Finally Found the New Frontier

Picking up the kids yesterday and made a detour to the mall to check for The New Frontier, again. I managed to strike gold at Wal-Mart this time, apparently missing the two-disc edition when I was there two days ago. Maybe I was in a bit of a rush and missed it since I scooted over there on my coffee brake from work, but the important thing is I now have it, I have watched it, am listening to the audio commentary as I write this and I have the day off so I'm going to explore the discs and maybe watch one of the movies my friend Dale lent me that I have yet to get to.

But I digress.

The film itself was pretty good. It sticks incredibly close to the graphic novel by Darwyn Cooke with very few points where they left the source material totally behind. Design-wise, the art direction is incredible with the period of the 1950s in the United States being represented beautifully, both in background sets and clothing. The script, as I mentioned before, stayed as close to the book as possible and had Darwyn's stamp of approval with some bits actually written by the man himself.

In particular, there's a scene with Lois and Superman shortly after Superman has his discussion with Diana in Indo-China, and they're sitting on the Daily Planet globe talking about the state of America and McCarthyism. It was added to throw some exposition in that would help round out the period, helped justify expanding Lois' role in the film and, like I said, was added by the original creator himself so it carries a litlle added extra weight.

The voice cast was incredible with David Boreanaz doing a wonderful turn as Hal Jordan/Green Lantern, Lucy Lawless is just the painfully obvious choice for Wonder Woman, Brooke Shields and Kyra Sedgewick do a surprisingly good Carol Ferris and Lois Lane, respectively, and Neil Patrick Harris is a surprising but inspired choice as Barry Allen/The Flash. And that's not the whole cast, by a long shot. I suppose Miguel Ferrer should get some props for his Martian Manhunter and while Darwyn loves Jeremy Sisto as Batman, I'm still wrapping my head around it, so I'm just going to leave it at that.

One of the things that really stood out for me on the picture was the animation used on The Flash and how he was written. I've never been happy with how the character is portrayed while running in TV or animation prior to this, but the guys who put this movie together got it absolutely right. The guy is the fastest man alive, he can circle the world 7 times in the space of a blink, you shouldn't see his arms and legs moving while he runs, not unless he's running a little slower, anyway. He should just be a blur and be able to do things you can't even see on-screen, and that's how he was here. When Captain Cold asks why his cold gun doesn't work and Barry says, "I rewired it on the way down," I was thrilled that someone finally got it right.

I'm not sure why Warners holds these movies to a 75 minute running time because New Frontier would have been so much better with another 5, 10 or 15 minutes of story added in. Seeing young Hal Jordan, The Losers on Dinosaur Island and, while I understand how the John Wilson story does little to advance the plot, it would have been nice to see it play out as more than a news bite in the middle of the film. Or even leaving some of that stuff out and just fleshing out some of the details at the end. The climactic ending, to me, did feel a bit rushed and was not as satisfying as the finale in the book. There are a lot of dialogue-less moments in the movie, and probably just as many slow cuts as quick ones, but I'm the kind of guy who likes to linger on characters and events to let them soak in a bit.

Still, these are minor nitpicks since a person could always go back to the source material if they really wanted to get some of that extra texture, and as a living, moving representation of the graphic novel goes, The New Frontier hits so many of the right notes that it is hard to complain about too much of it. My wish is that, because of the book it was based on, they would have done this movie a la Batman: Mask of the Phantasm and gave it a longer running time and a theatrical release, but you gotta take what you can get, where you can get it, right? And, really, I'm still viewing it as money well spent and that's before I've had a chance to scour through the special features and documentaries, so that should speak volumes to anyone who knows me.

All this Darwyn chatter is making me want to resurrect an old interview that I conducted with the man but never saw print in its full form. A segment of it was published as an article in my University newspaper which I've since posted on my website, if you care to check it out.

I remember calling Darwyn afterwards and wanting to do another interview that I would blend with the old one since it never saw print and I always felt bad about that. After making the request, though, he said, "What do you mean, I read the article already?" Somehow, he managed to get a copy of The Sheaf (through a friend, I think) checked out the piece and liked it, so I felt a little better about that, but I still always wished that I got the whole interview in print.

