Beau James needs to have a Wikipedia entry.
Saturday, March 25, 2006
Wednesday, March 22, 2006
Television Perfection
NP: The Napster World Music Radio Station
*** Spoiler Alert***
In my post below, I recommended last night's season finale of the Shield. After watching it, I have to say that it is as close to television perfection as you can get. First, the build-up from the previous episode regarding Kavannaugh entering the home of Vic's ex-wife, ostensibly to rape her, was handled very well. They started off just where the last show ended and the tension quickly built. Kavannaugh, at the last second, turned away from the darkside, choosing to leave the house rather than committ the unspeakable. It was very well done and eased the tension at just the right moment.
The pace of the show was also expertly handled. There were so many cross-stories and subplots that the producers had to slow down the pace in places to keep the viewer from turning it off in frustration. The Danny-baby scene was very anti-climactic, but everything else was good.
Finally, the Shane-Lem scene. Oh. My. Goodness. That one should make the highlight shows for best TV scenes of all time. Will Shane murder Lem? Will Lem murder Shane? Will Shane let Lem turn himself in? They did the actual action so low-key that you didn't see it coming. Then the grenade gets dropped and then the cut out to the long shot for the explosion. Wow. Both actors did well in that scene (until the one started apologizing for killing the other one and he overacted a bit). Very tense and exciting scene.
In conclusion, buy the season 5 DVD when it hits and watch them from start to finish. The whole season was much better than the last, when Glenn Close phoned it in, and the IAD character added another level of tension to the show. Hopefully Kavannaugh will be back again next season.
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
On the Documentary Recommendation Tip
NP: Moving Units -- Emancipation
So I haven't recommended anything for your viewing pleasure in a long time. Rather than hitting up the latest sci-fi movie or tonight's 90-minute season 5 finale of the Shield (10 pm ET on FX, check your local listings), I come before you to point out a rarely-seen historical documentary.
Negroes with Guns: Rob Williams and Black Power (2004). It was produced out of the UF documentary institute and tells the story of Rob Williams, a North Carolina NAACP leader who fought discrimination by arming himself and his organization and resisting segregationist violence through civil defense. One of the talking heads in the piece is Timothy Tyson, who chronicles Williams rise and fall as a civil rights leader in the book _Radio Free Dixie_. The title of the book comes from Williams' pirate radio show that he broadcast out of Cuba, after he fled the country. I'm using the book in an "America in the 1960s" class that I am trying to teach next fall.
Williams left a lot of audio and vide recordings, so the documentary is often told in his own words. If you can snag a copy, or catch it when it comes on PBS again, it is worth watching.
Thursday, March 16, 2006
My new obsession
http://www.dvdaficionado.com
I'm steadily cataloguing my DVD collection as we speak ... I never fathomed how deep and extensive a collection of films I have; I'm also surprised at how many movies I have that are out of print.
I'll put up a link to my collection when I'm done.
Edit: Alright, done:
http://www.dvdaficionado.com/dvds.html?cat=1&sub=All&id=arukuban
551 titles. Of course, do note that some of these are my wife's; don't go thinking I'm all into "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" or some shit.
Wednesday, March 15, 2006
[DVD] Battle Royale
Alright, I'm convinced that I got a bootleg copy of this incredible Japanese film, since all my online sources tell me that there isn't a legit US DVD copy that's ever been available. But as far as bootlegs go, it's a pretty damn good copy.
But anyway, this film is about a dystopic Japan, and in order to promote the importance of education as this world goes to hell, a random class of children is hijacked & taken to a remote island. There, they are given three days and one item/weapon at random (someone gets a shotgun, someone gets binoculars, someone gets a crossbow, someone gets a megaphone), and they are sent out into this island to kill each other. Only one student can be left alive.
It's kinda like "The Most Dangerous Game" meets "Lord of the Flies." The really incredible theme that runs through the film is that, above it all, as these kids are reduced to their base instincts, the things that kids build their academic lives on (extracurricular activities, cliques, and school crushes) remain the most important part of these kids' survival.
