"The 21st Century Superhero: Essays On Gender, Genre and Globalization In Film", Edited by Richard J. Gray II and Betty Kaklamanidou

It is possible to publish a book of essays about superhero movies without discussing the source material. That's what this book was, as well as offering an argument that the films made in the early-2000s had allusions to 9-11, the war in Iraq and American military action, all within a narrow margin...it feels like it had a limited sell-by date, with some discussions dated by their choice of films to examine  ( it's been a long time since anyone talked much about Hancock, Aeon Flux or the Kick-Ass movies ), but there are some good tidbits:

*Bruce Banner's exile in Brazil's favelas, as depicted in The Incredible Hulk, piqued the author's interest more than the remaining 2/3 of the film ( so...somebody liked at least some of that movie ).

*Jean Grey's "..limited cinematic presence" in the original X-Men film trilogy  is a reflection on "the mythos of patriarchy" in the films - in other words, she doesn't have enough screen time to develop into an interesting character..unless it's a character development that serves the mechanics of the script, i.e., everything centers around Professor X, Magneto, and  especially Wolverine.

*In his efforts at "Understanding 'Hotness' in the superhero film genre", Richard J. Gray had quite a lot to say about Ellen Page's sex appeal as Kitty Pryde. Considering how she barely had about 15-20 minutes of screen time and the essay was focused on her debut in X-Men: The Last Stand...I say he was smitten with Page...she was appealing in Super, though nobody has ever written this much about her attractiveness since - far less was written about her coming out a while back. He also has a crush on Jessica Alba, since he seems to give her shrill, vapid Sue Storm in Fantastic Four a favorable review. Even Halle Berry's Catwoman gets a light love tap of criticism, so whether he wrote the essay to talk shop about attractive female superheroes and ponder why they were sexy or critique their sexualized image is moot.

*No surprise that several essays compared Christopher Nolan's work on Batman Begins and The Dark Knight as commentaries on life post-9/11, but what caught my eye was a shout out to Batman Unmasked, a book I reffered to in my previous blog post as a possible inspiration for Grant Morrison's take on Batman, even confirming my suspicion by noting the passage I vaguely remembered..so now I don't have to hunt for that out-of-print book just to check out a hunch!

*I've never read any of Marvel's Kick-Ass or seen the movies, so I wouldn't be able to agree or disagree if the films share a correlation with the Spider-Man movies in their contrasting use of voiceover narration reflecting the masculinity of their respective effete protagonists, but I do know that nobody's rallying for more sequels to Kick-Ass.

*I'm actually bored with reading material that puts Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' Watchmen on a pedestal, because I don't really think it's the greatest comic ever written and drawn - I just respect the effort that the creators made at telling this story. I do agree with the essay in this book arguing that the film adaptation succeeded in being a pastiche of film noir, but that's what the comic book did, and Snyder was simply following it. It's hampered by the fact that it features an ensemble cast of also-rans, could've-beens and never-weres, so it feels like we're watching a big-budget made-for-cable mini-series on Starz or Reelz instead of a proper superhero adventure film.

So..the book essentially covers what I would argue was the formulative stage of modern superhero movies. If Avengers is being considered the definitive maturation of this genre and Tim Burton's Batman films the embryonic, then the films covered in this book premiering between 2000 and 2011 are formulative development...but that's my hypothesis. If the authors had thought of that, they would've cranked out two sequel books of essays by now..

The Magrs Method of Book Reporting: "Comic Wars: How Two Tycoons Battled Over The Marvel Comics Empire - And Both Lost" by Dan Raviv

Encapsulate the plot of this book in one sentence?

The financial woes in the 1990s of Marvel Entertainment Group - the corporate entity behind Marvel Comics - is explained.

When was this book published?

2002. This was a 1st edition hardcover in great shape that I bought at a comic shop for 5 bucks.

What's your verdict?

I remember reading a library copy of this book around the time of it's release;  obviously, it's past its sell-by-date, because Marvel's fortunes have improved: it's part of the Walt Disney Company, it's film adaptations of their comics are box office smashes ( some more than others, to be honest )...who cares that it was faring poorly in the 90s? The past is dead!

