The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Aug 14, 2022 18:24:43 GMT -5
After getting back into the states late Friday night and traveling back to Pittsburgh on Saturday morning, no one in my family had any energy to do anything (except my older daughter, who picked up a late-afternoon lifeguarding shift at our pool to cover for someone who didn't bother to show up). So, while my younger daughter caught up with all of her friends via text and my wife watched an old Cary Grant movie and crashed out around 8:30, I binged the first five episodes of the show, and I have to say that they did a really nice job with the first half of the season. First episode was fairly faithful to the comic, which I think was needed to set up the story. Didn't really like the voiceovers from Dream, but I understood they were necessary to move the story forward without wasting too much time trying to "show" what was happening. Second episode was fine. Liked Cain and Abel. Other than that, don't remember too much, but I may have been drifting in and out during it. Third episode left me flat, which was disappointing, because I ADORE Jenna Coleman. The writers completely missed the character, as they wrote Constantine as cheeky and capricious, not a selfish blighter who uses everyone around him/her to further his/her own ends. Also, I wish they could have found anyone other than Patton Oswalt to voice Matthew, not because I don't like him but because he's done so much that I find it hard to separate him from other things I've heard and seen him in (Gravity Falls, that abomination of a MODOK show, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., etc.). Fourth episode was hit or miss. The visuals of Hell were sufficiently disturbing (such as the tortured soul holding the mallet for the gong, as well as the trail of the damned), but there was something...off...about Gwendoline Christie's Lucifer. She's a good actress (LOVED her in GoT), she had the right look, and yet, she just didn't seem like Lucifer to me. Fifth episode was bananas, in a great way. The writers took something that was already creepy in the comics and somehow, they turned it up to 11. David Thewlis was fantastic, menacing but not maniacal, frightening but not frightful. This was definitely my favorite episode of the five. Got my survey this afternoon and completed it, even though I'm only halfway through the season. Will be watching at least one episode tonight, maybe two if the wife decides to turn in early again. And I just started to watch The Boys, too! Curse you, time-consuming televisual offer!!! I'm in the same boat as you, my friend. I finished Season 1 of The Boys right before leaving on vacation and I want to get back into it, but now there is this lovely thing in front of me. Decisions, decisions...
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Aug 13, 2022 12:46:50 GMT -5
Unfortunately, I haven’t seen any episodes due to being on vacation, although I fully intend to dive in possibly as early as this evening. On the plus side, without the distraction of TV for nine days, I was able to read through 2/3 of American Gods, so I have that going for me.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 29, 2022 20:26:37 GMT -5
Never read the comic, but I started watching the show this week, primarily because I love Supernatural (also done by Eric Kripke, and I want to see Jensen Ackles in a different role later on). Just finished Episode 5 of the first season, and have just one thing to say about it thus far:
Forking diabolical.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 28, 2022 6:18:28 GMT -5
Damn. I’m so sad for bert. Can’t imagine what’s he’s feeling and going through right now.
Not sure if he’ll see this, but I hope bert knows how much many of us love and care about him.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 25, 2022 14:00:23 GMT -5
Looks excellent to me. So with Namor showing up, who is the biggest Marvel character (leaving aside members of the FF who will be upcoming) that hasn't been in an MCU movie? And the X-Men probably aren't available...though we did see one of them. So of characters who are available. Wonder man? Maybe. I’d argue it’s Ghost Rider, since Kevin Feige seems damned and determined to not allow Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D to be considered canon, much like the Inhumans as well.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 24, 2022 11:54:57 GMT -5
That looks utterly fantastic and epic in scale.
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Post by The Captain on Jul 23, 2022 7:04:11 GMT -5
Snap was literally the only thing that was decent in the Chuck Wendig books, but I liked him alot less in the Poe Dameron series.. he kinda grew up to be an old Curmudgeon. I'd never say someone should read those, though, so unless you suffered through them, you can't really appreciate it I suppose. It seemed like such an odd story to have all these characters pretending that this guys death was some big deal. A eulogy for Luke or Han? Sure. But having one for Snap is like eulogizing Porkins or the Walrus man from the cantina...what's the point? Excuse me, but how dare you disrespect Ponda Baba, the Aqualish bodyguard and partner-in-crime of Dr. Cornelius Evazan, who smuggled spice for Jabba? Bunch of savages in this town.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 23, 2022 6:59:28 GMT -5
Picked up a copy of Amazing Spider-Man Epic Collection, Volume 8, entitled “Man-Wolf at Midnight” yesterday, which covers issues 124 - 142. I have a handful of these as floppies, so the big draw was getting a bunch of expensive issues, including 129, for $40. I now own a copy of every ASM in one format or another from 1 - 400, so I can get down to the heavy work of actually reading my entire way through the rest of the series (I stopped at the end of the last Epic because there was too big a gap between 123 and where my floppies began). What about the clone saga that uses the other Spider-man titles to tell the story ? It becomes much more than 400 , I think. Nope, no Clone Saga. Avoided that completely. I have Spectacular from 1 - 203, which is the last issue of that book tied to the Maximum Carnage crossover. I only own about 20 or so issues of Web, mostly ones that tie into the other ones (Kraven’s Last Hunt, Maximum Carnage).
