Friday, October 1, 2010

This and that.

Hey all, happy Friday! I kind of wanted to post something today, if only to stay connected with the blog. My EPIC review of Superman: Secret Origin is still in the process of being finished, so I'm unable to post that, and most of the comics I've read lately haven't really caused me to think, “Boy, I NEED to review this comic for the masses!” So what to do... Well, since this IS a comic blog first and foremost I might as well talk comics. Last night I read Shadowland: Daughters of the Shadow #2, Shadowland: Power Man #2, Shadowland: Moon Knight #2, Detective Comics #869, and Captain America: Patriot #2. I didn't like Moon Knight at all, while the rest were pretty good. None of them really blew me away, they were just good solid reads. If I had to pick a best out of that bunch, I'd go with Cap: Patriot. I also finished up, “The Last Days of Animal Man” trade at school today. To be honest, I don't know why I decided to read it, it was one of those spur of the moment, grab the first trade you see sort of decisions, and I have to say, I'm glad I did read it. It was WAY better than it had any right to be. Animal Man never appealed to me in the least, but this story actually caused me to care about the title character, something I didn't believe could be done. Basically the story is set in the near future where Animal Man learns that he's losing his powers, which causes him to go through several stages of grief. I'd easily recommend it. With Animal Man out of the way, Kick-Ass is the next trade to find its way into my book bag. Here's hoping it's as good as I've been hearing. Besides all that, I've been slowly making my way through the many Green Lantern back issues I seem to have accumulated(mainly thanks to my sister). You see, my sister is a huge Kyle Rayner fan and actually collected the last Green Lantern series from issue #51 to... whenever that series concluded. After she finished them up, she gave 'em to me(like a year ago...)and I'm just now getting around to them. I'm up to issue #89 and so far I'm enjoying them WAAAAAY more than the current Green Lantern series. Unlike Hal Jordan, who really doesn't have any compelling stories left to tell, I've been finding many of Kyle's stories to be interesting and original. I can fully understand why DC went the direction they went with the Green Lantern series back in the 1990's.

Okay, that takes care of the comic book portion of this post. Next let's get to Fallout 3! After getting home from the art gallery(which I'll get into later...)I finally started the game over again with a new, scumbag sort of character. I will admit to taking a perverse pleasure in ignoring Butch's plea to help his mother during the break out from Vault 101 stage. Plus blowing his head off after I told him I wouldn't assist him was like icing on the cake... The cake of EVIL! Sorry, that was really lame... Anyway, Butch shouldn't have messed with me at my tenth birthday party. If you ask me, he had that bullet coming(anybody who's played Fallout should get that). From there it was off to the Capital Wasteland to make a name for myself as the baddest man to ever walk the planet. It should be a blast.

As for the old personal life, I had to go to an art gallery for my English class earlier tonight. That was probably the first time I've ever been to an art gallery, and it's pretty safe to say that it'll be the last time! It was all just weird... I mean, when I think art I think pictures, portraits, sculptures, etc. Sure, there were some pretty decent paintings there, but then there were just weird, WEIRD things... Some of them I got a chuckle out of(such as a painting depicting Sarah Palin as the Anti-Christ), some things left me feeling uncomfortable(like the painting of Adam banging Eve against a tree in the Garden of Eden), and others(most of them actually)left me feeling absolutely perplexed(how the HELL is a block of wood with the word “painting” across it considered art???). It was bizarre... Now I have to try to pick out one piece of art and write a 2-3 page paper on what I thought about it, what I thought the artist was trying to say, how they used light/dark and symbolism to try to make their point, etc. Normally I really enjoy writing(as I think this blog proves), so I have no problem starting a paper, but this time around I'm drawing a total blank... The paper is due next Friday, so I have about a week to try to make heads or tails of what the hell I was looking at today. Besides that, I've been thoroughly enjoying the current season of Hell's Kitchen, so if anybody wants to talk about that, be my guest(I'm looking at JT and Falisha!). Same goes for the Ultimate Fighter series, which is another of my guilty pleasures. That's gonna do it for me tonight. I'll be doing some quick studying for my science test on Monday, reading a few more issues of Green Lantern(as well as two or three new books)before calling it a night. Before I go though, here's an Impulse scan. Why an Impulse scan? Why not? See ya around, X out.Now THIS is art!

