Why everybody going Batfleck is a little misguided pt 2

Yes I know that wasn't the other title, I don't feel like retyping that whole thing(call me lazy on this one, that definitely earns it). I personally feel that there are a lot of similarities between the characters of Batman/Bruce Wayne and Daredevil/Matt Murdock. Even Aesthically, if you look at their costumes both of them have assumed looks that are menacing and meant to draw on your fears. Once DD got over his color blindedness (I will joke about that later) and donned his Blood Red Spandex those who broke the law in Hell's Kitchen really did see the devil. As for Gotham's underworld I give Nolan a huge nod in Batman Begins for having his caped Crusader glide overtop of the city during it's build to the climax while the entire city was under the influence of Scarecrows toxin looking like a nightmare instead of a savior.

Similarities of the Characters

Why everybody going Batcrap crazy over Ben Affleck as Batman is a little misguided pt.1

Let's be honest here a few of yall are mad because you don't like Ben Affleck as an actor, those folks hey if you don't like somebody you don't and nothing the person does will EVER be good to you. I'm not talking to you, because you are allowed not to like who you don't want to like. I'm the same way with Dane Cook, dude just isn't funny to me. While there are roles where I say okay, yes Dane Cook worked in that, they are few and far between and I ain searching out a Dane Cook movie JUST to see if he worked in it. We could get into how I LOATHE Jamie Kennedy ENTIRELY but you know what that is a blog in itself, when he came out he was like a poor man's version of Dane Cook to me so yeah he had no chance.

Some of you guys are basing your dislike for Ben Affleck as Batman because you disliked the Daredevil movie, I am partially talking to yall. Mainly because you are mad at Ben Affleck because you were expecting a Blind Spider-man which is YOUR fault not his. Some of you really don't read Marvel Comics, don't understand where MOST of their characters come from, and thus when you come at it from the ORIGINAL DC stand point you get some chapped hides. From a guy pushing 40 let me give you the basic breakdown of DC vs Marvel: when I was younger MOST of the DC characters were models of perfection, yes they had the normal super hero mishap Superman his planet was destroyed. But his life:he was a kid who had almost perfect Step Parents(John and Martha), was raised on a farm with love and caring, and while he had a few issues tamping down his powers as a child(well not really in a lot of the early comics he didn't get his powers til his teen years so he had a mostly normal life) for the most part he had it pretty steady. The Flash: was a pretty decent police lab tech(don't know if they called them csi's back then but normally he worked in a lab doing work for the police), a lightning bolt hits some chemicals he becomes your faster than life speed demon. Oh wait I should pause I am doing the comics from MY Childhood I understand there was a flash before Barry Allen I just didn't read him that much, the Magical Ring green lantern either. Even Batman Rich kid, having a pretty good time then he's parents are killed after a pretty good night and while still privileged he is tortured for the rest of his life and goes out to fight crime. Early on he actually used guns, was less of a fighting specialist and more of just a brawler, and while he had gadgets he wasn't as super prepared as he is now.

Comic book movies I want to see made Marvel: X-men Pt. 2

The Why:

Everybody takes their bumps and bruises in the hero game, X-men actually takes the time to try and train the NEXT generation. They show young kids having to go through school, dealing with normal kid behavior, while sometimes enjoying throwing their powers around. One of the oft repeated panels are various games of baseball, where in the rules it's supposed to be POWER FREE and yet somehow somebody always catches a snowball, a shock, sometimes a psychic flutter. You also get to see the X-men being normal without having to wonder which one is the mask. I mean Cyclops wears red sunglasses when he doesn't have his visor on but no matter what he is Scott Summers he has a code name but he always has his powers, Wolverine/Logan/James Howlett III always has that adamantium skeleton and healing factor. Kurt Wagner is always blue with a tail, I know in one of the shows they gave him a holographic projector(and yes he has had one from time to time built by Forge the mutant with a power that lets him invent almost anything he puts his mind to) but around the team he is who he is tail and all, hell wolverine calls him a blue Elf half the time(which is hilarious since wolverine is shorter than Nightcrawler when he stands to full height instead of doing his demonic/gargoyle crouch). You also see that for the most part the Mutants at Xavier's school for Gifted Children accept each other for who they are, disembodied brains, blue furred beasts, demonic looking priests, Bugs, lizards, whatever if you are a mutant all are welcome and if somebody dares tease a fellow mutant for their mutation somebody comes to their aid.