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 23, 2022 5:29:01 GMT -5
I now own a copy of every ASM in one format or another from 1 - 400, so I can get down to the heavy work of actually reading You have some unpleasant task ahead. I couldn't get past Amazing Spider-Man #325 and only read #400 out of curiosity. Funny you say this, because I started ASM around 305 or so and have actually read all the way up to 375 previously, so I’ve gotten through the worst of it already apparently.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 22, 2022 18:25:11 GMT -5
Picked up a copy of Amazing Spider-Man Epic Collection, Volume 8, entitled “Man-Wolf at Midnight” yesterday, which covers issues 124 - 142. I have a handful of these as floppies, so the big draw was getting a bunch of expensive issues, including 129, for $40. I now own a copy of every ASM in one format or another from 1 - 400, so I can get down to the heavy work of actually reading my entire way through the rest of the series (I stopped at the end of the last Epic because there was too big a gap between 123 and where my floppies began). What’s your earliest floppy? #65, then nothing until 120, although I did own a 101 at one point in time. Early in my collecting, I focused on my floppy X-Men run, and have everything from 94 up, plus a handful of issues pre-reprints (including 10 and 13). Then I moved to Captain America and have every issue from 100 up, as well as some ToS issues, in floppies. ASM was something that I didn't try too hard on because I knew I would never be able to afford the entire run due to all of the high-priced issues in the first 50 or so.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 22, 2022 17:38:50 GMT -5
Today my Thor: Heroes Return Omnibus arrived. It collects Thor (1998 series) 1-35 plus some other comics.
Dan Jurgens writes the majority of the stories in this collection and John Romita Jr. draws many of the issues: That’s some really good stuff there. I enjoyed the Jurgens run quite a great deal, although to be honest, it was in spite of the art, as I am not much of a JRJr fan, although I do like Andy Kubert usually.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 22, 2022 17:35:54 GMT -5
Picked up a copy of Amazing Spider-Man Epic Collection, Volume 8, entitled “Man-Wolf at Midnight” yesterday, which covers issues 124 - 142. I have a handful of these as floppies, so the big draw was getting a bunch of expensive issues, including 129, for $40.
I now own a copy of every ASM in one format or another from 1 - 400, so I can get down to the heavy work of actually reading my entire way through the rest of the series (I stopped at the end of the last Epic because there was too big a gap between 123 and where my floppies began).
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Jul 21, 2022 12:57:59 GMT -5
And yet the Disney Plus model of releasing an episode a week of the Marvel and Star Wars series is creating "appointment TV" again and doing much better than the Netflix model of sustaining subscriptions for the long term rather than taking the free trial and cancelling after you binge the handful of shows you want or taking 1 month subscriptions then cancelling. Disney Plus has a fair share of those too, but they do much better as sustaining subs than Netflix does and they are growing while Netflix subs are shrinking. -M Agree with you about the reemergence of “appointment TV”. In my house, for example, Wednesdays are a cause for celebration when there is a new Marvel show on Disney+. My daughters get hyped up about it over the course of six days, and then we all (Mrs. Captain included) sit down AS A FAMILY and watch it after dinner. It gives us something to look forward to and share together, unlike Stranger Things, which our daughters tore through Season 4 in a weekend while the missus and I were busy doing real life things.
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Post by The Captain on Jul 21, 2022 10:07:01 GMT -5
I don’t own a lot of Batman/Detective issues, but many of the ones I do have are from Alan Grant’s time on the titles. At this point, he is MY Batman writer, and I usually enjoy what he wrote.
Sad news indeed.
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Post by The Captain on Jul 18, 2022 15:31:43 GMT -5
I9. Why does The Captain hate Rick Jones so much? Did he secretly want to BE a sidekick to all the Marvel heroes and was rejected? I’ve actually explained it before (couldn’t find the exact place or else I would post a link), but it boils down to the fact that Rick Jones has a couple of annoying traits. First off, he’s an absolute jerk to everyone. He gets pouty at Steve Rogers when Cap won’t take him on as a sidekick, and then he’s an ass toward Mar-Vell during their time tethered together. Secondly, and even more egregious, is that Rick Jones is the biggest lucksack in the Marvel universe. He’s the guy that can’t do anything right, has no discernible skills, and is a toxic personality, yet he always falls into success. I’m guessing the writers thought it was charming to have this guy always come out smelling like roses, usually completely in spite of himself and in direct contradiction to how the situations SHOULD HAVE played out, but no one likes a lucksack in the real world and that goes double for fictional characters.
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