Comic review: Memetic #1- Don’t worry, government will save you from the Internet

Writer: James Tynion IV
Artist: Eryk Donovan
Publisher: Boom! Studios
Released: 22nd October 2014


A good way to judge the mindset and world-view of any writer’s work is to examine whom they position as heroes/villains in their narrative. In issue #1 of Memetic by James Tynion IV the heroes are the military and the government. The villains, at the moment, are unclear, but the tools they are using are the Internet and social media.

'Look into my eyes.'

The story is simple. A meme of a hypnotic Sloth goes viral. It makes people feel good, then turns them into blood crazed, murderous zombies. The Internet attacks the poor innocent people, so it needs to be shut down by the heroes working in the military and government. Does this sound familiar?

What happened in Tunisia when the people started to get fed up with their government and refused to keep on apathetically and cowardly supporting it? The government shut down the Internet, of course. What happened when the Hong Kong students refused to allow their criminal slave-masters to continue with business as usual? The government shut down the Internet. Or at least they tried to. The students found ways around it, and the Internet continued. Do you know why government fears the Internet? It’s because the Internet is freedom, and when people have freedom why do they need government?

Answer is, they don’t, and so the only interesting thing about Memetic is to find out whether or not government (or the banks/corporations/intelligence agencies/occulted secret societies) that run it are behind the Internet ‘problem’ that has made the government want to shut it down.

I could read this book, hoping than in two-issues time it will be revealed that the government created a panic just so it could gain tighter control on their slave public, but so far I see no hints that the book is going in that direction.

Instead, what I read is a scare story about the evils of the Internet, and with the heroes being the usual feminist liberal crowd working for the military industrial complex, the very evil that has turned this planet into one giant prison camp in the first place.

What I see with this book is an old man going, ‘Oh, look at that scary Internet. It’s brainwashing people. Something must be done about it. Save me government, save me pentagon, save me heroic young feminist.’

Decent art

That sounds like a load of old man bullshit to me, and so I won’t be reading any more of this book. Hey, if I’m wrong in a couple of months I’ll gladly admit my error and buy the trade paperback and put up a grovelling review here on my blog where I will personally apologise to writer James Tynion IV. I hope that happens, but it’s looking a bit unlikely at the moment.

I’m fed up of reading books where the heroes are all ignorant children, pet dogs of the power elite’s who control this planet. Heroes do not wear uniforms. Heroes reject uniforms. Uniforms are slavery. You do not work for the people when you put on a military uniform, you obey orders, you do what you are told, and the people who give you your orders are not good people, they are slave-masters, they are the enemies of human freedom. This is not my opinion. Uniforms have always been symbols of state control and slavery, always have been, and always will be.

Put on a uniform, wear their badges and you are a tool of the system of human enslavement FULL STOP. Stop giving me more uniformed slaves. Not interested mate. Give me a hero unattached to the control system of human slavery. Give me something new, something real, something that doesn’t bow down to uniforms and the corrupt scum who act like God. They are not gods, and we are not their dutifully worshipping slaves.

We need to start a revolution where we refuse to be their poor, helpless, dumbed down sacrificial victims.  A revolution where we stop looking for them to save us from the engineered (Ebola) crisis’s that they themselves manufacture to keep us scared, dependent slaves. We are free people, but people who choose to bow down to the slavery of uniforms, and until we get rid of the tyranny of uniform it will be absolutely impossible for us to be anything other than their slaves.

This comic is still bowing down to uniforms, and because of that one reason, I cannot recommend it for any free thinking person’s reading pleasure. That could change, but at the moment, it’s just another book about a random villain using the Internet to turn the people into zombies. And in positions to save us, it’s the same old crowd in government uniforms, sigh.

