Tag Archives: Marvel

Iron Man Three (**1/2)

5 May

Robert Downey Jr. returns as adorable bad boy Tony Stark in the third, presumably final solo film about Marvel Comics’ Iron Man. The first film kicked off the current run of (mostly) enjoyable Marvel movies, after some letdowns in the form of X3, Spider-Man 3, the Fantastic Four and so on. The first Iron Man film proved that with the right cast and script and attitude, the public will embrace a character they don’t necessarily know as well as, say, Superman. The second Iron Man film proved that Downey was not enough.

The third is not as fresh and invigorating as the first – how could it be, really? – but it is a definite improvement over the second. Nor is it anywhere near as exciting as the Avengers film, which it references regularly, so if you are one of the few people on the planet who missed it, you might want to check it out first.

Some minor spoilers may follow, so be warned:

I had mixed feelings about this film by the end. There are some very fun moments, especially during the action set pieces, and Downey is on his game throughout. I also enjoyed how the plot is, in a way, a poke in the eye to The Dark Knight Rises, with Ben Kingsley’s Mandarin seeming at first to be an analogue for Bane’s weirdly-accented terrorist. The true villain is Guy Pearce as the chief of AIM (who are, disappointingly, not wearing yellow hazmat suits); he has developed a bioweapon called Extremis that allows people to become undetectable living bombs, detonating themselves at key moments.

When one of the bombs hurts a friend, the American public is eager for Tony Stark to strike back at the terrorists, and he obliges by challenging the Mandarin on camera. The Mandarin replies by sending some of his people to destroy Tony’s Malibu home, leading to a long middle sequence of rebuilding and investigating.

It is that middle where the film loses its way a bit. Tony befriends a young boy outside of Nashville, shares some ham-handed insights on absent fathers and standing up for yourself, and learns to cope with the post-traumatic stress that has dogged him since The Avengers. Meanwhile, I was checking my watch, and I don’t wear a watch.

On the bright side, the finish of Iron Man Three (and I’m not being cute by spelling it out that way; that’s how it is spelled in the titles) is stronger than the finish of Iron Man 1 or 2, both of which were clunky and confused. The conceit of Tony being able to control his suits remotely, and depend on Jarvis for situational awareness and quick changes, is used to good effect. I enjoyed seeing a swarm of different suits designed for different jobs.

But, on a less bright side, when the credits rolled and turned into a kind of victory lap for the series, I realized that the ensuing montage of clips was more engaging and energetic than most of the previous two hours. So, while Iron Man Three is certainly not the letdown that other third instalments have been from Marvel, it is something of a limp to the finish.

Tags: , , , ,

Digital Comics Thoughts, Fall 2012

19 Oct

You may recall that after the beginning of this year, I bought an iPad and posted some words about digital comics, particularly what they should cost (especially if they are coming from a major publisher) and how they could be produced by independent artists. It’s hard to believe that it was less than a year ago that people were fretting about how Marvel and DC would get their books to market, what it would cost, how it would impact comic shops, and so on.

My opinions on all of that stuff have not changed much, but I do have more data to work with now in terms of my own experience and buying habits, so I thought I would check in. So, here is a bit of an update:

1) Paid legal downloads. I don’t do a lot of this, and when I do it tends to be either a title on sale in Comixology or one that is “on special” for a limited time. I usually hear about these deals on Twitter, where I follow dozens of cartoonists and publishers who work in all genres. I have not yet gotten into the habit of checking Comixology every Wednesday to see what’s new; but then I haven’t been in that habit with comic shops for a long time either. Generally, I don’t care for paying a same-as-print price for a digital file which I can’t freely copy but which I have to store; this applies to video games and other software as well as comics. That said, I have found some nice gems when I bother to look, like Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover’s Bandette or Penny Arcade’s Lookouts comic.

2) Unpaid legal downloads. Some artists, especially webcomics artists, have experimented with providing samplers or archives of their work for free, like Rich Stevens’ Diesel Sweeties or Mark Waid’s Insufferable. J. Torres invited reviewers to do the same with the first volume of his series Bigfoot Boy, drawn by Faith Erin Hicks; a book which I recently picked up in print. I expect I will do something similar in the future once I have enough instalments of my own webcomic, Time Wounds All Heels, built up.

