I Don't Have A Great Comic Collection. Apparently

Tom Spurgeon wrote a post on Sunday called The 50 Things That Every Comics Collection Truly Needs. In it, he lists and explains his choices. Now, I didn't read this – I read other people's reactions to this, in a meme kinda way. But, when I did, I was taken aback at the list, mainly because I don't have hardly any of the books mentioned on the list, but also because of how elitist it felt. Obviously, it's a personal selection and opinions differ, but it seemed to suggest that the only collection worth having is filled with esoteric and snobby books – the equivalent of a DVD collection full of black and white foreign films from before 1960, or a 'proper' book collection made up of Shakespeare, Chaucer and Proust.

It's not just sour grapes on my part for having my collection of comic books is so very far from great. Or the stupidity I feel that I hadn't heard of quite a few things on the list (Arcade? Barnaby? Binky Brown? Saul Steinberg?) Or the presence of comics that I don't like and wouldn't have in my collection (I don't like Peanuts, I don't like Jack Kirby – sacrilege, I know – I don't like Archie and never want to read one [perhaps it's a US/UK thing], and I've never got into the autobiographical comic book scene [sorry, Alan]). Or the items that seem to be on the list for the sake of showing off to other comic book collectors (Tijuana Bibles? Woodcuts? New Yorker cartoonists? An entire run of one manga series? Comics not in your language?). It just feels like snobbery to me, but I am a one of those boring types who likes what he likes, so what do I know?

You can read the whole list at the original post, but (to make things shorter) here are the things that I can actually say that I do own on the list:

10. Several Tintin Albums (a cheat: my girlfriend owns these)
12. Several Significant Runs of Alternative Comic Book Series (I have some Eddie Campbell books)
14. Several "Indy Comics" From Their Heyday (I have some original American Flagg!)
15. At Least One Comic Book From When You First Started Reading Comic Books (well, obviously)
33. Some Calvin and Hobbes
39. At Least A Few Alan Moore Comics (that's obligatory, isn't it?
41. A Few Comics About Comics (Understanding Comics, Hicksville)
43. Some Frank Miller Comics (but not that many)
48. An Array Of Comics In Various Non-Superhero Genres (Usagi Yojimbo, Sandman, Preacher, Transmetropolitan, Criminal, etc.)

Not very much, is it? I shall have to live with a less than great collection. I know these sorts of lists are supposed to initiate discussion more than being definitive (and there is discussion at the end of the original post), and I do disagree with many suggestions, and I haven't read enough comics to be able to post alternatives, and my tastes are too narrow to be part of the discussion, but it still left me with a strange taste in my mouth. I guess I shouldn't let other people try and tell me what I should have in my comic book collection ...

[EDIT: I had to mention Chris Sims' response to Tom's original post, in which he turns the whole thing on its head with 'Twenty-Five Things Every Comics Collection Truly Needs To Be Awesome'. God bless you, Mr Sims.]

Comic Book Shops: Avalon Comics (Number 6 In A Series)

(Apologies for the unprofessional photo – you can see my reflection in the shop door. Scratch off 'photojournalist' for the list of potential careers.)

In the previous posts in this series, I've talked about comic book shops mostly situated in central London; these are shops that are some distance from my home and require a trip on the tube to get there. Avalon Comics, on the other hand, is the shop closest to me, as the crow flies, but, because it's a bit more of a pain to get to, I don't go there, and this makes me feel bad.

Unlike Forbidden Planet or They Walk Among Us, Avalon Comics is a comic book shop that sells comic books (as you can see by the words 'COMIC SHOP' in bold letters in the window) and pretty much nothing else. About eight minutes' walk from Clapham Junction station, with not many other shops nearby (unlike the shop-heavy area immediately around the station), Avalon Comics is a small shop full to the brim with comic books. On the walls, on the shelves, in boxes in the centre, everywhere; you get the feeling that the owners care about comic books and set up a shop to share that enthusiasm with the world.

There was only one gentleman behind the till, taking a phone call during the time I was perusing, so I didn't find out if he was the 'Can I help you?' type, but he seemed a serious chap and I can guess why – selling comic books (and not without the help of a lot of merchandise either) is a difficult business, and the Clapham location, away from other comic book shops, probably doesn't help. It must be tricky to manage a profit margin, especially now, and with the trend towards the trade paperback impinging on the selling of singles.

Avalon Comics has a wide range of trades, Essentials, and back issues, but I do wonder for its profitability. As with They Walk Among Us, the prices of new comic books are 10% higher than the central London shops (which I still can't work out – surely rents are cheaper out of central London? Or is it just the amount of books sold?), but the back issues aren't excessively expensive, so there must be a balance. There is a good selection of comics, independent and mainstream, as would be expected from a shop that sells itself as a comic book shop, and the website (although basic) suggests that they will get anything you would like to buy. I just hope that they continue to operate and be successful; I feel guilty for not buying my comics from them, but I can't be responsible for keeping a store in business, can I?

[EDIT: as of May 2011, Avalon Comics the physical shop has closed down; it is now an online-only shop, at the same website.]

Reading The Guardian For A Week

I've had a full week – my post about the Harrod's Comic Book Exhibit helped to tweak the accompanying copy, if Rich's comment is true; a question about the use of double hyphens in comic book lettering to Todd Klein became the source of a post on his excellent blog about lettering (by the way, he's a very nice chap based on his email correspondence); and I've spent the week reading a a proper national newspaper on my commute to and from work. Okay, I admit that doesn't sound a lot, but I thought it was eventful.

