What the Caped Crusader Did for Videogames

Today's guest post comes from fellow GameCola staff writer Daniel Castro, who has successfully captured two of our favorite topics on this blog: videogames and Batman. And it's actually more relevant to modern society than most of the games we talk about! Note that this post uses slightly stronger language than you might be used to seeing here, so feel free to put the kiddos to bed before proceeding.

 

Possibly many of you already know this, but I’ll say it again, the latest Batman games developed by Rocksteady are truly awesome. For those still unaware of this, you don’t have to take my word for granted, there are plenty reviews over the ‘net, and most of them will tell you just that.

But still, every now and then I get to talk about videogames with some of my students. Everyone has played Battlefield or Call of Duty, and the conversation always veers toward the latest Halo, Grand Theft Auto, or whichever other sequel is coming out this year, but anytime I mention Batman: Arkham Asylum/City, I always hear the same old, “I’ve heard it’s great, but I haven’t tried it yet.”

Part of the blame is probably this multiplayer-obsessed era of gaming we’re currently living in (we can discuss that later), but still I know there’s a lot of people not trying any of these games just because they're based on a superhero character, and licensed games have a tendency for sucking.

And while both Batman: Arkham Asylum and Batman: Arkham City aren’t exactly underrated or unappreciated, I still want to talk about the things these games do great, because I consider them to be a great contribution to this gaming generation, and they’re already influencing the way some games are shaping up to be.

A licensed game done right

Since the early days of videogames, licensed titles have mostly sucked, and those based on a superhero license have been some of the worst offenders. This seems almost a general rule, since licensed games are commonly rushed and underdeveloped in order to meet an irrational deadline.

I can see why there are still some people not trying Arkham Asylum/City; many of them must have grown skeptical about superhero games; I know I did, and I know that I was a hell of a lot more skeptical the first time I tried Batman: Arkham Asylum.

And thanks to you, guys.

Batman: Arkham Asylum wasn’t being developed in order to be released during the hype surrounding the newest blockbuster movie; it was created and conceived in order to serve as Rocksteady’s interpretation on how a Batman game should be experienced. Speaking of which…

A game done right

Rocksteady actually worked their minds to create these titles; as the game industry is actually going, they could’ve just reskinned the game on top of something already made. While it takes some obvious inspiration from other games and genres, the final result feels like a game utterly different from anything this generation has thrown at us.

It just doesn’t look and sound awesome; way more importantly, it plays awesome, and that’s the part where these games really stand out.

I hate to say it this bluntly, but they did everything right! While the game is focused to be played in a stealthy approach, it also gives you freedom to tackle every situation any in way you want, and it works that way too!

That’s my biggest issue concerning sneaky games, like Splinter Cell, Tenchu or the previous Hitman titles; they play perfectly while you remain undetected, but the games utterly break down the moment you’re caught; then is when you realize every single fault their control scheme has.

But it doesn’t go that way for Batman. In fact, your enemies eventually will realize they’re being pinned down and will react accordingly, growing more desperate as their numbers start growing thin.

And when you have to fight your enemies in a face-to-face situation, the game actually feels more awesome. I can’t help but admit that the combat mechanics in these titles are the thing that really got me all over them. I can play these fights over and over and still amaze myself of all the crazy stunts Batman is capable of doing in order to beat an always more numerous foe.

By the way, it brings me odd memories of the old Adam West’s series.

An exclusive plot for the game

Now this is the thing that truly marks how different the Arkham games are compared to the rest of the crowd. Every superhero game being made has always been tied in to the events of the newest movie or loosely based on another publication.

Rocksteady’s take on the Batman franchise tells a story that, while based on the lore of the series, is also not afraid to create and go further than any videogame ever has. Up until now, every superhero game has played safe and sticks really close to the material it tries to represent. But after the events of Arkham City, we all know that these games just don’t walk the same way; they have the nerve of killing some major characters of the series, creating a whole new continuity exclusive to videogames.

Do the Batman!

Maybe I’m getting ahead of myself, and maybe time will prove me right or wrong, but I’ll say it anyway: I think Batman: Arkham Asylum has created a new milestone in videogames, the same way Ocarina of Time did for adventure games and Halo: Combat Evolved did for first-person shooters.

Batman: Arkham Asylum has set a new standard for new games to come; superhero games especially are trying to be like Batman, and you can’t really blame them… I mean, who wouldn’t want to be The Batman?!

The comparison bar is now higher than ever before, new superhero games can’t stumble into our consoles and expect to make a dent into the industry now that Old Bats has shown everyone how it’s done.

Captain America: Super Soldier and The Amazing Spider-Man games feel heavily influenced by Batman’s fighting and general gameplay; they’re both not that good, but they’re not as bad as superhero games usually are, their main flaw remain being tied-up to the newest movie and rushed in order to meet a crippling deadline.

Now here we are, while there is a Deadpool movie in the works booked for a still unspecified release date on 2014, next year there’ll be a Deadpool game hopefully not tied-in to the movie, but being crafted only because someone had the great idea that the character deserves to live on videogame glory, and people are possibly working on a plot and a gameplay tailored specifically for the “merc with a mouth.”

I know that trailers are not always accurate... but so far, it looks awesome.

Of course, the game that I’m really waiting for next year is the sequel to Batman: Arkham City, because this game not only had a lot of momentum going on its own, but it managed to let us know that it wasn’t quite the end of the story; if you’ve investigated enough into Arkham’s world, you’ll know there’s something huge coming to Gotham.

See you next year, you creepy bastard.

Regressive Progress and the Crisis of Communication

I've been observing two trends recently that are causing me to become more of a curmudgeonly hermit than I already am. The first trend is one that's been going on for years, but I feel has really snowballed in the last two or so: a shift to a culture driven--not aided--by technology. The second trend is one I've only started to feel in the past few months: a shift toward a culture of mass outrage and mass hysteria over any kind of news--good, bad, or otherwise--frequently spearheaded by informed citizens.

I had an idea for a short story the other day where a grandfather is explaining to his grandson why everyone from the older generation is so hunched over: they had all been enslaved, and their backs have become permanently bent from the positions their bodies had been in for decades. At the end of the story, the grand twist was to be that the grandfather hands the kid an ancient iPhone or BlackBerry, telling him something like, "This is what slavery looked like to us." We have become a culture not aided by our devices, but ruled by them.

It was, what, the 1950s or so when dishwashers and vacuum cleaners first arrived? I'm no historian, but everything I've read and seen about technology from the postwar years was that the United States, at least, enjoyed a few decades of increased domestic prosperity and happiness thanks to machines that made work easier, or did all the work for us. More time for leisure; less time wasted on chores. The American dream, some might say. A dream that, from my perspective, is twisting more and more into a nightmare.

I followed a link from Facebook recently to a news article about this grand invention that detects when the milk in your refrigerator is about to spoil, notifying you with a light-up display and via text message. Thank goodness for that; I've always found the expiration date on the bottle to be so hard to read. I realize we've had inventions like this for decades, but something about this one in particular caused me to pause and sigh at the state of technology in our world, or at least this country. We are creating devices that improve the quality of life by consuming more time and money than we can save without these devices.

