Jazzmoose Posted March 10, 2009 Report Posted March 10, 2009 Yeesh... If I'm going to read Superman, it had better have art by either Curt Swan or Wayne Boring. Quote
RDK Posted March 10, 2009 Report Posted March 10, 2009 Yeesh... If I'm going to read Superman, it had better have art by either Curt Swan or Wayne Boring. Why you... mouldy old fig! Quote
Jazzmoose Posted March 10, 2009 Report Posted March 10, 2009 I'm not just old school, I remember when they built the damned thing... Quote
Alexander Posted March 10, 2009 Author Report Posted March 10, 2009 (edited) Yeesh... If I'm going to read Superman, it had better have art by either Curt Swan or Wayne Boring. Actually, Moore's "Whatever Happened To The Man of Tomorrow?" was drawn by Curt Swan! It's an amazing story. In the late '80s, around the time Moore was doing "Watchmen," DC (as I mentioned above) was preparing a complete reboot of the Superman character to be done by then-hot property John Byrne. Byrne was to rewrite Superman's origin story in a miniseries called "Man of Steel" and would then take over writing and drawing both "Superman" and "Action Comics" (Jerry Ordway would draw the "Adventures of Superman" book) which would follow Bryne's reboot. For example, one of the changes Bryne made was making Superman the only survivor of Krypton, which meant that there was no Supergirl, no Krypto, no Phantom Zone, no Bottle City of Kandor. There would also be Green Kryptonite only (no Red, Gold, Blue, White, or any other colors). Anyway, as a send-off to the "old" Superman continuity, Moore was comissioned to officially "end" the series in a two-part story called "Whatever Happened To The Man of Tomorrow?" The story is set ten years after the death of Superman. Now married and retired from reporting, Lois Lane is interviewed about Superman's last days during which he and his closest friends and allies were under attack from various old enemies. Since nothing Moore did would be carried over into Byrne's new continuity, he took the liberty of killing off Lana Lang, Jimmy Olson, Lex Luthor, Brainaic, the Kryptonite Man, Krypto the Superdog, Bizarro, The Toyman, the Prankster, and Mr. Mxyzptlk (who is revealed to be something far more than a little man in a funny hat). He also exposed Superman's identity as Clark Kent. I had never been a Superman reader up until this point, but Swan's art is wonderful. The image of Lex Luthor's corpse (with Brainaic's head wired into to his skull) staggering forward is one of the most horrific in mainstream comics... Edited March 10, 2009 by Alexander Quote
BruceH Posted March 10, 2009 Report Posted March 10, 2009 (edited) Well, Jazzmoose, there you have it. Curt Swan. Go to it, man. (In many ways it's kind of the "ulimate" Superman story. You can get both halves of the story in a single square-bound comic now, too.) Another really great one is "For the Man Who Has Everything" written by Moore, drawn and lettered by Dave Gibbons. It came out just before the start of the Watchmen series. Still another great Moore/Superman story is a Swamp Thing crossover where Superman caught a Kryptonian disease and is dying. Really quite good. Edited March 10, 2009 by BruceH Quote
RDK Posted March 10, 2009 Report Posted March 10, 2009 Another really great one is "For the Man Who Has Everything" written by Moore, drawn and lettered by Dave Gibbons. It came out just before the start of the Watchmen series. Did you see that they adapted that one for the Justice League animated series a few years back? I'm man enough to admit that it always brings tears to my eyes. Quote
Jazzmoose Posted March 10, 2009 Report Posted March 10, 2009 Damn. I recognize the covers, and realize now I read them at the time. Must not have been Moore's most memorable work. That, or the brain cells are really starting to fade. (Yeah, I know which one you guys are betting on! ) Quote
BruceH Posted March 10, 2009 Report Posted March 10, 2009 Another really great one is "For the Man Who Has Everything" written by Moore, drawn and lettered by Dave Gibbons. It came out just before the start of the Watchmen series. Did you see that they adapted that one for the Justice League animated series a few years back? I'm man enough to admit that it always brings tears to my eyes. I haven't seen that adaptation. So it was pretty decent? Quote
Alexander Posted March 10, 2009 Author Report Posted March 10, 2009 Damn. I recognize the covers, and realize now I read them at the time. Must not have been Moore's most memorable work. That, or the brain cells are really starting to fade. (Yeah, I know which one you guys are betting on! ) I would think you'd remember half of the Superman cast getting killed off... Quote
