Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on Feb 11, 2017 22:48:44 GMT -5
Finally gave in to all your hype and read Vision. Wow. I laughed, I cried, I was as impressed by an overall creative team as I've ever been before. The art, the coloring, even the lettering were just masterful compliments to one of the best superhero stories I've read in decades. I'm probably one of the last ones here to read the series, but if you haven't yet, I encourage you to check it out. Don't let an unfamiliarity with Marvel or superheroes stop you. I haven't followed Marvel closely in decades, but Tom King gives you everything you need to understand the story, and then to completely feel it as well. Wow. You're not the only one... I'm waiting for the trade (which is soon, I think). I wasn't that interested when it came out, but Viv is pretty cool in Champions, and the reviews are pretty crazy good. The compliment "Marvel's Watchmen" is not entirely unwarranted.
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on Feb 11, 2017 21:57:03 GMT -5
Our guardian angel Kurt (Cei-U) has truly done amazing work with the original, pre-Crisis Earth-Two over the years. However, there's a question I asked on PM that I asked if I could share with the larger group, and he didn't object.
The pre-Crisis Earth-Two (as distinguished from the New 52's Earth-2, which uses a numeral instead of a word) & its characters have shown up a few times post-Crisis. This is the most complete list I've been able to collect. Feel free to add others:
-Last Days of the Justice Society 1, pub. 1986, apparently set c. 1986: Most of the JSA is sent off to fight Surter forever. -Infinity Inc. #30: Infinity Inc. mourns the JSA & the last effects of the Crisis shift into place, present-day. -All-Star Squadron #61: The last effects of the Crisis shift into place, WWII-era. -Armageddon: Inferno 3-4, pub. 1992: Attempts to undo Last Days, but gives us back a JSA that's most definitely post-Crisis, placing them in DC's regular continuity. -Zero Hour 4-0, pub. 1994: Collapses the Hawkmen (eliminating the GA one altogether) & ages many JSAers out of existence or at least out of fighting ability. The JSA gets its own series anyway in 1999, another group among many on the post-Crisis New Earth. -JSA Classified 1-4 (starring Power Girl), pub. 2005: Though set on New Earth, Psycho-Pirate talks clearly of Earth-Two, also establishing clearly that PG is actually an Earth-Two character, despite the fact that Earth-Two has never existed. Except it might, soon. -Infinite Crisis 6, pub. 2005: A few JSAers on Alexander Luthor's newly-minted "Earth Two" (Mark II) vaguely recall that they were once residents of Earth-Two. -52 #52, pub. 2006, has a vignette establishing that Earth-Two is back (as are other earths). Huntress and Robin are alive, despite having died under some falling rubble in Crisis on Infinite Earths #12. -JSA (2007 series) #17-20 and Annual #1, pub. 2008, but apparently set c. 1988: Suddenly Earth-Two is back in all its glory, like it'd never left, Huntress and all, and there's no sign that the older JSAers were ever sent away to fight Surter for even a month or two. -JLA Retroactive: The 70s #1, pub. 2011, set c. 1978-1979 based on Zatanna's presence & costume. An "untold story." -Convergence: Action, Detective, Infinity Inc., Justice Society of America, World's Finest, and arguably Plastic Man & the Freedom Fighters (all #1-2), pub. 2015, apparently set c. 1987. Again, we have Huntress & Robin (E2) alive, and the older JSAers are here instead of fighting Surtur.
My big questions: Why are Robin & Huntress alive when they died in CoIE #12? Is the post-Crisis Earth-Two the REAL Earth-Two ... in other words, should this all be official Earth-Two continuity, or is this all Alt-Earth-Two? What's the status of the (newly-reprinted) Last Days of the Justice Society? And has Superboy been at that darned wall again?
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on Feb 11, 2017 21:33:04 GMT -5
I've always wondered why the high-profile Secret Wars was Zeck's worst published story...
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on Feb 11, 2017 14:33:19 GMT -5
I've recently returned to pre-Crisis Superman. I'm up to 1980, and I just finished the Radio Shack TRS-80 giveaway drawn by Starlin & Giordano, a surprisingly awful art pair. I'm sad the Marty Pasko issues are behind me; I think his run was my favorite since Clark joined WGBS. Hey, I actually have that Radio Shack TRS-80 giveaway! By the way, I was watching an episode on my Thundarr, the Barbarian DVD this morning, and I noticed Marty Pasko's name among the writers! Steve Gerber and Mark Evanier, also. Indeed; Thundarr's writing was well above that of most of the Saturday-morning pack. The Radio Shack story is in-continuity, amazingly; the classroom he visits (complete with Alec and Shanna, "the Radio Shack Whiz Kids" 🙄) shows up again in Superman #230 EDIT: and a second Radio Shack giveaway!. I'm currently on DC Comics Presents #26-30, a fantastic run of art by Jim Starlin (sans Giordano) that's often overlooked due to José Luis Garcia Lopez' equally-impressive but better-known ~eight issues tossed in from #1-35. Starlin & Giordano are both great artists, but the same techniques that make Giordano work wonderfully over the dark, angular Neal Adams make him a truly terrible pick on Starlin's rounded, generally lighter art.
