HeroDistrict

Comic book fans don’t seem to be the most adabtable group of people in the world. Whenever you hear about a comic book movie slightly altering something from the comics, a super hero getting a new costume, or Loki becoming a girl, you’re sure to find a plethora of message boards fueled by nerd rage. It can be quite amusing to see people get so upset that they threaten to burn your house down over some minor changes to fictional characters. That kind of behavior just seems absurd. The truth of the matter is that comic books have actually been grooming their readers to this kind of thought, simply through the fact that most changes that deviate from the original facets of a character are absolutely terrible.

In retrospect, giving Captain America a DD bust was a mistake.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that the stories themselves are terrible, just the results of them. Comic book companies have a habit of creating “what-If” types of storylines featuring alternate dimensions and stuff where different circumstances put well known heroes in odd situations. Marvel had several titles that actually went by the name of What-If, asking questions such as what if Spider-Man kept the power cosmic? All of these stories ended the same way, in disaster. What if Iron Man was a traitor? Then everybody dies. What if Thunderbolt Ross became the Hulk instead of Bruce Banner? Then everybody dies. What if the Invisible Girl married Namor? Then everybody lives happily ever after. No, not really, everybody dies. This kind of thing holds true for almost every alternate universe type of story told in mainstream comics, and usually with the emphasis that the main story line universe (Earth 616 in Marvel comics) is the only one where things are working out okay and the world isn’t about to end. At least not for real.

This holds true with DC titles as well. Their Elseworlds story lines kind of do the same thing as Marvel’s What-If. In one world, Batman is an actual vampire. In another, Superman is a communist. This works out about as well as can be expected. Even the recent DC story line Flashpoint, which was a terrific read, focused on minor changes leading to absolute disaster. We as comic readers have been conditioned to believe that any change to the main continuity of our stories will inevitably lead to disaster. This in itself is not a bad thing, as disasters can be exciting and fun to read about. What makes these disasters unpalatable for us is that they always seem to lead to the end of the story. What-If stories were pretty much always just one issue self contained tales. They didn’t leave room for sequels, so we just read the story, saw our favorite heroes die, and then it was over. These type of stories have made us cautious about any changes made to our favorite heroes, as we don’t want to see their stories come to an end. This kind of paranoia comes up when an artist decides to foolishly wreck the delicate balance of the universe by changing Spider-Man’s costume design, a change which will surely bring about the end of the Marvel universe as we know it.

In our defense, I’m pretty sure the Scarlet Spider/Clone Saga did almost kill the Marvel universe.

The Amazing Spider-Man release date draws closer and closer and the media will soon be ramping up previews and such now that Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance has officially been released. Starting the flood of Spider-Man news is the release of the first official clip from the movie! We get our first taste of this new web-slinger, and I was hoping to get a peek of the Lizard as well. Unfortunately this first clip is a lot more mundane than I was hoping for. Watch as Peter Parker, the spectacular Spider-Man, takes on his first foe: The Tenacious Doorman!

I would have liked to see some more punches thrown, webs slung, or spiders manned, but I am actually pretty pleased with that clip. Andrew Garfield has a certain awkwardness about him that fits his role of Peter Parker very well. The only thing that could have made this better is if this clip followed the tradition of the previous Spider-Man movies and cast Bruce Campbell as the doorman. I actually feel a little bit more excited for The Amazing Spider-Man than I was previously. Other looks have made Andrew Garfield’s portrayal of Peter Parker seem a little moodier, but this showed a good balance of social awkwardness and a little snark. I still want to see a fight scene though.

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance hits theaters tomorrow. Easily the least anticipated superhero movie of the year, I decided the only way to determine whether or not to see the movie was with a good old fashioned pro and cons list. 

Pro: Idris Elba and the Highlander Are In It

If you’ve seen Thor, The Wire, or Luther, you should know that Idris Elba is an undisputed badass. This guy’s steely gaze makes me feel inadequate as a man and as a human being. Every movie he stars in immediately becomes twice as watchable. Not to mention, Christopher Lambert is in it.  That’s right, the god damn Highlander.

Con: Nick Cage Needs Professional Help

Remember when everyone was so excited about Nick Cage coming back to play Ghost Rider? Me neither. You may or may not know that Nick Cage is an Academy Award winning actor, and has delivered some wonderful performances throughout a memorable career. He also starred in The Wicker Man. The internet has already done a great job of insulting the man, so I’ll just leave you with this. Beware the foul language and general insanity.

Pro: Mentally Unhinged Directors

Ghost Rider is a…less than realistic hero. He’s such an extreme character, anything other than excessive violence is just a waste of my time. Exploring the nature of humanity feels kind of ridiculous when your protagonist has a flaming skull and motorcycle. Luckily, directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor excel in this sort of batshittery. Look no further than Crank to see how far removed from reality these guys are. Sounds like a decent fit.