Living in London and using public transport, you don't need to buy a paper. The free daily newspapers are The Metro (in the morning), The London Lite and The London Paper (in the afternoon); and there are the free weekly magazines Short List (men's lifestyle) and Sport (about, erm, sport) on Thursday and Friday, respectively. These litter the trains of the underground because, with the possible exception of Short List, they are rubbish, as you can see in posts where I complain about The Metro.

I decided to try an experiment. Buying and reading a paid-for newspaper rather than wasting my time on the freebies. The only choice for me was The Guardian – I always buy it on a Saturday, as my weekend paper, but also because it has the best supplement: The Guide, which is home to the entertaining Charlie Brooker. There was also the fact that this week they were doing a collection of give away booklets under the title How To Write, with each one a different type of writing (fiction, comedy, journalism, etc.). So, every morning, I picked up the paper and read some proper journalists and proper news.

I've never read a newspaper on a daily basis: I'm not a journalist, I'm not a news-orientated type, and because it costs money. This was the first shock: The Guardian is 80 pence – when did broadsheets get so expensive? That's a lot of money: £7.50 every week, including the Saturday Guardian (£1.60) and Sunday Observer (£1.90). I know I could buy a book for that money, but that's not the point of the experiment. Anyway, they do give you a lot for your money. As well as the main paper (50 pages), there is a diverse selection of extra bits. The daily paper has a separate Sports section, the G2 supplement, and a day-specific supplement (Media on Monday, Education on Tuesday, Society on Wednesday, Technology on Thursday, and Film/Music on Friday) – that's more than enough to keep you busy.

In fact, how do people read that amount of paper? My commute is about 75 minutes, but with the walking and changing to different lines, it comes to about 45 minutes of reading. Even with both journeys, I could barely manage to read the main section and the G2 (I can't be bothered with the sports section – I played a lot of sport as a younger man but I never got into reading about it). I'm quite a fast reader but it was tough going – I ended up skipping bits that I found too boring. How do journalists read all of it and absorb it? My brain felt overloaded with information; I felt up to date, but it was tough keeping it. And I didn't even get round to reading the booklets that were the reason for the experiment in the first place ...

It was also tough to physically read the paper; even though The Guardian switched to the slightly smaller Berliner format, a PhD in origami is required. It's particularly tricky when one is trying to read it in a packed commuter train carriage, while standing up and trying to hold on to something. The other problem is inky fingers – I would have thought that technology could have sorted this out by now – which means the first stop on arriving at work is the toilets to wash your hands.

I've come to the end of the week and I have to admit that it has been enjoyable. It's been nice to read well-written articles, rather than rewritten press releases (The Metro) or rewritten bits of news of the day (London Lite and London Paper); it may be a cliché but The Guardian is the reader’s paper. Even though the news is a day old, it is a joy to let people who are good at their job explain things and inform me in a professional manner. The G2 supplement provides the media ingredient I require and there is the added bonus of decent sudoku, kakuro and quick crossword. I just wish I could afford to do it on a regular basis.

Now, time to actually read the How To Write booklets – I wonder if there's anything in there about writing a blog ...

Book – That's Me In The Corner

When I mentioned I had bought a book by Andrew Collins in my post about the oddity that was my presence on the Wikipedia page for The Collings and Herrin Podcast, this was the book I to which I was referring. I would like to point out that I didn't buy the book because Richard Herring asked all the nerds, as he calls them, who listen to the podcast to buy the book in a devious plan to get it to number one in the bestsellers before it would plummet the week after.

I read Andrew's first memoir, Where Did It All Go Right?, covering his early years before college; I enjoyed it very much but I wanted to get to the 'good' stuff, i.e. during the time when I became aware of him.

Andrew first impinged my cultural radar in ITV's Collins and Maconie's Movie Club, a very enjoyable movie review show that was buffeted across the late-night schedules. They brought a sense of humour to their reviews (describing Sphere as 'Not so much sphere, as spheres') and I've always watched out for him, and the reason I started reading his blog. The other Collins' connection is his brief tenure as editor of Empire magazine: I had a week's work experience at Empire in 2003 (long after Collins had moved on), which was great for a long-time fan of the magazine like me (I even got stuff of mine posted on their online news section). So, I was eager to read his memoirs of his time in the media.

He started out working in as assistant to the art editor of NME (he had done art at college, and was quite artistic growing up), before progressing to writing for NME, starting out doing small pieces before working up to the gossip column, reviews and hanging out with the rock bands, achieving his dream of working for NME, a periodical he had grown up reading. He stays there for a while, flits to Select magazine, comes back and then goes to Q magazine, stays there before taking the editorship of Empire because he felt he shouldn't have passed over for editorship of Q; fortunately, he got the chance to get the Q job, which he did and enjoyed, until he realised that the job was nearly killing him.

During this time he had started doing radio bits with Stuart Maconie, another writer for NME/Select/Q, which turned into a Radio 1 show, which led into writing comedy together for television, leading to the Movie Club (as well as writing for Clive James). Other television (hosting music awards, writing for awards shows, the multitude of various clips shows that blossomed in the 1990s) and doing a film review show on Radio 4, writing for soaps (first for Channel 5, then on Eastenders), writing sitcoms (Grass with Simon Day and Not Going Out with Lee Mack), and being film review editor for the Radio Times – his career seems completely unstructured and without any kind of plan.

