Castle Crashers: Awesome

Behold.



Not since the likes of River City Ransom has something so awesomely run-around-and-smash-whatever-moves come across the horizon. And my girlfriend will play it with me. That's about as ringing of an endorsement as I think any game can receive. $15 of xbox download points and worth every penny. (And there are animal friends. I dig the Bat that eats people's heads.)

Joker Dog...

Fact 1 - While a lifelong Bat-fan, I was not a fan of TDK movie.
Fact 2 - I am not a fan of people dressing their pets in stupid costumes.

1+2 = Fact 3, witnessed below.




This shit is available online from Target.
Serious.

Juggernawesomeness

While I never expected it to happen, I can now proudly say that I am the owner of (IMO) the single coolest published Juggernaut page to ever exist.



YEAH!

There's other cool stuff out there, sure, but you'd be hard-pressed to outshine this. Joe Madureira pencils, Tim Townsend inks, memorable title splash page, 100% frame-worthy, from the original Onslaught arc. Super-super awesome Juggernaut with stone-cold-killer-eyes.

It's really hard to believe that in the past year (more-or-less) I've been able to get 3 of the 8 'own-if-its-at-all-possible-before-I-die' pieces - even harder to believe since out of the 5 that are left I only know where 1 of them is! So a big thanks to Mr. Matsuda, Bazzana, and Thrash (which sounds like the awesomest lawfirm ever) for making these dreams become realities! And thanks to Girlfriend-of-Apocalypse for being cool with me buying them! (I WILL get you back. I promise!)

Awesomeness that Comics has Lost

Believe it or not, this isn't about how comics used to be better than they are now; this is about two artists that aren't working in comics anymore - though I really wish they were. John Hebert and Arnie Jorgensen.

John Hebert (not 'Herbert') was in comics around the mid 90's, doing work on some Punisher titles and most of the 'season two' X-Men Adventures book. (You'll know which ones he did because they're the ones that look really good.) I always hoped Marvel would move John over to a 'real' X-Men book, (he drew the best Omega Red I've ever seen) but no such luck. (He was discovered by Mike Zeck and I believe, to some degree, was a protege.) While I don't know the details, rumor has it that some shady office politics stuff went down and suddenly John's out of a job and some other guy who wasn't half as good was propped up in his place. To me, that is a HUGE loss. If things had gone a different way, we would've had 10+ years of improvement upon his already kickin in '95 style. I've talked briefly with John, and he's got a 'never say never' attitude toward the industry - so there's at least a little bit of hope that we could see this type of dynamism return to comics.



Arnie Jorgensen, to the best of my knowledge, was 'lost' to comics in the same way that Joe Madureira was - video games. Now, I love video games - and I love comics - heck, I even love video games about comics (even when they suck, which they do about 3/4 of the time)... and I totally support artists moving to a profession where they can earn more and diversify their skill sets - but it sucks for me, the comic-buying consumer who likes their comics to look cool. Arnie did work mostly on fill-in issues for the Big Two, but he'll always be a legend to me for being the guy who introduced Prometheus. He did the full interiors for the Prometheus one-shot, along with the full-interiors to the JLA issue that introduced him. Tell me we couldn't use this guy in comics today.



Sidenote: apparently I am looking for way way more villains with helmets, and with things sticking out from their helmets...

Bionic Commando: Rearmed

A picture of 'then' and 'now.'



Bionic Commando Rearmed is the best $10 I have ever spent. There are games I've spent $50-$60 on that I have not enjoyed as much as BCR - and had I known BCR was as good as it is, I'd have gladly shelled out 'real game' money for it.

The original Bionic Commando was released for the NES amidst a number of other 'soldier-shooting-stuff' games, but differed greatly in the fact that you had an extendable-robot-arm - which means it was awesome. (The game is also famous for graphic-head-explosions.) This game is so awesome, that even owning it on NES, I bought it again on GBA (on one cart with Strider - another great NES game, and Mighty Final Fight - it's $8 at Gamestop now folks!) just so I could play it 'on-the-go.'

Now, as they're revitalizing the franchise after a 20-year-break with '09's release of Bionic Commando on the next-gen consoles, they've released a downloadable game (BCR) which is essentially a remaster of the original NES game with plot aspects added to bridge the 'gap' between the original 80's game and the impeding '09 game. BCR has more logical boss battles, a better health and shooting system, hidden secrets, and rocket-launchers-that-shoot-rockets-that-are-guidable.

