Friday 30 May 2014

Review: King Conan The Conqueror Part 4 of 6- Akivasha the Temptress


Writer: Timothy Truman
Artist: Tomas Giorello
Colourist: Jose Villarrubia
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Released: 28th May 2014

For long time fans of all things Conan related this story (an adaptation of Howard’s Hour of the Dragon) will be extremely familiar. This issue follows the part of the tale where Conan meets the vampire Akivasha, makes a run for it, witnesses the priests doing their ceremony with the heart of Ahriman, is startled by the intrusion of a third party and ends up joining the fight himself. So what is new? That’s the question here as the story is already well known, and I don’t want to go through it all over again. Firstly, the art is gorgeous. Akivasha is drawn extremely seductively, and there’s an air of menace to her, an alluring sense of danger like a siren calling a ship onto the rocks. Conan resists, but few men would, and the framing device of an older King Conan explaining how he resisted is something new.



‘That day I saw the hideous reality of immortality. The foul perversion of everlasting life. Perhaps it was the memory of Zenobia’s warm hand which put the lie to Akivasha’s cold, dead touch and kept me free of her spell.’

That is the main difference in this re-telling and others I’ve previously read, but the final panel is also particularly worth mentioning, using a cliff hanging device of Conan being in peril from what appears to be a Mummy creature that you would normally find in a Hammer horror movie. It’s a great way to end the issue, making up for what often comes across as a bit of a weak climax where the main villain Thutothmes is rather easily dispatched, and not even by Conan but by an interloper on the final, climactic scene where the power of the heart of Ahriman is revealed.

Get this book for the art, even if you’ve got dozens of other comic book variations on the Hour of the Dragon tale. Akivasha has never looked so seductively evil, and it’s a lot of fun to see Conan escaping her alluring caresses, even if you know exactly what is going to happen next. Rating 9/10

Review: C.O.W.L #1- Fear and Control


Writer: Kyle Higgins and Alec Siegel
Artist: Rod Reis
Publisher: Image Comics
Released: 28th May 2014

I went into this book blind, knowing nothing about it, and hoping for the best. What I got was some nicely stylised artwork, jetpack related action, characters I couldn’t care less about and a world building introduction to a universe that, at first, I struggled to care about. The book is set in a fantasy 1962, in Chicago US and involves an Avengers type of superhero group who are fighting against evil Russians, or something. I couldn’t understand what the point of it was. I was reading about a group of secret agents and their extra marital affairs, their career intrigues and personality issues and couldn’t care less about any of them. The book ends with the secret agent group looking for a new threat to justify their existence. That makes sense to me, as in the real world the corrupt elite’s always need a new perceived threat to justify their existence. At the moment, in the real world, the corrupt western elite’s are looking for a new public bogeyman now that Islamic terrorism and Al CIA Durrr has been exposed as a tool of their intelligence agencies. Looking to the past they’ve decide to use the Russians again, as should be pretty obvious to anybody who watches the dinosaur mainstream media, who’s job is to keep the television watching masses in a permanent state of fear and anxiety. If C.O.W.L #2 expands on the idea that the enslaved and brainwashed public always need to have a bad guy to fear then this could be worth following. I have a problem with the lack of likeable protagonists, but I’ll overlook that for the time being. I’ll give this book a chance, pick up issue #2 and decide whether or not it’s worth some long-term investment of my time and money. Rating 7.5/10

Review: The Star Wars #8- Flush the Turd


Writer: J.W. Rinzler
Artist: Mike Mayhew
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Released: 28th May 2014

What a load of junk that was. I feel like the biggest sucker imaginable after paying for this load of rubbish. Eight issues and I bought all eight of them. What the hell was wrong with me? Perhaps my Star Wars fandom needs to be sorted out, because if I continue to waste my money on anything Star Wars related, even when it’s horrible, then I have nobody to blame but myself. What I should have done here was get the first two issues, realise that the awfulness was not going to get any better, and stop buying this stupid comic and wasted my time and money on it. But no, I stubbornly bought every bloody issue, and now I have eight dripping turds of an awful comic that I’ll never read again and feel a whole lot embarrassed about buying in the first place. This final issue features a drama free space battle, boring villains, a childish and unconvincing love story and a brief mention that the Death Star has blown up. Cue celebrations from underdeveloped characters that are impossible to care about, and that’s it. Don’t buy this book, and look out for the trade paperback when it’s released. Make sure you avoid it, and don’t be conned like I was. This comic book is Star Wars on a paper napkin. It’s bloody awful, knows it’s awful, and doesn’t care because suckers like this reviewer have been buying it just because it’s ‘Star Wars.’ Lesson learnt. Rating 1/10

Thursday 29 May 2014

Review: Trees #1- Toxic Alien Trees = Normalcy Bias


Writer: Warren Ellis
Artist: Jason Howard
Publisher: Image Comics
Released: 28th May 2014

You are born into weirdness, but the weirdness is all you have ever known, so it ceases to become weird at all. Support the troops and slave away for the corporate elite’s. Eat your poisons and vote for your oppressors. Never question who is in charge and pay your tributes or end up in cage. It’s normal to put a rope around your neck, cuffs around your collars and support the status quo control system of oppression. You live to work, and when you are too old to work you no longer have any purpose in life. Overwhelmed by shame you age rapidly, deteriorate into a shell of what you once were in your working prime. You have no wisdom, just regret that you are past your working prime and beginning to break down. The young do not value your opinion, and you have nothing to say to them anyway. They look at you in horror, a reminder of what they will soon become. Used up, discarded, as experience is useless, and wisdom non-existence in this corporate land of the forever young, forever enslaved. Generations repeat, repeat, repeat and the slavery of humanity continue forever. This is normalcy bias, where the insane becomes normal. Everything around you is insane, and sometimes it takes a comic book about toxic alien trees to remind you of that fact.

ALL THIS IS NORMAL

 This statement concludes the first issue of ‘Trees’ by Warren Ellis and Jason Howard. The book boasts quality art, quality art and quality writing. It begins with some scene setting detail, some history about the madness that is now viewed as normalcy. It could be talking about private banks with roots in everything that modern society is built upon, toxic roots that are poisoning us all. That is our world, this one is using the clever allegory of trees. You see what Warren Ellis is doing here? Trees are perfect.



‘And now we all act like this is normal.’  

Is private banking, loaning imaginary money to our governments, at interest, normal? No, it’s about as normal as a toxic tree suddenly sprouting in the middle of our cities, but that’s what the banking industry is, isn’t it? A giant toxic tree with roots in our cities.

There are three main characters in the book. An ambitious politician who sees his job as defining normalcy through control of the biggest gang of thugs in the city, that gang of thugs of course being the Police. The second character is a scientist, a story-telling vehicle who will no doubt be used to explain what is going with the trees. The third character is more interesting, an artist who is going into the heart of darkness, and the toxic centre that is the city. Is he going to work for a bank? Perhaps he is writer Warren Ellis himself going to work for Marvel comics?

What do you reckon?

Issue #1 concludes with a single page reminder that normalcy bias makes the insane appear normal. That’s how it works, and if that’s what this book is going to explore then it’s something I’m very interested in following. Warren Ellis might have had his wings clipped on Moon Knight, where issue #3 saw him falling back into the tired and dated tropes and clichés that makes up 90% of the Marvel corporations output, but he appears to be doing something more relevant in this book. It’s a promising start, check it out, and don’t hold up any hopes that Moon Knight #4 will be any good. That book is just paying the pills in the Ellis household; this book is actually trying to say something. Rating 9/10


Notes: I use the term ‘Normalcy bias,’ to describe a phenomenon of putting your head in the sand whilst the world turns to s**t around you, or seeing the insanity as just being a normal part of life, when this is certainly not the case. Think about the people living in Nazi Germany with a concentration camp down the road from them for a recent historical example.  ‘Normalcy bias causes people to act as if life is going on as normal while the world is falling apart around them.’ Check out this blog link for more info- http://geroldblog.com/2013/04/26/beware-your-dangerous-normalcy-bias/




Kilts and Comics: Rorshach in Edinburgh

Wednesday 28 May 2014

My Scottish Stash (Of Independent comics)

If you read my previous post you’ll be aware that I recently took a bit of a break from my usual routine and ran a half marathon in Edinburgh Scotland. Whilst in that rainy, tourist packed city I managed to find a hidden away comic book shop-
http://www.yelp.co.uk/biz/deadhead-comics-edinburgh
I took a lucky dip and selected five locally produced comic books. Here’s what I picked up, a quick description of the book and whether or not I thought it was any good, or not.



