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Tag Archive: Jason McClain


The Walking Dead Escape – Comic-Con 2012

Filed under: Pop Culture, TV — Leave a comment
July 20, 2012

By Jason McClain (@JTorreyMcClain)

Let me start near the end.  I stood amid a sea of at least 200 people at 9 pm on Friday the 13th outside of a Petco Park gate.  Around me were a man dressed as the Eleventh Doctor, a man disguised as a zombie, a man wearing the uniform of someone in special ops, a trio of lovely ladies and many more people in smart running shoes.  The metal gates leading inside opened and we moved into a small area that normally serves as the queue area for a concession stand, and now had a chain-link fence serving as a cage holding back about 20 zombies.  A man struggled and wrestled with two more zombies on a leash.  A bullhorn squawked and a voice advised us to remain calm, as this was a safe zone. One of the zombies on its leash grabbed its handler and started to feed. His zombie sister joined him in his feast.  The chain-link cage opened and zombies poured into our safe zone.  The man on the bullhorn exhorted us all to run and run now.

I became pretty familiar with the words and actions in this first room.  (“We’re with FEMA, we know what we’re doing” was my favorite backhanded political swipe.)  On Friday afternoon, I stood just beyond that first section of “The Walking Dead Escape” in a room with body bags, a couple of closed-circuit TVs showing a continuous loop of zombie disaster scenes and a small, narrow pathway leading to the next part of the course.  A cloud of fog, assuming the breezes flowing through the park did not blow too swiftly in those couple of minutes, met the survivors as they frantically pushed their way inside.  I shambled along in the fog, they found my business casual zombie presence and avoided my reach as I swung around my one good arm and tried to catch people in my grasp.  They screamed and dodged and I became the center of an island of dread with streams of survivors running around both sides of me.  The zombies from the cage would wander in and join me for a little before returning to their posts.

(Full disclosure, as our training instructed us, I figured out that I had my right collarbone snapped when I became infected and could only move my left arm and my head stayed anchored to my shoulder.  I’m a method zombie.  Also, I didn’t try too hard to catch anyone, because if you were trying to avoid the zombie hoard, it would suck to get touched by the first “wild” one you saw.  However, in one of the first batches of people to come through the course, one guy got scared and actually jumped back into my chest, then jumped back the way he came and ran scared as I stifled a laugh while continuing my forward shuffle.  I think that was the only real contact I made.)

Eventually, the zombie horde got bored with just this sample of the carnage and followed the survivors further and further into the course.  We found other places to set ourselves up and give the people running another chance to avoid the undead.  We did anything to prolong the excitement of the chase and to avoid the wait between waves.  When the survivors escaped, we took pictures of each other and I even took the time to sit by a working electrical outlet (you wouldn’t expect that during the apocalypse) and charged my phone.

This reflection on the survivors getting to have all the fun got me to thinking, why shouldn’t I be a survivor?  Why shouldn’t I go back and try my hand at surviving the zombie apocalypse?  So, once I finished my shift, I emerged into the daylight, my makeup fading and my humanity returning.  I found the box office, used my right arm that now worked perfectly to pull out my wallet and I tried to figure out the spookiest time possible.  The last shift in the dark of night on Friday the 13th fit the bill.

Surviving became a blur.  Once I jogged through the first gauntlet, we all piled up behind the first set of obstacles – rope nets and a big slide – and were thinned out so the horde of survivors didn’t overwhelm the horde of zombies and to make the experience more fun. We ran around burned out cars.  We crawled under obstacles and through chain link tunnels. Zombies waited around corners.  Zombies wandered around mazes of construction barriers throughout every level of Petco.

I did perform one heroic deed and I have to thank the zombie for it.  A maze of barriers stood in front of me and about four other survivors.  I darted inside and the lone zombie guard turned toward me, allowing himself to be distracted by middle-aged-man flesh, leaving the path to freedom open for the others.  They ran through without any worry and I managed to escape his grasp.  Three of the survivors, the same trio of lovely young ladies from the beginning of the course, thanked me for my heroism as we continued our escape.  I felt my breast swell from more than just being out of shape and trying to catch my breath.

“The Walking Dead Escape” let me feel like a hero in that small moment.  That’s what made it fit in with Comic-Con so well.  If I may paraphrase the chorus of a David Bowie song, we could all be heroes, just for four days.

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Trying Not to Think about the Music: Even More on The Amazing Spider-Man

Filed under: Comics & Books, Movies, Superheroes — Leave a comment
July 11, 2012

By Jason McClain (@JTorreyMcClain)

Let me tell you about this really great idea I have for an independent movie.  It opens with a six-year-old kid becoming an orphan because his parents die when they stand up to the local drug cartel after his father breeds a strain of coca plants that have poppy flowers.  Then, as he reaches the age of 17, he starts to rebel against the father that raised him and that father dies in the lawless streets of his hometown.  Then, lost and bereft of any father figures in his life, he listens to his girlfriend’s father for advice and instead of trying to get back at the drug cartels and innumerable criminals, he tries to protect the innocent, and in the middle of protecting people his girlfriend’s father ends up dying.  Lastly, he looks to his birth father’s botanist colleague for approval and the colleague tries to kill the boy and the rest of the city when he gets high on his new drug, herocaine.  I set it around Halloween in Mexico and call it “Dia de Los Muertos de Los Padres.”

But, you’ve probably already seen it in its American incarnation as The Amazing Spider-man and I think all those deaths are the reasons that led to me noticing the music in this film.  It is also the first time I remember thinking, “Why is there so much music and why do I hate it?” (I felt that during Katy Perry: Part of Me as well because that title didn’t tell me that all I would see was the bad parts.)*

* Before you think less of me, I didn’t really see that movie. I will probably never see it.  If it was called Katy Perry: All of Me Covered in Whipped Cream, well, I’d be tempted a little bit.

