Comic Review #49: Amazing Spider-Man #436 (1998)

 

Has it really taken me 49 reviews to finally discuss a Spider Man comic? You could argue that Marvel Team Up was a Spider-Man comic but I consider it a Team Up comic because well 1.) not every issue had Spider-Man in it and EVERY issue was well duh a Team Up. No, I don't truly believe that counts. The Darkhawk issues with Spider-Man in them also don't count because they are a team up. I've definitely talked about Spider-Man on this blog because he's my favorite super hero period, but it's still taken me 49 reviews in this silly little column on my silly little blog, I knew I had to talk about some good Amazing Spider Man stuff.

I picked this era that took place after the second Clone Saga story. You know the one people all know about. That was a sequel to a story from the 1970s. I think most people know that but I felt like I had to mention it. Ben Reilly had given up his life to stop the original Green Goblin who had been brought back to be the mastermind of the Clone Saga. This is when I really started to pick up new issues of Spider-Man. I don't know I guess something about these comics called to me and I used to have a lot of them. Sadly it seems most of them have gotten away from me and man I need to pick them up again. This era only lasted two years from 1997 to around 1999. Marvel was putting out five Spider-Man comics at the time. Spectacular Spider Man, the weirdly bi-annual Spider Man Unlimited (which I always forget about) Sensational Spider Man, Spider-Man and the original series Amazing Spider Man. The Spider-Man comics from this short lived era were amazing. They ended on a pretty poor note which I've still not read in full but what I've heard just makes me go "what?" and I've read more comics than most people should. It takes a lot for me to go "what?" to a comic book. 

There were about 90 comics published between those 4 series between 2 years and every single one of them is at least pretty good. This is probably the best a series like Spider-Man ever got. Yes people those Todd McFarlane issues had great art but the stories fucking sucked shit. Let's finally admit that Todd McFarlane is good at the art but his creative ideas are lame. Spawn fucking sucks. Let's finally just admit this. It'll be good for all of us. I'll go over the creative teams because I plan to discuss each and every one of these stories. This era ended when Marvel thought they weren't making enough money so they went with John Byrne to reboot the stories. This effetely killed my interest in Spider-Man for at least a few years, because while John Byrne may have been amazing in the 1970s and 1980s, he was very hit or miss in the 1990s and Spider-Man was one of those insane misses. I think I picked up a few issues and just gave up. It was the first time I just gave up on comics until I found the store I go to now in 2003. That reinvigorated my love for this stuff. I guess I would have rather have that copy of New Years Evil on VHS from Allan's Video instead of A Spider-Man comic made by John Byrne and Howard Mackie (I really feel this guy got the shaft and had to just write stories Johnny boy didn't want too)

I don't want to come off as a John Byrne basher because I really do love a lot of his work. I just thought those Spider-Man comics were not worth what they were replacing. What they replaced where fantastic fun comic books that everyone should give a read. They were solid tights and fights comics that I still enjoy re-reading. This comic has a few problems but I overall still like it. I'll get to those issues after I recap this issue. 

So This comic was done by Tom DeFalco, a guy who wrote for a bunch of Marvel and DC characters and was ALSO Marvel's editor in chief from around late 1987 to sometime in the early 1990s... I want to say 1993 or 1994. I forgot to mention that and I should have. The artist is Joe Bennett who started work in the 1990s and is still doing work today. I love the work he does for this comic but I love the stuff he's doing for the Immortal Hulk even more. That's a comic I will talk about but only during my Halloween Super Spectacular that I will start in September because there's a ton of stuff I want to talk about and I want to discuss them as soon as possible. Joe is a pretty great artist and I like his work a whole lot.

This comic starts with Spider-Man fighting one of the two new-ish foes that Tom DeFalco had created for his (second) go around on Spider-Man. This guy is the Black Tarantula. He's a South American criminal mastermind behind some kind of criminal gang that's been going on for centuries. Seeing as he mentions how the father gives the son the power of the Black Tarantula. Black Tarantula is a tough cookie and unlike say BloodDeath or KillMan or another throw away 1992-1995 Spider-Man character is that he actually gets a good enough back story to make you go "Yeah I can see why he's beating the piss outta Spidey". Characters like BloodDeath come up and just beat Spider-Man and usually barely have an origin. His design also helps a lot. You can tell this is a dude that even a hero more powerful than Spidey would have trouble with. I dunno maybe it's just nostalgia and I like Black Tarantula more than BloodDeath. He also has a little person henchmen with weird gadgets. I like that guy too.

He and Spider-Man fight until we flash back to what brought Spider-Man here. He's talking to his wife Mary Jane Watson-Parker and people can complain that Peter Parker is a nerd and shouldn't get a supermodel wife or whatever but Peter is fuckin jacked. Look at him! I don't care what naysays say about these two but I LOVE them together. Mary Jane is pissed because Peter wants her to go stay with her sister because he found a photo at a crime scene of three women and Mary Jane is one of them. One of the others is Marina Caches. Which turns out to be the Black Tarantula's wife and his son Fabian! Holy heck. 

Mary Jane goes to talk to Marina and finds that information out and then a guy named Dante Rigoletto. Yes he's related to the mobster character Don Fortunato that I'm honestly curious about what happened to him. He appeared a lot in this era and I always liked him and his cartoony old man design. He probably died to prove how cool some generic 2000s character no one remembers was. At this place is also the Rose who is arguing with Don Fortunato and was revealed to be JAKE CONOVER one of the 82 thousand people who worked at the Daily Bugle. Spider-Man and the Black Tarantula end up having a really great fight. Most of this comic is a fight until Marina yells at the Black  Tarantula that he needs to decide to ruin his son's life or to continue the legacy. Spider Man then goes "Are we going to finish the fight or are you gonna give up like a gentleman. The Black Tarantula says he has time to be patient and that he will return while leaving. Also Spidey tries to go after him even in his fucked up condition because that's the kinda hero Spider-Man is. I don't believe we've seen the Black Tarantula since. I would like to see him return. He's a complicated bad guy and I like that.

