Universal Dork

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  • Cool Comic Debut: Paper Girls #1 Brings us an ‘Amblin’ Style 80’s Mystery!

    I just finished ‘Paper Girls’ #1 by hotshot writer Brian K. Vaughan and it’s one of best debut issues I’ve read in a long time. What’s even better is at it’s $2.99 cover price it’s a double sized issue filled with a great little story just waiting to burst into a retro ‘Amblin’ style adventure set way back in 1988. Not only do we get an intriguing story here but also some great artwork by Cliff Chiang. We follow twelve year old Erin as she heads out onto the streets to do her paper route in wee hours of the A.M. after a extremely peculiar dream, involving apples, aliens, winged astronauts and classroom demons speaking what seems to be gibberish. I love the way the dream sequence is played out in the pages here, with a ton of strange symbolism, conversations that seemingly make no sense and some frightening creatures, it really feels like an actual dream which is quite nice.

    The setting in the morning is the night after Halloween, so as Erin hits the streets with her sack of papers she encounters some neighborhood bullies still roaming. Luckily three other paper girls arrive on rad bmx bikes to the scene to her defense. From this point Erin decides to ride with the girls on her route and discovers that the three of them too had been jumped by some strange “people” dressed as ghosts who stole one of their walkie talkies.

    I don’t want to spoil any of the story as there are some cool surprises that develop along the way. But what I will say is this has the perfect setting for a lost 80’s flick and puts some cool supernatural elements in the mix that leave you longing for issue #2. A super solid debut and just the kind of comic book story that I love even if for some reason we get a bit of prominent product placement by the way of Apple computers. Check this one out, this issue gives you more bang for your buck too as it’s twice the normal size. A great scheme to get people to drop their hard earned cash these days on a comic book!

  • ‘The Final Girls’ Transports Us Back In Time to a 1980’s Supernatural Slasher Flick! !

    Have you seen the full trailer for the upcoming horror comedy “The Final Girls”!! This one’s been on my radar for quite some time now and with Halloween around the corner I’m super pumped on some great new horror flicks! This one will be released October 9th! Tomorrow!!

    Here’s the synopsis:

    “When Max (Taissa Farmiga) and her friends reluctantly attend a tribute screening of an infamous ’80s slasher film that starred Max’s late mother (Malin Akerman), they are accidentally sucked into the silver screen. They soon realize they are trapped inside the cult classic movie and must team up with the fictional and ill-fated “Camp Bloodbath” counselors, including Max’s mom as the shy scream queen, to battle the film’s machete-wielding, masked killer. With the body count rising in scene after iconic scene, who will be THE FINAL GIRLS left standing and live to escape this film?”
     
    This one looks like a damn good time bringing the characters back actually into a movies from the 80’s that they’ve seen many time before, however do they really have the skills to survive? I’m seeing a full on mother/daughter team up in the end hence the title “The Final Girls”. I’m a huge fan of 1980’s horror and most of the reviews out there say this one not only delivers the chills but also great comedy and some real heart. Sign me up I’ve been waiting  to see this one for a long time!! 
     
     
     

  • Comic Cover of the Week: When John Byrne Tried to Draw Every Marvel Character EVER!!

    One of my favorite comic books of the 1980’s was “The Official Handbook of The Marvel Universe” (Deluxe Edition)! Yeah it wasn’t a real comic book per say but damn was it amazing! Back in 1985 all the way through 1988 Marvel released this 20 issue deluxe edition which featured EVERYTHING you could ever want to know about pretty much EVERY character in Marvel comics. This included their real names, specific powers, how much they could bench press, their history, their hometown, yeah I mean EVERYTHING. I spent hours and hours of my time reading these and brushing up on my favorite characters history. This must have taken some serious time to document as it listed the main life events of the heroes and villains that took place in the pages of the comic books. A complete history up until that point. This was a time when Marvel was truly an amazing company…

    Each character was drawn by a different comic book artist and it included pictures of the characters in action taken from panels in the comics they’d appeared in. But my whole point here was to talk about the covers which the majority of them were drawn by my personal favorite John Byrne! The cool thing about the covers was that they could all be connected as one super duper long cover of the characters running. So Byrne pretty much tried to include all the characters from each alphabetical issue!! I’d love to see a video montage that follows each issue until it’s end! But until then I’ll include as many of these covers I can find right here! Check this out! 

    (more…)

  • Somebody Take Me to “Marvel Universe Live”!

    Maybe I’m out of the loop here but I recently discovered this whole Marvel Universe Live! thing by accident on Youtube! Anyway this is like a dream come true for the 10 year old me…..and… the current day me too it seems!