...

I found it interesting that none of the financial wizards fighting for control of the company were into comics* - and that's why I found this book hard to enjoy: the author tried to make the events surrounding Marvel's leadership woes into a Wall Street/Wolf of Wall Street - esque caper, but there was no real hustle or careers at stake; sure, people got laid off, but the principals in this escapade - Ronald Perelman, Carl Icahn, Ike Perlmutter and Avi Arad - were never at risk of losing their fortunes and being put out on the street; this was all part of the game - Marvel Comics was just a pawn on a large chessboard.

The book reveals that Perelman was only interested in acquiring Marvel because of it's potential as a character licensing company, putting the characters on films, TV series and merchandise;  when he learned, after buying the company, that the merchandising, film and television rights were already tied up, he began using the company as a platform for selling junk bonds and acquiring other companies that could correspond with Marvel's product licensing. There was nothing wrong with that - hoarding companies is a common practice.  Is it a good idea? Well, you end up forming a conglomerate when you do that, and any failure within the conglomerate can create a domino effect that can bring it down to its knees. Perelman acquired the trading card companies Fleer and Skybox,  the sticker company Panini, the distribution company Heroes World, and small-time rival Malibu Comics Entertainment ( only, the book reveals,  because that company had developed a computer coloring system that could be run twenty-four hours a day for faster production ), and a controlling interest in a toy company, Toy Biz, which meant Marvel now had a stake in the toy-making industry.

And the comics were not selling well.

HOWEVER...

The book strongly implies that the company would've been headed for bankruptcy even if their comics sold well. The cause of Marvel's bankruptcy had nothing to do with overprintings of X-Men#1 and bad Spider-Man comics ( and depending on who you're asking, they're still making awful comics with those characters ).

Perelman's initial goal to push Marvel into licensing was actually a good idea - they've been doing it for the past decade, even beginning aggressive campaigns to get back the film rights to characters/franchises that were sold to other studios. This book is really an artefact representing a finger-pointing attitude people held during the late-1990s, when they were looking for someone to blame for why the medium almost died.

Do you plan to keep this book?

I'm not sure - it is like one of those old gimmick comic books from the 80s and 90s that promoted an event that was eventually revised and negated a decade later - it's claiming everything Perelman did was wrong, yet the current owners are doing the same thing, so it's okay, right? ...
Or perhaps there's gonna be a Crisis...

Can you give us a good quote?

Sure. Check out the gallery below.

*actually, Avi Arad comes off as the only figure in the debacle who COULD have feelings about the source material behind the toys, t-shirts, video games and screenplays being cranked out, which explains why he is a major player in Marvel's current corporate hierarchy - after all, SOMEBODY in that boardroom has got to know what a "Spider-Man" is!

A Technical Knockout

So, here's the big question: who'd win in a fight? Superman or The Hulk?


I'm out-of-sorts this week. As I get older, I find that a fever is followed by a cough, then a swollen ear. I can only hear good with my left and I'm watching for sudden gusts of wind.

I was asked the above question on Monday at the library, after I had returned their copy of Justice League Vol. 1, Origin. I thought it was okay, a bit of an obvious attempt at offering a blueprint for anyone producing a live-action film adaptation, including timely bits of characterization (I think Geoff was counting on the Green Lantern film to be a hit, because Hal has a lot more screen time than he ever did in an average issue of JLA). The librarian, a dark-haired and cute, if slightly overweight (Carolyn Keene's unfortunate description of George Fayne & Bess Marvin forever stayed in my head) wanted to know what I thought:

"Superman. Because he has all these powers and ... actually the Hulk fights dirty, so he'd win it."

I can't help thinking that I've been poisoned by 20-30 years of bad comic book writing. Of course Superman could take down the Hulk - he could toss the green giant into space. He could combine his x-ray vision and heat vision and perform laser surgery on ol' jade jaws. He could use his ice breath to give Hulk frostbite. He could run fast enough to make him dizzy. And he's STRONG. He used to be able to move PLANETS! And that's when he's not "holding back", as if we're even sure what that's supposed to mean..