Time and money are two things I have been especially aware of in the year and a half since I proposed to the woman who is now my wife. Weddings cost money. Planning takes time. Maintaining a home costs money. Working the job to support it takes time. Spending an evening or weekend with friends and a now-expanded family involves both time and money, whether it's gas money or snacks for your D&D session. Making YouTube videos and writing posts and articles is free, but the equipment costs money, as do the forms of entertainment that inspire the content, and the time investment to see a project through to completion can be considerable.

As the administrator of GameCola.net's official YouTube channel, and as a staff writer and editor for the main site, I feel it's my responsibility (and joy) to keep up with everything my comrades post. I've been finding time to catch up on a video playthrough of Phoenix Wright: Trials and Tribulations, and was stunned to discover that the last episode in a five-episode video series contains over eight hours of video footage.

In the time it takes me to watch that one episode, I could finish off an entire anime series. And when I start thinking that way about something that only takes a handful of hours, I begin to see entire months of my life disappear when I think about following through on my crazy plan to watch through the 35 years of Saturday Night Live that are available on Netflix. This is something I'm doing both for my own enjoyment and--as with any of the crazy plans I undertake anymore--so that I can share and discuss the experience with others...but it's staggering to think of how many 15-minute YouTube videos I could make in that same amount of time. (At the current rate of recording, about three.)

Even though the dilemma of what to do with my free time is shaped in no small part by the technology available to me, Netflix in particular simply makes it easier and cheaper to view the content I want than buying everything on DVD. In my mind, this is what technology is for: that 1950s vision of a more leisurely, more efficient way to live. Virtually everything I see around me today utilizes technology to make things different, and the increasing pace of technological developments--which require money to buy and time to learn--is driving a wedge between me and the rest of the tech-savvy world.

Where lifestyle-changing technology is involved, I don't do different. I do better. I'm more than content to stay on the sidelines while I observe the impact of new technology on the world before I consider jumping on the bandwagon. I did this with online shopping. I did this with texting. I did this with Blu-ray. I did this with Facebook.

I can no longer afford to be a few years behind everyone else and still expect to fit in with the culture of this generation. If I'm more than a few months behind, I'm archaic and out of touch. Things are changing too quickly, and I don't have the time, money, or interest to discover what's truly better until something is forced on me. Unsurprisingly, I'm discovering more and more that better is whatever I had before the forced change. I am a creature of habit, but more than that, I'm only seeing technological solutions to things that were never problems for me. Telephones shortened the distance between people in ways the postal service never could. E-mail opened up an additional means of communication that has many benefits over telephones. Now we've got technology that allows us to share everything we're looking at the press of a button, effectively eliminating the need to communicate at all.

That brings me to the second trend I've noticed: In a world where opinions are expressed with a Like button, we're veering away from meaningful discussions and unleashing our thoughts and feelings on polarizing issues in 140 characters or less. As my wife pointed out, everything good we post about is the best thing ever, and everything bad is the worst thing ever. Whether we're excitedly slapping up a link to this hilarious cat video or heralding the downfall of western civilization with whatever [pick one: Obama, Romney, Chick fil-A] did today, it's increasingly rare to see well-articulated opinions that take the extremist edge off of our concise gut reactions. We blow things out of proportion, or we present our completely rational and justified responses in such a inarticulate or reactionary way that we lose friends who would have at least tolerated us if we'd taken the time to explain ourselves over a cup of tea.

The trouble isn't just on an individual level, though: news travels fast through our social media-oriented culture, and our enthusiasm or outrage over something we post prompts someone else to retweet or repost the same content, adding their own enthusiasm or outrage. Repeat, ad nauseum. Now, instead of one person who's ecstatic or upset, everyone you know is ecstatic or upset. We are now statistics: X number of people think this way about animal testing, while X number of people think that way about it. There may be actual conversations that stem from the initial posts, but a quick skim through your feed tells you who you real friends are. In our solidarity, we have lost our individuality, along with our relative objectivity.

It has been unbearable to be around social media in the wake of the shooting in Aurora, Colorado that left 12 dead and 58 wounded. Unbearable to think about the loss of life, the suffering of the victims and their families, and how something so terrible could happen at all. Unbearable to think about it every hour of every day as new details emerge that encroach upon the personal privacy of the victims. Unbearable to have a flicker of concern about seeing The Dark Knight Rises on opening weekend because "midnight premiere of The Dark Knight Rises" was almost more prominent in the media's first news reports than the shooting itself. Unbearable because, from the perspective of someone who was not following the news and only seeing the headlines and snippets of coverage, the entire tragedy had spiraled into a nationwide Kickstarter campaign for actor Christian Bale to pay a visit to the victims in the hospital.

It seemed to me a surreal cause where the American people could demand the involvement of a celebrity whose only connection to the tragedy--as far as I knew from headlines and the one or two articles I'd read--was that he starred in the movie that was playing at the time. I know there's more to it than that. But my gut reaction to such a horrific event has given way to media fatigue and a sort of irrational indignation over how the whole country seems to be rallying behind a community that lost twelve people, while we remain silent on how, say, suicide is claiming almost eight times that many people a day in the U.S. Without understanding the full story, I'm just looking at the headlines and the numbers and the secondhand information, and forming opinions that make me sound like a bad person if you don't agree, and a worse person if you don't have the context of the rest of this post behind you.

So you can understand why I don't post things like this on Facebook. I couldn't even condense my feelings into a punchy blurb if I tried--but, as my wife points out, a punchy blurb is all we have to catch anyone's attention anymore. By the time you've written a thoughtful response, the Next Big Thing is here, and people have already forgotten what you're talking about. Yet writing brings clarity, and spilling my thoughts out on paper (or the electronic equivalent) allows me to sort through those gut reactions and come to a conclusion about why I feel as I do. Sometimes I need to say the wrong thing before I can get to the heart of why I said it. Sometimes I'm right, and "the wrong thing" is merely an unpopular, but valid, opinion. Sometimes I truly am wrong, which is why the door is always open for a civilized rebuttal.

My heart goes out to the victims in Aurora, and their friends and families. That there has been such a compassionate and supportive response speaks volumes about our culture. That I have mixed feelings about that response has me concerned. My willful ignorance of the full story, and my perception that social media and news media have inadvertently engineered such a massive response by skewing the story to keep Batman in the spotlight, make me worry that I'm becoming cynical in the face of something that clearly demands my sympathy. There's no question that we should care, but I worry that the media has needlessly emphasized the wrong information to draw out our genuine compassion for the right cause.

If someone on the sidelines can feel so conflicted about something so universally clear-cut, it's no wonder the people in the thick of debates about unclear issues such as politics and ethics can be so vitriolic toward those who disagree--they're probably all cynical, because people like me sound like idiots when they're firing off their gut reaction to an issue they're only partially informed about on their way to the hilarious cat video someone posted below you.

I think we'd all be happier if we started having real conversations again with each other, and started using modern technology the way it was meant to be used:

Recreational Thursday

I'd like to use today's post to show off a bit. Also, to showcase some unsung talent.

I met the Fraim Brothers a few years back at the excellent Baltimore Comic Con. They were set up in Artists’ Alley, which is where you’ll find them at a great many conventions throughout the year. Offering up highly detailed commissions at low prices, Brendon and Brian Fraim are definitely artists’ artists.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve purchased several pinups and commissions from the brothers, but the latest one—a recreation of my favorite comic book cover of all time—takes the cake.