The two problems I have with this comic is some of the references Spidey makes for his jokes date the comic. I mean it still isn't as bad as say Marville #1 with it's 9,000 AOL jokes because well Spidey has always kinda referenced things but references to Titanic and South Park when it was new kinda date the comic a little. I dunno. Most of Spidey's jokey comments are still pretty great. The big problem is with the Rose just randomly ending up being Jake Conover. That was a on-going mystery and I can't remember how many clues DeFalco had laid for the mystery so it kinda feels like it was like "Damnit I gotta finish this story now because in 4 issues they are gonna screw this shit up" so maybe this will work better when I re-read some of the other issues from this era and don't worry I'm sure I'll talk about them. Still one very minor and one mostly minor issue does not ruin this fun little story. 

FINAL VERDICT: I really like this era of Spider-Man. It was just a shame it was so short and then a new lesser era replaces it. I'm sure I'll talk about some issue from the second Amazing Spider Man comic (yes they rebooted it here for the first time. Woo.) but that won't be for a while. I'm sticking with the talking about comic books from my childhood so that #50 probably won't be an amazing anniversary thing this time.

The Final Episode #68: Dungeons and Dragons (1983 - 1985)

 

From now on every few posts I will be taking a show request from my discord and or Facebook group! That's right! You can now enjoy me talking about something you picked out! For the inaugural show I choose Dungeons and Dragons a Saturday Morning Cartoon from the 1980s. It was a pick from Orville. Shout out to Orville! I like his name and all the memes he posts. He's a pretty swell dude. I would eat a pizza with him. I mean I'd share a pizza with anyone but still it's the thought that counts, damnit! Anyway I picked this show for two reasons, I like it and think it's fun AND I get to complain about something from Twitter. I will post that in the next paragraph.

So a week ago? Time is weird when it comes to people complaining about "woke" stuff, I'll just say a week or so ago, Ernie Gary Gygax Jr supposedly said some racist stuff about Native Americans on a podcast. I don't listen to this podcast because the only thing I care about related to Dungeons and Dragons is the cartoon. And maybe Mazes and Monsters I say maybe with that movie because I haven't actually seen it but it sounds wild. So people got angry at his comments because well it's Twitter. Of course Conservatives ran to defend Ernie's right to yell about those damn Natives. It was a big thing for like half a day and then apparently Ernie apologized for his comments. That's good. Anyway I don't know why I mentioned this shit but yeah here it is. Enjoy. hardcore conservatives have ruined the internet. Not that Web 2.0 was ever that good.

Uh, ok enough comments about twitter and stuff I mostly just posted to annoy Portnoyd/Dave W. It's always a fun time in my comments section. Dungeons and Dragons was created by Gary Gygax in like 1974. It's a fantasy RPG game and that's all I know about it. I've never played this game because it seems to complicated for my dopey ass. I'll just watch the cartoon and maybe Mazes and Monsters. So in 1983 Marvel Productions made their fourth cartoon which was this one. Pretty wild huh? Anyway several people worked on this show Kevin Paul Coates, Dennis Marks and Takashi. They created it and Mark Evanier developed it for TV. Mark Evanier is a name you will hear many times on this blog because that dude had his hand in anything and everything. The Man is a writing machine and always did a good job.

The animation company that worked on this show was Toei animation. That's right the Dragon Ball people. Also the Sailor Moon people. And the Saint Seiya people. Those are the only anime I actually recongize from the big list of animes they worked on. Oh and the Pirate one that's like 12,000 episodes long. I think it's like the longest darn anime out there. I think it finally finished up too, maybe I'll have to talk about that Final Episode because it sounds pretty wild. Anyway Toei animated stuff for Hanna-Barbera, Rankin/Bass, Sunbow, DiC and lastly Marvel. They worked on an insane amount of shows and it would take like two paragraphs to tell you everything they worked on.

I have just HAVE to talk about the voice cast for this series, which is something I honestly should be doing more because well a cartoon isn't very good without voice acting. Anyway This show had a fucking WEIRD voice cast. Yeah it had Peter Cullen and Frank Welker but every cartoon in the 1980s had them in it. That's pretty damn normal. No what's weird is the fact Willie Aames from Charles in Charge and something called Bibleman (yes if I can find any of this show I will discuss it for you on this blog) voiced a character the main hero Hank, the Ranger. Yeah that's some wild shit. I like Willie Aames and the movie Zapped even if Scott Baio is a dope. Don Most, yes Ralph Malph from Happy Days voiced Eric the spoiled douchebag kid, who is also my favorite character. One of the kids from Eight is Enough voiced Presto the Magician who is another character I like. Sidney Miller an old timey actor who started acting in 1931 did the voice for Dungeon Master. I don't know about you but that's a pretty wild cast.

The concept of the show is pretty simple and works very well. While riding a theme park ride six kids are brought to the world of Dungeons and Dragons. Did this happen to other kids prior? or after? I really think it would have been neat for a one off episode where they meet some other kids. Did Dungeon Master pick these kids? Are these questions actually answered within the cartoon and I'm just over thinking a fun fantasy action cartoon from the 1980s? That is probably the right answer. Anyway they have to fight a evil bad guy named Venger and other crazy fantasy things. They also have a unicorn friend. He's a cutie. I like him. 

I remember watching this show being shown on Fox Kids. They would show reruns sometime around 1999 to 2000. It was the last show before the boring horseshit would come on and I would turn on the Super Nintendo and play Donkey Kong Country 3 or something. It's one of those shows where I just remember the INSANE opening theme and not much else. I don't know how much of this show I actually watched but I'm sure I saw a decent amount of it. The crazy ass opening is the best part of the show even if I do like the rest of it quite a bit. You need to check that shit out on youtube as soon as possible!

