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Thursday, March 20, 2008

Fangirl Thursdays


I finally removed When Fangirls Attack off my feed and blogroll. I have nothing against people who visit it, and I think if you find it useful or entertaining you should continue to do so. I've been at the receiving end of pretty inexplicably nasty and bitter comments by one half of that team for some time now, and I see no reason to continue to support them. I used to justify keeping them on the blogroll, long past the time when I visited the site on a regular basis, out of the feeling like "well, they're doing this great service for women in comics, and well heck that makes it all okay." But, I think the fact of them being female and writing (or rather, linking to) female topics is not enough for me, based on some sense of "gender unity," to overlook their pettiness.

Perhaps it's my support of their occasional critic Dirk Deppey that soured them; to which I say that, despite the fact that Dirk has disagreed with some of my opinions (and has even been quite snarky with me on occasion), he has never addressed me with the sort of personal attacks that I have experienced from Ragnell at WFA. With Dirk, it's just commentary and different points of view. With Ragnell, there seems to be this bitter and bitchy edge that has finally made me decide to keep WFA at arm's length.

I stopped reading WFA a while ago, around the time I discovered Journalista existed. Between Journalista, JK Parkin's & Kevin Melrose's work on Blog@Newsarama, Tom Spurgeon's news round-ups, and the occasional Beat update, I'm pretty set for my comics news for the day. (though just to clarify, I do read a variety of blogs for commentary & reviews. I also read Comic Mix, but more for the columns).

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As for Kevin Church's bizarre and adamant objections to, of all things, a post on search engine optimization (as if two posts on that subject cannot exist at the same time or teh internets blow up), I am content to believe this is his version of an Andy Kaufman routine, and leave it at that.

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The Spoiler Train:

RE: Last page of Captain America #36 --D'oh! D'oh! D'oh! D'oh! Do'h! D'oh D'oh! D'oh!
However, since it's Ed Brubaker, I'm sure he has some twist on the whole thing that will exceed expectations and make it worthwhile.

RE: Last page of Avengers: The Initiative #10 --I know at least one really happy camper who jazzed off that reveal :-)
Now, can we have this New Old New Warriors team go up against that New New Warriors team and clean house?

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You know who wins from having Bendis on both Avengers books? Dan Slott.

I know so many readers who don't follow the Bendis Avengers but will read The Initiative.

I know a bunch of readers who don't even follow Marvel's superhero comics but follow The Initiative.

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The upcoming Speed Racer movie is either going to be really really awesome or extremely sucky. It's tricky, because on one hand it's the Wachowski Brothers, so there is that expectation. On the other hand, it seems, by viewing the trailer, rather high-concept -- and high-concept, I have found, either goes really really awesome or really really terrible. Whereas sheer mediocrity, as in the case with the Scooby Doo or Garfield film outings, will almost guarantee you a two-picture deal.

Also saw the Hulk movie trailer. Loved everything up to that gloppy Abomination. The big fight scene between Hulk & Abomination at the end of the trailer looked kinda cartoony. I've heard they still have F/X to put into the final film, so maybe it will look better. If not, it's all sort of resting on Edward Norton's shoulders. I'm sorry, every time I see him in the trailer talking about how he has this other personality, I think Fight Club. A YouTube video mash-up between the two seems inevitable.

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This flyer for a Christian church, found on Scans Daily, takes a page from comix (and Frank Miller?), I believe...
You know, I remember when we got that cover for "Dark Knight 2" in the office. Somebody remarked that it was like Frank Miller plunked his hand down on the bristol board, traced it, and picked up his check. Some of us were pretty disappointed; and as you can imagine, that was only the beginning. (though the stack of concept drawings he did at the beginning were really nice)

15 comments:

  1. In re: the hand covers - aren't both images derivative of Jack Kirby's famous image of Darkseid's hand?

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  2. I think the whole motif of the fist in general is probably influenced by old political posters (I'm guessing, just based on memory)

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  3. Loved that last page reveal of Initiative too and even posted on it yesterday - so make that two happy campers!

