Garm Howling

Wake Up Sheeple! (or, How Buzz Aldrin is going to find you and punch you in the face)

2009-10-17T01:03:00.007-04:00

I ~~just read~~ have just been enlightened by some truly amazing work. Really. I mean it. Of course, it's COMPLETE crap, but. . . it's an amazing job: easily, without a shadow of a doubt, in the wackjob-conspiracy-theory hall of fame. A sample of the masterpiece to which I refer:

It is important to note that the room in question was numbered 217 in the Stephen King version of The Shining. For unknown reason's Kubrick changed it to 237.

Those unknown reasons are about to be come known.

Danny is literally carrying a symbolic Apollo 11, on his body, via the sweater, to the Moon as he walks over to room 237. Why do I think this?

Because the average distance from the Earth to the Moon is 237,000 miles.

The real truth is that this movie is really about the deal that Stanley Kubrick made with the Manager of the Overlook Hotel (America). This deal was to get Kubrick to re-create, in other words, to fake, the Apollo 11 Moon landing.

EUREKA! 4 pages may seem long, but trust me (and why shouldn't you?) the words just fly by. In no time at all YOU WILL JOIN ME WITHIN THE RANKS OF THE ENLIGHTENED. Read the whole thing.

Need a bigger boat

2009-10-05T23:56:00.000-04:00

I guess I abstractly knew that such a thing existed, but now I have a burning desire to be cited for "Unlawful Possession of a Great White Shark." I'm not sure how, but I'm pretty sure being able to say that I was cited for unlawfully possessing Jaws would enhance my life in many ways.

it'd be even cooler if the shark had a fricken' laser

So, you’re thinking of buying an AK-47?

2009-09-29T09:55:00.001-04:00

Or AK-74? Or AK-101? Or AK-107? Or AKMS? Or any other Kalashnikov? If so, you should check out this introductory guide to the wonderful and often confusingly varied world of (semi-auto civilian) AK's. It's written for the novice enthusiast rather than the already-initiated, but for many people, the article will be quite helpful in explaining the basics. For example, the Father of Garm has a vast wealth of knowledge regarding handguns, but his knowledge of rifles is much more narrow, a fact he readily admits, which is why I've already sent him the above link.

Kudos to Cheaper Than Dirt for putting this on their site; I'll be sure to pick up some accessories from you next time I'm in the market for them.

Way too close to home

2009-09-25T16:06:00.003-04:00

That's where this chart hits. It's easily the most simple chart of its nature I've ever seen. Who says trying to figure out to what genre of metal the band you're listening to belongs has to be a complicated and argumentative procedure.

No reason

2009-04-17T21:32:00.001-04:00

Awesome

2009-04-06T23:28:00.001-04:00

Just Awesome

Wonder Woman Review

2009-03-14T22:04:00.001-04:00

The new animated Wonder Woman movie is good, heck it’s just about perfect.

First off, the animation is great, a nice blend of the JLU style and Anime with detailed eyes and shadow. Combine that with fairly top-notch voice acting and the characters become solid with ease. Wonder Woman’s origin story is quickly setup up with a bloody opening battle between Aries and the pre-Diana Amazons that puts the body-count in the double digits in the first five minutes. This opening battle is actually clever in putting the motive in a cast of Amazons, along with Aries, which drives the rest of the story.

It’s not a difficult plot to figure out, so the makers did something pretty smart. They invested in the characters. Aries is not some bahahahah villain, but has real reasons for what he does. Steve Trevor, who’s a little odd sounding just like Captain Malcolm from Fire Fly since Nathan Fillion voices him, is not just some chauvinistic idiot. Wonder Woman is not a man-hater, nor a naïve girl. Every time we come to a fork in the road for character they make an unexpected but good choice. And there’s banter, romantic comedy level banter mixed in with the decapitations.

Then there are the difficult choices. They introduce the bracelets verses the arrows instead of a rifle. They subtly suggest Wonder Woman’s mother intended for Trevor to find the island. The invisible jet is never explained, and that is wise since an explanation would only draw the viewer out of the story. So deftly, are these choices made that when the bookworm Amazon comes up with a key magic phrase to save the battle it is barely noticed—we’ve been hearing her spout on about reading ancient books the whole movie.

Then there are the battles: Monsters, nukes, automatic weapons, zombies with meat-puppet ninja skillz, and a whole heck of a lot of butt kicking. One problem you always face is how the hero is suppose to be threatened by the villain. Make him or her more powerful than Superman or Wonder Woman and they become fairly impossible to beat, but this Wonder Woman shows the guile of a warrior while being super powerful. So, while Superman slugs it out in battles that we really can’t see him losing; Wonder Woman manages to be in the fight of her life without relying on some McGuffin to pull out the victory.