Title: The Steamin’ Headmaster
Publisher: UK Comics Creative Limited
Website: http://www.comicsy.co.uk/rapidcomics/store/products/the-steamin-head-master/

A book about a drunk Glaswegian headmaster who gets kicked out of his house by his rightfully angry wife and ends up living a drunken bachelors life, of sorts, at the school. Whilst messing around in various parts of the school in his underpants and swinging a bottle of booze around his head he comes across his equally strange science teacher buddy and together they hatch a plan to do some crazy sci-fi experiment involving a disgraced former colleague and a millipede. The book doesn’t quite work, perhaps unsure as to whether or not it’s a comedy, horror or serious look at the moral implications of genetic manipulation between man and animal. The first half is fun, but the conclusion is a bit of a let-down, packing too much into a short number of pages and ending with a silly panel of a giant millipede that left me feeling a bit confused. My lasting impression of the book is of a good idea that got a bit lost in translation. It started off fun, got a bit weird and ended up a bit of a mess. Rating 5/10




Title: Saltire
Publisher: Diamondsteel Comics Ltd
Website: http://www.diamondsteelcomics.com/

I was looking forward to this one, having heard about it on various comic book websites. However, after reading the book I was a bit disappointed with it. The story follows Roman era Scots battling the invading Roman legions, and there’s not much to it at all. Saltire is a superhero/God and he helps the locals fight against the Romans, and that’s about it really. I found it to be a bit childish, shallow and not very rewarding. The art was not bad, but there was a tone of seriousness to it that was a bit po-faced and severely lacking in fun. That’s okay sometimes, but there wasn’t enough meat in the story to justify the serious tone, and by the end of it all I was getting a bit bored with the silly, largely undeveloped characters. I was a bit upset by this book. I thought it would be great, but it wasn’t even good. Rating: 5/10




Title: Maximum Alan
Publisher: Black Hearted Press
Website: http://blackheartedpress.tictail.com/product/maximum-alan-1

This one looked like a lot of fun. The front cover is designed to look like a Watchmen comic, and it appears to be offering a cutting piss take of all things Alan Moore related. What I actually got was an amateurishly drawn joke stretched way to thin, loads of inside jokes about comics that even I didn’t understand and a silly plot that got a bit tiresome half way through the book. This book was certainly bizarre (as is claimed by David Lloyd on the front cover) but it wasn’t that funny, and not half as good as I wanted it to be. Rating: 4/10




Title: The Freedom Collective
Publisher: Rough Cut Comics
Website: http://www.roughcut-comics.com/pages/frames.htmlhttp://www.roughcut-comics.com/pages/frames.html

This one is a lot of fun, taking the piss out all of those old American comics of the 1960’s anti communist era that portrayed everything Soviet as bad, and everything American as good. The book comes from a Kremlin perspective, so everything communist is good, and everything capitalist is bad. It’s a good idea, and there’s a lot of mileage to be had from reversing western propaganda and showing how it might work if the other side uses the same, simplistic and deceitful tactics to deceive their own populace. The book plays it for laughs and there are underlying assumptions to be wary of, but there are moments when it gets it right, in particular the panels that show a large mountain of money flowing underneath the White House, and the portrayal of the US president as a Mafia boss, which is closer to the truth than a lot of people would like to admit, even to themselves.  Reading this book makes me long for a modern equivalent that tackles contemporary US propaganda, perhaps looking at what is happening in the Ukraine right now where the US has sponsored a coup to overthrow a democratically elected government, and how the US corporate media is misleading the American public about what has happened, what is happening, and who is responsible. Where’s that book? We certainly need it right now in this era of corporate mainstream media deceit and connivance with the rich and powerful.  This book however is all about the comic code era propaganda in American comics, not what’s happening in 2014. It’s a lot of fun, drawn very well and I’d fully recommend it to anybody reading this review. Rating: 8/10




Title: Laptop Guy
Publisher: Black Hearted Press
Website: http://blackheartedpress.com/comics/laptop-guy/

This book is undoubtedly my favourite of the five books I picked up during my time in Edinburgh. The plot follows an eternally optimistic, yet obviously doomed, comic book writer as he takes time off from his McJob to come up with the big idea that is going to make him the next big thing in the world of comics. Things are looking pretty bleak (Sherlock Bones anyone?) but then a work colleague horribly mutilates himself as a result of his own doomed attempts at artistic creativity, and the amazing Laptop Guy is born. This book is absolutely hilarious. It’s the kind of book that leaves you properly laughing out loud, as opposed to typing LOL at your own half asset attempts at humour on facebook. The art, in particular the facials of the hapless comic book creator himself, is perfect and furthers a sense of the ridiculous that makes this book an absolute riot. Check out that cover. Check out that stupidly optimistic face, surrounded by his ridiculous creation. This book is awesome. It’s probably the funniest comic book I’ve read in a long, long time and it was well worth going all the way to Scotland and running a half marathon (in the rain) to get my hands on it.  Check out the website, and get a copy for yourself. You won’t regret it. Rating 10/10













Edinburgh Half Marathon 2014: Free Running through the Rain Soaked Streets of Kilt Town


It’s nice to get off the Internet for a couple of days and explore the world as it used to be, so that’s what I decided to do over the past couple of days. No mobile devices for me, just five days in the wilderness where I’ve been trying to avoid bumping into people with headphones on and brains off.

The location for my trip back into time was Edinburgh Scotland, and the reason for my being there was to run their half marathon. The rest of this article will be a race report, but before I dive into the details I’ll quickly sum up my experience of the city of Edinburgh.

It’s very hilly, so if you ever visit be sure to wear a decent pair of walking shoes, because after hiking around for an hour or two you’ll have achy breaky feet and be looking for the nearest pub to put them up for a bit. Don’t worry about finding a pub though, the place is full of them. Pubs and blokes in kilts actually. The two go together as the kilt wearing blokes are on stag does and looking to be all manly by getting drunk with a bunch of their similarly attired skirt wearing buddies.

Of course you are more likely to bump into the kilt-wearing drunks during the early evening. During the day you’ll find yourself being engulfed in waves of foreign tourists looking for tartan scarves and Loch Ness monster souvenirs, two things that I immediately acquired for myself of course.

I won’t bore you too much with the weather. It’s Scotland, so it rains, a lot. You get a bit of sun as well, but Scotland is very green, so very wet as well. Just bring a brolly and don’t moan about it.

Here’s the race report then:

You start off in what they worryingly call ‘pens’ depending upon the race time you have predicted for yourself. I thought I would do it in about 1:50. So I started off in the Green pen with a load of other runners. Just before the race it started to rain, a lot. Why does it always rain on me? Because you’re in Scotland mate, so I put on a bin-bag and got wet with everybody else.

The official race beginning was about ten minutes delayed from where I was standing, so after a bit of a wet wait I slowly shuffled past the start line with everybody else in the Green pen, started my stopwatch and set down to running down a wet street and trying to get into some kind of rhythm. This was actually a lot of fun, as there was a kind of released from jail/tribal feeling of euphoria as we began to run through the now closed off streets of Edinburgh, past the shops and pubs that we had been dodging traffic to get to earlier on in the day and week. I spent this part of the race running past people, and I kind of assumed that I’d quickly join a pack of runners where I would settle into some kind of rhythm for the race. That didn’t happen though, and for most of the race I would be dodging, weaving and accelerating past people. A few people overtook me as well, but it wasn’t many and I found that to be a bit surprising. You normally get into individual races with people in runs, but not in this one. I was part of the crowd of runners, but tribal feelings put to one side for the moment, I was really just running by myself for the entire race.