3) Unpaid borrowed downloads. This is probably more common with regular novels being lent as ebooks through public libraries, but I have been able to read a fair number of graphic novels lately through a galley service, which provides DRM-protected books that expire after a few months. They are intended to be read in Adobe Digital Editions, which is a terrible thing to try to read with on a standard computer screen; and thanks to Adobe’s butthurt over Apple not wanting to deal with the piece of shit known as Flash, there is no version of ADE for the iPad. Fortunately, an independent app called the Bluefire Reader will handle ADE content, so I am able to read those books in a comfortable format. The tradeoff is that if I finish a book, I write a review about it on my blog and send the resulting link to the publisher. Seems fair enough. It tends to be smaller publishers like First Second, who can harness the power of online reviews for their sort of books perhaps a little better than a more-scrutinized publisher like Marvel. My only complaint about this route is that some publishers do not provide a very readable copy of the book; presumably concerned about DRM being broken and PDFs of their books being released into the wild, they submit a very low resolution file that makes the artwork look like shit and the text difficult to read. In which case, why bother?

4) Free online comics. Apart from the above mentioned galleys of graphic novels, these are far and away my most common source for reading comics now, from old favourites like John Allison and Tatsuya Ishida to relatively new ones like Kate Leth or Eric Dyck. Webcomics artists support themselves all kinds of ways, from website ads and physical merchandise to day jobs and commissions. I try to support the ones I like however I can.

5) Ethically questionable downloads. Let me get this out of the way: I download torrents of stuff, especially TV shows, movies recently released on DVD, and the occasional album by some band I want to check out. Downloading torrents is legal in Canada (though uploading is not, resulting in some confusion, but I suspect the main goal is to discourage wholesale widespread piracy rather than downloading something for personal use). I have no qualms about downloading TV shows; to me it is no different from having digital cable, and it is not my problem that Media Corporation A has not yet figured out how to measure and bill Media Corporation B for it. The big reason I don’t have reservations about downloading TV or new DVD releases is that the quality of the resulting file is not a replacement for what you would buy; it’s watchable (usually) but it’s not HD, it’s just a compressed AVI or Quicktime rip of a better quality product. I think it’s fair in the sense of sampling, and there have been numerous occasions where downloading that way has led me to buy the DVD later for myself or as a gift.

However, I am not so comfortable with downloading rips of digital comics as torrents, or ebooks, or other situations where the file you get is basically the file you would get if you paid for it. As a result, I have done very little torrenting of comics, with the exception of a few situations where I have already paid for the series in print and would like to have a digital copy to carry around or refer to. The most notable instance of this is Lone Wolf and Cub, which I originally bought in the form of Dark Horse’s tiny trade paperbacks; 27 volumes at about $12 a pop, totalling over $300 in comics which due to my advancing age and sudden need for bifocals, I could no longer read. So, I downloaded them and am not losing any sleep over it. Your mileage (and local laws) may vary, of course.

So, the main lesson I have taken away from owning an iPad so far is that I am reading more digital comics than I expected I would even a few months ago, and sometimes even paying for them despite my initial skepticism of services like Comixology. If there is ever a service like Netflix for comics that allows access to a content library for a flat fee, I would probably be all over it. Publishers with deep backlists, like Marvel and DC, might want to consider it as a way to generate interest in the current adventures of their characters.

Tags: , , , , ,

The Moral of the Story

2 Jun

It’s been one of those weeks where the same issue – in this case, gay rights – got raised from a variety of sources. It’s an issue that I care about, but I weirdly also have little patience for thinking about it or discussing it, because in my mind, it should already be settled. It IS settled. It has been for a long time, whatever some idiots say, and we are suffering through the period where courts and laws must catch up to common sense. Oh, and full disclosure for those few who don’t know: I’m bisexual, and therefore a member of the only sexual orientation hated by gay and straight alike. :P

Anyway, the first source of discussion I noticed this week was a story about US retailer JC Penney. You may recall that a laughably misnamed interest group called the Million Mom March threatened to boycott JCP for hiring known lesbian Ellen DeGeneres as their spokesperson. JCP told them to cram it, correctly reading the general sentiment of the American public; and this week they went further, unveiling a rather sweet Father’s Day ad that shows a handsome pair of men spending time with their sons. I lauded JCP on Twitter for it and told them that if they had stores in Canada, I would shop there.

