All true, of course. But you have to ask yourself whether your readers want to read a book about Blue Beetle, or Huntress, or fucking Geo-Force. The realities of day-to-day publishing may get in the way, but if people want to read about the Magnificent Seven then maybe that’s who should be in the JLA.

Sorry, got a bit distracted there.

The point is, the practicalities of juggling characters spread over various titles make Big Gun team books difficult to handle, making runs like Morrison’s JLA even more impressive. This isn’t a new problem, and is the main reason why Avengers isn’t really expected to be a Big Gun title in the same way Justice League is. Hawkeye and Wonder Man and whoever allow the team book writer to own some characters.

The best execution of this kind of team book has to be the X-Men. The mutants are so successful, in fact, that they’ve been able to spin off several characters that can stand on their own feet, although Wolverine’s probably the only really successful one (and more on him next week). But most of the X-Men are resolutely one-note, in both power-gimmick and character, and this is very deliberate.

Core Genre: Science Fiction, with the usual Marvel mixture of everything else.

The X-Men should be taken as a single character, a plural protagonist in the nomenclature of screenwriting. Their conflict occurs on two levels; drama between the various X-Men themselves, and the external conflict with their villains. The operatics of the X-Soap has always been the most-discussed element of the book, and it probably goes without saying by now that the psychology of the thing isn’t what I’m going to concentrate on, so as usual I’ll skip over that in favour of the mechanics of the thing.

A) A team
B) of mutant
C) students
D) with distinct powers
E) and access to advanced technology
F) defend a world that fears and hates them

Considering the complexity of its implications, that’s one of the most elegant concepts you’re going to find in comics. Stan Lee and his various colleagues really were that good.

What’s interesting here is that every element here is the root of both internal and external conflict. Hmm, it looks like I will be talking psychology after all. Well, it’s the X-Men. You just can’t avoid it. Their personal conflict stems from their powers, or their race, or their relationship with non-mutants. They argue with each other as well as the outside world. And this is mirrored in their conflict with their antagonists.

Factor A tells us their mode of interaction, a gestalt identity. B is the source of their abilities, and also the inciting element of their conflict, either with other mutants or with non-mutants. B leads to both D (how they interact with antagonists) and F (which gives context to the interaction). Personally, I could live without the advanced technology of factor E, but the jets and the danger rooms and Cerebro/Cerebra have been integral from the start, shaping how the villains are located and put into context.

And their villains are very interesting. Intolerant Homo Sapiens, and intolerant Homo Superior. Peaceful integration is the ultimate goal, even if it has to be fought for. It’s easy to cast a cynical eye over superheroes and their drive to solve problems with their fists, but I’m reminded of a quote from author (and daughter of the Fair Country) Jo Walton, as found in the sidebar of Making Light: “Peace means something different from ‘not fighting’… Peace is an active and complex thing and sometimes fighting is part of what it takes to get it.”

Factor C is the controlling element of the stories. The adventures are all centred round a school or academy, a place of learning. It gives the team its character. It’s also the thing that gives the book a sinister edge.

The idea that a trusted teacher of children sends them out to war is unavoidably creepy. It’s a concept that’s been played with many times since Claremont. I don’t know if this odd vibe was deliberate on the part of Lee and Kirby or just another oddity of 60s Marvel, but it plays to other themes present since the beginning. I’m not sure it can all be considered coincidental, though it may be subconscious rather than conscious.

Student unrest tied in with movements wanting to change the status quo is one of the primary images we have of the Sixties, not only in America but across the world. Stan Lee explicitly wrote this into Spider-man, so it wasn’t something he was oblivious too. I wonder how much this informed the structure of the X-Men. The radicalisation of the young by influential figures is a perennial concern to the Daily Mail crowd, something that can be found in modern hysteria regarding Islamic university organisations, Victorian political concerns, right back to Socrates and Plato.

I’m probably reading too much into it, but the X-Men concept does play into anti-intellectual fears of an educated populace, with university education seen as a threat. Like I say, it’s nothing new but there’s been a lot of it in recent years (and if I was feeling particularly tin-hattish, I’d say it’s yet another tactic to discourage the masses from bettering themselves and to keep education strictly for the privileged few, but that’s just crazy talk isn’t it now.)