15 comments:

  1. X, this was a great post, one worthy of our Legion of Losers blog. Did you get my invite to be one of the authors in your e-mail? It's totally okay if you don't want to join, I just like to ask because it makes me feel like Willy Wonka giving out golden tickets, or Captain America recruiting Avengers.

    Your art gallery adventure had me laughing so hard. I think it's safe to say most sane people would feel the way you did, although that piece of wood with the word "painting" on it sounds pretty cool to me.

    I don't have any of the current gaming systems, but any time I could play as a villain in a game on PS1 or 2 I would. There's something so satisfying about just taking the easiest route and killing everything. Along time ago my friend had some Star Wars RPG where this wookie owed him a life debt and he just killed it right then and there. I actually felt pretty guilty for how gratifying that was...

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  2. Oh my GOD, Kello, I had NO idea such a wondrous blog even existed!!! I hardly ever(and by that I mean I never)check my g-mail account, so I had no clue until I took a quick look just now and discovered my Golden Ticket!!! Woo-hooo!!! It should go without saying that I consider this to be one of the crowning moments in my life, which is kind of sad... :P

    The weirdest thing about the art gallery was the fact that my professor and his wife were there, as well as two of my classmates. Besides that, it was like 30 octogenarians toddling about the room staring aimlessly at things, eating the free cookies that were being handed out... Man was it weird!

    You know, I actually have mixed emotions when it comes time to play the bad guy in a game that gives you the option to create your own moral compass. After my first playthrough as a full out good guy/hero type, there were definitely some characters I really wanted to kill, but couldn't due to the fact that I was a good guy. Of course now as a bad guy I can happily run around avenging myself on those characters. That doesn't bother me. What does bother me is doing bad/evil things to the characters who DON'T deserve it! You know, a lot of people in the last playthrough were very good to my character, and now I have to go around and wrong them... I know it's just a video game, and I PROBABLY shouldn't be getting THIS attached to those characters, but I can't help it!

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  3. I'm glad your on the team, X-Man. I expect to see a lot of great rants from you on the site!

    You know I've been thinking about your class assignment, and I think in honor of the piece of wood that said "painting", you should turn in a piece of paper with the word "essay" on it. Sounds like an instant A+, right?

    I bet no one at the art gallery really came to see any of the pieces, they just came for free cookies.

    I totally agree about the moral dilemma of being the good or bad guy. It just always turned out that the longer I played the game, the more bored I got of being the hero. Say what you want, villains get quick results, like the dark side of the force.

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  4. I'm glad I'm on the team too! I'm sending you my blog pic from my good e-mail that I check daily, so if you ever want to e-mail me, use that one!

    HA!!! I wonder if my professor would get that... He has a strange sense of humor. For example, we were watching "Waiting for Godot" in class last week. Before I go any further, my favorite part of Waiting for Godot is when it's over. Anyway, the whole class is watching the movie in the darkened classroom when all of a sudden we hear laughter. I turn around, and it's our proferros just giggling away at stuff like a little school girl. THe rest of the class was dead quiet, and he was chuckling away... So yeah, I don't know about his sense of humor...

    I'd bet those uber old folks went there for the cookies! The cookies actually looked good, but I was there on a mission, and as such had no time for eating cookies.

    Agreed, the villain definitely gets quicker results since he doesn't care what his actions do to people, so long as he gets what he wants. To me though, the hero makes deeper connections to the other characters in the game. He learns back stories and oftentimes is motivated to help out another character who desperately needed help. The hero's story experience is deeper, while the villains is usually more shallow... Hey, you know, this sounds like just the type of thing I should be posting about over at the LOL blog!

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  5. Thanks for keeping us up to date on the comics you've been reading, X! Sometimes you don't need more than a few words to say how you felt about a comic, so I'm glad you didn't stress out about putting up reviews for each one.

    I'm really glad you mentioned the Last Days of Animal Man trade, because I just got it! For one of the eBay auctions I won, there were nine books I knew I was getting, plus two random ones that were the seller's choice so I didn't know what they were until I got them in the mail. Well, one of them was the aforementioned Animal Man trade (the other was a Magog trade). So I'm really glad to hear that it's worth a read!

