Smile Time

Last day of November. Perfect time to kick of a new Untrue Tale, wouldn't you say?

This is kind of a dark one, so stock up on the Prozac and remember to....

Keep Smiling

This week I picked up the collection of James Robinson's Complete Wildcats.
























This is mostly of interest to me for the early Travis Charest artwork in the first few issues collected. It's interesting to see his humble beginnings as an Image artist in the Jim Lee/Whilce Portacio vein. That cover's by him. You can hardly tell, huh? The art here is very Image-y indeed but you can certainly see hints of the greatness to come. As a stand-alone collection the book is pretty hit or miss. There's hardly a complete story to be found. Lots of cliffhangers that are wrapped up in crossovers that aren't part of this collection. Kind of makes me want to track down Wildstorm Rising and Fire from Heaven for that matter since that ties in to the Alan Moore run that precipitated me picking up this collection in the first place. Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure those are long out of print (and I'm not sure if Fire from Heaven was ever even collected). Anyway, I found it interesting and the stories included were perfectly fine, but I can't really recommend it since it doesn't really hang together as a whole. Some very nice art by Barry Windsor-Smith for one issue though. If you're really hankering for some Wildcats action, I do recommend the Alan Moore collection since it tells a complete story. Wildly uneven art though. The Charest stuff in the beginning kind of spoils you for the pretty pedestrian art that follows. I'm thinking I might have to pick up the Alan Moore Wild Worlds Collection that collects up a bunch of his Wildstorm odds and ends. Even though I hear it mostly kind of sucks.

Saw a couple of movies this week. Terminator Salvation was an utter piece of crap. Astonishingly bad really. I'd heard it got pretty poor reviews, but so did Terminator 3 and I still managed to get some solid enjoyment out of that one. But this one was really just joyless. Christian Bale shouts his way through a completely charisma-free performance. And the story makes no sense from top to bottom. The only bright spots are a 30 second cameo from CGI Arnold and a nice turn by Chekov as Kyle Reese. He almost seems to channel Michael Biehn in a couple scenes. I read an interesting article as to just why the movie turned out so bad. It boils down to McG being so desperate to land Christian Bale that he's willing to tie the script into ridiculous knots so Bale can play John Connor - a character that barely appears in the original screenplay. Then, rather than starting from scratch with a new script focusing on Connor, apparently they started shooting the original idea and just added more John Connor scenes on the fly while scaling back the screentime of Kyle Reese and the other Terminator guy who were supposed to be the main focus. It's an interesting article. You can read the whole thing here.

The other thing I saw was Zombieland. I would call it pretty good. It starts off spectacularly then kind of peters out after awhile. Woody Harrelson is great. That kid that acts an awful lot like Michael Cera is fine. The girls lean more toward annoying than cute. And there's a pretty cool cameo that you've probably already heard about. Worth a rental at any rate.

Okay, here's a sketch.
























Seeya next week....

All Cleaned Up

Good day!

The big wrap up:

Karen Comes Clean page 18

That about does it for Karen this go 'round. Hope you liked her. She may pop up again down the road.

Brand new tale starts up next Sunday without delay. Bleak it is. Dark it be. And furry.

So I finished up Richard Price's latest this week - Lush Life.
























It's fantastic. Ostensibly a crime novel, it's more a snapshot of life among the mix of hipsters, immigrants and poor blacks and latinos of New York's lower east side. Every character is vividly drawn. Price gets in the heads of the cops, the victims, the perpetrators, the bystanders and the families of all involved in the shooting of a young bartender downtown. Price writes dialogue like no other and the city itself is maybe the most interesting character in a book full of compellingly flawed individuals. Not to be missed.

Took the lady to see the new Coen bros A Serious Man.
