Also, the world is run by lizards.

Conclusion: If we dig around there’s some ugly things lurking in the X-Men concept. Of course, that can only help in terms of drama, action and conflict. It shouldn’t be a surprise that, when handled properly, the books are amongst the most popular ever made.

Holy crap, is this game terrifying. And that’s just the intro. Sure, the creepy nursery rhyme theme is a little derivative but I think that’s something computer games are actually really good at. You take the really good bits from genre work (films mostly) and you squish it all together (see Halo, amongst many others). It’s not art, but it’s fun. And this game is packed full of blood-squirty dismembering fun.

The only possible hiccup is that like Condemned and Call of Cthulhu before it, it may be too scary to finish.

Why yes, I am a scaredy cat.

Fallout 3

Depending on what mood I’m in, I could well call Oblivion my favourite computer game. It’s certainly the game I’ve spent the most amount of hours on, by a hee-uge margin. I got it years ago, and because of the finding time thing, I still haven’t completed it. So I’m very much in the target market for a post-apocalyptic version.

Not spent loads of time on it yet because I really do want to finish Dead Space, but I should imagine a lot of ‘09 is going to spent on this one. And, hopefully, Elder Scrolls V in ‘10.

The Rise and Fall of the Shi’ar Empire

I’ve been meaning to get this one for a while. The follow up to Deadly Genesis (reviewed here previously), and like the previous story an entertaining yarn. Brubaker’s an excellent writer, and very good at doing a Claremont-style story in the modern Marvel house style. I feel like I’m damning with faint praise, but that’s not the intention. To be honest, it’s nice to read a superhero comic that doesn’t irritate me on any level.

Lovecraft’s Haunt of Horror and Cthulhu Tales

Sorry, that last one got a bit catty.

A couple of Mythos comics were added to the haul this year, and although I haven’t had chance to read them yet I’ve skimmed through. The MAX title is the hardcover of Richard Corben’s straightforward Lovecraft adaptations, and looks gorgeous. The second is the first paperback collection of BOOM! Studio’s ongoing anothology title. BOOM! Haven’t made a single misstep yet with their Cthulhu titles, and I doubt they’re going to start here.

Arkham Asylum 15th Anniversary edition

Really needs a post to itself. In short: brilliant, better than I remember it. Unfortunately the good bits were all left in Morrison’s original script, so this is the first version I’ve ever read that makes a damned bit of sense. A flawed masterpiece.

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War

Late to the party on this one, as I’ve only just upgraded to a graphics card that can handle the game. I assume we’re all geeks here, and we’re all familiar with the Games Workshop property that is, perhaps, nerdness incarnate.

Let’s just say, if Fallout 3 doesn’t suck up all of my time, then Dawn of War will be getting the rest. Hoo boy, I hope you’re all ready for another dip in productivity. Damn shame I’m fucking awful at RTS games.

The Steel Remains, by Richard Morgan

Britain’s best SF writer tackles fantasy. Half way through this, and it’s very good.

The Birthing House by Christopher Ransom

Picked up at random for being a haunted house book on the cheap at Asda. Last book I got from there was Joe Hill’s Heart Shaped Box, and that one was fantastic.

Again, only half way through it. Good points and bad points and I haven’t made my mind up about it yet, but it’s entertaining and it cost about three quid so I shouldn’t really complain either way.

That’s that faint praise thing again, isn’t it?

Anyway, turns out there’s a competition running in connection with the book, and the first prize is a weekend in that haunted hotel in Ludlow (Ludlow?) that’s been mentioned here before, more than once. The town’s obviously cornering the market in this kind of thing.

Batman RIP hits, with somewhat mixed reviews. I’m not quite sure what to make of it all, really. I had decided to wait for the trades on Batman, because I’ve found Morrison’s run to read a hell of a lot better in one chunk rather than on an erratic monthly schedule. Now, I’m not sure whether to bother or not. I’m sure I’ll pick it up eventually, but there’s plenty of other things I’m more enthusiastic about.