It's a amusing, disgusting and heartbreaking take on the direction that society is leading, not only in pop culture, but also with regard to socioeconomic status and the will to achieve. Even as these children proclaim to be friends, they're in cutthroat competition. Hey, save it for high school, kids, when you're stabbing your friends in the back to look attractive to the best colleges around!
2 & 3/4 count; wonky subtitling keeps it from being a 3.
Vacation, all I ever wanted
I wound up taking a vacation day today, because I was up until just past 4:00 AM last night watching the HBO Original series "Deadwood," which was two hours longer than I should have and four hours shorter than I would have, but I wasn't sure if there would be vacation time available today. If I'd known there would have been available vacation time I would have just stayed up all night and finished the first season of "Deadwood" before bedtime. When I woke up at 10:00 AM to go to work I'd only been asleep for four and a half hours and that's just not enough sleep one needs in order to face the half-witted reprobates that don't pay their cell phone bills on time. And also, there were the last four episodes of "Deadwood" that needed watching. And if this paragraph is hard to read, it's because I've spent the last 12 waking hours staring at this computer screen, watching "Deadwood" and as a result, my brain has turned to shit. And if you haven't figured out the point of this paragraph yet, it's that you should be watching "Deadwood." And if you've already been watching "Deadwood" and you hadn't told me how awesome it was, you're a cocksucker. Season two is currently on its way, so there's the weekend.
As to Ron's thought-provoking question, I pondered it for a few days. It was hard to come to a conclusion, because very few bands have a great song that you would use to convert new fans with that is simultaneously overlooked. I realize that wasn't the exact question, but for that reason the answer becomes too easy. I suppose it's "too easy" in the sense of being a music elitist and wanting to pull some obscure answer out of my ass, like referring to some unheralded song from an album that didn't make much noise, like "Go Let it Out" from Oasis' last mainstream gasp "Standing on the Shoulder of Giants" or such. But, when the answer is whittled down to the bare bones, my favorite band is Nirvana. And I recently downloaded a bootlegged live show from Chicago in October of 1991, just before the dam broke on their success. I was listening to it in the car Sunday night and "Smells Like Teen Spirit" came on; those four chords like a bolt of lightning and those drums pounding like the thunder behind it, and yeah, that's the song I'd evangelize with.
In second place, the semi-elitist obscure choice of Pearl Jam's "Yellow Ledbetter."
And finally, for those of you that remember the classic 1998 environmental PSA "Tennessee Trash," I recently acquired a copy of it on VHS and will be encoding it into digital format this weekend along with the 1978 original. If anyone wants a copy, let me know and I'll see what I can work out.
Keeping up with the competition
I've had a whole lot of very little to do this whole time I've been out of work, so I've been online, and I don't know if any of you have noticed or not, but Blogger has these little features that enable you to find some really unique takes on some stuff going out there in the ... *sigh,* "blogosphere".
Here's a random smattering of sites I found that proved to me that, yes, Virginia, blogs are no longer for whiny Goth kids to mope about how depressing their 13 yr old lives are. Blogs are also for ...
... uppity womens who think that calling themselves "bitches" = being strong & independent (hint: it makes you neither, except uppity ... and poorly in touch with syntax ... and vulgar). E.g. The, ahem, "Book Bitches"; the, ahem, "Hot Librarian."
... B-level celebrity. E.g. MC Hammer; Neil Gaiman; John Kricfalusi (creator of "Ren & Stimpy")
... satire & self-promotion. E.g. Chewie's Blog; Force of a Revolving Toilet; Synapse Films.
... news for fans of Asian cinema and, of course, the wrestling. E.g. Kaiju Shakedown; Pro-Wrestling Chronicle.
... homegrown literature & social commentary. E.g. Raven "Don't call me Confederate" Mack's Haiku blog; Dr. Lao's Intern.
And, of course, not to leave out the fine folks of Livejournal, here's a handful of guily pleasures:
- Paul Dini, co-creator of "Batman: The Animated Series"
- Jackson Publick, creator of "The Venture Brothers"
- Mike Sweetster, co-admin of the Death Valley Driver Video Review
- Evan Dorkin, comic writer & creator of "Milk & Cheese"
- Warren Ellis, comic writer & creator of ... a lot
Anyway, enjoy.