By the time that Peter Parker becomes Spider-man there’s already been the death of two fathers.  In a two-hour movie, I’d call that routine.  To make us feel the betrayal that Peter feels as Dr. Curt Connors becomes The Lizard and to make us feel sad when Gwen Stacy’s dad dies, the movie has to rely on music.  The music keeps building and soaring and popping up at every single moment possible and it finally got to the point that I just longed for a touching moment of silence.  I even started rooting for prayers.** Unfortunately I didn’t get either wish.

** Think of me as an atheist and then you see how strange that sentence would be.

Whenever I think of movie music, I think of my favorite movie quote, “Bah, bum, bah bum.  Babum babum babum.”  I think it’s one of the most memorable movie quotes of all time and brings to mind immediately what is happening on the screen in Jaws. (I have reread this a few times as I edit it, and I can’t help but mouth a few bars of that piece of music.)  There’s also the best use of a single note as played by a four-year-old on a piano in Eyes Wide Shut.  Then there’s the music as a summation of character history in Once Upon a Time in the West.  All add to the story, but aren’t the only thing.  There’s “You’re going to need a bigger boat,” and crazy masked sex parties and the childhood images that go with the music of Harmonica.  The music is just an interesting part of those movies and my remembrances are how the music added to the story, not because it stuck out more than a severed human limb in Pixar’s Cars.

Music can also create a feeling of era.***  Though it sometimes feels like a shortcut, it can work if used correctly.  Hey, there’s A Flock of Seagulls and we’re in the 80s.  Hey, there’s Elvis Presley, we’re in the 50s.  (Maybe the 60s, but the 60s usually means a Beatles song.)  If you want a primer on this type of shortcut, just watch Forrest Gump.  I don’t mind it because the car and the car radio has been a part of my life and so many other people’s lives that those songs do evoke images and nostalgia in us easier than any line in a movie like, “You know what Donnie, I love the 80s” as a guy flicks out the hair in his mullet. In an independent movie the line would be, “You know what Brecklin Sarpord, I hate the 80s because of White Lion.  They caused my parents to divorce and I’ve been sarcastic toward hair metal ever since” as Jenny Kolt puts on a black shirt before Brecklin’s wide eyes at seeing his first bra on a girl.  In both cases, I would expect a chuckle from the intended audience.

*** As far as I know, this is not a score, but as I say later, I don’t know much about movie music.

I really wanted to love The Amazing Spider-man and instead I merely liked it.  Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone had amazing chemistry.****  I could have watched those two interact instead of most of the music-swelling action scenes.  (Really?  Cranes?  Can’t the writer just have Spider-man be closer to the Oscorp building?)

**** Feel free to boo me for that one.

I don’t like doing traditional reviews because the act of creating is a very personal act and just getting something creative finished is a major accomplishment.  I prefer reflecting on things that the movie inspires me to write about.  I wish I knew more about music scores so that I could just write about those some more as I’ve exhausted what I know in just two paragraphs.  I guess The Amazing Spider-man will just have to serve as my first major negative lesson on scores.  I learn from both good and bad and this will just have been one more movie lesson.

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Baseball All-Star Game Preview for Non-Fans

Filed under: Pop Culture — Leave a comment
July 10, 2012

By Jason McClain (@JTorreyMcClain)

The Midsummer Classic, baseball’s All-Star game, takes place on Tuesday and to help out you non-baseball fans, here are some cool things to keep in mind as you watch.  I’ve tried to frame the game in ways that I hope will make it easier for non-fans to understand.

Centerfielders Abound Just Like The Simpsons Episodes!

In the third season of The Simpsons (a season that I love for my favorite Halloween episode “Treehouse of Horror: II” because the frogurt is cursed) they had a baseball crossover episode called “Homer at the Bat” that starred the biggest baseball stars of the age, including Ozzie Smith, Mike Scioscia, Don Mattingly, Wade Boggs, Jose Canseco and Darryl Strawberry.  At the end of the episode, you hear a revised version of “Talkin’ Baseball” by Terry Cashman called “Talkin’ Softball.”  The new version replaced the signature “Willie, Mickey and the Duke,” with “Homer, Ozzie and the Straw.”  The original song commemorates the city of New York and the three great centerfielders that played there at the time, Willie Mays, Mickey Mantle and Duke Snider.  Today, a couple of new centerfielders, Mike Trout and Bryce Harper, have drawn comparisons to these celebrated players of the past.  Add to them the great defensive centerfielder for the Braves, Michael Bourn, and you have a new part to the song, “Michael, Harper and the Trout.”  As the linked articles say, we’ll be seeing these guys for a while, and you’ll be lucky to catch glimpses of them both in their first All-Star Game.

The Fellowship of the Championship Ring

In baseball when you win the World Series, each member of the team now gets a championship ring.  To win the World Series, a team must win four games.  To get to play four games at home, the league must win the All-Star Game.*  So, think of it this way – the players for each team in the All-Star Game are like the league’s Fellowship of the Ring.  Nine members of the fellowship, nine players start for a baseball team. They are there to protect the interest of their league in procuring rings in October.  Here’s your guide to what person in each league equals each member of the Fellowship.

Frodo Baggins – Mike Napoli, AL;  Buster Posey, NL

Frodo was the guy that was modest but really in charge, and that just screams the position of catcher to me.  I put catcher Mike Napoli here because he looks like he would have hairy feet and Buster Posey because he has a baby face like Elijah Wood.

Samwise Gamgee – Derek Jeter, AL;  Yadier Molina, NL

Samwise had to be the most loyal person in the history of literature.  So, for his position, here are two players that have been with the same team for their entire career.  Derek Jeter with the Yankees and Yadier Molina with the Cardinals.  The fact that Molina also looks like he has hairy feet is just a bonus.  Since Molina won’t be at the game due to being on the bereavement list, I think Carlos Ruiz makes a great substitute as he has always been a Phillie and also looks to have hairy feet.