The Final Episode is not the one that's on some DVD set that's just people doing a script read. No what the Final Episode is the one that actually aired on television on December 7th, 1985 (No it's not a Christmas related episode. Would you believe that there are three shows that I have wanted to discuss so badly on this silly ass blog that end on a Christmas episode? Weird huh?) and was called "The Winds of Darkness". It starts with the kids having fun swimming in a hot springs when Dungeon Master just pops in and gives them some cryptic talk which they will find out during the episode. I think this was his big thing just being a cryptic asshole and having the kids figure out what the hell his nonsense his stupid ugly ass talks about. Anyway he fucks off and then GIANT FUCKING RED ANTS break out of the fucking hot springs because there needs to be a reason to get the kids to run the fuck away which they do after trying to fight them.

They get into a cave and find a fairy dragon named Amber that immediately takes a liking the Presto the Magician.  She doesn't like Eric. After a bit of discussion and walking they run into another dragon which I will call Frank the Dragon because I forget the silly Fantasy Name they gave the dragon and I like the idea of dragons having people names. So Frank tells them that Queen Tammy (not the actual name but one I've decided to use) has been kidnapped by a greedy king asshole. So it's up to the kids to save the Queen. They easily get into the castle thanks to the Thief's cape that turns her invisible. They then go looking through the dungeon and find the one with the Caged Queen Tammy. Sadly the Evil Greedy King Dickface informs them that their magic wont work here inside this cell. So they are ALL captured. Even Eric and the Unicorn who were a look out. Thankfully Amber escapes and goes back to tell everyone. Sadly she gets seen by King Dickface's men. 

Meanwhile the kids realize that Presto's cap can be put out SIDE the door and used. You'd think King Dickface would get his Wizard to make the ENTIRE Dungeon magic proof but I guess the Wizard is lazy and hates King Dickface. He uses magic to have some fucking termites pop up an eat the damn wooden door. They then go to meet up with the Fairy Dragons at their cave. The Queen tells them about their treasure but that's just when King Dickface comes in to the damn cave and they get trapped in the treasure room. They realize that a mirror in the room can bring you anywhere you want to go because Eric sees the amusement park because he wants to go home. They think of the place Queen Tammy had mentioned earlier and the dragons go flying in. I mean they also get the kids to shove in the treasure that THEY DON'T NEED BECAUSE THEY ARE DAMN DRAGONS. You should you know let the kids escape back home because they SAVED YOUR GREEDY ASS. Man these fairy dragons are honestly kinda worse than King Dickface.

They get the dragons out but they have to break the mirror before they can get back. They get past all of King Dickface's men by having Presto use his magic to make them float like balloons. They leave the cave with King Dickface screaming about how they need to let him down. Fuck King Dickface. The Episode ends with that little turd DungeonMaster being a cryptic little fucker. Man I would have kicked that little fuck right in his stupid face so many times if he brought me to that realm. I guess that's why I'm not in the realm of Dungeons and Dragons. That and the fact the realm is also a cartoon, but still Fuck Dungeon Master. 

FINAL VERDICT: I enjoyed this Final Episode. All the kids get something to do and it's fun to watch them interact. I also found out that one of the writers on this show would also go to write for Batman the Animated Series and Gargoyles. Michael Reaves is his name. That dude is good. Anyway A lot of people who watched this show first run swear the kids get home in the last episode and you'd think they would have because they were so damn close this time. Maybe tell the dragons to fuck their gold and let them get home. There was clearly enough time to save the dragons AND the kids but NOOOO the greedy dragon pricks needed their gold. I hope the kids realize that those dragons are jerks in the end.

Comic Review #48: Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew #6 (1982)

 

I've decided for the next little while I am going to review comic books that I had owned as a wee baby child. I collected Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, and X-Men so expect them to show up. I also ended up owning Archie and all kinds of other stuff. I didn't do much DC because Batman barely ever showed up in the comic sections of my local book store. Either that or they'd get bought out so quickly. I thought the rest of the DC Universe was "gay" because I was a dopey ten year old in 1995. Expect a lot of bronze and late 80s stuff because I would pick that stuff up the most. I will probably talk about some stuff made in like 1998 because that was a great era for a certain hero! I got a special TMNT comic coming up too! And some Simpsons! It'll be a fun time for everyone maybe even portnoyd. Probably not because he's a negative jerk.

I've also wanted to talk about this comic series for some time because I've gotten several issues now as an adult and I think they are wonderfully fun and charming and goofy. I'm pretty sure I got this in a 3 pack with Secret Wars II #8 (yes I'm sure I will read the entire story one day) and some other comic I can't remember. Any DC stuff that was in my collection was from these 3 packs. I think one of them was a Blue Beetle comic. It seriously wasn't much because sometimes I'd always try to see what all 3 comics were and only get packs where I was at least interested in two of them. I like how I can turn a simple memory in to a boring paragraph. I'm the best!

I must have read this comic quite a bit because it's stuck in my mind for the past 26 years (time flies when you're havin' fun!). I mostly remember the cover because it's pretty damn wild. The Zoo Crew having their asses kicked by the BUNNY FROM BEYOND. Anyway I think before we get to far into this thing I should talk to you fine people about who Captain Carrot and the Amazing Zoo Crew were. Well they first debuted in New Teen Titans #16 in 1982. Created by Rascally Roy Thomas and Scott Shaw! It stars Roger Rabbit (no really) a cartoonist who becomes Captain Carrot! The Zoo Crew were made up of Yankee Poodle, Pig-Iron, Fastback (can you guess what animal is the fast character??), Rubberduck (his alter ego is Byrd Rentals. I love it) and Alley-Kat-Abra the magic user! They were funny animal characters that fought crime as well you can tell. The stories took place on Earth-C and I miss when DC Comics had alternate earths. Getting rid of them was no good.

Now let's talk a bit about the creators because well that's what I usually do Roy Thomas was a fan first and even had an zine out there called Alter Ego in the 1960s and that he brought back. I have a few issues we will probably review them! Why not! I enjoy spewing my thoughts on things to an uncaring internet. Anyway he became Stan Lee's right hand man in about 1965. He then go to write for the  Avengers, X-Men, Conan, got them to do a Star Wars comic, and the concept for What If? So Roy's got some stuff behind him. He moved to DC in around 1980 I believe and did All Star Squadron which is a great comic book. I like Roy. I think he does good comics most of the time. Scott Shaw! has worked in comics and cartoons. Like the Flintstones and The Completely Mental Adventures of Ed Grimley (yes the Martin Short character got his own short lived cartoon and yes I'm sure I'll discuss it) and in comics on Sonic the Hedgehog as the first artist for that comic! I like his art in this comic quite a bit. It's very cartoony and that works for this comic.