Some (stapled) navel gazing at almost 5am
Got my sleep all out of whack, so I've been up since something like almost 20 hrs ago.
I watched some movies today, and by movies I mean a couple of episodes of the animated "Fantastic Four" series and the movie "Nekromantik 2," which, believe me, is a total mindfuck. (I'm on this insane quest to buy and watch as many of the movies found in "Fangoria's 101 Best Horror Movies You've Never Seen" book and Rue Morgue Magazine's issue #50 article "100 Alternative Horror Films." So far ... 74.)
Anyway, all of this idle time, the struggling to get out of the chair 'cause my staples hurt, the impending doom of a return to work hanging over my head, the complete claustrophobia that I've had since last Tuesday, when all this mess started ... it's really made me think.
I've come to realize that the old childhood dream of writing that great American novel is dead. I've always been a writer, and I'll always be a writer, but I had envisioned that day when I would be a published author. Don't think that'll happen anymore, though. Not at this rate. But that's not to say it's a bad thing, I guess.
See, I do a whole lot of writing for a career. I have to keep constant, endless notes on clients that I see in my office. I keep up a pretty fair pace of writing on this here online thing (it was daily until the warranty on my appendix ran out). In essence, then, it can be said that my "novel" is written on everything I touch. It's just not been collected in a publishable format. Well, there is that fiction thing that I write on here, that I have no idea where that's going to go.
Speaking of the body and the dream, relationships break down too. And relationships that I've had, both long term and burgeoning, are becoming the target of some serious reflection. Case in point: I've been laid up with the results of this appendectomy since last Tuesday. I've seen few cards, I've had few phone calls. The people I know from work, they sent me things, but that's about it. I've been in pain for a little over a week now, which for me feels like "as long as I can remember," and it's felt like being cast aside. Now that shit might work for the buffalo and the gazelle herds, where the faster ones keep running and leave the lame behind so the jackals can feast on them. But we aren't buffalos or gazelles, and it wouldn't have hurt some people to pick up the phone. (Present company excluded ... we have an online oasis for that kind of thing, and I appreciate the well wishes I've received from the majority of you. But some folks that have been the closest to me haven't even sent me an email.)
I find myself, at 31, questioning my role in the world. Stapled belly-button, horror movie worshipping, message board decorating, videogame playing, Mountain Dew drinking, mental health hating son of a bitch that I am, I feel directionless, purposeless. Like Jack Nicholson in that movie of the same title, "What if this is as good as it gets?"
When I got out of the hospital, I had two ideas in mind: 1) Return to Tennessee. 2) Become a rector for the Episcopal church (basically a priest). Now, that last one might amuse, but hey, you pretty much come out of anesthesia thinking some pretty wild stuff. But I digress.
I once told a group of clients, following the death of a group member, to try everything they could to not live angry; the group member that died left behind a legacy of internal and external rage. And it's not even that you have to live happy. Me, I just want to live satisfied. But then the question is, is it enough to live not dissatisfied? I find comfort in the rap CDs, and the horror movies, and the videogames, and those occasional moments when a client actually thanks me for what I do. So, then, what if that is as good as it gets? When it gets down to it, what else is there, really? Will that novel make me happy? Wait, let me rephrase ... Will that novel make me any more satisfied than cobbling together pieces of fiction that a handful of folks that I connect to and genuinely care about can read and comment over and *gasp* possibly enjoy?
That's nuts; my wife's alarm clock just went off. I hate when that happens ... means I've been up all damn night. Plus, it's time for another pain pill. One more day and these staples come out ... alright, then; let's get to it.
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
How the West Was Won and Where it Got Us.
NP: Random music at Starbucks
This is another one of those "focus my mind posts" before I get started editing Chapter 3.