All in all, this feature is a triumph. Buy it, rent it, support it. But be warned, this is a hard PG-13, and not for the kiddies. It’s simple, heroric, and not one part of it carries the shrill “I’m River/Buffy/Echo and I’m a suffering and abused” that some might implant in the Princess of the Amazons. She is a warrior born and a woman. This movie says men and women need each other, in life and in the fight against evil. Good story, good message, great fun, trust that you will laughing and clapping like a kid at the circus.

Status of socks: officially knocked off.

(This post is actually by genie junkie; he's lazy or technophobic or something, so I posted it. Also: Yeah, the WW movie kicks all kinds of ass. -Garm)

Well, that's just unfortunate

2009-02-10T12:17:00.004-05:00

Talk about taking the wind out of your sails. Here I am, all geared up to read an exciting story about girls engaged in a pillow-fighting tournament, when I see something in the "related stories" section that just ruins the whole experience for me.* In case The Sun realizes what their automatic story fetcher has juxtaposed, here's a screenshot:

(click to embiggen)

*(After typing that I realized, again, that yes, I'm a selfish, selfish person.)

Taken: a thinking man's action flick

2009-01-31T11:43:00.003-05:00

New to the screen is the Liam Nelson fueled Taken, which pits a retired "preventer" (read: bad mother) against ethnic mobsters who have stolen his daughter to sell into prostitution.

Sort of Daddy Knows Best meets Man on Fire, Taken starts out slow and picks up pace. Brian Mills retired to connect with his Californian daughter, who he barely gets to see at her birthday before the shrewish ex-wife starts busting his chops. Husband number two is a rich Nancy-boy that trots out the pony birthday gift making Mills' carefully chosen and wrapped gift a quickly forgotten trinket. All this middle-aged divorcee's issues nicely setups up Mills' character, skills, and emotional state. He will do anything for his daughter, even take a security job for a pop star just to ask her how his little princess can break into the singing business. Even letting himself be manipulated into agreeing to her trip to Paris.

So, said princess is taken by Albanian mobsters while on the phone with the father. He springs into intelligent action collecting evidence, reaching out to contacts, doing his homework. This is a prudent older gentleman, who doesn't even yell that much--and he barely repeats himself. Some leads don't work out, but quickly his efforts lead him to the grittiest levels a PG-13 rating should allow.

The skill craft is good. He's not superhuman, he's not a daredevil, his combat is subtle and realistic by movie standards. Car chases are practical if not a little fanciful, and the big stunt is what appears to be a live stuntman falling what must be the absolute distance limit. Sometimes he's lucky, sometimes he's quick, but Mills' eyes are always one step ahead of the viewer--watching who gives the order, noting who's got the key, measuring the distance to the next bridge.

Mills' says, "no," at first, to a 17 year old going to Paris without adults because he's not an idiot. But also, he's not the cool dad; in a word, he's kind of conservative.

And the negative characters in this film are kind of a conservative hit-list: the poor parent/mean ex-wife, the bitchy pop star, the pampered slutty influence on the daughter, the corrupt bureaucrat that enables crimes, the illegal immigrant gang, the French, and the evil, decadent Arab sheik. And oddly, it is the daughter's own values that seem to give her the few breaks she gets.

Taken doesn't have that "hero moment", it has cold blood and a warm heart. Not flashy, not abig popcorn movie, but way more refined than you'll get in most genre flicks.

FF 562 review

2009-01-15T12:53:00.000-05:00

Fantastic Four number 562 is a boring issue and a so far good run. Sure, I kind of found the death of future Sue Richards predictable, but I was pleased that even if they created an easy target at least Dr. Doom got to kill somebody. With all that’s been happening with Secret Invasion and Dark Reign (or not happening), surely the book can be forgiven for an issue that has a funeral, a minor family tension setup, and “some one is coming” cliffhanger.

But it is hard to forgive what they did to Dr. Doom. Richards heads to the Hague to defend Doom from a death sentence, which is stupid for a number of reasons: 1) because the Hague does not do capital punishment anymore, and how would you execute a guy that can switch minds with people? 2) Dr. Richards killed a ton of Skrulls for kidnapping his family but now he’s all Christ-like and forgiving, didn’t he almost kill the director of SWORD and not even say “sorry?” 3) What exactly would he say to defend Doom? Doom helped deliver his child then tried to sell the child to the devil? Doom is a great leader whom Richards has deposed on a couple of occasions?

What’s worse than bad ideas is bad ideas done well. The art is fun if not perfect, the dialogue is well written. Every panel is clearly going to pay off—well, except for the trial of Doom since he was sent back to Latveria in Dark Reign number one. Doom as crazy evil, bad characterization but par for the course at Marvel these days when dealing with true super-human antagonists. But then there’s the “My Master” bit.

Doom has a master? A master that taught him everything? Come on! Let’s just re-write the whole character! And because this master has almost no earthly connection you can be sure it’ll have no earth universe wide effect. Are they going to put the Osborn Supremacy on hold so earth’s heroes can have a planet wide battle with the mysterious master, no!