I think it's finally time I get into the actual comic book here and now because why not? This comic starts off with them talking about what happened in the last part. Yes this is a two parter and I'm only reviewing part two because that's the one I had as a kid. I also forgot that it was a two parter. The prior issue involved fighting alien egg yolks from Easter Bunny Island (I told you the jokes in this comic were goofy!) and they learned that there were more alien egg yolks in Washington and that Baron Von Vermin was behind it. He's a Ratzi. You know a Rat that's also a Nazi. He had found the alien egg yolks before. They all stop the Egg Yolks from harming people and the president Mallard Fillmore. They then go back to Easter Bunny Island to help find a coffin that contained THE BUNNY FROM BEYOND. They are doing this because they think that he'll get rid of the Egg Yolks. I mean he does do that but he also turns Baron Von Vermin into a rock statue. Oh this comic also has Oklahoma Bones and Whipley the snake that acts like a whip. I think he's a chipmunk or something. Anyway he's Indiana Jones as an animal and he was pretty big in part one of this story I'm guessing but he kinda gets thrown to the wayside in this one. I did feel like I had to mention him though.

Captain Carrot and the Amazing Zoo Crew don't like that they turned Baron Von Vermin into a rock statue because they are for justice and feel that people should get a fair trial. They fight the BUNNY FROM BEYOND and he is not a fan of that so he quickly beats the crap out of them all and puts them in his spaceship which materializes out of nowhere. They are all put in capsules that will keep them from using their powers. Like Alley-Kat-Dabra is stuck in a capsule that plays nothing but disco music. I found that amusing despite the fact I like disco music. It's radder than you think jerks! Anyway Captain Carrot needs to eat a super Carrot to get his powers and he turns back into regular old Roger Rabbit. As Roger Rabbit he tries to mess with THE BUNNY FROM BEYOND and gets his butt kicked. He then decides to eat another carrot and become Captain Carrot while THE BUNNY FROM BEYOND isn't looking. He gets a good hit on him and then twists the two antennas on his head around and when the BUNNY FROM BEYOND goes to use them he blows up. I guess THE BUNNY FROM BEYOND doesn't get a fair trial. Just death.

This comic also has a second story which I shall tell you all about because why not I want to make this the longest review I've ever done because I think that's funny. The second story starts sometime after this story but before the next issue. It has Captain Carrot run-flying around. It's weird and hard to describe really. It's funny though. I like that. He's talking about how he needs his Cosmic Carrots to turn into Captain Carrot and how he should be careful about the carrots being eaten by anyone else. He goes back to his job. We go to the same building and find a Mole janitor who got fired for literally jabbing that thing you use to pick up paper into his boss's foot. He then ends up eating a Cosmic Carrot and turns into DIGGER O DOOM. I don't know why he's now Irish but hey. Digger O Doom then decides to go after his bosses because he didn't know his foot was there! Of course Captain Carrot and Digger O Doom fight until Digger O Doom loses the power from the Cosmic Carrots. There's not much to describe with this little story but it's still a fun addition to the overall comic. 

FINAL VERDICT: I enjoyed this comic as a kid and was one of the few DC comics that I did. I still enjoy this comic as an adult. It has lots of fun action, art and is a good pick up for your collection. I don't think I paid more than a dollar for my copy and any of the issues I have. I might even come back to this series for more reviews but I got like 320,000 things I've already talked about doing first. I'm gonna be a busy boy!

The Final Episode #67: Donald Duck (Family Planning - 1967)

 

I had fun when I discussed The Final Looney Tunes Cartoon of the Golden  Age. I even had fun yelling at how much I hate Casper The Friendly Fucking Ghost. I don't know why I haven't done more Final Episodes on the Golden Age of Animation but I have a lot of stuff that I want to talk about. I literally want to talk about at least every damn thing that ended between 1960 and 2000. It's a lot of stuff. Even stuff that only had 13 episodes. I'm weird and I like doing this so I've decided to discuss the Final Donald Duck Cartoon today. I decided to do it because Donald Duck is my favorite Disney Character.

I won't be doing an entire damn look through of everything Disney did because I will be returning to this well again and again, but during this little look at Donald Duck I found out that there was a 30 year gap between Mickey Mouse cartoons. The Final Golden Age Mickey Mouse Cartoon happened in 1953. That's like 19 or 20 years before the Golden Age of Animation ended. That's quite a bit of time man. I just find that interesting. The Final Disney Cartoons of the Golden Age involved Donald Duck, Goofy, Uncle Scrooge and Winnie the Pooh. I'll save what the Final Disney Cartoon Short of that era was until I decide to talk about it. Or you could just look it up on Google and RUIN THE SURPRISE. I bet some of you will do that now. Jerks.

Donald Duck is fucking hilarious. I was given a Chip N Dale cartoon cassette when I was a child. I'd like to own all those VHS tapes but I'd also like to have some where to place them so people can go "WOW YOU REALLY LIKE TO WASTE MONEY" and I'll be like "Yeah, I don't know what will happen when I die so I might as well enjoy spending it. So shut up jerk" I don't know why I make the fake people I talk to so antagonistic. And also don't know why I make myself so antagonistic. Either way, Uh. back to the VHS tape my uncle bought me in like 1985 for my birth. It had two great cartoons in it. One called The Lone Chipmunks, which I think is actually the last Chip N Dale cartoon so I won't say any more. The other was called Chips Ahoy which is one of the best Donald Duck AND best Chip N Dale cartoons. Ever. There's one scene that will forever crack me up whenever I think of it or see it. It's beautiful.