Gainesville is great during Spring Break. Most of the undergrads have bailed for the beach (except for the rare .1% of them who go elsewhere to do service projects) and the businesses don't want to disrupt their own schedules, so everything is open regular hours and no one is around. During the holidays, everything closes early...but during Spring Break you get the run of the place. It's great to be alive in Gainesville.
The jury is still out on my Napster subscription. It's great to have access to all the albums they have (which is most everything since 1995) and the ability to stream almost anything. I say almost anything because, if a song comes out and it is popular, they charge you 99 cents to download it. If you pay, the licensing restriction is taken off, meaning you can burn it to a CD, but that is the only benefit. I have been waiting for 5 weeks for Beck's "Heaven Hammer" to go off the pay list, but it remains there. I really think they have a thing where if you search for a song incorrectly, they think you want it and so they make it .99 so they can get an extra almost-buck. Man, I miss the days of free Napster.
Starbucks coffee is kinda tangy today. Maybe the dude forgot to put chocolate in it.
Chapters 1 and 2 are 98% ready for "committee draft" status. Chapter 3 is in front of me ready to edit, and 4 is in the folder next. I have 5 back from my advisor, and I get 6-8 back on Thursday. Once I get them worked into shape, I will re-write the introduction and write a conclusion and, hopefully by April 7, will get the whole thing into my full committee. Then....I wait and wait for people to read it and get their feedback. No matter what, it looks like I'll have a D and an R in front of my name by August, if its the Good Lord's will that things keep progressing and nothing really bad happens. Current page count -- 457
You know, I'll get Josh fired up here, but the Democrats of today are a lot like the Republicans I am studying. In 1952, the GOP had been out of power for 20 years. The Democrats had started an unpopular war (Korea) and the high tax rates and price controls associated with the conflict were grating on consumers. The GOP was split between liberals and conservatives, and the conservatives were chomping at the bit to take over the party and run an abashedly anti-Democratic platform. Their strength came from a disparate group of grassroots organizations that communicated together via newsletters and telephone. Today, the Democrats have been out of power for 6 years, the Republicans are fighting an unpopular war and the human toll, moreso than the cost, is grating on the public. The Dems are split between liberals and centrists, with liberals really doing outlandish things to make public statements and push the centrists out of the party (i.e. Feingold's censure resolution), and they are all connected through a group of internet sites now referred to as "Netroots." If history repeats itself, the Dems will nominate a very, very hostile liberal candidate in 2008. That person will lose handily, but the organization they built for his/her election will remain together and eventually find the right formula to get their guy elected.
The 2006 results mean nothing. The GOP won the House and the Senate in 1946 in a similar situation and their own party splits prevented them from capitalizing and winning the White House in 1948. What this means -- watch for a very liberal, aggressive, what I would call "nutty" campaign in 2006 that succeeds. From 2006-08, Lieberman and Clinton will reassert themselves and in 2008, the Dems go down in flames to McCain or Allen.
The Middle East is the 2006 version of Post-World War II Asia. Don't let anyone tell you any different. Hamas' election was today's "Loss of China."
Ric Flair will so break his hip at the Wrestlemania ladder match. I've also heard that Vince is going to call the Repo Man out of retirement to cause Flair to have road rage just after the match.
Man, I miss the Rock pouring concrete into Vince McMahon's corvette.
Paris Hilton....why?
Monday, March 13, 2006
Flavor Flav
I have had this all wrong.
I was never sure who to condemn for the state of affairs Flavor Flav has found himself in. Was it VH1, for taking one of hip hop's most flamboyant characters and turning him into a caricature of himself by sticking him with Bridgette Neilsen? Or, was it Flav himself, for allowing all of this to be done?
Now, with "Flavor of Love," I see how the masterplan has worked. Flav allowed the raping to go on, because he must have known that he could work this gimmick up to equal mad pussy. I could not say that I wouldn't put up with Bridgette Neilsen's skanky ass if it meant getting some fly dimepieces to open up their stripper-quality asscheeks for some Flavor pudding. Some of those women are quite fine, and I'm sure Flav has dipped a finger in at least one twizzler or two from that set of wannabe hookers and wish-they-were golddiggers.