I have to give it to the writers that one of the most interesting things you could do to introduce a new villain is have Dr. Doom call him “master.” But you know what? As fun as the Millar run on FF might be, it lacks accountability. Global Warming is going to destroy the earth but forget about that there’s a huge Captain America robot on a rampage. Cap-bot commits various acts of war of nuclear powers and beats up all the heroes (but doesn’t kill any of them), but all is set right with a newly invented FF robot that is basically a WMD. Heroes from the future try to kill Johnny Storm and Doom but they were trying to save the world so just send them all to Nu-Earth (but nobody debrief hooded Logan on the next hundred years of world events). And now Dr. Doom has a master? It’ll probably be the last we hear of his connection to the bad guy. Millar calls it “the masters of doom” in a November interview were he claims to have more to say about the New Defenders. They apparently trained Doom but I doubt they’re from Tibet. Way before that Millar did an interview with Marvel.com where he says 1985, FF, and Old Man Logan are all interconnected. Millar suggests that one of the Masters of Doom do have something to do with the Tibetan monks and one of them is the villain from 1985, which makes no sense. Maybe it’s the Monster in the Iron Mask from Tales of Suspense number 31, but really, Doom’s master? Seriously?

How about next story arc they try to find the formula Magneto made himself a mutant with? Or make contact with the aliens that really designed the Iron Man armor? Or maybe Richards will time travel back to WWII and plant a clone of Captain America in the arctic because he actually saves the real Captain America brings him to the present—wait that last one actually sounds kind of cool. Anyway, the point is Fantastic Four is good, but it reads like it’s the only book there is or ever was in the Marvel. These are my friends Mr. Kirby and Mr. Lee, they did more than just setup it up so they get a check every time you put pen to paper. Perhaps the tiniest illusion of respect is in order?

Then again, I do plan on buying the next issue. I mean, I got to find out who Dr. Doom’s Master is, right? Maybe it’ll not suck, but I doubt it.

Merry Christmas

2008-12-25T05:59:00.000-05:00

Secret Invasion: worst. finale. ever.

2008-12-13T12:01:00.000-05:00

Here’s what I predicted at the beginning of SI:

Possible Skrulls

1. Spider-Woman.

Called it.

2. Anybody who’s 1970s version didn’t pop out of the crashed Skrull transport (Spider-Woman, Iron Fist, Black Widow, Echo, Ares, and Sentry). In the Director’s cut, Bendis emphasis this panel but suggests it could be all Skrulls. all humans, or even half and half. First, all human would be stupid, and half and half is just cheating.

Called it. But then they brought back a bunch of them--that was weird. Maybe it’s a trick, but really it just seemed like a total cop out. The Skrull’s are a big threat, not big enough to kill anymore than maybe three major characters, but they’re a really big threat. Seriously. Really. Big. Whatever. But every loser that piled out of the space was, indeed a Skrull, but we quickly lost count of who was where and what--and interest. Like halfway through Reed Richards fixes the whole infiltration thing.

Skrull connections

1. AIM was hiding a Skrull in the last Ms. Marvel issue.

Remember when AIM and Hydra had something to do with Nazis?

2. Everyone involved in the Raft Breakout story.

I still don’t quite get why they needed the pterodactyl guy, but I did call the connection, which was almost stated outright by the writers—so, not much of a call.

3. Latveria was invaded by Fury (because they were supplying two-bit villains with super weapons, which was the plot of “acts of vengeance”, right?), and then Fury went underground, so maybe there’s a connection.

Well, not so much a connection as an easy way to write a bunch of SI Fury spy stories.

4. The Hood suddenly grows a spine puts together an evil organization…

Well, apparently this was the way to make him a player for Dark Reign. Whatever.

5. Anybody Kree is automatically connected by rule of lazy writing. Ex: Inhumans, Hulkling (half), Marvel Boy.

Yes, yes, and yes, they all got a taste.

6. Civil War…

Yeah, the Skrulls loved all this, and they made Stark look bad, hey I thought they hated Richards, but really the Civil War was just their “friend with benefits.”

What’s the likely outcome?

1. Somebody rides to the rescue (after a series of defeats that seem devastating). But the villain will do some interesting things.

Completely true. Actually, a couple people rode to the rescue, but the big one was Thor (although Reed Richards seemed to really save everyone). The twist was Osborn getting the credit, which is really kind of “the American people are stupid” as a plot device. And I can’t even figure out how it works considering he was dead, he knew who Spider-Man was (he works with Venom who knows who Spider-Man is! Everyone knew before Brand New Day—wait, didn’t Punisher kill two villains because of the Parker reveal? Are they dead? That was only a year ago and I’m completely confused), and lastly he was completely nuts. But we’re stupid, we’d turn to anyone waving an American flag in a crisis, just like we did with (insert political enemy’s name here). Whatever.