After the first mile I saw a sign and assumed that the rest of the course would be similarly sign posted, distance wise. I was wrong, it wasn’t. The next sign I saw was at ten miles. Before that though came a long and enjoyable run down the seafront where I took in the sights as best as I could before getting worried about my time and putting my head down to try and do some serious running.

The serious running portion of my race moved into a tough running portion at the ten-mile mark when I saw that sign and thought, ‘Oh, I better get moving then, only three and a bit miles to go.’ So that’s what I did. I went into 5k mode and started to accelerate past even more runners. In this last three miles or so of racing I wasn’t overtaken by anybody. I was tiring, but knowing the finish was coming I ignored the tiredness and sang happy black metal tunes in my head as I angrily thundered down the streets looking for that finish line.

That finish line took what seemed like a bloody age to come, and at the end I was getting pretty fed up of not seeing it. I shouted at a bloke standing on a corner watching the race, ‘How long to go?’ and he was kind enough to let me know, ‘About a mile.’

After hearing this I forced more acceleration into my legs and saw that the crowds lining the streets were increasing in number, indicating that the finish was getting close. Finally I saw the big FINISH barrier, checked my watch and saw that I might not make it to my under 1 hour 50 minute target, so for the last three hundred metres or so I went into a full sprint, passing other tired sprinters as I finally finished in a time of 1 hour 49 minutes and 51 seconds. YES, I made it, with nine seconds to spare, so punched the air in a private celebration as the indifferent crowds around me chuckled in mild amusement.

So that was that. My first half marathon, done and I managed to do it in the time I had been training for. I probably could have done it faster, but the crowds of runners bottlenecked at places forcing me to slow down, and there was a lack of mile markers to give me an idea of how well I was doing. I finished well and I loved the tribal feeling at the beginning of the race as we were running like newly freed prisoners from our pens. The last three miles was difficult, and it rained a lot, but that’s what I was expecting anyway.

Now I’m back in my plugged in and tuned out routine of daily Internet news and reviewing everything that passes by my orbit, and this is the first review since my return. Next I’ll get onto the comics and other stuff that I stupidly obsess over. I found some pretty decent independent comics in Edinburgh from a local publisher called Black Hearted Press, but I’ll talk about that later on my blog.  It was nice to unplug for a while. It’s probably something I need to do more often, and so I will. A few days a month I think. I’ll find stuff to do. It’s a big world and it doesn’t need to hear me moaning about it on a daily basis.


Thursday 22 May 2014

Review: Monster & Madman #3- Sad Endings



Writer: Steve Niles
Artist: Damien Worm
Publisher: IDW
Released: 21st May 2014

How can I not say something about this excellent book? The previous two issues have been fantastic, and this concluding book caps everything off perfectly.

The artwork in this one is all about the atmosphere created with colouring and shading. Shadows, bleak reds and brief flashes of light create a feeling of grim darkness that is perfect for anybody wanting to delve into the more gothic side of the comic book world. I love that kind of stuff, and when it’s done well it is something to behold. This book is done extremely well, and the story of Jack the Ripper creating a bride for Frankenstein’s monster, using his need for body parts as justification for indulging in his sadistic slayings, is the perfect justification for these two characters interacting with each other.



The ending itself offers finality, but there’s no comfort there. That’s what you want in this bleak, coal black horror yarn about a tormented creature meeting a deranged lunatic. There can be no happy ending here, and when you don’t get one you are perfectly willing to accept it. Sometimes in life things end badly. Sometimes that’s all there is. There are no heroes, just disappointment and pain, and all you can do is decide to end the suffering. That isn’t depressing, it’s a brutal fact of life and to see it here in this excellent book is a sign of superior writing by a man who knows that sometimes, oftentimes, life just sucks, and that the longer you live, the more it continues to suck.

Dark stuff, right? Well that’s life and you have to tell it like it is sometimes. That’s what I want in my comics, some harsh truths. We might not like them, and we might not always want to hear them, but if you live in a bubble where truth never enters what kind of life is that? You might as well be in prison, and who cares how comfortable it is. Prison is still prison, and only truth will set you free.



If you haven’t already got this book then get it now. Three issues, all excellent and with a satisfying conclusion. Great stuff. If you have ever been into the Horror genre then Monster & Madman is an essential purchase. Why can’t all comic books be as good as this one? Now that’s a question, and I’d suggest that the bubble of untruth that a lot of comic book fans have created for themselves might go a long way into explaining it. I’ll leave that thought dangling for the time being. All you need to know about this book is that it’s bloody good gothic stuff. If that’s your thing then get it now. You’ll love it.
Rating 9/10

Wednesday 21 May 2014

Review: Forever Evil #7- Event Closer



Writer: Geoff Johns
Artist: David Finch & Richard Friend
Publisher: DC Comics
Released: 21st May 2014

Comic book events always end up the same way. After months of crossover books where the heroes look like they have no chance whatsoever against the dastardly villains, a few twists and turns later and everything returns to normal, just like an episode of the Simpsons. The characters are back on the sofa, unchanged, and back to their usual selves like nothing of any consequence has happened over the past few months. That’s what always happens in comic book events, so complaining about it is a bit daft. It’s like complaining about a western government drone bombing a village in Afghanistan or starting a new war with the latest mainstream media vilified foreign villain (Hello Mr Putin). You voted, so you are at fault. You bought into the system, and that system is just doing what it always does. You can only complain about it if you didn’t buy into the system in the first place. Don’t vote and you can complain, vote and it’s your fault, so shut the Hell up about it. The same is true of comic book events. Buy them and you are supporting the system. You look a bit silly complaining about it, because just like voting it’s your bloody fault for supporting the process in the first place.

 I’m not going to complain about the end of the Forever Evil arc. I bought all the books, so any complaints would be ridiculous. I knew what would happen at the end, and it happened. What I can do though is discuss whether or not the ride to that inevitable conclusion was any good or not. Well, was it?

Yeah, it was okay. It started off on a bit of a crap note with one of the dead heroes being brought back to life in a typically con-artist comic book way, but after the annoying start the book is full of big-time battles and loads of cool stuff happens. The plot threads and happenings from the other books are smoothly drawn together into this conclusion, and it all fits pretty well without too much confusion. The villains are defeated in a convincing way as well. They were too selfish and power crazed, plotting against each other rather than maximising their strengths by effectively working together. This is a weakness that makes a lot of sense, as it shows the moral inferiority of the villains as opposed to the more selfless heroes.

What really made this final issue though was the smart decision to have the book’s main hero as a character you wouldn’t normally put into that role. It made the ending appear a little different, and was far more interesting than having one of the more predictable big name heroes being involved in crafting the game-winning touchdown. By the looks of the new Justice League #30 book it appears that character’s story will continue, so that should be a lot of fun and it gives us something to look forward to in the future. That something is happening because of the events of Forever Evil, so the satisfaction that comes from being a long-term reader is on offer here, and you can’t always say that about cross over events.

So the Forever Evil arc has finally come to an end. I largely enjoyed it, even though some of the crossover books I picked up were a complete waste of my time and money. That’s on me though. I really should know better by now. But overall the end issue (although overpriced) offers a lot of action, lots of full-stops, it sets up what’s happening in Justice League #30 and although the final few panels felt slightly deflating, I was expecting that, so prefer to look at the ride rather than the destination. The ride was fun. It largely made sense, and it was a lot better than that bloody awful Fear Itself event that largely killed off any interest I had in Marvel comics. I’ll still be reading DC, so this event was probably as good as an event can be. No complaints from me, it was fun, and I knew what I was getting into.  Rating 8/10

Captain America versus Mars Attacks

Monster & Madman #3: Plus the rest of this week's books.