We both liked it. A tad slow and epically frustrating, but that's kind of the point. It's about a Jewish guy in 60's Michigan who leads a Job-like existence. You watch the guy squirm as the miseries stack up and you squirm and twist in your seat right along with him. Those Coen guys know just what their doing and they tease the audience with a catharsis that never comes. It's funny and tragic and ultimately unsatisfying, but like I said, that's the whole point. Not a pleasant evening at the cinema really, but a worthwhile one. Also, the Coen's go for another of those non-ending endings like in No Country for Old Men. It kind of fits here, but it also kinda feels like it's starting to become a thing. Next movie I would like a proper ending please.

Gotta ton of stuff going on these days. Lots of projects bouncing around in various stages of completion. A few I'm really quite excited about. Chimps, chameleons, convicts, clones, cthulu, cops with attitude and creatures of the night. I guess I must have a yen for things that begin with "C".

Sketch o' the week:























Have it good!

Almost Clean

Good Monday. Nearly at the wrap-up of the latest Untrue Tale. Here's the second to last bit of bidness:

Karen Comes Clean page 17

Still working on a couple of books. One in particular that's reeeeeally good. Review next week.

Saw a few movies this week. The Johnny Depp/Christian Bale Public Enemies put me right to sleep. Whoda thunk John Dillinger could be sooooo boring? What a snooze.

The Brothers Bloom, with the guy with the nose from The Pianist and that other guy from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind who isn't Jim Carrey, was a pretty good if rather predictable con-man piece. WOrth a rental I'd say.

Best of the week was Funny People, the latest Judd Apatow thing with Adam Sandler.
























I think I recall this one getting pretty tepid reviews but I quite liked it. I like Sandler. And I like him even just a little bit more when he gets to be somewhat serious. This is no Punchdrunk Love (which is genius on rye and if you haven't seen it well you should run right out and watch it) but it's still darn entertaining. Seth Rogen and Jonah Hill and Jason Schwartzmann and Apatow's wife and the girl from Parks and Recreation who isn't the chick from Saturday Night Live or Quincy Jones' daughter are also in it. And they're all dandy. Eric Bana also pops up and finally gets to use his Australian accent. Not as uproariously hilarious as 40 Year Old Virgin or Knocked Up, Funny People is still pretty funny. Recommended.

Okay I'm out.

Sketchy:
























Bye!

Not quite Clean yet

Here we are again. Another not-so-lovely November Monday.

Here's your weekly dose of Untrue Tales:

Karen Comes Clean page 16

Didn't finish any novels this week, but I did burn through the latest X-Factor collection. A Secret Invasion tie-in by Peter David and Larry Stroman.















I've been enjoying the David's latest iteration of X-Factor. It's the only X-book I read nowadays (other than Astonishing X-Men but I'm still waiting for the trade paperback of Ellis' run). I really tried to get into Brubaker and Fraction's stuff but it's really just left me cold despite my manlove for all things Brubaker. I think he does better with more street level stories than over-the-top superhero action. It's too bad, 'cause I really love the X-Men but I just haven't dug too many of the stories in recent years other than Morrison's and Whedon's stuff. Guess I'm turning into an old fart.

But back to X-Factor. I've really enjoyed this book. I enjoy David's characterization and the fact that X-Factor has operated mostly in its own little corner of the Marvel universe, telling stories without being too terribly affected by larger events while still acknowleding them and running with some of the interesting plot threads left over from House of M. However, it's suffered a bit of late by having some key characters like Rahne the werewolf shunted off into other books by editorial mandate. And this latest collection that ties in to Secret Invasion was just plain ol' crappy. I liked the larger Secret Invasion event, but this story seemed like your standard going through the motions tie-in. She-Hulk pops up, pretty much simply 'cause David writes that book too. And I really didn't care for Stroman's art. To my eyes it was just plain ugly. It really broke with the sort of noirish style that the book's artists have held to more or less up to this point. Oh well. I'll give X-Factor one more chance when the next collection comes out, but it might have run its course for me.

On the movie side, I saw a couple of good ones and one awful one.