Comic book movies I want to see made Marvel: X-men

I know somebody is gonna say but they made an X-men movie, they made 4 of them. No they made ONE First Class, but that isn't the X-team we marvel fans Know and Love. As for the Crap Brian Singer put out, yes it was nice to see SOME of my favorite mutants on the screen but he constantly Pooched everybodies abilities. Storm was a flier and so was Jean Grey, always having them on the ground when they were teachers at the school was an insult. If you wanted them to be just learning how to use their powers you should have reduced their ages to teenagers. Bobby Drake could "Ice Up" since he was about 12 years old, depending on which continuity you listen too Bobby Drake/Iceman is an omega level mutant who's powers manifested pretty damn early. So for him to ONLY Ice Up one time in the last movie for a 2 minute fight(which versus Pyro was 1:30 secs too damn long) was not only a waste but an insult. Hell he didn't even freeze anybody and HE WAS ON AN ISLAND. Bobby Drake can draw the water out of a fellow human being to create his ice, on an Island Bobby Drake is surrounded on all sides by water, you are pretty much fighting a God right about them he has all the ammo he needs. Hell it was one of the reasons why I couldn't stand X-2.

Movies I want to See DC: Justice League pt 2

The why in my mind isn't so much simple as it is awesome. While these guys are all Alphas(not to be mixed up with the Syfy show) they seem to find a way for everybody to become a well oiled machine, using each others strong suits to get the job done. They may not be happy with each other afterwards depending on how things went down, but while they are going down once they figure out what you are doing, why and where the focal point is, look out. These guys are the Top Dogs in their city, their may be other heroes(especially in Metropolis and Gotham) but these are the guys who everybody else makes room for when they step through the door. And rarely do they need or ask for help, I mean Superman is nigh invulnerable, has moved asteroids to planetoids, can fly, run almost as fast as the Flash(technical comic book rule I will get to in a second), has super hearing, X-ray vision, heat vision, super breath of various kinds and has a 1 percentile intelligence when called upon(depending on storyline). Wonder Woman is an Amazon, look unless you lived under a rock for most of the 90's you saw Xena Warrior princess, you saw what many at the time called an Ancient Wonder Woman.

A fierce and fearless female warrior, unflinching in her cause, rarely matched in her skill. While blogging wasn't really that big in my life at the time if it would have been I would have said then "DC comics needs to stop whatever they are doing and tell the people at WB to sign her(Lucy Lawless) to a movie deal quickly and just put out a half decent popcorn Wonder Woman flick just to have SOMEBODY besides the big two on the silver screen." Because in all honestly all they have is Superman and Batman, which while they are great when your competitor has 5 block buster movies, one that is a Household name that just has a hard time living up to expectations(Hulk) but folks still

Movies I want to see made: Justice League

This one was obvious. The reason is also obvious I want to see the Best vs the Best. No their powers are not all the same, though some are similar, no their stories are not all the same (DC has a penchant for Orphans, while Marvel seems to prefer tortured souls out of place in either time or society), Their enemies aren't the same nor do they all live in the same place. But they are they best of the best at each of their respective companies.

The Justice league is pretty much every major DC hero(just like the avengers is pretty much every major Marvel hero) plus cameos of folks who either can't or don't regularly keep their own title running. The thing is though, while Marvel is a bunch of guys saving the world and then hanging out afterwards to enjoy each others company for MOST of my time watching Justice League on TV or reading the comics, for DC it's all about the job. I have often said one of the most brilliant things Marvel did was pretty much house all of it's heroes(save a few) in or around the city of New York, and if they aren't in one of the five boroughs they are inside the Empire State. Spider-man trips over The Human Torch, trips over Iron Man, trips over Captain America, trips over Wolverine/Luke Cage. You get in a big brouhaha and knock somebody through the wrong wall and you could go from being one up on a hero who's skills don't match up to well against you, to getting double teamed by guys bouncing around you and hitting you from both sides making you wish you hadn't got out of bed. So yeah I love the casualness of Marvels team ups/crossovers.

Comic Book movies I would like to see made.

Doing my little rant about all those DC fans Screaming "Young Justice" as an answer to Disney Marvel's the Avengers got me to thinking, "exactly which comics would I like to see translated into future movies from EACH company?" And you know what that is a valid question, not only is it a valid question but it is an excuse to release the entirety of my Comic Geekdom just for the out and out hell of it. Now I am saying BOTH but I may add in Image, Dark Horse and Top Cow comics as well. But much later down the line because there are PLENTY of DC and Marvel characters I think can do well on the big screen.