Rating: 6/10 (based on my reservations about it's statist worship)

Click link for details of recent government censorship of the Internet during ‘Arab Spring’ uprisings.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_in_the_Arab_Spring

Click link for recent government censorship attempts in Hong Kong:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/01/world/asia/chinese-web-censors-struggle-with-hong-kong-protest.html?_r=0

Wrestling fanzine review: The Atomic Elbow #11- Nostalgia, the iron claw of death

Get a copy here:
http://theatomicelbow.blogspot.co.uk/

Click here for a very funny pro wrestling nostalgia podcast:
https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/old-school-wrestling-podcast/id334529079?mt=2

Click here for my favourite song about the death that is nostalgia:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMMkXvzTvYA



When the entertainment of your youth enters the realms of commercial nostalgia you know it’s day in the sun has passed. It has become little more than a replay, a spectral apparition for the comfortably numb.

Nostalgia is a box set for the suburb dwelling masses. The silently complicit who pay their taxes for war and slavery whilst not getting involved in the world around them, a world they support through their quiet, apathetic resignation and comfortable, selfish cowardice.

Nostalgia digs up a corpse for this moribund sofa dwelling generation. Look at how it moves when we shake its fleshless limbs. Look at how it smiles when we stretch its toothless jaws. Buy the special edition programme, the T-shirt, the autographed photograph of the dead star. Is that what pro wrestling has now become?

Perhaps there is a new generation of young fans who are going to revive the corpse, but at the moment it appears (at least to my eyes and ears) that those still paying attention to modern pro-wrestling are only doing so for their own personal, nostalgic reasons and because it gives them a creative outlet, with an in-built (and sadly declining) audience they wouldn’t have if they were blogging/podcasting on other, more serious, relevant and contemporary subject matters.

‘The Atomic Elbow’ is one of those creative outlets. A fanzine in the style of the much loved old fanzines that I myself used to subscribe to many decades ago. Full of spelling errors and stream of consciousness thoughts about pro-wrestling put together in an A3 black and white, folded and stapled down the middle, made in the bedroom and local library style. That’s exactly what The Atomic Elbow is. A nostalgic blast back into my past, with the big difference being that the people writing in the fanzine are not, as they were twenty odd years ago, talking about what is happening today, they are talking about what happened in the past. A vehicle of nostalgia, in form and content, this fanzine is not bringing the corpse back to life, it’s keeping it dead, driving the stake deeper, making sure the beast does not stir.

To be fair, there are a couple of brief moments of life in AE11. The Undertaker’s streak being broken is mentioned, but the discussion is more about how they are ruining future nostalgic opportunities, rather than what is most exciting for the wrestling product of today. Dolph Zigler is the favourite wrestler of a lapsed, now back into it female fan. She watches the WWE today with her husband. This is not the fanzine writer that I grew up with. A female, and married? No way, not happening mate. Where are the basement dwelling, anti-social young men? The girl repellent, obsessive compulsive King geeks who wear ECW T-shirts and write reams and reams of over the top prose about the latest five star matches from Japan? Where have they all gone? Suicide, homelessness, career or marriage? I miss those guys. I miss the early days of ECW, the fanzines, the independent shows, the laughing at Adam Bomb and King Mabel, the times before the death that is nostalgia kicked in.

That’s not to say that AE11 is a complete waste of time, because it isn’t. There is enjoyment to be had, but it’s death enjoyment, nostalgia sprinkled with sadness at recognition that most of the wrestlers you are reading about didn’t have a happy ending. The best article is about World Class Championship wrestling, and the Von Erich family. Need I say more? But still, I enjoyed the article. It’s written in a carefree, funny style that, again, reminds me of the old fanzines, plus it gave me some new information on a wrestling event that featured the Ultimate Warrior before he nailed down his gimmick. How did his story end? We know, and it’s sad. That’s nostalgia for you. You cannot live in the past, and if you try it will end up killing you.

So was this just a sad affair then? Another case of going back to the past because the present offers nothing, but when you go back all you find is dead memories and dead people?  It kind of was. The sadness is not in the nostalgia itself, but in the fact that life still goes on, and if you don’t find something new to cling onto, the past becomes a skeletal claw from the grave, tempting you closer, closer, until it grabs, and pulls you into the abyss.