It’s a full-on recreation of Batman, issue 227, which was originally drawn by the legendary Neal Adams. Here’s the original comic cover:

As you can see, the Fraims definitely captured the essence of the Adams, which is quite the feat.

You can check out more of the brothers’ work at their website, and you can order your very own Fraim masterpiece right here! 

Writing, Ironically

There’s a strange irony about being paid to write things for a living and not having any time to write things outside of work. As with most things in my life, irony is pretty much old hat for me, so I’ve come to accept the fact that, once I became a “professional” “writer” I pretty much abandoned all outside writing.

Which kinda stinks, because writing about whatever I want to write about is pretty much my favorite thing in the world.

My “off” days are spent writing about the things I couldn’t finish writing on my on-days, so when I finally have a few moments when something’s not due, or something’s not about to be due, I prefer to stare at a wall, blankly.

And, really, is there any other way to stare at a wall? Not for my money, there’s not.

Not for my money.

It’s gotten to the point where things like this happen. See, when I started writing this post, oh, about five minutes ago I’d say, I knew where it was going. The general direction was in place, and I had a beginning, a middle, and an end.

Now, though? Nope. Completely forgot what I was trying to accomplish with this.

So, instead, I’ll link out to a really interesting interview with Grant Morrison about Batman. And how, in Morrison’s words, “Gayness is built into Batman.” Go check it out here. It’s definitely worth a read.

Also, just to chime in on the matter, I completely despise this new Blogger. It's annoying, non-functional, and certainly not user-friendly. Other than that, though? It's a fantastic achievement in...[insert something snarky here].

Exfanding Review: Justice League: Doom

Last week, the latest in the ever-growing line of DC Universe Animated Original Movies was released. I picked it up and, somehow, even managed to watch it.

With these DC releases, there’s usually very little middle ground—I’ve bought a number of them, and it’s been my experience that a title is either quite good or quite bad. Either the movie works, or it doesn’t.

In the case of Justice League: Doom, everything definitely works.

The characters mirror their comic book counterparts nicely, the voice actors are spot-on, and there’s that perfect mix of action, interesting plot, and witty dialogue that is lacking in so many comic book-to-film adaptations.

DC gets that the people buying these DVDs—which are often rated PG-13, by the way—understand who their characters are, and as such, the audience can be thrown right into a story without any background.

And when you’re trying to tell a fast-paced super hero story, any time wasted on pointless introductions only succeeds in sucking the life out of the film’s momentum.

Adapted from the new-classic JLA story “Babel,” Justice League: Doom features the final screenplay written by the late, great Dwayne McDuffie, and it's heavy on both character moments and great action beats.

Doom is the story of what happens when Batman’s JLA contingency plan--a detailed rundown of how The Dark Knight would take down each one of the members of The League in the event they were to go rogue--is stolen by the League’s greatest enemies.

What results is a harrowing example of what can go wrong for the good guys when the bad guys get everything right.

There are legitimate "oh-uh" moments in the flick, and on more than one occasion I just wasn't sure how the good guys would prevail. In a medium where we know the outcome of pretty much every story we're told, that's saying something.

McDuffie, as he'd done so many times in his too-short career, turned in something that was both thought-provoking and punch-you-in-the-face exciting--the perfect balance for a a good, solid super hero story.

So I can say quite loudly that Justice League: Doom receives the Official Exfanding Stamp of Approval.

So you know it's good.

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Happy Friday, everyone!

Best Link Post All Year

I've been staring at this blinking cursor for much too long, trying to figure out what would make for the perfect after-wedding blog post. Nothing came to mind, and I continued to stare away.

And then my brother sent me this link, which includes this photo:
Go on, now. You know you have to follow the link above. It's not as bad as it looks. Actually, it's a pretty cool story.

-- -- -- --

Sorry, folks, that's all you're getting from me today. Oh, stop complaining. Real Time Alex is in a car right now, making his way home from the wedding and (in between getting lost and/or acquiring speeding tickets) he's thinking about that book that's due Monday...

Waiting for Wednesday, Volume 3, Issue 37

When I was in my Junior year at college, my laptop's background image was, of course, an image of Batman drawn by Jim Lee. The art featured the Dark Knight, standing in the shadows and looking about as bad as can be.
I mention this because, while in my Junior year, I hadn't read a comic book in at least a decade. I had no idea that the image on my laptop was taken from Jim Lee's epic Hush storyline, or that that particular title was taking comics by storm and helping to usher in a new era in the medium.

I also didn't know that, in just over a year or so, I would embark on a mad hunt of every comics shop in my area to track down a copy of Batman, issue 608, which was the beginning of the Hush arc.

I didn't know any of this stuff, and I honestly didn't care.

But, as I've said many times before on the blog, I've always loved Batman, and I've always wanted to be Batman.

What can I say? Some people have Real Person Aspirations, like becoming a doctor, or a lawyer, or a pumpkin salesman in Michigan. For me--and for as long as I can remember--I've just wanted to be Batman.

You know, but without all the tragedy.

For a whole mess of reasons, Batman has been with me since day one, it seems. Some of my earliest memories (granted, I suffered a couple of concussions in college, so these might not be actual memories) revolve around playing with Batman toys (back when they were, in fact, toys, and not action figures), watching reruns of the Adam West Batman show on TV, and listening to an old record that came with a book about Batman and the Scarecrow.

I have no idea why this came as a record--maybe because it was cheaper than a cassette, or easier to pack with a comic book?--but I remember sitting next to my dad's old record player, listening to that same story, over and over again.

The Scarecrow of that particular story was of the not very scary kind, and the whole thing was very clearly aimed at me and my demographic.

In the end, Batman always foiled the Scarecrow and he did it in exactly the same way, but I still hung on every word. I'm willing to bet that record exists somewhere, in a box under a whole lot of other stuff from many years ago.

A few years later--1989, to be exact--another familiar Batman villain did manage to scare me, and he kept me up at night. When Batman hit theaters in that wonderful, Bat symbol-filled summer, I was right there with my parents and my brother.

Before the movie, we went to an IHOP down the street from the theater (today, the IHOP is still there; the theater is not) and had an early dinner. Then we made our way down the block and to the theater.

I don't think it's possible to explain how excited I was for that film. I was going to see Batman--my hero--up on the big screen, and it was going to be the Greatest Thing Ever.

And, honestly, it absolutely was. The Greatest Thing Ever, I mean.

But Nicholson's portrayal of the Joker scared the crap out of me back then, and I remember coming home and checking behind doors to make sure he wasn't there--waiting for me as he waited for Jack Palance in his office.

Looking back on it now, that's probably one of the main reasons I was always drawn to Batman--the fear. Batman himself was scary (even when he was just Michael Keaton in a muscle suit), but Batman's villains were terrifying.

They still are, actually.

That first Tim Burton Batman movie changed things in terms of comic books and their acceptance in "normal" culture.

I didn't realize it at the time, but comics were becoming mainstream. Batman was everywhere, from drinking cups at McDonald's to magazine covers in supermarkets. The Bat Symbol, especially, became the symbol of that summer and of that year.