Tuesday 20 May 2014

Comic Book Preview: (For books released on 21st May 2014)


Here’s my list of what I’m looking forward to reading this week, plus a couple of books that I’ll be avoiding, and a couple of new books to look out for.

Pick up:

1- Forever Evil #7 (DC): The main book that follows DC’s latest crossover big event. It’s coming to an end now and there’s been a lot of filler in the other crossover books, but this main book is usually pretty good, and it’s well worth picking up.

2- Sinestro #2 (DC): The first issue was great, let’s hope the second one is just as good.

3- Monster & Madman #3 (IDW): Amazing art, and awesome Gothic story about Jack the Ripper and Frankenstein’s monster. This is a must buy book.

4- Witcher #3 (Darkhorse): Extremely enjoyable slice of Goth. Well written funny and with likeable characters who you really care about.

5- Justice League #30 (DC): More fall-out from the Forever Evil arc, but this being another main book is worth checking out. Hopefully we’ll get more Metal Men action as well. I love those guys.

Avoid:

1- Trinity of Sin- Pandora # 11 (DC): Ray Fawkes struggles to do anything interesting now that the seemingly never ending Forever Evil Blight arc has come to an end. Dull, very dull.

2- A Voice in the Dark #7 (Image): Serial killer nonsense based on two movies, Heather’s and Pump Up The Volume. The serial killer is a girl this time, yawn.

3- MPH #1 (Image): Mark Millar embarrassingly gets down with the kids. This one sounds awful and could be exceedingly embarrassing for all of the middle aged Dad’s involved.

4- Harley Quinn #6 (DC): Making psychopathic behaviour appear cool for all of the lame-ass liberal girls out there. Avoid the sickness. Being like Harley is not a good thing.

5- 7th Sword #7 (Image): Painfully average book about a mercenary with tribal tats.


New Books that are worth checking out:

1- Last Broadcast #1 (Archaia): This one is about ancient treasures, magic cults and urban exploration. Sounds like fun.

2- Star Wars Darth Maul Son Of Dathomir #1 (Darkhorse): New adventure starring the criminally under-utilised character from that awful prequel movie.

Theatre Review: The Ballad of Martha Brown (Swindon Arts Centre 19th May 2014)


I didn’t plan to visit the theatre this Monday night, but after seeing the recent performance of ‘The Ballad of Martha Brown’ I’m certainly glad that I managed to find myself there, sitting with a small, almost conspiratorial group of lucky Swindonians. This show was great, so why did it seem like it was some kind of secret that was only to be shared with the initiated few? Well call me a whistleblower if you like, but I have to talk about it. I have to tell the world that this is a great show, and as it tours the country over the next few months, you need to go out of your way to hunt it down for yourself. Why? Because it’s good, bloody good, and a lot more fun than staying indoors in front of the lying box watching panicked politicians and political pundits cry, ‘Racist Racist Racist’ in an effort to stop the sleeping masses from voting for UKIP this coming Thursday.

A few details about the play: Martha Brown was a real life person, a woman who murdered her abusive husband by burying a hatchet in his head (seven times) in 1856. She was the last person to be publicly executed in Dorset, and this play tells the tale of her extremely interesting life story. It’s told by Martha Brown herself, with a Greek Chorus style foursome of singing, mocking ghouls assisting Martha by acting out the roles played by the different people in her life.

As you enter the theatre you are personally escorted to your seats by the ghouls who cheerfully ask, ‘Are you here for the hanging?’ before playfully engaging in atmosphere setting banter and playfulness that sets the scene for what is to follow. During the evening the ghouls blur the boundary between stage and auditorium by interacting with the audience. This is a lot of fun, keeping you off balance at all times and ensuring you feel engaged with the show that is unfolding. It’s a far more enjoyable experience than the passive assembly line feeling you often get at your local cineplex.

The story that unfolds during the evening is engrossing, entertaining and also very amusing. It’s wonderfully performed by a high-energy cast who bound from audience to stage with wonderfully infectious enthusiasm, and a playfully over the top Halloween style macabre sense of humour. The performance features musical numbers, props and other wonderfully inventive little touches that delight throughout the evening. They are tightly produced, well timed and add an element of top-notch professionalism to the performance.

I’d recommend the show as a good night out spent with a highly competent cast of professional entertainers. It’s far more fun than watching that stupid box flickering away in the corner of your living room, so what are you waiting for? This wonderful production by Angel Exit Theatre is dancing its merry little way around the country right now. If you are worried about the cost, then don’t. The tickets are priced in the same range as a stupid action flick at the dehumanising and impersonal local Cineplex, so don’t worry about that. You’ll have a lot more fun here than your local cinema and you’ll get to learn all about the history of public executions in the UK as well. Remember, when you enter the theatre you are not an audience member, you are part of a baying mob at a public execution of a woman who buried a hatchet in her husbands head. That’s got to be more fun than Eastenders or Transformers 6 hasn’t it? Check it out, you won’t regret it.
Clink on the link here for further info- http://www.angelexit.co.uk/marthabrown.html

Thursday 15 May 2014

Review: Stray Bullets #3- Profanity Laced Cleverness


Stray Bullets Killers: Number Three “The Five Fingers.”
Writer and Artist: David Lapham
Produced and Edited by: Maria Lapham
Publisher: Image Comics
Released: 14th May 2014

Stray Bullets is a black and white crime genre comic book that you’ll find certain fans gushing over, proclaiming it to be ‘gritty,’ ‘noir,’ ‘edgy’ and anything else that they can conjure up to encapsulate the image of an ‘adult’ comic that is nothing like those silly, childish superhero books. Absolute nonsense of course, because Stray Bullets comes from exactly the same kind of mindset as any other comic book on the market today. The only difference is that this book deliberately attempts to shock by using sex, violence and profanity. It has children playing childish games with their dolls, but instead of childish banter they talk in a language of sex and violence learnt from their absent father. The themes in this book are of Italian gangsters, absent parents, damaged children and horrible people doing horrible things to each other. Leaving aside the surface differences of black and white artwork and sexually explicit language, the main difference between this book and the last book I reviewed on this blog (Captain America #20) is that the Mother in Stray Bullets is just as self serving and willing to abandon her children as the Father. Captain America had a drunk Dad, but his Mother was a paradigm of moral respectability and expounded the rarely realised ethic of doing the right thing no matter what the cost to yourself personally. In Stray Bullets #3 both parents are rotten.
Captain America #20 is set in a contemporary setting with villains laughably trying to make the world attack America for their latest war outrages (and yes, it’s just as stupid as it sounds). Stray Bullets #3 deftly avoids dealing with any contemporary issues whatsoever by setting itself in a safe pre NSA surveillance era of 1986. The first panel uses the F bomb and the last panel sticks it in there as well, just in case you weren’t aware that this is an ‘adult’ comic and something you are supposed to take seriously. Well I didn’t take it seriously, but I have to admit that writer David Lapham knows how to do profanity laced cool dialogue in a Quentin Tarrantino anachronistic, sex and violence is cool kids, kind of way. There’s no wisdom in this book, but there’s a cleverness to the narrative structure and the dialogue has moments of humour throughout, as you might expect, with people swearing at each other in cool ways that only really happens in fiction.

This is a book for people who are easily impressed by fictional characters swearing at each other. That sounds like I hated it, but it’s actually very enjoyable to read. The story itself is interesting, entertaining and probably worth following. There’s a glimmer of moral integrity in the book as well, in one character that at least at the moment appears to be doing the right thing. You’ll like it. I did, even though it’s hiding in 1986, using cleverness to get away with not saying anything, depicting parents as selfish, horrible people and giving you the impression that violent gangsters are super confident, cool people. Hello Quentin. It was a good book, probably a bit too much in love with it’s own cool cleverness, but an enjoyable read nevertheless whether this reviewer liked it or not. Rating 8/10.