Okay so I'm saying I want to do it right, next is the how. The how will be a post on each comic, for each company and possibly on or at the start of a certain story line. In certain cases say like New Mutants/Xforce and Teen Titans/Young Justice (or even X-factor 1 and 2) I may do a couple of posts because I would like to see a sequel of movies. Also in the case of young Justice and X-force since there are a few iterations of each I also plan to make a case for each iteration. Now some may know about the Young Justice Cartoon having a different line up then the comic. But how many remember that the ORIGINAL X-force was not Cyclops' personal black ops team but Cable's mutant soldiers in training. Which is kind of funny since Cyclops is Cable's dad, whew the drama in that family I tell ya.

Young Justice, really DC fans? pt.1

I know my first blog in who knows how long and it's title is a question. Yup and shamelessly at that, I am a well documented Marvel Maniac I have been one for well over 3 decades. So after seeing the Opus that is The Avengers I have heard something coming from many DC fans that has to be considered laughable at best. They feel that DC's response to Marvel making a movie about their PREMIER super hero team should be to make a Live Action movie about the 3rd Robin's super team.

Yes I am calling you out, I should do this on wordpress so I can curse but no, I really do want to call you out here on the Ponderings. The Avengers is about Earth's Mightiest Heroes(in the Marvel U), that means their best of the best. The roster: Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, The Incredible Hulk, Hawekeye, and Black Widow with SOME involvement by Nick Fury and his buddies at SHIELD. Now yes there are plenty of Roster changes that come along with The Avengers, quiet a few team members that I wish had been able to make it into the first movie but you have to go with characters people know about. Black Widow was introduced in Iron Man 2, Hawkeye was introduced in Thor(not as Hawkeye but as Clint Barton Hawkeye's real name, and yes I did a huge girl cheer when I saw him grab the bow in Thor). Now for me Hawkeye was the guarantee that yes an Avengers movie is coming, Hawkeye really doesn't exist anywhere else in the Marvel Universe except for in Avengers titles, so you see Hawkeye you know Marvel is about to bring out the big guns. And they did to what is apparently going to be Box Office Record DESTROYING results(again it's THE AVENGERS yes they could have screwed this up royally, but something tells me Disney, Marvel and Joss Whedon wanted this one badly) so if I were to bring out my big guns I would of course expect you to bring out yours.

Sequels vs Remakes/Reboots: Spider-man Pt. 3

Live Action


For any comic book fan live action has always been either feast or famine. Of all the characters who have gotten a Live Action version the most popular seems to be Superman, the Man of Steel has had 8 live action incarnations. From Movies to Broadway Plays and TV shows, Superman is to date the most successful Comic Book Character to be translated into Live action. Now to be fair I am not just talking about money made off of said property I also mean the dutiful translation of the character and his villains, If I was just talking about money Superman would still be up there but especially including recent box office success the list would probably be:Batman, Spider-man, Iron Man, Superman and The Incredible Hulk(mainly because of his long running TV series and made for TV movies). The problem with most live action attempts is that the medium of Comic book and cartoon allows you to create a world where physics don't matter, you can create whatever look you want and since it isn't "real" you tend to get a break on the look of things. With live action if it doesn't look right people will be disappointed.

The 1970's

Peter Parker got a live action TV show in 1978 called the Amazing Spider-man starring Nicholas Hammond

Okay, as a 4 year old at the time this show came out I would like to say as BAD as it looks now hey everybody looked like that back then. Those extra shiny costumes, the cheesy special effects, the bad wire work there was no cgi back then it was all rotoscoping, stop motion camera work, and picture flipping. As a little kid just happy to see Spider-man on my TV screen I ignored the fact that the webbing came out as a Nylon string or else a premade net, I also ignored that I guess Mr. Hammond had never done any rock climbing because it always looking like he had just bent over and dog walked up the sides of buildings. Nick Hammond had the look of peter parker though, yeah yeah those weird eye screens were always kind of silly but I guess back then it was the only way they were able to let him see. It ran for about 2 years and while today's standards relegate it to the campy-ness of the original Batman live action TV show or maybe a step below the Incredible Hulk TV show for believability. The Transformation from Bill Bixby to Lou Ferrigno worked because of the difference in stature of the two men even if since then live action hulks tend to be CGI and stay away from purple pants hood.