I'm going to see if I can dig it up, find out how much of it was transcribed and how much work it might be to post it on the blog.

Anyway, the second commentary track is almost done so I'm going to sign off here for the time being, grab some breakfast, take it easy.

Oh, and if you haven't been inspired to go out and check out The New Frontier yet, go do it. I urge you to do so.

Later!

mike

Missing the New Frontier

The DVD pictured at right is the new original DC Animated film, Justice League: The New Frontier, based on the comic book of the same name created by uber-talent, Darwyn Cooke. I've been waiting months and months for this puppy to come out. I loved the comic book and when I heard that they were going to make it an animated film, my brain lit up with the possibilities. I will also go out on a limb and admit that part of my motivation for going out and buying the Superman: Doomsday disc when it came out (the first DC original animated movie) was to see the New Frontier preview that was included there as a special feature, so you can maybe see how I'm kind of jazzed about this whole thing.

My only problem is that Warners put out two versions of the DVD - a single-disc and a two-disc special edition - and I can't seem to find the two-disc version anywhere nearby. I hit the local Future Shop, as well as the Wal-Mart (which can usually be depended on to carry stuff like this), and neither have the DVD I want. It's enough cash that I'm not willing to buy the single-disc just to watch it but it's torture to think that I won't be able to see the film until I track one down.

Curse my 9 to 5 workday.

Maybe I'll take my thursday off and scour the city for this elusive Objet de mon désir.

Until then, I can only hope that my copy of 30 Days of Night will keep me occupied for the next couple of days.

Later!

mike

I Actually Picked Up Some New Comics!!!

It's been a while since I've been to the LCS and possibly even longer since I've done a proper review segment on the blog so, since I've remedied the one, I'll get to remedying the other right now...

Fantastic Four #554: When I heard that Bryan Hitch and Mark Millar were taking over the World's Greatest Heroes, I think my reaction resembled a rousing "woo-hoo!" I think the last time I'd been tempted to pick up the FF's monthly book was when Carlos Pacheco was doing the book. Since then, I've resorted to grabbing issues of the Ultimate FF to get my FF fix since nobody else was writing the series in the way it was meant to be done, with the four heroes tackling fantastic cosmic problems, straddling inner and outer space, and behaving like a family, warts and all, throughout their adventures.

After reading #554, I'm seeing some of those elements come into play, but I found the issue overall to be a bit of a bore. I'm not one to shy away from the group just hanging around and doing nothing, as long as what they're doing is somewhat interesting, but the set-up that we are made to endure in this issue is kind of tiresome and the action bits at the beginning to give you a bit of an adrenaline boost before the real doldrums begin fall somewhat short of exciting.

As for Hitch's artwork, I've seen better from the guy. I don't know if it's the format or Neary's inks or what, but I just didn't feel the magic here.

Also, as a sidebar, I'm not sure I really enjoy the post Civil War Marvel U, so watching Millar try and pull off a 'reconciliation', as he puts it, doesn't hold a lot of interest for me at this point. We'll see how it goes.

I'm not too sure I'm going to stick with the title through the whole Millar/Hitch year, but my curiosity is enough to keep me onboard for at least three or four more issues.

Star Wars: Dark Times #5-6: Part of getting back to the LCS was catching up on titles I'd sort of left behind in the middle of a storyline, like Star Wars: Dark Times. Grabbing #5, the end to the "Path to Nowhere" storyline, and #6, the beginning of the "Parallels" story, I was reminded why this was the only Star Wars book that I would not only pick up regularly, but go out of my way to obtain it.

For those of you who may not know the concept, Dark Times covers that period of Star Wars history post Episode III. In fact, in some cases, it actually picks up immediately after Order 66 is invoked to chronicle what happens to several Jedi not covered by the film (it had to be assumed that not all of the Jedi were wiped out by the Clones). The first 5 issues were great reading with amazing artwork by the talented Doug Wheatley and concluded with a truly heartbreaking ending that fit the series' title to a T. I've just begun the next arc which starts with a bunch of Jedi and younglings being wiped out by Clone Troopers, so I'm assuming that it doesn't appear to promise any lighter fare for the forseeable future.