Collins is a very readable writer – his journalistic experience means he knows how to get his point across cleanly and efficiently, and with a good sense humour – and his life experience is a fascinating and diverse flow through different aspects of the media. He provides inside glimpses of how things actually work in magazines, radio and television, but without being salacious. He is very honest about the difficult times, the worry about being a freelancer after having security (and stepping down from being a high up as an editor), and the strangeness of doing so many different things. It also dispels any myths about the mystique of what goes on behind the scenes – and he is quite open about a deserved cynical attitude to the magazine business – and reveals the difficulties of working in television. The book seems to jump around a bit more than the first book, as it covers a lot of ground over a long period of time, but it is still an enjoyable read. I'm glad I've finally contributed financially to Andrew Collins after all the free podcasts I've downloaded.

From A Library – Moon Knight: Midnight Sun

Moon Knight #7–13 by Charlie Huston and David Finch/Mico Suayan/Tomm Coker, plus Annual #1 by Duane Swierczynski and Jefte Paolo

Although I didn't completely enjoy the first collection of Huston's take on Moon Knight, it didn't mean I wouldn't read any more of the stories. Now that Huston has set up the new status quo (Moon Knight is back in the game, and Khonshu is talking to him in the form of Bushwacker, whom he killed in the first story), there is room to play around a bit with the character and integrate with the Marvel universe. This happens because these issues take place in the middle of Civil War, and nearly every comic book Marvel published had to crossover with it.

Huston maintains the noir feel with gritty realism – Spector's kneews are constantly popping loudly, causing him agony the morning after a night patrol – and Moon Knight gets a new pilot for his copter (a former soldier who was in Iraq). He plays with Civil War by having Captain America pay Moon Knight a visit – not to recruit him, but to tell Spector that he doesn't like his style, and that he should stop being a psycho (the scene has a nice slice of dark humour, with Bushwacker constantly pleading with Moon Knight to kill Captain America, if just to shut him up).

Meanwhile, someone is killing people just to get Moon Knight's attention; this someone is Midnight, a super-powered robot man, who comes to Moon Knight's home to attack him. Midnight is the son of the Midnight Man, a former enemy of Moon Knight, but Midnight initially wanted to be Moon Knight's sidekick.

Back in the Marvel universe, Moon Knight meets the Punisher, who is out punishing the wicked. More dark humour from Khonshu: 'See how he flies his lord's banner.. How he appeases his master's appetite. Unlike some other I could mention.' There is tension because the Punisher killed Spector's brother, and a discussion of methods, and there is an interesting aside from Spector's former soldier pilot, who talks about how the army guys are big fans of the Punisher.

Building up the supporting characters, Huston brings back the Profile from the earlier issues in his run, with Moon Knight beating him up to get information, such as the location of Midnight – but the Profile can also see how crazy Spector actually is in his devotion to Khonshu (which helps to separate him from Batman: DC will never admit how crazy Bruce Wayne actually is ...).

Civil War pops up again when Tony Stark pays a visit – Moon Knight was an Avenger at one point in his career. Stark also doesn't want Spector on his side, because he is too damaged, and we get some amusing meta-dialogue about Civil War – Tony: 'How'd he look?' Spector: 'He's Captain America. He looked like a ####ing hero. You, you just look like an ###hole.'

Huston really hits his stride in the last issue with Coker on art duties, with a story mixing noir and superheroes, as we see victims of Moon Knights vigilantism, and Spector visits a SHIELD office for a psychiatric evaluation, in keeping with new regulations. However, the Profile provides him with details about the psychiatrist, and Spector pretends to be Khonshu and subjugates the psychiatrist and gets his superhero license, giving us some insights into Spector and his history.

The final story is an odd little tale, almost Rashomon-like, with Moon Knight playing a cameo role in a tale of women and revenge on a seducer, which seems slightly out of sync with the Huston arc, but isn't too bad.

Huston seems to have found his feet with the character in this story arc and, after the more muscular Finch artwork and the competent if unspectacular Suayan, also found the perfect complimentary artist in Coker (who channels Scott Hampton's work from his time on Moon Knight), bringing the correct sensibility to the atmosphere that Huston has created for Moon Knight. A definite improvement on the first trade.

From A Library – Superman: Camelot Falls vol 2

Superman #662‒664, 667 and Annual #13 by Kurt Busiek & Carlos Pacheco

This second trade of Busiek & Pacheco's run on Superman, finishing off the story started in the first Camelot Falls collection, which I reviewed here. To catch up: Arion has told Superman that Superman will be responsible for a dystopic future, due to his continued battle against evil, which results in a supervillain called Khyber leading the villains against the world and killing Superman (punching him to Earth from space, his impact causing a nuclear winter). Superman is having difficulty believing this (he even gets Zatanna to check him for mystical influence), so he goes to Tehran to investigate Khyber, who turns out to be dead (he was the original master of the Hashashin).

Then Metropolis is invaded by young New Gods, causing accidental havoc, but who are actually on a field trip with Lightray (who makes them apologise: 'SORRY, SUPERMAN ...'), which helps Superman realise that he has to keep doing what he does. This results in Arion starting a fight with him, putting a spell on him to restrain him. And, because it is now assumed that Superman is under somebody's control, he is attacked by Squad K, a unit of soldiers specifically tasked to take him out; he is even confronted by Green Lantern, Wonder Woman and the JSA.

The guest stars continue in the next issue (Zatanna is back ‒ Comicraft do a nice job of individualising her backwards word balloons, making them more magical), including the Phantom Stranger, who you don't see that often. The UN backs Superman, and Lana Lang sends 'Scamcams' (new video camera technology that can fly after Superman) to follow Superman as he flies around (thus allowing the world to witness his struggle). Superman is attacked by Subjekt-17 (see the first volume), an alien imprisoned by the Soviet Union, who demands that Superman stand with him against the humans, or protect them by hurting Subjekt-17. Then he has to fight Arion ...

