GottaGetAGrip

Quit a fair bit of ugly-bumping in this film, but alas none of it involving a fully-armored participant.

Bit of a shortsighted move on the local Cinemark to get rid of the "social distance ticketing" policy when not nearly enough people in the States are vaccinated and there's a few nasty variants mutating...

Anyways went to see The Green Knight as my second "return to theaters" film - an arthouse take on the Arthurian legend. There are some absolutely spellbinding sequences in the film, but I suppose I'll have to rewatch it down the line or think over it for a few more days for as a whole the artsiness of it all hasn't totally cohered for me yet. Perhaps it needed a couple of war elephants?

Bit odd that Constantine is being written off the show, but Ryan's sticking around to portray an OC.

I wonder if this is a case of WB/DC once again going with the "there can only be one!" adaptation mindset, considering how there's an HBO Max Constantine in development by JJ's company and John hasn't been confirmed to be part of the Netflix Sandman adaptation yet either...

If so, it's a kind of mindset that seems to be applied only when the powers that be feel like it, considering they seem to have no issue with two simultaneous live-action Flashes (speaking of, the upcoming Flash film will have both Michael Keaton and Ben Affleck returning as Batman while Robert Pattinson stars in his own Bat-film while Iain Glen portrays Bruce Wayne in the Titans series)

Heads up: to tie-in with the incoming second season, Amazon is temporarily making the first Sandman Audible drama free.

I suppose I'll listen up to the part with Egerton's John.

Max Allan Collins isn't too pleased with a certain element of Brian Azzarello's upcoming Suicide Squad mini - in that his creation Wild Dog is reimagined as taking part in the January 6th insurrection.

Now I don't think I've ever actually read a MAC comic (unless you count the movie of Road to Perdition) or prior comics featuring the character of Wild Dog but I will say that Azzarello is probably the last writer or among the last writers on Earth I'd expect to be able to incorporate *that* recent real-life event into a comic book and handle it well.

(Maybe Azzarello thinks he's doing some "clever" commentary on how vigilante characters like the Punisher got appropriated by the Far Right)

I'm surprised that editorial somehow okay'ed it, more than anything. Wonder if there will subsequently be a rush to censor those references like a certain Bat-dong from another Azzarello Black Label project after release if the controversy happens to go mainstream again.

Saw it at a drive-in theater sometime in October of last year.

(Yes, there's a whole chain of those still in operation in this part of the states)

In retrospect a drive-in screen with car lights shining on it and a train rattling by every other couple of minutes wasn't the optimal setting to watch it.

I appreciated the second viewing on blu-ray disc months later much more.

Surprisingly I had little reaction to my second shot (considering that I was feeling pretty bad for like two days after Dose 1 and the things I've heard about Dose 2, I was kind of expecting an alien to burst out of my chest amidst a euphoric daze of pain, or something like that). The arm was even sore for less time than it was after the first dose.

(Moderna for the record)

Still, it's nice to finally go out and do some things I haven't done in over a year now that I'm fully shot up. Though a year of leisurely convenient streaming has soured me even more on movie theaters' insistence of playing nearly thirty minutes of commercials after the supposed showtime has started...

Aaron Campbell of the gone-too-soon Sandman U Hellblazer fame has been periodically posting teasers from his next DC Comics project on Twitter.

Given that Si sometimes retweets these, I'm hoping this means he'll be the writer (or maybe he's just being supportive).

Since there's a new movie coming out soon and based off some of Campbell's previous teasers, I'd previously guessed it's going to be another Black Label Suicide Squad book but this tease of the Superman emblem does throw some curves into the speculation.

More casting.

Edit: From Neil's mouth directly: Jenna Coleman is actually playing both Johanna as originally seen in the comics and a gender-swapped version of modern John Constantine?

Or maybe Johanna Constantine's a bloody time-lord or highlander in this show's version of things.

(Maybe Neil wanted to beat the rumors that the JJ Abrams' produced Hellblazer show for HBO was looking to cast a diverse John to the punch eh)

Coincidentally I'm playing through the updated PS4 version of the game right now. This is the first time I've touched the game since spending far too much time on the original PS3 edition. It's hard to believe that it will soon be ten years...

(That stranger storyline with the racists harassing Mexican immigrants is a bit more uncomfortable to play in a post-Trump world than it was back when Obama was in office, to put it lightly)

I can't dust off a PS3 right now to see just how improved the graphics and performance is, but I can appreciate the additional songs and first person mode - the latter takes some time to get used to and there are times when the original third person camera is far better for gameplay but it does a good job of playing the game from a whole new angle.