Anyway Chips Ahoy was the last regular Donald Duck cartoon. You know one with an actual plot. The rest were PSAs. One was about math. one was about fire safety. one was about accidents in the home and another one was about work accidents to make sure your dumb ass doesn't hurt yourself. One which I actually thought was the last Donald Duck cartoon was about Littering. One was about The Steel Industry called Steel and America about the manufacturing of well Steel.  One is about who may have created the Wheel and what the Wheel does. The Final Cartoon however was about Family Planning. Yeah the 1960s was a weird time for Donald Duck. Uh so Family Planning was a joint production by Walt Disney Productions and The Population Control. 

It starts with Donald Duck trying to put together one of those art stands for painters. I'm sure it has a name but I also don't care enough to look it up. I think you can tell already that this is gonna be one of those Final Episodes that I don't really like very much and feel it was a failure. So that's kinda pretty sad ya know? Donald of course messes it up and gets angry. The animation isn't all that great and clearly it's more about Family Planning then creating wild comedy for children. Paul Frees of like 92,000 cartoons and voice over jobs does well the voice over where he talks about how wonderful Family Planning is. I'm pretty sure this was just made for parents because this cartoon talks about death and poverty and people dying in some pretty fucking wild ways and some art (like actual seriously drawn stuff that is probably the best drawn stuff in  the cartoon) would have freaked me out at like 7 years old. I guess Les Clark who was the first of Disney's Nine Old Men still had something in him but that's like the only scene that I liked because it was pretty well drawn.

They talk more about Family Planning and I wish I had just pretended that Chips Ahoy was the last Donald Duck cartoon even though it really wasn't. This wasn't even theatrical. I don't even know how the hell you viewed this cartoon. Did you go to a Family Planning clinic? This cartoon is just depressing and it feels like Donald Duck was just shoehorned into it. I wonder if the rest of the Donald Duck PSA cartoons were like that. I'm gonna go ahead and guess yes because PSAs are weird like that. I like that I get to bring this to you because I think it's pretty weird and people should know about it. I just don't think it's fun weird like Webster. It's weird but also kinda dull. Weird doesn't always mean a good time people.

FINAL VERDICT: The next time I do a Final Golden Age of Animation Cartoon look back I must find one that's actually pretty good because this really isn't. Donald Duck was in like 128 cartoons and  I doubt any of them were as bad as this one. The Final Casper cartoon was better than this. Yeah I said that. I was very disappointed but it's still kinda interesting to find out what was the last one. I don't know what character or studio I plan to do next but we will find it all out.

Comic Review #47: United States of Captain America #1 (2021)

                       

I've been excited for this comic since it was announced. I'm a fan of big Anniversary stories. I'm a fan of like every Captain America on the cover. They are all great characters as Captain America or The Falcon or USAgent or Bucky or whatever. I thought the new Captain America inspired minority characters were really cool looking. I put those two words in fancy text because angry people from the internet who don't read comics but still call themselves comicsgate are angry about "wokeness" and how these characters were gonna replace Steve Rogers despite Marvel Comics doing the Legacy Character thing better than DC nowadays. How about we not leave Wally West in the dust, DC? He's a good character too damnit. You pricks. Whenever comicsgate gets mad about a comic you can get excited about it because it's actually going to turn out pretty good. The comics they make. Not so much. Maybe I'll write about one of their crap piles. I dunno.

The day this comic came out even more conservative crybabies got angry about it. They got angry over the fact Captain America got disillusioned over America and the American Dream. Wow. You know the thing that happened in the 1970s when He literally quit being Captain America because Richard Nixon was the mastermind behind a cult who wanted to take over everything. It's pretty wild. Not to mention other times but that's still the most famous. These people will always amuse and enrage me. It's quite sad. Anyway it's time for me to discuss this comic and was it worth the time to read, and I'll say yes and that I enjoyed both stories within this comic and I will regale them to you with great enthusiasm!

This is the first comic book I've read by Mr. Christopher Cantwell, and he uh has an unfortunate name. I won't say why but you can easily look him up and find out why. He's a pretty new guy with very few comic books under his name. His Iron Man ongoing didn't seem that interesting to me so I didn't pick it up, now I might end up picking up an issue and seeing what it's like because I was a fan of this comic but who knows. I've already got enough comics to read. Which is like 12,000. I do like Iron Man though. The art is done by Dale Eaglesham and he's a pretty great artist and I like his stuff. I'm not very good at the art criticism side because I just know what I like and what I don't. I'm not going to go DUR THE ANATOMY IS WEIRD or whatever crap hoity toity art nerds too. I just like his work. It's cool and good.

The story starts out with Steve Rogers thinking about how much America has changed since 1940. Thinking about does he have a place within America. Thinking how America treats a lot of people poorly and how that's terrible. You know things the character usually thinks about. OK, that will be the last pokey comment at people. When a mother fucker dressed like Captain America pops into the room and fucking steals his shield. Just outta fucking nowhere holy hot damn. It's pretty awesome. Captain America contacts the Falcon and he watches where the guy goes. Captain America is off on the road. During the search the Evil Captain America fucks up a train station and Captain America has to help a damn train brake AND then get the people off the train. He jumps out at a shadow that resembles a Captain America but it's not Evil Captain America but actually Captain America of the Railways! A gay teenager who has been helping people on the railways of America.

This is the one thing I didn't like about the comic and it's when Captain America the real Original Big Man literally says he will beat this kid up if he doesn't get an answer on who he is. I do not like that one bit. Captain America wouldn't do that and I don't like it. That's about it. They are shot at by a sexy lady. Comics do need more sexy lady assassins. The comic ends with Captain America The Real Original Big Man and FalconCap deciding to suit up and kick some ass. They are gonna find that sexy assassins and that stupid jerk Evil Captain America. And meet up with some of the new people inspired by him that they were told too by Captain America of the Railways.

So let's talk about the Captain America of the Railways origin story. It's a pretty simple short little story that involves him being kidnapped by the evil company ROXXON who wants slave labor. ROXXON is another thing that these totally big comic fans that were angry about this story would be angry about if they actually read comics because they are like the most evil corporation of all time and you know these guys love corporations all of them. Yeah I said I wouldn't be pokey but I lied. Fuck that It's my damn blog sonny. Uh so he meets a guy there and he decides that he doesn't want to be a fucking slave for a piece of shit corporation he decides to dress up as Captain America and kick some ass. I like that his shield is just a trash can lid. Lol. Anyway this ends with him kissing the boy he talked too. Aw a nice sweet way to end this comic book.