"Used to". That old chestnut of showing how tough a bad guy is by punching out Supey with one blow has done a lot of damage. His rogues gallery is actually better than the Hulk's - one of the few examples in which you can say it is so. Okay...you know what? Hawkman and The Atom's rogues gallery is pretty weak. Daredevil's is even worse. Does Ant-Man even have a rogues gallery? And then there's that cruel YouTube fan film - a lovingly made, knock-down, drag-out, cgi brawl between the Hulk and a comparatively frail Superman that vaguely resembles Christopher Reeve (talk about pouring salt on an open wound). I'd rather let you guys search for this all-too-convincing brouhaha than offer a direct link. The last few seconds will made even the most hardened fan hide behind the sofa. Hey, if you didn't see it, it didn't happen.

So, for the record, Superman wins. We're just not likely to ever see it. Same thing with a Superman vs. Wolverine brawl - I recall Wolverine slammed The Vision against an ice cream truck once ... isn't The Vision one of the few characters that could kick his ass? Guess not. Hey, is anybody interested in a crossover where Lex Luther replaces Wolverine's adamantium skeleton with a kryptonite skeleton and brainwashes him to go after Superman? Well, I guess that's just me, then...

Garfield, plus Spider-Man, minus Jon

Is it time? I like to time these posts just right...I'll time it with the box of movie tie-in cereal  I just bought. It was terrible, like stale Frankenberry. Oh, and Mr. Kellogg, Curt Conners is The Lizard, not The Green Lizard. Though judging by the teeny-tiny photo provided, he looks like what Killer Croc could look like.

The only thing that could top a new Spider-Man movie would be an Avengers movie, or a new Batman movie by Christopher Nolan. Both are out this year. So is that why the reaction to the new film with Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone (as Gwen Stacey) is a bit "hm...okay."? What happened?

Well, we're getting a retelling of the origin. Do we need it? The 2002 film was loosely based on the Stan Lee/Steve Ditko original, but it also mish-mashed with/incorporated bits and bobs of Brian Michael Bendis' update from Ultimate Spider-Man. A brightly-colored spider bit Tobey on his hand as he tried to use the class trip as an excuse to get off the bench and reach first base with Mary Jane. Something new was added: Organic web shooters. No, that's not an exclusive kitchen gadget sold at Whole Foods, that means that Spidey's webs came out of his arm - his body could secrete spider silk, conveniently through his wrists and not his buttocks, like a real spider. You know, if Stan and Steve had spider silk emerge from Peter's buttocks, then Kim Kardashian would be cast as Spider-Woman. Yes, that is the train of thought I'm riding on - welcome aboard. I'll derail that train now.

Spider-Man's powers were that he gained the proportionate strength and reflexes of a spider - which meant that he didn't grow eight arms (though that happened later as a side-effect of an attempt to remove his powers), but he did have the ability to stick to surfaces voluntarily and also a psychic "Spider-Sense", which warned him of danger. Since he was not born with these powers, he is not considered a mutant. The spider silk that came from his arms was a manufactured  super-strong polymer he invented - along with the "web shooter" a touch-sensitive gadget that fires this compound like silly string. when fired, the webs are flexible enough for Spidey to manipulate it, sculpting into shapes like a club, glider wings, a shield, a sphere and even decoys. It hardens after a few minutes and dissolves completely after an hour. In Ultimate Spider-Man continuity, the formula for this compound was an unfinished project of Richard Parker, Peter's father, who was a scientist. In "classic" continuity, Richard and Mary Parker were S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents - it's not clear if Marvel ever tried a combination of the two approaches, but perhaps the upcoming film will. The cartoon spin-off of USM eschews the continuity of that book in favor of an idea hinted at - that all superhuman are drafted into becoming government agents and put into active duty.