Though part of me will always hold it against Rockstar for choosing the more profitable route of going all in on supporting the online multiplayer instead of developing sizable single player expansions like they did for GTAIV.

Constantine will be getting a pin-up in DC's soon-to-be released Pride special anthology, though there won't be an actual story involving him.

She could've been just referring to John's appearances as part of Ram V's Justice League Dark, though that's been reduced from an ongoing series to a back-up for Bendis' Justice League.

And in other news, Brian Azzarello is doing a Suicide Squad mini, entitled "Get Joker." Blink twice if you're drawing this against your will, Alex Maleev!

DC Comics is setting up another mature readers imprint, this time a horror themed imprint with the imaginative title of DC Horror.

Their first title (with more to be announced this July) is not a preexisting DC property or original creator-owned work but instead a spin-off for the Conjuring movie franchise.

(I'm not exactly sure why there needs to be a wholly separate imprint for books like this when Black Label probably covers the same ground unless DC plans to use Horror as the home for licensed titles)

Cruel Summer - a deluxe-sized hardcover collection of issues 1 and 5-12 of Brubaker and Phillip's latest Criminal series (the missing issues are standalone stories that have been collected elsewhere). The aging patriarch of the series' Lawless family pulls off one last heist in a prequel that fleshes out the backstory of the original Criminal comics. It isn't revolutionary work and the ending does feel somewhat rushed, but it is a very refined collaboration between a proven team that is a must-read for Brubaker/Phillips fans.

Jimmy Olsen by Matt Fraction - spinning out of (I presume) Bendis' Superman work comes Matt Fraction's first work for DC (that I know of). Who killed Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen? That's the mystery he'll have to solve after faking his own death, but not before getting into twelve issues worth of wacky hijinks.  If you aren't a fan of Matt Fraction's "look at how hip I am" writing style this isn't going to be a pleasant one to read. Even as someone who can occasionally enjoy Fraction, I found that the series' premise (issues are generally comprised of short non-linear vignettes rife with "funny captions/narration") ultimately wound up a bit too thinly stretched.

DC is doing a set of Internet polls to determine which new series* gets made. I suspect this is just going to boil down to whichever pitch has the character with most built-in name recognition. None of them from their brief descriptions in the link seem all too exciting, especially with DC withholding the creative teams until a later date.

*I don't expect most of these will be more than a six-issue mini if they end up being made

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1779513615?

So Amazon and other sites have leaked a listing for a yet to be announced two-issue Grant Morrison-written Superman/Authority crossover book, with Mikel Janin on art.

I guess Morrison wasn't content with Green Lantern being their final word on DC.

I suppose Jim Lee will never give up on trying to integrate the Wildstorm Universe into the Mainline DC Universe!

(Also is it just me or does Mikel Janin's rendition of Superman villain Manchester Black look like he literally just traced over and altered details on one of his preexisting John Constantine drawings)

https://aiptcomics.com/2021/03/12/dc-comics-ennis-sharp-dc-black-label-batman-reptilian/

Garth Ennis and Liam Sharp are collaborating on a Black Label Batman mini.

I imagine Garth is doing a Batman book because he really needed to make the payment on a new car or something.

Gorgeous art from Sharp, regardless!

The McKenzie-Miller stories generally get recollected alongside the Miller run proper whenever Marvel puts out collections of Miller's Daredevil.

Maybe to contextualize the impact of Miller's run, or maybe so they can pad Miller's Daredevil trades out to three volumes instead of two!

Reading the second Del Rey collection of Elric, entitled "To Rescue Tanelorn." Unlike the first Del Rey Elric collection, which was a straightforward collection of the early stories in chronological order, this one's more of odds and ends for the entire Eternal Champion concept rather than a specific focus on the titular character. In fact, some of the stories don't even involve Elric - there's a novella version of Moorcock's The Eternal Champion and a sizable excerpt from the first Jerry Cornelius novel collected in the contents, among other things.

Though who knows? Maybe the half of the book I haven't read yet will up the Elric stories exponentially.

Playing Spider-Man Miles Morales. The PS4 edition, as I'm in no state to try and gamble for a PS5 right now. But even in its last-generation form, the presentation of the game still excels. It's a standalone expansion - not quite a sequel - to the PS4 Spider-Man title, following up on that game's portrayal of Miles Morales as he comes into his own as Spider-Man 2. Peter's in it briefly, but quickly leaves on vacation so Miles can have all the spotlight for himself.