The second source of discussion was a CBC story about a college in nearby Moncton called Crandall University – formerly known as the Atlantic Baptist College. They are in a spot of hot water because of their policy not to hire (openly) gay people. They feel they have the right to do this due to their religious affiliation (name change notwithstanding) and have created a “morals clause” for employees that prohibits homosexuality. Meanwhile, they are partially funded by the tax dollars of my province. I think that ought to stop. Well, the bigotry should stop too obviously, but I am not going to waste my breath on people who believe in a magic man in the sky that sends us one place or another after we die. They can believe any crazy old things they like; just don’t expect me to fund it, and don’t expect public schools to hire your “graduates.”

The third source of discussion came from good old DC Comics, who has watched their New 52 Whoop-De-Doo relaunch lose steam and devolve into the same old. They decided a good way to get some publicity would be to introduce one of the newly revised characters as gay. I would like to believe that there is some good motivation behind it too, or at least some kind of desire to reflect the reality of the world today in their comics, but my gut reaction (again, immortalized on Twitter) was to scoff at them. Later today I wondered, was that fair of me? Why three cheers for JC Penney and an eye roll for DC?

In the end I suppose it’s because it is such a feeble gesture on DC’s part. For those who have the sense to avoid mainstream comics news, the gay character is the original Green Lantern, called Alan Scott. The character is many decades old; I first became aware of him as the “Golden Age” Green Lantern, a member of the Justice Society. As such, he was always of marginal interest to most of my generation and I would think even less to those that followed. JC Penney is all in; DC is extremely late to the party, and while I do think James Robinson is a good writer, I have to wonder what the depiction of a gay relationship in a superhero comic will be like.

It’s all well and good for Archie Comics to introduce a gay character and have him go to Riverdale High or whatever; Archie Comics are all about relationships, stunted as they may be. I have not yet had the pleasure of reading Mr. Keller’s adventures but I have heard good things and I hope that somewhere out there, gay little kids are enjoying the fact that one of them is on the comics page. When they get older, they can graduate to Alison Bechdel or Love and Rockets or Stuck Rubber Baby.

But DC? Or Marvel, for that matter? How do they depict normal human relationships, straight or gay? As obstacles that must be overcome in the life of a hero. As hostages to be dropped from the Brooklyn Bridge. I hope that won’t happen to Alan Scott’s partner. It doesn’t have to be that way, of course; the original Lee and Ditko Spider-Man tales were an extraordinary depiction of a young man balancing learning to be a superhero and coping with family and friends. Kurt Busiek did a good job of grounding his Astro City characters at times. But for the most part, the superhero’s loved one – especially romantic partner – winds up in the refrigerator. And in a world like that, the sexual orientation of a superhero is pretty irrelevant. It also leaves a bad aftertaste to see DC making a press release event out of it, and Marvel competing by having their token-gay-superhero-that-no-one-cares-about, Northstar, get married. It would have been much more interesting and classy for them to take the J.K. Rowling route, casually mentioning after the last Harry Potter book was published that Dumbledore was gay and so what if he was?

Anyway, those are my scattered thoughts, for what they are worth. Whatever their intentions, I hope that those who at least try to do the right thing, be they JC Penney or DC Comics, succeeds. And Crandall University, well; they can stop being hypocrites and accepting tax funds collected from the many New Brunswickers who are gay or believe in gay rights. They can fund their little college solely from the contributions of those who agree with their “morals.” I’m sure that will take them far.

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

The Avengers [2012] (****)

5 May

This review is of course about the Marvel movie directed by Joss Whedon, not the much less interesting adaptation of the classic British series about John Steed and Mrs. Peel. Though it would be fun to see Whedon try his hand at that too.

Well, what can I say? Marvel promised a lot with its credit cookies, starting in Iron Man and leading up through last year’s Captain America film, and all of the setup films were pretty good, even great, with the exception of Iron Man 2. So how good is The Avengers? It’s about as good as all those other films put together. Indeed, it is up there with X-Men: First Class and Spider-Man 2 in terms of pure superhero film vision.

It could have gone horribly wrong. After all, The Avengers comics have gone up and down over the years and if someone were to ask me “what is the definitive Avengers story?” I would have no answer. But now I do. It’s this story, by Whedon and Zack Penn, neatly unifying a number of subplots from all the other films. After striking a deal with an alien army, Loki has returned to Earth to find the Tesseract, which we used to call the Cosmic Cube when I was a kid. This all-powerful artifact is under guard by S.H.I.E.L.D., but they do not quite have the resources to defend against Loki, so after a certain bit of ado, ta-da! The Avengers. And that is all I will give away about the plot.