Part of the problem here is how much the storyline has been hyped. These days, COMIC HYPE more often than not makes me less inclined to pick something up, and even the fucking British press got in on the act with RIP. My overall impression is that RIP’s just a middle-act storyline to a larger Morrison plot that ended up getting the metaphorical fridge nuked out of it by the DC marketing department. I think I’ll wait to see if there’s ever a proper resolution to all of this before plonking my cash down. And I’m certainly not buying any of the pointless spin-offs.

One thing I did notice in a lot of the commentary was the idea that DC isn’t properly capitalising on the success of the movie. I’m not really sure if they can, to be honest. If superhero blockbusters had any effect on comics sales, I’m sure it would’ve happened by now, so I doubt taking Bruce Wayne out of the regular title for however long is going to make any difference.

That said, I’d love to see an ongoing Batman title out of regular continuity in the style of The Dark Knight. I know All-Star was kind of DC’s answer to the Ultimate U, but it didn’t quite work out that way (to Superman’s benefit, and Batman’s detriment). I say, balls to it. Outright steal Marvel’s initial attempt to capture Movie X-Men’s style in the Ultimate X-Men title, only do it for Batman. Hell, call it The Legend of the Dark Knight, with “the legend of” in little writing.

And you know the key to getting the tone right? Making sure Batman’s cowl is drawn with eyeholes rather than blank lenses. It would make the world of difference in terms of atmosphere, and it would be a fresh spin because as far as I know (and I’m happy to be corrected, as always) the mainstream Batman has never been drawn with, you know. Eyes.

(Odd coincidence: In the middle of drafting this, I looked at the new site statistics under the new domain provider, and one of the recent searches that led to the Journal was “why doesnt batman have any pupils?” Well-timed.)

Speaking of waiting for the trade, I picked up Geoff Johns’ Superman and the Legion of Superheroes hardback during the downtime. Now, you should understand that I have almost zero interest in the Legion, I’m ambivalent if not hostile to the 70s throwback storytelling we’ve been getting in comics for the past couple of years, and that I really dislike the concept of there being a Superboy before Superman.

Because I really fucking loved this story. Seriously, one of the best Superman stories I’ve read in ages. It just highlights what a good writer can do when he doesn’t mess around with Crises and crossovers and events and things that get your comic mentioned in the Daily pissing Mail. This six-issue run beats every single Brand! New! Changes! Everything! Forever! storyline I’ve ever read, because it just lets Superman be Superman. A damned shame Johns follows it up with a year’s worth of stunt storytelling, kicking off with Pa Kent kicking the bucket.

Oh, and there was one excrutiating thing that, while not really Johns or Gary Frank’s fault, I found to be completely unacceptable in this day and age. The first double-page spread of the Original Legion has dozens of characters, apparently from dozens of different planets in a galaxy teeming with different cultures. Yet every single one of them was white.

In short, I take back what I said about the final issue. I understand where Morrison was coming from, now, and it’s brilliant. And if Cole Odell’s theory on Luthor being Quintum isn’t correct, then it should be because it makes so much sense.

Bloody awesome.

The Bad: Easily the most-explored character in comics, with countless different versions over the years. Comedy, tragedy, dark avenger, borderline psychopath; is there a single take than hasn’t been done to death? I submit this is the biggest obstacle. There’s nothing left to do with him.

He’s a billionaire with unlimited resources. Simply put, there isn’t a single person with experience of this who’s going to be in a position to write the character, so “write what you know” goes straight out of the window. He’s the world’s greatest detective, but writing mystery fiction, in particular fiction with great twists and enthralling, fair puzzles, is incredibly difficult. Month in, month out, damn near impossible. Writers have developed plenty of tricks to sidestep this over the years, whether just ignoring detective work entirely or getting the batcomputer to do all the work, but the crime fiction roots run so deeply that I think this lack sticks out (admittedly, Dini is far better at this kind of thing than most, but this just makes any issue where he’s not writing even more noticably poor).

The Good: Nothing new to do, maybe, but this doesn’t have to be a bad thing. It gives us an opportunity to put aside a desperate need to reinvent the wheel with constant change, but instead to really get to grips with the rich history we already have. I think this is what Morrison’s been trying to do, but has gone a bit too far down the path of chucking everything against the wall without considering how the story flows. Unfortunately, if you list dozens of cool ideas, no matter how cool they are you still end up with a list. What’s needed is a writer who takes a Geoff Johns-type approach by putting a satisfying spin on everything that’s gone before.

