New Comics: 1/14/09

Hey, imagine that? Comics are in the news these days, so let's talk about them. Fortunately, the two biggest selling comics for the big two publishers for the month were out yesterday so I figured I'd give my impressions.

First up is Amazing Spider-Man #583, which, according to one person's whose blogging I have high regard for, is bringing out classiness all over America:



Now there are three distinct things wrong with this issue, and they are all on the cover, let me break them down for you.

Problem #1:

Firstly, let me say, I don't have a problem with the fact that they are doing a "Tribute to Dating" issue. It's close to Valentine's Day, and hey, whatever you can do to shift a few more units, you go right ahead Marvel. But, it's the fact that this issue points out what a soulless, awful hell the dating world of the 21st Century is, well, it's just cruel. The whole point of the issue is for Betty Brandt to reflect on her relationship with Peter Parker while she does her best to hook him up via the time tested devices of speed-dating and getting her friends so drunk they'll sleep with anyone (except, of course, Peter Parker). The big problem is that she proves that there is not one, acceptable single woman in all of (make-believe) New York City. That's just sad.

Problem #2:

OK, though Peter's not meeting any women inside the book, outside he's hitting on promiscuous older ladies. This is disturbing to me on many levels. First of all, ever since Peter was made single by selling off his marriage to the love of his life to the devil magic, Marvel's gone to great pains to point out that this was to make him seem younger (especially because once you've got a ball and chain, you're one foot in the grave already), but this is just not the way to do it people!

Problem #3

Spider-Man's gettin' lucky tonight! That's just too much.

Anyway, once you get into the actual content of the issue, it's pretty damn good, and it's odd that this could be an issue that a lot of non-comic readers pick up, since Spider-Man only appears in about three pages.

Oh yeah, and the thing that everyone's talking about, the back-up featuring President Obama. It's OK, certainly a rush-job featuring some workmanlike art by Todd Nauk, but it's not bad and it features a pretty good Joe Biden joke. Obviously I was not one of the lucky few to get the much-vaunted Phil Jimenez Obama cover, but I think I got some good mileage out of this one.

Next up, we've got Final Crisis #6, spoiler goggles on for the rest of this one:


So let's get this out of the way, who woulda thought that the comic that features the death of Batman would be a newscycle also-ran this week? But let's begin at the beginning. I've really been enjoying Final Crisis, and so have a lot of other people, but I have a feeling that this book just isn't going to get its due for a while. Grant Morrison is making you work for it a little more than you do for other big event books. Often the big fights are left off-panel, leaving you to fill in some of the blanks. Also, something that rarely has occurred to me while reading the book is that the "big seven" of the DCU is pretty much been taken off the board ever since issue #2. This is a book, though rewarding in (somewhat) monthly reading is going to be a whole different, better beast once collected.

In this issue, we get the show down between the last remaining remnants of free humanity and Darkseid and his accursed horde. This is really where the series really rewards those of us who have read a lot of old DC books, I mean, there's a scene where Tawky Tawny disembowels Kalibak, who has been reincarnated as a tiger-man from Kamandi. That scene pushes a button that few people have, but if you have that button, like I do, it's a motherfucker.

All of this wraps up in the showdown between Batman and Darkseid, which is just as understated and as well written as anything else in this series. It's just plain good.

Anyway, we have one or maybe two (depending upon how much Superman Beyond #2 ties in) issues of this series left to go, and I can't wait to read the whole thing through sometime soon.

A quick word about the art, up until this issue, the multiple artists that they've been employing have blended pretty seamlessly through out, however this was the first time that I noticed a jarring shift. There were a few, obviously rushed pages in the middle with some sloppy inking, and the last few by Doug Mahnke didn't flow as well from the rest, just because he has such a different style from Pacheo, Jones, etal. But overall, still very nice. Hopefully the inking will be cleaned up in the collection.

So there you go, two very good books this week, I feel blessed!

What Bugs Me About Fringe: Part One

You know, I've started this post two or three times and just never gotten around to finishing it, but seeing the promos for the second half of Fringe's first season really solidified something in my mind. The thing that bugs me the most is that fucking robot arm. In the first episode, when Olivia met with the suit from Massive Dynamics (can't remember her name, but it might as well be Deus Ex Machina), to show the benevolence of the company's owner, she shows off the nifty robot arm he gave her to replace the one she lost to cancer.

See, with The X-Files being one of my favorite TV series ever, it's obvious that I'll make comparisons, seeing as how they're pretty much the same, ie. FBI Agents exploring weird shit. However, The X-Files always went out of their way to make things somewhat plausible. At the end of the day, most of the stories could be explained by delusion or some other, real-world type of explanation, and even the more fantastical stuff was grounded in a some form of reality. Hell, the aliens in the show didn't run around blasting each other with lasers...fuck no! They stabbed each other in the neck with ice picks.

But in Fringe, that robot arm showed that all bets were off, we were no longer grounded in reality and in full on, sci-fi zone. This show does not take place in anything close to the "real" world (unless you listen to a lot of Coast to Coast AM), and it does not have to play by the physical rules as we know them. Once I saw that, I just started to care less. It's not that it resides in that zone, it's that it went out its way to flaunt it in its first episode. Take Fringe's older brother, Lost. A show it is obviously meant to be a companion to (the in-jokes leading me to believe that they even take place in the same "universe"), Lost, though dealing in the fantastical as well, didn't delve into the full-on, anything can happen, sci-fi realm before its third season, when it had earned the audience's trust through a lot of very good story-telling. In my mind, it had earned that leap. Everyone who was watching had seen the clues along the way, the polar bear, the subtle time-shifts, the smoke monster. But at any time, there could have been a "rational" explanation. Then they took the plunge and it worked. It just seemed cheap to me that Fringe took that leap without earning it, like they took the believability of the series for granted.