Merry Brandybuck and Pippin Took – Elvis Andrus and Asdrubal Cabrera AL;  Rafael Furcal and Jose Altuve, NL

If hobbits were ever to play baseball, they’d have to be middle infielders, generally the smallest players on the diamond.  Jose Altuve, the 5’5” second baseman for the Astros, makes this list as the slightest of all the players.  Elvis Andrus joins him because not only is he a middle infielder, he has hobbit power with only 1 home run.  Add to them shortstops Asdrubal Cabrera and Rafael Furcal and you got some serious small and quick guys (small being relative as Elvis and Asdrubal both stand 6’0”.)

Gandalf the Grey – Joe Nathan AL;  Chipper Jones, NL

When I think grey, I think older, as in, “I keep getting older and keep getting more grey hairs.”  So, for Gandalf, look no further than the two oldest players on each team that I didn’t select for another character.  Joe Nathan is just a little bit younger than Derek Jeter and Chipper Jones is the oldest player on both teams at the ripe old age of 40.

Aragorn – Robinson Cano, AL;  Matt Kemp, NL

I think of Aragorn and I think of a strong leader.  So, for Aragorn I choose the Home Run Derby Captains, Robinson Cano and Matt Kemp.  If we were just judging it on dreamy guys, because I think all fan girls swoon at the sight of Viggo Mortensen, then I think Matt would still easily make this cut. (He dated Rihanna.  Don’t worry, you probably don’t know her because you didn’t see Battleship.  Trust me – she’s very pretty.)  We’ll give Robinson Cano the benefit of the dreamy doubt as well.

Legolas – Curtis Granderson AL;  Andrew McCutchen, NL

I think Legolas, I think lithe.  Yes, both Andrew McCutchen and Curtis Granderson can hit a lot of home runs, but watching them cover ground in centerfield harkens back to Legolas running through the woods without getting winded.

Gimli – Prince Fielder, AL;  R.A. Dickey, NL

Prince Fielder is an easy choice as he is easily the most bearded guy on the field, and if there is one thing that dwarves can do, it’s grow a beard.  R.A. Dickey might not be as bearded as Prince, and since he climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro, he may be closer to Frodo or Sam climbing Mt. Doom, but I wanted to be sure to include him on a list because he is cool.  He climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro.  If you want an NL player with the same physique as Prince and Gimli, the Kung Fu Panda (yes, that is his nickname) Pablo Sandoval is pretty close.  If I had to name a fourth dwarf, David Ortiz of the AL would easily make the list.

Boromir – Josh Hamilton, AL;  Joey Votto, NL

I think Boromir, I think of a big, strapping, huge guy ready to take on all comers.  As far as hitters go, you can’t get much bigger and stronger than Josh Hamilton and Joey Votto.  (If you think of Boromir as a traitor, put a little more Sean Bean as Ned Stark in your viewpoint.)  Right now, Joey and Josh are 1st and 3rd in wOBA, a stat created by Tom Tango to measure the whole picture of a player’s offensive contribution.  What does that mean?  They are the first and third best hitters in the game right now.

Now, you can watch the game, look at all these players and see if you agree with me.  If nothing else, it will keep your mind occupied in between the action on the field.  To make it simpler, just look at the big screen on each player and ask yourself: hobbit, dwarf, elf or man?

*Is it a good rule to have the home team of the World Series determined in this way?  Probably not, but I have much bigger complaints in the world and all the griping I hear now should have been as loud for alternating years back in the 80s.  Weee!  It’s an even numbered year and that means NL home field advantage!  Weee!  Do I sound bitter for being a fan of the Cardinals who made the World Series in the odd numbered years of 1985 and 1987 when I actually paid attention?  Yeeessss!

Pitchers pitching as fast as a Tron Identity Disc

Yes, Tron and Flynn can throw their identity discs with the speed of a starship, but wait until you see what these pitchers can do with a baseball.  Because the radar gun in Kansas City is “hot,” the readings will regularly look to be near triple digits, but even if you know that ahead of time and adjust down two miles an hour, you’ll still have plenty of chances to see guys that can throw a baseball at speeds approaching 100 miles an hour.  Here’s a list of pitchers and their average fastball velocity, but to simplify it to those on the All-Star roster, here are the All-Stars with their average fastball speed:

Stephen Strasburg – NL – 95.9 mph
David Price – AL – 95.5 mph
Justin Verlander – AL – 94.0 mph
Gio Gonzalez – NL – 93.3 mph
Clayton Kershaw – NL – 93.2 mph
Yu Darvish – AL – 93.0 mph

That’s just the starting pitchers.  These relievers can also throw very, very fast:

Craig Kimbrel – NL – 96.8 mph
Joel Hanrahan – NL – 95.9 mph
Fernando Rodney – AL – 95.6 mph
Jim Johnson – AL – 94.3 mph

If you look beyond the speed and just want to see pitches that move in crazy directions, check out R.A. Dickey and his “angry” knuckleball.  Yeah, that’s off the point, but I wanted a chance to mention R.A. Dickey again.

Hope that helps non-baseball fans to enjoy the game.  Happy viewing!

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Fatale–Jumping into the world of Brubaker and Phillips for the first time

Filed under: Comics & Books — Leave a comment
June 23, 2012

Review by C.J. Bunce

Jason McClain is a big fan of Ed Brubaker’s writing.  He’s mentioned his appreciation for Brubaker’s Sleeper books here at borg.com more than once.  So when I saw the enticing noir cover art on the first issues of the new series Fatale, I figured this was a good place to start.  I picked up Issues 1 and 3-5 and it took me awhile to track down #2 so I only this week could read the first story arc straight through.  The new story arc starts with the next issue, coming out soon.