Here’s the question: what does Batman consist of?

A) Scary costume
B) Mad Fightin’ Skillz
C) Madder Detective Skillz
D) Cool gadgets

A and B go together, because they’re his methods of directly interacting with ne’er-do-wells. C is how he locates and puts them into context, for himself (in-story) and for the audience (without). D covers both these grounds, depending on what the gadgets are being used for.

It’s tempting to put “Deep Psychological Problems” in, too, because in recent years this has become the default reading. But even so, I’m not convinced that “Mad Fucking Bastard” needs to be demonstrated in a Batman story, otherwise it’s not a Batman story. What I mean is that A-D, in one form or another, are essential, otherwise it isn’t really a Batman story. It may be good fun, but the central character becomes interchangable with almost anyone else. It may not matter in a good story whether your protagonist is Batman, the Blue Beetle, or even Sam Spade, but in a good Batman story you can’t imagine Ted Kord doing the honours.

I don’t know, maybe eventually “raving nutter” will become essential, but I don’t think we’re quite there yet. By the same token, “Sidekick” is an important element, but not essential. Plenty of good Batman stories with Robin, plenty of good ones without. In fact, Robin’s become so unnecessary that he rarely seems to have a role in a Batman story that’s deeper than showing his face around the cave.

To extrapolate, a good Batman and Robin story should have Robin actually making a difference to the plot. Or to put it in the form above, it should cover the Batman elements listed above, and Robin’s corresponding elements. Of course, that’s another post entirely.

Other factors: Batman’s supporting cast. Let’s break down the essentials:

Commissioner Gordon. He’s been there since the very start, though perhaps not properly utilised as a character in his own right until Miller’s Year One and Oldman’s performance in the two most recent films. Trying to write him out of the Batman titles is as crazy as deciding to write ongoing Sherlock Holmes series with an arbitrary character replacing Watson. Frankly, the same goes for Alfred. Neither have to be in every Batman story, but if you need to utilise their specific character type for a task within a story, it doesn’t make any sense to ignore them and use either someone else, or invent someone new.

That’s the problem with characters like Spoiler and the current Batgirl (in terms of story), and that’s why Leslie Thompkins was such a brilliant creation. Spoiler provides nothing to Batman’s story that Robin can’t. New Batgirl provides nothing that Old Batgirl couldn’t. Note, however, that this doesn’t mean that Spoiler doesn’t provide something significant to Robin’s story, or that she shouldn’t make a perfectly viable character on her own. Leslie Thompkins was brilliant because she provides a perspective on Bruce Wayne that can’t be provided by any other previously existing character. Which is incredible, if you think that in the thirty years and many different adaptations before her creation, this gap had never been addressed.

His rogues gallery is perhaps the best in comics, but at the same time, seriously over-exposed. It’s been good to see the Riddler get far better play thanks to Paul Dini, but the one guy I’d love to see done well, certainly in a form more appealing than “generic shapeshifter”, would be Clayface. Basil Karlo’s still around, right?

Conclusion: Batman’s one of the greatest characters created in the Twentieth Century. It’s just a shame that so often he can be so easily switched with other, lesser characters, in so many of his stories without any noticable effect.

Click here for the Delineation Archive.

It was initially late because I’d planned to post perhaps the most hilarious* post in the Journal’s history. Unfortunately, for that I needed a screencap from Superman: The Movie, and some copy protection thing wouldn’t let me do that. On the DVD that I paid well-earned cash to own, for a film I have bought more than once. It’s absolutely true that DRM only punishes honest customers stupid enough to act legally, and also people who want to make fun of films on the internet.

What I’m saying is, Warner Bros. and WordPress (for losing this post first time round) are to blame for today’s entry being late, and you should all write to them to complain.

Ahem.