There is just nothing bad to say about this game. If you haven't yet, download it now. It already set records for a game in terms of first-week-download sales, and for good reason. Because it's AWESOME. (If I have this in the nursing home when I'm like 80, being old is going to rule.)

It is SO cool they're finally coming out with some 'retro' (aka 2-d) games that are awesome. In a week or so, they're releasing Mega Man 9 - and if it's even half as good as Bionic Commando Rearmed is, it's going to be a steal.

Thank you Capcom. Thank you for ruling so freaking hard.

My Comic Book Dream (#1)

Last night, while sleeping on the couch (not due to any awkwardness, but to my being child-on-Christmas-Eve excited... more on that later), I had a dream. This dream involved comic books, and I now feel one step closer to being Matt Fraction. (Note to self: Being Matt Fraction would be a really good indy film. What? Somebody already did something like that? Ah well...)

My dream? Relatively simple. Me, at a run-down diner somewhere sitting across a table from... Grant Morrison. I am wearing glasses; they are hard to see through. (In real life I 'should,' but do not, wear glasses.) Grant Morrison is much nicer than I'd expect, not arrogant at all, (neither am I) and it seems like we are old friends. I am still screwing with my glasses and am wondering if Grant likes coffee. I know I would like some coffee. In the dream, Grant is not Scottish - but British. That's about it.



On the way to work this morning, Girlfriend-of-Apocalypse mentions that he might've been British because Scottish would be a hard accent for me to do in a dream. She may be onto something. In the past, my mind has gone out of its way to amaze me in dreams, especially in hilarity - situations such as 'Bront Bacon Burnt' on a GI Joe dossier/filecard in which he declares 'this stache,' and another dream where Bront punches a dude in the face like 100 times anime style. (Note: that guy must've had like 3 sets of teeth MINIMUM.) Anyway - I'm pretty sure I could've made Morrison sound like Connery, but that's a totally different kind of Scottish than he actually is.

The point being, if there is one (which there's not) that I had a dream about Grant Morrison (which does NOT mean I find him 'dreamy'). And not a lot of it made sense, and not a lot happened. Even out of what did happen, I had a hard time being able to focus it in and was left wanting. So I believe this is proof that Grant Morrison is now writing my dreams. Unless he's a psychic. Wait. Bald guy, psychic... could it be???

Cliff Chiang is Awesome

This guy draws an awesome Batman, and is a Brooklyn local (as if he needed extra 'cool' points).

I've had trouble trying to explain Cliff's work. Simple but striking designs with a noir feel like Frank Miller or Mike Mignola? Yeah, but that's not it. Incredible use of black and shadow like Tim Sale? Yeah, but that's not it. The seemingly effortless 'pop' of Paul Gulacy? Yeah, but that's not it. Incredibly sexy femme fatales like Adam Hughes? Yeah, but that's not it. Organic undetectable lines like Marcos Martin or Stephane Roux? Yeah, but that's not it.

Then I saw this and it hit me.



Steranko.

Cliff Chiang has an uncanny ability with staging, and also with layering - with knowing what will make a striking image (whether simple or complex) and how best to creatively and originally arrange those aspects on the printed page. He puts thought into it. He's not drawing, he's capturing your attention subtly, whispering a story you can't wait to hear.

If you can't tell, I love this guy's work.

Here's Cliff's website, (check out the 'atomic bombshells,' which are crazy awesome,)
and here's Cliff's art sales.


Some career highlights are: The Creeper, LOTDK, Detective, Human Target, The Spectre, Dr. 13, and Green Arrow/Black Canary.

The Awesomeness of Goldust

Portrayed by Dustin Runnells, who wore a gold-and-black jumpsuit, matching facepaint, and donned a long straight-blonde-wig, Goldust was a character in mid-90's professional wrestling. He made references to the femme fatales of the early silver screen and one of his finishing moves, the 'Shattered Dreams,' was running across the whole ring to build up extra momentum for KICKING YOU IN THE BALLS.
(Note: the 'Shattered Dreams' is nearly the awesome equivalent of a Kevin Nash 'Jackknife Powerbomb.' God, that guy was just made to powerbomb people.)



Dustin himself is the son of Dusty Rhodes - making Goldust the 'grandson-of-a-plumba.'

Eventually Goldust (kayfabe) developed Tourette's to humorous effect, and also cut a number of awesome promos with Booker T. As much comedian as he is wrestler, Dustin Runnells deserves whatever money can buy. (He now wrestles in TNA as Black Reign.)

"Remember the name... Goldust..." is Awesome.