When Raimi ditched the "mechanical web shooters" in favor of "organic web shooters", it launched a flame war on the Internet. Why? The big reason is that it takes away an important element of Peter Parker's character - his intelligence. Without that, or without something in its place, he can come off like a cipher. Stan and Steve opted to show how bright Peter was in a distinctive way - not some backyard project that he had been tinkering with, but an invention that he created for one purpose - to fight crime as Spider-Man. Raimi made Peter more lovestruck and less cerebral, so he came off as a sap. Regrettably, the comic books followed suit. Writers now create suspense by making you wonder if Spider-Man is going to be a patsy to another character's schemes in every new storyline. Raimi's decision created a ripple effect that changed Spidey's characterization. He reasoned that it was more realistic than "...creating a miracle polymer and not even think of selling it to 3M for a couple million bucks," yet very little about superhero comics is realistic. Consider how in X-Men comic Wolverine has always been the big  draw, while more-powerful characters like Storm, Jean Grey and even Iceman wind up sidelined in some way or other.

One choice Raimi made that made sense was to feature Mary Jane Watson as the main love interest in the series. This is because in the comics, she eventually became Peter's wife - and still is, if you're reading the Spider-Man newspaper strip. In the comic books, however, the marriage has been written out of continuity to allow for a more flexible status quo. (I'm staying out of that particular debate right now - that's an entry for another time)

Peter Parker's only had two love interests that could be considered serious - Gwen Stacy and Mary Jane. Gwen was killed-off in a memorable storyline in the late 70's. Writers often find her to be a more plausible love interest than M.J. and have been tempted to bring her back from the dead, first as a clone, then as part of new spin-off media tie-ins/retro-continuity. The past is a different country - they did things differently there. I'm sure if Gwen were still around, the writers would have the same problems that they have with M.J. or Aunt May - and they killed her off in 1994, bringing her back from the dead in 1998!

I actually dread seeing Dennis Leary as Captain George Stacey. The clips we saw in the trailer hint a leaden performance and some cliched, kitchen sink conflict/melodrama, yet in the comics, George was an likeable character - his death is actually technically more effective than the death of Gwen, whose final scenes were as a limp rag doll tossed around.

There's not much to be said about the Lizard beyond the "The Green Lizard" rubbing the rhubarb. He's a popular villain, but every story with him is usually the same. Oh, well, he gets his moment.

I recall Sam Raimi's idea for the 4th Spider-Man film would have been to feature The Sinister Six - just mad,mad,mad - but brilliantly mad! I think he wanted to show off that it could be done, since the most villains we've had in a superhero movie to date is four, if your counting the film tie-in to the 1966 Batman show with Sir Adam West. Speaking of Batman, I can't help but wonder who the heck is Joseph Gordon Levitt playing...he's eating up too much trailer footage to be anyone but the Riddler. Well, the trailer talks in riddles...

Oh, and  yellow eyes! The last time I saw this was the old Spider-Man cartoons of the past. Every idea gets used. Almost. I think a live-action Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends would work. Jennifer Lawrence or Emily Browning as Firestar, Ryan Gosling or Taylor Lautner as Iceman. Mr. Muggles (from Heroes) as Ms. Lion. Judi Dench as Aunt May. Megan Fox as Spider-Woman. Tobey Maguire as The Beetle. Flo Rida as The Hypno Hustler. John Slattery as Silvermane. Seth Macfarlane as the voice of Video Man.  Go for it!

Pinketty, Panketty, Poof!

It's not unusual to find issues of Wizard: The Comics Magazine in the half-dollar/dollar bins. On two occasions I've found issues that were still in their original bag - the first "special"/annual and an issue from 1998, which was opened, but still had a free chromium trading card that it offered - a picture of She-Hulk and Fairchild (Gen13)drawn by Jason Pearson.