It's very much more of the same in a more succinct package due to the game's smaller scope (in just a few days I'm already at 60+ percent completion), but when the original game did such a superb job of capturing the feeling of playing as Spider-Man it's hard to complain about it. These games may very well have dethroned the Batman Arkham titles as the standard-setters for comic book video games.

Si Spencer isn't a writer who I read too much of, but the work that I did read often turned out to be something I enjoyed. The comics scene will be all the poorer with his passing.

Remember New 52 I Vampire being one of the better New 52 titles, though its writer's take on Constantine wasn't one of the high points. Also was a series where a lot of the appeal was in part to Andrea Sorrentino's artwork, and he sadly left for the final stretch of the series.

Not getting involved with whatever's going on in DC's Future State (and not much of the post-FS DC slate appeals to me) but I did spend the past few months reading some older material.

New 52 Suicide Squad - for some reason, I brought the first four volumes when Comixology put it on sale. Like many New 52 books, the Adam Glass run of Vol 1-3 is not very good, to put it succinctly. Ales Kot takes over the book for Vol 4, but he only does four issues before leaving the book. To date, this remains Ales Kot's only DC work. Not a must-read in Kot's bibliography, for the completionists only, but still outshines the Glass issues by far.

Phil Jimenez's Wonder Woman - the Omnibus edition went on sale and I took a chance on it. It collects his twenty-something issue run and some extras like the Donna Troy resurrection mini he did years later. Jimenez's Wonder Woman is ultimately okay. There's a lot to like about his ideas and characterization but on the downside Jimenez's writing isn't as polished as his artwork despite his clear love for the character. He is a frequent victim of the "why use 10 words when you can use 20 instead" mindset and there are many instances of clunky exposition.

On another note, it is kind of funny to see how sensibly Jimenez draws Wonder Woman and avoids blatant sexualization, only for that modesty to go flying out the window whenever a guest artist pops in.

If you're already a fan of Wonder Woman, his run is probably worth checking out down the line but for casual readers stuff like Rucka or even Azzarello might be better to start with.

Though another Azzarello DC comic I recently read isn't something I'd recommend, unless you really love looking at Jim Lee art. It's his Superman story, For Tomorrow. It starts off promising enough but the plot quickly devolves into what feels like excuses to create fight scenes for Jim Lee to draw. And you can tell through Azzarello's approach to Superman that he was kind of struggling to write a hero who wasn't a morally ambiguous hard-boiled jerk at this point in his career.

Old thread, but I figure this is the most relevant place for this bit of news:

Simon Spurrier did a Reddit q&a about his DC comics work last week.

Some highlights:

• His favorite issue is #9, the one with the unicorn
• Sadly, no plans for more Hellblazer at the moment, but he does have upcoming DC Black Label projects and another project with Campbell in development.
• The Noah twist is something that was planned from the start, but he did have to reveal it earlier than he wanted due to the cancellation.
• Spurrier's coy with just what exactly he would've done if the book hadn't been cancelled in case he gets to do more Hellblazer in the future, but he does let slip:
  • The next arc would take place in America and the state of John's body at the end of twelve would be a problem he'd have to solve.
  • Swamp Thing and Clarice are characters he'd considered using in the future. Sadly for Tefe fans, he had no plans for her. Same goes for the First of the Fallen.
• His favorite three classic Hellblazer runs are Delano, Ennis, and Carey.

The biggest problem I found with Azzarello's run based on my last reread is that everything (except for Freezes Over) in some way is leading up to Ashes & Dust, which just taints everything to some extent, even the better stuff like Lapdogs & Englishmen. Guess that's why Freezes Over is the best of the run, even if it is still rife with Azzarello's Total Asshole characterization of Constantine.

But Azzarello's run isn't totally irredeemable - Freezes Over and Lapdogs in spite of SW are Azzarello's best stories, parts of Hard Time and Highwater are good, and I'd also say the first issue of Good Intentions about John hitchhiking the backwoods is good as well - too bad the rest of the story arc spiraled off into that nonsense about porn and dogs. And of course, Marcelo Frusin's art!

While we're here on the topic of Azzarello, I checked out the newly released Bermejo DC artbook on Hoopla, the digital library service. It's got multiple interviews with Bermejo and his various collaborators like Azzarello about his various art jobs and the odd writing job at DC over the years, including one where he names a Hellblazer cover as his all-time favorite cover:

Sadly no one in the book ever asks Azzarello or Bermejo about the Batawang in Batman Damned.