A-KON 25 Cosplay Pictures - Part One

Captain Planet and a Planeteer.


Lara Croft from Tomb Raider and Samus from Metroid.


Vega from Street Fighter.


Tina and Bob from Bob's Burgers.


Violent Lavender as Playboy Bunny Poison Ivy.
Big Ass Dice provided by Big Ass Dice.


Kinetic Ash as Playboy Bunny Harley Quinn.
Big Ass Dice provided by Big Ass Dice.


Classic Bane.


Kitana from Mortal Kombat


Superman Freddie Mercury


Static Shock.


John Constantine.


Anna and Elsa from Frozen as Hogwarts Students.


Mia Moore as Daenerys Tagaryen from A Game Of Thrones


Lara Croft


Superman

A Shock To Your System - Static Fan Film

SOURCE: Static Shock: Blackout

 

A trailer for this student-made fan movie hit the Internet a few months ago.  For a budget of $5000, it looks pretty solid and is a lot truer to the spirit of the original Dwayne McDuffie comics that the recent Static Shock comic wound up being post-Rozum.  Give it a look-see here, then check out their page. 

DC Comics: Six Books Out, Six Books In - My Thoughts

SOURCE: Six DC Comics Canceled But Six New Titles Are Planned To Keep The Magic 52 Number

Word is that the characters from the canceled series will be popping up in other titles, so not all is lost. Let's count them down.

THE CANCELED

Blackhawks - Unsurprising. The artwork was lackluster and the concept was basically G.I. Joe for adults. Problem is, most of the fans of that sort of book were buying the much more adult official G.I. Joe comic series.

Mister Terrific - This one hits me hard. I honestly enjoyed this series, though apparently I was one of the few who did. I think the series was just starting to find it's footing and needed a little more time to find an audience. Maybe the multi-dimensional storyline will get resolved in time for Michael Holt to find a place in the new Earth 2 title? We can only hope.

OMAC - Another good series aimed at a limited niche. I guess there weren't enough Jack Kirby fans willing to shell out three clams a month for a tribute book.

Men At War - Again, it was a good series for what it was. But there wasn't enough appeal to make it sell to the majority of comic readers who don't typically like war comics.

Static Shock- Unfortunate, but predictable. John Rozum leaving the book early on worried many long-time Milestone fans and Scott McDaniel - while a skilled artist - is relatively untested as a writer. Throw in the fact that the book opened mid-stream, with plot threads from previous Static comics going unexplained (such as why Virgil's older sister now had a clone) despite the series being meant to be a jumping on point for new readers, and it's not hard to see why this one failed to find an audience.

Hawk And Dove - Perhaps the least surprising cancelation of all, given poor reviews and the widespread hatred of Rob Liefeld among the comic-reading mainstream. The one thing this book had going for it was Sterling Gates' scripts. When Gates jumped ship, it was just a matter of time.

THE NEW BLOOD

BATMAN INCORPORATED – Writer: Grant Morrison. Artist: Chris Burnham.

The acclaimed ongoing writer of ACTION COMICS, Grant Morrison, presents a fresh take on BATMAN INCORPORATED, in which the Batman brand is franchised globally in preparation for a major international threat.

Despite generally enjoying Morrison's work, I'm not a big fan of the Batman Inc. concept. And do we really need another Batman book at this point? Still, this has been in the works for a while and I'm sure it will sell well.


EARTH 2 – Writer: James Robinson. Artist: Nicola Scott.

The greatest heroes on a parallel Earth, the Justice Society combats threats that will set them on a collision course with other worlds.

This series has also been in the planning stages for a while and I've been looking forward to it for several reasons. My fondness of Robinson's work is well-known but I also loved Nicola Scott's work on Birds of Prey and Secret Six. Putting Robinson in charge of the Earth 2/Golden Age heroes makes perfect sense given his track record with them and Scott's style will be well suited to such a title. A definite must see once it comes out.


WORLDS’ FINEST – Writer: Paul Levitz. Artists: George Perez and Kevin Maguire.

Stranded on our world from a parallel reality, Huntress and Power Girl struggle to find their way back to Earth 2. Perez and Maguire will be the artists on alternating story arcs.

Levitz work is hit and miss with me. His Legion work is largely inaccesible to me but I have enjoyed his Huntress mini-series. Despite this, having either Perez or Maguire on art duties would tip the scales in favor of me giving this book a shot. Having both of them clinched it. Can't wait to see this one.


DIAL H – Writer: China Miéville. Artist: Mateus Santoluoco.

The first ongoing series from acclaimed novelist China Miéville, this is a bold new take on a cult classic concept about the psychological effects on an everyman who accidentally gains powers to become a hero.

Unless this gets particularly rave reviews, I'll probably pass on this one personally. I've never been a big fan of the H-Dial concept. I'm not familiar with Miéville's work. And Mateus Santoluoco's artwork looks far too dark and dirty for my tastes though well-suited toward a psychological tale.


G.I. COMBAT – Writer: J.T. Krul. Artist: Ariel Olivetti.

Featuring the return of a classic DC Comics series, THE WAR THAT TIME FORGOT, along with rotating back-up stories and creative teams – including THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER, with writers Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti and artist Dan Panosian; and THE HAUNTED TANK, with writer John Arcudi and artist Scott Kolins.

Cancelling one war book to publish another? Even with Gray and Palmiotti doing a back-up, I'm having a hard time working up an interest.