Ah, what do I know, I'm just some crank on the internet. Plus I keep watching, but really, I can't deny the awesomeness of crazy-Walter. I wish the show was just about him.

Yes, apparently, this is the first in a possible series, as there are some other things that bug me about Fringe and I will continue to keep venting them at you until you go to everyone of my Amazon affiliate links and buy all of the shit that I am pushing on you.

What I'm Reading: RASL: The Drift

Hey there, I still have on more Vacation Reading post to go up, but, I haven't finished to book yet. Hopefully tomorrow night I'll get through it and get a post up. Anyhoo, this week I picked up RASL: The Drift, the first volume of Bone creator Jeff Smith's new book. A ways back I reviewed the first issue of this book, and though I liked it, I had felt that it was simply not paced for single issue reading, especially considering the book is coming out on a quarterly basis, so when I saw the collection was hitting the shelves today, I was excited.

And I was right to be, though this volume only collects the first three issues, it feels like a much more solid chuck of story, though it is obviously only just the very beginning. Our protagonist is Rasl, a man who has discovered how to jump between parallel Earths and uses this knowledge to steal priceless works of art from other Earths to fence on our own. OVer the course of the volume, he learns that other, more sinister interests have discovered how to do this too, and they're out to get him. We also get some back-story as to how Rasl discovered how to traverse universes and what led him to go from straight-edge scientist to hard drinkin' thief.

As a whole, it's very good and I'm definitely interested to see where this is going. I was wondering how Smith's rather cartoonish art style would match up with the more real-world, violent themes of this new creation, but I should not have worried. It all looks good and nothing seems out of place. It's obvious that Smith came from animation, because his art just moves. There are a couple of foot-chase scenes in the book and you can practically see the characters running in your mind as you go.

My only hesitation about the book is that it is so obviously only the beginning and there's probably a lot more to before we really get into the meat of the story. I want the rest now. But, then again, I'm an impatient ass, so YMMV.

Also, a note about the packaging of the book itself. I had assumed that the book would be would be in the "smaller than a comic, but bigger than manga" size that the re-issues of Smith's Bone have been in, however, it was in an oversized (roughly 10''x13'') format and it added some nice heft to the volume. It also allows Smith's art more room to breathe and it helps the story. It made me very happy that I waited for trade.

Marvel Team-Up Featuring: Spider-Man & Barack Obama

I realize that I'm late to the game on this one, but I just had to comment that this is incredibly cool:

Amazing Spider-Man #583

I mean, when was the last time we had a President cool enough to team up with Spidey, much less, share a "terrorist fist-bump"?

Anyway, hopefully I'll have a review of something I picked up this week later today and maybe even finish up my Vacation Reading series (if I ever finish the last book I started).

For more amusing, if not down-right scary, reactions to this issue, check out the latest from Get Off The Internet.

Hey Kids! Art!

Just had to share these, Les McClaine, co-creator of The Middleman and creator of the web-comic Johnny Crossbones put out a call a month or so ago that he was taking commissions, so I had him do these two:

OMAC

The Demon Etrigan

I'm very happy with the way they turned out, and if you like them, keep an eye on his blog for the next time he puts out the call.

Vacation Reading: THE BEST OF THE SPIRIT

The Best of the Spirit is a book I had read several years ago, courtesy of the local library, however it recently came up as a selection of my (Comic)Book Club for this month. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend this month's meeting/drink-up, so I neglected to pick up a copy. Fortunately, the weather on the night in question proved apocalyptic, so I learned on Christmas Eve that it had been pushed back to Jan. 2, so I grabbed a copy and threw it in my suitcase.


This book contains various stories from The Spirit Sunday newspaper supplement from 1941 through 1950 and (I believe) they are all seven pages long. The single fact that they are all so short is shocking considering the amount of information and story they contain. Will Eisner's art is very good and you can see it evolve throughout the book, from the very "puply" style of the first few stories, to a much more cartoonish style towards the end. And some of the title pages are just jaw-dropping, employing techniques that Jim Steranko would use to drop jaws forty years later.

Here are two as examples:




The stories themselves are very good and the wide range of story-telling styles employed (standard comics, text with pictures, story-book-like, etc.) is just incredible when you consider that it was all done by one author. The hardest part about judging the stories is that you have to keep reminding yourself that Eisner is inventing this stuff. It's kind of like when I watched Citizen Kane for the first time a few years ago and I realized that I'd already seen the whole movie in various bits on The Simpsons, it's almost impossible to understand how revolutionary this stuff was, since so many of these things have been woven into the tapestry that is comics today.

One of the best things that Eisner does so well, is that he recognizes that the Spirit himself is one of the least interesting characters in the book, and as you get to the later stories, the Spirit becomes less of a character int he stories and instead is a macguffin or a force of nature that moves the stories forward, sometimes appearing only in a single panel or not at all.

Overall, the box at the top of the title page promises Action, Mystery, Adventure! and this book does deliver. The only mark against this book are the absolutely horrible racial caricatures, particularly of Ebony, the Spirit's cab-driving side-kick. They are indefensible other than to say that they are a product of their time.