    The art gallery doesn't sounds like it was all bad if there were free cookies. :) But seriously, I love modernism and postmodernism in fiction, but in "fine art" it can be absolutely baffling. When I was working in Washington D.C. I remember seeing this thing at the National Gallery of Modern Art that just looked like...a piece of newspaper that someone had used to clean themselves up after going to the bathroom. Heck, for all I know that's exactly what it was!

    And blowing off Butch's head...that's cold, man. Just plain cold. :)

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  6. "Before I go any further, my favorite part of Waiting for Godot is when it's over." <--- That made me laugh WAY harder than it should have. Great post X, I love the way you described the art, it seems like the perfect place to go with a buddy and just laugh and make jokes.

    Glad ya joined the L.O.L. as well, I love seeing what everyone posts and that makes it fun because you literally never know what to expect there.

    I also have that feeling you guys mentioned when ya feel bad about doing stuff on a video game, I've been playing through Red Dead as I am and I'm looking forward to playing it as a bad guy but I can tell I'll feel bad hurting people in the game I've grown attached to.

    Kello - Don't know if you have the net fixed yet buddy but if so you should join Myself, Marc, X and Falisha for a chat on AIM tomorrow night buddy.If so gimme an add, my screen name is KevinKavalier

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  7. Hey, since you guys seemed to enjoy this short post, maybe I'll do another one like it tonight. I like Marc's idea about just throwing out a few words about what I've read, especially since some comics really don't deserve more than a few words. I'll throw out a few more thoughts about my weekend readings tonight.

    As for the art... Yeah... It really was baffling... And I still have to write up a 2 page paper on one of the pieces of "art" that I saw due on Friday. I have no clue how to start the paper, so it's probably gonna be a last minute a last minute type paper.

    Have you ever seen/read Waiting for Godot, JT? I truly can't stand that play... It's just so pointless/bizarre/agonizingly boring! Ugh...

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  8. "I have no clue how to start the paper, so it's probably gonna be a last minute a last minute type paper." Is there an echo in here X?

    And I can't say I've even heard of the Godot thing by but it does sound boring as hell..

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  9. What did you want from me, JT?! I was in a hurry and I didn't proof read my comment... What a red hood helmet... :D

    JT, do yourself the biggest favor you possibly can, NEVER read, watch or even think about Waiting for Godot! Trust me on that one!

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  10. Lmao, this is the second time yo've called me a Red Hood Helmet, you're such a Mofo! And not the Grant Morrison kind :P

    Lol is it really that bad? What would you give it on a rating scale? 0? or -10 :D

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  11. Well, to be honest with you, I'd have been more offended if you would have called me a Morrison Follower! :P

    Hmm, on a scale of 0-10 I'd give that damn play a negative infinity out of 10! It was all just pointless and weird... Hmm, kind of like Morrison's Batman run...

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  12. LOL! Only you could Trash Morrison in two different topics. I gotta say though, he really is overrated, his Batman work is some of my least favorite ever. Just bring Batman back and have him fire the Outsiders, make a new team with Jason, Arsenal, Connor Queen, Ravager, Batgirl and Geo-Force then have em fight Deathstroke and his Titans. Batman vs. Deathstroke = money.

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  13. I've never seen a film version of "Waiting for Godot." Was it just a recording of people literally performing the play, or was it an actual TV/movie adaptation?

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  14. You know me, I'm of two minds with Crazy Grant. On the one hand his X-Men work took a franchise that needed a shake-up and delivered just that. I mean he made the X-Men worth reading again. I think the problem is the fact that Batman didn't need a shake-up. I didn't think there was anything wrong with the pre-Grant Bat books. We both REALLY enjoyed Judd Winick's work, and I liked James Robinson's take on Bats. I think Grant should be used on a title that could actually use a huge shake-up like Wonder Woman, Teen Titans or... I don't know, the fudging Doom Patrol I guess.

    The Godot film I saw was an actual movie preformance of the play. It took the play word for word, and it was set in the only scene in the play, so it was 100% loyal to the play, Marc.

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  15. Ugh, I don't like it when film versions of plays don't bother to adapt it so there's at least a scene change...they just end up feeling claustrophobic. That's why I didn't really like Driving Miss Daisy (among other reasons).

    On the other hand, something like Glengarry Glen Ross is good because even though it follows the play closely, it's well shot and feels like it could just as easily have been written for the screen as for the stage.

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