Anyway, onwards. Finally got round to reading the final All-Star Superman, and I think I’m going to need a little time to process it. I was a little, I don’t know, not disappointed with how it ended, more that I don’t think I quite get it yet. The more I think about it the more I like it, though, and it goes without saying that it’s still packed full of brilliance, and the series as a whole is one of the best Superman stories I’ve ever written [Edit 4/10/08: read, best Superman stories I've ever read. I'm not Grant Morrison, honest. Certainly after hearing about the story Mick hints at in the comments.] But the last panel did confuse me a bit. The “2″ is very clever and all, but it seems like it should be a gimmick ending to one of the earlier issues rather than a cap to the whole series. And it looks more like advertising for a second All-Star series more than a solid ending. And Quintum may be a funky addition, but he doesn’t seem significant enough a character to be the focal point of the ending, although I suppose he’s meant to be the manifestation of Morrison himself (although, in a couple of places, I got the vibe that Lex was meant to be the Scotsman’s avatar.)

Oh, bollocks to it, I don’t really want to moan about the comic because it was great. I suppose most of my reservations come from the fact that I don’t want it to be a 12 issue series at all. I want it to be ongoing, and I want to wallow in this fantastic world Morrison, Quitely and Grant have created for a hundreds of issues.

One thing (of many) that Morrison handled perfectly was the issue with Jonathan Kent’s death, probably my favourite one of the run. Only problem is, from what I can tell, there have been hints that Pa Kent is for the chop in the main titles, too. This is a very, very bad idea. Because bringing him back into the story, post-original Crisis, added an important and interesting element to Superman’s supporting cast. By removing him again, all we’re going to get is another excrutiating death scene that’s unlikely to have anywhere near the impact his death had in the movie, or in All-Star, partly because not every writer is as good as Grant Morrison, and partly because death is so incredibly underwhelming as a plot device in comics. It has none of the resonance it used to have. In fact, far from being affected by the drama of death, these days when someone buys it I don’t feel anything more than boredom, and disappointment that the writer can’t find a single thing new or interesting to write about instead. It’s just cheap and ineffective. And damaging to the character, too; Spider-Man’s diminished supporting cast, as always, being the biggest example of this.

Speaking of the web-slinger, not reading the main title (because, as I always maintain, I don’t have as big a stiffy for rehashing the Seventies that the rest of the aging comic reading (or writing) population obviously has) I don’t know whether Aunt May still knows his secret identity, or whether she’s gone back to being a dribbling moron. In retrospect, absolutely the best thing about JMS’ run was his reinvention of May Parker as a decent character, and it’s a damn shame to lose that.

Final point about All-Star: interesting how Morrison was very clear that Superman is the character, while Clark Kent is the disguise, while latter day takes have always been the other way round. Personally, like with Batman, I’ve always been more of the opinion that there are three character elements present. In Batman’s case, the scary vigilante mask, the playboy millionaire act, and then the real personality is a third person, the one who confides in Alfred and his adoptive sons, and who never wants anyone to go through the same loss he did. For Superman, you’ve got the mild mannered reporter, the optimistic inspiring hero, and the third personality is Kal-El, the more contemplative, perhaps more alien side, the last son (ho ho, these days) of Krypton. In fact, you could make a really creepy story out the idea that he really is a cold, unknowable, Sinestro-like alien, who has to integrate into human society for his own safety, and uses the two masks as a shell to achieve this. Doesn’t quite fit with the character, mind, although I wonder if that’s how Luthor sees him.

Speaking of which, I never got the dislike some people have for the lonely alien take we saw in Donner and Johns’ “Last Son”. I quite like the idea of having the inspirational human-like take in one title (Busiek’s at the time), but the more Kryptonian take in another. No reason we can’t have both.

[*^ it may not have been all that hilarious.]

I wasn’t keen on Krypto’s modern-age return, even though I think Jeph Loeb’s take was interesting (namely, that a dog with Superman’s powers would be an absolute disaster), but that’s mostly to do with the really shitty Return To Krypton storyline that was running at the time. And then I read Morrison’s All-Star issue with Krypto in it, and finally understood the concept.

I get that a lot with Morrison. Sometimes it takes a writer like him to make sense of otherwise crappy ideas. I mean, as Superman stories go I’m far more of a Golden Age fan than of the chubby Silver Ager, and I usually loathe the shoe horning of Sixties goofiness into more recent runs (like Return To Krypton, in fact), but All-Star really did make something brilliant out of something a bit crap.