As for the recent movie, ever since I saw the first images, I had a feeling that it wasn't for me, coming from "Whores, Whores N' More Whores!" Frank Miller, I had a feeling it would stray from what I've always liked about this character. After reading Doctor K's recent negative review, and Conditional Jeff's thoughtful notes on why he was skipping out on it and I decided that life's too short to waste my time and money on a movie that I know that I'd hate (though I will rent it, since I bizarrely consider Netflix "free"). All I can say, is considering the movie made about $1.25 in it's first weekend, hopefully that means we won't get subjected to Frank Miller's "vision" of Buck Rogers.

Other recommended reading: To see a big-name comics creator do right by the character, definitely check out Darwyn Cooke's first collection of DC's recent re-launch of The Spirit. It contains six, very good done-in-one stories, and Cooke & Jeph Loeb's The Spirit/Batman team-up, which is a hoot.

Vacation Reading: THE RIGHT STUFF

Happy New Year folks! After a fun few days in the sun (and a few more at home in recovery), I've decided to do a quick series about the books I blew through while trying to keep my kids from jumping into the lagoons to "play" with the sharks they had on display.

First up is The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe. After catching the last half of the movie on AMC a couple weeks ago I lamented on twitter that I had yet to get off my ass to read the book, one quick recommendation from Kevin Church and a 40% off coupon from Borders later and it was on the top of the pile for my vacation. Being a space geek from earliest childhood, my first ever book report was about a biography of John Glenn, I was very familiar with the story of the Mercury Seven astronauts and the American space program in general, I've also seen the film many, many times. However, the book is a much different animal than the movie, which seemed to be a much more straight forward docu-drama about how the men were chosen and what happened during the years of the program. Wolfe, in his book, seems more interested in getting in their head and finding out, "what makes a man willing to sit up on top of an enormous Roman candle ...ad wait for someone to light the fuse?" He also delves into the idea that the Astronauts were not merely meant to be heroes to our nation, but our ultimate heroes during the Cold War, single-combat warriors battling the Russian Cosmonauts for rule over the very space above our heads.

I think he does the first the best, helping us to understand the mind-set of a military pilot and how the best of the best judge themselves against each other. The supreme amount of confidence that a ma must have being a pilot at that time, knowing you had a 20% chance of dieing by simply climbing into an airplane in those days must have been stifling. Yet, Wolfe never makes these men out to be egotistical. They are doing a job that requires them to be this way, and quite simply, it almost makes them, ad their families unable to operate as "normal" society does. In a way, it mirrors what seems to be happening with returning Iraq and Afghan War veterans with PTSD, and I wonder if he looked into those who had "the right stuff" and lost it ever experienced symptoms of PTSD, or if that was a closed subject, both in the 1950's & 60's when these events occurred and even in the late 1970's when this book was written.

Wolfe's second theme of the book, that the Astronaut's were America's proxy single-combat warriors of the skies didn't work so well for me. Probably because, by the time I was a child, the Cold War was still going on and space seemed less like a battle ground than an empty place where ICBM's will pass in the night whist on their way to delivering mutually-assured destruction. Wolfe even goes as far as to declare the Cold War over once the US pushes forward its agenda to go to the moon, despite the War forging ahead for at least two more decades. I understand his point, but the Astronauts proved to be simply warriors in a battle that came in the middle of the war.

All of this is not to say that I did not enjoy the book, the cooperation of many of the Astronauts in the writing of the book is what makes it the most interesting, as a long time space geek, I'm very familiar with the time lines and the general facts of each launch, but the personal recollections ad some of the behind-the-scenes politicking of the missions are very enlightening. Also, it is a very quick, snappy read. I blew through its 351 pages in two days, so I highly recommend it.

Other recommended reading: Andrew Chaikin's A Man on the Moon, is probably my favorite book on the American space program, gaining incredible access to NASA and the twelve men who walked on the moon, this book (at 720 pages) is a solid brick of knowledge, but it's also a very fast read as well.

Thinking About Batman

[Note: This was written on Wednesday, so, if the zombie horde has since taken over, please disregard what I have to say.]

I just finished reading Batman #683 and I feel that, it and #682 are easily the best issues of Grant Morrison's run since the three-issue Club of Heroes storyline last year. [SPOILERS AHEAD] In these two issues, we're shown what has happened to Batman since he was strapped into the machine in Final Crisis #2 (or was it 3), essentially, Desaad and Simyan have been beating all of the pain and rage out of his psyche and feeding it into their artificial soldiers to essentially give them an army of Angry Batmen. Fortunately, the pain he has endured over his life is so extreme that not only is it too much for creations of Apokolips to bear, but he can also wield it as a weapon against psychic attackers. This is one of those cool, clever ideas that Morrison has become known for, and really haven't been seen a lot in this series.

Along with all that, we're given some closure as to what happened to Batman after he plunged into the Gotham River with Dr. Hurt at the end of #681. The only real problem here is that, with Batman breaking free at the end, we get a big "TO BE CONTINUED IN FINAL CRISIS #6!" Now, I'm sure this is going to piss a lot of people off (and it already has on the internets), but it doesn't really bug me. Mostly because I'm already reading that series and it seems appropriate that if Bats is going to do something big in FC, it should happen in the main series. The big problem a lot of people are going to have is that the "end" of Batman R.I.P. isn't happening in Batman. I can kind of see their point, but let's face it, this is the nature of big event comics, if there's going to b a major change to a character, it's going to happen in the big event book d'jour. The only place that this hasn't happened is when Marvel showed an uncharacteristic amount of restraint in letting Captain America getting shot in his own book. But anyway, it is what it is, and I, for one am excited to read it when it happens.

Favorite Things: Coda

Hey all, I just wanted to thank everyone who has read all, or even just one of these posts. It was a lot of fun, and not a little bit of work. I still have four or five half-written posts so I'm thinking that I'm going to make this a continuing series.