THE RAVAGERS – Writer: Howard Mackie. Artist: Ian Churchill.

Spinning off from TEEN TITANS and SUPERBOY, this series finds four superpowered teens on the run and fighting against the organization that wants to turn them into supervillains.

Hey kids! Is Scott Lobdell's Teen Titans not angsty enough for your liking? Have we got a book for you!

Ignoring that the concept sounds like a blatant rip-off of Marvel's Runaways, there's still the matter of the creative team. Howard Mackie, lest we forget, was the writer of most of the Spider-Man Clone Saga. Ian Churchill is the poor man's Michael Turner, who was responsible for putting Supergirl into a stripper version of her own costume back when Jeph Loeb was writing her book.

Three words. DO. NOT. WANT.

52 Pick-Up - Week One

Since my recent Internet outage has left me somewhat behind, I've opted to do something akin to the old Fast Thoughts reviews from my old blog regarding all of the new DC Universe books I was trying again after the first month of 52 new #1s.

Welcome to the first installment of 52 Pick-Up.


ACTION COMICS #2 - Captured by Lex Luthor and General Lane, Superman must endure some horrific tortures as he bides his time waiting for an opportunity to escape. Morrison and Morales continue give us the best Superman comic in recent memory as they reestablish the key elements of the Superman mythos. We see our first appearance of John Henry Irons and John Corben (a.k.a. The Man Who Will Be Metallo) and what I think is the first appearance of Brainiac in this new reality. But Morrison still finds ways to bring something new into the mix, not only giving us a plausable-sounding scientific explanation for how Superman's heat vision would work (i.e. focused microwaves) but finding new uses for Superman's powers, such as using his microwave vision to scramble electronics. Highly recommended.


GREEN ARROW #2 - Concerned about Green Arrow's success in taking out their party pals, a group of celebrity supervillains make plans to draw out the Emerald Archer. We get a lot character scenes this time around, watching Ollie go through a typical workday. Not surprisingly this involves as little "work" as possible, opening with him playing basketball with the local star athlete, meeting with his personal assistant briefly to bump back as many appointments as possible and then heading to the lab to test-drive the new trick arrows. Still an enjoyable book, with plenty of action in the beginning and end. And bonus - the last page promises we'll see Black Canary next issue!


STATIC SHOCK #2 - Recovered from his apparent injury at the end of last issue, Virgil is as shocked that his powers apparently let him reattach a severed limb as we are, figuring that the only thing that saved him was his attacker using an atom-thick blade that cut so neatly his electrical powers automatically fused the flesh back together. While this is a cool explanation that cements just how powerful Virgil is, it still seems like a total cheat. There's still no explanation for why Static has two sisters now, though we do find out that one of them is a clone of the other and that Virgil feels responsible for it... somehow. This book is stumbling a bit but the action scenes are still great, though McDaniel's pencils are getting a little sloppy on the long-shots. I may give this one another issue but this may be moving to "Wait For The Trade" status.

Static Shock #1 - A Review

I never met Dwayne McDuffie. I never even got the chance to talk to him on-line before his sudden death earlier this year, which is a shame because I always liked him as a writer and I suspect – from what I saw of his personal writings – that I would have liked him as a friend. He was outspoken, opinionated and he upset a lot of people by opening his mouth when it probably would have been easier to keep quiet.

Small wonder I identify with that, right?

I bring this up because I couldn’t help but think about Dwayne McDuffie as I was reading this first issue of Static Shock and wondering how he’d feel about it. I believe this is the first time anyone has produced something with the character without McDuffie’s involvement. I’ve read a few of the original McDuffie’s original Static comics and I also wondered how this book might read to those who only know the character from the Static Shock cartoon.

Thankfully, the book is quick to establish the character of Virgil Hawkins a.k.a. Static – who he is, what his powers are and his “I put the smart in smart ass” personality. So it doesn’t matter if you’re an old fan, a new fan, a fan who only read the comics or a fan that only saw the cartoon. Within two pages, we know everything we need to know and the action is on!

Scott McDaniel is a natural for the illustration duties on this title. Looking over his resume, I’m surprised to see that this is the first time he’s done the art for a comic book centering upon a super-powered protagonist. McDaniel is famous for his work on Nightwing and Green Arrow but his style – which I’ve always thought of as living graffiti – is perfect for a high-energy character like Static.

I believe this also marks the first time McDaniel has officially done double-duty as artist and storyteller. Joining him on the writing duties is John Rozum, who is no stranger to the original Milestone Comics universe, having created the characters Xombi and Kobalt as well as writing several issues of Hardware. Fitting, as Hardware himself is reintroduced in this title as Static’s mentor and the figure responsible for moving Virgil and his family from Dakota to New York City.

Reading this title, it’s hard not to be reminded of Stan Lee’s work on Spider-Man. Virgil is Peter Parker’s spiritual successor, possessing the smarts to go with his smart-mouth. The fight with the plasma-wielding villain Sunspot – which takes up most of the issue – showcases how Virgil uses his knowledge of science in combination with his superpowers to bring bad guys to heel. I wouldn’t go so far as to say this book is educational (mainly because I want to encourage teenagers to read it) but I could see it encouraging some young readers’ interest in science.

Regardless, I think Dwayne McDuffie would approve of this book. I know I do. And I’ll be back to see the result of what is – bar none – the most shocking splash-page of the year. No electricity-related pun intended.