It doesn’t take much, I find, to have my opinion changed on something. Usually, all the bits are there, it just takes a single key to unlock everything. Maybe not a key, maybe a lockpick. You know, like in Elder Scrolls, or Splinter Cell, when you’re in that mini-game that stands in for picking a door lock, where you kind of jiggle the right-hand stick until the tumblers slot into place, and you get that satisfying click-thunk that opens the door. It’s like that, but in real life.

When it comes to Krypto, all I needed was to see a young Superman playing catch with his dog, but on the moon. Just a boy and his pet, but on a huge, epic, Superman-type scale. Click goes the tumblers, and suddenly I understand the point of Krypto. Also, this Krypto cover is awesome, and I want it as a poster really badly.

It’s not just comics this happens with. More than once, there are songs I hear that I don’t quite understand until the lock gets picked. Like “Feathers”, a Coheed and Cambria single from the last album. At first, it seemed just like an alright kind of record, and I didn’t get why they chose it for a single release. Then I heard it live, and it was awesome, and it’s really one of the best tracks on an excellent album. Or maybe I’m just easily influenced. Or fickle, perhaps.

I’m not sure how I feel about how English literature is taught in schools, and I tend to think that it just didn’t quite suit me. I know a lot of people who really appreciate the things they learned in their Lit classes, and the tools it gave them to understand what they read. A conversation I had with a friend a while ago still sticks with me, because my mate was so glad she did To Kill A Mockingbird at GCSE as she wouldn’t have appreciated it otherwise. See, I couldn’t disagree more. It’s one of my favourite books, and analysing it in school would have killed it for me. Shit, there were books I used to like that I hated once we were done with them in the classroom.

The problem comes down to keys, or rather how we find the keys. English Lit just works for some people, but it didn’t for me. Take Shakespeare; now, there’s one writer who just cannot be appreciated from being pulled apart and scrutinised by a classroom full of bored thirteen year olds. Up until recently, as in last year, I still had no appreciation whatsoever of his work. Then a couple of things made the tumblers rattle over.

First of al, I read about a Canadian comedy drama called Slings & Arrows over on Siskoid’s blog (think it may have been this bit) that sounded interesting, despite being about The Bard. And it’s really good. Really well written, very funny. But more importantly, the main character (played by Paul Gross, who was Fraser in Due South) speaks so well about Hamlet, that I actually started to understand where the heck the play was coming from.

As an aside, this is how the real information revolution will work. Not from big changes and social phenomena, global trends that make everyone love particular brands, although that’s always going to happen, but from more people being able to connect with smaller things they would never have found otherwise. A short run Canadian comedy from a few years ago? I never, ever would have found out about that in any other way than in the haphazard mode things are distributed over the internet.

About the same time, I went to see an open-air Everyman production of Midsummer Night’s Dream at St Fagans, the Welsh folk museum. And it was hilarious, seriously funny, and I realised that Shakespeare’s work is almost completely reliant on the delivery of the actors. Reading it just doesn’t have the same effect. These things together picked the lock, and I understood the man’s writing far better than I ever had before. I watched the Ian McKellan Macbeth from the 70s, and was completely engrossed, even though the exact same thing had bored me to tears at school.

All that said, I doubt anything will make me want to read about Streaky the Super-Cat.

Grant Morrison, as always, handles the character best, by realising that an uncompromising idealist in the Marvel U, one that believes completely in Xavier’s dream, that believes he will trumph in any situation regardless of the odds, must have one personality characteristic above all others. He’d have to be completely fucking barmy. The “ice-cold lunacy” Wolverine refers to in the very first Morrison issue. It’s a great spin, a way of making the character compelling while retaining the idealism, and also goes someway to explaining the whole leaving the mother of his child for the woman she was cloned from plot point of the 80s, a character twist meant to make the boring character more interesting but ultimately kind of broke him.

Morrison’s take also allowed for an interesting comparison between Scott Summers and the Hairy Short Guy, examining the way their relationship could oscillate between friendship and antagonism. It led to the Assault on Weapon Plus storyline that had him and Logan team up for a mismatched buddies on a mission vibe, like a mutant Lethal Weapon. And for future reference, I would absolutely pay cold, hard cash to watch a Wolverine/Cyclops road trip flick.