FINAL VERDICT: I enjoyed this comic and I hope that the other 4 issues are just as good. I cannot wait for the rest of these issues and I hope the next Captain America ongoing is good too because I am now hyped up for some Cap action. 

The Final Episode #66: Thundercats (1985 - 1989)

 

Alright! It's the big 200! That's right I've done 200 posts on this blog. It's time to discuss some history of my time talking about stuff on the internet via websites. I had a website about the NES. I won't type the name because it's honestly really stupid. It no longer exists because I deleted it. It was bad. I worked with another person who now hates me on a website called KRAP. It got hacked. We tried to bring it back a few times and none of them really worked. I had another blog where I reviewed NES games. I won't link to that because I don't like the work I've done on it. Yeah, believe it or not the closest I've come to actually enjoying the work I put into talking about all this silly shit is this blog. So you can just only imagine how bad those other sites were. Actually they were worse for other reasons. I didn't have my own voice it was just stolen from B from Whatever-Dude.com and done poorly. I can't be salty and silly and sarcastic towards this goofy shit because I genuinely love this stuff. I'm glad I found my voice which is slightly poking fun at this stuff but not being so negative at it. I just wish it didn't take so long.

Enough discussion of my old websites and blogs that you shouldn't care about because they were really bad. It's time to discuss something important and cool because it's the 200th post so it should be something important and cool. So I just had to discuss Thundercats. One of the biggest 80s cartoons. I've already done Transformers and G.I. Joe. I've also done Jem for the girls. I only had 3 "big" 80s cartoons left to talk about. I mean I liked Denver the Last Dinosaur but it sure as hell wasn't a super popular can't get away from it no matter how hard you try cartoon show. The other two are She Ra and He-Man. Oh also Ghostbusters but I can't talk about that for a few months. Gotta save some stuff for Halloween. So I chose Thundercats because I have easy access to the Final Episode. I actually don't have He-Man at the moment and I'd rather talk about that series before I did She-Ra. Why am I telling you this boring shit? Honestly. I don't know.

Thundercats for those not in the known was a tv cartoon made by Rankin-Bass, characters created by Tobin "Ted" Wolf. I think that's the coolest name I've ever heard. That's right the Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and Santa Claus is Coming to Town people. That's right! They made actual cartoons in the 1970s and 1980s. I think their first was some Lord of the Rings hogwash that I don't care about. Hobbits are stupid and I would only read a story where Conan the Barbarian wrecks the shit outta their little assholes. Fuck Hobbits. Thundercats is the story of a bunch of buff steroid using cat-human people that escape their dying planet to Third Earth. On Third Earth they have to fight a Mummy named Mumm-Ra (he just might be the best 1980s cartoon villain and I don't care what you have to say.) and his henchmen. Sometime later they find a New Thundera which is well the New version of their old planet, duh. Mumm-Ra still bothers them on New Thundera because it's really hard to get rid of a Mummy.

To the best of my memory I did not watch Thundercats but I do believe YTV put it on so I might have watched it. I would hope that I watched it because I'd hate to think that I have better taste in cartoons at age 36 than at age 6.  I did watch some episodes during my downloading shows off KaZza (remember that?) and I thought they were just spiffy. Spiffy is a word that should be used more. Anyway I've seen a bunch of Thundercats, enough to say that I like the Thundercats and think they are cool. The Final Episode was called "The Book of Omens" and was put out on September 29th, 1989. It starts off with Lion-O and Panthro talking about how the fucking planet is going to explode. That's one way to start off a Final Episode.

They then go to where the Book of Omens is and Panthro talks about how there's two ways to open it. One with the Sword of Omens and two with a fancy key. He opens up the key and the Book tells them to put several items back to where they originally were (an oar goes to a lake, a tile goes to the caverns of cold which used to be a nice lush garden, etc) and to present the key to the guardian that lives within the Book of Omens at the 24th hour will save the planet. I don't know what kinda drugs they were on when they wrote that but I want some. I bet it's some potent shit. Lion-O and the gang take no time to go off to their places while Lion-O stays home to meet the Guardian. However what Lion-O doesn't know is that Mumm-Ra had turned himself into a damn bug and stole the key.

Lion-O found out about Mumm-Ra's misdeeds and runs off to his evil base that somehow moved to New Thundera. Mumm-Ra is being bitched out by those cool looking statues that he would talk too and saying that he shouldn't mess with the Book of Omens but he's like "eat my shit you saggy fucks I'll do what I want" and he does. Using the key to escape just as Lion-O gets there. Lion-O has to fight the statues and use the Sword to get into the book. Meanwhile the other Thundercats, Panthro, that piece of shit Snarf, that bigger piece of shit Snarfer, and those shitty kids, Cheetra, some blind guy and some tiger dude are all trying to put their items where they should be. However something is keeping each one of them from doing that. Cheetra and the blind guy were stuck in a cave. Panthro and Snarf were having trouble getting up the weird ass mountain, Wilykit and Wilykat were being attacked by fucking steel pinecones and Snarfer and the Lion (??) Guy have to fight a giant ass motherfucking turtle. All kinds of crazy shit happening to the Thundercats.

Lion-O meets up with the Guardian who well freezes all of the other Thundercats in time. There's a cool effect where everything turns kinda gray-ish to show everyones frozen. It's like one of those old timey sepia photographs. I like those photographs. Mumm-Ra and Lion-O fight and then the Guardian tells them that they are at a stalemate because the key will not destroy the Sword of Omens and vice versa. It would have been nice to mention that before hand you big dickhead. Anyway they decide to settle this the way everyone should settle a problem, by wrestling. They wrestle until it seems Mumm-Ra has been defeated but seeing as he's an evil asshole he calls for the statues to send him some power which they do in the guise of a weird barbarian. He's got like a knights head thing on and a some He-Man like shorts but Lion-O decides to just say fuck it and fight fire with fire and cause these two snake heads to start burning the Knight Barbarian. This show is wild as fuck and I love it. Lion-O of course shows the key to the Guardian at the exact moment and the planet is saved.