Even with all this action, the second half of this story feels slow and not as exciting. The idea is a big one (is Superman doing good the right thing to do?) and the emotions are true, but it doesn't really connect. Technically, everything is good and there is a lot to admire ‒ Busiek writes a good story and Pacheco is a fantastic artist with a beautiful style (his art is so amazing, you even forgive the very large breasts he gives to Zatanna ‒ they explode out of her top) ‒ but I didn't enjoy the story overall, which is a shame.

Harrods' Comic Book Art Exhibition

I don’t like Harrods. It makes me feel uncomfortable. It’s a shop for posh, rich people who think they are better than everyone else. Although that may be true, it doesn’t mean they should get to rub our faces in it. Therefore, I think that the only thing that could get me to step through their doors is the prospect of an exhibition of original comic book art.

There are no signs to direct you to the exhibit, and the store guide describes it thus: Comic Timing Artwork Exhibition. This doesn’t really suggest original drawings of comic book art; the first image conjured up concerns the timing of comedy (no, I don’t know exactly what sort of exhibit this would include, but that’s not my fault). It’s not a great name, and you would only know to look for it because Rich Johnston has been telling us about it in his Lying In The Gutters column for the past few weeks.

Descending the escalators at Door 5, you reach the exhibit: in the atrium created by the space between the up and down escalators to the basement. It’s not a large space, and you have to be impressed by the amount of artwork included in such a small space. There are even pages up on the column next to the escalators themselves, so you have to lean over (or walk backwards to maintain the same location) to view the page. This ‘gallery space’ isn’t going to win any awards for displaying art. (I didn't take any photographs, but you can see some images here.)

However, all of this can be forgiven by the diversity of comic book art on display. The collection is made up of work by British artists, from the past to the present. As well as pages from The Beano, Viz, Look-in and even an Our Willie strip, there is an amazing selection of work here. I’m sure there must be a list somewhere, but here are some of the works I noted down:

• Two pages of Watchmen by Dave Gibbons
• The Killing Joke by Brian Bolland
• V for Vendetta by David Lloyd
• Captain Britain by Alan Davis (from the Alan Moore era)
• All Star Superman (double-page spread by Frank Quitely)
• Judge Dredd by Jock
• Jack Staff by Paul Grist
• Strangehaven (from Millidge)
• Judge Death by Frazer Irving
• Summer of Love by Brendan McCarthy
• Tank Girl by Jamie Hewlett
• Books of Magic by Paul Johnson
• Hellblazer by Sean Phillips
• From Hell by Eddie Campbell
• Slaine by Glenn Fabry
• The Filth by Chris Weston
• Tale of One Bad Rat by Bryan Talbot

The fact that this even exists is something to be happy about: a free collection of original comic book artwork in one of the most famous stores in the world. The exhibition isn’t mentioned on the website promoting all the other events going on in-store, and the display is a little cramped, poorly lit and dismissively presented, and the information about the art could have done with some proofreading ('An number of', 'terrible prophetic', inconsistent use of italics to identify the titles of books – Rich, if you're reading, I offer my copy-editing services free of charge next time you do something like this, and I do it for a living); however, it brings a smile to my face to know that drawings of Batman, Superman, Captain Britain, Judge Dredd and Watchmen are hanging on the walls of Harrods for anybody to see. Well done, Rich, for bringing it together.

TV: No Heroics

I really want to like No Heroics. I'm the demographic (well, I would be if I was younger, sigh ...): I like comedy and I like comic books. It doesn't require complicated mathematics to work it out. So it is with heavy heart that I write the words, 'It was okay'. Even with Warren Ellis' seal of approval, I can't muster up excessive positivity about it, and that makes me sad.

No Heroics is a sitcom about British superheroes in a pub. I never thought I'd write a sentence like that in my life, let alone about a programme on ITV2. They spend most of their time in The Fortress (No Masks. No Powers. No Heroics.), a boozer for capes when they're off duty, while they check out who has the most appearances on telly. This is usually Excelsor aka Devlin (Patrick Baladi, The Office), who is effectively Superman but is also a complete dick (just like the website), a smug and annoying rugger bugger type who lords it over everyone. The main group of characters are: The Hotness (Nicholas Burns, Nathan Barley and ManStrokeWoman), Alex, who has powers of heat; Electroclash (Claire Keelan, Nathan Barley), Sarah, who has control over machines; She-Force (Rebekah Staton), Jenny, who is the third strongest woman in the world; and Timebomb (James Lance, The Book Group, Sensitive Skin), Don, a gay Spanish retired hero with the ability to see 60 seconds into the future. The cast are good (Lance seems wasted in his role, but brings quality to the screen when he is on) but have to work hard to overcome some of the character traits and attempts at made-up swearing ('Bum socks') that don't flow naturally or organically.

What is good in the show is the background: if you look at the 'Geek detail' section of the official website, you will see the level of comic book geekery involved in the props department alone (such as Logan's Rum or Gin City gin, or the fact that the sign for the pub resembles the giant key Superman used for his Fortress of Solitude). The world of the superhero permeates, such as the phrase 'cape rape' when a groupie threatens The Hotness unless he has sex with her, or the way he talks about her previous conquests ('He's a demon!). Drew Pearce, the creator, writer and producer of the show is obviously a huge fan of all thing comic books (and professes that Zenith was a big influence), and this sitcom means a lot to him. It is for this reason that I will keep watching, because it isn't to do with the jokes.

