Into the Longbox

I binge watched Luke Cage a few weeks ago. Specifically, over the weekend it came out. I've taken some time to start writing this because I wanted to let it sit with me for a little while. I didn't want to go with my instant reaction on this show. NOW, I'm ready to talk. Luke Cage is a fantastic show. Don't take this the wrong way when I say this, but it is an unapologetic black show. By this I mean, the vast majority of the cast is black and the dialogue feels authentic. Even in this day and age, this show is a huge risk in my opinion. We're living in 2016 and the idea of a prominent black cast outside of a show on BET is such a foreign concept. I applaud Marvel for not only taking this risk, but letting the show be what it is. I also want to point out that it was written and produced by a man of color, Cheo Hodari Coker. Before I get into the wonderful cast, I want to start by going over some of the little things they did that I truly appreciate. First of...

So, I'm a little late in posting this. I finished episode one a few weeks ago. I really like the games from Telltale and I loved "The Wolf Among Us". So you put Telltale and Batman together and I'm already sold. I remembered that I have a PC and I can sometimes play games on there. So I picked this game up on Steam. There was some good and bad with this game. I'll start with the good. The graphics were really good. This was in the same style as all the other Telltale games of late, but closest to "The Wolf Among Us". The voice acting was pretty good. The story is pretty good too. I liked the focus on the Bruce Wayne side of things. That makes this a little more intriguing. I like that this takes place during the early days of his career. You get to have a first encounter with Catwoman and Harvey Dent is still just Harvey Dent. Not Two-Face. You are dealing with street level criminals and I hope they stick with this instead of trying to go straig...

A few weeks ago I got to see the Killing Joke in theater during it's limited release. I am going to treat this movie like two separate movies. It's the only way I can reconcile what I saw. For those that don't know, the graphic novel that this movie is based on was really short. So in adapting it, they had to add some filler. They felt that Batgirl needed to be fleshed out, so about thirty minutes was added to the film. While I can understand what they were trying to do, they failed so miserably that it detracts from the movie. That first section dedicated to Barbara Gordon was so disjointed from the rest of the movie, it is completely jarring. It's why I made the two separate movies comment earlier. You have Batman and Batgirl chasing after some mid-level thug. Batgirl makes some very un-Batgirl like mistakes. Batman chastises her. That's the crux of this backstory. Where the outrage comes in over this section is what happens that has nothing to do with the cri...

It's all downhill once you open the book Normally, I'm not moved to the point where I would write a post about how bad a comic book is. Then the first issue of the long awaited Adam Hughes written/penned Betty and Veronica series came out a few weeks ago and I just had to say something. This is what drew me out of my hidey-hole. In this blog, I've stated on the record how I truly love Archie comics. So the fact that I'm writing something negative about this issue shows you how egregious it really is. First of all, the new modern takes on the characters have been nothing short of fantastic. Gone is the fifties feeling of the Archie comic books. They now truly reflect current times. They have been smartly written and genuinely funny. This book is neither of those. This book is not written well at all. I am always weary of artists who also fancy themselves as writers. That usually comes with disastrous results. There are many examples, but I'll start wi...

I know this is late, but let's get started. This is starting to feel like a rote exercise for me. DC movie comes out. I go in hoping for the best and end up getting disappointed. With each succession, I lower my expectations to try and make these movies palatable. Then they still go under the bar. Let's just get through this. Suicide Squad is a bad movie. I see what DC is going for here, but now was not the time.  With Marvel, they were eight years and nine movies into their catalog before they introduce the off-beat and unexpected Guardians of the Galaxy. They had to build a universe before they could start digging into those C-level characters. DC was trying to do that with Suicide Squad, but they had not put in the legwork yet to get here. It's too soon to trot out your C-level characters. I say this, not including Harley in that description. So where do I even start with this movie? Let's just start with what I actually liked about this movie and ...

For those that don't know, DC decided that after five years of the "New 52" they are going to do another kind of reboot of their universe. The idea is to get their characters back to the classic elements that fans loved while trying to keep things fresh. I will give DC credit, what they did five years ago took a big pair. I initially hated on the "New 52" idea. I warmed to it when it meant that everything will be new and I can jump in on the ground floor. Being a Marvel fanboy, I never had a full appreciation for DC's history and it's deep cast of characters. After a couple of months, when I had paired down to a dozen or so comics that I wanted to actually read, something happened. I began to become less invested in the books. Constant changes brought on by editorial lead to that. I'm sure Geoff Johns leaving most books had that effect. All of a sudden, I was dropping everything in sight except for Batman and Justice League. What had started of...

I know it has been about a week, but I wanted to share my thoughts on HeroesCon. This was my twelfth consecutive trip to what is easily my favorite convention. That's because the focus is squarely on comic books. I had another good time at this convention. However, something was different this time around. I came to a starting revelation that I knew was going to eventually happen. In all my years going to this convention and others, I have now pretty much exhausted my list of comics to search for. What I have always loved about these conventions is the thrill of the chase. I'm always looking for SOMETHING. Since my friend and I have gone to this for so many years, the convention has become an exercise in routine and structure. I briefly described this in my  post  last year. This year we took a different path than what we did last year. Instead of pre-ordering tickets, we simply bought our tickets with cash at the ticket booth. It took us all of two minutes. As you'll...