Last week, some collector let go of his/her collection and the bulk of it was tossed into the half-dollar boxes at this particular store in NYC ("No names?" Yes, no names) and there were a bunch of Wizards from the magazine's heyday in the 1990's. The magazine had been around since 1992. The title is a holdover (or hangover) from the original concept: a mascot named Poof the Wizard, who would appear on the cover of every issue. When Gareb Shamus, the magazine's founder, learned that his cronies had suggested that name to have a laugh (Poof is slang for homosexual in the U.K. and Australia), the little cartoon wizard lost his chance at the spotlight, but the title of the magazine and 1st issue cover and copy had already been set and "proofed"! The solution? For the first few years, the cover of Wizard would show a comic book character holding a purple flag or cloth with white stars on it. Anyone picking up a copy expecting fantasy role-playing game tips was no doubt confused.

I recall Warren Ellis once remarked in his old column at Comic Book Resources (a website I am not affiliated with, though we have the same initials and I do lurk around on their message board as Joenosleep) that if you're on the Internet, you don't need to read Wizard. If you do, that means you're picking it up for the price guide. I would like to argue that there was a time when this was not so - between 1998-2001, Wizard was actually witty and informative. This might have to do with the fact that the "collector's bubble" had burst - huge print runs of comics published in the early 90's became worthless clutter as the publishers either blew deadlines or churned out bad comics. There were a lot of comics published by wannabes, could-have-beens and neverweres - all "Buy Me! This book is Hot!" and Wizard and Comic Buyers Guide and Hero Illustrated were the cheerleaders, rallying for these losers. Hot comics were hot not because the stories were good, but because they anticipated an event, or came bagged with a free trading card or had a shiny cover and the demand for this junk was considered hot. Ren and Stimpy #1 came bagged with an "Air Fouler" (air freshener-get it?) of either Ren or Stimpy - instead of packing both, you had to buy two copies - and guess what? Ren was harder to find! People cared about that!

And then it was over. The little guys weren't making money - just filling up their homes. Comic Shops went out of business - except for the worst ones, where the boss owns the building and can afford to run the store as he pleases, or shops that changed their name and appear to be "under new management", until you spot the old owner in the back of the shop.Wizard was last man standing when the bubble went "poof".

Anyway, I picked up Wizard #80, from 1998. The cover had the Hulk fighting Wolverine (one of the silliest recurring brawls in comics - the equivalent of watching a chess match with just two Kings standing on the board). The cover story was a countdown of the nastiest brawlers in superhero comics. Some of the pages had been torn from this section, so I assumed Wolverine was #1, while Azrael, Orion, Hulk made appearances. Azrael...the thinking man's Ghost Rider. Or Spawn. Or Death Scooter...

Oh, and once upon a time... Kevin Smith was cool! That's right! Before he became too fat to fly in a passenger jet, he was just the guy who made "Clerks", "Mallrats", "Chasing Amy" and the soon-to-be-released "Dogma", of which all anyone remembers is that it had Salma Hayek doing a pole dance (she did that a lot in her early movies - hmm, maybe Freida would've won her Oscar gold if it had a pole dance on museum scaffold). He had gotten attention for writing a rejected script for what eventually became Superman Returns, a film which became a cautionary tale in Hollywood for what happens when too many executives become too many cooks. The interview featured in this mag seemed to portray him as being on the rebound, hinting at his upcoming work relaunching the Daredevil comic book with Joe Quesada and Jimmy Palmiotti (Who knew this assignment was going to change the next decade of superhero comics? It seems so long ago..) and his work on Green Arrow (which landed with a thud, but it brought Oliver Queen back from old fart heaven, so go figure), and most interesting, but maddeningly - I wish this was something he had done - a film based on The Question.  When asked which characters he would like to direct a film about, he suggested this character and mentioned Dennis O'Neil's comic book series, that Hub City was like Sin City - fascinating. Can you imagine adding the Huntress to that mix? I hope the years of donuts and cannibus haven't wiped this idea out of his brain, because it's very good. He also gives Batman Forever a good poke in the ribs - "..that scene where he's like "I quit, Alfred. Batman no more. I'm like, 'Are you high?' Batman's desire for justice would never allow him to do this." And he plugs his N.J. comic book store - this was actually an ordinary shop; the Jay and Silent Bob's Secret Stash shop came almost a year later.