SERIAL KILLERS ARE EVERYWHERE! - The Baffling Case of Pete the Pot Head


After another hard evening of attempting to catch devious serial killer Pete the Pot Head (so-called because he leaves a potted plant on the head of his victims), hard-boiled detective Jack Jackson is drowning his sorrows in his favourite watering hole, ‘The Quiet Exposition.’ But before he can down his fifteenth shot of whiskey coloured water he is interrupted with the devastatingly predictable news that Pete the Pot Head had struck again. This time it is personal, for the victim is none other than Jack’s ex Girlfriend, or something. This had really upped the ante. Pete was already playing mind games with the suspiciously handsome detective, but he had potted the wrong person this time, and it was time for Jack Jackson to play dirty to get results.

Leaving just enough time for a flashback of some scene in a play park or something, Jack quickly downs his whiskey coloured water, leaving just enough time to stare mournfully in shadow before putting on his 1980’s flowing Mac coat, tossing some dimes at a fat bartender left over from old Bogart movies, and strolling nonchalantly out of the door, cigarette dangling cooly from his lips, even though smoking indoors has been illegal for well over a decade now.

Arriving at the murder scene in his beat down car, Jack stoops low under the yellow tape to see for himself the results of Pete the Pot Head's latest, dastardly crime. Oh, it’s raining, and it’s dark, and the crime scene is in an alley, or something like that.

“So what’s the score,” asks Jack, lighting another cigarette and sprinkling it over the crime scene as he does so.

“You might not want to see this Jack,” replies Inspector Moustachio, “It’s Sally, and she has a pot in every orifice of her body, it’s not a pretty sight, the sick bastard.”

After a close-up of the poor be-potted victim, Jack screams to the heavens, clenched fists raised to the sky, “That’s it Pete, you think you can play me for a fool? I’m going to get you Pete. I’m going to get you if it’s the last thing that I….”

But before Jack can finish his sentence a bored looking cop who normally spends his time giving people tickets for not wearing their seatbelts and for having expired tax disks stops him in his tracks with breaking news about the case.

“Errr Jack. We caught Pete. He’s at the station right now. His name is Malcolm McSpannerheadz and he’s confessed to it all. We checked the CCTV tapes, used the licence plate recognition software on the roads, and then checked his cell-phone. DNA testing should confirm it was him, but he confessed immediately when we told him we were sending his clothes to the lab, although he did look a bit surprised that we caught him so easily.”

A shocked looking Jack knows that the criminal mastermind cannot be caught so easily. This must be a ruse, right?

But no, it wasn’t a ruse. Malcolm Mcspannerheadz, a television obsessed website designer in his early thirties was duly tried and convicted two months later, after DNA evidence, phone evidence and CCTV evidence connected him to every murder. Plus a quick check of his computer showed he had an unhealthy interest in pot plants.

Jack Jackson knew that this was only the beginning of the story though. The day after Pete was caught another serial killer was on the loose. This time he went by the name of, ‘Sid the Stroker.’ This devious madman would brutally slay his victims in their homes before stroking their pet cats with his bloody fingers, thus traumatising them for life. Jack knew that this would be a difficult case to crack, and so he went to the bar to drink more Whiskey coloured water, whilst another bored traffic cop checked through the CCTV footage, again.


Wednesday 14 May 2014

Review: Captain America #20- Government Is Not Your Daddy


Captain America #20- The Iron Nail: Part 4
Writer: Rick Remender
Artist: Nic Klein
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Released: 14th May 2014

I decided to pick up a copy of Captain America this week after not reading the book for well over a year.  I’ve been avoiding the book because the last time I read a copy it was turning somersaults in an effort to avoid discussing any of the real issues of our times. With recent American history consisting of illegal wars, banker bailouts, sponsoring foreign coups and spying on their own citizens you’d think that good old ‘Cap’ would have something to say about it, wouldn’t you? But no, not a word, so I dropped the book, and moved on until I heard it was starting to deal with something resembling reality in 2014.

And so here I am with issue #20, a book I picked up after reading reviews that suggested to me that Captain America was out of fantasy land, and back on planet Earth. Another reason for me checking it out is that I really enjoyed the recent Captain America Winter Soldier movie. That movie amazed me by bringing up crucial topics such as the New World Order and Project Paperclip, two topics that have huge relevance to the mess of our world we find ourselves living in today. So would the Captain America comic book take a hint from the movie and start to deal with some real world issues? Read on, and I’ll let you know.

After a complex beyond belief summary of previous events, which is the usual way with a lot of Marvel comics it seems, I got straight into the story and knew exactly what was going to happen about thirteen pages before it actually did. All you need to know about the first thirteen pages or so of this book is that Captain America is in dreamland (they call it a ‘Mind Bubble’ this time) thinking about nice things. Dreamland is a prison construct, the kind of construct that’s extremely common place in comics, so common that the Justice League is currently in their own version of it in the DC universe. So I have to wait quite a few pages, and it all seems very pointless, as Cap breaks out of this false reality mind prison. The most memorable aspect of his time spent in said prison is his reminiscence of how great his Mum was, and his Dad, of course, is a useless drunk. That’s a regular theme in comics. Mums are always perfect, and Dad’s are always feckless losers. So what you have is a nation of superheroes with Daddy issues, and who’s the perfect father replacement? That would be the government. Put on the uniform kids, we’ll be your Daddy now. It’s a common theme, and in Captain America #20 you get it in the very first panel.

So far, so blah. So what happens when Cap breaks out of the mind prison thingy? He gets to punch a cartoon villain who keeps droning on about destroying America. The villains go on about America being a ‘Dying Empire,’ so at least they are tapping into some real world concerns here. The problem though is that the villains are evil foreigners who are setting up America to look bad so the rest of the world will, ‘Unite to dethrone you.’ Errr, call me a reality junkie if you like, but how exactly can America look any worse in the eyes of the world after what they have done over the past decade or so? A war in Iraq where millions died, all based on a lie, and all done to make corporate billionaires richer, whilst not benefiting humanity one single jot. Just look at the state of Iraq today. Suicide bombs are a daily occurrence; the country is in a state of civil war and has become an absolute Hellhole. And who is responsible? America. How is it possible to make America look any worse, and who exactly is going to come and destroy the evil empire? America has the biggest military in world history. It has the biggest nuclear arsenal in the world. If you attack America you are committing suicide. Everybody knows this, but apparently there is one exception. That exception is the writer of Captain America #20, Rick Remender.

In conclusion, Captain America #20 has an implausible plot, it’s very predictable, the villains are ill-conceived, barely believable and they have strange ideas of the world coming together to attack America for it’s latest moral outrage. I liked the art, it reminded me of the art when I was last enjoying Captain America, when Ed Brubaker was doing all of that stuff with the Red Skull and the Winter Soldier. But art alone is not enough, and this is yet another example of a Marvel comic that is out of touch with the times. Avoid it, unless you are a very small child. And if you are a small child, don’t believe all of the guff about Dad’s being useless drunks.  Government is not your Daddy; your Daddy is your Daddy. Rating: 3/10


Explaining this ‘Feminist Liberal’ thing.


Okay, I think it’s about time I put some clarity on my increasing usage of the term ‘feminist liberal,’ as without explaining it I’m leaving myself open to misunderstanding and attacks based on that misunderstanding. The following description is what I mean when I mean the term ‘feminist liberal.’