Meanwhile, completely unknown to me, comics shops across the country were being flooded with new customers and new, edgier work from creators.

After the first film, I remember being very excited for Batman Returns. I still love the look of that movie, even if it's not the best the Bat has ever been. After that, though, I pretty much abandoned comics and Batman.

Sad to say, but true.

Still, Batman managed to pop up here and there. Like in my Junior year of high school when I was being considered for a fairly prestigious peer group. There was a pretty long process to get selected, and the final part was to sit for an interview with the current year's group.

I honestly can't remember any of the questions except for one: Who would win in a fight, Batman or Superman?

I said, quickly, "Superman. He has powers." Then I paused, and thought about it for a moment. "But Batman has that utility belt, and he's way smarter than Superman...so I don't know, actually."

Ah, the ignorance of youth.

Flash forward now to my Junior year in college, me staring at my laptop and doing everything imaginable to avoid writing that paper on Yeats that's due in a few hours. I find myself searching for a new desktop image--because, clearly, that is more important than starting my paper.

I stumble across the DC Comics website, see the latest interpretation of Batman, and grab the wallpaper you see above.

Flash forward a year from that moment and I'm in a comics shop in Connecticut, rifling through back issue bins labeled "B". My heart races every time I reach the Batman section and get to the higher numbers.

600

601

607

613

Nope. Not this time. Next store.

That goes on for a couple of weeks until I finally find a copy of number 608. It was up on the wall of a now-defunct shop (actually, the shop that replaced that one is also gone), sitting behind the most recent issue of the series.

It was in a bag with a board, and the price was $5.00. That day I bought my first back issue.

A year later I have a pretty impressive collection of back issues. I live for Saturday afternoon back issue bin diving like Scrooge McDuck.

A year later and I have all but abandoned back issues to focus on collected editons and graphic novels.

A year later I catch the original art bug.

A year later, I share a blog with this bearded guy at work and we write about fun, geeky, wonderful things.

Three years later we still have that fun, geeky, wonderful blog.

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Now, I know I've been getting away from what the typical Waiting for is supposed to be like lately, but that should change starting next week. Why? Well, because the books are getting so darn good, that's why.

DC's New 52 launched last week, and I fell for a good number of them, hard, and I'll be buying almost all of their new titles this week as well.

Of particularly high quality were Action, Swamp Thing, and Animal Man. Even Detective, written by Tony Daniel (known more for his outstanding art then for his writing ability), was quite good.

This week, I'm looking forward to Superboy, Frankenstein, Grifter, and Suicide Squad. But the book I'm most excited about is Batwoman, by JH Williams.

If last week was any indication, you might want to get to your store a little earlier today as many of last week's titles sold out before lunch.

DC took a big, bold step, and so far at least, it's paying off.

Total Studs and Total Duds: A Review of the LEGO Movie Games

Today's post comes from none other than returning guest writer Neko-chan, who is also engaged to half of the writers of this blog.

As readers will know, Nathaniel and I have been playing through the various LEGO Movie games as a couple. Now, LEGOs are something that he and I both cherish. We both have our respective collections, we both get excited every time we pass by a LEGO store, and he even proposed with LEGOs, so of course we were going to buy and play through each LEGO video game together, especially since these games are based around some of our most-loved fandoms.

To date, we have completed Star Wars I+II, slogged through all of Indiana Jones, and have played a few hours' worth of Batman. You would think that each game would improve upon the last, keeping the things that worked, and touching up the things what needed fixing, but unfortunately that has not been the case.


LEGO Star Wars I+II

Plot: Broken into two sagas (on the GameCube; combined into one complete saga on the Wii), the Star Wars games follow a condensed and oh-my-gosh-kids-can’t-see-violence-let’s-make-it-funny-instead version of each movie from the original epic through the less-than-satisfying third prequel.

Characters: Fans get to play as all of their favorite characters, and even the secondary characters are unique and interesting to look at. Sure, there are a few more Stormtroopers than necessary, but the fact you can play as a Jedi with force powers, an evil Sith Lord, a crossbow-shooting Wookiee, a bomb-throwing bounty hunter, or a robot that can fly, totally makes up for any extraneous characters. You can also use the character editor to customize your own character using costume parts and weapons from any character you have unlocked thus far.

Gameplay: This is a very family-friendly game. Level designs are just interesting enough to offer multiple pathways, exploration, and a decent challenge, but not so confusing that you are often at a loss for where to go. Aside from the usual running around and attacking enemies, there are simple puzzles, a little bit of minor platform jumping, some swerve-and-dodge podracing scenes, and a few chances to blow up starships with other starships. As you play, you can attack plants and other destructible background items to earn “studs” (coins), which can be spent to unlock characters, hints, and game modifications that either make playing the game easier or sillier.

Most moderately-okay gamers should have no problems with the difficulty level, and even the worst players can join in and have fun. You are granted infinite lives, so if your character dies you just respawn in place, losing nothing but studs and pride. Also, the game gives hints in the form of arrows if you are unsure what to do with a particular object you have picked up.

As with all of the LEGO Movie games, there are two modes–“Story Mode” and “Free Play.” In story mode, you get humorous cut-scenes, and can only play through levels with the characters indigenous to that scenario. In Free Play mode, you can replay through levels with characters of your choosing in order to unlock secrets and bonus areas that were inaccessible, or that you missed, on the first playthrough. In effect, this gives you infinite “do-overs” and the ability to keep racking up in-game currency, so eventually players of any skill level will be able to beat the game, having unlocked and collected every secret.

The game is allegedly designed for two-players. Certain puzzles need two characters to simultaneously pull switches or attack targets, and certain boss battles require cooperative strategies to win. Both players have independent control of their characters, so each player has the free ability to attack, interact with objects, or collect studs. However, due to screen limitations, the characters can only run so far apart. This means that if one player decides to explore the far side of the screen, and the other is standing on a platform, the second character will be dragged along and most likely fall into a pit of despair.

Also, the camera angles on two-player mode are awful. For certain levels, the camera is not only skewed, but is zoomed out so far that it is almost impossible to accurately judge platform edges or to distinguish objects from one another. Players must alternately drop in and out of one-player mode to zoom the camera far enough in for detail, and for many sections of the game it is simply easier for the second player to drop out entirely.

Gimmicks: In these games, each character has a specific weapon or ability; for instance, some characters can use Force powers, and others can high-jump or use specialty weapons or computer terminals. The abilities are built-in and inherent to that type of character. Certain secrets require a specific ability to unlock, so if you see a control console in story mode, and don’t have a droid in your party, you know you will have to come back later in free play to get in.

There are also hat disguises that you can get from random hat dispensers, which allow you to sneak through enemy territory and bypass checkpoints. In Free Play mode you will have characters that are automatically equipped with these disguises, but in story mode it can be a pain because a single hit from an enemy removes the disguise, and then you have to wander halfway back through the level to re-equip one.

Bonuses: There are numerous secrets to unlock as you play and replay through levels. Some secrets involve unlocking game modifications, some unlock bonus missions or cut-scenes, and some are merely for fun or decoration. There is a percentage counter that lets you know how much of the game you have unlocked, and you can see at the start of each level which bonuses you have yet to clear. Almost every secret is worth going for, and the rewards you get, either in awesomeness or in laughs, are proportional to the effort you put in.