Because it really isn't that funny. Yet. I think it could be, but there were only a few good jokes along the way; there were a few chuckles, and a lot of the humour was quite black, but the balance wasn't there. I'm trying to remember some of the gags from the twenty-four minutes of the first episode but apart from some nice James Lance delivery (Excelsor tries bullying Timebomb with 'What's the password?' to which he replies, 'Is it “Let me through or I rape you and kill you?”'), they were thin on the ground. I didn't hate it, and I wanted to watch more, and I'm very impressed that (a) it's on at all, especially ITV2, and (b) they've created a sitcom where superheroes exist as background to the story, and superheroes are not mocked for the campness or the silliness. That's really impressive. I hope that it picks up when it's settled in, and that I'm just overreacting because I was really looking forward to it.

Thoughts On New Stories Versus Old

I've been thinking about new stories versus old stories. This applies to entertainments I enjoy (film, television, books, comedy, etc.) but particularly to comic books. I try to read a variety of material, but I will gravitate to stories I haven't seen before. This is the stance of the jaded reader, who has been a fan for (gulp) more than twenty years ‒ I've read this before, I don't want to see Hulk Smash again/Batman fight the Joker/the X-Men fight Magneto/Captain America fight Red Skull (insert personal favourite).

The other side of the coin, however, is the idea that somebody hasn't read this before and it will be their gateway comic. I was reminded of this listening to the Word Balloon Bendis Tapes, when Brian Michael Bendis was describing how much his daughter enjoyed the Hulk film this summer. People like her will want to see Hulk comic books with the Hulk smashing things, but I don't want to see those stories again. I've no objection to watching mindless violence but I want more ‒ something new and different. But surely the appeal of the character lies in the 'Hulk Smash', so what is the writer of the Hulk going to do to win the affection of both the old and the new fans?

The modern writer has to create a more sophisticated story than the old days: they have to keep the continuity and the hook of the original creator, but they have to tell an original story that doesn't tread over old ground. This is a tough act, which is why I think that the best of the current writers do such a good job. To use Bendis again, he is doing something new with the Avengers and the Secret Invasion crossover, but still using the old works as inspiration for continuing adventures. (I didn't read the original Avengers, so I can't tell if he's repeating ideas, but I might be biased to enjoying his work.) Although the Skrulls have invaded the Marvel Universe before, this incarnation plays on the current political climate and terrorism and even identity theft.

The other aspect to balance this feeling out is the 'nostalgia' factor: the majority of comic book readers grew up reading these types of stories, so they keep on reading them for the feeling of comfort and security of knowing what will happen (good guys fight bad guys, good guys win). Surely this reason is why Spider-Man has famously been returned to the bachelor who has to balance freelance photography with looking after his aunt (with the ridiculous Mephisto 'magical divorce lawyer' nonsense), to turn things back to the way they were when people first started reading his adventures. Why make new stories when you can have the same thing again, just with new art and cultural references?

I'm not going to make judgement on which approach is better (a blogger who doesn't shove his opinion down your throat? Do they revoke my blogging licence for that?), but I can try to formulate my thoughts. I grew up reading The Uncanny X-Men ‒ were these comics seen as dazzling and new, or were old fans of the X-Men complaining that they were doing the same thing again? ‒ but that doesn't mean I still read the X-Men slavishly (although I did love the Grant Morrison run and enjoyed the Joss Whedon run). I still enjoy reading superhero stories but I want them to do something new (e.g. Powers ‒ police investigating superpowered crime; Top Ten ‒ the police unit in a city where everyone has superpowers; Sleeper ‒ espionage in a world where superpowers exist; Ex Machina ‒ a superhero becomes mayor of New York). I enjoy the work of writers who doing something new and interesting ‒ Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, Warren Ellis ‒ rather than repeating themselves. Surely the whole point of telling stories is to give us something new? But am I being fooled by writers telling old stories that I think are new because I haven't read them before? Neil Gaiman used old stories in Sandman, but I hadn't seen them before so I couldn't make that judgement. Obviously, there are only so many stories, and the trick is telling them in new ways, but is there some balance between the amount of stories a jaded old reader has consumed?

As you can see by the lack of conclusion, I haven't quite worked out the answer. But it won't stop my continued search for new and interesting stories, which I'll review at some stage on this blog.

Comic Book Shops: They Walk Among Us (Number 5 In A Series)

They Walk Among Us is a small comic book shop in Richmond, which means it's quite a distance from the previous four comic book shops in central London I've talked about so far. I would have thought that the location would be a negative ‒ the central London shops can always guarantee a lot of passing trade, in addition to the regulars who work locally ‒ but the website says they've been going for 21 years, so it must be okay, and Richmond is a lovely place with lots of other little boutique shops that seem to be surviving.

Richmond is at the end of one branch of the District line (or a train journey from Waterloo), so I had never been to They Walk Among Us before. The name meant something to me because, according to the DVD commentary, it is the shop used as the location for The Fantasy Bazaar, the comic book shop run by Bilbo Baggins and where Tim works in Spaced, the greatest geek sitcom ever. However, when you enter the store, it looks nothing like the interiors filmed for the television show; therefore, either someone has got things mixed up, the shop has moved since filming, or there's been a lot of interior decorating.

The shop is nicely presented ‒ you could mistake it for any of the other high-price little shops that Richmond can support due to its affluence ‒ but is quite small. The windows are very packed (see some of the photos on the website) with lots of different merchandise, not just comic books, such as statues of Wolverine. This gives the impression that merchandise is the focus, not comic books, and you'd be right: memorabilia and odd geek culture objects fill the shelves, such as a John Lennon statue/action figure, Mario figurines, Gorillaz merchandise and tiny Japanese toylets.