(Hookers & golddiggers ... po-tay-to, po-tah-to. Oh, and fuck Kanye West for jumping on the golddigger wagon and thinking it's his own, when EPMD was warning me about golddigging bitches back in "Business As Usual.")
Flavor, you done it again. This is easily the best PE scam since Professor Griff came back.
Saturday, March 11, 2006
Sick day musings pt. 2
Had no choice but to watch more movies than anyone has any right to. Having something like 15 staples in my gut (why not stitches? Beats me ...) leaves me little choice of anything to do except read, check the internet, take pain killers, and watch shit on TV. So here's the rundown ...
"Destroy All Monsters" - Godzilla and about 8 of his nearest and dearest get the fudge off of Monster Island and wreak terrible havoc on the major cities of the world. Great fun, except the DVD has no menu, no chapter stops ... it's pretty much like a video tape, except video actually has one advantage over this DVD: if you take a video out to play it in a different VCR, then at least you can start at the exact same spot. With most DVDs you can at least zip ahead a couple of chapters. No so much here; you'd have to fast-forward to the point that you remember watching last. Anyway, pretty standard Godzilla fare here; monsters trash city, then monsters trash each other, while infuriated Japanese people try to make sense of it all.
"Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things" - A film crew takes a day's break from shooting to go hopping around in the nearby graveyard. One of their shenanigans includes digging up a dead body and performing black magic rituals. Then ... hey, it's a horror movie set in a graveyard, what d'ya think would happen? Plus, this film boasts one of the most annoying characters this side of that guy in the wheelchair from "Texas Chainsaw Massacre." Yes, the original one ... *sigh*
"High Tension" - French fish eaters make a countryside trip to visit one of the chicks' parents. Then one of the fish eaters gets kidnapped, leaving the other fish eater to go avenge her girlfriend's family's brutal death. Shit's one insane, sick tale, which makes it perfect for a horror fan. Good spooks, gore, the whole nine ... but the ending's a bitch.
"Five Fingers of Death" - Traditional kung-fu film. Not so much of the "you killed my father/teacher/family, and I fail to defeat you so I must train until I am victorious," but more along the lines of "I will train hard to enter this tournament to avenge my family/bring honor to my school, and I don't know who I can trust and who I cannot." The cool part of this are the closeups mixed with the Ironside theme, a la Uma in "Kill Bill" when she'd spy one of the Deadly Vipers. And the glowing fist that was ripped off by "The Last Dragon" is also pretty swell. The film suffers from the lack of a cheesy-cool villain; dude with the big forehead just don't cut it. However, the kung-fu here is magnificent.
"TNA: Impact" - The AMW vs. Naturals match was pretty solid, as the matches that I've seen beteween these two teams usually are - nice 69 spot (and a chant of "Brokeback Mountain") on AMW; the Naturals vs. MNM would make a nice match; TNA is the only group that is devoting time to the tags (only crew doing better is ROH; SHIT! Near-fall! SHIT! Canadian run-in! That's the way it goes; but Eric Young is solid gold.
- Chris Sabin vs. Alex Shelley vs. Sonjay Dutt: A whole lotta stips for this ... winner gets a spot on Team TNA for the World X Cup, plus they get a spot in the International match on tomorrow's Destination X, plus they get a booklet of Sizzler coupons; if Sonjay Dutt wins, does that mean he represents India in the international shootout tomorrow?; Shelley is the damn man; the quicker we get Aries and Strong back, and if they'd add Frank Kazarian, we'd be looking at a solid stable; Sabin with a nice multiple powerbomb set, wonder how a Sabin/Jericho match would be? Shelley & Sabin have a "shitty dye job" competition going on; and Sabin gets the duke.
- I like the Christian/Monty double-screen interview segment. Feels like the old TBS Saturday night wrestling show. Very nice, plus it hid some of the flaws that Brown has in his interviews.