Rating: Look, but don’t linger. 

Insane Tales from the Dead Issue 2, Volume 1: Halloween frights

Writers/ Artists: Doug Randazzo and numerous

Released: Halloween 2014

Website to order a copy: 
http://www.insanetalesfromthedead.com/



A good horror short, in the style of a television episode of Tales from the Crypt or EC horror comic has to have a satisfying ending where a twist in the narrative leads to a morally dubious character getting the instant karma that s/he deserves. Horror therefore isn’t really about the horror; it’s about the good story. If you don’t have a good story, if you don’t have strong characters, and if you don’t have a strong ending, then you don’t have a good horror narrative. What you have instead is grimness, and a celebration of being gross for the sake of being gross. It can be very childish and teenage boy as well. Oh look, it’s somebody sawing a guy’s leg off.

KEWL MAN!

Do you know what I mean? What made the movie Seven a good movie? The horror, or the twist at the end? It was the twist, wasn’t it? It elevated what would otherwise have been just an unpleasant movie about a disgusting individual into something that made you feel satisfied, and totally grossed out of course, when you left the cinema. It made you feel like you got your money’s worth. That’s what a good movie is supposed to do, horror or otherwise.

Thus, when I read ‘Horror’ genre comics I’m looking for a good story first, and the horror, and art, are secondary concerns. ‘Insane Tales from the Dead Issue 2, Volume 1’ has points of interest, but does it contain a fully formed, satisfying horror story? No, it doesn’t have one of those.

What it does have is a funny story about aliens making everybody on planet Earth need to go to the bathroom at the same time. The story concludes with a ridiculous panel where the entire planet is subjected to its second world-wide flood, but this time Yahweh/Allah/El/Jehovah/Whatever is not involved.  That was a funny story. There was no moral lesson, no characters/ protagonists, but it was funny, and probably the best thing about the book.

A werewolf tale didn’t work because the protagonist was unfairly punished whilst his unpleasant, horror hating girlfriend was spared. It should have been the other way round. That would have been satisfying to the reader, but instead, the opposite happened.

A tale about alien musicians was more or less an advert for a bands myspace (does that still exist?) page.

‘Torture’ was unpleasant, and it went nowhere.

A story about a squirrel being tamed and then killed by a watchful crow was equally unpleasant, but it had a better structure to it.

Some pages of random horror artwork followed. A guy called Mortuss Art showed some talent, but the rest of it was a bit ‘high-school teenage boy doodling in the back of his textbook’ in its quality.

It sounds like I didn’t much enjoy this book, but I don’t want to conclude this review by giving the impression that I hated it, because I didn’t.

I would much rather read independently produced comic books, such as this one, than all of the mainstream superhero, statist junk that dominates the comic book industry today. I enjoyed the roughness and amateur nature of it all, and it wasn't trying to be something that it was not. It screamed independence and ambition, two HUGE plusses in my book.

I want people to keep on producing independent comics, to do them over and over and over again until they’re so bloody good that some twit like me will be absolutely unable to say one single negative thing about them. I’ll leave this book thinking, and laughing about aliens making everybody poo themselves. I’ll tell you what. That’s a lot more than I’ll get out of reading the latest copy of Spiderman, Avengers, Wolverine, X-men, Captain America or Batman.

Rating: A couple of Pumpkins and a bag of sweeties

Comic book review: Winterworld #3- The cult of Gore

Writer: Chuck Dixon
Artist: Butch Guice
Publisher: IDW Comics
Released: 8th October 2014


Why was I reading a comic book about some bloke, his teenage ‘charge’ and her cute badger? Why was I reading what is ostensibly just another post apocalyptic, dystopic wasteland book? I wasn’t quite sure. There was something about the writing, something that I couldn’t quite put my finger on, until now.

Issue #3 has clarified a few things in my mind. I know why I’m reading the book now, and I’m glad that I let my subconscious mind guide my comic book reading choices.