Con: Ghost Rider 1 Is the Worst Comic Book Movie Ever Made

In the long years between the original Spider-Man and Iron Man, Marvel produced some pretty terrible movies. Two of which were directed by Mark Steven Johnson. One is Daredevil, the other Ghost Rider. With the hellishly terrible Blackheart as the villain and a cliché script, the movie was just terrible. I like the idea of giving things second chances, but Ghost Rider was too terrible to be forgotten.

Result: Stay the Hell Away

Sure, I haven’t seen the movie. Technically, yes it is unfair for me to judge this movie purely on hearsay. But you know what? I will anyway. The trailers were forgettable at best, and everything from the low budget to Nick Cage’s presence screams train wreck.  Save that money so you can buy an extra ticket for the Avengers.

AMC has gotten a pretty nerdy following recently. The Walking Dead is a big part of this, and AMC has apparently realized that comic books and the people who read them are awesome. Also we are now a powerful demographic to be targeted by everyone! Our time has finally come! Moving on from that rush of power, let’s talk about AMC’s newest show: Comic Book Men. The basic premise is watching a bunch of nerds hang out in their comic book shop, talk comics and collectables, and show the cool stuff that people bring into the store. Also. it’s Kevin Smith’s comic book shop. Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash.

There are plenty of anti-Kevin Smith folks out there, but I am a fan of most of his work. While his refusal to pay attention to any sort of deadlines with his comic book work is infuriating, I still find Kevin Smith to be a very entertaining individual. That made me pretty optimistic about Comic Book Men, but I was surprised to find that I found the employees in his shop to be a better and bigger part of the show than him. Bryan, a former manager at a different branch of Smith’s comic book stores, isn’t technically an employee anymore, but he hangs around the shop and has quickly become my favorite part of the show. His sardonic wit, often at the expense of Ming, left me laughing several times throughout the premier episode. The back and forth between everybody on the show, and their willingness to tease their customers, make for a fun show that leaves me excited for the next episode.

One thing I’d like to see more of is the stuff that people bring to trade into the shop. The first items brought in were pretty cool, with issue #35 of Batman and an original sketch by Batman creator Bob Kane. Unfortunately the quality of the stuff brought in dropped off sharply after that. It is hard to be interested in a folded up Australian movie poster for Dawn of the Dead. Hopefully some more awesome stuff will be brought in during later shows. Overall, I was very pleased with Comic Book Men and highly recommend that you check it out if you missed the premier.

There are few superheroes as maligned as the Red Hulk. And he’s earned every ounce of that spite. Even his name is uninspiring and blatantly lazy. Introduced by Jeph Loeb alongside the Incredible Hulk movie, the character’s identity was left as a mystery for two years. During this time he was of the most obnoxious creations the medium has ever known and I maintain that the Defenders vs. Offenders story arc is the worst Marvel has put out in a decade. Now? Rulk’s series is one of my favorite series month in and month out. 

Mindless violence always wins me over in the end.

Rulk’s identity was eventually revealed to be the infamous General Thunderbolt Ross, a badass old military veteran who spent his twilight years hunting down a rampaging force of nature. That’s how awesome he is. The problem was that the Red Hulk was never written as Ross, and sounded nothing like the grizzled veteran we had known. It was an entirely different character. Then along comes Jeff Parker, who ignored the obnoxious Red Hulk attitude and brought back the cantankerous, hippie hating war hero. It didn’t matter whether his body was that of a gamma radiated monstrosity or an old war veteran; it was always the same character underneath.

The book now offers a fresh spin on what it means to be a Hulk. Providing a new perspective on one of the most engaging characters in comics, Parker puts Ross to the test by introducing some exciting new villains to the Marvel Universe. Yeah, the Red Hulk written by Jeph Loeb is completely despicable, but General Ross written by Jeff Parker kicks ass.

The superhero movie apocalypse is soon upon us. We already have exceptional footage from the Avengers and Batman, and this trailer for the Amazing Spider-Man gives us another good look at the movie. Enjoy.

It might just be me, but I wasn’t blown away. I didn’t see any “wow” action moments like I did with the Avengers, where Tony propelled head first into an alien onslaught and the Hulk swatted down enemy aircraft like flies. We didn’t get any original dialogue, and to be honest Andrew Garfield sounds kind of whiney so far. I’ll keep my fingers crossed on this one.

One thing that feels kind weird is the tone. Our benevolent editor recently wrote how he wasn’t a fan of the dark and gritty approach, and neither am I. The comics have always been at their best when they tell fun stories about Peter managing his personal life with superheroics. It’s basically a soap opera with tights and a lot of punching. There are some darker stories, but I’m hoping one day to see a happy-go lucky Peter who can somehow keep his chin up even when absolutely nothing in his life is working.

The problem is that this trailer has me asking some strange questions. Mainly, why won’t Peter work with the police? They seem like regular guys, and Spider has pissed them off to the point where they’ll actually shoot at him and try to kill him. Peter Parker isn’t Batman, working outside a corrupt police department to uphold a strict moral code and act as a symbol of fear. This trailer really plays up the idea of Spider-Man as a vigilante, which I suppose all superheroes are, right?

