House to Astonish Episode 135
The world turns, a new day dawns, and there’s a new episode of House to Astonish for you. We’re talking about Channing Tatum’s trials and tribulations signing on the line for the Gambit film, Bluewater’s ill-advised name change, Chris Pine joining the Wonder Woman movie, Marvel’s newly-announced titles and the upcoming Civil War box set. We’ve also got reviews of Power Up and Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye, and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe faces an awful inevitability. All this plus Spider-Man 209099, the Kennedy Nasal Variation Test and Spider-Man’s Face-Sense.
The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, either in the comments below, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page. You can also pick up one of our shirts at our Redbubble store – fashions so sharp you’ll have to watch you don’t cut yourself.
Two measuring jugs, Al? You practically are a Golden Age hero already! You could give the Red Tornado a run for her money.
More Than Meets The Eye is amazing. It’s criminal it hasn’t been nominated for an Eisner or a Harvey. I’m fine with James Roberts not expanding out to other comics work, but man, he would be fantastic on Doctor Who.
I hope the Claremont screenplay rumor turns out to be true. I’d be really interested in seeing a live-action film where the characters introduce themselves by shouting out their names.
I havent read them lately, but didnt Paul Cornell’s book try to rehab the Black Knight and that Crusades stuff, esp given his relationship with Faiza.
Paul, I’ve been a fan since your X-Axis (site) days and I recall your fondness for the Furman-era Transformers comics. I think Roberts’ comic is actually better than those–especially up through the “Remain In Light” arc. It’s the only TF comic I would recommend to anyone and it’s a must-read. I can’t say enough good things about it.
He even made Drift, a “Poochie”-style character, pretty likeable. I’m not even getting into Chromedome / Rewind, or the DJD.
Alex Milne and Nick Roche are similarly outstanding.
I thought Nightbeat as Idris Elba’s Luther (not Benedict Cumberbatch) was a nice touch!
Did you guys like Last Stand of the Wreckers? And similarly, did you read the similarly bizarre Transformers Vs. G.I.Joe by Tom Scioli? That’s another one that’s amazing (albeit more controversial).
I know you have reviews TF comics a couple times and i know Al talked up the book when he wason our podcast.
I havent been able to get over my apathy over TF to read the book, as good as everyone says it is.
Sad to hear Power Up #1 isn’t great. I like to support new magical girl series for all-ages. Maybe it’ll be better in trade. It would be fun if y’all review Zodiac Starforce when it comes out, to see if you like it better. The art looks lovely.
BTW, Al, I’m going to Um Actually you here: Sailor Moon isn’t the first magical girl super-hero. Toei did a string of live-action magical girl super-hero shows for several years before SM, as part of their “Fushigi Comedy Series.” And then there’s the question of characters like Cutie Honey, a transforming girl super-hero who goes back to the 60s, but was pitched to teen boys rather than little girls.
SM’s real innovation, as I understand it, is blending the Sentai team formula (color-coded ensemble of archetypal personalities) with the magical girl genre. And also it was hugely popular so it changed the genre from that point on.
Julia – it’s not so much that it isn’t that great – what’s there is a lot of fun, and has some wonderfully characterful cartooning – just that the magical girl aspect doesn’t get introduced in the first issue. I imagine it will read more smoothly in tpb.
And no problem on the Um, Actually front – thanks for the info! I only have a 101-level knowledge of the genre at best so I’m more than happy to be educated.
Al – That’s good to hear. When listening to your and Paul’s discussion about how slow the issue is to set up things, I remembered how the original Sailor Moon anime doesn’t introduce a second Sailor Guardian until 8 episodes in, and it doesn’t complete the roster until episode 33. That’s pretty extreme, but even more recent magical girls shows like Pretty Cure take one episode at a time to introduce each member of the team. I wonder how much this more Japanese structure is influencing the American creators here. Though I guess this is different, since the Japanese shows pack in the magical girl concept and action from the get-go. It’s just the characters they trickle out slowly.
Y’all definitely reviewed MTMTE #1, because it was your review that got me to pick the series up a week late. It’s one of my very favorite things coming out, even if I will always prefer the klutzy anthropologist version of Skids from the 80s to his amnesiac super-spy iteration.
I may have said this before, but I’m assuming that Snyder flicked through Wonder Woman’s Wikipedia page and said “Okay, now this character definitely snaps her enemies’ necks.”