There were features I liked and missed when they were taken away - "Report Card"/"The Skinny", "We Read It For You", "Good Reading", "Thumbing Off", "Famous Firsts" and, in time for April Fool's Day - "Bad Readin'", "Famous Worsts" "Top 10 Comics" - all dedicated to reviewing comics and letting us know if any of this stuff was good.

When did this renaissance end? Around the same time the X-Men and Spider-Man films began production. Joe Quesada and Bill Jemas were running Marvel and using a lot of gimmicks to plant their feet. DC had Jeph Loeb and Joe Kelly boasting about their Superman comics, Bob Schreck was running the Batman comics with big stunts, like "Bruce Wayne: Murderer". J. Michael Strazincski was writing the adventures of a character that he wanted us to believe was Spider-Man - anyone who disagreed needed to "...get out of their parents basements." Joss Wheddon was getting his pop culture crown fitted. Grant Morrison slipped on the pop culture banana peel and achieved his own nirvana. Alan Moore became a wizard himself. Neil Gaiman and Todd MacFarlane butted heads over old comics. Leggo my ego, it was time to throw down.

And then there was ... boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom ... a giant monolith appeared from out of the sky ... BENDIS! Seriously, on his message board, Brian Michael Bendis would sign his posts like that. Oh, but he was cool at that time, too. Now he just looks like Kristin Davis' hubby on Sex and The City

So, if you perchance see any dusty issues of Wizard lying in a half-dollar bin somewhere, from 1998-2000, please don't laugh - those are actually my cup of tea.

Dr. Desire's Valentine's Day Prescription

TV Specials/Episodes:

Be My Valentine Charlie Brown/A Charlie Brown Valentine

Ducktales : "Back To The Klondike", "'til Nephews Do Us Part", "Metal Attraction", "Ducky Mountain High", "A Ducktales Valentine"

Darkwing Duck :  "My Valentine Ghoul"

X-Men : "Weapon X, Lies and Videotape"

The Flintstones: "Dino and Juliet"

Disney's DTV Romancin'

Doctor Who: "Army of Ghosts/Doomsday", "Destiny of The Daleks", PRIME Computer ads

Bugs Bunny Cupid Capers

Power Rangers Ninja Storm : "I Love Lothor"

Batman: "Mad Love", "Love Is A Croc", "Harley and Ivy", "Chemistry", "Catwoman Goes To College"/"Batman Displays His Knowledge".

Avonlea : "Ah..Sweet Mystery Of Life"

Justice League Unlimited : "Double Date", "This Little Piggy"


Films:

As Good As It Gets

LA Story
Valentine's Day

Valentine (was it Jessica Capshaw or David Boreanez - they were both nuts!)

I Hate Valentine's Day

The St. Valentine's Day Massacre

Candy :

Valentine lollipops

Cherry Cordials

Elmer's Assorted Chocolates


Now go, go, go!

One Life To Waste

Soon, perhaps not soon enough, One Life To Live, the ABC daytime soap opera, will be over...maybe. It may get a regeneration in the form of an online web series... or not. Whatever happens, its time on network television is running out, and will it go out with a bang - or like a cancelled comic book?