A feminist liberal is (normally) a younger person, in their twenties or early thirties, who has been through the mainstream indoctrination process that is the modern school/and or university system. The more ‘education’ this person has, the more enslaved he or she is to the feminist liberal brainwashing. This kind of person will instantly take the moral high-ground on all subjects, and tell you that you are an intolerant and hateful person if you don’t agree with their borrowed opinions. The feminist liberal is of both genders. The female version will be very entitled and feel like she is a victim of a male centred society that is oppressing her because she is a woman. She will be very angry, very intolerant, very aggressive, very violent, very egotistical and constantly trying to prove to everybody that she is ‘just as good as a man.’ She will be career orientated, and if that career doesn’t work out she will become increasingly angry and resentful to all men, who she will blame for her failure. She will be a statist (government supporter) who is pro abortion, pro gay-rights, pro religious rights and pro everything else that could loosely be termed as ‘liberal’ and talked about by mainstream heroes like John Stewart and Bill Maher. She will spend all of her time online acting as the thought Police where she will call people racist, or sexist whilst ignoring any real racism and sexism, especially if it comes from non-white people, and especially if it comes from one of the western friendly dictatorships like Saudi Arabia, a country blighted by real, state sanctioned racism, sexism and homophobia.

And what about her male counterpart, you might ask? The male version of the feminist liberal is a sad sack, emasculated shadow of a man. He feels guilty, but doesn’t know what he should feel guilty about. He’s a total doormat for all women, and is happy to be so as his liberal feminism education has made him feel utterly confused about being a male. All he knows is that being a man is a bad thing, and if you are a white man, well that's the worst thing of all. All men are violent warmongering rapists and therefore he hates them, and he also hates himself. The feminist liberal male is a mess. A pathetic victim and he’s happy to be one as well.

I hope that clears up what I mean by the term ‘feminist liberal.’ Put simply, it’s the Rockefeller funded indoctrination process that is pushed by mainstream education establishments. It’s wrecking people’s lives. Making women feel like they have to compete with men, and that they are being discriminated against when they are doing so. Feminist liberalism makes men feel like worthless pieces of crap who should immediately kill themselves because they are not women. Feminist liberalism pushes the idea that there is no difference between men and women, and that women are victimised and oppressed because of their gender. The system wants women working, and men out of the home. It wants government to be the daddy, and the real daddy to be nowhere near his own children, kicked out of the home by a career orientated woman who hates men, and wants to prove to everybody that she can live without one. This leads children vulnerable to state control and indoctrination at a very early age as mummy is not home to look after them, and daddy is long gone, banished to weekend visits by the corrupt family court system. The end goal is state control of families, and an end to family life of mummy, daddy and the children. Future families will be nothing more than centralised breeding programmes with donor sperm fathers and the children being taken from their mother’s at birth. This is the goal, and feminist liberalism is helping them to get there.

Comic book writers in 2014 are usual feminist liberal males, and all of their themes and concerns are centred on male guilt and desperately trying not to offend anybody. They are normally statists (big government supporters) and refuse to even consider the possibility that government is bad. Their comic book heroes will be an even blend of males and females that compete on the same level, and normally work as ‘special agents’ for some higher authority. These heroes will be very young, and trapped in a perpetual state of childhood, just like the readers of the comics themselves. This celebration of perpetual adolescence stops adults from growing and learning, as they should be doing if they ever want to develop as properly functioning adults. The comic book heroes will fly around the world ‘saving the civilians’ from ‘evil dictators’ without questioning what is going on back home, and who is really in control of their corrupt two party ‘democratic’ system that offers no change and no choice. Comic book writers in 2014 are largely cowards. Their readers are not children. Children do not read comics in great numbers, adults do. Feminist liberal adults, sadly. So the next time you pick up a comic book think about the underlying themes and assumptions that are being made by the writer. Is it really a free thinking comic, or is it just more Rockefeller funded feminist liberal brainwashing, designed to destroy the family, make women feel like they are being oppressed, and turning men into self hating sad sack losers? Read the comics for yourself, you’ll see.

This week's comic books- 14th May 2014

Tuesday 13 May 2014

WEEKLY COMIC PREVIEW (FOR 14TH MAY 2014)


Check out this week’s preview for Gail Simone’s BatGirl # 31:

‘Clandestine meetings tapped phones, video surveillance - Barbara Gordon is being watched! Who has it in for her, and how can Batgirl investigate without compromising her secret identity?’

Pretty hilarious eh? Who is watching BatGirl? Who do you bloody think? Edward Snowden has been talking about it for the past year.  And that’s the problem with mainstream comics in 2014. They exist in a strange pre 9/11, pre Edward Snowden naive era where the good old US of A are the unquestioned good guys and illegal wars, drone murdering of villagers, illegal surveillance and all of the other fascist/collectivist/corporate/socialist realities of the modern world don’t exist. And that’s why I’m writing this blog. If the comic book web sites won’t do it, then I guess I’ll have to do it myself. So what do we have to look forward to this week in the strange, backwards, purposefully ignorant world of comics? Here’s my list of the books to look out for this week.

1- Green Lantern Corps (2011) #31 (Uprising): Set in space, so it has some wriggle room to talk about real issues. This is Part 2 of the Uprising story-arc. Continued from last week’s Green Lantern #31 that featured the amazingly accurate statement about the drug trade on planet Earth- ‘Legalisation is the enemy of profit.’ And that folks is why they make it illegal. Keep it illegal, keep the money coming in and it gives a great excuse to raid people’s homes, dumb them down and fill up the for profit private prison system. Modern day slavery and drugs. Don’t take drugs kids. Don’t fall into the new world order’s sick little trap.



2- Shadow #25: The story about Zombies will be terrible as usual, but this book always has fantastic alternative covers. There are normally two or three of them, so check them out on ebay before ordering.

3- Weird Love #1: Old school horror classics from the 1950’s, when men were still men and the feminised liberal name callers were yet to cry ‘racist’ or ‘sexist’ at anybody who disagreed with them.


Here’s a list of this week’s top five politically correct comic books designed by and for the Rockefeller indoctrinated feminist liberals:

1- Wraith Welcome To Christmasland #6 (Of 7) Stephen King’s talentless son writes a generic serial killer book with some snow in the background. Is the serial killer a government employee? Of course not, he’s a grotesque old man who looks like a serial killer and who would be apprehended in about 2 minutes flat in the real world.

2- Uber #13: An alternative history look at WW2. The favourite war of all contemporary comic book writers. Talking about Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and Syria are no go areas at the moment, so comic book writers continually go back to where it is safe. Cowardly stuff from the mainstream.

3- Justice League United #1: Jeff Lemire continues his slide towards mediocrity with this slice of badly drawn lameness. Think Nato in Canada, with bad jokes, puns and quips instead of interesting, believable and likeable character and a statist mindset that would have all of it’s readers bowing down to anybody wearing a uniform.

4- Royals Masters Of War #4: Once again the cowardly comic book writers are stuck in WW2 battling the evil Nazi’s. This book is particularly insipid as it features the British Royal family (who are actually German) battling the evil Nazi’s.

5- United States Of Murder Inc #1: Another Marvel book that is stuck in the past. This one is about the Mafia, and features people with names like Valentine Gallo. Will they mention the real-life crime families that run the privately owned Federal Reserve Bank of America? What do you think? Just what we need eh? Another book about Italian gangsters. What year is it again?

And that’s my list of what to look out for, and what to avoid this week. I’ll also be picking up a few books not on this list, just to keep up to date with what is happening, and who knows? I might be pleasantly surprised by something.

Review: A Voice in the Dark #1



Anybody who knows me personally will tell you that I hate the serial killer genre. Whenever I see a new movie, book, comic book or anything else about serial killers I tend to go on a big rant about it.  I’ve been doing this for a long time now, so long in fact that I no longer have anything to do with serial killer genre stuff at all. If I see ANYTHING that has a serial killer in it I’ll avoid it like the plague, refusing to give it a single second of my time.

I felt the same way about this book when I first heard about it, but I bought it anyway, against my better judgement. Why? Because the guy who owns my local comic book ensured me that this wasn’t just another serial killer book. It was different, better if you like. So I took his word for it, purchased the book and read it. My immediate reaction after finishing it?

Ah crap, it’s just another serial killer book.