Still, as editor Randy Stradley comments in the lettercol, perhaps stories like this will show people what happy ending A New Hope really was and just how tough the interim period of the Star Wars saga is.

I'm wondering what the live-action TV series will look like in comparison.

That's it for now, I suppose. I still have a lot to run down so I'll hopefully be back with more soon.

Later!

mike

John Alvin, R.I.P.

I was surprised to find out about the passing of artist, John Alvin, the other day. Part of the reason for that was just the sheer shock at yet another death in the industry following so closely on that of Roy Scheider and Steve Gerber, but also because I was literally just watching him talking on the Blade Runner Ultimate Edition DVD and he seemed perfectly fine. I guess you can never really see a heart attack coming, but to turn around and hear of his passing was just a little shocking.

StarWars.com has a nice tribute done up for him that also showcases some of his work. If you have any interest in the man or his work, I'd urge you to pop over and check it out.

Later!

mike

Untitled Bill & Ted Project

There's not much information on it here, but those 5 words have filled me with a small ember of hope that the Bill & Ted in their 40s story that Alex Winter and Keanu Reeves talk about every now and then is an actual possibility.

Knock on wood.

mike

First Day Back in the World

Today was my first day back at work which was all right, all things considered. My lungs have had better days, that's for certain, but overall it was pretty low key with not too many customers and very low expectations. I basically puttered most of the day away and got used to being back in the world, as it were. It was a little more tiring than I anticipated and the dust and grit floating around in the air at work didn't help with the coughing at all, but it's good to be making some cash again. I think I've only missed 3 or 4 actual days of work so I won't feel it too terribly hard on the old paycheque, but any more time off and I think things would start to hurt a bit monetarily.

Not a bad start. I just hope my reacclimation period isn't too long.

I'm sure I'll update the situation later.

mike

Mad Rage

I just spent 2 freakin' hours at the minor emergency clinic to get a doctor's note confirming that, yes, I did have pneumonia and I wasn't just faking work out. I waited an hour in the waiting room and then an hour in the examination room for about a minute and a half of the doctor's time.

If I didn't have some X-Files to watch right now, I'd probably be out on a mad rampage with my cat somewhere.

Later!

mike

More Sad News

Steve Gerber, creator of Howard the Duck and many other comic book properties for Marvel, DC and various indie companies, died on the 10th of February as a result of his long battle with pulmonary fibrosis.

Howard was the only Gerber character that had a truly lasting impression on myself as a reader but I did enjoy his work wherever I encountered it, be it on television or in the funny boooks. He was a brilliant satirist, a unique voice, and a presence in the industry that will be sorely missed now that he is no longer with us.

Mark Evanier, long-time friend and colleague to Steve, has a nice tribute to him up on his blog which I'd urge you to go check out.

And don't think I didn't notice that Steve passed on the same day as Roy Scheider. Not a great week.

mike

R.I.P. Roy Scheider

I just saw this on Sci-Fi Wire this evening:

Roy Scheider, a two-time Oscar nominee best known to genre fans for starring in Steven Spielberg's '90s TV series SeaQuest DSV and 1975's Jaws, died Feb. 10 at age 75, the Associated Press reported; he died of complications from multiple myeloma, a cancer of the blood cells.

I've been a fan of Scheider's for years and was very sad to learn the news. Anyone who has read this blog for any amount of time will probably know that I'm a big Jaws fan and hold his role in that film as, probably, my favourite that he's ever done. Yeah, I know he was in The French Connection and a slew of other films, and he's a great presence in all of them, but I think Jaws was the first movie I ever saw him in and he made such a great impression on me.



Rest in peace,Roy.

mike

Pneumonia...Not a Fun Thing

So, I discovered a few days ago that I have pneumonia. After a week or so of feeling draggy and unpleasant I developed a heaving dry cough, a fever, shakes and just felt unpleasant overall. I hit the minor emergency clinic where they told me that I was in the beginning stages of pneumonia and hooked me up with some antibiotics to fight off the bad mojo.