The movie is long, but doesn’t feel long. The first half is concerned with assembling the team, getting a sense of how the different personalities do and do not mesh, and the second half is an insane city-destroying battle; pretty much all that you would hope to see in a story where the stakes have to be high enough to call in “Earth’s mightiest heroes”. Everyone has time to shine at least a little and Whedon lingers especially on Captain America and Iron Man, which makes sense I suppose due to their recent storylines in the Civil War comics. I enjoyed Hawkeye and Black Widow far more than I expected and certainly more than I ever did in the comics.

But the real revelation for me in this film was The Hulk. I liked the first two Hulk films well enough, for what they were; but I love him in this movie. Mark Ruffalo does a superb job as the tortured Dr. Banner, now able to exercise more self-control and function in a team. The Hulk also gets some tremendous moments in the battle, a couple of which made me laugh very hard. British actor Tom Hiddleston is a close runner-up as Loki, creating a more three-dimensional villain than in the Thor solo film and stealing every scene in which he appears.

The supporting characters are well-used in Whedon’s script too, from the familiarity between Pepper Potts and Agent Coulson to the interplay between Col. Fury and Agent Hill (Cobie Smulders). Stellan Skarsgard reprises his role as the scientist from Thor, and there is even a moment to note the whereabouts of Natalie Portman’s character.

This film is so good, such a perfect distillation of its various source materials, that I almost wish there did not have to be a sequel; but there almost certainly will be. As with all of the other films in this series, be sure to stay through the credits for not one but two credit cookies: the first of which made me nod knowingly, and the second made me laugh and say “oh, Joss.” I look forward to seeing it again, as soon as possible.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Open Letter to Nicolas Cage

10 Feb

Hi Mr. Cage,

I’m writing because you’re on David Letterman right now promoting your new film, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance. I enjoyed the first Ghost Rider film, was pleasantly surprised that such a thing could even exist, much less be a fun movie and a good adaptation of the comics.

I know that you’re a fan of comics too, that’s why I wanted to write you and let you know about the creator of Ghost Rider, Gary Friedrich; today he was ordered to pay Marvel Comics $17,000 and to stop claiming that he created the character for the purposes of making money. Essentially, Marvel and its parent company, Disney, are asserting trademark ownership of the character and of course they are within their rights to do so. However, myself and many others who love and make comics feel that this judgement is needlessly punitive to Mr, Friedrich, who like many retired comics industry veterans does not have a lot of money to spare, much less $17,000 to give to one of the richest companies in the world. Here’s an article about the case:
http://www.comicsalliance.com/2012/02/09/ghost-rider-creator-lawsuit/

Anyway, Mr. Cage, I don’t have any specific request for you, I just wanted to bring this matter to your attention in the hope that you or your fans can do something to help the man who created the character that you have brought to life on the screen so well. The film and comics industries are big businesses and they protect their properties within the letter of the law – sometimes going so far as to lobby for laws to be modified so they can protect them longer or more strenuously. But what good are these laws if the creators of the characters we love have to worry about going broke in their retirement?

I’m reminded of a line from one of my favourite movies, “My Favourite Year” starring Mark Linn-Baker and Peter O’Toole. After a huge TV star threatens to cut an aging movie star from his show, a young comedy writer tells his boss:

King, you’re a big star now, and I’m sure you always will be. But suppose someday you end up like this. I hope nobody does to you what you’re doing to him.

Thanks for your time, Mr. Cage, and good luck with your movie. I’m looking forward to seeing it.

Yours truly,

Scott Marshall
Saint John, NB, Canada

[Updates: Steve Niles has created a donation button for those who want to support Gary Friedrich.

Very amusing comments by the very amusing Ty Templeton on how this issue has brought out the worst in entitled fans.

And while I'm at it, here's some comments from the always wise Mark Evanier, and some additional insight from the other side of the desk by Jim Shooter.

Finally, about a week after the original story broke, reassurances from Marvel chiefs that convention sketches will not bring the wrath of God down upon cartoonists - provided they are part of a "Marvel-positive" experience. In other words, no Air Pirates-style shenanigans where the characters are shown in X-rated situations and the like. Hardly surprising.

As I write this update, this post has become by far the most-read post on my blog, and Nic Cage's second Ghost Rider film opens in two days. Thanks for reading it, I hope it gave you something to think about and I hope it inspires you to (1) think about what you support with your entertainment dollars and (2) read contracts carefully before you sign them. :) ]

Tags: , , , , ,

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 554 other followers

%d bloggers like this: