This blog should be sub-titled: a journal of my life in geek.
I get my geek on with things about which I am geeky: comic books, Baseball, Ultimate, science fiction, my favorite bands, books I have read and loved, and Jungian psychology to name some of the most frequently traversed subjects.
I began this project simply as a way to count my T-shirts. I own a lot of T-shirts. But how many do I have? Do I have 365? We shall find out.
When I started this blog, I thought about how each T-shirt means something to me. I bought it for a reason, after all. I set myself the task to post an entry about a new T-shirt every day as a way to simply write something every day, a warm up for writing fiction, which is my passion. Writing is like exercise. Warm ups are good for exercise. But after completing a month of blogging about T-shirts, I have learned that this blog serves as a journal; it documents my life in geek, sort of a tour of my interests in pop culture. The blog serves as a tool for self-inventory, for assessment and analysis of self and the origins of self, for stepping through the process of individuation in catalogues, lists, and ranks.
The blog also made me aware that I have some serious gaps in my T-shirt ownership, and I am in the process of collecting some new T-shirts for several of the great popular culture icons that I truly love. Stay tuned.
I was also a bit surprised that people checked out my blog and continue to check it, read it, and even comment on it. I am very appreciative of this readership. Please feel free to share your thoughts in my comments section. I will respond.
Also, please note that I have moved the original introductory text to the side bar. And now, I present to you the most recent entry of 365 T-shirts: a journal of my life in geek. Thank you for reading.
(Second Update - 1310.24. First Update - 1306.05 Originally Posted - 1304.25.)
T-shirt #264 - Alfred E. Neuman Faces - Mad Magazine
I am trying to restrict myself to one subject per entry. I am finding this difficult. As I discussed yesterday, I am trying to work on shorter entries last week and this week in an attempt to save time to get ahead on the blog and work on entries of greater length. So far, I have not been 100% successful at saving time this way. Hell, I have not been 10% successful. For instance, yesterday, the entry grew and grew, and the work needed to complete it in cross-referencing and researching ate up all the time I allot for writing each day, which is around 60-90 minutes, though sometimes less, depending on the day and the work load.
If you are a follower, you may have also noticed that I generally post most often in the morning. But lately, I have taken to spreading out the blog work throughout the day so as to get to work (on my actual jobs) sooner. If I let it, the blog will carry me away like the tide or pull me down like a gravity well. So I must remain diligent, disciplined, and strong. Not an easy thing to do when the blog provides such a wonderful and fun escape from WORKING. Though my jobs are not that bad and actually rather enjoyable (most of the time), it's not like I am always super motivated or excited to start working for the day. Anyway, today is one of those days to spread out work on the blog. The only way you will realize I am doing this is that the blog will be published later in the day, so if you are following via Facebook or Twitter, you won't see a notification this morning. I am not sure if anyone is watching that closely. :-)
I have discovered that the blog's readership often spikes on Sunday, which is why I try to plan entries of substance for those days, which is why I keep putting off the entry I had planned for last Sunday because it will be one of substance, but it's not so substantial yet. My point being that I would keep an eye out for Sunday posts of value. I am trying to deliver good quality all the time, but as often on Sundays as I can manage, which means working ahead, as I generally like to be lazy and have a day of R&R on Sundays because if I don't get one day of R&R per week (and one is about all I can manage with my work schedule), I become VERY VERY grouchy. And, YES, that was a damn LONG sentence, but I do think it is grammatically correct.
Also, I wanted to mention that my readership jumped to 103 hits on Sunday December Eighth. According to my stats analysis, the entry for T-shirt #241: Advice from a Volcano continues to be a top viewed item, which I find odd. I am not sure why this is the case.
All of which has very little to do with today's subject, which is Mad Magazine, and it's brand-name face, trademark, and franchise identity: Alfred E. Neuman.
This is and has been one of my favorite shirts for a very long time. I would judge the shirt to be at least ten years old if not older. I think it's a very clever joke and very much in the vein of Mad Magazine to have the back of Alfred E. Neuman's head on the front of the shirt and the front of his face on the back of the shirt. Very clever indeed, which is why I indulged in extra pictures of it. See two clothes hanger, off-body pics farther below.
I previously wrote about Mad Magazine in T-shirt #92. I had pictures taken at Fanfare with two of the people who work there, whom I count as friends. It was also the week I decided to start the Weekly Comics List feature, and so it is the first entry in that category (or the last, the oldest, if you click on the category and dial backwards).
At the time when I wrote T-shirt #92, June 21, I was soon to leave for Ann Arbor to see a concert (which I wrote about in T-shirt #112 and T-shirt #113), and intending to shop for the Mad Magazine paperbacks from the 1970s published by Signet and by Warner. In T-shirt #92, I expressed my interest in collecting all the paperbacks from this time period. You can see the extent of my collection so far displayed in pictures beside, above, and below. In addition to wanting to obtain all the Doc Savage Bantam paperbacks, I want to obtain the Mad Magazine books as well though I would prefer to find them in bookstores. I have looked in both used shoppes in Ann Arbor and the great Powell's of Portland, OR as well as local Kalamazoo shops and have found none. In today's world, the Internet (EBay especially) provides many options for acquiring what I want. Earlier this year, I bought 40-50 of the Doc Savage books this way, though I have not yet shelved these as I have not yet completed my office remodeling, which includes creating display shelves for both sets of paperbacks (the Doc Savage and these Mad Magazine books).
As for whether I will resort to Internet purchases or scour more used bookstores for what I want remains to be seen and is question I am attempting to answer for myself.
Also, as I mentioned in T-shirt #92, I continue to give Ivan a subscription to Mad Magazine simply as an excuse to get current issues in the house. Though the appeal of the brand of satire (brand Ecch) is noy as strong as it once was, I do enjoy flipping through the current issues.
Unless I buy another Mad Magazine shirt before the end of the blog year (or am given one as a gift), I am out of such shirts for now, which is all right because I do not have volumes of content to deliver about Mad Magazine.
However, before I sign off for the day, I looked up a bunch of resources via the Internet to share on the subject of Mad Magazine. You may find them interesting.
I found TWO such posts of collections of someone's idea of the ten best Mad Magazine covers of all time. Though the sets of ten overlap with some of the same, there are notable differences. I will combine these into a selection of five (no need to overwhelm) covers. Okay, I intended to do five. I did more. Keep reading.
Some guy named Tom Richmond runs a daily MAD BLOG. Some people have a lot of time on their hands. A DAILY blog? Crazy. Totally insane. Where does he find the time?
A very MAD collector site. The Internet has made it possible for all sorts of odd folks to come out of the woodwork and put themselves on display, like this chap at Dick's Mad Stuff. Here a mad, MAD collector, dedicates the site to another MAD MAD creator named Dick and collects all sorts of Mad Magazine ephemera in one place. Links to sites from other countries, cover sites, vital links, and many links to sites for that "Usual Gang of Idiots," the Mad creators. Great site collecting most of what is relevant with Mad Magazine on the Internet.
There are MANY cover sites on the Internet all collected in Dick's Mad Stuff. But this one reigned supreme at the top of the Google search.
Okay, some guy I have never heard of who has his own CNN show, though he looks like he never touched a copy of Mad Magazine in his life, though he wants you to think he's "cool enough" to have done so, Jake Tapper, did an "Inside Mad" piece for his show.
Though CNN is owned by Time Warner who also owns Mad Magazine, it's an interesting enough story.
I liked this bit: "One of Mad's core reasons to exist is to question authority, because as you get older you'll realize that basically everybody has an agenda and everybody is lying to you," said longtime editor John Ficarra. "Mad really doesn't make up anything, we just sort of look at what's going on in society and say, 'Isn't this kind of weird, or stupid, or dumb?'" and this bit: "The hope is that jokes aren't just funny, but formative. 'We feed to a counterculture, we feed to that 'question authority, they're lying to you,'" said Ficarra. "It's amazing that almost every generation has to relearn that, and Mad is there to teach it to them in some way.'"
Did you know that before MAD TV, there was a Mad TV pilot created in 1974? Neither did I. TV network executives deemed the humor "too crude for television" and it never aired. Here is a link.
Alan Bernstein from Royal Oak, MI is making a documentary about Mad Magazine, billed as "MAD Magazine poked fun at everything - and changed the world. A peek behind the scenes at this culture rotting institution."
Though Bernstein and company have reached their goal, they are still accepting contributions to :"make the frosting all that much sweeter." By the time you have read this, I will have kicked in my part because I want an awesome T-shirt and DVD of the movie!
COVER GALLERY
There are many sites that compile "Best of" Mad Magazine covers. Here's two top tens.
T-shirt #240 - Veronica Mars - Kickstarter - shirt-1
I am excited about the impending Veronica Marsmovie. I thank my intrepid step-daughter Piper for spotting the Kickstarter campaign and alerting me immediately to the fund-raising for the film. I jumped right into that band wagon.
For those looking for their next binge watching candidate, choose Veronica Mars. It's less of a commitment than many shows with only 64 episodes. And with the feature film due next year, it is the best time ever to binge watch this fantastic program in time to better understand the movie.
For those not "in the know," Veronica Mars was a television show on the UPN and then subsequently the CW network.
A modernization of the Nancy Drew model, the show featured a smart and sassy main character, Veronica Mars, daughter of the former Neptune county Sheriff, who, after being ousted from office in a recall election, opens his own private investigation firm, where Veronica works part time.
The show only lasted three seasons, but it was a hit with its fans. Given the fervor and intensity of the fan support, it is surprising that the show did not survive for a fourth season.
Creator Rob Thomas experimented with a variety of approaches for story telling in the episodic format. Like most hour-long dramas, the show featured a "case-of-the-week" for Veronica to solve as well as progress on the over-arching mystery, which in the first two years encompassed the entire season, but in the last year, Thomas broke up the larger mystery format and presented two extended mysteries and several stand alone episodes. For those who love episodic fiction, like me, the mixture of weekly mysteries and larger, season-long story lines was an addictive combination. Adding strong characterization and compelling subject matter (such as Veronica's muddled memory of a rape and her search for her mother), the series is arguably one of the best teen dramas of the more recent UPN, WB, and CW set.
Like many shows of its kind, such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the main character, in this case Veronica Mars, played BRILLIANTLY by Kristin Bell, begins as a high school student (a junior in this show) and each year grows one year older. The third season of Veronica Mars takes place in the main character's first year of college. The proposed fourth season would have followed Veronica Mars to her first job at the F.B.I.
The show's writing was superb: witty, gritty, pathos-laden, dark, light, and endlessly inventive. The cast of characters surrounding Veronica were fresh and well-rounded. The introduction of new characters when she went to college added rather than detracted from the cast synergy. And the show dealt well with the classic love triangle between Veronica and two hunky males: Duncan Kane (Teddy Dunn) and Logan Echolls (Jason Dohring), both of whom figured in key ways into the ongoing and weekly stories and mysteries.
Without hyperbole, I would count this in my top ten favorite TV shows of all time. In an objective ranking, it would probably be demoted from being among the top ten best ever shows only due to its short run. I made a partial list of favorite shows in the entry for T-shirt #73, in which I discussed the merits of Battlestar Galactica. Though after my wife's recent experience with Breaking Bad, this list may have to be revised. After all, my list of favorite TV shows is quite obviously restricted by the TV shows I have actually seen.
Season Three cast
Veronica Mars set Kickstarter records when it launched the Kickstarter in March. I ordered TWO incentive T-shirts when I donated, and I have been waiting months for them to arrive. I may try to hold off on featuring the other one in the hopes I can use it when the movie is released.
The Kickstarter project page features all sorts of news and nifty and videos, such as the initial pitch and updates by Kristin Bell. The video at the top of the page will give you a GREAT idea of why the show is so hilarious and wonderful.
Did you click the link? Oh you mean THIS LINK BELOW???
I think you will understand why I funded this IMMEDIATELY with my hard earned dollars.
(BTW, I created a Kickstarter category, so you can see other Kickstarters I funded and one I wrote about but missed out on funding, though I would have funded it had I known. There's one Kickstarter that I have funded that I have not yet written about so STAY TUNED, Marshmallows.)
FROM WIKIPEDIA:
On March 13, 2013, Rob Thomas and Kristen Bell launched a Kickstarter fundraiser in an attempt to get the film made, with the help of fans to reach the goal of $2 million. The campaign offered various incentives to those who donated more than $10. Thomas and Bell stated that they approached Warner Bros. with the idea and they approved and will be distributing the finished title. Bell, Thomas, Enrico Colantoni, Ryan Hansen, and Jason Dohring appeared in a video promoting the campaign that was shot in February 2012. The goal was met within 10 hours of the start of the campaign. The project broke several Kickstarter records, including being the largest successful film project on Kickstarter. The Kickstarter campaign ended on April 13, with 91,585 donors raising $5,702,153. Production began in June 2013, with a projected early 2014 release.
On April 5, Thomas had completed the first draft of the script. Several casting announcements were made through April to June, with confirmation of several returning cast members, including Jason Dohring (Logan Echolls), Enrico Colantoni (Keith Mars), Percy Daggs III (Wallace Fennel), Chris Lowell (Stosh "Piz" Piznarski), Francis Capra (Eli "Weevil" Navarro), Ryan Hansen (Dick Casablancas), and Tina Majorino (Cindy "Mac" Mackenzie), among several others (Veronica Mars, WIKIPEDIA, 2013).
I joined the Kickstarter in that early surge and added my money to the first wave, the original investment that funded the movie's goal in ten hours and set it on its way to breaking all KICKSTARTER and indie-Internet funding records. OH YEAH.
Also, this Kickstarter factors into my Blog Journey (which I just started writing about yesterday). The good crew of the good ship Veronica Mars launched their lovely Kickstarter the DAY I found out I had cancer. Dear readers of this blog will know that this diagnosis prompted me to start the blog eleven days later on March 22, 2013, beginning my T-shirt odyssey. If I remember correctly, Piper texted me the morning of my follow appointment, and shared a link on Facebook, and I banked my money into the Kickstarter immediately. Later that day, a very nice doctor told me as nicely as possible that I had prostate cancer. Good news and bad news in the same day. Really?
I guess that's how it happens. Good news, bad news. Then the bad news turns into good news? Sometimes.
Two hundred and fifty-one days later, I am on day #240 of my daily blog. Is that insane or what?
Did you click the link above? Want convenience? The video on the Kickstarter is the original viral video, but here's the San Diego Comic Con sneak peek with trailer. Oh yeah.
Veronica Mars Official Comic-Con Sneak Peek (2014)
And I have another Veronica Mars T-shirt left to feature. Woot! Woot!
"Bring it now, Sugar. Bring it on, bring it on, yeah. Just remember me when"
- Dandy Warhols, Veronica Mars theme song "We Used to Be Friends"
COUNTDOWN TO THE END OF THE BLOG YEAR: 125 shirts remaining
Today's T-shirt is another filler, which I am using just to post a shirt and will then veer off into other topics. In all, I have THREE Space Ghost shirts. By far, this is the most comfy. I already went on lovingly, about Space Ghost in T-shirt #69. My full Space Ghost love letter is yet to come when I render my post for my third and final (as of this writing) Space Ghost T-shirt.
A round-up of stuff today.
First up, it's mail call time.
Look at what arrived the mail the other day. Kickstarter dreams do come true.
I owe Warren Ellis (whom I have blogged about many times, but notably in T-shirt #75 and T-shirt #22 ) for turning me on to the music of Meredith Yayanos and her Kickstarter project, which has now reached its fruition, the completion of the musical piece entitled A Blessed Unrest from a duet (with Dan Cantrell) calling itself The Parlour Trick (and that there is the link, yup).
THE PARLOUR TRICK
This is the text from The Parlour Trick site about the project: "The Parlour Trick’s first full-length release, A Blessed Unrest, is named after a well-loved quote by Martha Graham. Creatively and thematically, this album is very much a “Madwoman in the Attic” affair. Some of the compositions are dense and meticulously arranged. Others are more sparse, ambient soundscapes. Instrumentation includes piano, violin, harpsichord, theremin, voice, celeste, percussion, bowed glockenspiel, accordion, bells, musical saw, an ancient wheezing pump organ, a nonagenarian typewriter, and cutups from wax cylinders (both freshly recorded or repurposed). Ninety-five percent of the material was recorded in a century-old Craftsman house, including ambient recordings of creaks, groaning floorboards, mysterious knocks and rustles. Both ultra-modern binaural recording techniques and antique devices were used to piece it all together."
I also LOVE how Meredith Yayanos describes her own predilections: "Violinist, thereminist and vocalist Yayanos created The Parlour Trick music project in 2006 after being inspired by some of the creepier and more dysfunctional aspects of Victoriana. Her work is informed by a lifelong study of classical, folk, and experimental music.... In her compositions and arrangements for The Parlour Trick, Yayanos experiments with fusing modern classical, varied folk traditions, and aggro-ambient palettes. The loose narrative of The Parlour Trick’s first album A Blessed Unrest was inspired by Yayanos’ fascination with 19th century concepts of the afterlife, mourning rituals, and can be considered a kind of creative response to outmoded perceptions of female hysteria. Many of the pieces composed or co-composed by Yayanos are conscious riffs off (t)rappings of Spiritualism and lingering concepts of the “monstrous feminine”. Yayanos began collaborating on material with A Blessed Unrest duo partner Dan Cantrell in early 2009."
Check out one of the tracks on the The Parlour Trick site or the cool video (on Vimeo) of the same track as danced by Rachel Brice.
If the subject matter, the "Madwoman in the Attic" thing, the Victoriana thing, if that sounds good, then you will like the music. Trust me.
You can buy the album from the site. The Kickstarter is over, but the album is available for download.
I love the inter-connectedness of social media. I turned on a friend to Ernest Cline's wonderful book Ready Player One, and he in turn, shared with me this wonderful interview with the author.
Ernie Cline gave away a DeLorean like the one in Back to the Future! Though it's not a replica.
It's the ECTO88: "What if Doctor Emmett Brown and Dr. Buckaroo Banzai collaborated
with Knight Industries to create a unique inter-dimensional
time vehicle for the Ghostbusters?" ( ERNEST CLINE)
I know I do not need to tell any of you that things are terrible in Syria. I steer clear of politics for the most part on this blog. If anything, this blog is more about escapism, escape from these kinds of horrors in the world. However, with the recent use of chemical weapons on the people of Syria, many of them children, it's time that the international community no longer sits in the side lines.
Citizens can do a lot with their support. Here's one thing.
I just finished reading The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones by Cassandra Clare, and I was unimpressed. I chose the book and its audio edition to read (listen to) prior to the release of the film, which is now considered a flop at the box office. I can see why. The book is not the single worst thing I have ever read, but it's really not very good. Because of the strength of the audio narration and the story, I stayed just interested enough to keep listening to the fourteen-plus hours of audio book. But then, I like listening to books that are not very good because it is instructive for what I do not want to do with my own writing.
City of Bones joins the glut of supernatural YA novels that over-burdens the market since the success of books like Twilight and The Hunger Games. Not that this book is appreciably better than either of those, but that's just the point, it's not better. The premise is mildly interesting, but it is not well-explored. In the book's world, there are specially trained "Shadow Hunters," who kill demons and protect "mundies" in the "mundane world" from their evil. These Shadow Hunters come from some mythical and magical land called Idris, which can only be visited through magic portals. A young girl, Clary Fray, a presumed Mundy, though she isn't, gets caught up in this Shadow World in the quest for The Mortal Cup, which is sought by the villain Valentine, who turns out to be her father--quite obviously. There are some mildly interesting twists and turns in the story, but the author tips her hand to all of them before the characters catch on, so that when they do, the impact falls flat.
In fact, lack of proper set up and delivery is the book's greatest problem. The author keeps her characters in the dark too long about stuff that has become painfully obvious to the readers, and then she tries to make a dramatic reveal in which the characters catch on, which only makes them seem exceedingly stupid and the story over-long and hackneyed.
If you are in the market for an uneventful, cliched romp through half-baked ideas about demons, angels, vampires, werewolves, magic lands, and rune-spell-casting try this one, but I recommend the audio edition. Listen to it on a long road trip, while gardening, or even while sleeping. Otherwise, skip it.
PHOTO GALLERY OF OPENING MY MAIL
I close today with a series of photos of me excitedly opening my package from Meredith Yayanos and The Parlour Trick. Enjoy.
If you read regularly, you may have caught this blog in its preliminary form, which was a cheat. On Friday, I posted an unfinished because I need to have a post published every day to make my goal of the 365 consecutive posts.
In the history of the blog so far, 155 entries, I have only cheated this way once by posting an unfinished entry with the intention to finish it tomorrow. But this has been a weird day. Trying to ween off the narcotics and just had the catheter out. Sounds fun, doesn't it? Have to re-train myself how to urinate. Joyful. And yet, on a daily basis, the Batman takes more punishment. (I had to someone tie in my situation to today's subject.)
For regular readers, I am so thankful for your support. So, you may have seen the rough draft and work in progress or maybe you are tuning in later for the finished product. I did not share Friday's unfinished product with any social media in the hopes that it would go unnoticed until I could finish it.
ANOTHER NOTE BEFORE WE START:
A good person (identity protected for to observe security protocol Alpha Delta Charlie Niner)--whom I do not know well and would like to know better--told me today that he regularly follows my blog and, thus, was apprised of my recent circumstances and had refrained from speaking to me in public because of my previous cries for privacy. The exchange with this smart, young man warmed my heart. Thanks, dude. You rock. It's just further proof that I am surrounded by a great and wonderful community and that many people apparently care about me as much as I care about them.
OFFICIAL AND YET WORKING DRAFT BEGINNING:
Hello again. I return to the regular blog production. This post has been over a week in the making. When I started this post, Grading Robot was at peak performance. I found that what I wanted to write about Alex Ross was going to involve more time and thought than I could devote during Grading Robot's most intense power time, and then, I had surgery.
For some odd reason, I thought I would have enough energy post surgery to not only finish this blog but get ahead during my hiatus.
So, I have some back log news, such as I had nice messages from a couple of TitanTalkers on T-shirt #144: Teen Titans, and when I tagged George Pérez on Facebook, he liked my post, which I consider a great compliment.
ERRORS IN T-SHIRTS BY COLOR
Last week, I categorized shirts by color and posted the list by frequency. I spent a fair share of time on this that I should have spent grading. What I did not do is ADD UP the list of numbers to see if it equaled the number of published posts. Originally, it was 15 shirts short. I fixed this problem, but now it seems to be one shirt short, which makes me fear that I have a numbering error somewhere. I went through the list of posts, and they are all categorized, even the unpublished drafts. But where is the missing shirt? I checked the counting, and it all looks accurate. So where is the missing shirt?
THE STORY OF THE BATMAN SHIRTS ON MACKINAW ISLAND - 1989
In 1989, I went on a vacation to Mackinaw Island with my parents. It was the summer the first Batman movie came out, the one directed by Tim Burton and starring Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson.
In one day, I counted over 60 different Batman T-shirts worn by, as far as I could tell, were over 60 different people. I cannot be absolutely sure I did not count anyone twice. But it seemed as if everywhere I looked someone was wearing some kind of Batman shirt.
This experience was the first I can remember about the mainstreaming of comic books. Previously, I would see evidence of people into Spider-Man or Hulk, and the original Batman craze really swept the country when I was very little as discussed somewhat in T-shirt #94. But seeing so many Batman T-shirts in one day really brought to mind how hugely popular that movie was at least with people on vacation on Mackinaw Island.
With my tendency to go the other way from the popular and mainstream, I did not buy or wear a T-shirt related to that 1989 Batman film.
WE ARE BATMAN - the movie
What is it about Batman? Many people consider him to be their favorite hero. I wonder if other heroes had more mainstream exposure if this adoration would remain in effect. Don't get me wrong. Batman is awesome. But so are many others who have not enjoyed much in the way of general public exposure.
And yet there is something about Batman. His insuperable spirit. His development as a true renaissance man: great at everything. The punishment he takes as he tries to make the world a better place. His angst as he must become part of the darkness he hates to help the world stay in the light, a light he can rarely enjoy.
And, so, Batman. He inspires me, and he has inspired many others as well.
There's a great Batman related Kickstarter project, You should check it out: WeAreBatman.
I have funded a four Kickstarters in the last year. I wrote about one Kickstarter that I did not fund in T-shirt #122. I can't believe I missed the Kickstarter for Dear Mr. Waterson. I am likely to write about another Kickstarter that I did fund soon (as there will be T-shirts), which is Veronica Mars.
However, for this post, I would like to mention the documentary Legends of the Knight and the Brett Culp site WeAreBatman dedicated to the film.
This is a very inspirational project.
One person can make a difference.
From Brett Culp's site: "But this movie isn't about Batman. It's about us. It is about who we are as people & who we desire to become.
The most important Batman tales are not in comic books, TV shows, or Hollywood movies. They are within the people for whom the Dark Knight has become a symbol. Not a symbol of fear - as he is for evil doers - but a symbol of hope.
Over many decades, the Caped Crusader has motivated people around the globe to overcome devastating obstacles, to help & encourage young people, or to be a vital contributor to the community. His legacy has also been a vehicle for connecting us to each other & stirring the hero within.
LEGENDS OF THE KNIGHT is an inspirational documentary that tells the stories that Batman has uncovered in us & the power of heroic storytelling to transform the world. Our goal is to inspire everyone on the planet who loves Batman to embody his spirit, engage with the world, and make a difference.
Together, WE ARE BATMAN!
In the spirit of Batman, all revenues generated by the completed film that are beyond production, screening, distribution, & administrative costs will be donated to charitable organizations" (WeAreBatman, 2013).
Batman embodies the very spirit and essence of how one person can make a difference.
Legends of the Knight - Official Trailer
THE IMPORTANCE OF ALEX ROSS
Alex Ross paints some of the most beautiful art work in all of comic book history. He has given us vividly real depictions of many heroes. Ross' art inspires us to believe in the heroic nature of heroes, to believe in the power of the individual spirit, but mostly to believe that the heroes are real.
Many comic fans would list Alex Ross in their top ten favorite artists. I would be inclined to add him to this list as well, though I am still not ready to make that entire list. Some things, like best artists, must be discovered slowly and decided after much thought and sampling. I will not be hasty with the favorite artist list.
Notice that I have dropped "comic book" as an adjective to modify artist. Alex Ross may paint comic book heroes. He may paint for publication in the comic book format. But more so than the majority of comic book artists over the years, Alex Ross is a true, fine artist. His work elevates the imagery above and beyond the four-color process, which was, once upon a time, cheap and disposable.
Six of the ten art pieces on display in my office (nine are on the walls and one is not) six of them are pieces painted by Alex Ross, including the Batman and Superman pics seen here above. Also, the Marvel Heroes and Villains lithographs and the Kingdom Come poster all hang on my walls as seen in the photos right and below. I had the over-sized huge posters of the Justice League and the Crisis on Infinite Earths featured later in this posting mounted on dry board. They used to hang in my bedroom, but I did not wish to inflict them on my wife (not much chance that she would want them in our bedroom), and so, since my parents moved, they are sitting a top my comic book collection stored at their condo.
So, my point being that, obviously, I REALLY adore the art of Alex Ross.
His art is meant to be hung on walls and considered in the realms of fine art. Not that other artists do not deserve such displays and accolades, but Ross is one of the most deserving in the history of comic book art and illustration.
I am not going to go through Ross' entire catalogue and share reviews and thoughts on every work. There is a whole book entitled Mythology dedicated to his art work with just DC Comics. He painted many over-sized specialty comics for DC, featuring some of their most iconic heroes: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Captain Marvel, and two issues devoted to the Justice League. His Earth X series for Marvel was a delightful tour de force of geek lore for die-hard comic book fans.
I am going to write about two of his best books: Marvels and Kingdom Come, and then I am going to bring it back to Batman as write about Batman:Earth One as this is what appears in the photos of me with the shirt. I probably should have posed with an Alex Ross book.
Marvel Heroes Lithograph by Alex Ross
Alex Ross on Alex Ross From the Comic Creator interview provided in the link below: "Part of the joy I have always had in illustrating these things, with the attempt at such vivid realism, is the sense that hopefully the reader, like I, is somehow buying into this completely. That somehow it's a more immersive experience than the tale you're getting over here, whether it's a novel that you just have to imagine the images completely or a comic book with more two-dimensional pen and ink images where I'm filling in the gaps for you, giving you something that's lush and vivid and the illusion of every color and every angle of a form" (Comic Creator, 2013).