Some heroes can work well with the darker tone. Batman certainly does, same goes for Daredevil. Let’s hope Spider-Man can make it work too.

While I love The Walking Dead, I hate that they took this mid-season break. How was I supposed to get mentally scarred on Sundays without Rick and the gang taking on little girl zombies? Thank goodness that the wait is nearly over. The Walking Dead will be returning with new episodes tomorrow night on AMC! It has been far too long since we’ve been able to see a good old zombie apocalypse in action. Check out AMC’s trailer for tomorrow’s big event:

Yes, this looks awesome. What that trailer didn’t focus on is the great relationships building up between the various characters on the show. This is a mistake, considering that Valentine’s Day is coming up on the 14th. We should celebrate the love between Glenn and Maggie, Shane and being a dick, zombies and succulent human flesh. The good folks over at someecards.com didn’t forget that fact and have created some great Walking Dead themed Valentine’s Day cards. Here are two, you can check the rest out on someecards.

The Death of Superman was a pretty monumental event in comic book history. It happened in issue 75 of volume 2 of Action Comics, when Superman went toe to toe with Doomsday and only kind of won, what with the whole dying immediately after thing. The whole story is actually pretty ridiculous, especially when it gets to the aftermath of Superman’s death. I don’t feel like typing out that whole story, so instead here is a movie produced by Bryan Basham and starring Elijah Wood and Mandy Moore that explains the whole Death of Superman storyline in a very entertaining 17 minutes. Be warned, there’s lots of swearing and stuff in this movie, so maybe you don’t want to watch it in the same room as a boss/grandmother/small child.

I’d like to defend this storyline for a second. Watching this movie, it is clear to see the many faults and lack of logic used throughout. Still, it was a groundbreaking event at the time and it was the 90′s, so lots of this stuff seemed like a good idea at the time. Looking back, yeah, the whole Death of Superman thing was pretty dumb. We are older, wiser and less into grunge music now, able to look back on the silly things we used to enjoy and laugh at how naive we were. Hopefully you found this short film to be as entertaining as I did.

The Super Bowl is famous for having the best commercials of the year, and one of the most anticipated is the long awaited second Avengers commercial. Many details are still murky. We have yet to get a great look at Loki’s army, which limits the amount of action we can see, but holy hell was this trailer amazing. Here’s the extended trailer shown online.

Talk about epic. The Avengers has something very important other Marvel movies have been missing: scale. The action looks larger than life, and we can see the team desperately fighting against the impossible. This isn’t going to be a cheery ride. The world is on the line here. Iron Man and the Hulk had some unbelievable shots, and I think this movie will be the most visually exciting Marvel movie yet. We even get glimpses of the alien antagonists, which look pretty cool.

The Avengers is three months away. If you’ve been following this movie since Iron Man, it’s been a long road. We’re almost there. It’s been one hell of a ride so far.

By now you’ve probably heard that the Watchmen are getting the prequel treatment. As expected, Alan Moore is furious, and many fans are in a state of uproar. Of course, Warner Bros has the right to make “Before Watchmen”. They own the characters, even if Moore has zero involvement. Still, there are is a long list of reasons fans are giving out to denounce this project. Check out any forum for long lists of reasons why no one should touch Moore’s treasured graphic novel. While there a lot of good arguments for both sides of the debate, I object to this project for a pretty simple reason: I hate prequels. Prequels have a tendency to tell stories that never needed telling. Stories start at a certain place for a very good reason; that’s where the interesting stuff begins.  The Watchmen aren’t an ongoing franchise like Batman. The graphic novel is written as an isolated, complete narrative. Everything worth knowing about the characters is presented in the most effective manner possible. This is a similar trap that the Star Wars prequel trilogy fell into. Details like the origin of Boba Fett or how Chewbecca fought in the clone wars just aren’t that important, and we don’t need that explained to us. Just the same, we don’t need someone to explain the Comedian’s blood filled career to us. We already get the character.

He’s not a very nice guy.

Yeah, interesting things can be done with prequels. X-Men: First Class, while not a perfect movie, had a solid message and strong story that deserved to be told. Still, ore often than not prequels are simply fan service, appeasing to people desperate to participate in more of the universe. This comes at the expense of any story telling power the setting might once have held.  Prequels are rarely written because the author wants to convey a new message. DC’s statements almost confirm this. The purpose of the project is to keep these characters alive and maintain public interest in them. To keep it as a franchise. What will be the message behind these prequels? Is the goal to deconstruct the superhero genre again? The original series already set out to do that, and succeeding. Going back to the same territory feels redundant, while adding new material might be at odds with the world already created. I’m not saying these stories will be awful. Chances are at least one of these projects will strike a chord and be successful. And chances are some of them won’t. The problem is that nothing about “Before Watchmen” seems in any way organic. It exists because someone thought there should be more Watchmen, and that characters we already had closure with needed more to do. Turning the Watchmen, something created for the purpose of having a clear story arc and structure, into a franchise misses the point of why everyone fell in love with the group to begin with.