Powers

31 December 201231 December 2012

2012 in Print

Yah, it’s the end of 2012 already so time for a quick blow-out.

Another average year in terms of quantity of reading. Texts, as you can see immediately below, were a bit on the thin side.

Books

Other People’s Wars – Nicky Hager
Road Dogs – Elmore Leonard

Comics

Ongoing titles Walking Dead, Powers and Scalped continue to rate with excellent storytelling. Castle Waiting, Dolltopia and RASL were very pleasant surprises.

RIP – Thomas Ott
Castle Waiting Volumes 1 and 2 – Linda Medley
Tamara Drewe – Posy Simmonds
Walking Dead Volume 15 – We Find Ourselves – Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard
The Killer Volumes 1 and 3 – Matz and Luc Jacamon
Dolltopia – Abbi Densen
Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense: Being Human – Mike Mignola
Scalped Volume 7 – Rez Blues – Jason Aaron and R M Guera
RASL Volumes 1-3 – Jeff Smith
Powers Volume 14 – Gods – Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming

Scripts

This year’s overall slant towards television writing is represented below with the number of pilots listed.

3:10 to Yuma – Michael Brandt & Derek Haas
Analyze This – Peter Tolan and Harold Ramis and Kenneth Lonergan
Gilmore Girls – Pilot – Amy Sherman-Palladino
Arrested Development – Pilot – Mitchell Hurwitz
My Name is Gary Cooper – Victor Rodger
30 Rock – Pilot and S01E07 – Tina Fey
Groundhog Day – Danny Rubin & Harold Ramis
The West Wing S02E04 – Aaron Sorkin
Justified S01E08 – Benjamin Cavell
Django Unchained – Quentin Tarantino

I’m a little worried I might’ve spoiled things a bit by reading Django Unchained before its opening here in New Zild but I enjoyed the script heaps more than the script for Inglorious Basterds (the film of which I have yet to see in its entirety [and those bits I have chanced across have been intriguingly tasty]).

30 December 2011

2011 in Print

Comics

A nice mix of mainstream, European and indy this year.

Asterios Polyp – David Mazzuchelli
Britten & Brulightly – Hannah Berry
Chance in Hell – Gilbert Hernandez
Doing Time – Hanawa Kazuichi
Fun Home – Alison Bechdel
Hellcity: The Whole Damned Thing – Macon Blair and Joe Flood
The Lagoon – Lilli Carre
Maybe Later – Dupuy & Berberian
Powers: Z – Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming
Shaolin Burning – Ant Sang
The Third Musketeer – Jason
Walking Dead: No Way Out – Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard

Scripts

Hm. According to my reading diary, I read the average annual amount of these this year but very few have wowed me like I want to be wowed.

Billy Elliott – Lee Hall
The Good Wife: Pilot – Robert King and Michelle King
Lone Star – John Sayles
Manhunter – Michael Mann
The Straight Story – John Roach and Mary Sweeney

Maybe it’s just me.

Books

Some ah, research led me to more non-fiction reading that I would previously readily admit.

Armageddon – Max Hastings
Nemesis – Max Hastings
Striptease – Carl Hiaasen
True Grit – Charles Portis

I’m tempted to try the Demi Moore vehicle that started out once upon a time as a film adaptation of Striptease but… ‘m afraid I mayn’t survive it.

21 May 200727 July 2012

Comics Splurge

James Henry‘s ruminations on Saturday morning entertainment got me thinking. (ABC Warriors and Nemesis the Warlock would be so coool. And Strontium Dog. And M.A.C.H. One.) (Okay, maybe not M.A.C.H. One.)

Late last year, I finally discovered where they hid the comics at the local library. Giddy with the find, I was adventurous with my choices: X-Men/Phoenix – Endsong, X-Men/Black Panther – Wild Kingdom, Invincible: Perfect Strangers, Batman and the Monster Men, and Hicksville.

Once at home, I tore through them. It was – to those of you who know their comics – a mixed bag.

Even back in The Day, X-Men never really turned my dial. Its exclamation-mark-laden dialogue, descriptions-for-dummies, and the artists’ renditions of breasts that defied gravity and biological reality were quickly tiresome. Almost two decades on,… the dialogue’s more realistic, the minimal description borders on curt – but the breasts, ohhh the breasts. Large juicy breasts encased in spandex, mysteriously free of nipples but full of teen wish-fulfilment. Nope, still not my thing.¹

Robert Kirkman and Cory Walker‘s Invincible is a variation on a Superman-like alien protecting the Earth – and proof there’s still life (and fun to be had) in tights and superpowers yet².

Batman and the Monster Men was a disappointing pulpy homage by writer/artist Matt Wagner. Wagner’s critically acclaimed creations, Grendel, which never made much sense to me, and Mage, of which I’ve had but one unforgettable taste, may be his most well-known but it was his brilliant jumpstart of Sandman Mystery Theatre that inspired me most.

And Dylan Horrocks‘ Hicksville. This title really made me reevaluate my attitude to New Zealand comics. An instant favourite – one I’ll have to buy and add to my collection. Fired by the positive experience, I tried Maui: Legends of the Outcast; my comics cultural cringe has blinded me to homegrown comics for too long. I’m collecting Horrocks’ Atlas now, and am following DMC‘s New Ground with interest.

As The Goddess never tires of saying: thank gosh for libraries.

Just between you and me? I thank The Goddess.

¹ – I was always more a DC man than a Marvel boy. But I quite enjoyed Ultimate Spider-Man: Silver Sable – due largely to Brian Michael Bendis‘ writing (Bendis being half the creative duo behind the magnificent Powers series, another recent and belated ‘discovery’). Confirmation that when I follow a writer I’ve enjoyed from one title to another, I’m unlikely to be disappointed.

² – Update: Mark Waid‘s Superman: Birthright was an unexpected gem for 2007. (Why, I might even try Superman Returns now….)<p