Back in ’64, Doctor Who did a Crusades story which was all “warmongers on both sides were terrible, both sides also had their nice guys, give peace a chance, man”, so I wouldn’t necessarily blame Black Knight‘s failings on 1990 being a different time.
I could be off-base here because I haven’t been reading it, but the impression I’ve got off the internets is that Loki is currently written as genderfluid, so that’s something on the LGBT front, even if his/her bisexuality isn’t explored.
Wasn’t there also a running gag under Pak and Van Lente where Amadeus had to keep denying that he had the same relationship with Herc as Iolaus did?
Regarding team books that forget to include the team, I’m reminded of New 52 Justice League #1. You could strip the cover from that and tell someone it was The Brave and the Bold featuring Batman and Green Lantern, and they would have no reason to doubt this.
Spider-Man 1999 would be written by Howard Mackie and John Byrne and probably feature Mattie Franklin. I’ll pass.
MTMTE sounds excellent, even to someone whose strongest memory of Transformers is watching the cartoons in the eighties and completely failing to keep track of who the characters were. Has the verb “to lampshade something” actually caught on outside TV Tropes?
BTW Marvel Wiki says Merzah was apparently in one of those Miniseries About Random Obscure Golden Age Characters Forming A Team stories where he telepathically sensed one of his comrades was gay.
Telepathy having been randomly but canonically added to his power of precognition, he then appeared in X-Men: Legacy trying to heal Legion’s mind, at which time he died of “mental backlash”.
(Marvel Wiki claims that he is also “post-cognitive”, which I assume means the supernatural ability to know that things have happened.)
I agree with Al about the Loki comic. Much was made of Loki’s bisexuality in Marvel press, and the fact that he never actually hooked up with dudes is a bit of false advertising. That’s not necessarily the writer’s fault, but there were definitely raised expectations that weren’t met.
I think Power Up is going to be a pretty good trade; what really will mark its success is if it gets noticed by its intended audience, which seems to be those outside of the traditional superhero block. I also agree that it’s not what I’m looking for in a first issue; a little too much set-up for my tastes.
For what it’s worth, I’ve long considered Ian Flynn’s Sonic the Hedgehog from Archie as a comic that, like More Than Meets the Eye, is routinely underrated because of its source material (in this case, being a game adaptation of an increasingly dodgy game series). It’s not as good as Transformers, but there’s a reason why it’s the longest running videogame-based comic series (25 years now).
*edit: 22 years. Math is not a strong suit of mine.
Power Up’s artistic style actually has some precedent as it’s coming from some of the creators behind Adventure Time and Bravest Warriors. You’ll see it also in a lot of today’s cartoons and their comic spin offs, too, like Steven Universe and Bee & Puppycat. It’s a comic definitely for these audiences of these aesthetics just as much as the magical girl genre, but I’d argue that Power Up actually doesn’t push the boundaries of whimsy and absurdity like the best of its predecessors. But that just means if anyone likes Power Up, there’s a lot to choose from for more!
I’m still listening to it, but I have to say to one thing.
I’ve only read up through what in MTMTE was covered in the Humble Bundle “sold” a few months back (the same one that famously got Chris Sims hooked), so I haven’t gotten up to this point yet). However, I’m familiar enough enough with the concept behind everything that hearing about IDW’s Cyclonus sitting in the apartment from FRIENDS was enough to *literally* make me reflexively fall down on my living room carpet laughing and punching the carpet…
Glad somebody knowledgeable mentioned Cutey Honey. I was on my way here to discuss how awesome she is (that theme tune is probably third/fourth-best of all superhero theme tunes after S-M & WW (& BM)), so instead FUN FAKT Go Nagai, the creator of Cutey Honey, is also the mind behind 80s superanimarionation-’em’-up Star Fleet. You know, the one with the Brian May theme song and Drake out of Aliens as a little fat foot-robot-pilot.
Poor Mattie Franklin. If she’d been created but ten years later, there’d be campaigns to overturn the dirty way she was done in Grim Hunt. Because she was done dirty in Grim Hunt. Dead dirty. 🙁
I’ve really enjoyed those Transformers comics (again, thanks to the mighty HumBun), and while I’d love to see more actual transformining (and a lot more Jazz!), I love how these stories embrace the best part of the cartoon and the Budiansky/Furman/Collins etc. comics and runs with the notion that these characters are people first, warrior robots in disguise second. Diametrically opposite to those movies about racist explosions in a cutlery factory that everybody went to see.
RE: Bluewater, that new name of theirs is also the name of a chain of App|e stores, with a branch in my own town centre. We can’t have a HMV, but we can have a corn stand (a stand that sells corn), two American sweet shops and Narzy ip0ds. Harrumph.