    Well Marvel is all the rage these days with all of the movies still drawing absurd amounts of money so this here I guess isn’t  that much of a surprise I suppose. The whole Marvel Universe Live is like Ice Capades but jam packed with Marvel Comics characters both popular and rather obscure-minus the ice skates. This has become a touring show and this trailer was was recently released check this shit:

    Looks pretty fly huh? Well check out this live footage of The Hulk looking pretty awesome & doing some serious battle! Now THIS is fun:

    The whole thing follows a story loosely inspired by the movies but we get a bunch of villains as well as a more classic look of costumes ripped from the classic comic books!

                                      Wow they finally nailed a live action Green Goblin?! WTF?

    Anyway call me crazy but this looks like damn good albeit totally ridiculously stupid time, so check your local listings because Marvel Universe Live is on tour now! It look s like it costs around 25 bucks. It hits my city, Portland, Oregon March 3-6th at the Moda Center!

  • Please Don’t Bring Darth Vader Back from the Dead!!

    We’ve all heard the rumor mill this week about all things Star Wars all the damn time 24/7. To be completely honest I’m trying to avoid as much of all that as I possibly can-I would really like to see Episode 7 without knowing the whole damn plot and every one of it’s secrets ahead of time! Remember when you used to see a movie and it was a total surprise? Now days every website is trying cash in on spoilers & rumors on our favorite movies. However when I saw the rumor posted that Hayden Christensen is in training to return as Darth Vader in Episode 8 I couldn’t resist.

    I’m really hoping that this is just one big fat lie. Not because I dislike the prequels (which I totally do) but I really think it’s time to let go of good ol’ Lord Vader. Yeah he was an amazing villain, one of the best, most iconic of all time. But let’s face it his story has been told and his demise was perfect, bringing him back from the dead would only diminish how important his role was in the entire saga!!

    It’s a “do it merely to cash in” move that puts pleasing the fans above a compelling story. Let’s face it too, Darth Vader IS dead! We even saw George Lucas replace Sebastian Shaw with Hayden Chistensen’s version of “ghost” Anakin back in his “improved” version of Return of the Jedi.

    I’m also totally ok with bringing back Actors like Ewan Mcgregor to play Obi-Wan Kenobi in spin-off flicks. So no I’m not just prequel hatin’! Let’s move forward with Star Wars, keep little bits of the old but we really are fully capable of having a new villain again who’s just as potent as Darth Vader!  I mean I’d like Hayden to get one more chance to really redeem himself in the role – But what do you think? You want to see Darth Vader back from the dead in the flesh? Could they do it tastefully?

  • Ahhh the 1980’s When You Could Call Freddy Krueger on the Telephone?! Those Were the Days…

    There’s been a lot of talk lately about another rebooted Nightmare on Elm Street flick getting ready to be made, hell we’ve even had Robert Englund telling us he thinks it’s going to be a “Dream Warriors” remake. Well you know how I feel about it, just get Robert Englund back as Freddy dammit! What’s the problem Hollywood are you all braindead?!

    Anyway thinking about good ol’ Fred got me thinking about the old 1980’s and how when you got bored on a Saturday night you always had the option of giving the dream demon himself a call on the telephone! Yep that was thing back then call up Freddy and have him tell you some scary ass stories! Of course I never actually called, but I always wanted to!! So I checked on Youtube and sure as shit there were the commercials! 1-900-909-FRED! Yeah he really was always there for us teens back then!!

    Oh yeah and in the 1980’s Freddy even appeared on Dramarama records! Whatta guy!

  • Who Should Take Over The Role of WOLVERINE in the Movies?!

    We got word today that Hugh Jackman suggested Tom Hardy take over as Wolverine when he exits after his final appearance as the character in the upcoming movie set to be released in 2017. This sounds like a decent enough idea to me but isn’t the real reason Jackman is quitting the role is because of his age? Jackman is now 46 years old and Hardy is 38.

    If you think about it by the time they actually get around to rebooting the character it will likely be 2018, Hardy will already be 41 years old. So while it seems like a good idea it would’t be long before Hardy is also an “Old Man Logan” himself. I do agree with Hugh, Hardy is an excellent choice and totally shined as the replacement for Mel Gibson (who I actually always though could have been a good Wolverine back in the 1980’s) in the ever so epic Mad Max Fury Road.

    Plus if you ask me Hardy is STILL too tall! The comic book character is 5 foot 3 inches, isn’t it about time we get a short dude to play Wolverine? So who though could fill the shoes? A younger shorter Wolverine?

    My vote here (as far as more mainstream actors goes) is cast for Kit Harrington who’s most famous for his role of Jon Snow on Game of Thrones. Yep Kit would be the perfect Wolverine, he’s ten years younger than Hardy and could fill the role for much longer if needed. He’s also not a tall guy either he’s 6 inches shorter than Hugh (but still a whoppin’ 5 inches taller than the comic book counterpart) and as it stands he already looks the part! He’s a great actor as well and would be more than capable of capturing the grit of Wolverine.