    As for Cap - its not the first time the Skull has been down a road like this. He used to live in one of those (er, did that make non spoilery sense?)

    As for WFA, while I like one half of that team the other half I don't have much time for. C'est la vie.

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  4. Damn, damn, damn! I hate when my online friends fight! I hope you and Lisa Fortuner have a chance to talk things out sometime in person. I have nothing but respect for the both of you.

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  5. I can't agree more on speed racer, it's going to be the bomb or a huge bomb. No middle groud there. One quick correction I believe the Wachowski Brothers now refer to themselves as the Wachowskis because one of them is undergoing gender reassignment.

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  6. Re: The Hand Covers - Standard revolution posters is what they are. :)

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  7. Anonymous2:19 PM

    "...there seems to be this bitter and bitchy edge that has finally made me decide to keep WFA at arm's length."

    This is where someone would no doubt take you to task for using the term "bitchy" in relation to female bloggers, especially in your official role (though this is a personal site).

    Not me, mind you. If that's the word that you chose then I figure that it's the word that you meant. ^_^

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  8. "using the term "bitchy""

    -- I think at least "bitchy" has a certain degree of charm to it. I could have used the word "vicious." :-D

    I also think men can, on occasion, act "bitchy." I saw it more as a style of attack than a gender thing.

    As far as personal vs. Friends of Lulu president roles are concerned... I don't see me being a president of a woman's organization as reason for me to just sit down and take abuse from other women.

    Certainly, if we do a listing of female bloggers for reference, or a narrative of the history of feminism within comics, they would be listed. But personally, as a blogger, I can choose to respond to public attacks on me by saying: "no, this is not ok; you have the right to your opinions, but I have the right not to link to you or read your blog." I think it's fair.

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  9. Since I have my own bias regarding the whole mess, I'll just say I'm sorry to hear about your decision regarding WFA, but I respect your reasons.

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  10. I was pretty stoked about the end of the Initiative too--the New New Warriors have been kind of a drag lately, and this dust-up would be pretty rad. And if it makes Firestar come out of retirement, it will make my fiance's year.

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  11. The Cap thing's happened en masse in the Marvel Knights run, and it wasn't just limited to Cap. I'm not sure how canon that was supposed to be, and it might've even been in an issue penned by Chuck "comics bogeyman" Austen.

    I get the impression that the Civil War reveal isn't going to change things. I mean, it's real hard to say that the kids aren't getting things together and trying to do good. The greater good in this instance is mind-wiping an insane clone. The New Warriors, meanwhile, have that clown who beat Gauntlet into a coma for no better reason than he couldn't accept that what Gauntlet was saying was true. Penance, ridiculous as he is, is the only one who's actually accepting responsibility and trying to do something about it, misguided as it might be. Rage, clown, purple guy who recruited MIA all seem to just be putting their fingers in their ears and saying "la la la la I can't hear you New Warriors aren't at fault for anything la la la la." or "it's okay because see, this one time, like, Hulk destroyed a city or the Avengers got in a big fight and buildings got destroyed!" which seems to miss the point.

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  12. Andrew, more along the lines of the New Warriors did ONE mistake (that wasn't their fault, it was Nitro's) and suddenly their entire history is bonk and they've been idiots forever. When comparisons are made to the Hulk or Iron Man or anyone else doing collateral damage, it's to point out hypocrisy.

    Hey Val, how about the last-page reveal in the latest Robin? ^_~

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  13. $5 says the 'bubble cap' is the Grand Director.

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  14. You know, it's weird, but I used to read WFA all the time too, but found that I ended up better informed and less confused just reading you instead. I didn't even know there was a conflict between y'all.

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  15. I am convinced that SPEED RACER will be awesome. Nothing can shake my faith in this.
    I believe.
    I must believe.

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