I often hear people use soap opera as an example of good storytelling in comics - "..the stories have enough of a soap opera-element to get the reader to want to ask ,'What happens next?'" Unfortunately, soap operas on television often belie this idea - they are the best examples of bad storytelling. Stories that have no plot last over a year, then extended if popular/unpopular because the writer has hit a dead end. Characters linger on past their sell-by date, bad teenage actors, weird plot connections, and worst of all, new characters are introduced either to pander to trends or further the current plot. One Life - set in an expanding working-class New Jersey town - has got it all - The Buchannon family were introduced to capitalize on the popularity of Dallas and never went back to Texas. A popular baby-switching storyline that featured Judith Light and Tommy Lee Jones (!) did not end until most of the principal characters had already left. Inner-city ghetto Angel Square and the Vega/Delgado families (Carlotta, Antonio, Christian and Tea) did not exist until the mid-90's. Before that, the show was mostly quaint New England coziness with looming skyscrapers thrown in. It was the middle-child among the ABC soaps, and , if you ask my Mom, the best years were 1993-1995, "...when they ended they story lines fast - on the next day, Joe! The next day!"  Oh, and the years when Jill Larsen played Ursula - a loony who liked to flirt with other loonies by showing her talent at building homespun electric chairs. You really had to be there to see that one. Then there's Eternia - the show's nadir. A fortune (well, in TV talk it was a fortune) spent imagining a lost city built by more-alive-when-dead tycoon Victor Lord and had all the excitement of a Land Of The Lost marathon. Eternia...Eternia - why does that sound familiar? ;)

Then there's Todd Manning. Former gang-rape leader turned tabloid newspaper magnate. As played by Roger Howarth, the character was the Joker of Llandview, PA (Didn't I just write that the town was set in New Jersey? Well, I guess Eternia took up so much space to build that all the people had to move to Pennsylvania, because the writer's have it set there, now). Always the first suspect in every crime (usually outwitting the slow-as-shit ne'er-do-well Commish, Bo Buchannon, and his comely wife Nora - the town DA) and represented by his ex-wife Tea Delgado (played like a Red Shoe Diaries character by Florencia Lozano, who often outsmarts everyone by talking down to them in a condescending manner : "Your honor, my client needed to have a time out because he did not get apple juice on his last play date.") When Howarth left, we had to endure his replacement, Trevor St. John, who played the character more like a cheap thug - you really felt like the writers needed to give up the ghost watching him play a character that had run out of mileage. Howarth came back, but they didn't want to lose St. John, so a contrived "Identical twins" twist was drunkenly pulled out someones posterior, and we've had to swallow that one for the last year or so, even after St. John left and his Todd (Victor Lord Jr.) was killed off by Howarth's Todd (ironically one of the few crimes he was actually guilty of).

I'm really leaving out a bunch of stuff, here. All the bad teen romances, the musical episodes ("We were more stoned pulling this crap out than we were when they came up with that Eternia thing.") , "Very Special Episodes" devoted to social issues that featured characters created by demand of social interest groups, and ... and... well, if it was really any good, it wouldn't be replaced by a show where a group of people with no last names tell you how to pick out clothes. Seriously, even divine intervention (Oprah) turned them down.

(for more information about the history of this cancelled TV show - I guess it's up to fan-fic now - consult Wikipedia by typing 'Tea Delgado', 'Todd Manning', 'Victoria Lord Reilly Buchannon Carpenter Davidson Balsam Buchannon', or 'One Life To Live')



UPDATE - March 27, 2012:  I noticed the online web series plan fell apart and ABC has decided to take four OLTL characters and add them to the cast of "General Hospital" - John McBain, Todd Manning, Blair Manning (yeah, she married Todd again) and Starr Manning. It was the most graceful of transitions: A car carrying Starr, her daughter Hope and husband/boyfriend/baby-daddy (I forget if they got married at all) Cole Thornheart on their way to Port Charles was wrecked in a botched hit arranged by Sonny (Maurice Bernard), the mob boss with a cold heart of gold. Instant conflict! Plus, Instant trip to ... General Hospital - the place where gangsters go to get patched up. The soap used to be a sudser dealing with medical-type stuff, but that gave way to storylines involving spies, gangsters, noisy fist-shaking tycoons, Rick Springfield, Elizabeth Taylor cameos, weight-lifting aliens, Dancing With The Stars contestants and James Franco as James Franco. my big complaint about the show is the cost-cutting measure to use the dimmest lighting possible - it looks like my tv is about to go. Oh, and it feels like there are too many characters, too many models for the camera (some of the actresses here look alike and they're not playing twins). With the OLTL gang in place (hopefully Robin Strasser - Dorian Lord - won't be far behind), it's time for some serious spring cleaning. Oh, and brighter lights, please.