I spent Thursday at home in bed, Friday at my parents house with my daughter, me lying on the couch feeling like shit, Emma fighting off her own cold and watching Family channell all day in the play room there.

I've never been this sick before. I've taken a day or two off work before for the odd flu or cold but this thing is potent. It'll be a few days yet before I make it back into the co-op. Hell, it'll be a few days, I'm sure, before I make it out of the house for any length of time. This is not something I'd reccomend to anyone.

The only bright light amidst all the sickness and near-death experiences was the fact that, while waiting for my precription to be ready, I found Season 3 of Futurama for a really great price and picked it up. I've watched all the commentary tracks so far and will wait for my health to get better before watching the episodes since I want my brother, Ed, to be in on that action. I've seen most of the episodes already, so it's no big whoop waiting a few days.

Anyways, I'm sure I'll post a few more times before my quarantine is up.

Later!

mike

Optical Drive Burnout

Well, I've finally managed to burn out my DVD-ROM drive. I'd heard that it was possible, I knew that the day would eventually come, and after several years of faithful service, my Pioneer DVR-109 has finally gone the way of the dodo. She still reads okay, but the writing capability on it is completely shot and the disc hardly spins up anymore.

The good news is that optical drives are cheap as borscht, so I've already replaced it and am just waiting to get at the guts of my computer in order to install the new one.

I'll be up and running again in no time, I'm sure.

Later!

mike

In a Boyle Sort of Mood

I find myself these days gathering together a large number of Danny Boyle films around me in the wake of my watching 28 Days Later and Sunshine. For that matter, the two most recent books I've read have been The Beach and The Coma by Alex Garland, screenwriter of both of those films. I'm not sure, exactly, what about those movies and books is speaking to my particular frame of mind, but they seem to be giving me some comfort.

Boyle is a filmmaker I've always followed (his 'trilogy' of films with Ewan McGregor, John Hodge and Andrew MacDonald being my faves) so rounding out the collection is feeling pretty good right now. I've never had a copy of Trainspotting and The Beach and Millions are nice additions to the collection. I also picked up 28 Days Later a couple of weeks ago, I think. At this point, with the exception of some of the smaller works they've done, I think Shallow Grave is the only one I've yet to grab (unfortunate seeing as it's one of my all-time faves from Boyle and co.). I'm pretty sure the DVDs I've seen of it are all fullscreen with no features, so I'm in no hurry to grab one of those. If anybody knows of a nice widescreen copy, feel free to let me know where I can grab one.

On the Garland front, I enjoyed The Beach immensely and feel confident that it won't help my opinion of the film, which I didn't enjoy too much the first time, anyway. The Coma I read the same night I finished The Beach and am still sort of trying to unclench my mind. I loved it as a story but its Kafkaesque elements leave your brain a bit twisted at the end. I'm kind of cruising for something new, now. I'm thinking of trying out The Tesseract but I'm not all that interested in South East Asia, so I'm not sure how much I'll like it.

I hear he wrote teleplay for the BBC in the late '90s based on that book. I should look into whether or not it was ever produced.

Later!

mike

Sick Day...But Not All Bad

I'm off work today on yet another sick day. Man, everyone and their dog has come down with either a flu, a cold, or both at some point and time. We're operating short at work because there is a minimum of 2 people off sick every day (plus the few people off on holidays and the like, but never mind them).

Anyway, as much as I hated staying home yet again, things weren't all bad today. I did pop off for a bit with the family on a shopping trip which I was able to shanghai briefly to grab some new comics! I haven't bought any comics in about three months and I was really starting to chomp at the bit. I was particularly down because I was concerned that I would miss the final two issues of Howard the Duck, the final issue of Starlord, the beginning of Angel: After the Fall (which I have genuinely missed the boat on), and the new Courtney Crumrin book which the family has been awaiting for some months now.

So, with new reading material may come new review material (for those of you who bother to read them when I do them) but not until tomorrow at the earliest. I'm off to my brothers to install some software on his Macbook for him so he can do something with Garage Band. As tech support goes, it could be worse.

Later!

mike

Perfect Playlist

Have you ever hit random on your CD player, iPod or MP3 player and what came out was just the perfect mix or blend of tunes to fit your particular mood?