- Team Dudley, Truth, and Rhino vs. Diamonds in the Rough, Shannon Moore, and (NOT) Southernfried's Own Matt Bentley ... I smell summer squash; godDAMN, Devon is JACKED~!! Ya know, I miss Truth back when he was "racist" Truth; hm, mainly X-division guys vs. Rhino & the Duds ... yep, I see tons of offense; this match has three representatives from the SGM Super 30 Black Wrestlers list: Elix Skipper (#13), Devon Dudley (#12), and Ron Killings (#8); Triple X vs. 3D is our third & final "fantasy book" match of the show; MAVERICK Matt??? Hm, Jarrett's team takes out their opponents in a little over a minute, but the 3D team takes almost 8? I think the message is clear. And if you don't know who won, then you've never watched wrestling before.
Man, shame that Northland cable won't let me get the PPV tomorrow, 'cause I so would. But apparently we don't have digital cable.
Friday, March 10, 2006
My sick day musings - pt.1
Watched "Dead & Buried," "Raw Meat," and "Ninja Checkmate" (a/k/a "Mystery of Chess Boxing"). Watched some matches off the Bret Hart DVD set, particularly Hart vs. Deisel, vs. Bulldog, vs. Benoit, vs. Hakushi. Played "Sonic Mega Collection Plus," working my way through "Sonic The Hedgehog 3" and "Sonic Spinball." Read a couple of short stories in "Wake Up Screaming," a H.P. Lovecraft short story anthology; I'd never read Lovecraft before, so some of his stuff is particularly unnerving.
Shame we couldn't do something along the lines of a "SGM Book Club" or "Movie Club" or some such, where we could suggest some titles to each other, then discuss our viewpoints on them. (Although, I know Joshua is not a movie watcher.) But I could only wonder how many times some of you'd like to read through multiple reference texts, as that's what I'm usually flipping through. While in the hospital, I was reading bits and pieces from the "A-Z Encyclopedia of Cryptozoology."
I'm considering a super huge, megatastic project on SF ... a tournament poll, but before you pull your hair out, hear this one out. I'm thinking of seeing what popular opinion says about the greatest one-on-one wrestling matches ever. It will be a 64(!) entrant/match tourney ... we'll see if this gets off the ground.
Thursday, March 09, 2006
Well, I'm out of the hospital
I just spent 3 days and 3 glorious nights at *beautiful* Self Memorial, for a glorious midweek vacation due in no small part to a bum appendix.
I was at work, doing paperwork, when I noticed some annoying abdominal pain. I'd had pain before, but this was new. So, I begged for a day off, then went to my doc. He sent me to a surgeon, who then sent me to the emergency room to check in for some tests. Then they sent me down for some tests, which involved a wonderful trip in and out of the CT. All told - acute appendicitis, necessitating immediate surgery, so I got rushed into the OR, stat. I had some cutie nurses, and I've had more people seeing my bare ass than I'd cared to, but that's okay, 'cause I work out.
So, in case anyone's been wondering about me, I've been in the hospital. I now have three nice incisions in my stomach that are stapled shut and hurt like MFers, but I got all next week off. So, good job, appendix; you did good.
After a few days, I'll hope to get back to some daily posting. This Friday, I hope I'll the All Day post up. If not, I'll put two up to make up for it later.
Tuesday, March 07, 2006
Thought-provoking question
Ok. I want to propose a mini-survey here, just to get some discussion.
We all have our favorite bands and our favorite musical styles. If you were going on a sort of evangelical trip to spread the word of your favorite band and attract new followers, which song would you use? In other words, what is the single best track from your single favorite band.
This doesn't necessarily mean what is your favorite song. Groups that absolutely suck it for three albums can produce a good track every now and again (i.e Collective Soul). The question is, what is the best song from a band that has a highly respectable, very solid catalog of work.
I'm going to hold off on answering to see where this goes. Maybe we can drop down some debate on this one. If it doesn't work, I'll throw up the standard "Best Album of the 90s" question so Josh and I can get into it over "Nevermind" versus "Jagged Little Pill" again.
Thursday, March 02, 2006
[Comics] I paid for Garth Ennis' newest ivory backscratcher!