Writing stories for other writers - Special One-shot, 2nd print

The idea of taking a comic book superhero "Back-to-Basics" is nothing new. Every few years, Batman has to demand a little "Alone Time" from his surrogate family of sidekicks and goes solo. The Justice League headquarters gets blown-up or abandoned in favor of a new pad run by a smaller team of six or seven. A hero retires for the civilian life and passes the costume to someone else (though this is often not as smooth as it sounds). A company goes belly-up and a new company aquires the characters and decides to start fresh. The Green Lantern Corps and the X-Men have a massacre or two. Savage Dragon gets regular 'breaks' -killed off and replaced by other 'Dragons' for a time in rotations. Spider-Man and Superman have chunks of recent history erased. The latter three are the most extreme examples.

There is an alternative to having a character wipe the slate clean to tell new stories - wipe the continuity slate clean to re-tell familiar stories. Now, it's one thing to re-tell the story of how Batman met the Joker to a new audience that's never read the old stuff before. It's one thing to want to re-tell an old story because the original seems dated (the origin of the Fantastic Four is an example). It's one thing to joke about how it seems like the only Spider-Man stories anyone wants to tell are the ones with the clone, the dead Uncle, the crappy boss, the dead girlfriend, and the feeble Aunt. But how about this: I'm re-telling a familiar story because I want a Hollywood screenwriter to see it and take ques from it.

Let us suppose that a movie starring ... J'onn J'onnzz, The Martian Manhunter is in development hell because the screenplay gathering dust lacks snap.  Well, how about re-launching his comic book (he managed to have one for a while on the heals of the successful JLA launch, which made the animated Justice League/Justice League Unlimited possible, which is a good example of this phenomena) but within the context of something hip and happening right now.

Bear with me...these pitches only sell in a single sentence, more or less:

"Martian Manhunter - It's like Twilight with superheroes - Taylor Lautner as J'onn J'onnz, the Manhunter from Mars - he'll have his shirt off for 1/2 of the film."

Now I'll plot a 12-24 issue arc that incorporates his origin, along with all the bells and whistles to make it fit my one-sentence pitch, and be sure to set it up in a way that could help launch a Martian Manhunter film.

That's an example of using a character that's okay, yet kind of so-so...he's actually the only member of the League that does NOT have a movie in the works. Not a single one. I figured playing an all-purpose superpowered semi-clothed Martian would be a cinch for a former sharkboy-turned-werewolf.

Now Geoff Johns has a storyline in the new Justice League comic book that's easy to visualize as a storyline for a movie - the league meets and teams up to fight the ultimate representation of pure evil in the DC Universe. Sure, they've spent the last two issues fussing over a Mother Box, but that's the stuff of deleted scenes. Besides, Mother Boxes are nifty. They're iphone12's - can you imagine? That's their function, yet they're often portrayed/talked about casually like old Rubix cubes, dial-up or Compuserve. Not here. They've spent two issues picking at it like the fancy toy that it is, even at risk of seeming like hitting a creative dead end. Whatever. I wish Marvel did something like that with the Cosmic Cube - what the heck is that, really? It's a strong-enough Macguffin to build an Avengers movie, that's what, and what's good for the goose is good for the gander.

Besides, I don't find Darkseid very exciting. He's become more like a sparring partner at a boxing match than a really entertaining villain. A large statue with blinking laser eyes. All rope-a-dope. zzzzzzzzz...If the 1st six issues are devoted to this cosmic Chinese puzzle box with Darkseid creeping in for a cameo in the final panel - well, this was written for me to read, then!

Don't get me wrong - I'm not using my deductive powers for evil and predicting that Johns is going to try to top Joss' lil' ol' film before it clears the editing room, or that he's telling a familiar story with familiar plot devices to show how easy it would be to get a JLA movie made... well, yeah, I just did. I'm pretending I didn't so that I won't spoil my fun.

I wonder if Lautner has his own production company? He's got to stock-up on green spray paint for the big screen test...