Sequels vs Remakes/Reboots: Spider-man Pt. 1

As I am sure many have heard by now next year a new Spiderman movie will be released that is going to restart the entire Spidey Universe for Sony. The movie is titled "The Amazing Spiderman" after the long running comic of the same name. Now while there has been some complaining about the new movie I want to look back at how we got to this point, because especially for us Marvel Fans spidey was a culmination of years of wants, dreams and disappointments.

The Comics


Through the years if you were a spidey fan you have probably heard of the following titles: the Amazing Spider-man, the Spectacular Spider-man, Web of Spider-man, Ultimate Spider-man Peter Parker has been swinging through the streets of New York in his red and blue PJ's for the better part of 50 years. Stan Lee and Steve Ditko brought us these wonderful tales of the Queens New Yorker with the extreme case of the guilties starting in 1963. Peter Parker is a straight "A" student, slight in build, high in intelligence, awkward, and seemingly out of place. Peter stays with his Uncle Ben and Aunt May Parker, because something happened to his parents when he was a young child. One fateful night  Peter takes a trip to Empire University to see a demonstration of nuclear energy.

And the winner of the awesomest older brother of the year

Once upon a time in the city of Memphis

 They may have been 2 days late, it may not be all of them, but my baby brother got the ALMOST complete set of Scott Pilgrim books, Ironically enough Scott Pilgrim vs. the world(the book for which the movie was made) ISsssssssssss......... out of print *face palm*, yes we would have been pressing the awesome button full speed ahead except book 2 is no longer being printed, which means I'm going to have to E-bay it probably to get him the complete set. As with many other comic/anime/graphic novel to movie transitions while we had heard of scott pilgrim vs. we hadn't really read them because well basically I'm a marvel whore and unless it was a passing "oooh I gots ta have it" fancy my money went to marvel comics. And for those who don't know my most recent marvel "obsession"(is obsession even a strong enough word) is the ultimate series TPB or trade paperbacks. I'm old, I'm cranky and I want the whole storyline in one book, thus I go back and by the trades volume by volume and let my eyes feast.  Now by ultimate I don't just mean THE Ultimates, I mean ultimate X-men, Ultimate spidey, Ultimate FF, and the ultimates.

 Scott Pilgrim though was printed by Oni Press created by  Bryan lee O'Malley from Toronto. On my various movie sites that I like to frequent(and I have mentioned them plenty of times before and will mention them in the labels) Scott Pilgrim was getting a lot of buzz, so me and baby bro(he doesn't frequent said sites but he did like Lead actor Micheal Cera because of "Superbad") went to check it out in the movies. Just prior to the movies release PSN(playstation network) put out an 8 bit inspired game about Mr. Pilgrim and it was a blast so okay we are gonna go check out this goofy movie that we didn't know much about.

And we LOVED IT, the whole movie:the gay room mate, the 7 evil EX's, the fact that Michael Cera was perfect for the part because he makes a great goofy loser, which made him perfect for Scott's goofy every day demeanor and the SHOCK of him kicking MAJOR LEAGUE BOOTAY so much more fun. July and her auto censor, the way music played an integral part and wasn't just like a thrown in for extra teen ANGSTINESS(eh don't start my blog another word I made up DO NOT CARE). So yeah for a character we knew pretty much nothing about except for a trailer here and there and an 8 bit game our socks were knocked off, to say Scotty P was a wise investment is an understatement. So after waiting for it to come out on DVD we do(okay blu  ray, I like to keep my movies especially the new good ones where I can find them 1 blu ray player in the house NO WHERE ELSE TO WATCH THEM) and while some folks don't like the fact that I watch the extras from time to time, Ero Kitsune(yeah yeah I have an american nom de plume him japanese, I swear not my fault he chose it on his own) will watch them with me. Can I tell you the extras just made this movie funnier, I didn't even get to the "auditions yet, or half the behind the scenes stuff" oh no the blooper reel and the deleted scenes are just classic. I want to say this, whoever directed scott pilgrim the movie is EVIL, just see how many takes the "delivery" scene took.