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What I took away from the Power-Up review is that there’s probably room in the market for a magical girl comic played absolutely straight and using all the tropes that the English-speaking audience isn’t over-familiar with and hasn’t grown tired of.
Power-Up is trying to execute a twist on a genre that most of its readers don’t know that well in the first place.
Matthew – This is my dream! When I look at stuff like Power Up and the upcoming Zodiac Starforce, I see it primarily being pitched at American adults who watched Sailor Moon when they were younger and now might like a comedy take on that. Whereas I think there’s real value to making comics with characters and aesthetics that are unapologetically girly and targeted primarily at little girls. It shows them that their power fantasies are important too—worthy of being presented as compelling, romantic, action-packed drama.
1) Having a character who never mentions being bisexual doesn’t preclude them from being bisexual necessarily. You preferably don’t want to go full Dumbledore and never drop even the subtlest hint, but maybe Loki just didn’t meet the right man.
2) I know we’ve all built up a tolerance from reading comics for years, but there is very little about Wonder Woman that isn’t deeply campy. Let’s start with her name. And her bloomers, or g-string or whatever it may be now. If it has stars on it, it’s camp. Face it.
3) I’m extremely sceptical that I could enjoy something about robots that turn into cars, but I broke down and bought the first More Than Meets The Eye trade. James Roberts seems like a nice guy so why not.
4) I don’t know about noses, but I think the thing about Jamie McKelvie’s art is it is so clean and finished that the characters start to look a bit like police identikit images. Maybe he needs more facial expressions or something. Don’t get me wrong, he’s obviously an incredible artist, but there is a certain sameness to his characters that people seem to pick up on but not be able to define.
Julia: apologies for the spamidj, but on the magigirl hero front, I may have two (free) digicomics for you in the link attached to my name.
Si: Wonder Woman’s costume now includes trousers (boo) and a giant red letter V above her, well let’s just come out and say it, who’s really for being coy, noo-noo. So yes: camp as chicory.
I was watching Chris Pine in a non-Star Trek thing last night, and he’s about the best choice for Steve-Trev you could wish for. They’ve almost sort of kinda wasted him as Kirk by doing movies instead of telly, but he’s got an easy-going charm I can see playing well off what I imagine to be a quite straight-faced but warm Gal Gadot (I haven’t seen her in anything outside of about thirty seconds of Fast&Furious). Plus, hey, bonus: if they do the Old Peg scene in Won2er Wom2n: Wonder Warder, they can get Shatner in to play Old Steve.
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@Si
“Having a character who never mentions being bisexual doesn’t preclude them from being bisexual necessarily. You preferably don’t want to go full Dumbledore and never drop even the subtlest hint, but maybe Loki just didn’t meet the right man.”
While this is indeed true, the failure to follow up on that thread does somewhat smack of bi-erasure, and somewhat gives the impression of non-hetero sexuality in the Marvel line as a bolt-on. Something that the company can pay lip-service to bolster credentials but unless it’s actually addressed in the text it does seem to be patronising lipservice. Marvel have come on in leaps and bounds in addressing their white male heteronormativity but there’s still a whole lot of work to do. Just like in society at large, eh?
As for Mckelvie’s art, I’ve personally found his inability to do more than a handful of facial expressions somewhat distracting. What really annoys me is his trait of having characters raise an eyebrow an cast their eyes roofwards in a dismissive bitchy fashion whenever they’re being witty. He does it all the time, especially with Kid Loki, and it’s at the point for me where it undermines the dialogue.
Grumble.
I’m thinking the idea that marvel didn’t pay much attention to last Hercules series and don’t know more than the basics of Greek mythology is probably pretty likely.
If anyone really wants to know, the rumor about Claremont writing the gambit movie is really Claremont wrote the script treatment and someone else is writing the script/screenplay. No, i do not know what the difference is between a script/script treatment or screenplay is. 😉
This might just be my ignorance, but isn’t the whole idea of Ewing’s Loki not so much that he’s bisexual, but that he’s truly transgender, in that he’s not that fussed about which gender he’s currently representing. Which was one of the funnest moments in Original Sin, where he switches to a woman for the latter half of the book, without any real fanfare, and just keeps being Loki. “Baby murder will happen! At tedious length!”
I mean, Loki’s never been much of a “sexual relationship” character as far as I can recall.