I hadn't been to Atomik Comics in going on two years, so one of the first things on my to-do list now that I've got a good job and a cash flow that isn't inhibited by a marijuana habit was to get my ass down to ye olde comic shoppe. Where, in two trips, I have spent approximately one hundred and twenty bucks. And that's not counting what I'll be spending on the Ennis' Punisher trades I put on order, some of which, I have deduced, may not be what I needed. That's what I get for not knowing what I needed when I went in there.
So, in the last month I picked up the Tulip figure from the Preacher line that I put on hold sometime in mid-2003, the fourth and fifth Hitman trades, the six-issue Ghost Rider "Road to Damnation" series, the six-issue Punisher series "Slavers", the first four issues of the five-issue Punisher vs. Bullseye series and the Punisher "Red X-Mas" one-shot. I think I also picked up the herp from having Garth Ennis' penis in my mouth, considering that of what I bought, only the PvB and the one-shot weren't lining Ennis' pockets. And of course, there are the Punisher trades I ordered and the ones I will order ("Born" for sure). For fuck's sake, at least New England Comics hasn't published any Tick books in the last two years, so I won't be spending any money on that.
Now for some reviews.
Ghost Rider "Road to Damnation"
Garth Ennis loves to make fun of Christianity, particularly the Catholic variety. I love to make fun of Christianity, any variety in particular. So I don't have any qualms when Ennis twists Christian theology around his warped pen to fire off a tale in which the Angels of Heaven are no better than the Demons of Hell. But, it gets old. (Don't tell anyone I said that, though. I'll get kicked out of the Atheist's Club.)
Here's the deal: Johnny Blaze finally had to pay the Piper and now spends his time in the torment of demons. Meanwhile, a filthy capitalist, confined to an elaborate robotic walking contraption because of a drunk-driving accident, creates the perfect condition in which to loose Kazann, a vile demon from deepest, darkest Hades. Kazann has, of course, grand designs for a new Hell on Earth and is mysteriously aligned with Malachi, one of more prosperous Angels of the Host. Heaven has sent its' champion, Ruth, a ruthless she-warrior who will stop at nothing to send Kazann back to Hell. Hell also has a mercenary on Kazann's trail, a morbidly obese, beer-drinkin', Cadillac-drivin' good-ol-boy named Hoss(!).
Malachi doesn't want either Hoss or Ruth to get to Kazann, lest they find out his horrible secret. So fellow Angel, and presumably younger sibiling, Daniel gives Malachi a tip: free Ghost Rider from Hell and send him after Kazann. Malachi offers Ghost Rider his freedom if Rider can send Kazann back to Hell before anyone finds out about their alliance. Rider accepts the offer and is quickly on Kazann's trail. He soon finds himself allied with Hoss, trying to beat Ruth to the place in Texas (of course) where Kazann has arisen. And there's a big battle and chaos ensues and Ghost Rider gets screwed in the end and at three bucks a book this is worse than the short Punisher story arc where Frank Castle goes out West that was pretty much the same as the Hitman story arc where Tommy Monaghan goes out West.
Two count, just because it's Ghost Rider, who I've always dug, and because the artwork by Clayton Crain is pretty damned good.
The Punisher "The Slavers"
The best thing about Ennis' Punisher books is that we generally get straight to the fuckin' blowin' shit up and the killin' of the lowlifes. So this one starts out with a young lady firing a handgun at a crowd of scum in a torrential downpour. Bodyguards bust out after her into an alley, leaving a wounded drug-dealer standing behind his limo. Directly in the scope of Frank Castle. Unaware of what happened to their boss, these thugs have caught their female assailant and plan to have their way with her before they leave her lifeless body in a pile of garbage. Forgive them, father, for they know not who stands behind them. Speaking of forgiveness, line of the arc is on page 12 of the first book: "Whatever he was jabbering, it wasn't English. Pavla [aforementioned drug dealer] was Albanian, maybe he was too. But I'd know the Lord's Prayer in any language. Gave him a moment. To just before the line about forgiveness." (Gunshot, exuent thug.)