At the back left corner of the shop are lots of trades, mostly DC and Marvel, and in the far right corner is the small rack of new comics, at a price 10% more expensive than found in the central London shops. The range of different new books is limited ‒ I can't imagine that the locals want to read the full diversity of comic books available ‒ but at least they are there. The areas at the front of the shop, going into the windows from the large till area, are full of the film-related, geek-related, Dr Who-related merchandise that lure in the rest of the shoppers, but it feels a little cramped. A strange little shop, a little out of the way, with plenty to offer just with comic books lower down the agenda.

Book: Crooked Little Vein

Being a fan of Warren Ellis (see this rather extensive selection of previous posts about Ellis' work), it was obvious that I was going to buy his first novella; the only question was how much I would enjoy the book.

The story of Crooked Little Vein is pure Ellis, a mix of his love of hard-boiled fiction (e.g. Scars, Desolation Jones, even Gravel is hard-boiled meets magic/action) and his love of the strange (Transmetropolitan and his former website, www.diepunyhumans.com). Michael McGill is a down-at-heel private detective and a shit magnet (his last case was an adultery case where the husband formed a sex cult that broke into ostrich farms, drugged them and had sex with them; this caused his girlfriend to leave him for a woman called Bob who designed strap-ons), who is tasked by the White House Chief-of Staff to find a book, the 'other Constitution of the United States', with the 23 Invisible Amendments to be read by presidents, vice presidents and Chief-of-Staff, bound in the skin of the alien entity that probed Benjamin Franklin's bum. If that isn't a great start to a story, I don't know what is.

The framework is an excuse for Ellis to do a road trip of American weirdness, such as gay men filling their testicles with saline, being in a hotel with Jesus sex aids, and Godzilla bukkake (and the lizard clean up). The fringe of society has always interested Ellis (which is still outside the norm, despite the thesis of the book that the perverse and abnormal is now mainstream because of the internet), and this books allows him to indulge in it, presented in novella form.

What's more, the book is fucking funny ‒ I read it on the train to work, and I had to keep holding my guffaws in check when I read some of the hilarious passages (such as the Godzilla bukkake). There are some fantastic turns of phrase ('he howled like Bruce Lee being enthusiastically taken from behind') and McGill's first-person narrative is self-deprecatory and human in his interaction with the love interest Trix.

An aside: after reading the first arc of Desolation Jones, the memory of which floats to the front of the brain when reading this, particularly when the story reaches LA, I was worried for the great character of Trix and her outcome; however, Ellis allows his romantic, optimistic side to win out, and everything turns out for the best.

I may have alluded to a happy ending and a lot of humour in the adventure, but the book gets serious and scary towards the end, as would be expected and hoped for. It's an interesting idea, that America has changed almost completely in the past 50 years (which is when the other Constitution book was stolen), and Ellis has fun with, providing us with an entertaining and enjoyable read. My only complaint? It's too short. I was enjoying it so much, I wanted more. Next time, a full novel please.

From A Library: Ultimate Power

Ultimate Power #1‒9 by Brian Michael Bendis, J Michael Straczynski, Jeph Loeb and Greg Land

I enjoyed Supreme Power, the revamp of the Squadron Supreme by JMS and Gary Frank for the Max imprint back in 2003, and I like Bendis; I don't like Jeph Loeb or Greg Land, so this collection was always going to be a mixed bag. However, my love of story overcame me.

The overwhelming aspect of this crossover between Marvel's Ultimate and Supreme Power universes is the art of Greg Land ‒ I was familiar with it through the remix by MGK ‒ and the Porn Face phenomenon. You want to read the story but you are distracted by the strange facial expressions of both the women and the men; even the photo reference for each character can change from panel to panel. He's more obsessed with the female mouth and form in general ‒ any excuse to draw buttocks and breasts and really shallow hips, and Land uses it. He may make things superficially pretty but his storytelling is weak and his characters are static.

As for the story itself, the first third (by Bendis) is the meeting of the Ultimate and Supreme characters; this is handled well by Bendis because it is nearly all dialogue between the heroes. The Squadron Supreme turn up, talk, fight, then there is exposition as they explain why everything is going on ‒ Reed sent data retrievers into different dimensions, which caused organic things to attack the Supreme universe, so they want to take him back to answer for his crimes.

The middle third is written by JMS, and involves the Ultimates going to the Supreme universe, have an issue-long fight, then some more fighting before the reveal: Dr Doom is the man behind things. The superhero action is obviously the main lure in a big crossover series like this but it is very flat, just sitting there on the page. This is a similar problem with the other notorious photorealist, Alex Ross: they are good for covers and posters but their interiors are a little dull. For example, a full page of the Torch putting some nova in an Invisible Girl sphere with Hyperion in the middle of it is bland; a double-page spread of Thor vortexing the Ultimates ship is decidely ho-hum. During these issues, the only let up from these pages is JMS dialogue, which can be a little obtuse at times.

The final three issues are the product of the workman yet inexplicably 'big name' Loeb, playing to his strengths of over-the-top largesse with little substance. We discover that Fury got Doom to reprogam the data probes but Doom did his own thing and made a deal with a member of the Squadron Supreme, Emil Burbank, the super genius, who created the infection that was killing the Supreme universe as a way to kill Hyperion under order of the US military of their world. Then, the fan-pleasing return of old-school superheroes with Wanda's magic causing the split of the Squadron Supreme into the new versions and the old versions. This is very indulgent but it's par for the course for a big event these days. The story ends with Fury unleashing the Hulk, with more fighting and everything working out. The trappings may be more sophisticated in the modern crossover, but it's not necessarily more impressive than the old-fashioned counterpart. A bit of a disappointment.