Right, what else has tweaked the radar recently? Looking forward to Hellboy 2, finally landing this side of the Pond on Thursday. I know I had a bit of a go at the original film a couple of weeks ago, but this one looks like Del Toro has more of a grip on what he wants to do. I think I’m a little more used to the idea that it is Del Toro’s world rather than Mignola’s, and with that in mind I’m interested to see what kind of original take he has on it. I watched the first one last week, and while I don’t disagree with the negative things I’ve written about it (it really doesn’t quite hold together), what it gets right, it gets very right, and ultimately it’s a fun, engaging, good natured film, which bodes well. Ron Perlman was born to play the role, and John Hurt was brilliant too. And the sequence set in 1944 is absolutely brilliant, really spot on, and I hope the second film takes its cue from that.

And speaking of live action, BBC 4’s been showing a lot of the old 60s Batman series. I keep forgetting they’re on, so I haven’t managed to catch a whole one, but I caught the end of the one with the Green Hornet and Kato in it. It is beyond strange to watch Bruce Lee turn up in Batman. I’ve also watched a few YouTube clips of Kevin Smith doing his lecture series, ones where he mentioned his abortive attempts at writing screenplays for The Six Million Dollar Man and Green Hornet. The idea of Smith doing Green Hornet is really laughable, and it’s not really surprising the pitch was based in the 90s. The infamous First Wave of John Peters-driven superhero movies led to so many crazy properties being thrown round on the grounds that any of that shit would make money, regardless of whether the world really wanted a film version of the Lone Ranger’s grand-nephew.

Of course, what’s even crazier is that now were in the Second Wave, shit is still being flung just to see what sticks, and now Seth Rogen’s on writing duties. This is how insane Hollywood is. Kevin Smith writes about Superman’s sex life, so obviously he’s the man who should do Green Hornet, regardless of suitability. And when he can’t do it, they employ another funny fat guy on the grounds that, I don’t know, he also writes films with lots of naughty words in them.

I also notice io9 reporting an American live-action remake of Akira. Oh no oh no oh no. Is not going to work. Whinge whinge whinge.

In nicer news, getting through the latter half of Series 3 of Battlestar Galactica. It’s been awesome to see Dean Stockwell, Al Calavicci from Quantum Leap, turn up again, this time as a bad guy. Reminds me of how creepy he was as Devil-Al in that QL episode with Stephen King in it. Damn, I loved that show, and damn the show’s final episode was shitty. I really hope Galactica doesn’t screw the pooch when it comes to an end, because the rest of it’s been so very good.

With all the other superhero films doing so well, it’s going to be interesting to see how the X-Men franchise pans out in the next couple of years. It’s really the series that proved the viability of a new approach to rubber-trouser characters, in terms of faithfulness to the themes and stories of the original material, and a way of taking the best bits of what went before. Sure, Blade is technically the first of the successful comic book adaptations, but that really is in spite of the original rather than because. And I like the Tomb Of Dracula stuff.

If I were being pessimistic, I’d say I don’t have a whole lot of hope with the Magneto prequel. First of all, you’re not likely to find a young actor as good as Ian McKellan to take over the role, and someone of the calibre of, say, Hayden Christensen isn’t going to be able to handle what will inevitably be a pretty dark film. It was never going to be all bright pink flower-bunnies, but after The Dark Knight you can bet the message Hollywood will be taking from the public reaction is nightmarish, unrelenting grim is what’s required. There’s too much scope to mishandle this one.

Wolverine, on the other hand, had got Hugh Jackman going for it. The stupidest thing about X-Men 3 was the way Cyclops was killed off for essentially being a boring goody-goody leader type, only to be immediately replaced by a neutered Logan in the exact same role. A prequel means angry loner Logan, hopefully with a dollop of the sinister slaughter from X-Men 2. Also, Deadpool, and who doesn’t want to see a cinematic Deadpool? I just hope they use some of Grant Morrison’s take on the Weapon X programme; after all, there was a split-second shot of a “Weapon Plus” vial in The Incredible Hulk. Also, I don’t notice any stinkers on director Gavin Hood’s IMDB page, in the way that Brett Ratner’s previous convictions correctly indicated a screw-up.