2. This event somehow leads to the next event, and that next event is when “all will be revealed.”

Yes. Except the revealing stuff is more about Osborn’s Dark Reign and the “secrets of the Marvel universe.” They’re gearing up to retcon Emma Frost and then there’s “whatever happened to baby cage” and what about all the Skrulls that didn’t die or get captured???!? All…will be…revealed…if you just keep forking over the cash!

3. Either they got the goods or not, but ultimately, even if they dared to do an occupation series, general status quo is coming back.

That “embrace change” ad run seems to be hype, but while there’s a few loose ends, come on, one battle in central park and we’re back to good guys and bad guys, in fact we have a great number of missing good guys back. The difference now is the gov’ment good guys are now clearly the bad guys, so, now there’s not even a suggestion that the conflict is complex… Osborn is now Stark. Stark is now wanted, just like Cage, Web-head, and the Hulk. At least, Osborn isn’t going to constantly show up, tell rogue super-heroes to “stand down,” and then let them walk. When was it that the gov’ment was the good guys in Marvel?

4. The purge continues.

The Wasp died, the Wasp. And why do we care? They didn’t even make it clear Thor killed her. Totally the woman in the refrigerator. Personally, I think Marvel is all about the Teen/Mature rating these days. Captain America may have bit it just so they could get the okay to have a new Cap waving a gun around on every cover. The other day in a book store a dad was about to show his little kids comics, like he use to read, and picked an issue up. I leaned over to warn him that particular issue probably wasn’t something he wanted to give his little kid—what with the murder and the torture and the overt sexuality. In a super-powered world Marvel’s moving into the government’s role and hopefully world-wide power struggles, which is actually reasonable except they ain’t Tom Clancy. Still, they’re moving things toward a more realistic world, one that’s not so divorced from the media and government. Trimming the fat is fine so long as there’s a point. Is there a point? All… will be… revealed… Whatever.

So, officially, it was an interesting story with a “whatever” ending. Kind of like Cap just stopping the Civil War or Hulk refusing to kill anybody in WWH, hmmmm.

Best of the Event: X-Men. While the X-Men’s new home in San Fran might secure them as the “alternative lifestyle” superheroes, the book’s SI run gave us some hardcore Scott Summers without Logan stealing the spotlight. Hit and run tactics, ruthless/lethal force, and the use of WMD, Scott Summers is actually cool, when did that happen? (Honorable mention to Thor).

But here’s why I’m buying Dark Reign: Dr. Doom may, in fact, have been given his balls back.

First, Fantastic Four had him kill future Sue Richards (which I also called). In the preview of Dark Reign, Dr. Doom scares Emma Frost, detects the Hood in inviso-mode, makes Loki as a God, and senses Norman Osborn coming to the room. Namor looks like a tool (seriously, terribly off-model), Frost a stripper, Loki a dominatrix, but Doom looks tough as nails—shows the artist has a little love for the Doctor. Maybe, just maybe, Marvel’s finally going to bring back the Master of Menace. But with the insulting way the Sentry yanked his mask off before SI, I doubt it. Keeping Doom on a team has always been difficult, and is Doom really going to put up with Osborn?

What possible goals could Osborn have? Complete power? Why, so he can run the world? Revenge? Look, Osborn is going to give freedom to act to his conspirators. Probably something like this: Emma Frost gets protection for mutants, She-Loki gets help in battling Thor, Namor gets his kingdom back and maybe revenge, the Hood (and Dorramu? or however you spell it) gets to rule the super-criminals if he keeps it quiet—and everybody (except maybe Loki) hates Stark. But what does Doom get? Does he need anyone’s help? Taking out Reed Richards? They gang up on each other’s foes? Wasn’t that also the premise of “Act of Vengeance”?

Oh, well, Doom’s in it, so, I’m in. Besides, next issue, all…will be…revealed…

Whatever.

Punishment for Punisher Fans

2008-12-11T18:35:00.004-05:00

How bad is Punisher: War Zone? Bad. Really bad. And this from somebody that liked the Daredevil movie. It’s not just bad. . . it’s punishment. . . (Couldn’t resist).

The Thomas Jane movie was flawed, but it tried. PWZ doesn’t try. In the earlier movie, Castle is at least kind of developed as a character. PWZ just plops him on the screen.

So, the Punisher creates Jigsaw and accidentally kills an undercover FBI agent. Jigsaw tries for revenge with the dead FBI agent’s family as bait. You’d think a simple plot like that would be hard to screw up.

You’d think. PWZ needs an editor to attack all the odd extra minutes of getting out of cars and staring blankly at other characters. Jigsaw is played for laughs, but his face is well done though seemingly similar to the wheelchair bound billionaire bad guy from Hannibal. Seriously, he’s personally searching a house for $200K, which doesn’t seem like a lot of money, and giving Patton-like speeches to gang members. Looney Bin Jim is as interesting as a drying paint, and just runs around hurting himself and quoting medical trivia. Furthermore, their entire criminal empire seems to be made up of four guys. And the Russian mob boss they anger? He’s got a dozen guys that show up and then he basically disappears from the film. But wait, there’s a possible terror angle, right? Wrong, any terrorism talk is a complete red herring.