LEGO Indiana Jones

Plot: I don’t know many American children who didn’t at one point run around the house pretending to be Indiana Jones. He is an iconic figure, and I was super-excited for this game to come out, if only for the chance to play as him and destroy everything on the screen with a whip. However, this game somehow managed to capture the events of the movies while removing any sense of excitement or adventure.

Characters: There are really only a handful of characters in the game. Besides Indy, Short Round, Sallah, Indy’s dad, the female love interest du jour, and the guy with the yak on his head, every other character in the game was a generic thug, a generic thuggee, a guy in a uniform, or a screaming female. There were far more palette-swaps than original characters, and it wasn’t worth raising the in-game currency to unlock them, as they did not add any new abilities or visual interest.

Gameplay: This game had the same problems with camera angles that the first games had, and compounded those issues with non-coherent level pathways that made it difficult to figure out not only where we were supposed to go, but how to get from point A to point B in the first place. This game was also heavily glitched, crashing at random points that caused you to lose an entire level’s worth of gameplay, having places where you could literally fall of the map of the level or fall into areas you shouldn’t have been able to get to...and then there was the infamous “elephant drop.” [Editor's note: Don't ask.]

Additionally, certain sections popped you directly into a cut-scene if your timing was off, making it nearly impossible to collect a few of the secrets. Furthermore, a couple of the boss battles are illogical to the point where Nathaniel and I had to use a walkthrough to figure out what in tarnation we were supposed to be doing. Moreover, it was difficult to determine which of the secrets we could get in story mode, and which we would have to go back and get in free play, because it so often looked like we should be able to make a jump or get to an area when in fact the bounding boxes made it impossible. Finally, this is a poorly designed game that will result in fights and one of you sleeping on the couch.

Gimmicks: LEGO Indy uses a tool system. A character can carry one tool at a time, and certain characters are always equipped with a specific tool such as a wrench or a shovel. During story mode, you must bribe monkeys with bananas in exchange for tools, and sometimes you will find a tool randomly on the ground; however, whatever tool you procure will not be necessary until more than halfway through the level, so if you accidentally drop it, or decide to take your chances by picking up a different tool instead, you must then run all the way back to the beginning to get another one, but most of the time it is no longer available and you are out of luck. Free Play is more tolerable because you can choose to have the proper tool-bearer with you if you know in advance which tool the level requires.

They also added torches, which usually burn themselves out in-between when you pick one up and when you find what you are supposed to use it on, so you have to go back and wait for the flame to respawn. This is a joyful process in battles than require fire, especially when you try to throw your torch and miss.

Oh, and they kept the hat system, but took away the dispensers, because a whole level built around scrambling through piles of random drops that disappear within 10 seconds of hitting the ground is fun.

Bonuses: Most of the useful bonuses require you to beat story mode, go back through each level in free play, find a random block, run to and fro through the level looking for a hidden postal box, mail the block, complete the level, run back to the in-game store, realize you don’t have enough money to unlock it, and cry. Almost all of the other bonuses are not worth getting. There are a few cameos that make you pine for the first two games, there is one cameo that is just strange (and glitched), and the bonus missions are simply not fun to the point that we gave up on achieving 100% completion.

LEGO Batman

Plot: Seeing as there is so much source material to draw from, this game does not seem to be following any particular movie, TV plot, or comic, but rather is extrapolating a plot in accordance with the spirit of the characters and the setting of Gotham.

Characters: You play as Batman and Robin. If you play far enough, you can unlock a few of the villains, but otherwise, you play as Batman and Robin. This should feel limiting, but somehow it wouldn’t feel right to play as anyone else. [Editor's note: Except Batgirl! Maybe we haven't met her yet.]

Gameplay: The camera angles continue to be a problem, and in fact, I think they got worse. Also, the designers made each level dark and foggy to fit in with the feel and aesthetic of Gotham, which is nice in theory, but makes it less playable when you are trying to see the edge of a tiny platform stretching between rooftops. However, this game seems to be easier and more straightforward than the first three as far as level design paths and boss battles go, and ::cross our fingers:: so far it has not been glitchy. It is also really fun and satisfying to wave the Wiimote around and Batarang everything on the screen, which I guess makes up for not being able to see what you are Bataranging.

Gimmicks: Instead of special abilities or tools, Batman and Robin have special suits. Scattered throughout the levels are teleporter platforms that allow you to switch suits, gaining new abilities like gliding, tech panel control, magnetic metal-walking, and janitorial dustbustering. Most of them are fun, and it is incredibly obvious where you are supposed to use each one, but Robin’s dustbuster suit can be annoying when you have to backtrack through the level picking up random blocks, and then backtrack even further to find the machine to dump them into, so you can then build a vehicle that you have to ride halfway across the level with, just to unlock one secret.

We have not unlocked all of the villains yet, but it seems like each one has some sort of ability related to their superpowers, as is to be expected. The Riddler is actually quite fun to play as because they gave him Yoda’s staff-physics in addition to mind-control powers. Good times.

Bonuses: It seems as if there are almost too many things to simultaneously unlock. I’m not sure what the rewards will be for our efforts, but so far we have unlocked a few bonus missions, have access to the villains’ lair, have a couple of less-than-but-not-equal-to-good game modifications, and have picked up a couple of different suits and vehicles. We have also collected a few different styles of LEGO minikit components, but at this point it remains to see what they will build.


Right now, LEGO Star Wars I+II are still reigning supreme. We genuinely had fun on each and every level, despite some bad camera angles. LEGO Indiana Jones had some enjoyable moments strung together by many moments of pain and frustration and boredom, but I’m still glad we stuck with it and gave it a chance, even if it didn’t really deserve one. LEGO Batman is shaping up to be mindlessly fun in that, “I want to satisfyingly smash something after a long day” kind of way, but it doesn’t have the presence or the atmosphere that Star Wars did. I think that is part of it.

As much as LEGO Indy and LEGO Batman try, neither one has really captured the feel of being in the world of its subject, neither one fully engages the imagination. Hopefully we’ll have better luck with LEGO Harry Potter, LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean, and LEGO Star Wars: The Clone Wars, but it seems the more I play through LEGO Batman, the more I want to go back and replay the Star Wars I+II.

The Geek Wish List

Quite a while ago we shared with you our geek claims to fame, but there's an addendum to that list that has yet to be written: our geek claims to fame wish list.

Maybe we'll get a shot at these some day; maybe they're too logistically or financially impossible to achieve without first learning to bend the fabric of space, time, and Wall Street to our respective wills.

Either way, if our New Year's Resolutions were any indication, Alex will almost certainly get that time machine he's been wishing for, while I spend yet another year convincing Alex that we cannot go back in time to kill Grizzly Adams.

So. On to our wish lists, then.

--

For me (and, by "me," I mean, "Alex"), the biggest--and some would say most shameful--thing on my geek wish list is a trip to Comic-Con in San Diego. Shameful, because I have never been, and, likely, will never be.

This one hasn't happened for a couple of reasons, and they both rhyme with, "way too expensive."