This isn’t going to be a long review. I hate them, and who reads them anyway? There’s going to be nothing about the art here. There will be no analysis of the panel layout and narrative flow. I have something very simple to say, a quick point, and so I’ll make it and get out of here.

Creepy cults are common in comic books and action based narratives. You know how it goes, right? Charismatic leader, brainwashing, ridiculous ideas, end of world scenario, cult is bad.

There’s a ‘cult’ comic book out there at the moment that’s doing pretty decent business. That book is called ‘Sheltered, by Ed Brisson and Johnnie Christmas. It’s not a bad book, it’s okay, and it’s doing the cult thing quite well. The problem however is that it’s just another cult book, in a long line of cult books. The book is William Golding's Lord of the Flies, updated, somewhat, for the ‘Prepper’ generation. The main problem I have with ‘Sheltered’ is that the cult it chooses to demonise is a cult that is politically safe to do so. It’s a safe area, and because it’s safe it doesn’t really say anything. The biggest cult problem of our times is the cult of government worship, but comics don’t go there. Some cults must not be discussed.

Winterworld #3 introduces a cult that isn’t often acknowledged, at least in the neo-liberal mainstream media, as a cult at all. No, it’s not the cult of government worship, but it’s a good second best.

The cult that is being addressed here is the cult of man-made global warming believers.

I couldn’t believe it when I first read this. A 2014 comic book where the UN funded, Al Gore worshipping corporate man-made global warming fanatics are shown to be the deluded, nonsensical cult of gibbering, creepy morons that they actually are.

Chuck Dixon, thank you.

I have in my hands a comic book that appears to be mocking the corporate sponsored, anti-human, anti reality cult of man-made global warming. How did this get pass the liberal censors? Has anybody noticed this yet? I’m reading a ‘cult’ book where the cult is based on a real-life, ideology driven cult.

Wow.

Brilliant.

I knew there was something about this book, something that was keeping me reading. Now I know what it is. It’s the writer.

Chuck Dixon is a rare comic book writer who knows what is going on, and I’m so grateful that I’ve managed to find him. Somehow, subconsciously I’ve managed to stumble into something alive, something refreshingly honest in this age of corporate mainstream deception.

Winterwold is a book that is exposing a cult that actually needs exposing. This is what comic books should be doing, but so few of them actually are.

Thank you Chuck Dixon. Thank you for sticking your head above the parapet. Thank you for treading the less trodden path. Thank you for introducing real world ideas and concepts into the depressingly conformist and painfully politically correct neo-liberal world of 2014 comic books. This might start a new fad. Reality being addressed in comic books. That would be something new, and something worth exploring, don’t you think?

Rating: 9/10

Comic review: The October Faction #1: Halloween greetings from the Worm

Writer: Steve Niles
Artist: Damien Worm
Publisher: IDW
Released: 8th October 2014


I love Halloween. Everything about it screams (literally) silliness, fun, excitement and adventure. The cold, wet, dark nights, the Pumpkin lights, the trick or treating, the scary movies, and the even scarier comics as well, of course.

Worm and Niles are the spooky twosome who bought us the wonderfully gothic Monster & Madman, and here they’ve teamed up, just in time for Halloween 2014, to give us another dose of gloom and doom, comic book style.

Truth be told, I was already adding this book to my pull-list before I even read it. All you have to do is look at the names on the cover, flick through the book for a couple of seconds and you’ll already be a fan. The story involves a spooky Adam’s family scenario, monster hunters and mysterious goings ons involving a wife who has slowly become less attached to her husband. Is she having an affair? Nah, that would be far too boring. So what is she doing? What do you think? It’s coffin related, and that’s all I’m giving away.


The art, by the fantastically named Damien Worm, is gloriously gothic and enveloped in shadows, bloody memories of the recent past, seances, tormented spirits and haunted house atmosphere. It’s the colouring that does it. You have to look closely, but don’t linger for too long. You might not like what you find lurking in the gloom encrusted shadows, and once seen the spirits of the dead have a horrible habit of burying themselves into the deepest, hidden recesses of your mind. The book could be written in Mongolian for all I care. The art alone makes it a must by book for all fans of gothic horror.