But anyway, thanks again to everyone who read and commented, I look forward to staying on a more regular posting schedule in the new year. Hope you're all having a wonderful holiday and I'll talk to you when I'm back from vacation in a few days.

Favorite Things: Christmas Day

Finally, one of my favorite things in the world is the beach, because, barring flight delays, that's where I'm on my way to right now. Ha ha ha suckers!!!

OK, for reals, one of my truly favorite things is Christmas Day. While I am no stranger to the seasonal melancholy and the nigh-unbearable stress that the holiday season loads upon us all, somehow, once the day itself dawns, that all washes away. Suddenly it's a flurry of wrapping paper and smiles. Once the first-thing-in-the-morning insanity wanes, it becomes a more relaxed day of playing with toys, drinking coffee and moseying on over to a family-members house for comfort food. I realize that's not everyone's experience (especially if you're hosting), but I think the best way to put it is as Ira Glass said on a This American Life Christmas special, when he said, "Christmas is the time when everyone is the same person that they normally are, but only more so." That pretty much sums it up, we're all good parents, or siblings, or sons and daughters, only more so. And fortunatley, very few of us are truly miserable bastards. So, on this day, I hope you are all enjoying a wonderful, relaxing day with your family. If you celebrate it, I wish you all a truly Merry Christmas and if you don't, I wish you a happy holiday of whatever type you choose.

Favorite Things: Day Twenty Four

Almost to the finishing line here, so let's go with a more traditional, year-end post here. So here are some lists of my official Favorite Things of 2008.

Favorite Movies of 2008 (Theatrical):

1. The Dark Knight: Easily the best movie of the year, and quite possibly one of my favorite movies ever. There's not much to say that has not already been said elsewhere, but this is just a perfect movie.
2. Wall-E: Another perfect movie. Visually beautiful, incredibly intelligent, absolutely unflinching in its indictment of wasteful consumerism, all wrapped up in a package that is perfect for all ages. The amount of information and story this movie expresses in its first, almost dialogue-free hour, should be shown in film-classes for years to come.
   
3. Speed Racer: Fun. No other description applies, this is just a plain fun movie, the likes of which just doesn't seem to get made much anymore (you can check out my original review here).

Favorite Comics of 2008 (Collected Editions):

1. Starman Omnibus Vol. 1: My love of this book has been well-stated before, but now that DC is re-releasing the series in lovely, over-sized hardcovers, I'm falling in love all over again. Just a great package, and though the book is not without its faults, it's still probably the best thing DC put out in the 90's.
2. Invasion!: Pure 1980's stupid fun. It's rare that I can read a book that I loved when I was 14 and still find the same amount of fun in it 20 years later. Shit, I feel old now.
3. Howard Chaykin's American Flagg!: Definitive Collection: It's rare that you get to read something "fresh" these days. I never got a chance to read this series back when it came out, and since then, it was never collected in any meaningful way, so I jumped at the chance to pick up this new edition (at 50% off at DCBS), and it was pretty much as great as everyone had always said. On top of that, it was just a beautiful package, just a brick of a hardcover, a little more trim than the standard size, perfect for carrying on planes and clubbing attackers.

Favorite Comic Series in 2008:

1. Criminal: See Day 22.
2. Captain America: Again, see Day 22.
3. Blue Beetle: As the character-creators Keith Giffen and John Rogers left the book, the very able Matthew Sturges took over...and the book was promptly cancelled. Once again, despite the "fans" bitching that there aren't any teen-skewing, fun, non-continuity laden comics out there for the proverbial "kids" to read, they didn't buy the fucking book that was pretty much exactly what they were asking for. Sturges and continuing artist Raphael Albuquerque came on the book and did, what I thought to be, a very good job despite being doomed from the start. It's to bad really, with the push the character is getting from Batman: The Brave and the Bold TV series, it would have been nice to see if they would have gotten a sales bump off of it.

Favorite Live Music Shows of 2008 (in no particular order):

1. David Byrne (performing the songs of David Byrne & Brian Eno) at the Civic Opera House: Just a beautiful, fun, rollicking show. Playing songs from throughout his career, Mr. Byrne was just plain entertaining.
2. Kraftwerk: Saw them in Milwaukee, don't remember the venue, but it was fantastic. I was doubtful going in, but I had been assured it was one of those shows you have to see and they were right. I really can't explain how good the show was in words, since it was essentially watching four German dudes, sitting behind laptops, playing pre-recorded music, but it was magical. Just fantastic.
3. The Pogues at the Riviera: Yet another one of those "have to see them before you (or Shane McGowan) dies" shows. And once again, it was absolutely perfect.
   

So that's what I have for now, I'm sure I'll have some more comprehensive "best of" stuff in the new year. Anyway, be back tomorrow for THE FATEFUL FINALE!!!*

*Well, not really but hey, some hyperbole was called for.

Favorite Things: Day Twenty Three

Home stretch time, and here's a two-fer Tuesday for you. These are two of my favorite discoveries of the year, bands that I had not paid any mind to, but through the power of some very strong releases (and eMusic making musical risk-taking much easier on the budget) I found some bands that I hope to follow for a while.

First up is Cut Copy and their excellent album In Ghost Colours that has found its way onto many year end lists*, but let me tell you, there's a reason for that, pretty much perfecting the melding of indie-pop and dance music into something that just appeals to me more than I would have thought possible if you had explained it to me beforehand. Here's a video** for Far Away:




Another find (for me) this year were The Mates of State. This husband and wife team makes beautiful indie pop music together and it's just a whole lot of fun. It's pretty much perfect music for my commute home to help shake off the workday. Though they did release a very good album this year, Re-Arrange Us, lately I've been enjoying Bring It Back which features this little slice of fried pop gold, Fraud in the 80's:



*Two list in particular of note are Poor Ditching Boy's Best Songs of 2008 List(featuring Lights and Music) and Kevin Church named Hearts on Fire his #10 track of 2008.