Just to get out there--in the middle of the summer, no less--would take a monumental effort on my part. Summer is always, always, always busy around these parts, and not to mention gas prices have a tendency to inflate during prime vacation months.

July, apparently, is a prime vacation month.

On top of plane tickets and hotel accommodations (I'd need to sleep somewhere, I'd imagine), there's the cost of the show itself. Put me in a room with that many comics and that much original comic book art and, well.

You can imagine.

Oh. and food. I'd also imagine that would be a necessity.

Also also, I don't much like crushing, smelly crowds. And when there are that many people together in a single room...crushing and smelly are givens.

So, yeah. Comic-Con is definitely at the top of this wish list, and it'll likely stay there for some time. Unless, of course, we get that time machine, kill Grizzly Adams, and...

Nevermind.

Nathaniel, you say things now.

--

One item? That's it? One little mostly plausible thing on your wish list? Pfft. Let me show you how it's done:

I want a Death Star. Life-sized. Fully operational. Manned by dancing Ewoks.

Now that we've established our baseline, here's what's on my to-(probably never gonna)-do list:

Whether through major or minor involvement, I want to leave my creative mark on a video game that garners an honest-to-goodness international fan following. I want to be that guy that people wonder about when they ask, "Who in the world designed this insanely difficult, yet surprisingly fair video game level?" and, "What kind of a person comes up with a boss like Sheep Man?" Somebody stuck a Goomba in a boot in Super Mario Bros. 3, and I want to be that guy.

Hm. I suppose that doesn't actually compare at all with the Dancing Ewok Death Star. Oh, well. Maybe it's better to be a little reasonable.

I want to be published some day. Getting around to producing that blog book we promised on our first birthday would be a good first step, but I'm also thinking of collected journal entries or poetry or even short stories, should I ever feel the drive. Hey, come to think of it, writing the instruction manual for a video game would satisfy this wish and the previous one. Score.

I want to run into one of my YouTube fans somewhere, and be asked, "Hey--don't you do Mega Man videos for YouTube?" And I want them to ask with the hyperlink in their speech and everything. Without a doubt, I have the best group of YouTube fans ever, and I think it'd be tremendous fun to get to meet some of them.

I get closer to achieving this with each costume I don, but I want to attend a convention in a homemade costume that is simultaneously unique, immediately identifiable, impressive, highly accurate, and convention-friendly (I.e. will allow me to sit down without needing to disassemble myself). Barring that, I want to see my fiancée in a homemade Panda-Z helmet.

Lastly (at least for now), I want to travel through space. So much space. Need to see it all. Doesn't need to be anything fancy, and I don't even mind if I'm an old man before I go; simply having been into space will be good enough for me. But I think it's gonna be a long, long time.

And...um...back to you, Alex.

--

The Death Star, huh? Maybe you should try starting with something a little...smaller? Like KITT. Start with KITT.

Speaking of, and since we're doing the whole pie-in-the-sky thing here, I want a Batmobile. And not the one from the Adam West show, either. Or the new tank Batmobile from the latest films. I want the Michael Keaton Batmobile.

I also wouldn't mind some explosives to drive it through. And, finally, since we're talking Things I'll Never Own, I want a Detective Comics, issue 27 (the first appearance of Batman), and a page of original Batman art by Frank Miller.

To wrap up, and to bring things back to Planet Maybe (as opposed to Planet Ain't Gonna Happen, Bucky), I echo Nathaniel's wish to be published, or to be a publisher.

That...that would rock.

I'd love to do something that will shake things up and change the way we look at books and comics and this whole digital revolution everyone's talking about.

I also wouldn't mind opening my own comics shop/coffee house someday. Two of my favorite things becoming the thing I do every day. That would rock, too.

--

You know what else would rock? A flip-phone shaped like an original Star Trek communicator. Beam me up, Verizon.

Comics Cooldown

When I started my foray into comics some two years ago, my plan was to sample a little of everything, starting with as many origin stories and issue #1's that I could find. I started with Marvel and DC, intending get enough of a feel for the characters and histories to read through a few of the pivotal universe-spanning events such as Civil War and Crisis on Multiple Trade Paperbacks. In the beginning, my self-education was quite rapid and effective.

I gobbled up Batman: Year One and consumed one trade after another in single sittings. I already knew I liked Batman, so I eagerly digested Alex's copies of The Long Halloween, Dark Victory, and Hush, and I added a few more of my own purchases to the pile. Around this time, I hopped into the Ultimate Marvel universe--selected for its seemingly easier-to-follow continuity--and slowly plodded through the teen-focused Ultimate X-Men before picking up and burning through a few trades of Ultimate Fantastic Four.

A strange divide began to occur: I collected anything and everything with "Ultimate" in the title, leading to a shelf with complete runs of a few different series; meantime, another shelf was filled with a single Jonah Hex trade next to a single Wonder Woman trade next to a single Eclipso trade. Marvel was for continuing storylines; DC was for trying out new characters. As a result, collecting DC comics became much more interesting and fun.

Very few DC characters had the honor of multiple trades appearing on my shelf (as I refuse to buy single issues except in the case of very specific one-shots). I grabbed a few different Superman comics that showcased the unlikely fact that Lex Luthor is not the only villain in Superman's world. Green Lantern was sci-fi enough to catch my attention. Blue Beetle with Jaime Reyez became an unexpected favorite. Green Arrow will fill up a lot more shelf space as soon as I find a collection of older comics, predating Kevin Smith's Quiver.

On the DC side, I started prepping myself for the first Crisis story by scaling back on the heroes I knew I liked and focusing on the complete strangers. On the Marvel side, I gradually made my way through the Ultimate universe, slowing down whenever things got too angsty or heavy. For a while, especially when the video games I was playing at the time were getting to be frequently frustrating, I sat down to read comics on a regular basis.

Comics pretty much came to a halt when I found some video games that were truly relaxing, and some comics that were difficult to finish. Specifically, Dragon Warrior IV became exactly the blend of strategy and mindless repetition that I had been craving, and JLA: Year One turned into a pseudo-horror story where (minor spoiler) the heroes fought against an army of creatures comprised of other people's stolen body parts. For me, this was a little gross and definitely not what I signed up for when I picked up the book.

That's about when my interest in comics tapered off. Or, more specifically, my interest in superhero comics. I'm still reading through a black-and-white trade of the first several Booster Gold comics, but I missed a big event with Manhunters a few issues back, and all of a sudden things are getting a little more fantastical than I prefer. I was never really interested in the Justice League or any of their equivalents, and the story arc detour I mentioned made the trade even less appealing. Ultimate Spider-Man wasn't helping, either, because I got to the part where there's romantic drama and Peter Parker gets all angsty.

Oh, wait.

Meanwhile, the long-awaited Shepherd Book Serenity comic just came out, and I can't wait to stop writing this and read it. I mean, uh, I'm excited. I recently polished off an Alien trade in preparation for my introductory post on the Alien movies, and it was pretty good. I've picked up a few original Star Trek comics that I'll turn to once I'm done watching the last bit of the original Star Trek that I haven't seen in full (The Animated Series). I'm sure I'll still need my fix; there's no questioning that.