And as with most movies we like we want to know the back story, thing is I'm a on a Deadpool kick now so meh wasn't really interested in reaching out to a new series, baby bro though really wanted to read all the books. And what do you know his birthday was coming up and HayLeeeeeeew(going for a Mrs. Doubtfire effect work with me here) where have a rather nice Comic Shoppe in the area so I stroll up, ask the friendly proprietor at the Comic Cellar (I want to say I knew NOTHING about the website, this is a first time, but not a last because I do go there for comics all the time, and now I have to go edit the last blog to add the link in there) about the scott pilgrim books, he tells me he can order them(he doesn't keep them in stock) and as he looks it up mentions that he believe one was out of print. I figured it was probably the first one, had been a while and oldest one usually falls off. But no it was the actual book NAMED Scott Pilgrim vs. the world. Oh well he said it would take about a week or two to get them in (which was perfect because his birthday was in a little OVER 2 weeks at the time) dropped a small down payment(I usually like to pay the books off up front so I can just go pick them up, but hey even I hadn't planned previous to the brain blast of buying 5 books) and left the shop, now I told baby bro on the day I reserved them about the missing book. He was like I was "making him mad because now he wanted them" but I know him, the face drop would have been terrible when he noticed the world wasn't in there. So 2 weeks before you get them to get over the disappointment of not having the whole set was a very good idea.

(I may re edit this later and crop out some of the extra gobbledygook from each of the individual pictures) so here we go five books for my baby brother for his 22nd birthday. I rock, I'm awesome, he's been enjoying them ever since. Yes this still leaves my title of "Evil older Brother" intact it just also shows that the "Older Brother" part of my title is just as important to me as the evil. Total bill was about 60 bucks, and it was 60 bucks well spent. Sharing hobbies with a sibling or even having a similar if not the same hobby(I'm a big comics fan, he's a huge manga fan, I watch the sub titled anime's but I haven't really gotten into the reading the books stage of my anime viewership yet.I'm currently on Book 3 picture to the upper right hand side of this paragraph. It covers the whole Scott, Romana and Envy(or probably N.V. her name is actually Natalie V. Adams, I could look to see what the V stood for but it's just the first to letters that matter on this one) saga as well as scotts fight with todd Evil Ex number 3. Yeah yeah the whole He's a vegan and thus Awesome thing is in this book but it's more than just the bass battle, and him tricking him so that he would be De-Veganized.

 I like the extra details and the kind of silly stuff that Mr. O'Malley added to the world of scott pilgrim in the graphic novels. It makes scott even more lovelable, moochish(you can be a moocher but not moochish fine new word, I'm claiming it again) and shows how far Sex bob-omb came as a group. Now a little spoiler the movie Scott Pilgrim vs. the world combines all the books into the Second GN's title so each book will be following the escapades to beat each evil Ex until the final Show down with Gideon Graves. Now it's good that they gave us the whole story and so well put together but it's also bad, because that means (for the moment and if they are strictly going by the comics) no sequel and I wouldn't mind seeing scott pilgrim again. the little short scott vs the animation was cool that they showed on CN was fun and a nice piece of backstory. It's most likely from book 4 the whole scott and kim backstory but I wouldn't mind another movie to see what happens to every body.

The fact that (at least up to this point) Roxie Richter wasn't actually in the comics but was created for the game and the movie is awesome. It's another pick on scott moment(hey it works with spidey and look how much dough marvel makes off the Wall crawler, by the way if you don't know how to look up MARVEL COMICS, or who MARVEL COMICS is, nor spiderman you need help, I may link to marvel on a later name drop, just night right now technically this is an Oni Press party so I am trying to give them their well deserved props) . While all in black and white (similar to Sin City) the inking and shading tell the story perfectly without all the extra colors.

I have said it before and will say it again, a good story will ALWAYS trump the flash most people throw at you. I mean some people get a hold of potentially profitable franchises or good characters and make a heart wrenching mess. I am so glad that Universal didn't and that they introduced me fully into the world of Scott Pilgrim, and I thank Bryan Lee O'Malley for creating such an Awkward and loveable character.

The present has been given(gave it to him monday), he has been reading them almost non stop and for good measure we have both rewatched the DVD a few times, some catchy tunes and great action in this movie. This is hollywood the way I like it, not worried about what you can believe and more worried about making sure they Immerse you in the world THEY are creating. The real world is what you go to the theater to escape, not to figure out "hmmm is it going to be believable" make a good story and nobody is worried about believable they are just worried about wow.

*while the pictures taken in this blog were taken by me the characters, artwork, and copyrights belong to Oni Press, Bryan Lee O'malley, and who ever else collaborated on these wonderful graphic novels. I am in no way trying to claim ownership and if asked I will gladly take the pictures down*