The cops are morons, which is only offset by the idea that they are all protecting Frank Castle during his rampage. But would they really not care that the Punisher killed a fed? Microchip doesn’t do anything remotely interesting, except introduce a throwaway character that has nothing to do with anything. Everything that’s not melodrama is cartoonish. Yes, cartoonish—in a bad way.

That brings us to the Punisher himself. He looks right. The acting, especially the voice, isn’t bad. The skull symbol is down played, which we can live with. He fights okay. But his dialogue, hardcore-ness, and brains are unacceptable. Take a gander at this little exchange:

“What’s the plan?"
"The plan is I go in and get them."
"That’s the plan?!"
"That’s all the plan I need.”

And apparently all the work the script needs, too. Seriously, did they film this over a long weekend?

And he jogs. What? Jigsaw is after the widow and her kid? I better take off at a medium trot across Manhattan. Somehow this Punisher can hit a cartwheeling meth-head in the air with a rocket launcher, but watching him slowly reload is important for the realism. Gee, maybe if he’s such a bad dude he could reload without constantly looking down to fumble with his battle-rattle?

The Punisher does do some things right: mercy killings (which the audience is envious of), abrupt shotgun blasts to the head, and some creative kills. But where are the claymores? Where are the flame throwers and heavy machine guns?

Now, you have to say the final scene is reasonably like the Punisher comic: an abandoned building full of armed gang members who barricaded the windows but forgot to build up any cover to fight behind in the squeaky clean hallways. They just hide in the rooms waiting to be killed video game style. And Jigsaw does do a good job with the whole “final showdown thing.” But, really, the best action you saw in the previews.

Why can’t we get a good Punisher movie? It’s not hard. Frank Castle kills a bunch of criminals and makes Jigsaw. Jigsaw pulls some twist like kidnapping his cop conspirator’s family. Castle saves them and then learns that the big bad guy is really like the Police Chief or the FBI big whig. Before anybody can kill Frank the cops and media show up. He goes to jail, and while being brought into a courtroom Jigsaw attacks letting all the jailed criminals loose into the building. Big battle ensues, showdown on the roof, Frank kills everyone and maybe saves the judge for a little irony—maybe his buddy cop blows away the crooked cop and helps him escape. There, was that sooooo hard?

Punisher is about blowing away the bad guys. Hasn’t anybody seen a Deathwish movie? If we want some chuckles we’ll watch the Catwoman movie. You know what the Punisher really is? Ultimate Punisher plus Welcome Back Frank. A serial killer of criminals and a military trained warrior using special forces warfare against the scum that the law can’t seem to deal with. The Punisher is a soldier, a murderer, a grim but fun anti-hero that outsmarts the bad guys and shocks the audience with his brutal tactics. Somebody buy a copy of The Dark Knight DVD for the people that made this and let them know they just can’t crap out a loser comic book movie anymore!

Always the last place you look

2008-11-28T06:44:00.001-05:00

Nicholas Holderman fell on his parents' car keys. One entered his eyelid and penetrated his brain.

Full Story. Also: Obligatory.

Happy Thanksgiving

2008-11-27T07:14:00.001-05:00

No new content today folks; there's much eating and watching of football to be done. Ya'll have a good day.

Here's looking at you, Nardelli

2008-11-26T05:01:00.001-05:00

From CNN comes the story of JAL CEO Haruka Nishimatsu who, in response to his company's downturn, cut his benefits and pay; he now makes less than his pilots. Contrast that to the execs of the Big Three and the failed or failing financial institutions, among others, and realize that this is what the CEOs here should be doing, not floating away on $200 million+ golden parachutes after wrecking or harming their companies. . . especially if those CEOs go before Congress to beg for money without a plan to pay us back or even a plan to turn their companies around. I don't begrudge the executives of these giant corporations their giant paychecks; after all, they are paid such large sums because of their large responsibilities. If they fail in those responsibilities, however, shouldn't they also face the same financial hardships that they guided their companies, stockholders, and employees into?

I can't shake the suspicion that the CEOs in this country probably think of Nishimatsu as a laughable naïf who doesn't understand that a CEO can fail to turn a profit and still walk away with a fat paycheck. . . even if he's fired.

Consequences? Bah, who needs 'em, right?

Good 2A News in GA

2008-11-25T12:04:00.001-05:00

Good stuff:

Madison County gun ordinance swiftly rejected

Madison County commissioners voted 4-1 Monday night not to enact an ordinance that would have prohibited residents from firing a weapon within 300 feet of a home in the unincorporated areas of the county.

At least 100 county residents, many of them wearing anti-gun-control stickers, attended the meeting to protest the ordinance. The crowd forced commissioners to move the meeting to the county's courtroom, which still did not accommodate everyone.

Commissioners would violate not only the Second Amendment, but also the rights of property owners if they approved the firearms ordinance, residents said.