Free For All Posted March 11, 2009 Report Posted March 11, 2009 Just got back from seeing it. A little long, a little unintentionally funny in spots, but overall very entertaining and some great escapist entertainment (and great visually). I am glad I knew a little about the story going in. I haven't read the comic, if I had I'd probably have been more critical. At times it reminded me of Bladerunner. I also liked the music, some nice Philip Glass in there. Quote
Jazzmoose Posted March 11, 2009 Report Posted March 11, 2009 I would think you'd remember half of the Superman cast getting killed off... Well, Superman was pretty irrelevant in my book by that time anyway. The reboot of the character that I look back at fondly involved a sand creature back in '72 or so. Um...I guess you had to be there... Quote
BruceH Posted March 11, 2009 Report Posted March 11, 2009 I would think you'd remember half of the Superman cast getting killed off... Well, Superman was pretty irrelevant in my book by that time anyway. The reboot of the character that I look back at fondly involved a sand creature back in '72 or so. Um...I guess you had to be there... Oh, good God, I remember that issue! He lost two-thirds of his power, which gave them an excuse to nix the truly moronic super-powers, like blowing out suns or flying faster than light and so on. The "big" reboot in the 80's, with John Byrne was a good idea in theory...the only trouble was that Byrne was an average writer at best and a truly terrible artist IMHO. "Kirby without balls" is how a friend of mine liked to put it, but mainly his art looks ugly and amateurish. To ME anyway. Quote
RDK Posted March 11, 2009 Report Posted March 11, 2009 I totally disagree re: Byrne. While I've since lost my taste for him - and always preferred such stylists as Neil Adams, Wrightson, and Starlin - I find Byrne to be one of the finest artists of the last few decades (at least in the 80's, his best decade imo). He's not always flashy, but at the very least he's consistently competent and one of the very best comic book storytellers of his generation. Oh snap. Now are we gonna get into the "who'd win in a fight between Batman and Superman" debate? Quote
Alexander Posted March 11, 2009 Author Report Posted March 11, 2009 I totally disagree re: Byrne. While I've since lost my taste for him - and always preferred such stylists as Neil Adams, Wrightson, and Starlin - I find Byrne to be one of the finest artists of the last few decades (at least in the 80's, his best decade imo). He's not always flashy, but at the very least he's consistently competent and one of the very best comic book storytellers of his generation. Oh snap. Now are we gonna get into the "who'd win in a fight between Batman and Superman" debate? Byrne has always been one of my favorite artists. I used to own his entire run on the FF and on Alpha Flight (the first book I ever really collected). I also loved his X-Men comics (inked by Terry Austin). Byrne is clearly inspired by Kirby and has done some of his best work with Kirby created characters (the FF, the New Gods, the Demon). Has anybody here read "The Hunger"? Darkseid vs. Galactus! Quote
Jazzmoose Posted March 11, 2009 Report Posted March 11, 2009 I thought Rog-2000 or whatever was pretty good (I was a BIG E-Man fan in the midseventies...turned into a weird Charlton obsession which was then rewarded ten years later with Watchmen in a way), and like everyone else enjoyed Byrne's X-Men run, but after he started cleaning up his style (as comic artists do), there didn't seem to be a whole lot left underneath. I mean, he beat the holy dogshit out of later pretenders like Lee and Leifield (or whatever his name was), but I didn't think he was the wunderkind of the ages as some did. Quote
BruceH Posted March 11, 2009 Report Posted March 11, 2009 Well, all I can say is Byrne's Superman art really left me cold. Quote
Alexander Posted March 11, 2009 Author Report Posted March 11, 2009 Well, all I can say is Byrne's Superman art really left me cold. It was far from his best work, I'll agree with that. Quote
jazzbo Posted March 11, 2009 Report Posted March 11, 2009 I was out of comics by then, I pretty much stopped reading in 1979 or so, and didn't read much at all in the eighties besides the Warren magazine and Kitchen Sink comics reissues of The Spirit. When the graphic novels hit I picked up a few, The Dark Knight and Ronin because Miller had impressed me with Daredevil before I stopped reading comics, and he was so Eisnerian, and Watchmen because I actually was fond of the Charlton characters that Ditko had breathed new life into for a brief sixties time, and Rorsach really seemed like "Mr. A" to me, one of my favorite Dikto efforts (because it was so extreme!) So I'll not be going to see Watchmen with great expectations other than to have a good comic book movie experience. (Which to me is more than enough; Daredevil for example, or Spiderman 3 or Dark Knight or Iron Man). Quote