Drag Me to Hell is Sam Raimi's return to the horror genre that kicked off his career and he doesn't disappoint.
























Seriously funny, seriously creepy, seriously gross. Alison Lohman does great work as the bank exec cursed by an old gypsy woman for foreclosing on her house. She is called upon to do some seriously gross stuff in the call of her actorly duties. Seems like every other scene some nasty goo or icky bug or toothless old woman's tongue is going into poor Alison's mouth. Ugh. Good scary stuff. You'll know where the whole thing is going pretty much from beginning to end, but it's a fun nasty ride anyhow. Stay far the fuck away if you're the least bit squeamish though. Goo galore.

(500) Days of Summer is a dandy romantic comedy that puts a nice little spin on the old conventions.
























The guy from Third Rock from the Sun is awkwardly charming. Zooey Deschanel is awfully cute. The movie skids back and forth through time and is vaguely reminiscent of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless mind without really coming anywhere near the brilliance of that movie. It's perfectly fine though. Worth a rental to watch with a girl you like.

Sunday nights at my house is crappy romantic comedy night and this week my girl and I saw one of the crappiest: The Ugly Truth with the chick from Knocked Up and King Leonidas. This was really really terrible and makes you wonder if the actors were embarrassed to be in it. I vaguely recall the Grey's Anatomy chick complaining that Knocked Up portrayed women badly, but in this movie she plays such a complete shrewish bimbo that it boggles the mind. It's really the most unbelievably chauvinst caricature of an uptight neurotic career-gal that I've ever seen. Of course she has to learn how to loosen up from the King of Sparta playing a piggish shock jock who tells her she needs to spend more time "flicking her bean" and buys her vibrating underpants. The King needs to be more choosy in his movie choices. More Guy Richie less by-the-numbers "romance" please. Another weird thing about this movie - a bunch of fairly well known actors appear just to say one line or two of absolutely no importance and are then never seen again. Like the short guy from Entourage and the guy from that Aaron Sorkin show who's the brother of that guy who used to be on the Daily Show. Okay, maybe they're not that well-known, but still, what was it about this script that made all these people agree to be in this movie? 'Cause it's an ugly pile of shit. And that's the truth. Really, it's even worse than that awful bit of wordplay I just did there.

Okay, here's a sketch:
























And I'm out.

Clean November

And then it was November. Hope everybody had a hap-hap-happy Halloween. My plastic pumpkin was filled to the brim with the hangover of the century. It was quite a party.

Here's a new Untrue Tales page to kick off November:

Karen Comes Clean page 15

So, this week I read The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett.
























This was a goody. It's a classic private eye yarn featuring Nick and Nora Charles the crimefighting couple that would go on to be featured in a series of films although Hammet only wrote the one book about them (it was also the last book he wrote about anything, as it happens). Lots of snappy dialogue and cool characters and a very cool central mystery. It's interesting to read old-timey noir novels like this one from the thirties just for the evolution of language. It still feels pretty contemporary, but at one point Nora Charles has to ask her husband to explain what a "junkie" is. He tells her it's another word for "hophead" which clears everything up. It's also funny that Charles and his wife spend the lion's share of the short book waking up at noon and drinking their breakfast. They basically party their way through the mystery. Nick has a drink with practically every one he meets. But it's never presented as a problem. Nick doesn't even really seem particularly "hardboiled". He and his wife are just mostly merrily wasted through the whole thing. Funny.

Also finally saw Up this weekend. I wept like a schoolgirl through the first ten minutes where they show the life of the main guy with his wife. I'm a sentimental sucker for that kind of stuff.
The rest of the movie I thought was just okay. I liked everything well enough until they got to the jungle and the whole plot with the old explorer guy kicked into gear. I found all that chasing and running around kind of boring. I liked the one dog. I vastly preffered Wall-E and Monsters vs. Aliens to this one though.

Okeydokes, that's it for now. Here's a sketch:























Have a happy November!