Marvels by Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross is one of the most original and compelling books in comic history. In the world of superheroes, it would be my first choice as a recommendation for a non-comic book reader who wants to sample the comic book superhero world. Male or female. It's a better entry into comic books for reluctant women readers than Sandman, which has to stop being the "go-to" comic that is recommended for the tiny (but growing) female readership.
Published in 1994, Marvels blended realistic, painted art with fresh and innovative writing.
The most interesting thing about the book is its perspective. The main character is not a hero but is instead a news photographer named Phil Sheldon, who happens to be on scene to catch some of the most startling images from the birth of the age of superheroes. The book opens in pre-World War II America as New Yorkers witness the birth of the original Human Torch and his subsequent battles with Namor, the Sub-Mariner, before he joins the Invaders with Captain America among others to fight the Axis powers in the war.
The story continues after skipping ahead almost 20 years to the early days of the Fantastic Four and the coming of Galactus as well as the coming of the mutants, the X-Men, who are feared, maligned, and persecuted. The series concludes with the pivotal sequence in Spider-Man's early career as he is falsely accused of murdering police Captain George Stacy, father to his girlfriend, Gwen Stacy, who is ultimately killed during a battle between Spider-Man and the Green Goblin.
As I wrote before, it's the perspective that makes Marvels so compelling. Not only are many of the shots from the perspective of the photographer looking up, as in the excellent panel with Giant Man featured above, but also the story shows us the fears of Sheldon, which reflect the fears of society at large, as they try to piece together what is happening from hastily shot still photographs, TV footage, or from watching the battle between Galactus and the FF from the street below the Baxter Building.
Marvels tries to answer the question of what the world would be like if these heroes were real and we were living in a world that must frequently recover from cataclysmic events, such as when Namor floods News York City.
Marvels also addresses quite directly and ardently the question of bigotry against mutants as a metaphor for the public's bigotry against anyone or anything "different."
And though we Sentinels attack Charles Xavier during a TV interview, the emphasis is on the reaction of the viewers and not as much on the battle between the Sentinels and the X-Men.
And yet, Busiek keeps the story grounded in the human drama of Sheldon's pursuit of his career, which he tries to balance with family and home life. Ross' art aids Busiek beautifully in lush paintings of vintage 1940s and 1960s era America and the world of these Marvels, these heroes.
It's a masterful work and is the single best book for non-comic book readers. Watchmen is great but it's incredibly dense and quite a project for first-time readers. The Dark Knight Returns is fun and delightfully violent and yet better suited to fans who will catch all references and nods to comic book lore. I defy anyone to come up with a better single book that would inspire non-comic book readers wanting to try out super heroes to read more comics.
Following the huge success of Marvels, Alex Ross took a job over at DC developing a definitive look at its line of heroes. Unlike Marvels, Kingdom Come is neither about the early days of the dawn of the Age of Superheroes nor about what a realistic world of heroes would look like to the people on the street.
Kingdom Come is an Elseworlds story set in an alternate future in which the big three DC heroes--Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman--must come out of retirement to restore the ideals of truth and justice to a world inherited by amoral and dangerously reckless "heroes."
Kingdom Come features a huge cast of old and new heroes plus grown up versions of current youth heroes, such as Robin or Speedy (Green Arrow's sidekick). Even die-hard DC comics fans needed guides to interpret the poster and its huge cast as depicted (seen here again but matching the one that hangs in my office in the photo I shared earlier).
One of its most compelling story aspects as the re-interpretation of Captain Marvel as a brainwashed, misguided, emotionally-stunted adult manipulated by Lex Luthor and Mr. Worm.
Ultimately, Captain Marvel chooses heroism and sacrifice over his brainwashing as he almost beats Superman down, using the lightning he calls with his magic word "Shazam!" For those not in the know, Superman is vulnerable to magic.
Kingdom Come is a great comic book but casual fans or non-fans will find it dense and impenetrable. It is best enjoyed by die-hards or with fans of comics with enough background knowledge of the main players to get the most out of the story. Though the story may be dense and difficult for non-fans, it may prove to be enjoyable read if those reading can relax and realize that they cannot understand or "get" it all. If nothing else, the art is gorgeous to look at.
Kingdom Come is at it best when it is not trying to do too much and focuses on interactions between heroes, such as great scenes with Superman and Wonder Woman, wonderful sequences with Batman and Superman, and the epilogue, which is probably the best sequence in the story featuring all three heroes a year after the events of the main story.
Though Ross' art work for the Spectre and his companion, a minister named Norman McCay, is beautiful, the plot device is far too reminiscent on Dickens' A Christmas Carol, and even forgiving that neither the Spectre nor McCay seem integral to story, their function could as easily be fulfilled by someone else.