Lion-O and the other Thundercats talk about how they can help care for this planet and it's a totally subtle way of telling you how you should care for our planet. We didn't listen though. This planet is gonna be wrecked just like the original Thundera. Pretty sad. Anyway they all talk about how they need to be vigilant against evil and the episode ends.

FINAL VERDICT: BOY HOWDY was this something! I expected this to be a fun episode but holy shit this is a top 10 Final Episodes for sure. Totally better than both the Final Episodes of GI Joe OR Transformers. I didn't expect Thundercats to take that spot but they did. I'm sure I will end up talking about the other animated series Rankin-Bass did in the 1980s called The Comic Strip but that won't be for some time. Anyway watch this episode because it fucking rules.

Comic Review #46: Darkhawk #2-3 (1991)

 

A few posts ago I said I wanted to review every issue of a comic series. To see its up and downs, highs and lows and well it seems I've decided to do it with Darkhawk. I might pick a DC series after this but I need to stop saying "yeah I'll review that" and just review another issue of What If or something. So I'll try to pace myself and review issues of Darkhawk in-between all of the other stuff I plan to discuss. It'll be wonderful and fun. I picked Darkhawk because honestly I enjoyed the 15 issues I've read out of the 50 or so issues and I want to see where this series goes.  Plus I get to annoy portnoyd and that's always fun and I can't wait.

I usually talk about the writers and artists in a second paragraph for the Comic Review but I did that with Darkhawk #1 so I believe I will discuss what happened in that issue. Phillipe Bazin and the Hobgoblin are looking for a item of GREAT POWER. Chris Powell and his family are having a bad time when they find out that their dad has taken money from Phillipe Bazin and ran off. During this event he finds the Darkhawk amulet that Phillip Bazin and Hobgoblin were looking for.  Chris Powell becomes the Darkhawk and fights some of Philip Bazin's men. 

Darkhawk #2 and #3 involve the Hobgoblin. And Spider-Man because why not bring in Marvel's most famous character for a new character. This issue starts with Darkhawk literally kicking the shit out of Phillipe Bazin's men and then pulls him and throws him OUT A WINDOW. He saves Bazin and then tells him to treat him seriously and then the Hobgoblin comes by. They fight until Darkhawk is injured and becomes Chris Powell again. He's worried that if he becomes Darkhawk again he will die. He goes home to a mother that is working too hard because their shitty dad gave up and took the money and ran like a piece of shit. 

He then sees Hobgoblin going to check out the amusement park that appeared in the first issue. Darkhawk's house is also apparently close to Aunt May's house so we see Spider-Man coming out to see whats up with Hobgoblin. Chris Powell sees two homeless men are gonna get crushed and rushes out to save them. He then turns into Darkhawk and realizes the injuries are gone. He helps Spider-Man fight the Hobgoblin but the Hobgoblin gets away. This is the end of issue #2.

Issue #3 opens up with Chris Powell trying to learn the Darkhawk powers better by......blowing up a car... He's kind of a dope but I like that because a damn fire happens because you shouldn't blow up a car that has tons of gasoline in it. It's kinda messed up man. Anyway he puts the fire out and then meets up with two cops who believe his story of the car just getting messed up and let him go. They also mention that his dad is crooked and wonder if they should have let him go. He then is helping cook breakfast in an amusing scene. He is not very good at it and his brothers do not want the lunches he made. I doubt he could have messed up a peanut butter and jelly sandwich because I don't think anyone could do that.

He then goes to school and hangs out with his girlfriend and one of his dumb friends sets him off and there's a huge fight and argument and Chris just ends up leaving. Chris then goes to a locker room and hears some dudes talking about Phillipe Bazin and how they are going to join up with him. They even mention where to go because they are stupid teens and also the hero needs to find a way to get there.  He shows up to the joint and while finding that Phillipe Bazin isn't there the guns he's selling can't get out there so he goes in to beat some ass. You know who shows up, yeah it's that fucker the Hobgoblin. So I gotta give some history here. The Hobgoblin was turned demonic by some demon that was messing with the X-Men. I'm too lazy to look up the weird name he had. Then Todd McFarlane decided the demon was a big fan of Jesus because while he can draw he can't write and The Hobgoblin thinks he's the servant of the Lord. He then breaks into two characters The Hobgoblin and the Demogoblin. Comic books are weird.

Spider-Man ends up in the fray, beating up all the gun runners while Darkhawk and the Hobgoblin fight. The Hobgoblin  gets his ASS handed to him and it's fun to see. Darkhawk then tries to kill him and is stopped by Spider-Man. The Hobgoblin escapes and Spider-Man calls Darkhawk a jerk saying he's sick of all these anti-hero types. It's a fun scene. We get a scene with Phillipe Bazin and Hobgoblin. Bazin tells Hobgoblin that Darkhawk doesn't have the powerful item he wanted but it's just an Iron Man suit because of his "scanners" and computer printouts. It turns out Bazin made all that shit up and the second Hobgoblin took it hook line and sinker. Man the Second Hobgoblin is kind of a dope. I'm glad the original Hobgoblin turned him into dust. Then it's back to Chris Powell's house where he gets a phone call with someone screaming BEWARE THE CURSE OF THE DARKHAWK.  Damn we end the issue on that ominous call. 

FINAL VERDICT: I don't know if I will come to regret this but if it gets too bad I can just quit. Anyway as of right now I'm having a really good time and enjoyed these two issues. The two heroes work together. I think Chris' group of friends could be interesting. I'm curious about what the curse of the Darkhawk is. So far, so good!