But before I go into the book in depth I’ll briefly outline just why I dislike the serial killer genre. My main problem is that I feel that it feeds into a false perception of reality that you cannot trust or talk to anybody that exists outside of your immediate social circles. After all, why chance talking to somebody when he might be a devious serial killer?

I feel that the serial killer genre feeds into the fear porn paranoia that the mainstream media is pushing upon the masses, specifically through the news networks that focus on the incredibly rare instances where for example a child will go missing or a stranger will hurt another person. It feeds into this idea that life is unsafe, that we are better off isolating ourselves in our safe little homes, rather than taking a chance and actually living a happy, rewarding and self fulfilling existence. When people are fed on a diet of mainstream news fear porn and serial killer fiction what is created? An insular society of isolated and afraid people that are easy to manipulate and control by the real threat that exists in society. That threat being those in positions of authority. The people wearing uniforms who have killed billions all by the letter of the law, and all state sanctioned. Serial killer genre fiction plays into the false idea that the real threat is an imaginary bogeyman, not the real threat that we all need to be aware of.



Secondly, the serial killer genre feeds into a pornographic need for violence. Making boring, sick perverts who do exist in the real world look like the most interesting people in town. Real life serial killers are not twisted geniuses who play games with the cops or leave devious clues at the scene where grizzled detectives work to catch their cunning prey. They are boring little perverts who have no power in their lives, so pick on easy targets to feed their sexual perversions and make them appear more important than they actually are. Serial killers are boring perverts, they are not interesting, not clever, and not worth writing about.

Lastly, the idea of a serial killer in 2013 is pretty ridiculous. As has recently been revealed, we are increasingly living in a surveillance state, where everything we do is being monitored and recorded by the state. A real life serial killer living in a cosmopolitan, Western City these days would not be able to escape this surveillance. He would be caught in two minute flat by the cameras, smart phone trackers, DNA and God knows what else that entraps us all like a fish in the New World order barrel. Writing about serial killers now is ridiculous. They cannot survive, and therefore I cannot take their fictional stories seriously.

So that’s why I dislike serial killer genre fiction. Why do I dislike this book? Let me explain. It begins with the line,

‘Dear Diary, It’s been 72 days since I killed someone. It was my first time, and I’m afraid that it won’t be the last.’

What we are getting here then is a serial killer story from the point of view of the serial killer, much like the 1986 movie: Henry, Portrait of a serial killer.  A movie that I found extremely disgusting in that it glorifies the sickness of a man and how he murders people for his own personal gratification. A voice in the dark attempts to twist the genre by having a female serial killer who has had a happy childhood in a liberal home, and has killed her first victim because she’s an evil racist who bullied her predictably gay and adopted sister. What we have here is a perfect blend of liberal political correctness that we are all supposed to loudly applaud from the rooftops these days.

A racially mixed family, homosexual sister and a girl who has only murdered to get revenge for some bullying that led her gay sister to attempt suicide. Every single politically correct box is duly ticked, and I find it as cliché as you can get. This is a Daily Show with Jon Stewart approved book. All liberal university, pre Obama hope and change bullshit that actually means nothing when you look at in real depth.

It shows a sheep like conformity that parrots the mind programming of the 1970’s university campuses. Racism, sexism and homophobia are important issues, but they are not the most important issues of our times. This book is woefully out of step with these times, and the issues that we should all be focussing upon now. It sings from a fake nice collectivist song sheet as the real world goes on all around us, and the real issues of our times are ignored.

Real issues like the destruction of the family by removing fathers from the home. The pushing of homosexuality on young children to make them gender confused and to engage in sexual activities at an age younger when they should even be thinking about it. The pushing of the state as the father figure, to replace the father’s pushed away by family courts and social services. Female empowerment meaning being a single mum, despite all of the terrible things that have been well documented to happen to children, especially boys that lack a strong father figure in their lives. The pushing of dangerous vaccines and shots onto children that damage their immune systems for life. The illegal foreign wars that have ended millions of lives, all to prop up the banks and corporations that own the politicians of all parties. The complicit mainstream media that lie to the public and treat them like idiots.

All of these things and more are the real issues of 2013. Not serial killers, being gay and your skin pigmentation. This book is about things that have politically correct value, but no real world value at all. It’s a book that is begging to be applauded, and I’m sure that it will be, because who wants to say something bad about a book that deals with such ‘important’ issues? Well, me for one, because these issues are fake issues. That are not issues of 2013, they are issues of a liberal past, a past that has come to fruition in the world we are all living in today. Look around you. Look at the world you are living in. Are you living in heaven? Do you like this world?  Because this world is the legacy of 1970’s liberalism, the world that this book is still obsessed with today.

Let’s get back to the book. So why wasn’t the serial killer caught after her first crime? No DNA? No video camera evidence? No mobile phone evidence that would definitively show her to be at the scene of the crime? How does the writer deal with these issues? With one throwaway line,

‘How’d I pull it off? That’s a story for another day.’

Hang on, no it isn’t. Without dealing with these issues there is no story. It makes no sense, and I’m not prepared to just forget about it and wait for some explanations to fill in the plot holes later on.

Back to the book. So we have another serial killer operating as well, like it’s a normal thing these days to have serial killers nailing naked girls to trees in college campuses. It’s all disgusting, unrealistic, unbelievable and pornographically upsetting. And the detective investigating it is of course the uncle of the main female protagonist. Wow, what are the odds of that eh? Sounds pretty unbelievable doesn’t it? Perhaps serial killers are more common than I thought on College campuses, or perhaps this is just a load of liberal bullshit that is glorifying perverted murder and wrapping it up in political correctness to somehow make it all seem okay. The serial killer uses a Polaroid camera by the way, a piece of implausibility that even the writer himself has to acknowledge as being achronistic and slightly odd.



To fully illustrate the liberal minded blindness in this book I want to analyse a scene that takes place in a college room, this of course all makes sense as this is a book that could only come from a mind of somebody who has gone through the liberal indoctrination process of western universities. The professor in class asks the girl students (and most of the characters in this book are of course girls, as is befitting the 1970’s feminist, liberal mindset that the book originates from) about the increase in teen suicides (and this idea comes from the 1986 movie Heather’s). The only ideas expressed in the class are from the standpoint that young people kill themselves because of bullying, not the idea that young people kill themselves because they copy, like sheep, like feminist liberals. And like the bloody movie Heathers so cleverly points out. This comic book has completely missed the point of the movie, and suicides are blamed on bullies alone. Gay bashing bullies, of course.

The book also tries to convince the reader that outing yourself to your parents in 2013 is a huge issue that can lead to suicide. I’m sorry, but this is based in 2013 right, not 1973. Nobody gives a crap if you are gay or not these days. It’s fashionable to be gay; it’s not a big issue. Get over it, and stop victimising yourself with this crap.

And all along as the book trudges through 1970’s feminist, liberal issues we have a girl fantasying about killing people, using the same device that has been done to death many times before, and yes of course in heather’s, the movie that the writer of this book has evidently based most of it upon, only not with the original wit and insight of that movie unfortunately.

I’m not talking much about the plot here in this review because I found it boring, turgid and relentlessly unconvincing. A girl with no experience in social work, counselling or voicing her own radio show walks into the college campus radio station and is immediately given her own late night show where she gives out advice to her fellow students? Sorry, but this is not reality, this is a writer who has watched Hard Harry Christian Slater in the 1990 movie Pump up The Volume, and likes the idea of a radio show agony aunt. The writer has decided to cram it into his story, without thinking logically why this inexperienced girl would be given this highly sensitive and responsible role. She wouldn’t, this makes no sense.

So let’s end this now. I’ve been talking too long, and I’m beginning to bore myself, even more than this bloody tedious book bored me, and that was a lot.

A voice in the dark is right on, politically correct, university approved liberal blindness from the 1970’s. The characters are largely cardboard cut out, Oprah Winfrey approved bores that do not reflect contemporary society as it is in 2013. The book has been patched together from ideas that came out of two movies: Pump up the Volume of 1990, and Heather’s of 1986. It has no new insights, and even lacks some of the insights that were given in the originally movies. Particularly in terms of the copycat nature of teen suicide. It is serial killer porn for the sleeping generation. It says nothing, reflects nothing and actually is nothing.