That's sort of happened to me today and has been running pretty consistent since I left the house this afternoon to the tune of John Mayer's 'Why, Georgia'. I take my iPod with me to work to zone out on my coffee breaks and lunch hour, or occasionally just to avoid talking to some people when I'd rather just be reading, and every time I turned it on it was not only a perfectly timed track but also one that I wouldn't have thought of on my own.

Normally this would seem a pretty trivial thing, but I was feeling kind of down today and it helped create a nice sort of balance for methat helped get me through an otherwise difficult 9 hours.

That said, I'm gonna head back to watch some more Galactica commentary.

Later!

mike

Settling Down

It's been kind of nice around the Jozic HQ as of late, partially because things have settled down somewhat since Jen got her snazzy new job, and partly because I've managed to get back in the habit of reading for pleasure and I've also been catching up on my backlog of DVDs I should be watching.

One of the books that I've picked up is Frank Espinosa's Rocketo. If you've never heard about this book, I would seriously reccomend checking it out. It's a great sci-fi adventure story with heroes, monsters, myth, mystery all beautifully packaged in a spiffy trade that is one of the nicest book designs I've seen in a while.

I've also finally read Warren Ellis' and Colleen Doran's Orbiter, which was a long time coming, I'll tell you. Something about watching Sunshine the other night just got me in the mood for a story like this one and the Ellis/Doran team did not disappoint. The only slightly off moment in the story was the abruptness of the ending, but I think I can let that slide in light of the sheer excellence of the rest of the 90 odd pages of the book. Again, if you haven't seen this one yet, go find it at your local comic shop or at the library. It is definitely worth it.

Novel-wise, I took a little break from Chrichton's Next due to lack of plot 250 pages into the story, and picked up Alex Garland's The Beach, again, based on the mad love I have going on for his film, Sunshine. I didn't like the movie too much when I saw it, but his writing style is pretty fluid and Nick Hornby gave him a rave review (and you all should know of my love for Nick) so I figured I'd give it the old college try. I'll probably go back and try to get a bit further along with Next today or tomorrow, but I doubt it'll be too productive.

On the DVD front, I caught the aforementioned Sunshine with my brother in a double bill rental with Eagle vs. Shark. Both were fabulous and I suggest you all go out and find them, of course. Sunshine was a little bit 2001, a little bit Alien and a bit of Solaris (all influences Boyle mentions in the commentary) and Eagle vs. Shark is Napolean Dynamite if it was from New Zealand, a romantic comedy, and as good as Eagle vs. Shark.

The Turtles buzz I mentioned a post or two ago continues as I finish up Season 4 of the new animated series. It's not the best cartoon that ever was, or anything, but there are definitely a lot of things that set it apart from other Saturday morning shows. There's a strong desire to stick to the original lore of the comics, it's light-hearted but characters do die (off-camera and bloodless, sure, but their dead, Jim...pushing up daisies) and they try and keep a running continuity/plotline instead of just doing one-off episodes which I respect and admire.

Jonny Quest: The Real Adventures has also been fun. An underrated show that includes George Segal and Robert Patrick among its voice actors. I'm one of the poeple who absolutely adore the original series and really enjoyed the 'update' it got in the '90s with this show. I have the original DVDs but am waiting patiently to see if they will ever release The Real Adventures. They probably won't, but if you can get Punky Brewster on DVD, you never know.

And with that, I say adieu.

mike

A Little Embarrassed

I recently read the first hardcover collection of All-Star Superman and have to admit that it is probably some of the best Superman stories I have ever read in my life. I also have to admit that looking at the cover, which is a repro of the first issue's cover (which I own and have looked at many times), I never noticed that Supes was sitting on a cloud looking down over Metropolis. For some crazy reason, I thought he was sitting on a mountain somewhere, relaxing for a spell in-between crime-busting and galaxy saving activities. I've always loved the cover by Frank Quitely, but have to say I'm just a bit embarrassed that I never caught that before.

It's possible that I was thinking of this old Superman cover by Dan Jurgens. I mean, it's Supes on a mountain with snow. I can't think of any other valid explanation for it.