Are you a Goth? If so, you need this book badly. If you’re not a Goth, then get the book anyway. Trust me, you’ll love it. You’ll discover something new, something awesome, as the kids says these days, or not, probably. I don’t know what the bloody kids are saying these days. What do I know? I’m old.

I’ll tell you what I do know though. I know a good slice of Halloween fun when I see it. This book is exactly what I need in my life right now. My decorations are up, my Medusa head is telling me to look into her eyes, my haunted tree is mocking me, and my Ghoul in a coffin is periodically jumping out at me as I scurry past his place of rest in my living room. Did I mention that I love Halloween? And I also love, love, love this comic. Put down that Batman book, and get yourself something spookalicious, just in time for Halloween.

Rating: 9/10

Television review: Gotham- Episode One: Penguin makes it worthwhile

UK Channel: Channel 5

UK Season: 1, episode 1

UK Premiere Date: 13 October 2014 at 9:00pm

Country of Origin: USA

Show trailer: 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0d1zpt6k5OI

Official website:
 http://www.fox.com/gotham/



There wasn’t anything particularly new in Gotham episode one. It was a television programme set in some alternate reality where people have mobile phones, but it didn’t resemble anything close to what you could call contemporary reality in a 2014 context.

The 'good cop' doing his cop show pose. 

It was established that the city is corrupt, and that you are probably better off just going along with the corruption if you don’t want to end up with a bullet in the back of your head. The main protagonist was, as you might expect, somebody new to the system who is going to change it by sticking to his personal code of morals, where he will do what is right, even at cost to himself, and his family. The problem was that this first episode had a cop out ending where the individual (a young Commissioner Gordon with a cool haircut) was faced with this moral dilemma, only to dodge it completely.

The underlying moral philosophy that will drive this show is that you can change a corrupt system by joining it. This is standard fare in all (corporate sponsored) television programming, pushing the idea that an individual can change a system by working within it. I have a problem with that. My main problem is that it’s a philosophy that (much like the ending of this episode) gives people a moral cop out. You don’t change a system by joining it. It incorporates you, and if you think that you are bigger than an entire societal system of evil and corruption, that you can change something a billion times bigger and more powerful than yourself then you an egotistical, programmed and utterly deluded individual. By joining any evil system you strengthen it, and the world keeps on turning, just like it always has done. All rebellion is incorporated. If you join, you lose. You change evil by refusing to join evil, not by kidding yourself that you can change it from within.

Penguin, the best thing about the show.

The show, looking at it from a character and narrative standpoint, wasn’t terrible. The plot was predictable, in that the killer wasn’t the killer. Of course he wasn’t, he never is in these shows. That was fairly obvious, but there were a couple of characters that made it more interesting to see it being played out. James Gordon was what you might expect from a show such as this. He was good cop playing with bad cops. The Penguin character was great though, a snivelling ambitious, cowardly, weasly psychopath who cares only about himself, and his future career progression. The guy who played him was the best thing about the show, by a long way. The ‘Fish’ character was somebody we have seen before, a ruthless crime boss. The twist was that she was not at the top of the crime pyramid, and was being used by a bigger fish in the pond. They kept that twist to the end, and that elevated the plot into something a bit more interesting than I thought it would be. The Bruce Wayne character has been done to death, so it was a good idea to keep him in the background. The child actor wasn’t great, but he looked like a young Bruce, so that will be enough. The fun part of the show, for comic book fans at least, will be to spot the younger versions of their favourite villains. This one had a young Poison Ivy. Her Dad was a low-level criminal; she hated him, but hated the Police even more. That makes sense. Oh yeah, the show had the Riddler in it as well.  I could watch the show just to spot the villains. That could be fun.