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on Feb 11, 2017 0:13:26 GMT -5
Re. modern stuff, I've been reading: -Tom King's output, including the much-lauded The Vision & Omega Men, both rich texts rightly deserving of their praise, -anything Warren Ellis writes, most recently (for my purchases, anyway) his run on Moon Knight; -the near-total Doctor Who, Godzilla, & Rom output from IDW; -the near-total Pulp, King, & 70's output from Dynamite; and precious little else. I'm occasionally tempted by a good DC Rebirth book, like Wonder Woman, or by Dan Slott's Silver Surfer, but not by much else.
In reprints, I'm kept poor by Fantagraphics' ongoing Barks/Rosa HC collections of Disney Ducks (recently expanded into newspaper strips!), as well as by Dark Horse's releasing all those Russ Manning archives (Tarzan, Korak, & Brother of the Spear) at the same time as IDW's Tarzan newspaper volumes. An embarrassment of riches indeed!
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on Feb 10, 2017 18:09:05 GMT -5
I've recently returned to pre-Crisis Superman. I'm up to 1980, and I just finished the Radio Shack TRS-80 giveaway drawn by Starlin & Giordano, a surprisingly awful art pair.
I'm sad the Marty Pasko issues are behind me; I think his run was my favorite since Clark joined WGBS.
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on Feb 9, 2017 9:03:21 GMT -5
This is my first time back in maybe ... two years? Great topic. My want list had recently shrunk big time, as I'd pounded the Bronze Age Superman & Action list down to nothing. However, I then surprised myself by re-expanding it with various issues of Ghosts, Unexpected, Witching Hour, and the two Houses of... series, based on artists I enjoyed. I'm also making an "Earth-Two in the Silver and Bronze Ages" index that I'll probably use as a want list. So yeah, "The end game is death" works for me, too.
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on Aug 24, 2015 21:30:39 GMT -5
Hi guys, Back in the early 1990s, I sold a three-part article to Comics Buyer's Guide, "Proto-Comics: The Proto-History of Comic Books before 1933." Nowadays, we even have a name for this era--the platinum age--but I was actually one of the first guys doing research in the field. This series has actually never been reprinted ... until now, when Amazon.com released them in a Kindle edition. If you want to read the research cited by historians Bob Beerbohm and John A. Lent in their works on the platinum age, then you need "Proto-Comics"! www.amazon.com/Proto-Comics-Proto-History-Comic-Books-Before-ebook/dp/B0143LALBE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1440467857&sr=8-1&keywords=comics+history+protoI hope you enjoy this article as much as I did! It's wonderful how much more we know now than we did then, but it's still pretty fantastic, remembering putting all of this together for the first time!
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on May 11, 2015 17:16:02 GMT -5
Aquaman---Kraven the Hunter Ooh, good one! That creates all kinds of story possibilities, actually...
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on May 11, 2015 17:15:01 GMT -5
Superman: Galactus, w/Terrax as herald Batman: Vermin!!! Wonder Woman: Enchantress & Executioner Aquaman: Klaw Flash: Magneto Green Lantern: A slew of Dire Wraiths (story arc)
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on May 10, 2015 18:18:08 GMT -5
WOW! Jeb Bush: W is my chief foreign policy adviser. Why do I get the feeling that Jeb doesn't want to be president? Or maybe he thinks that voters are really eager for that war with Iran. Yeah, I saw that. It was the moment when I decided I wasn't supporting any Republican at all (as I'd already verified that Huckabee had moved too far right in the last eight years for me to vote for him). So Bernie Sanders it is.
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on May 10, 2015 10:23:59 GMT -5
Like Richard, I'm keeping everyone here, especially Dan, Shax, and Pip, in my prayers.
Regarding sleep problems and aging, the body stops making melatonin, the chemical that makes us naturally go to sleep and stay asleep, as we get older. However, melatonin is actually available as an over-the-counter supplement that one can take in 2.5 or 5 mg doses about 1/2 hour before bed.
Besides that, it's basic stuff like stay away from computers/tablets/cell phones for an hour before bed, get regular exercise, try to keep meals and sleep to a schedule so your circadian rhythm can set itself up in a strong pattern, try to get sunlight during the daytime (also for circadian rhythm), watch PM caffeine intake, and the things doctors always say. But the melatonin has made a huge difference for me all by itself.
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on May 7, 2015 16:22:09 GMT -5
This really is a wonderful community. It's a real shame that my workplace figured out how to block it! An important FYI: 1 (800) 273-8255 National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on May 5, 2015 15:03:38 GMT -5
In the wake of seeing the *awesome* new movie, I reread Avengers #57-58, which I sometimes name as my favorite Avengers story, and other times merely rank in my top 3. Given that context, did you (or did anyone) catch the movie's Easter egg of what Ultron was wearing when he introduced himself to Wanda and Pietro?
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Polar Bear
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Post by Polar Bear on May 5, 2015 14:59:49 GMT -5
Counseling would be good, yes. But she needs to go in for individual counseling, too, as Rob Allen gently suggests, for a diagnosis of exactly what's going on there. (You could put it gently by saying that maybe each of you should have individual counseling too, that each of you should see a psychologist at least once or twice, or something like that.)
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