Bottom line? I'm reveling in the sci-fi stories and growing weary of the superhero ones. I've mostly determined which characters and series I want to follow, and most of them aren't with Marvel or DC. I'll still read everything that's on my shelf eventually, but I'll need to return to Ultimate Fantastic Four or crack open The Atom (who endeared himself to me in The Dark Knight Strikes Again) before being enthusiastic about tights again. And capes.

It's not just the superheroes. I've picked up maybe one indie comic that I'd never heard of in the past...ever. I left The Goon in Chinatown, and am still patiently awaiting his grand return when Alex brings me the next installment (hint hint). Yet, I haven't clamored for more; I've just brought it up in passing a few times.

I seem to have lost my enthusiasm for comics as a thing; most of the reason I'm keeping up with comics at all right now is because the continuing voyages of the fandoms I enjoy are available in that medium. The allure of sprawling out on a couch to read comics isn't as strong now that I've been doing that more often with regular books and non-motion-controlled video games. I can't remember the last time I stopped to stare at the artwork.

I had grand plans of being "in the know" with Blackest Night and Secret Invasion, of being able to tell the difference between Brainiac and Krang...but I've already had enough of a comics education to stay afloat in most comics-centric conversations I've heard. One of the reasons I got into comics so quickly was because of how neat it was to be exposed to so many different fandoms in such a short span of time. There's still enjoyment to be found in trying out new comics, but I find myself settling on a few different characters and stories, and paying less attention to my broader mission. For right now, and maybe for the long run, that's good enough for me.

Exfanding Your Horizons Turns 2 Years Old!

It's official: Exfanding Your Horizons is two years old! Happy Birthday to us!

Just like we did to celebrate last year, Alex and I have assembled a list of questions that make us feel like we're special guests on a geek talk show, like Sally Jessy Raphael Donatello or something. Year Two was a big year, and our penchant for inflating our self-importance guarantees we'll make it even bigger.

Our blog rules.


Most blogs don't last nearly this long; why are you still here?

Nathaniel: I love to write. I love the stuff we write about here. I love collaborating on geeky stuff with Alex. The fact that we post consistently at 11 AM every day gives me the structure I need to keep from posting "when I get around to it," yet the flexibility to switch posting days with Alex or write a fluffy links post keeps blogging from becoming a self-imposed chore. The Internet hasn't kicked us out yet; why wouldn't we be here?

Alex: 11:00, you say? Haha...erm. Yes. Well. Of course, just to foul up Nathaniel's response to this question, I purposefully posted at 11:40 yesterday. Yeah, that's what I did. Uh huh. All part of the plan.

What was the question?


Did you honestly think we'd make it to two years?

Nathaniel: Absolutely. This blog started out as a fun little side project, and after a few weeks or maybe months, it became a habit. Two years later, it's a fact of life. Like eating, or weekly showers.

Alex: Soon after we started, I read somewhere that 99% of all blogs go bye-bye within the first two weeks. At that point, we were about a month into Exfanding, and we both took that as a major positive. That we, um, hadn't gone bye-bye, I mean.

We always knew we were better than 99% of everyone else, now it was just being scientifically proven.

Honestly, though, I had a feeling we would both be too stubborn to ever give it up, and woe unto whichever one of us tapped out first. Now, like Nathaniel said, posting here is very much an everyday routine type of thing.


What's the best part about having a blog? What's the worst part about having a blog (And no chickening out--be honest!)?

Alex: The best part is having a soapbox from which to shout. And the worst part is having a soapbox from which to shout. What I mean is, I have a big mouth. What can I say? It's my nature. So it's nice to have a bit of a forum to express myself, especially when I read or watch something that I love, and that I want to share with others.

On the other hand, expressing myself tends to get me into trouble. And, apparently, I tend to take digs at Grant Morrison.

Nathaniel: The worst part about having a blog is the sheer amount of time I spend talking about geeky endeavors instead of actually engaging in them. Don't get me wrong; I love to write, and I love to gab about my favorite fandoms. It's just that there are nights where I'd rather be playing a video game than staying up 1d3 hours later than anticipated to finish a post that may or may not be what I feel like writing anyhow.

The best part about having a blog generally makes up for that, though. It is staggering to me how much material we've written, and it's a joy to scroll through the archives and look at how our thoughts, personalities, and humor are preserved in such detail across such a broad array of topics. And we get to share that with the world.


Has blogging gotten any easier or harder since last year?

Alex: I honestly thought that we'd have nothing left to talk about by now. That was my number one concern when we started this up. But, somehow, there's always a new post waiting in the wings. And that certainly wasn't the case (for me, at least) a couple of years ago.

Nathaniel: Speak for yourself! Blogging is hard! Actually, coming up with anything to post for the next day has gotten much easier for me--I seldom stare at the ceiling anymore, waiting for a post to emerge from the plaster--but writing the big introductory posts is much tougher, as you may have noticed from the lack of them these past several months. That ties in with the previous question, actually.


When would you say your writing was the strongest this past year? The weakest?

Alex: I've told Nathaniel this already, but I think it's pretty clear that he's carried the blog this year. Whereas my writing has been very inconsistent, I think he's been in overdrive--certainly through this summer--and he's posted some of my very favorite things we've yet had on the blog.

Personally, I think I peaked at the end of last year. I felt like things were really clicking for a while there. Maybe I'm just a better writer when I'm angry, but I'm really going to try picking up the slack for the rest of 2010.

Nathaniel: I feel like my writing was strongest when we both collaborated on "theme weeks," and when I let myself loose to geek out about Mega Man and Star Trek in greater depth than usual.

It's strange--I didn't feel at any point that I was carrying the blog; I was simply adding my contributions for the day. Okay, so I was carrying the blog during Video Game Week, but Alex agreed to it, so that's his own fault.

In truth, all my strongest posts that immediately came to mind are from Year One. I think my posts this past year were less diverse than the year before, so they don't stand out as much to me. I feel like I lost a lot of focus in May and June when a lot of Big Life Stuff was going on, and most of those posts in particular seem like filler to me.


Name a few blog-related things that surprised you in Year Two.

Alex: The amount of people who robbed banks, stores, and fast food restaurants dressed as super heroes and/or pop cultural icons.

Nathaniel: I was surprised to discover that I am a fan of Exfanding Your Horizons. A few weeks ago I had this big realization that I wasn't reading Alex's post that day just to check in on the blog--I was reading it because I really wanted to see what he had to say. I've always enjoyed reading his posts and re-reading my posts, but it never occurred to me that I'm actually a fan of our own blog!

...Does that count as "a few"?

Alex: Thanks for making my answer sound (even more) trivial than it was intended to be.

Nathaniel: My pleasure!


Were you introduced to anything new/cool this year because of the blog (either by each other, or by a reader)?

Nathaniel: The films of Akira Kurosawa. Not only were the screenings fun little adventures of their own, but I felt cinematically and culturally educated afterward.

Alex: Firefly and Serenity. I love that series, and I'm glad to have been introduced to it and to all of its ancillary stories.


Who would win in a fight--Batman or Superman?

Nathaniel: What, you haven't read Hush?

Alex: Are we talking the Taco Bell Batman Bandit, or the real Batman? Because if it's the real Batman, isn't he trapped in time/space somewhere, dressed as a pirate? And isn't Superman walking Earth and moping around all the time again? EMO Superman rocks!