Based on the noir covers I was looking forward to what I have found in my favorite film noir–Otto Preminger’s Laura, Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt, Rear Window, Dial “M” for Murder and Vertigo, Jimmy Stewart in Call Northside 777, also Sorry, Wrong Number, Elizabeth C. Bunce’s fantasy noir Liar’s Moon, and in a strange way, even the voiceover version of Blade Runner.  For the most part these are all crime noir stories.  A dangerous damsel–the Femme Fatale as in Double Indemnity–plus a Dana Andrews-looking character in a gray fedora who is usually a cop or newspaper reporter, and a dangerous city full of secrets and dark, wet streets–all of this is the stuff of noir.  But I was thinking about this all wrong.  I had no idea Ed Brubaker and artist partner Sean Phillips were creating a supernatural 1950s pulp horror/thriller, not a noir pulp crime novel.  None of my favorite film noir has anything supernatural so from only a few pages in I was thrown a bit.  Fatale is noir, but it is just as much supernatural horror.  So I read the story once and was confused a bit.  Then I figured out what genre I was reading and read it again.

If you like supernatural horror and you like the 1950s underworld as your setting, Fatale is a very interesting read–almost like revisiting a lost story type.  The supernatural bits remind me of the TV series Medium, which often contained surprisingly dark and gory crime moments juxtaposed with the lives of good, caring people.  Same goes here.  Like the movie Skeleton Key, where a man and woman use voodoo to switch bodies and live forever, and like Rosemary’s Baby and The Others, Fatale’s characters are sucked into shocking and frightening situations and as readers we aren’t supposed to know all that is going on until the end.

Fatale has the requisite fascination of an otherwise boring man with an attractive, inaccessible, mysterious woman.  Nicolas Lash meets Josephine at the funeral of his godfather, Hank Raines.  Raines once knew Josephine back in the 1950s.  She’s blackmailed by a detective in the 1950s world of the story, Walt Booker, and both Josephine and Walt have this unnatural power over each other.  Is Josephine a “pusher” in the X-Files sense or does she just bring out something in others innocently?  What are these occult priestly fellows in red showing up dead everywhere and this fanged beast who kills Raines’ wife?  I’d need a few more re-reads to really catch the complexity of what happened here.  Each issue from #2 on has a lead-in paragraph at the beginning to explain what happened in the prior issue.  I found myself puzzled by these summaries, as in “oh, is that what happened last issue?”  Since I read these through in one sitting, I’d think I shouldn’t be surprised by a summary of what I just read, yet I was.  Usually if stories suffer it’s through too much “telling” and not enough “showing.”  Here I think this story has the reverse problem, but only a bit, and could stand to explain a little more plainly what the heck is going on with the mass suicide, magic dagger, old novel script and some pile of papers that need translating.  At times I felt I was totally in sync with the story–there was a 1960s James Bond aura at different points along the way that created a cool vibe.  Then with the symbology and strange beast who was also a leader that looked like Hitler, I was out of sync again.

Without question, the best part of Fatale is Sean Phillips’ 1950s style art.  If I wasn’t following a scene from the dialogue then I could usually get there with the visual storytelling.  Fatale looks like the noir I’d expect to see, for most of the scenes.  Dave Stewart’s coloring creates a world familiar to fans of Edward Hopper’s paintings.  I think the storytelling has some jarring moments, however.  Things like expletives that seem out-of-place and -time bothered me here.  It could be because, even if people used expletives in the real 1950s, 1950s movies never did, and so the aura of 1950s drama seems more accessible to me than what might have been real-life lingo (although I refuse to believe folks in 1950s swear as much as, and with the exact same colorful metaphors as, we have today as this work reflects).  So I love the look of Fatale, but am not sure of how much I like the story and whether I would recommend it to others not familiar with this genre.  The “voiceover” parts were quite good (the “it was a dark night in the city when I first met her” kind of thing).  Are Brubaker and Phillips’ other works supernatural horror like this?  I’d be willing to try more of their works to find out.

Fatale did make me think a lot about characterization, mood, and what makes something a crime novel vs a horror novel vs a supernatural thriller.  In a different kind of way, it made me think about complexity of story much as I did reading and watching the Watchmen graphic novel and film adaptation.  Anything that makes you think like that is probably a good thing.

Fatale is available at Amazon.com for pre-order in a trade edition titled Death Chases Me.

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Borg.com celebrates one year of daily doses of sci-fi and fantasy

Filed under: Behind the Scenes, Blasts from the Past, Comics & Books, Fantasy, Movies, Pop Culture, Sci Fi, Superheroes, TV — Leave a comment
June 10, 2012

To get to borg.com’s first anniversary it actually took us 366 days because of the leap year.  And what a year it has been!

So what do we have to show for 366 daily posts–our attempt to keep you up to date on what is going on in science fiction, fantasy, and entertainment news?