The perfect amalgamation of the collective, wilful blindness and pat yourself on the back for not being racist or homophobic bullshit that has made people like myself turn away from the mainstream in their droves. This is a horrible book, and yet people will say nice things about it, just because it ticks all of the safe, I’m a good person boxes, that idiots stuck in the mainstream matrix hang their identities upon these days. Long-winded, boring, generic, lacking in social insight, completely humourless and with art drawn by somebody with very limited artistic abilities, this is one to avoid. Unless of course you are a fan of the warped serial killer genre that obsesses over race, sexual identities and old movies from the 1990’s. If you do, then this is the book for you. However, if you want something new and don’t feel the need to pat yourself on the back for being a nice, politically correct person then this book offers you absolutely nothing. AVOID, AVOID, AVOID.

Review: Adventures of Superman #12- Nostalgia Fail




I think I understand what writer Peter Milligan is trying to do with this book, but that doesn’t make it any less odd when reading it. The very first panel of this one-shot story features the main villain telling us that this book will feature, ‘None of that modern crap,’ and he’s true to his word. This book features no ‘modern crap’ at all. No mobile phones, no computers, no Internet, no computer games and nothing else that would give you any idea about what era this book is supposed to be set in. Is it 1950? 1980? 1930? I know one thing for sure, it can’t be 2014 because Lois Lane is worried that her gender is precluding her from being taken seriously as a proper journalist, and people still seem to be getting their daily news from print media platforms like the Daily Planet.

To me this book read like a Bronze Age comic book of the 1970’s. It was purposefully naïve and a bit childish as well. It was the kind of book that I’d love to read as a ten year old kid because it had simple villains, a good guy struggling with doing the right moral thing, was easy to follow, and had nothing to do with the real ‘boring’ world. The story was nicely wrapped up at the end of the book with the good guy (eventually) doing what was right and the bad guys being put in their place. The rightful order was restored, moral lessons had been learnt, and all was right with the world.



The big problem of course is that I’m no longer ten years old. I’m an adult now, and when I read a book that has seemingly been designed for the reading pleasure of the 1970’s version of myself I find it a bit odd. There should be a sense of nostalgia, but I didn’t get it from this book. All I got was a sense that this is an unbelievably simplistic and not half as good or as interesting as the other comics that I’m reading in 2014.

The plot of the comic has a huge element that I don’t want to spoil in this review, because even though the book didn’t work for me personally, that doesn’t mean that I want to ruin it for anybody else. Without spoilers, Superman is flying around the city being nice to the naughty villains whilst a rival superhero is also flying around the city being nasty to them. Superman sees the good in even the worst of them, whilst this new superhero (A black clad character known as ‘The Destroyer’) prefers to break their bones and threaten them with even worst kinds of violence if they don’t stop their naughty ways.

The good citizens of Metropolis are fed up with the villains, so are starting to cheer for the more brutal law enforcement style of the mysterious new super hero in town. How can Superman convince the people that his way is the right way, and will her anachronistically sexist boss ever treat Lois Lane seriously as a journalist? That’s the story, and with a few fairly standard comic book twists that’s all you are going to get in the Adventures of Superman #12.

The art in the book is not very good. The drab colouring giving it all a washed out, and distinctly unappealing effect. The backgrounds are uninteresting and the square jawed superhero looks like your Granddad’s version of what Superman should look like. And why is everybody frowning? Seriously, I’m flicking through the book right now and the only person smiling is the stupid villain. What’s up with that? This is supposed to be fun, isn’t it?

It would probably be a good idea if this review were to be done by a ten year old boy rather than myself, as this book is certainly not for a jaded old comic book reader like myself. The big problem of course is that the main consumer of comic books these days is somebody far closer to my own age than a ten-year-old kid. So why does this book exist? I guess it’s trying to conjure up feelings of nostalgia, but if that’s what it’s trying to do it failed for me. It was too dumbed down, too simplistic and played too straight. There was a lack of humour throughout, and no sense of fun. In the end it becomes one of those books that you end up laugh at, and not for the right reasons. If you didn’t laugh you wouldn’t bother to read it at all. It’s naff, very naff, out of date, lost in some strange era of a forgotten 1970’s childhood, it has no relevance to anything, fails in the nostalgia department and ultimately just reads like a very bad comic that is a bit embarrassing for all concerned.

Review: Grindhouse Doors Open At Midnight No. 7- Shockingly Unshocking



There’s something a bit odd about this book, and not in the way that the creators are probably hoping for. It sets out to shock, but because of its politically correct nature it ends up failing to elicit much of a reaction at all. This comic shocks in the same way as reading about Wolverine drinking in a bar, or Jean Grey turning into the Phoenix, again.

The problem with the Grindhouse concept is that the methods of shocking the reader are at least three decades out of date. If we were still living midway through the 1960’s then I can see people at least having a discussion about this book. In 2014 nobody is going to say a word about it, good or bad. It’s just a book with some boobies in it. Sure you wouldn’t want a ten-year-old reading it, but they aren’t going to be the audience for this book anyway.

The plot in this particular issue of Grindhouse centres on old religions, human sacrifice, a girl’s summer camp and a demon from the old world coming into the new one. The old world is sacrificial alters and a bit of female masturbation, so far so blah, and the new world is a group of predictably lary girls having fun at hockey camp. There’s some generic drug and topless scenes, but a strange absence of modern day essentials like cell phones, blackberries and Internet connectivity. It’s set now, but not really now, and that’s the problem.

Does writer Alex De Campi want it to be 1970 again? A time where he thinks (and he’s probably wrong anyway) that sex and beheadings in a comic will shock and outrage people. I don’t understand what he’s doing here. The problem is that images of sex and violence are everywhere now, people carry it around with them on their phones. It’s boring now, it’s everyday. Nobody cares if you show some big-breasted girl ripping some generic trucker’s head off. It’s actually quite lame and yes I know that’s a depressing thing to say, but it’s the truth.

A huge structural problem with this book (and series) is that everything is written from the feminine point of view, so when things happens it’s all structured to empower females and make them look like they are in charge of proceedings. In the 1970’s this would have been something different, even liberating to the readers. However, in a 2014 context, female empowerment is the accepted norm. If you really wanted to shock contemporary readers you would have to display females as helpless victims, not as the protagonists. If this book is designed to shock and be different, then playing by the norms of 2014 western entertainment narratives isn’t going to cut it.

Looking on the positive side, there were moments of silly humour in this book that I really did appreciate. It’s still a terrible facsimile of the world as it is today though, especially considering the girls don’t even have the ubiquitous cell phones that are practically glued to the heads of every teenager living in the real world today.



That’s the highlight of the book, the occasional clever joke, but the rest of it is as liberal and safe as you can get. There’s a banner on the front cover of this book that proudly states, ‘How have we not been arrested yet?’ I’ll tell them why. It’s because they are not doing anything outside of the accepted western cultural norms of 2014. It’s not edgy, dangerous or revolutionary. It’s just a comic with typically empowered girls flashing their breasts and taking charge of their own lives. It’s like an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but with Buffy getting her breasts out every now and then.

So ultimately, how to judge a book that prides itself on being edgy and dangerous, but doesn’t have the balls to do anything that is genuinely shocking? I guess that means it kind of fails, doesn’t it? It has scant moments of comedy, the art lacks detail and isn’t particularly memorable, and that’s all there is to say about it really.

If you really want to shock somebody then take an issue of this comic, jump in a time machine and set it to sometime in the 1970’s. The people there won’t find it that shocking, but at least they might have a discussion about it, because in 2014 the only person talking about it will be me, in this review. Now I have finished, and that’s all that will be said about it.

A very safe book that boasts of rebelliousness that it noticeably lacks.