On the tangent of Bluewater and Stormfront
I recently started reading the popular urban fantasy series about wizard Harry Dresden.
I was amused to see book one is titled Storm Front. Which is even more unfortunate when your character’s name is Dresden …and he works for the White Council (of wizards, of course).
There is absolutely no racism in the book, but the combination of elements did make me wonder (:
If someone goes looking for the neo-Nazi Stormfront and ends up on the new Bluewater site then isnt that a good thing?
I mean, its terrible for Bluewater, but they make terrible comics anyway so they can at least do the world a little bit of good by making internet searching that little bit more difficult for white supremacists.
Parts of Power Up turned up on another comic board and what I saw didnt impress. To me it seemed like a bog standard Marvel #1 that was trying to ape Adventure Time rather than Jim Lee. And hey, lots of people like Adventure Time and Marvel sells a bunch more comics than other people so its not a bad business plan.
I am mildly suspicious that Hercules is straight because Disney now owns two Herculeses that look quite similar to each other.
While it would make sense for Herc to be bi given some other versions of the character were bi, the reaction to the declaration that he’s straight has been pretty damn idiotic.
The original version of Herc may have been bi, but much as the original version of Iceman was straight, there’s a new version that’s gay. To quote or possibly paraphrase George RR Martin, “How many children does scarlett o’hara have?”
There’s clearly a big difference between making a straight character gay and doing the reverse, given the paucity of representations of gay characters.
I bought that 75 years of Marvel omnibus book and in the back they run down the list of the best Marvel comics of the past 75 years, as voted by fans. Civil War was #2.
I despair.
…what was #1?
1. SPIDER-MAN: THE DEATH OF GWEN STACY
Full list: http://marvel.com/news/comics/23034/find_out_the_75_greatest_marvel_comics_of_all-time
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Sean – When was Herc portaryed as bi in a Marvel comic over the past 50 years? There’s been a couple of jokes but there were far more jokes about Iceman and I don’t think anybody is complaining about the fact that adult Iceman is officially straight.
You could appeal to Greek mythology but that would be a selective appeal given that the depiction was not just that Herc slept with men, but more specifically his teenage nephew. If people insist on sticking to the myths, we’d have to accept things like Herculeus being a bi-sexual rapist and Loki’s horse rape incident as canon.
Getting annoyed about the fact that an editor declared that a character who has been depicted as straight for 50 years, is straight is silly. Maybe some day somebody will write a story where the internal logic of the story supports a depiction of Herc as bisexual, but until then, it’s perfectly logical for an editor to state that Herculeus is straight.
“… and I don’t think anybody is complaining about the fact that adult Iceman is officially straight.”
Oh yes we are! Well, more complaining about the extended wait for the next issue of Uncanny to find out what adult Bobby’s deal is. If young Jean mind reads him and declares he is unquestionably straight, whoah boy there will be a lot of complaints, and vice versa. It’s a no win situation that I hope they thought through.
Superboy punch?
Honestly, I think the differences will be linked to time being broken and the fracturing of reality. Either that or they’ll just call it and claim the original 5 came from a divergent timeline.
It’s probably Cyclops’ fault.
Or mind control.
Mind control would be the worst thing they could do. You do not want to explain an instance of homosexuality as being the result of supervillian meddling.
But what if it’s ADULT Iceman who was mind controlled to be STRAIGHT? Mastermind always looked like the type to do that to someone.
Well, was he the one who made Jean Grey dress up.as the Black Queen in the hellfire club?
The first two, two and a half seasons of “X-Men: The Animated Series” were great. The show sorta lost directionafter The Dark Phoenix Saga (which was surprisingly well done) and never really got it back together.
I especially loved season 2
adult Iceman could have been mind-controlled/mind-wiped/hypnotized into being straight at some point in the timeline after teen Bobby came to the future.
perfect opportunity for Marvel to fall back on one of its favorite go-to devices: Professor Xavier is a jerk!!!
SUPER-VILLAIN MEDDLING?
I was suggesting something far more horrible…. and a little bit ULTIMATE-ish.
Jean got sick of All-New Iceman being a “Dudebro” so she altered him.
It’s not like there are limits to her powers nor moral inhibitions towards using them.
All-New Jean Grey mind-screwed All-New Iceman.
“It’s not like there are limits to her powers nor moral inhibitions towards using them.”
It doesn’t matter what she’s capable of. She’s a major character owned by Disney/Marvel and if you think they’d allow a “Jean Grey used mind-control to make Iceman gay” story to pass, then you’re not really thinking it through.