"I don't appreciate anyone trying to pass a law that's going to erode my rights to fire my firearm on my property," said resident Mike Smith. "Our laws are eroded daily for gun control, and I stand in opposition to this."

Damn straight Mr. Smith. For now the right of Madison Co. residents to go out back and pop eviilll Coke cans off the fence (among other things) is preserved, as long as said residents live outside city limits.

As always with 2nd Amendment rights, we must remain vigilant to not only those cases which affect us on a national level or get national press attention (Heller, most recently) but also those laws which are drafted and/or modified in our own backyards. After all, the creation of local laws and ordinances are both the easiest for us to ignore and the easiest for us to affect. A gradual reduction of local firearms rights at the local level is still a reduction of our 2nd Amendment rights and just as heinous as a reduction of rights concocted at a national level.

At the same time, however, those of us on the pro-2A side must restrain ourselves from engaging in rumor-mongering in the hopes of provoking an emotional reaction from the less-informed:

Once word got out that the board planned to discuss an ordinance, Youngblood said rumors flew, including that commissioners wanted to ban deer hunting and take away residents' guns.

I'm of the opinion that we mustn't stoop to the level of mudslinging and rumor-mongering to educate and/or change the minds of the less- or misinformed, but I do acknowledge that the dirty side of politics is ever-present. Acknowledging that the mud exists does not mean that we sink into; should we do so, we might find ourselves stuck in a quagmire from which we may never escape.

Regardless, it's good to see that citizens are engaged in 2nd Amendment rights at the local level; it gives me hope for the future. Additionally, Mike Youngblood, the Madison Co. commissioner who brought up this issue to his colleagues, also had this to say:

"I've gotten more phone calls and e-mails in the last three days than I've ever gotten, and I appreciate it," he said. "If we could get this kind of crowd at every meeting and have you voice your concerns about the decisions we're making up here, the county could be a lot better place to live."

Yep. If we don't speak up, how could they ~~ignore us~~ listen?

Wha? WTF? Poor Dog

2008-11-25T06:01:00.000-05:00

Rumor is that this a viral marketing video, but whatever, it's funny. Just wait for it. . .

Subtitles I can't read, not to mention the crappiest cover of the crappiest saccharine-sweet pop-rock pap ever recorded, just adds to the hilarity and the overall WTF?ness of the vid.

Through the Eyes of the Allies

2008-11-24T15:16:00.000-05:00

Via BLACKFIVE comes a depiction of American troops in Afghanistan as seen by a French Infantryman:

Heavily built, fed at the earliest age with Gatorade, proteins and creatine - they are all heads and shoulders taller than us and their muscles remind us of Rambo. Our frames are amusingly skinny to them - we are wimps, even the strongest of us - and because of that they often mistake us for Afghans.

Here we discover America as it is often depicted : their values are taken to their paroxysm, often amplified by promiscuity lack of privacy and the loneliness of this outpost in the middle of that Afghan valley. Honor, motherland - everything here reminds of that : the American flag floating in the wind above the outpost, just like the one on the post parcels. Even if recruits often originate from the hearth of American cities and gang territory, no one here has any goal other than to hold high and proud the star spangled banner. Each man knows he can count on the support of a whole people who provides them through the mail all that an American could miss in such a remote front-line location : books, chewing gums, razorblades, Gatorade, toothpaste etc. in such way that every man is aware of how much the American people backs him in his difficult mission. And that is a first shock to our preconceptions : the American soldier is no individualist. The team, the group, the combat team are the focus of all his attention.

Read the whole thing; it's well worth your time. I promise I won't make fun of the French for at least a week.

(Sorry about that Freedom Fries thing bro.)

All Hail Megatron

2008-11-24T05:00:00.002-05:00

Update: IDW has linked to this post on their site, you can also see the first edition of this article here.

What do you call a cut of beef named after a civic club? Optimus Prime.

In 1985, the comic world was a heady place. Secret Wars was out, Watchmen and The ’Nam was about to be, and Wolverine and the Punisher culling out a fan base that would soon lead to their appearance in every Marvel title including Barbie and He-Man (just kidding—or am I?). And Transfromers the comic, which wasn’t bad, was selling right alongside the TV series building to the inevitable.

In 1985, the toasters were king: Go-bots, Voltron, and Transformers, with Transformers being probably the best and definitely the best opening montage and song. G.I. Joe (also a great opening) had huge fire fights with laser rifles that never hit anything, but then Transformers was up next and, because they were robots, they routinely got shot and blown apart—though always repaired.

And then it happened.

In 1986, Transformers: the Movie did the best and the worst thing it could do. It gave Optimus Prime a noble death and it traumatized an entire generation of kids (you cried; you know you did—we all did). They also killed a ton of main characters like Ironhide and Prowl, and, amazingly enough, improved the opening song. After that the Transformers took to the stars and only later did Prime return in at the end of the series’ run. Since then it seemed the Transformers (Generation I, the real Transformers) rarely seemed to return to the earth in anything worth watching or reading though there were a number of good tries.