DTMX Posted March 12, 2009 Report Posted March 12, 2009 In case no one has posted it yet, What If Frank Miller Created "Peanuts"? Panel 1 Panel 2 Quote
RDK Posted March 12, 2009 Report Posted March 12, 2009 In case no one has posted it yet, What If Frank Miller Created "Peanuts"? Panel 1 Panel 2 Thank you! That's brilliant! Quote
Alexander Posted March 12, 2009 Author Report Posted March 12, 2009 (edited) In case no one has posted it yet, What If Frank Miller Created "Peanuts"? Panel 1 Panel 2 I saw this yesterday. It is very clever and well-executed. I would like to point out, however, that my childhood friend Jason Yungbluth beat this guy to it a long, long time ago. Behold! Weapon Brown. A post-apocalyptic take on Peanuts. In this story, Weapon Brown is looking for Little Red, the girl he loves, who has been taken from him by the evil Doctor Van Pelt and her religious fanatic brother, Linus. Linus plans to sacrifice Red to the Great Pumpkin. Will Weapon Brown get to her in time? Will he ever kick that football? This came out in installments several years ago before being compiled into the one-shot seen above. Jason is currently at work on the followup, "Blockhead's War." Here, Weapon Brown goes up against the heroes of other comic strips. Here's the first couple of pages... I know what you're thinking. Yes, I grew up with a freakin' genius. Visit his website whatisdeepfried.com in order to read the whole story. You can also order the first Weapon Brown story ("A Peanut Scorned") and the first issue of the new story directly from him. He's a nice guy. And tell him Alex sent ya! Edited March 12, 2009 by Alexander Quote
BruceH Posted March 12, 2009 Report Posted March 12, 2009 As Johnny Carson would say, "Weird, wild, funny stuff!" Quote
Alexander Posted March 12, 2009 Author Report Posted March 12, 2009 Here's a link to my blog in which I write about a totally geeky project I just embarked on: Compiling a soundtrack album to the "Watchmen" graphic novel (I thought the film's soundtrack album was lacking). You can read it here. Quote
Jazzmoose Posted March 14, 2009 Report Posted March 14, 2009 I finally caught the film today and was pleasantly surprised. It was better than I expected to get after a twenty-plus year wait, and far better than I expected after reading this thread. I agree with most of the criticism. The additional gore is not only appalling, but it adds nothing to the story. (I found it almost as intrusive as "300" popping up here and there.) The movie definitely has the "everything thrown in but the kitchen sink" feel, but it's not nearly as bad as some other adapatations; the abyssmal Dune comes to mind. Of course, I came to the film with full knowledge of the story, but then I saw Dune the same way. The soundtrack in particular was a pain, but for me it wasn't due to the choice of music (though I'd rather have seen them stick to eighties stuff) but due to the influence of music videos on modern film and television. Story-wise, I thought they did an excellent job, although certainly a twelve hour movie could have presented it better, but let's get real. I also have to agree with Alexander's evaluation of the acting ability of the woman playing the Silk Spectre. All in all, I think it was a decent job, and much better than anyone had a right to expect. The real argument, of course, is should the attempt have been made at all, knowing the compromises that the film medium would demand in the source material. There just wasn't that much to cut in the original work, time constraints or no. Biggest disappointment? The scene where Rorshach figures out what happened to the kidnapped girl. It was handled so well in the book (I couldn't turn the page, without conciously realizing why) that it was a major factor in the book. In the movie, just another scene. Oh, well... Quote
jazzbo Posted March 18, 2009 Report Posted March 18, 2009 I just came back from seeing this. I enjoyed it. I read the work when it was first compiled as a graphic novel, and maybe once since then but at least a dozen years ago. And I've not read much of Moore otherwise, nor much of comics since then, so I'm not sentimentally attached to the material, author or anything else. It was a fun afternoon movie. Pretty well-done for a fantasy comic-book film. Some excellent effects. I really liked Archimedes and Mars. Quote
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