That being said, I can't wait for HC collection #2. For whatever reason I stopped buying these after the first issue and it's nice to be able to get a chance to read these for the first time.

Later!

mike

Samurai Tourist

As anyone who has kept up with the blog must know, I am a big fan of Stan Sakai's very cool Usagi Yojimbo comic book. For the last little while, I have been working my way through the collected books and finally reading the series in chronological order rather than in the piecemeal fashion I have in the past. The last book I read (Book 8, I think) featured the Ninja Turtles/Usagi cross-over story which I vaguely remembered from back in the day when I was a huge Eastman/Laird Turtles fan and still find pretty entertaining now despite the hackneyed plot contrivances used to bring the two properties together.

Flash forward to last night when I decided to pop in Simon's TMNT Season 4 DVDs and the episode, "Samurai Tourist".

On Boxing Day I bought the TMNT CGI movie for Simon (dirt cheap, I might add) and watched the audio commentary for it about 4 or 5 days ago. It kind of got me in a Turtle sort of mood and, lacking any actual comic books that I have easy access to, I popped in the series DVDs to get my fix. Two episodes in there's a rhino with his horn cut off who looks remarkably like Gen walking around Manhattan. I know I shouldn't have been surprised because Usagi has made prior appearances on the show, but it was a surprise so I got a smidge excited.

The episode was not all that great, all things considered, but it was still a neat-o little guest-shot that I stumbled into and it sort of made my night.

Doesn't speak much for how I spend my nights, does it?

Anyway, thanks to the Usagi Yojimbo Dojo for the pic of the cute little bugger to the right, and with that I'll sign off for the night.

Later!

mike

Three Years

Happy anniversary to me.

It was three years ago today that I decided to hit the web and create one of those blog things everyone and their dog was talking about. It was something that I avoided for a while, mostly because I'm generally slow to jump on any internet bandwagon, but also because I was never really sure what to do with one if I started one up.

For all intents and purposes, I still don't know what to 'do' with it other than use it as an occasional soapbox or a way to keep the writing muscles from completely atrophying. I've tried the regular review thing and that doesn't seem to be working too well for me. I've also tried the online diary thing, the linkblog, and toyed a bit with an interview blog, but the 'glove', as it were, doesn't quite fit just yet.

Hopefully in the new year I'll do a little more in the way of regular posting and, fingers crossed, get to writing some of the things I discussed in the last few posts, like my Indy reviews and what-not (I know you're all biting your nails through waiting for me to get right on that, by the way).

Anyway, we'll see you in 2008!

Onwards and upwards!

mike

I Am Lethargy

Well, that might be taking it a little too far, really, but it has been waaaay too long since I made a post on the blog. There were a couple of attempts in the last week or two, but nothing that really made it through. We have been pretty busy, of late, what with Jen finding a job and me taking the promotion and Christmas being here and all that. Still, like most bloggers at one time or another, I just couldn't find the time, or energy, to sit down and contribute a post for whatever reason.

This time out, I wanted to extend my heartiest Christmas wishes to everybody out there in the blogosphere and beyond, and to wish everyone all the best in the New Year (in case I don't make it on again until then). I probably should be on in the next day or so because I did want to talk about the new film I Am Legend, which I just saw tonight, and also to commemorate the blog's anniversary which is coming up in a scant few days (if I'm feeling productive, I may even join the masses and cook up a year end list like proper bloggers do).

Take care everyone, and to all a good-night.

mike

Promotion Time

Well, it's official. I got a promotion at work the other day and I will be the new GD2 at the Co-op Home Centre on Avenue C. It's not a bad deal, really. I get a pay raise of about a buck, my wage cap is raised, and I have a little more that I'm supposed to do around the store. I'll be managing the electrical department, which is funny since I don't know much about electrical stuff, but time and a little work should make all the difference.

In a couple of months or so I'll probably try and make another jump to Building Materials Clerk which will be nice cash-flow-wise.

Then we just need to set up Jen with something and we just might achieve that comfort zone we've been trying to hit for the last few years.

Knock wood.

Onwards and upwards!

mike