I'm gonna have to go with the Goon.


What are some blogging goals/site goals/plans for Year Three? Any possible exciting news we can reveal about the next year?

Alex: One thing I'd love to see would be more of a presence on comic book sites. Exfanding ads on Newsarama? CBR? Heck, yes! I think it might be a logical next step for the blog to take.

Nathaniel?

Nathaniel: I'd like to figure out when we started italicizing Exfanding, for starters.

As a blogging goal, I'd like us both to add a few more fandoms or genres to our regular idea pool. I'd like to write more about anime and Dungeons & Dragons, and I know Alex must have a few music artists or television shows up his sleeve that he hasn't told us about.

As a site goal, I hope to finish all these minor and gradual tweaks to end up with a totally polished and professional blog that shows up in Google searches for something aside from "potty mouth Batman."

As far as plans go, I'm itching to do a bunch of formal fandom introductions; it's only a matter of having enough time and energy to write them. I also intend to complete all the New Year's Resolutions(TM) Alex made for me while simultaneously causing him to fail hilariously at his resolutions.


Hey, where's that book and t-shirt you promised us last year, hmm...?

Nathaniel: Erm...we compiled all our posts from the first year and then...and then something happened that...we had everything together and...and...and...THOSE GNOMES!!!

Alex: I don't think I would buy a t-shirt--uh...I mean...they're coming soon. Promise.

The One I've Been Avoiding

I’ve put off writing this post for a while now.

I’ve even started and stopped a few times along the way. I just didn’t want to make the thoughts public; I didn’t want to put the words to the screen. They go so much against the purpose of this blog that I felt like a hypocrite every time I would stare at that blinking, mocking cursor.

I’m the Comics Guy, after all. That’s kind of my thing.

But the more I think about it, the less negative I see in the issue I’d like to talk about. And the more I think it needs to be said. So I’ll write about it. Today.

Here goes.

I’ve been kinda bummed out about/with mainstream comics--particularly those produced by DC and Marvel--for the past couple of months or so, and I think that’s been reflected in my Waiting for Wednesday recommendations of late.

More than that, I’ve been disappointed in DC and Marvel for, in my opinion, telling the same story twenty different ways and selling it to us as All-New and All-Different. They’ve been giving us--for the past couple of years now--the same characters in the same situations, month in and month out.

Yeah, yeah. I know. That’s just comics, right?

But, my goodness, let’s allow a few new writers into the mix, huh? A few new voices. Some new blood. Because, really, I don’t mind the same characters in the same situations. It’s those characters in those situations--Gotham City is under siege and Batman needs to save the day; the X-Men are being persecuted, but despite that, they rise above and prove that they’re true heroes--that make comics so much fun.

And such high drama.

But I’d like to hear a different voice, every now and then, please. A different take on the characters. A different trajectory in a story that, while we likely know the conclusion from the beginning--good guy beats bad guy--can take us to new places before we get to that familiar ground.

Something new. That’s all I’m asking.

And again, I don’t want this to come across as a tirade against comics. Because, as I said, there’s no bigger, louder advocate of comics than me. Mainstream, underground, mid-line, whatever. Fanzines, magazines about comics, interview collections with comics people?

Bring them on. All of them.

If it’s good, I’ll talk about it and recommend it to people who have never picked up a funny book. Because I think comics are great. Because I think comics are essential.

They’re our myths. Our legends. They’ve given us the heroes and villains of our generation, and they’re the same heroes and villains of our fathers’ generation. And that’s pretty cool, and utterly unique in fiction.

As much as we’d like to claim him as our own, James Bond is not ours. He belongs to another time. Another generation. Same goes with Holmes. And Dracula. And Dupin.

But comics are different.

Sure, Batman might be a hero of the late 1920s. And Superman is deeply rooted in--and intimately associated with--World War II. But as times change, so have these characters. There have been many different Batmen over the decades. There have been many different "definitive" runs on the character.

You can’t say that about Bond, or Dracula, or Holmes. When their creators passed on, their characters simply were not the same. But in comics? In comics, we have creators that become vital to the history of a character--and these creators pop up decades apart.

Take Batman.

Remember when he was campy? That Batman belongs to a different generation than did Bob Kane’s "mysterioso" figure of the night. What about when his back was broken? Or when Jason Todd died? Or when he returned, old and mean and at his very best?

My Batman is Jeph Loeb’s Batman; either in Hush or in the Halloween books. That was the first Batman I read as I got into comics. That’s the one that will stick with me.

That will likely always be my Batman.

I love Frank Miller’s Batman, and Brian Azzarello’s Batman, and Denny O’Neil’s Batman. But Jeph Loeb’s is the one--because of timing, because of happenstance, because that’s just how comics are.

These days, Grant Morrison is writing a new Batman for a new generation. And that’s cool. Morrison’s voice is unique and intriguing and he possesses a wealth of ideas. He’s a great writer--one of my favorites, and a literary idol of mine.

But he’s steered the ship for a very long time now.

In sports, every athlete faces the moment when he or she needs to leave. It’s just like anything else in life--endings come just as surely as beginnings. But in sports especially, the end doesn’t necessarily come when you’re ready to go.

Sometimes it doesn’t even come when you’re at the end of the rope, physically.

The end of a veteran’s career--even if he or she is still productive and is helping the team win--comes when the Next Big Thing is ready.

The comics industry is funny. The publishers tend to wholly disregard older creators once they’ve passed their "prime," once they’re no longer "hot." Though, for the life of me, I can’t figure out how age on a writer is a bad thing.

But at the same time, comics publishers are incredibly wary of changing the status quo. Either in their books or with their stable of talent.

It’s a weird contradiction.

The publishers--and, when I say that, I mean specifically, the editorial teams working today--do not want new blood coming into the industry.

And why should they? Imagine how hard it must have been for them to get where they are. Comics is such an incestuous industry that it’s incredible anyone manages to actually break in.

And once they do? They hold on for dear life. I can’t say that I blame them.

In comics, unlike almost any other form of entertainment, the line between professional and fan is quite thin. Just check out any convention. It’s literally a matter of which side of a table you sit on.

But the truth is, getting to the other side of that table is about as unlikely as winning a spot on the New York Giants offensive line.

But that’s not where I want to take this post. Though, admittedly, it feels good writing the words. Because, even though only a handful of people read this blog, I think it’s a notion that many out there are frustrated with.

And I don’t mean this as a, “If only I could get my hands on these characters--I’d show ‘em how to make comics!” kind of thing.

Clearly, the people making the comics know just what in the heck they’re doing.

My point here is to say this. I’m bored with mainstream, super hero comic book adventures. Only so many times I can watch the bad guy mess up, and the hero pull it out in the end.

Lately, I’ve been reading a lot of Harvey Pekar. And Joseph Michael Linsner. And Richard Moore. And Trudy Cooper.

But I don't want to not read super hero books. I want to keep following the weekly and monthly adventures of characters I love. I would just much rather Marvel publish one great Avengers book, instead of four good ones. And I'd love Marvel to pick up more creator-owned books like Scarlet and Incognito.

I dunno.

Comics are great, and I love them. But I want All-New and I want All-Different from the publishers.

That's my story. What's yours?