My (Fleeting) Wikipedia Glory

(Click on the image to see my fame in full size)

Life has got in the way of my blogging at the moment, particularly the part of life associated with work. Apologies for the infrequency. However, I had to return to post this news: I'm on Wikipedia. If you ever needed confirmation that the information on that site shouldn't be trusted, here you have it.

I was checking my stats; I don't do this very often, especially with the week-long sabbaticals I've been taking, but occasionally I like to check them to see where people might be coming from (I discovered that I had a link to my review of Mike Carey's The Devil You Know on the blog of the publishers due to checking my stats). So, the second highest referring link was for a Wikipedia page (mostly they come from bizarre Google searches [and I do mean bizarre]; the only regulars, apart from No Referring Link, are Yet Another Comics Blog and Johnny Bacardi) and curiosity led to bafflement.

If you go to the Wiki page for the Collings and Herrin podcast, you will see there is a link to my 'review'. If you click on the link, you will see that, yes, it's a post from my blog but it's not technically a review; it's more a pimping of their podcast. It's rather embarrassing that my only mention on Wikipedia is not actually accurate. Because of this, I don't think that I'll be on Wikipedia for very long (which is why I included the screenshot at the top of the post), but I get a perverse thrill out of seeing my blog name and a link on one of their pages.

But why was my non-review post chosen to represent people talking about the Collings and Herrin podcast? Surely there are better reviews out there that, you know, actually review the podcast? I mean, if you input 'collings and herrin podcast review' into Google, the link to my blog turns up on the second page but that's not really exhaustive research, is it? Obviously, I haven't contacted the people responsible and asked them to perhaps choose a better review, because I am shallow and vain, but it does make you wonder if the person read my review before including it on the page.

So, I'd like to apologise to Andrew Collins and Richard Herring for the lack of review on my part for their entertaining and amusing podcast. If it makes them feel any better, I have paid to see a Richard Herring show and purchased an Andrew Collins book. Thank you, gentlemen, for getting me a fleeting wisp of internet recognition via your Wikipedia entry.

DVD Reviews: Three Different Oscar-related Films

The online DVD rental company that I use tend to be not very good at getting films to me in the actual order I want (I'm sure it's the same with others, but I've only used this company). As such, seeing films when I would like to see them is difficult, and the multiple films that can turn up at the same time can be a strange selection. The three I wanted to briefly discuss all were nominated for this year's Oscars, with only one going away unsuccessful, but all three quite different.

Alphabetically, we'll start with American Gangster. Ridley Scott teams up with Russell Crowe for the third time (and Crowe teams up with Denzel Washington for the first time since the rather awful Virtuosity) for a period piece about a black gangster in Manhattan in the 1970s. As such, the film is about Washington's character, Frank Lucas, and his ascent from being driver for Bumpy Johnson, the kingpin who ran Harlem before him, to smuggling heroin directly from the Far East in the coffins of soldiers coming back from Vietnam and becoming the new Harlem kingpin. In doing so, he is hunted down by Richie Roberts (Crowe), who has been put in charge of a new taskforce to stop drug trafficking in New Jersey.

The film is well constructed, as you would expect from the impeccable Scott, with a real feel of the time, and the actors (a great cast of recognisable faces) who populate even the smallest role do an excellent job. Based on a true story, the film has a resonance when people and events that we know intersect with the narrative (such as Roberts first becoming suspicious of Lucas at the Ali/Frazier fight in 1971, where he has better seats than the Italian mafia) and feels almost like an African American companion piece to Goodfellas, especially when Lucas is captured and turns evidence (although the film almost seems to try and make Lucas out as a good guy at the end when he does this, happily ignoring the murder and violence he committed to get there).

The strange Oscar link is that Ruby Dee, who plays Mama Lucas, was nominated for a Supporting Actress Oscar (which she didn't win). I couldn't tell what it was about her performance that warranted this, or why she was picked out from the rest of the cast, but the Academy does do strange things all the time.

The next film won a surprise Oscar for the well-deserving Tilda Swinton, even though she perhaps didn't deserve it for her performance in the deserving Michael Clayton. This film is the directorial debut of the writer Tony Gilroy (Devil's Advocate, Proof of Life, the Bourne films), who makes a very good job of evoking the films of the 1970s. Michael Clayton (George Clooney) is an attorney, a 'fixer' for a prestigious law firm, who is trying to help his friend and one of the firm's leading attorneys (Tom Wilkinson) when he has a nervous breakdown while working on class action lawsuit for a huge agricultural products conglomerate. Tilda Swinton plays the lead counsel for the conglomerate, who is only taking on such a huge case for the first time, which causes her to take steps into darker territories in order to bring the case to a conclusion that will appease her bosses. We see her as an ordinary human being, anxious, sweaty, nervous, worried, concerned about her diliemmas.

The film is a well-constructed dramatic legal thriller, with good acting, a twisting plot, powerful men involved in conspiracies, money buying results and harking back to a different era of filmmaking. The cast is excellent and and you never feel as if you are watching somebody's first attempt at directing a film. The only aspect of the film that causes me concern is the denouement: this involves Swinton's lawyer character all of a sudden being very stupid in order to have the admittedly satisfying conclusion. Even though the film has demonstrated that she was a conflicted and anxious character, it beggars belief that she would all of a sudden completely forget everything she has learned in her successful career. Apart from that, a good film if not quite as good as the number of Oscar nominations would suggest (Gilroy didn't deserve the directing nomination and the film didn't deserve Best Picture nomination).