** Though not an "official" video, someone added the song "to the final race scene in cult classic 1986 BMX movie Rad". God, I love the internet (see also: Day Seven).

Favorite Things: Day Twenty Two [UPDATED]

Oh man, 22 days in ad I've completely blown through my cushion so this is starting to become a bit of a grind. But fuck it, I've got this far and I'm going to do my best not to get completely lazy these last four days till the finish.

Anyway, today's favorite thing isn't a thing at all, it's a person, or rather a writer, of comics books. Ed Brubaker is probably the best guy writing superhero comics right now. let's go down the current murderer's row of titles he's been writing:

Captain America: Forty come issues in to his run on this series (with artists Mike Perkins and Steve Epting) he's managed to not only make Cap matter for the first time in over a decade. He managed to kill his title character and have it feel real. And making a main character's death feel real in superhero comics is quite a feat.

The Immortal Iron Fist: Co-writing with Matt Fraction, Brubaker took a character that hadn't had much done with him since he was created during the kung-fu mad late-seventies and turned this book into one of the coolest, funniest most action-packed books on the shelves. While he and Fraction have since moved on, they set the stage for this book to be on of the true gems that Marvel is publishing.

Daredevil: I'll be honest, I'm a little behind on this book, but his first year on the book, spent straightening out the clusterfuck left behind after Brian Michael Bendis moved on was probably my favorite run on the book since Frank Miller's original run. One of these days, I'm going to have to do a post on those twelve issues alone.

X-Men: Yeah, I haven't been reading this. Except for Whedon's Astonishing X-Men, I don't think I've actually enjoyed a new X-Men book in 20 years, so I'm too afraid of being disappointed by his take as well. Maybe when the first trade of his (and Matt Fraction's) run is released, I'll give it a try. Unfortunately, they have Greg Land doing the art, or, when it comes to him "art". His "traced-from-porn" penciling style just leaves me bored.

Criminal: Not a superhero book, but easily the my favorite comic right now. Brubaker and artist Sean Phillips's excellent little crime book telling inter-connected tales of the various low-lifes that populate a nameless, ugly American city is so good, that I find it hard not to just sit in the car ad read it in the parking lot after picking it up from the shop. But it's not just their stories that make this book so good. The back of the book features articles or reviews by some of the best crime writers (and fans) around, often with illustrations by Phillips. Usually, right after I read this book, my ext move is to update my Netflix queue with whatever movies they're talking about. Easily the best value-for-money book around.

And that's just what he's currently writing. Brubaker also wrote one of my top-three books ever, Gotham Central (which I've go on and on about too many times before) and his first work with Sean Phillips, Sleeper is another excellent book (which could possibly become a movie too).

***Update*** Also, looks like teh trailer for Bruaker's new web series is up, go ahead and check it out:

From Crackle: Angel of Death: Coming soon to Crackle

Favorite Things: Day Twenty One

You know what one of my truly favorite things is? Waffles. No, not the crappy toaster waffles that have been foisted upon us since childhood (and I now foist upon my children), no honest, made in a waffle-iron waffles. Those are one of the few things that make waking up prior to noon on a Saturday or Sunday worth it. Anyway, if you don't believe me, drop the $15-$20 on a waffle iron and make some yourself. The absolute best recipe for these is from the Joy of Cooking, a book you really should have on your shelves, even if you don't cook that much. Seriously, if they sell it at your grocery store, most likely, there's a simple, easy recipe in there to make something delicious out of it. Here's the recipe:

Basic waffles

(adapted from the 1997 version of The Joy of Cooking)

makes 12 6-inch waffles

This recipe is adaptable: you can use as little as 4 tablespoons or as much as 16 tablespoons of butter. You can also add more eggs and reduce the milk for even richer, lighter waffles. One-half cup of raisins, ripe banana chunks, nuts, crumbled bacon or berries can be added after the wet and dry ingredients are mixed.

1 3/4 cup flour

1 T. baking powder

1 T. sugar

1/2 tsp. salt

3 large eggs, well beaten

8 T. butter, melted

1 1/2 cup milk

Step 1: Preheat the waffle iron

Step 2: Whisk together the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt in a large bowl.

Step 3: Whisk together the eggs, butter and milk in a second bowl.

Step 4: Add the liquid ingredients to the flour mixture and stir briefly. The batter should be slightly lumpy. Err on the side of undermixing.

Step 5: Spoon 1/2 cup batter onto the hot iron and spread it within 1/4 inch of the edges with a spoon.

Step 6: Close the lid and bake until steam stops emerging. Keep warm as above or serve immediately.

While the recipe states that it is adaptable for the amount of butter you want to use, really, if you love yourself, you'll go with the full, two sticks of butter. Even as your arteries clog you'll have a beatific grin on your face, knowing the shortened life span was worth it.

Favorite Things: Day Twenty

Hey it's Saturday! You know what that means, kids, yet another (somewhat) lazy post. Since we're getting closer and closer to the big day, and I already enumerated on my favorite Christmas Album earlier, let's do a quick run-through some of my fave Christmas/Holiday songs.

Let's start with A Fairytale of New York by The Pogues (w/ Kristy MacColl)


Next up, let's go with Calling On Mary by Aimee Mann , just a beautiful song (great album too).