While in the mid-80s the writing in comics suffered in some places, the art, marketing, and events were waxing until the excesses of the 90s turned many readers away. In hindsight, one of those excesses might have been the Marvel Universe series, which seemed like a good thing in the early 90s—we didn’t know about the Internet then—but was really just a character pic with a profile and a history. So, instead of ordering back issues or waiting for trades or looking it upon Wikipedia, we kids read Marvel Saga and Marvel Universe and Marvel Tales for about a buck an issue (25 cents if you got the beat up copies from the sales bin) to catch up on characters. These profiles included many Transformers and listed numerous powers that were extremely violent and terrifying and rarely came up in the Saturday morning cartoon.

But in the wake of the Michael Bay blockbuster, the Transformers are all over comics again, but in series not the easiest to just pick up and run with. Enter All Hail Megatron, and readers shying away from the transformers’ books since Optimus became one with the All-Spark (you know you cried, just be a man and admit it) get a well crafted adult book with all the punch of both movies. But what’s more, the terrifying power disclosed in the old Marvel Universe profiles is brought to bear.

For readers that don’t know what happened between the 80s and now All Hail Megatron side steps the problem by making it a reason to keep reading. Issue one starts with the on model, un-Michael Bay-ed, classic Decepticons doing what they did to Autobot City, only this time it’s New York City and humans are dying by the thousands. The black, gray, and red Megatron of the ’86 movie went from clownish to scary and actually successfully evil with a few cannon blasts, and that’s the Megatron that shows up in this issue to squash the humans like insects. It’s sort of like watching Skeletor behead the Sorceress and burn Castle Grayskull to the ground. The military response is flattened; in fact, Frenzy wipes out a large portion alone using the crazy powers not seen on TV. Any comic that makes a tape cassette robot look more horrific than the terminator is doing something right. Plus, there’s a Witwicky in it as part of a band of human survivors, a story arc that’s shades of Cloverfield, but this time in the subway we know what’s happening before the refugees as Astrotrain pulls into the station.

The old villains make grand appearances, one by one, invoking a sense of nostalgia and shock as your childhood characters commit genocide. Starscream shows up after blowing Air Force One out of the sky. And Megatron and Starscream have this father/son moment of praise and regret that actually develops their characters as tyrant and usurping champion—unbelievable, right?

So, where are the Autobots? In the most recent issue where we find the Autobots hiding and dying on Cybertron. Prime is apparently dead again (steady, fight the tears) but who knows, really? Ironhide is all in a huff about some betrayal: who’s the traitor? Jazz is keeping some secret project from the group. They’re at each other's throats when they stumble upon Hot Rod, who thinks they have come to rescue him. The writers sort of says, “you don’t know what’s happened, but keep reading because it’s all part of the mystery and charm,” which is arguably more fun than a caption reading “see Transformers Mangaverse vol. 17 and Beast-Wars #4—Ed.” Very Old Man Logan, very “how did this come to pass?” “What did they do to you,” which, incidentally, is exactly the cliffhanger line from the last issue of the Old Man Logan story arc, thus proving the effectiveness of starting inside the whale’s belly.

All Hail Megatron is an interesting series: characterization, good dialogue, action, “end of the world” level destruction, mysterious backstory, and a weird connection to the Saturday mornings of your childhood. Sure, it’s not Hamlet but for a Transformers comic the story’s got grit and surprise. Plus, any book that has the Decepticons decimating NYC and America in general, and then flips to the beleaguered Autobots is setting up a confrontation; perhaps a confrontation where, at the end of the battle, one shall stand and one shall fall? (You so cried when Optimus died).

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe

2008-11-23T11:00:00.000-05:00

Full story

Dude, BEAR

2008-11-22T12:12:00.000-05:00

The idiocy of people. . .

Panda attacks man who wanted a cuddle at Chinese zoo

A PANDA at a zoo in southern China attacked a student who sneaked into its pen hoping for a cuddle.

The 20-year-old male student surnamed Liu jumped over the fence at the zoo in the tourist city of Guilin, ignoring warning signs not to, Xinhua news agency said.

"The panda, named Yangyang, was wide awake. Apparently scared by the intruder, he bit at Liu's arms and legs," it quoted an unnamed worker as saying.

Zoo keepers managed to calm the bear and rescue Mr Liu, the report said.

"Yangyang was so cute and I just wanted to cuddle him," Mr Liu was quoted as saying from his hospital bed.

"I didn't expect he would attack."

Scientists believe fewer than 2000 giant pandas live in the wild in China.

"Didn't expect he would attack?" Really, even though it's, like, a BEAR and stuff? I know Pandas and other wild f'ing animals are all cute and cuddly looking, but that doesn't mean they're actually cute and cuddly. Not to be too heartless, but maybe the workers should have just let this guy Darwin himself. Hell, if some random dude just started trying to hug me, I'd be justifiably annoyed. . . probably enough to want to attack.* And I'm not a BEAR.**

*Cute ladies are still free to hug me (though I'd still prefer some warning) without fear of being mauled. . . maybe.
**Yeah, yeah, [generic gay joke goes here], etc.