Jason McClain and Elizabeth C. Bunce

We interviewed some great people, like DC Comics artists Freddie Williams and Mikel Janin, writers Sharon Shinn and Jai Nitz, and Star Trek insider Penny Juday.  In our “Sneak preview” series we reviewed the pilots for new TV series ABC’s New Girl and NBC’s Awake before they were broadcast on TV.  We gave you our take on several opening weekend screenings of a big year in movies from Cowboys & Aliens to Green Lantern, from the last Harry Potter film to Daniel Radcliffe’s first big adult role in The Woman in Black,  to the day of Marvel Comics movies that led up to the U.S. premiere of The Avengers.  We shared the first images released of The Hobbit and Total Recall.  We reviewed new books and classic sci-fi books in our “Retro reviews,” from Philip K. Dick, Ian Fleming, Michael Crichton, Rex Stout, Ernest Cline, and Richard Stark, and several non-fiction books about the “behind the scenes” of movies.  We covered Comic-Con International, Wondercon, Planet Comicon, Free Comic Book Day and the early release party for Avengers vs. X-Men.  We reviewed dozens of new comic book series, from Morning Glories to Terry Moore’s Rachel Rising and a whole slew of DC’s New 52 reboot, as well as Marvel Comics’ limited series events.  Along with that we’ve kept tabs on our (and hopefully your) favorite things like Doctor Who, Star Trek, Walking Dead, Peter Jackson, baseball, Community, Benedict Cumberbatch, the Syfy Channel, USA Network, James Bond, Batman and Green Arrow.  We’ve posted lots of original comic art to get an eye on the creative process of the artist, and we loved discussing genre costumes, including the latest news about incredible screen-used prop and costume auctions.  We’ve also taken a closer look at science fiction movies with our “Anatomy of science fiction” series, featuring iconic images, and the evolution of space suits in film.  And to give you ideas for movie watching from the archives, we provided our “favorites” and “best of” series, revealing our recommendations for overlooked TV series, Halloween flicks, favorite fantasy films, best adaptations, favorite characters, and best art of Alex Ross and Frank Cho.  We’ve profiled favorite genre stars like David Warner, John Carpenter and Mark Sheppard.  We’ve reviewed new compact discs from some of our favorite celebrities, Hugh Laurie and Zoey Deschanel, as well as new fantasy video games.  And finally, we’ve talked about borgs from every sci-fi franchise out there, and even how borg technology as cutting edge science affects humans in real life.

Art Schmidt and CJ Bunce

We think we like what you’d like, so we’ve tried to help you get the most out of entertainment by recommending to you the best sci-fi, fantasy and entertainment out there.

A personal thanks to professional writers Elizabeth C. Bunce (fantasy author, intrepid TV reviewer and fangirl), Jason McClain (Hollywood columnist and master of myriad musings) and Art Schmidt (diehard genre fan and fantasy realm connoisseur) for their great contributions and getting us more than 250,000 site visits and hundreds of positive feedback comments in only our first year.

Thanks for reading!  Year 2 begins tomorrow…

C.J. Bunce
Editor
borg.com

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“Saga” or Trusting the Past

Filed under: Comics & Books, Movies — Leave a comment
May 18, 2012

By Jason McClain (@JTorreyMcClain)

I’ve gotten in and out of reading comic books several times in my life.  I couldn’t tell you where the comic book store was when I lived in Columbia, MO.  I found one when I lived in Delaware.  There wasn’t one for miles when I lived in the mountains (but I found a baseball card shop).  I knew of and visited at least six comic book stores when I lived in Kansas City and I visit about the same number in Los Angeles.  I’ve visited them when I’ve made brief stops in London, England and Austin, Texas.  I had subscriptions to several Marvel titles when I was in junior high and didn’t have to worry about getting my parents to take me to the comic store.  One day a comic would arrive in my mailbox covered in the plain brown paper wrapping that I would later associate closely with either comics or porn.

A map of comic book stores across the U.S.

Still, every walk into a store is like a step into a colorful, inedible candy shop and I start to wonder, what I’m going to take home in my brown paper bag.  I like recommendations quite a bit when I look for new things (and that’s why on Free Comic Book Day as I went to a few of my favorite stores, I picked up All-Star Western and Justice League Dark) but since my time in Kansas City, my main focus for when I look on the shelves of whichever store I find myself in, is new material by past favorite authors.  That’s why on Free Comic Book Day I also picked up Saga by Brian K. Vaughan, who has entertained me in several stories like Pride of Baghdad, Runaways and Y: The Last Man.  Saga looks to be a great start to another captivating yarn as I ripped through both issues I bought as I curled up to relax on Sunday night.

However, I must ask myself, is using the past a logical way to pursue entertainment?  Are past performances indicative of future returns, unlike financial instruments?  How can you tell when to jump off the creative train of a favorite author?

This reminds me of a game a friend and I play every now again based on the Fellini movie, 8 1/2.  The film deals with the creative process and my friend and I used it as a jumping off point to analyze the careers of creative people by asking, “Does X have eight unarguable classics to their name?”

It’s tougher than you think.  To be able to create eight works of art is an accomplishment in and of itself, and to make eight super-duper terrific things, well, that’s a rarefied air.  Of course, everyone has a different opinion of what a “classic” is, but we generally know that Jaws and Raiders of the Lost Ark are both Steven Spielberg classics, where War of the Worlds and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull don’t come close to reaching the same height.  Even though I’m not a huge Spielberg fan, he gets to eight relatively easily as you could add E.T., Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan and Catch Me if You Can to Jaws and Raiders and you get seven, though there are a few flaws, but I quibble.  Finding an eighth movie among The Color Purple, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Munich and Jurassic Park should be easy.  George Lucas on the other hand, I think he’s lucky to get two.  I suppose I’m saying that at this point, going to see a Spielberg film may be a bit more of a question mark than it was in the 90s, but if you gave me a choice between Spielberg and Lucas right now, there’s no question I would choose to see a Spielberg film.

Looking at my favorite movies over the past few years, Midnight in Paris has reinvigorated my belief in Woody Allen and I’m more likely to see his next film.  The quality of Marvel’s movies Thor, Captain America and The Avengers makes me more likely to go see non-sequels put out by Marvel Studios.  (Iron Man 2 still leaves a poor taste in my mouth. That’s what I get for licking the screen).  True Grit cemented my love of the Coen brothers, which I had before the movie as I’ve seen every one of their films.

My point?  If you like the creative work of a person, you’ll probably like their other work.  Looking at my bookshelf filled with several novels from Kurt Vonnegut, quite a few selections from Alan Moore and most every film by Wes Anderson, I probably didn’t need to do much thinking about it.  Still, it’s nice to come to that conclusion and know that when I roll into a comic store, I can find some Brian Michael Bendis, some Matt Fraction, some J. Michael Straczynski, some Neil Gaiman, some Jason, some Craig Thompson, some Daniel Clowes, some Kurt Busiek or many others and be happy when I get home, turn on the lamp and snuggle beneath my covers.  Plus, there’s always a chance I can stumble onto many more authors in the future through sheer luck, the recommendations of friends or the recommendations of the people I meet while wandering the aisles at my local comic book stores.