Finally, the quirky one of the bunch: Juno. Diablo Cody (great pen name) won the Oscar for original screenplay for this thoroughly charming and idiosyncratic comedy drama, her first produced script. The story is nothing new: Juno (Ellen Page) discovers she is pregnant by her friend Bleeker (Michael Cera); she originally thinks she will have an abortion, but decides to give it up for adoption to a young couple (Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner), a process that doesn't run smooth, while her relationship with Bleeker changes and develops. The film is unique due to its voice: Cody's writing vibrates throughout in the quirky dialogue, especially from Juno. Even though Juno is a 16 year old played by a 20 year old, she is mature for her years and funny, saying the sort of sharp things you always think of later in a funny and novel fashion (Page is great in the role, and deserved her nomination). The film feels like an indie but with an amazing cast (including JK Simmons and Allison Janney) and a good director (Jason Reitman is proving quite capable after this and the excellent Thank You For Smoking), so quirkiness is permitted, but I can't remember a film with such a strong new voice. It's funny, enchanting, touching, beautiful and thoroughly enjoyable.

Rating (for all three films): DAVE

From A Library – Fantastic Four: The Beginning of The End and The New Fantastic Four

Fantastic Four issues 525–526 + 551–553 and 544–550 by Dwayne McDuffie & Paul Pelletier and Karl Kesel & Tom Grummett

I like the Fantastic Four: stories about exploring the edge of narrative imagination and about family appeal to me. However, creators don't always get this mix right, resulting in some less than stellar stories for 'The World's Greatest Comic'. The recent team of Waid and Ringo got it right (I didn't care much for the JMS stories), and I was interested in seeing how Dwayne McDuffie handled them.

These two books collect a large chunk of his recent turn on the book (as well as an old-fashioned two-parter from Kesel & Grummett about switched dreams and Diablo). McDuffie is paired with Paul Pelletier, a competent artist with a nice style who is suited to the FF. The first story is a fun yet ultimately inconsequential tale about Doom coming back from the future, where Reed has created a utopia ('Plan 101 – Fix everything'); Doom wants the credit for it, so wants to stop Reed. We get this FF fighting the FF of the future, which is fun, and McDuffie has a very good handle on the characters and their relationship dynamics, but it almost seems an apologia for Reed's behaviour in Civil War.

McDuffie shakes things up with the 'new' Fantastic Four, with Black Panther and Storm as the married couple in place of Reed and Sue while they are on a second honeymoon. In this story, McDuffie throws in a lot of things into the mix: Deathlok (now cured), The Watcher, Eon, Silver Surfer, Galactus, the Frightful Four, Dr Strange, Eternity, and even Gravity (after McDuffie killed him in the limited series, Beyond!). There are nice touches, such as Panther on the Silver Surfer's board, lots of good jokes, King Solomon's frogs and plenty of pop culture references (e.g. Shaun of the Dead, Grey's Anatomy).

The stories are cosmic, big, appropriate for the Fantastic Four, although not perhaps for Black Panther, and they are fun without being pointless. It's not world-shattering but it's enjoyable. I don't know if this is the start of the next big run on the FF, after the likes of Byrne and Simonson, but at least it's better than JMS.

DVD Review: The Nines

I'm not sure I completely understood The Nines, the 'psychological thriller/drama' by writer John August in his directorial debut, but I did enjoy it. Here's what I thought it was: I think it was a meditation on the writing process, about the creator and his interaction with his creations, the destruction that the creator brings to his characters, and the power inherent to this. Does that make sense?

I've been reading John August's blog for a while now; he writes intelligently and clearly about the scriptwriting process and provides advice to new screenwriters. He first came to my attention to with the film Go, a film I enjoyed a lot. He also also done great work with Tim Burton (e.g Big Fish), which helps you forgive him for Charlie's Angels (although that was more to do with McG). The Nines is a bold experiment for him, but he's warranted the achievement.

I don't know if I can accurately describe the film, but I'll try. The film is in three parts, all about three different men played by Ryan Reynolds. In the first part, he is a successful TV actor under house arrest for accidentally burning down his home after the break up with his girlfriend. The second part sees Reynolds as a television writer (based on August's own experiences), bringing his new show to the screen with his best friend, who the studios want to replace. The third section sees Reynolds as a games developer, out with his wife and kid in the canyons, who has to get help when their car won't start. All three sections are linked (the actor is staying in the writer's house while the writer is in Canada shooting the pilot, the section of which is part of the actual film in the third section) and seem to involve the number nine appearing in unusual places (such as part of title of the actor's television show). The film seems to be about the possibility that the Reynolds character is the same person in each but is actually some sort of God who has created these different universes for himself (the same people play different people in each: Hope Davis, Melissa McCarthy, Elle Fanning) and that he has forgotten who he is. Weird, eh?

The film is well written and well acted: Reynolds, known more for comedy and action, is great here, showing a range of emotion and making each of the three characters different from each other. Davis is good, as always, and McCarthy and Fanning are equally good. Shot on film and video and in 22 days, this is an intriguing and thoughtful movie that people will hopefully discover on DVD (although I don't think the Region 2 DVD is as full as the Region 1 version, which is a shame, as I wanted to get the full package where August explains the film ...). As the websites describes it: Look For The Nines. You won't be disappointed.