And finally, Christmas in Hollis by Run DMC, because it just ain't Christmas without it.

Favorite Things: Day Ninteen

Here's an easy one, tonight, one of my favorite Christmas movies is on Turner Classic Movies, Christmas in Connecticut. It's the story of Elizabeth Lane (Barbara Stanwyck) a magazine columnist who is pretty much the 1945 equivalent of Martha Stewart, only she has no clue how to cook or do any of the other things that she writes about. When her magazine's owner decides that she should host a heroic Sailor at her farm (which she does not actually have) for Christmas, hijinks prevail while she tries to get it done and not lose her job.

While that all sounds very stupid, believe me, it's all done very well and very smartly. It's on at 8:45 EST and I think it's great, here's the trailer:

Favorite Things: Day Eighteen

OK, I had originally planned on posting this yesterday, but after a 3 hour commute, I was just too wiped to go ahead with some writing. Anyway, let's pretend that this one is a follow-up to Monday's Middleman post, as we're sticking with the theme of comics being turned into TV shows. So, Fables, which has recently been picked up by ABC for development into a series, has long been a favorite of mine.

Imagine if all of the story-book tales we were told as children were real, and they lived elsewhere, on their own worlds. well, they do, and some time ago, a great Adversary began taking over these lands and subjugating the Fables under his power . A good deal of these Fables fled to the last free world, the mundane world, our own. And that's where the story begins, in present-day New York City, where Snow White's in charge and Bigby Wolf (a.k.a. the Big Bad) keeps the peace.

For the first few collections (which is how I've been reading the series), it's rather episodic, the first, a murder-mystery, the second the tale of a revolution at the up-state farm where the non-human Fables are exiled. That is not to say that they are not excellent, but they grow the cast and the concept of the book so well, that, when around issue 50, the grand arch of the entire book kicks in, you're hopelessly involved. This really comes down to the characters, writer Bill Willingham manages to take the archetypes of so many characters we've known, or thought we've known, so well over our lifetimes and invests them with human foibles that they jump off the page. He is ably assisted on art by Mark Buckingham (and a talented stable of guest artists) and no discussion of the book can be had without mentioning the amazing covers by James Jean. Hell, it's taken me almost an hour of going through them on comics.org (gallery here) to pick out a good one for this post, and while I went with the most seasonal of the bunch, I had to include another one below.

Recently, the book passed what was to be the planned ending of the book, the final battle between the Adversary and the Fables, but it has continued and I'm glad for it. Though I'm only collecting the book in trades, it's nice to have a big, thick block of the book to read every few months.

Anyway, as I had stated above, ABC has picked up Fables to make into a pilot for next season, and, while I have very little faith that it'll go to series, much less be any good, I am still hopeful The Chicago Tribune's Maureen Ryan wrote a very good article recently laying out the reasons why it could be a very able successor to Lost.

As with everything I've been talking about this month, I can't recommend this book enough. Oh yeah, here's the other cover I couldn't resist, still seasonal, though.

Favorite Things: Day Seventeen

If you've been around me the last few months, especially if I've been drinking, you've no doubt heard me evangelize about how much I love Feed the Animals by Girl Talk.

If you would have told me a year ago that I would be enjoying an album that features a mash-up of "In a Big Country" and "Whoomp! There it is", I probably would not have believed you. But Greg Gillis manages to take 40 years worth of disparate music and boil it all down to their barest pop materiale. Essentially, this album is a bomb of pure, concentrated pop, and it is beautiful. I really can't say more without repeating what many people have said on their own "best of '08" lists (as Kevin Church does a good job here), so I'll leave you with one of my faves, "Like This":

Favorite Things: Day Sixteen

Today I decided to talk about The Middleman. Over three mini-series (all helpfully collected now in one volume), Javier Grillo-Marxuach and Les McClaine created one of my favorite cast of characters from the last few years. The set-up is thus: The Middleman, a freelance operative who deals with all of the weird shit that abounds across the Earth. Along with him are his trainee, Wendy Watson, and their bitchy robot secretary, Ida. While that sounds all well and good, it's the whip-smart dialogue, the ingenious use of just about every genre convention (talking monkeys, ninjas, Mexican wrestlers, etc.) and the general insanity of the book that rises it above.

But, the creation of a fantastic new comic series wasn't enough, so they made a TV show out of it, and I love it. In fact, it's easily my favorite new show of 2008. I'll be honest, it seems to take a different tone to the comic series, where that was more of an "X-Files meets Bond movie" vibe, the TV series, is more of a "X-Files meets 1960's Batman TV Series" mixture. Matt Kleesar brings a much different note to the character of the Middleman, giving him a much more clean-cut demeanor than the one that seemed to be portrayed in the comics. But it works, and it's a lot of fun. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like they're going to get a second season order, but at least there should be a DVD release of the 12 episodes that were aired, so we hav ethat going for us. Anyway, here are some of the PSA's that they recorded to support the series, they're a hoot.

Favorite Things: Day Fifteen

Today's post is a little different that most of what I have put up here, mostly because it's not something I can link to from Amazon (and possibly earn precious pennies to assist Santa in filling his bag o' toys), instead, it's one of the highlights of my weekday, when I get to drive my two boys home after I pick them up from daycare. While my two year-old usually uses this time to zone out, my five year-old treats it as if it is Question Time for the PM. Occasionally he;ll ask me deep questions about death and exactly how old he will be when he will die, and sometimes it's full of simple declarative sentences, such as, "I can run real fast." However, the other day, we had an exchange that cracked me up greatly, it went like this:

Set-up: We're in the car, listening to sports radio when a commercial for the Official Barack Obama Victory Plate comes on.