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“Green River Killer: A True Detective Story” and Author’s Perspective

Filed under: Comics & Books — Leave a comment
May 3, 2012

By Jason McClain (@JTorreyMcClain)

I first read Jeff Jensen when a friend introduced me to his long explorations on each episode of Lost.  Almost two years after we both said goodbye to the passengers of Oceanic Flight 815, I read his Dark Horse graphic novel, Green River Killer: A True Detective Story.   I enjoy, wait, strike that pronoun and verb, let me start again.  The study and pursuit of serial killers by law enforcement agents interests me.  So, before I delve into what this book made me think about, let me just say that it’s a fascinating look at a detective who pursues the Green River Killer, Tom Jensen, the father of Jeff.

Whom does the author decide to follow?  For Jeff, I’m sure it was an easy decision to paint the portrait of his father and his family through the years and to intersperse it with the interrogation of Gary Leon Ridgway and a couple of scenes from Ridgway’s point of view.

For this genre, it’s a unique take.  For the take of the investigator, you have the books of John Douglas.  For the view from the killer, you have a number of books and movies like American Psycho and Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer.  This one, though technically the story of Tom Jensen, gives the obvious feeling that it is told through the eyes of a son.  Maybe I read too much into it, but the art of the novel feels like the scenes with Tom Jensen are from a perspective of someone shorter, listening to stories about how his father met his mother and looking up at him and his achievements.

It made me think of other graphic novels, books and movies and how that simple change of an author’s perspective can make a completely different story.  Think of Blade Runner from the perspective of Rachael, as a guy comes in and gives you the replicant tests.  Once that happens, if we follow her character, this revelation could change every relationship she has.  Does she wonder how people look at her?  Does she try to find answers at her job?  How would the movie change if told entirely from the viewpoint of Pris and how she just wanted to live, but a ruthless killer kept pursuing her?  What if it was from the angle of J.F. Sebastian who just wanted to find companionship?

I could go on as you can probably already see the different angels of your favorite movies, but humor me for a couple more.  What if The Lord of the Rings came from the view of the elves?  What if Eight Men Out told the story of the victorious Cincinnati Reds and how they won the World Series but the losers and their scandal overshadowed their victory?  What if instead of Harry Potter, the books focused on the bright, muggle-born Hermione Granger?

The whole idea of Wicked is The Wizard of Oz from a different view.  Elizabeth Bunce retold the story of Rumpelstiltskin in A Curse Dark As Gold completely from the view of the miller’s daughter and made her the heroine.

How does a writer choose a perspective?  What character can interest both the writer as they write and the reader as they read?

When I went to Comic-Con and sat in on a panel with Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams, they said what made Batman so interesting is that people could relate to him.  He’s human like us all and he has suffered terrible losses.  Everyone can understand those feelings and motivations.  They said it made it easy to write and create for that character.  They could interject themselves into the story.

On the other hand, Hannibal Lecter inspires book after book and movie after movie and I don’t think there are many genius cannibals in the world.  Then again, do writers need to be genius cannibals to step into those shoes, or just need to find the mundane and the ordinary contemptible?  I find it interesting that Lecter becomes a kind of hero in the stories movies even though he is a sadistic killer.  In real life serial killers aren’t heroes; they are Gary Leon Ridgway.  The eponymous Dexter makes a bit more sense as a hero because he only kills other killers.  If you accept that, then it’s not that far of a stretch to get back to Batman who doesn’t kill, he merely beats and cripples the bad guys.

At their heart, these example characters seek justice.  Rick Deckard seeks justice for the people the replicants killed to escape.  The criminal justice system places the Black Sox on trial to make them atone for accepting money to throw games.  Batman seeks to keep the streets safe from crime so that no one will have to face the pain he did.

A search for justice beats at the heart of many a crime story.  The search for love lies at the heart of love story.  If you want to tell a horror story, it’s about trying to find safety, and if you want to tell the story from the opposite side, it might be the search for retribution or something much darker.  If you make the darkness ridiculous enough, you’ve got yourself a dark comedy.

We all have a story to tell.  We all have a unique point of view.  Every author has to decide what their story will be and what character can best tell it.  I’ve heard it said that every story has already been written, and while that may be true, not every story has been told from every point of view.

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Irredeemable: On rooting for the favorites

Filed under: Comics & Books, Pop Culture, Superheroes — 1 Comment
April 22, 2012

By Jason McClain (@JTorreyMcClain)

This is not an eye-catching lede or a crazy supposition, this is a fact: the only way that Batman could beat Superman would be if Superman didn’t try.  If you read the first six pages of the first issue of writer/creator Mark Waid and artist Peter Krause’s comic Irredeemable (or the first six pages of the trade paperback, which tends to be what I collect these days) you would see that basic scenario laid out in graphic detail as the Plutonian faces the Hornet.  (You can see a free digital preview of these six pages now at comixology.com).

Of course, I’m biased.  I’m one of the rare Superman fans as opposed to Bats.  I like Green Lantern over Green Arrow.  (The obvious parallels break down when I try to shift to Marvel heroes.  Captain America?  A favorite, but not quite in the power realm of GL and Supes).  I obviously have a thing for the ultimate Boy Scouts.  I like the characters that have to hold back, that can’t give it their all, because if they did, someone would die.  (Don’t bother trying to make me think Kryptonite and the color yellow make a difference in stopping Big Blue and Lantern.  They only exist because no one knows what to do with characters this powerful.  Lex Luthor?  As Douglas Adams would say, “Mostly Harmless,” with Lex’s only good plan being the one he devised in Kingdom Come.  That’s not a coincidence that Mark Waid wrote it and that it’s my favorite Superman story).