Still, Kingdom Come is immensely entertaining and fun to read, the art is gorgeous, and the re-interpretations of some heroes, such as Hawkman and Deadman (both of whom have been featured in this blog before as well as their Kingdom Come toys: T-shirt #49: Hawkman and T-shirt #43: Deadman.)
BATMAN EARTH ONE
- Geoff Johns and Gary Frank
Here's the book I am seen reading in the first photos for this posting of me in the Batman shirt as painted by Alex Ross. As I mentioned before, had I thought about the artist of the shirt's image, I would have grabbed an Alex Ross book.
However, I do not mind taking some blog space to plug this wonderful addition to the Batman canon. Earth One is a wonderful look at Batman's earliest years. I especially like the re-imagining of Alfred as more of a bodyguard and a war hero, a comrade of Thomas Wayne's. The book also introduces Lucius Fox, in a clear nod to the Dark Knight movies, for how Batman gets his gear. The book also explores an alternate explanation for the murder of Batman's parents, and it brings in Arkham Asylum as a much more integral and closer to home element of the Batman universe.
This book is a great read and worth exploration of Batman fans who loved Batman Year One. Gary Frank is one of my favorite current artists (I know; there's that word again; I really need to narrow down this list of "favorites" sometime) and Geoff Johns writes another comic that I plan to write about soon (another post MANY weeks in the making): AQUAMAN.
REVIEWS These are not my four favorite reviews or even the four best. I simply chose four from sites that looked interesting as I searched for images. Though I must say that the review by JR Forasteros caught my eye, and I like his review the best of these four.
jrforasteros review: a great site, whose most recent post is about why we should not freak out about Ben Affleck as Batman: READ HERE. Yes, I had to get that news about Affleck in here. I won't belabor the point. I agree with JR. Good post. Also check out Charles Skaggs news: DAMN GOOD COFFEE.
Talkinthatshit review - Good review, which, like all of them, contains spoilers. Not as much emphasis on the gentler aspects of the story as seen in the image above but a solid review that ranks this book among Johns' other work.
COMICS ALLIANCE - Not so much a review as a preview with early looks at several pages. Good to browse if you think you might want to buy and read this tome.
SCIENCE FICTION.COM - I do not agree with this reviewers criticisms, but to each his or her own.
There you go. More than enough, too much actually, on Alex Ross and Batman. Egads. This was originally chosen because I thought it would be a quickie.
I close with some imagery. First, the posters I mentioned that I used to have hanging on my bedroom wall.
Justice League over-sized poster
Crisis on Infinite Earths over-sized poster
- chris tower - 1308.23 - 19:37 and again on 1308.24 at 11:52
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If you are a follower, you may have also noticed that I generally post most often in the morning. But lately, I have taken to spreading out the blog work throughout the day so as to get to work (on my actual jobs) sooner. If I let it, the blog will carry me away like the tide or pull me down like a gravity well. So I must remain diligent, disciplined, and strong. Not an easy thing to do when the blog provides such a wonderful and fun escape from WORKING. Though my jobs are not that bad and actually rather enjoyable (most of the time), it's not like I am always super motivated or excited to start working for the day. Anyway, today is one of those days to spread out work on the blog. The only way you will realize I am doing this is that the blog will be published later in the day, so if you are following via Facebook or Twitter, you won't see a notification this morning. I am not sure if anyone is watching that closely. :-).jpg)
All of which has very little to do with today's subject, which is Mad Magazine, and it's brand-name face, trademark, and franchise identity: Alfred E. Neuman..jpg)
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At the time when I wrote T-shirt #92, June 21, I was soon to leave for Ann Arbor to see a concert (which I wrote about in T-shirt #112 and T-shirt #113), and intending to shop for the Mad Magazine paperbacks from the 1970s published by Signet and by Warner. In T-shirt #92, I expressed my interest in collecting all the paperbacks from this time period. You can see the extent of my collection so far displayed in pictures beside, above, and below. In addition to wanting to obtain all the Doc Savage Bantam paperbacks, I want to obtain the Mad Magazine books as well though I would prefer to find them in bookstores. I have looked in both used shoppes in Ann Arbor and the great Powell's of Portland, OR as well as local Kalamazoo shops and have found none. In today's world, the Internet (EBay especially) provides many options for acquiring what I want. Earlier this year, I bought 40-50 of the Doc Savage books this way, though I have not yet shelved these as I have not yet completed my office remodeling, which includes creating display shelves for both sets of paperbacks (the Doc Savage and these Mad Magazine books)..jpg)
Also, as I mentioned in T-shirt #92, I continue to give Ivan a subscription to Mad Magazine simply as an excuse to get current issues in the house. Though the appeal of the brand of satire (brand Ecch) is noy as strong as it once was, I do enjoy flipping through the current issues..jpg)
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