Gotham says nothing about our world. It’s just another cop show, with good cops and bad cops. The viewer’s point of view is obviously on the good cop, as he tries to change a corrupt system. Good luck with that mate. The plot was blah, with some nice twists at the end to make it appear more interesting than it actually was. The show looked big budget, and it also looked a bit like old comics. That was okay. The bloke playing Butler Alfred had a horrendously fake English accent. He’s English as well, so that was a deliberate choice made by the programme makers. I still don’t understand why they do that. What’s wrong with an English guy just talking like a real English guy? Oh yeah, Catwoman. She was hanging around, looking like a lost kitten that would survive about a minute and a half in the real world. She was too feeble for me, but, again, like Bruce I guess she was cast for her looks, nothing else. I’ll conclude this review with a couple of reasons why the programme wasn’t a complete waste of time. The young villains, and the Penguin. That’s all there is here. Is that enough? As a one hour weekly distraction? Yeah, it’s just about worth checking out. If you like your old Batman comics then the show should have enough to keep you interested, at least for a while.

Rating: 6/10 

Green Lantern Corps #35- Godhead Act 1, Part 3: No blame, no shame

Writer: Van Jensen
Artist: Bernard Chang
Publisher: DC Comics
Released: 8th October 2014

I’m thoroughly enjoying this Green Lantern ‘Godhead’ crossover arc, and Part 3 of the story does not disappoint. I’ve read and reviewed a couple of truly depressing books this week, so I was in dire need of something to cheer me up. Green Lantern Corps #35 is an organic, vegan feast in comparison to what can only be described as Punks #1 and Wytches #1 genetically modified McCrap sandwich.

What I’m looking for in my comic books is a strong sense of personal/moral responsibility that is tied in with the no-harm principle and narratives that resonate with the real world of 2014. Green Lantern Corps #35 was a winner in my eyes because it explores what happens when people in positions of power think that they can operate with no regards to the universal principles of moral/natural law. This book demonstrates how real-life villains are the individuals who do terrible things, but take zero responsibility for the consequences of their actions.

Does this sound familiar to you?

John Stewart (of the Green Lantern Corps)- “You willingly destroyed a civilisation! You're murderers....butchers."

Uggha (of The New Gods)- “Watch what you say about the Gods, mortal. It did not work as planned. The flaw lies in your rings, not in us. For we’re Gods”

Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria.

George Bush, Tony Blair, Condoleeza Rice, Colin Powell, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, David Cameron.

Edward Snowden, Julian Assange, Bradley Manning.

Do you get my point? The ‘New Gods’ of our age are the political elite’s who order the slaughter of millions of innocent people, yet never take responsibility, and never pay any consequences for what they have done. Instead, they are handsomely rewarded for their butchery. That is the world that we live in. That is the world that we have created for ourselves.

But why do these monsters get away with what we all know they have done?

Because they are Gods, and we mortals must never question the wisdom of the Gods. Expose their crimes and you better pack your suitcase to Russia or to the Ecuadorian embassy, because the Gods will not tolerate mere mortals exposing their crimes to the sleeping, statist God worshipping masses.

That is the truth, like it or not. If you don’t like it, then do something about it. And remember. You cannot break down a wall by joining it.

Green Lanterns Corps #31 has the narrative to back-up its strong moral centre. Things are explained, the story is advanced, a mysterious lady makes an appearance and the elusive White Lantern is built up, and made to look like a huge, exciting deal. This is really good stuff. The villains have been fleshed out, the story has been explained in satisfactory detail and there’s plenty of action for those who just enjoy the fisticuffs.

Act 1, Part 3 of the arc finishes it’s lap with an impressive sprint, baton in hand, ready to hand it over to the next runner.

Green Lantern- New Guardians #35 is out next Wednesday 15th October 2014.

Get it.

If it’s anywhere near as enjoyable as Green Lantern Corps #35 it’s going to be a pretty bloody good book.


Rating: 8.5/10


What is the ‘No harm principle?’ Start here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRgoE5G_OJM