Supes and Lantern vs. Batman = overkill?

That’s why the first trade paperback of Irredeemable is so refreshing.  What would happen if one of the ultimate heroes lost his ever-loving mind?  (We saw glimpses of it when Hal Jordan became Parallax and I probably need to go back to read that to see if it needs to be added to my list of great stories).  When all a hero has is his (or her) sense of right and wrong to guide them, when all they have are the rules of society and the rules they make for themselves (right, Doctor?¹) to keep from doing harm, it’s a tenuous link.  When a hero is the nearest thing to a living God, the only thing that can stop the hero is another God, a hell of a lot of luck, or themselves.

Batman? Who is Batman?

I think the same is true of the great sports heroes and why I love to root for them.  It’s amazing to watch a truly skilled athlete do what he does best.  To watch Alex Rodriguez or Albert Pujols hit in their prime is a kind of living masterpiece.  To watch Tiger Woods make a golf course seem obsolete is a thrill of human achievement.  Well, it’s true while they are young.  Unfortunately, like all humans, sports heroes have to grow old.  It eventually ends.  It always ends.

Those tears are tears of joy, aren't they Supes? Batman is dead... long live Superman!

But, again, I’m in the minority.  How do I know this for certain?  Well, I have the great guys at Radiolab to thank for that information.  We, as humans, root, root, root for the underdog 80% of the time and if they don’t win it’s a shame.  We generally like to see the 15 seeds beat 2 seeds.  We generally like to see upsets in the Super Bowl or college bowl games.  We generally like to see the Yankees or the Red Sox and all their piles of money lose.  We like to think that Batman, the ultimate in human intellect and training could beat the Kryptonian Superman like in The Dark Knight Returns that C.J. Bunce and Art Schmidt mentioned in their favorites worthy of adaptation.²

Most people like the underdog.

So, when athletes age, when they pass 30 and the leap out of bed in the morning gradually changes into swinging your legs over the side and pausing, taking that moment, before rising.  The moment becomes longer.  The hands move to the edge of the mattress to give that little extra push.  The body bends forward so that the momentum of straightening helps to propel the body into space.  The body that used to rush headlong into the day now stands before it in repose, knowing it will be there when the time comes to make the forward push into the stream of activity.  Part of that pause comes from experience, from the idea that savoring those moments of calm and serenity helps to make the frantic moments acceptable, but part is that little voice in the back of the head that knows that one day the body won’t respond because as much as the mind won’t want to admit to growing old, it notices.  It always notices.

Carried off the field = good. Helped off the field = bad.

We grow old.  We watch our athletic heroes grow old and have to leave the game.  We watch our intellectual and artistic heroes do the same, but the curve isn’t as dramatic and those heroes continue to amaze us and give us hope that we can stay amazing ourselves.  Our fictional heroes remain the same though.  They are immortal.  But, of the immortals, only a couple of them are Gods.  If they ever break that trust that we have in them, that’s when they become “Irredeemable.”

1.  I think this is one of the reasons that I can’t get behind Rory Williams and his relationship with Amy Pond.  I root for the Doctor.  I root for him to be happy.  The relationship with Amy Pond seemed like it could have been the one.  But, that’s because I’m finite.  There can never be a true human “one” for a Gallifreyan.  Still, boo Rory.

To quote Nathan Petrelli to brother Peter in "Heroes"--"The world needs nurses, too."

2.  I always think C.J. and I get along so well because our interests intersect so much, but are so different.  He’s a Green Arrow guy and I’m a Green Lantern dude.  We obviously differ on Alan Moore.  We still have to discuss The Shawshank Redemption vs. The Green Mile.

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Five adaptations–balancing respect for the source material with the filmmaker’s vision

Filed under: Blasts from the Past, Comics & Books, Fantasy, Movies, Sci Fi, Superheroes — Leave a comment
April 15, 2012

By Jason McClain (@JTorreyMcClain)

When the idea first came around to write the top five adaptations of comic books, video games, books or characters that I’d like to see, I thought, “Great, what a great idea.”  Then, it slowly dawned on me.  I hate adaptations in most every case.  Seabiscuit?  Hated it.  The Lorax?  That looks so despicable, I refuse to give it my money.  Harry Potter?  I will never trust anyone that says, “No really, the next one is when they start getting good.”

The next thing I realized is that in some, possibly misguided, corner of my mind, there are still some things that I’d like to adapt.  Stories that captured my attention and that are on my list of things to write after I finish my current project.  I may never get to them, especially since a couple have been on my list for a while, but hope spring eternal, especially at this time of year.

So, how would I approach this?  First, I have to assume that I trust the filmmaker, like I trust Peter Jackson after the The Lord of the Rings trilogy.  I know that’s not a rational assumption.  For every Fellowship of the Rings that Jackson did, there’s a filmmaker who does Batman and Robin, Iron Man 2 or any Harry Potter movie.  For every V for Vendetta that takes Alan Moore material and makes it great, there’s a From Hell or Watchmen and I go back to hating adaptations.

To make a great adaptation, the filmmaker has to respect the source (don’t get me started on Michael Bay and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), understand the vibe of the source and still be willing to go off script and put their own voice into it.  I wonder if instead of a shot for shot remake, if Gus Van Sant had done something new with Psycho, it would have worked.  The cynic in me doubts it very much, but the optimist wonders mostly to himself that it could have been interesting if nothing else.  A shot for shot remake with Anne Heche instead of Janet Leigh?  Why not just watch the original?

So, what does that leave to adapt?  I think it leaves things that I don’t consider sacred and fortunately that still leaves plenty.  I’m not saying these aren’t favorites, but I think they could work nicely as adaptations.  Just to make it more interesting, not only will I choose the five things to adapt, but make them in five different genres.  First the honorable mentions: American Gods (tough to make, but in the hands of someone like Tarsem Singh who did the underrated The Fall there would be some cool, trippy otherworld sequences) and Geek Love (come on, aren’t we due for a great carnie movie?).  Now, let’s do the countdown.

