Tag Archives: Dinah Lance

Jun 16 2014

Batgirl 32

batgirl 32Today, Patrick and Shelby are discussing Batgirl 32, originally released June 11th, 2014. 

slim-bannerPatrick: I was recently putting together a resume for a creative position, and I found myself completely unable to distill what’s special about me into a digestible collection of jobs and experiences. Just by virtue of being a human being for over thirty years, I’ve amassed a weird collection of skills and experiences, and the only reason I can believe that it’s all part of a single lifetime is because I was there to experience it all. I’ve got something of an obsessive mind, and a propensity to burn myself out, so my list of former passions is long. The point is, there’s a lot feeding into the person I am today, and while it’s easiest to say that I am the handful of things that have effected me most recently (i.e.: improviser, writer, comic enthusiast, administrator), that definition is woefully inadequate. The same is doubly true for superheroes, and Batgirl 32 revels in developments from the recent past while acknowledging a history (both real and invented) that demands to be honored.

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May 5 2014

Batgirl Annual 2

 

batgirl annual 2Today, Shelby and Drew are discussing Batgirl Annual 2, originally released April 30th, 2014. 

slim-bannerShelby: A couple years ago I saw Melancholia in the theater, I believe with the esteemed Retcon Puncher Taylor. Spoiler alert: it’s probably the most depressing move I’ve ever seen. Beautiful, but calling it a downer would be an understatement. In it, Kirsten Dunst plays an extremely depressed woman; at one point, she is physically incapable of getting out of bed, relying completely on her sister’s aid. For me, it raised the question of how much leeway should we give people suffering from mental illnesses such as depression. While I was watching the movie, I was distracted by how seemingly mean the rest of the characters were to this severely ill woman, but you have to step back and think about the impact her illness has had on their lives. At what point do those closest to someone with this sort of disease finally snap from dealing with it, and can we really blame them for doing so? And finally, what happens when that mental illness manifests itself as super-powered criminal activity? (Okay, that last question is more about the Batgirl annual than Melancholia, but you get the idea.)

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Jun 25 2013

Birds of Prey 20-21

birds of prey 20-21

Today, Patrick and Mikyzptlk are discussing Birds of Prey 20-21, originally released May 15th and June 19th, 2013.

Patrick: Fun fact: when Family Matters debuted in 1989, Jaleel White had not been cast on the show. Instead of being the adventures of Steve Urkel and the neighbors he loved to annoy, the show was a simple spin-off of Perfect Strangers – the story of a middle class working family in Chicago. But Steve Urkel made his appearance in the twelfth episode and was so well-received that it changed the DNA of the series forever. For better or for worse Steve Urkel had taken over Family Matters, and suddenly he was the only thing mattered. As Birds of Prey struggles to find it’s own audience and its own direction, it receives an Urkel of its own: The Court of Owls. Continue reading →

Apr 23 2013

Birds of Prey 18-19

birds of prey 18-19

Today, Shelby and Taylor are discussing Birds of Prey 18-19, originally released March 20th and April 17th, 2013.

Shelby: I have the most trouble writing beginnings and endings. Beginnings are hard because you have to draw the reader in, entice them enough to keep reading. Endings are hard because you have to conclude your message with enough finality that there’s a sense of closure without being too abrupt. My biggest complaint about  Duane Swierczynski’s run on Birds of Prey was his endings; story arcs just sort of … stopped. There is little I find more frustrating than a well-written story that doesn’t deliver on the ending, that simply ends. Birds finds itself with a new beginning, though, as Christy Marx wraps up Sword of Sorcery and takes over writing duties here; her strong, female-centric take on Nilaa won me over from day one, and would seem to make her a perfect fit for this superheroine team title. Continue reading →

Oct 12 2012

Team 7 1

 

Today, Mike Logsdon and Shelby are discussing Team 7 1, originally released October 10th, 2012.

Mik: Hey all, Mikyzptlk here, but you can call me Mik (with a long “I”) if, you know, you’re into the whole brevity thing. With that out of the way, let’s get cracking. Going into Team 7, I know next to nothing about this team. I know that it was originally a Wildstorm book but that’s about it. Except for The Authority, I tended to stay away from most of what Wildstorm had to offer. That being the case, I normally wouldn’t be interested in this book but DC has done a few clever things to get me interested. First off, they’ve added a few familiar faces from the DCU into the mix and, more importantly, they’ve set the book in the early (and mostly shrouded) years of the The New 52. ZERO Month did a good job of filling in some of the details of the first 5 years of the new DCU but there are still A LOT of gaps to close. 
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Oct 11 2012

Arrow – Episode 101: “Pilot”

Today, Patrick and Al Reiser are discussing the Arrow pilot (episode 101). Pilot originally aired October 10, 2012.

Patrick: Origin stories are basically a requirement for TV shows. And given the nature of TV’s serialized storytelling format, that’s mind-boggling. Think of any show you’ve ever seen in syndication ever — do you ever find yourself asking “hey, how did the governing principals of this show fall into place?” No, you don’t. You don’t say “Hey, why do these people all hang out at this bar?” and you don’t ask “How did Mulder and Scully get these jobs at the FBI?” But tune in to the pilot episode of any TV show (dramas in particular, but comedies do it too) and you’ll get a long boring explanation of… whatever. Arrow doubles down on this crime, flooding the screen with exposition.

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Sep 24 2012

Birds of Prey 0

Today, Shelby and (special guest writer) Lindsey Peterson are discussing Birds of Prey 0, originally released September 19, 2012. Birds of Prey 0 is part of the line-wide Zero Month.

Shelby: A difficult aspect of writing a comic book has got to be maintaining the balance between new and old readers: specifically, keeping both sides happy. You want to keep the long-timers happy; without their readership, you wouldn’t have been successful in the first place. But, you need to keep your books at least a little bit attainable to attract new readers; if your readership doesn’t grow, you won’t continue to be successful. With half of zero month behind us, we’ve seen examples of origins that bore us with nothing new and origins that confound us with no background knowledge given. Then we have my favorites, those titles which have struck that delicate balance between old-hat origin and current story arc connections. Birds of Prey is definitely in that last camp.  Continue reading →

Aug 21 2012

Birds of Prey 12

Today, Shelby and Drew are discussing Birds of Prey 12, originally released August 15th, 2012.

Shelby: Why do we form teams? Is it to seek the support of others? Is it to accomplish big tasks more quickly? Is it to bring together different skill sets in order to solve more kinds of problems? These have to be at least some of the reasons why Black Canary decided to form a team to do some good in Gotham, but she has obviously made some mistakes in choosing her roster. You know that guy in the group who just won’t play ball with the plan and forces everyone to do things his way? Well, imagine that guy is an eco-terrorist metahuman holding you and the rest of the world hostage to do what he wants, and you can begin to see the dilemma Black Canary has on her hands.
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