Negatives? Well, Morrison aside I’ve never liked the Weapon X stuff. Gambit’s in it. The last X-Men film was poor and allegedly plagued with studio meddling, so is that going to play out this time too?

Wolverine’s a funny old character. First time I saw him was in Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends when I was but a lad. He used his claws to make an impromptu kebab. So I kind of missed out on the edgy killer persona that so captivated a generation. Then he turned up in a few places- a Hulk comic, Spider-Man, a few other things- and he was, frankly, a bit of a dickhead. I must have missed out on the nuance of his mysterious loner thing, but then he was a short-arse in yellow lycra with a daft haircut who was being a twat to Peter Parker. I couldn’t really see the attraction, and to make it worse he turned up in every fucking issue of every fucking comic during the 90s.

I wouldn’t say I ever really warmed to the character, but he certainly bugged me less as time went on. And thanks to Jackman’s performance in the first film, I finally understood where the character was coming from. It was properly surprising, really, but I ended up rooting for him, in particular during the aforementioned rampage in the mansion in the second film. Funny how things change, but that really goes to show how good Jackman did at grounding the character, leaving me more optimistic than not for the solo film.

Still prefer Cyclops, though.

Looks like Geoff Johns is coming back on The Flash. Perhaps if this doesn’t work, they’ll give Baron or Messner-Loebs another spin.

Joking aside, I’m cautiously optimistic about this. After all, I loved GL: Rebirth. On the other hand, that’s because Hal Jordan is my Favouritest Character Ever n’Ever n’Ever, and, as I’ve mentioned here before, I’m brimming with indifference toward Barry Allen. Also, I always felt that Johns had more to say about the Rogues than Wally West, although I’ll concede that’s more to do with Mark Waid closing off the character’s arc and leaving not much left for another writer to say, at least with that particular iteration of the character. Barry Allen is, for all intents and purposes, a brand new character, insofar as the standard techniques of superhero storytelling have fundamentally changed since they killed him off, and God knows they’ve done wonders for the Lanterns. Ultimately, all I really want is for Wally West to still be knocking round.

Of course, the absolute victory condition would be an ongoing Jay Garrick title. But I’ve probably used up my lifetime allocation of unexpected wish-fulfillment with this Summer’s cape flicks.

The latest Batman film has really brought it home how much I’ve enjoyed the recent film adaptations more than the actual comics. And this strikes me as a little odd. Firstly, The Incredible Hulk. Planet Hulk was awesome, and I enjoyed it way more than I was expecting to. But it’s not what you’d call the “classic” incarnation of the character, which is something I think the film managed to capture really well. As for Iron Man and the crazy rich guy, both comic titles have never had writing teams as good as they’ve had over the past couple of years. Ellis and the Knaufs have written some really great Iron Man stuff, ditto Morrison and Dini at the competition, but I’ve found my enjoyment seriously marred by the unending crossover bollocks I really couldn’t care less about. I guess that once again I have to conclude that I just prefer it when writers are allowed to get on with doing their jobs without interference.

That said, I’m really looking forward to seeing more of the shared universe the Marvel movies take place in. Sometimes I can’t even keep my own continuity straight.

I would be completely happy if they never made a sequel to The Dark Knight. There is just too much scope for a cock-up. But there’s going to be one, of course, because it’s now made more than eleventy-squillion Euros across the globe. The Riddler gets my vote for a grim reimagining, but absolutely not Johnny Depp. When he’s on form, he’s brilliant, but isn’t he just going to treat the role like Captain Jack II? Or, Heavens forefend, another crack at Willy Wonka?

Speaking of which, I fucking loathe Tim Burton’s Chocolate Factory, more and more with the passing years. What an irredeemable load of self indulgent wank. Comic geeks think they’ve had the shitty end of the stick over the years with disrespectful versions of beloved franchises. No one’s ever had the balls to follow through with a really nasty adaptation of Roald Dahl’s stuff.

In fact, I’ll leave you with this idea: Christopher Nolan’s BFG. Live action, with Henson’s Creature Shop doing the giants.