Obamania

2008-11-22T07:47:00.004-05:00

A school on Long Island is being renamed for Barack Obama. Other than being the first black President-Elect, what exactly has he done? Why not wait a year and THEN decide whether or not it's worth it to rename every park, school, and public restroom after His Barackness? At least wait 'til he's sworn in. Besides, what if everything we name after Obama is afflicted with the M.L.K. phenomenon?

Internet Therapy

2008-11-21T00:43:00.002-05:00

No matter how I feel about myself or my life, and no matter how maudlin and melancholic I tend to be, it seems that I can always count on the bounty of the WWW to put a silver lining on the storm cloud that is my life. After all, I'm not even on the same planet of screwed-up in the head as this crazy bastard.* So I've got that going for me.

*Not Safe For Lunch text

Review: Kull Number One

2008-11-19T18:22:00.002-05:00

Kull number one starts with a bang. You ever seen Army of Darkness? The 13^th Warrior? Read an issue of Vault of Horror? Somebody over at Dark Horse has too. Knock, knock. Who’s there? Ass-kickery. Welcome home geeks, welcome home.

The Days of High Adventure:

Kull the Conquer is another Robert E. Howard sword and sorcery hero like Conan. Perhaps the less well known Conan predecessor offers a freer hand to writers as Conan has expectations tacked on movies and books, and that can be a good thing. Picking up a copy of Kull number one readers my be less than impressed with the odd cover, which appears to be the weird variant cover fad we’re still suffering from the excessive 90s. But buck up, that’s Joe Kubert of Sgt. Rock fame and the art inside is actually pretty good!

Now spoiling will occur but seeing how this is issue one there’s not much to spoil. Kull’s king and he’s trying to take out the last Count to resist his rule who’s laid up in an impenetrable castle. Luckily, one guardsmen has been passed over for promotion and agrees to open the gate. Next panel, Kull’s army swarm’s in, no boring speeches or build up, let the body count begin.

Dark Horse Gods:

So, the Count has his men open this trap door in the courtyard. Anything foreshadowed with a “release the Kraken” moment and “we’re all dead,” has to be all cuddly and fun, right? From the dark an unseen fiend says “Yesss, release me…” Evil Dead 2/Army of Darkness, anyone? What is this Etrigor? Why it appears to be an undead, demon centaur with nasty wings and a C.H.U.D. head—and he’s about the size of an elephant. Ladies and gentlemen this is why we love comics!

In comes Kull in a two page splash that looks great and says, “let’s rock.” He’s got an axe and with here a chop-chop and there a chop-chop he fights the monster. Some of the action panels are a little wonky, but, seriously, demon centaur! And Etrigor also likes to talk smack, before it’s all over we get a little insight that the old ones are coming and things are going to get rough for our King Kull. Kull actually cracks a joke and his men laugh, which is kind of cool in a Viking way, but then again laughing at the demon centaur probably isn’t the smartest move.

Homage, not Swiping:

No surprise, but Kull makes it through his first issue alive, but not before the table is set for this adaption of Howard’s Shadow Kingdom tales. If Etrigor and an issue that has multiple disembowelings and beheading is the warm up act how metal is the main attraction going to be? The Count doesn’t make it, the traitor beheads him and whips the trophy out of a box with a callback line of dialogue straight out of the Vault of Horror: “I didn’t harm a hair on his head like you ordered, but, and get this angry King with a sword, I cut his head off, so you know, technically—wait what are you doing, aaaaa!” Kull, who looks a lot like Valdimir Kulich in The 13^th Warrior, is less than happy, and berates his advisor Tu, who looks a lot like Omar Sharif from the same Crichton flick, because the murder made him look bad and heavy is the head—blah, blah, blah, look, bad stuff’s going to happen, that’s the jist. Buckle up. (Seriously, what is with the face swipes from movies, like the earthquake chick in Fury’s Secret War—totally Angelina Jolie from Hackers!)

Some of the dialogue is crisp, some a little talky, some just corny like when Etrigor says he didn’t know men like Kull still existed. Kind of sounded like they were on a first date. They use a lot of old language and stuff, like coxcomb which totally sounds dirty. And scars, every body’s got scars, which is a nice touch; still it is a bit of a face scar convention.

Bottom line:

Kull number one comes out strong, fast paced, and enjoyable. I’m not trying to gush about this comic, but when you pick up a comic book these days and you get a demon centaur you feel like that cute girl remembered it was your birthday: “really? For me?” In a world of fantasy and a sci/fi comics that are short on action and story Kull number one wraps up three story arcs in one issue (plus: did I mention the demon centaur?). King Kull rules in this issue and if they match the fun next time the series should be good addition to any pull list.