5.  Red Dead Redemption – Genre: Western

I don’t know if there has been a good video game movie.  However, if they follow the story of Red Dead Redemption they’ve already got a pretty cool cinematic western.  John Marston plays the typical western hero of a former rogue looking for redemption and trying to save his wife and child.  It’s been done many different times, but if you have good actors, good scenery and good dialogue to go with this story, it could work.  I can’t tell you much more about this particular story;  I just know that I’m still surprised that a video game actually moved me.

   

4.  Captain Carrot and his Amazing Zoo Crew – Genre: Animated Feature

Originally, this spot was for The Invaders as I love a good WWII movie and there’s nothing better than fighting Nazis.  Then, as I wrote it, I mentioned some other favorite comic book characters: The Powerpuff Girls and Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew and how they would look cool fighting Nazis as well.  Then, I kept reading it over and over, and since Captain America: The First Avenger already went back to World War II, there’s not much space for The Invaders.  There won’t be more Bucky.  There won’t be the original Human Torch, Toro, Union Jack or Namor, the Sub-Mariner.  The Powerpuff Girls already have a TV show and a movie.  However, if you’re looking for a silly parody of super groups as an alternative to The Avengers or I have to assume an eventual Justice League movie, then look no further than Captain Carrot, Yankee Poodle, Fastback, Pig Iron, Alley-Kat-Abra and Rubberduck.  If they can fight the Nazis, that might be the perfect movie.

3.  Doomsday Book by Connie Willis – Genre: Medieval England Period Piece and Sci-Fi

C.J. Bunce introduced me to Connie Willis at his first San Diego Comic-Con when we went to a panel she did, and I read a few of her novels and found them charming, interesting and fun.  I think the appeal to adapting Doomsday Book comes from glimpsing a true epidemic in the form of the black plague in the eyes of someone from the future.  I didn’t like Contagion much, so maybe the book adaptation of Doomsday Book could effectively show the terror of an incurable disease spreading and the feeling of helplessness that follows.  For the protagonist Kivrin, trying to not reveal you’re from the future adds a great layer to that tension, having to remain disconnected while not being sure if she’ll ever leave this doomed time.

2.  Sleeper by Ed Brubaker – Genre: Noir

I’ve written about Sleeper in two previous Borg.com posts, so you know how much I like it.  I also think that it would make a fantastic film noir.  You have the femme fatale in Miss Misery, you have a guy that doesn’t know what’s good or bad anymore and you have crime galore.  If that’s not a great film noir, with bonus super powers, I don’t know what is.

1.  The Great American Novel by Philip Roth – Genre: Baseball Comedy

The Great American Novel might be one of my favorite baseball books of all time.  I took it in the third round of a baseball book draft.  (I knew it would last until then, so I grabbed The Boys of Summer and The Glory of Their Times with my first two picks).  The story of the Ruppert Mundys and the forgotten Patriot League as told by “Word” Smith (thanks, Wikipedia) would run circles around Moneyball the movie.  I think the fictional 14-year-old manager (I think that’s the age – goodness, I need to buy a copy of this book to read again and so I can look up such queries) would make a better representative of sabermetrics than the “fictional” Peter Brand.

Moneyball the book was my fifth round choice in the baseball draft – and just another perfect example of how I dislike movie adaptations of books that I enjoy.  As much as I would like to see this list made into movies now that I’ve written this post, my gut tells me it’s probably better if they’re not.

Come back tomorrow and C.J. Bunce searches out some choices he think would be difficult to adapt but fun to watch.

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Sleeper Season Two – What’s love got to do with it?

Filed under: Comics & Books — Leave a comment
April 7, 2012

By Jason McClain (@JTorreyMcClain)

This feels strange to say, but Sleeper: Season Two is one hell of a love story.  I thought that after first thinking about what to write about this graphic novel, and now after writing about my favorite fantasy movies, I think I’m just trapped in an endless love loop.  (No, this doesn’t have to do with continually listening to the Lionel Richie and Diana Ross song.)

So, how does a story about people that need to hurt themselves or hurt others in order to get by in their daily lives have anything to do with love?  Well, I think my contents of my question just answered my question.

Sometimes you have to put yourself out there and make yourself vulnerable.  The downside is that you could get rejected. So as the fear creeps inside you, you avoid even the specter of vulnerability.  You deprive yourself.

On the other hand, maybe you ridicule and laugh at everything that has even a touch of romance to make what you’re missing seem small, silly and unimportant.  PDA is gross.  Going to movies is stupid because you can’t talk anyway, so why does everyone do it?  “Sally and Linus, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G” had to be one of the first rhymes we learn to mock our fellow elementary schoolers.  Some people never grow out of that.

What makes this a love story?  There’s a guy.  He loves a girl, even though she isn’t good for him.  There are two girls, both of whom love a guy even though he isn’t good for them.  The guy tries to protect both of the girls.  They all try to figure out how to make it work.

Sleeper isn’t a comedy like the fantasy movies though.  If it isn’t a comedy, you can probably guess what it is.  If you can’t, I’ll give you a hint beyond what you’d see on two masks that hang in every drama student’s room.  Think Romeo and Juliet, with super powers and double crosses and adventure and great sidekicks and chess and origin stories told in third person and world domination.  (I know. All of that sounds so awesome.)

I guess, I’m saying that I really like the style of these Sleeper stories.  It surprised me the direction that they went and contained a great depth of plot.  As a person that doesn’t read things more than once too often, I’ve now read this three times in less than a year.  I guess that proves I’m just a romantic.  Though with “Sleeper: Season Two” as proof, at least I can pretend to have an edge.  Ladies dig a guy with an edge.

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