    I really can’t think of anyone else in Hollywood that’d be a better choice. You never know though they could find another unknown to take the role, Jackman back in 2000 was totally new on the scene. Who do you think should be cast as the iconic character?

                                                                                             Make a move bub!

  • In the 60’s “Cookie Man” Protected the Earth’s Cookies From Evil Greedy Puppet Monsters!?!

    One thing i love is an old vintage commercial! Here today we’ve got one from the 1960’s for Chips Ahoy cookies that features the original superhero Cookie Man in all of his glory! I love that he protects cookies from all the evil weird ass puppet monsters of the world! Those monsters are truly things of nightmares!! Damn! Check it!

  • Comic Book Cover of the Week: Dale Keown Rules The Hulk!!!

    We’ve got some artists in the comic book industry who really were meant to draw certain characters and one who always needs mention when it comes to The Incredible Hulk is Dale Keown!! Yep it really doesn’t get much better than Keown’s version of the Hulk & from 1990 to ’92 when he took over the art on the title it was clear his version of the Hulk would go down in history as one of the best. He’s right up there with Sal Buscema and John Byrne in my book as all time best Hulksters. In fact back in 1990 his artwork on Hulk reminded me a lot of Byrne’s version of the character. Keown would go on to Image to introduce us all to his own “Hulk” type character, “Pitt”. Anyway Here’s a great Keown cover from 1990 that shows he’s one of the best Hulk artists of all time!! 

    Oh and if you still don’t think Keown was one of the best Hulk artists ever here’s a few more images to prove my point!

  • WTF?! Did M. Night Shyamalan Just Make the Best Horror Flick of 2015?!

    Well, well, well, I must admit I didn’t see this coming! Yeah I’m a bit perplexed myself at just how much I liked M. Night Shyamalan’s new movie “The Visit”!! I am going to go as far to say it’s quite possibly the best horror movie I’ve seen thus far in 2015. Some major contenders were “It Follows”, “The Babadook” and “We Are Still Here” but I’d certainly put The Visit up against any of those. I alway knew Night had it in him somewhere to make a full on horror movie and this time around he certainly went the distance. This is easily the darkest of any film he’s ever done and it proves that he shines on a smaller stage, with a smaller budget. Night should stay far as far away from the summer blockbuster territory as he possibly can. I also think he’s invented a new style of horror flick “Senior Citizen Terror”!!

    The Visit is not only a return to form, but it’s also a transformation for the film maker. It show’s in a way that he’s grown up a bit and has become a bit more of a risk taker. He’s willing to scare the shit out of you this time around, pulling no punches like he did previously. I’ve always suspected if he let loose he’d be able to craft something really genuinely scary. You know how most of his movies reach the final act and they get kinda….family friendly? Well this one goes to some dark places and then some. In fact there are some scenes in this movie that you will NEVER be able to erase from your memory. A bold statement for any horror flick but it seems M. Knight was done fucking around this time. The guy has had a quite a string of clunkers under his belt recently and it goes to prove a point, never underestimate a guy who’s down on his luck with nothing really left to lose.

    The Visit really shines in it’s simple plot. Two kids go to visit their grandparents which they’ve never met because of a falling out that their mother had with them when she was much younger. So really it’s a bit of a story of trying to forgive and forget the past and hopefully move on. And really, we all can relate to being a little kid staying with grandparents, no matter how sweet they were they always seem a bit odd especially through the eyes of a child. Of course the plot thickens when Granny and Gramps do start acting a bit odd during the daytime really fucking weird when the sun goes down!

    This movie has got some great acting as well and the movie’s real stars are definitely the young boy played by Ed Oxenbould and his grandmother played by Deanna Dunagan. The Visit surprisingly also is one of the few modern horror flicks that really puts children in serious fucking danger, which is something you rarely see in this day and age. So kudos to Shyamalan for having the guts to go the distance here. It’s really best if you know as little as possible about this one as it’s packed with surprises and yes….a damn good twist!

    Last my only real complaint at all is the found footage route Night decided to go with this. I’ll admit I wasn’t thrilled about the idea going into it all. Seeming at first a little late to the party perhaps, he really does utilize this medium quite well to tell the story. He does it so well with no creepy score that this feels pretty damn realistic when all is said and done. He also blends some great comedy throughout somehow that works leap and bounds better than any movie he’s tried to pull this in before. So final thought, I’d say it’s safe to say M. Night Shyamalan is back. Scarier, bolder and riskier than ever before and I hope this time he’s realized he’s at his best when trying to scare the shit out of us.