Bodyguards quickly dispatched, the young lady begs for the Punisher's help. Castle isn't interested, being the stoic killing machine he is. The young lady tells Castle she knows who he is, that she's seen him on TV. The men he killed, they and others were responsible for killing her baby. Before she can explain further, a couple of uniforms show up. Castle disarms them fairly harmlessly and takes the young lady somewhere safe so she can explain: she is a sex slave, brought here from Moldova by an organized sex trafficking ring. When she tried to escape, her baby was murdered and pictures were emailed to the social worker who helped her. The drug dealer Castle killed was part of that ring and he was in the right place at the right time. The young lady's tale lights a fire in Frank Castle; Frank Castle will now light a fire in others (and possibly light others on fire).
The sex ring is run by a ruthless Eastern European mercenary and his horrible cunt of a wife. The death of Pavla at Castle's hands concerns them greatly, as well it should, but they are concerned about the mercenary's also-mercenary father finding out, because he lives in the old country and likes to do things old school, meaning taking care of it himself. He is a completely remorseless, fearless old man who would take it upon himself to deal with the Punisher one-on-one, unaware that the Punisher is the stuff nightmares are made of. Of course, the European has a mole in the NYPD, who convinces a higher-up to play up Castle's attack on the officers in order to turn public opinion and the NYPD against the Punisher.
From there we have some twists and turns and it finishes with Frank Castle having killed a bunch of assholes in glorious, fulfulling fashion. Because he's that kinda guy. It was a pretty inspired story, although an easy target. Sex slave traders who kill children to keep the slaves in line aren't in the least sympathetic. But it is fun to see them killed mercilessly. At the end Castle says this was the first time in a long while where he really hated his prey and it showed.
Three count. Fresh storyline, Frank Castle rules and Leandro Fernandez' artwork is very gritty, which is perfect for this arc. Steve Dillon's bright, crisp, clean visuals wouldn't have worked as well.
The Punisher "Red X-Mas"
Quick little one-shot by Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray, penciled by Mark Texeira.
Castle murders some Mob big shots, so their wives bring a vicious Italian assassin to finish the Punisher once and for all...and she's a hot piece of ass! Castle catches her, where she reveals that she took the job because she admires and that she will tell who hired her...for the price of a single kiss! Castle makes the deal, commences to putting the wood to her...then kills her! Castle kills the ringleader of the Desperate Housewives, but lets the others live on the condition that they...donate generously to charity! And leave the country! Merry Christmas!
Two count. It was almost worth the four dollars for the scene with the assassin. She offers the information and it shows the kiss on the last panel. On the following page it says "The next morning" and it shows her landing on the top of the car. Frank Castle, ladies man.
Punisher vs. Bullseye isn't finished yet, but it's turning out to be a lighthearted little story. When it's done I'll review it.
Wednesday, March 01, 2006
[DVD] "Seven Doors Of Death"
$3.99. That's how much this film cost me on DVD.
For that price, I got:
- a guy getting crucified, then burned alive by shovelfuls of lye;
- a guy attacked by a zombie, and his eyes torn out of his head;
- a woman knocked unconscious, then her face burned by acid;
- a man falls from a ladder, and tarantulas crawl from the shadows and devour him face-first;
- a woman gets attacked by the aforementioned eyeless zombie and her head impaled ... her right eye shoots out of socket; and,
- a blind woman is attacked by her own dog, her throat ripped out and her ear bitten off.
Lucio Fulci is one magnificent bastardo (he of "Zombie" fame). This film is the first in a while that gave me the creeps ... and I'm a big time fan of horror films. Seen a bunch, from zombies to vampires to werewolves to psycho-killers to ghosts to assorted demons and aliens ... and this film is a solid terror. I guess because I didn't necessarily expect much from it, it snuck up on me and done brung the fear. But shit, did it deliver.
The basis on which the whole thing hangs on is that some chick inherits a hotel, not knowing that the hotel sits atop one of the seven(!) gates to hell. Then after that, it's pretty much scene after scene of terror & gore. A great film for fans of such fare ... the end scene in the hospital is going to give me nightmares, mate. I assure you.
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