Jack: "Dad, what's a Barack Obama?"

Me: "He's the new President of the United States."

Jack: "Is he the first President."

Me: "No, he's the 43rd President."

Jack: "Who was the first President, Daddy?"

Me: "That was George Washington."

Jack: "Who was the second President?"

Me: "I believe it was John Addams." - (totally guessing here and disappointing all of my elementary school Social Studies Teachers).

Jack: "Have you been President, Dad?"

Me: "No Jack, I have yet to be President of the United Sates."

Jack: "That's OK Daddy, you can be President next time."

Me: "Thanks Jack, your vote is important to me."

Favorite Things: Day Fourteen

OK, it's Sunday and I'm feeling lazy, so here's a short one. Cartoon Network''s series, Chowder is a pretty funny series, but they play this one clip before just about every Cartoon Network show I get On Demand (and since I have two kids, that's a lot), and it cracks me up every time:



The full scene is here, in case you're interested.

Favorite Things: Day Thirteen

The Ravonette's Lust, Lust Lust is an album that I liked a lot when I first got it, but I didn't even realize that it was one of my favorites of the year until I realized that it was probably the only album that didn't leave the rotation all year. The way that I can describe their sound is that it is relentless, just a wall of sound that moves forward like a shark. Anyway, since writing about music is like dancing about architecture, here's the video for the lead single, Aly Walk With Me:



If you like it, the album is available on eMusic and Amazon.

Favorite Things: Day Twelve

I'm kinda taking a mulligan today, since it's been a pretty hectic week and last night was my office's Christmas party. No shenanigans took place, just a long evening of awkward conversations between people who have little in common, yet who spend approximately 50 hours each week together. Anyway, here's one of my favorite pin-ups ever, from Kevin Maguire an Joe Rubinstein as it originally appeared in (I think) DC's Who's Who:

(click to embiggen)

This image, and many other fine other like it is available in the just-released Justice League International Volume 3. I also heartily recommend volumes 1 & 2.

Favorite Things: Day Eleven

Today's a two-fer, but these are two albums that are hard for me to think about individually. Both were released in the summer of 1994 and they were both "borrowed" from the University radio station soon afterward, becoming a solid part of the soundtrack to my Junior year in college.

The first is Bee Thousand by Guided By Voices, the band's first album on Matador and their break-through to a national audience. This album is chock full of Robert Pollard and Tobin Sprout's two-and-a-half minute (or less) indie pop masterpieces and it made me fall in love with the band. Here's the video for I Am A Scientist, which is just fantastic:


Please note, this is the "single version" of the song, which is not the same as the album version, it can be found here and here.

Next up we have Sebadoh's Bakesale, their first album after founding member Eric Gaffney left, and despite the fact that most of the music press seems to look at their previous two (III and Bubble & Scrape) as being the "classics", this is my favorite. Anyway, it's late and I wish I could better put into words my love of this lo-fi rocker, but I can't, so here's the video for Rebound:

Favorite Things: Day Ten

Let's stay with music today on my run-down of favorite things. Elvis Costello has long been a favorite artist of mine, since my big brother pressed a copy of King of America into my hands lo, so many years ago. While I own many of his approximately 3,012 albums, which run the gamut from merely "Good" to "Oh my fucking God, all people should be issued this album at birth in order to spread good taste", I must say, live is the way to experience the man's music. I've seen him at least four times and my favorite of the group seeing him at the Arie Crowne Theatre in Chicago on one of his tours with Steve Nieve (the keyboardist for his original band, the Attractions). The format was just Elvis with an acoustic guitar and Nieve on piano and it led to a pretty free-wheeling show, and one with lots of banter. That Mr. Costello is a pretty chatty guy, there's a reason they just gave him a talk show. Anyway, the tour he did before the one I saw was recorded and released, in part, as a series of EP's in the box set Costello & Nieve. I'll be honest, when the box came out, I hemmed and hawed while looking at it at the record store (Rock Records in downtown Chicago, the worst record store in the city, to be precise), but I eventually took the plunge, and I'm very happy that I did (doubly so now that it's out of print). Anyway, here are two excellent tracks off of the disc for the Boston show, the first a great run-through of a classic. The second, Little Atoms, was a song that I didn't care for when it was on All This Useless Beauty, but the live setting flushes it out well, and it also features some of Mr. Costello's rapier wit.

Costello & Nieve - Angels Want To Wear My Red Shoes

Costello & Nieve - Little Atoms

Favorite Things: Day Nine

In my estimation, Tuesday is generally the lamest day of the workweek. Though we've been trained from childhood by the tyrant garfield to hate Mondays, you at least still have the pleasant memories of the just past weekend to keep you going. Wednesday, is the middle, so you know by getting through it, you'll be on the back-nine of the week (plus, new comics!). Thursday gets you one day closer to the weekend, and, if you're age 18-25, Thursday night is pretty much a warm-up for Friday night. Finally, there's Friday, and I really don't have to explain that one to you.

Anyway, back to Tuesday, sad, crappy Tuesday, it's often the hardest drive into work that day. So how do I get through it? Well, as 80's movies-montages taught us, the best way to motivate yourself for anything: Pop Music!

Here's one of my favorite early-morning-commute toe tappers, the appropriately named Tuesday Morning by Tommy Keene:

Tuesday Morning - Tommy Keene

This song, and the excellent album that features it, is available at both Amazon MP3 & eMusic . You know, if you'd like to pay for it.

