this book is still a solid adventure story and is true to these characters and this mythos, at least in its nascent form circa 1978. As the Nash video explains (and seriously, you really should watch it; it’s pretty great), Splinter was commissioned by George Lucas to serve as the basis for a lower-budget sequel in case the first film didn’t succeed. If you’re willing to overlook some awkward elements in order to read a fun adventure story about characters you know and love, it’s worth a look.

 

C.O.W.L. #1 (Review)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In 2007 Kyle Higgins, a Film Production major at Chapman University, wrote and directed a short film called The League with his friend Alec Siegel as his senior thesis. The plot involved a threat to the long established Super Hero Union in Chicago taking place in the 1960s. The film screened at some festivals and caught the attention of executives at Marvel Comics, who told Higgins & Siegel to start pitching. Eventually, they wrote a very good installment of the one-shot series called Captain America: Theater of War, one-off stories showing Steve Rogers on various battlefronts.

On the strength of that, Higgins was invited to write for DC, where he wound up writing the (very good) Batman: Gates of Gotham miniseries (based off of a plot by current Bat-wunderkind Scott Snyder) and, with the New 52, becoming the writer on Nightwing as well as Batman Beyond 2.0, the latest comic book continuation of the well-regarded DCAU series.

Now, with the identity of Nightwing revealed and the title subsequently ended, Higgins–while still writing Batman Beyond 2.0, has come full circle, reuniting with Siegel and turning to Image to create C.O.W.L., an extension of the concept and world of The League and it’s simply stunning, the great sort of first issue that hooks you in and doesn’t let up.

Funnily enough, the first issue of C.O.W.L. opens with a hero wearing a Nightwing-esque costume, Blaze, and other members of C.O.W.L. (which stands for Chicago Organized Workers League) hunting down Skylancer, a Russian supervillain explained as the “last of the Chicago Six,” a gang of baddies who, with others, have been plaguing the League since its formation in the 1940s (the series starts in 1962). But the league’s chairman, the Grey Raven, a retired superhero, isn’t exactly pushing the concept of the League going away anytime soon. Especially as C.O.W.L. detective John Pierce and others encounter a fanatic supporter of Skylancer the next day…

The number one name associated with the 50s-60s aesthetic in modern comics is Darwyn Cooke and while artist Rod Reis doesn’t approach Cooke’s mastery, he manages a unique blend of Cooke’s and Ben Templesmith’s style, a particularly interesting blend that is pretty dang great and breathtaking in some places. The way he uses panels to his advantage is just genius, resulting in a superhero book that looks like nothing else.

Higgins and Siegel write with one clear, united voice and it’s refreshing to see. No moment feels out of place, and even some that would be easily handled with poor taste elsewhere–like an extended sequence where one C.O.W.L. agent urinates on a peeping Tom–plays here as darkly funny.

Bottom line: here’s a superhero story not only rooted in history and intrigue, but here’s one that doesn’t require any backstory, just makes all its characters easy to get and understand. Do yourself a favor and check this book; I know I’ll be adding it to my monthly pull list.