Favorite Things: Day Eight

So in lieu of my regularly scheduled post for today (which still may be coming), yesterday's Chicago Tribune reminded me that today could be a very special day, today, Ron Santo could get into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Santo, former star third baseman for the Chicago Cubs, and their long-time radio colorman is very much a love him or hate him type of guy. Not so much for his play, which by all rational measures, more than qualifies him for the Hall, but his radio work, which if you've ever heard it, pretty much defines homer-hyperbole. Since I became a Cubs fan in my early twenties, it was during the hunt for the National League Wild Card in 1998 that I really came to love Ron Santo's radio calls (along with probably the best play-by-play man in the business, Pat Hughes), an early favorite was in a game vs. the Brewers, with I believe only three games to go in the season, the Cubs just had to win one game to clinch the wild-card. Of course, that's when Brant Brown dropped an easy fly ball in the outfield and gave way to one of my favorite radio calls ever, the text is below, click here for the audio.

HUGHES: "Two down, the Brewers have the bases loaded, and a 2-2 count on the hitter. Here's the pitch. Swung on. Fly ball to left field. Brant Brown going back. Brant Brown ... drops the ball!"

SANTO: "Oh, nooooooooo!"

HUGHES: "He dropped the ball!"

SANTO: "Nooooooooo!"

HUGHES: "Three runs will score, and the Brewers have beaten the Cubs."

I will say though, I owe Brant Brown for that one, without that drop, I would have never gotten the chance to go to the one game playoff between the Cubs and the Giants to decide the wold-card slot. That was easily, if not the best, the most fun, exciting game of baseball that I've attended live. Of course, that's helped by the fact that every post-season game I've attended since, has been lost by the Cubs.

Anyway, due to his....rather overdone calls, Ron catches a lot of shit. Admittedly, he also tends to miss a lot, and he's not always up on what is actually going on in the game, but it's like going to a game with your crazy uncle, most of the time, he's well, crazy, but some days, he's fucking on. Anyway, I love Ron Santo, and in an age when we're all bitching about the assholes who are getting into the HOF, here's a guy who clearly deserves to be in there, and if the veteran's committee has any sense, they'd let him in.

To learn more about Ron Santo, I' recommend checking out the documentary This Old Cub, which details his baseball career, his quest to be inducted into the HOF and his battles with diabetes.

Favorite Things: Day Seven

Well, it's still the weekend, and I'm still lazy, so let's give some props to one of the single-greatest time-wasting inventions of the internet age: YouTube. In order to do so, I present you with two recent finds that may tie into tomorrow's post.

Fist, here's "The Star Trek" Rap by Prime Directive and Galaxy Class (NSFW).



Next up, we have Captain James T. Kirk's (original flavor) reaction to his replacement:



There's ten minutes of your day you'll never get back, wondrous.

Thanks to BeaucoupKevin and AlertNerd for bringing these to my (and the internet at large's attention).

Favorite Things: Day Six

Well, it's Saturday here at Phoning It In Industries (NYSE: PI3), and we're taking the lazy way out by just posting a bunch o' videos by a favorite band of mine. Today, here's some great tunes by The Wedding Present. I've spoken about them before, most recently when I made the unfortunate decision to skip their concert in favor of watching the Cubs embarrass themselves live in the playoffs (I keep having visions of the old knight from The Last Crusade shaking his head at me and saying, "You have chosen....poorly.")

Anyhoo, here we go:

I'm From Further North Than You

Don't Take Me Home Until I'm Drunk

Kennedy

And finally, here's a seasonal cut:

Stepping Into Christmas

Oh, and hey, they just did another Holiday song, here's their newest:


Holly Jolly Hollywood

Favorite Things: Day Five

Yes, it's Friday, so along with the fightin', I think I'll take it easy today, so let's go with something I've already talked about last month. Without a doubt, hitting winged, mutant gorillas with a mace is one of my favorite things.

And that's for real

This, and other visions of man-on-simian violence can be found in the ape-tastic DC Goes Ape trade paperback.

Favorite Things: Day Four

Well, I've gone three days and not descended into anything too geeky, well today, let's not just cross that line, but blow by it at mach 12. I give you the pinnacle of 1990's fan service, JLA/Avengers


Produced at one of the rare times when the two major comic companies weren't in a pissing match about who can make the less coherent "event", they rounded up the two perfect creators, writer Kurt Busiek and artist George Perez to produce the end-all, be-all teaming of the biggest supergroups on the planet (short of Damn Yankees). Astoundingly, it pretty much meets or exceeds all expectations. While Perez's hyper-detailed art is ostensibly the biggest draw, Busiek's handling of such a gigantic cast of characters makes the book just sing. Really, if you enjoy your super-heroes, this is high-concentrate crack (now finally available in paperback).

Favorite Things: Day Three

Well, since we're into the holiday season, we'd best get into the spirit, and the best way to do that is with Christmas music. When it comes to Christmas albums, one album stands head and shoulders above the rest, A Christmas Gift For You From Phil Spector.


This record is not only the best Christmas record ever, it's easily one of the best pop records ever. Seriously, this thing stays on my iPod all year long ad when it comes up on shuffle, it's rare that it get skipped over. Now I understand that seeing the frayed, fright-wigged, crazy, possibly murdering old man that Mr. Spector has become makes it difficult to drop some cash into his pockets, but seriously, everyone needs to own this. Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) by Darlene Love is one of my top ten pop tunes ever, and I'll leave you with that:

While ACGFY is available as a stand-alone album, I'd highly recommend picking up the Phil Spector box set Back to Mono, which includes it in its entirety, that box is a must-own for any lover of pop music (which I just realized is out of print, that's just stupid).