The Final Episode #65: Disney's Fillmore! (2002 - 2004)

 

I think I need to amend a rule I had put in place for this blog, even though I don't know why I put in any rules but here it is: I didn't really want to review things past the year 2000 because I dunno I wanted this to be a nostalgia blog and most stuff after 2000 holds very little nostalgia for me. I think that rules good for the most part because you don't want to see me talk about some fancy high fluting well reviewed television series that people annoy you about for like its entire runtime to watch. NO PEOPLE I DONT CARE ABOUT DAMN BREAKING BAD SO PISS OFF. You come here to watch me talk about some weird thing from the past or sometimes something you actually remember. I am going to amend that rule to this "I'll review something past the year 2000 if I find it interesting or nostalgic or whatever" I think that works well for everyone because there's a small amount of shows I do want to talk about that I forgot came out past the year 2000.

So Fillmore! came out in 2002 and what I like about some Final Episodes is what I would tell you guys about what was happening in my life at that time, so in 2002 I was 16-17 and I was going to high school for my final year. I would end up quitting that last year and not finishing later with GED stuff or whatever. I finished at a  place called the Murphy Centre. Sometimes I still have nightmares that the Murphy Centre stuff didn't count and I have to go back to High School. I don't like those dreams. I don't even know why I'm telling you this stuff. In 2002 I was into collecting NES games and watching any movie made in the 1980s. I would also get up in the morning to watch Disney's Fillmore! and also Lloyd in Space but I'll get to that show some time soon. I enjoyed both shows immensely. I don't think One Saturday Morning was going on at the time or if there were any other shows on at that point but watching those two was a must. I'm sure if anyone at my school cared about me they might make fun of me but at that point I stopped caring about being seeing as cool or adult. I'll watch my damn cartoons and you can't stop me. Fuckers.

Uh, yeah, I didn't really like High School. or Junior High. Or Middle School. Or any School. Actually I kinda liked going to the Murphy Centre, they had a really nice laid back vibe that was really nice to me. I dunno. It was an interesting experience. Maybe I'll talk about it more when I can. This is not a blog where I discuss my life. It's a blog where I discuss old tv shows and their Final Episodes. Disney's Fillmore was a pretty weird little show now that I think about it. It was a parody of 1970s cop shows down to everything being taken so seriously but it was so ridiculous. Cornelius Fillmore was a bad boy who was given a chance to become a member of the Safety Patrol. He ends up giving a goth girl named Ingrid Third a chance to change her life around. She does any they end up taking on all kinds of Junior High Crimes. It's a very silly and goofy show but it's also very charming and amusing. I'm a big fan of Disney's Fillmore. The show itself ran from 2002 to 2004. Ending in January of 2004. It had a whopping 26 episodes so yes It's one of those shows Port will complain about. I wanted to talk about this show and I am and he can't stop me. The jerk.

The Final Episode of Disney's Fillmore was called "Field Trip of the Just" and this is an episode I do not remember seeing. You'd think I'd see all 26 episodes if I watched this show a lot and even in reruns but I do not have a single memory of this episode. I thought the last episode was something entirely different. I thought the last episode was the one where they go to the museum and someone messes up a painting. That's why I like doing this whole thing, just so I can find out WHAT is the Final Episode was like. If I saw it or not. If it was a good send off or what not. I dunno. This episode starts out with BAD BOY Eric Obern and his friends messing with some kids. He gets his friends to leave and a girl named Alexandria comes up to him and tries to act like a bad girl to get his attention. I think she wants a date. Some jerk comes up to HER and tries to tell her who she should hang out with. It ain't your damn business you little snot. Plus he tries to get her to go to a flute concert. What a fucking nerd. 

Eric Obern is looking after the science class' pet Tarantula, Guilderstern. I guess the teacher is a big Shakespeare fan or something. When he goes in this day BLAM Guilderstern is hurt and theres a big thermos of a weird looking substance worst of all is that he gets caught! It's not looking good for Eric! He's escapes from Fillmore and Ingrid and gets into a truck full of scarecrows. Bolger's Scarecrow Service or something. I think I'll leave why I find that funny to myself. Anyway Fillmore is given an ALL DAY PASS to go after Eric. We learn that the principal had a pet tarantula as a child which helped her through the tough years. Very amusing images of her playing with her tarantula. At least I thought they were.

It turns out that a Truant Officer that still has a grudge towards Fillmore is on the roads and captures Fillmore allowing Eric to get away. Meanwhile back at X Middle School Ingrid Third is talking to people and finding out that Eric is a straight A student whos only a bad boy to keep his friends that he's been friends with since kindergarten. Fillmore finds out that Eric is going to the Animal Hospital Guilderstern is at. Fillmore thinks its to finish the job. He finds Eric in Guilderstern's room and they go on a fun chase where Eric gets away on a camel. Also during the chase a goat gets Fillmore's all day pass! He gets out the door just to find the Truant Officer jerk coming back for another go at Fillmore. He has found out that the All Day Pass was real and that as long as Fillmore has it he's good. He tries to get Fillmore to show it to him again and oh shit Fillmore is in trouble. He jumps behind a portable table thing? You've seen these things before but I don't know what they are called! I don't work at a animal hospital you jerk!

Fillmore sneaks into a closet and waits till it's safe. However he dropped a picture of Eric AND his back up walkie talkie and guess who finds it. That's right the Truant Officer Jerk. Fillmore finds out about the one and only place that sells the stuff that was poured on Guilderstern. It's at a place called Elliminatrix. Fillmore goes there to find Eric but they both only find the Truant Officer Jerk. They get his tie stuck in a filing cabinet and he goes "Why didn't I wear my clip on!!!?" I dunno I laughed. They are found by a doberman dog and at that point it goes to what would have been a commercial in 2002. We see Fillmore on the phone with Ingrid and she's telling him that Eric is a A plus student and a animal lover we then see Eric playing wit the doberman that was there to eat their faces. Fun scene. He then leaves Fillmore back there and goes off back to X to confront the real prep. You see during all this a guy comes on the loud speaker and says his last name is Gravel. This makes Eric realize who did it. Fillmore gets filled in.

Who did it you might ask? It's not the Flute Jerk, no it's Alexandria. That's right because Eric was pretending to hate the Tarantula, Alexandria took it on her self to make it sick but poured too much on it. Fillmore and Ingrid hear her confession but even though Eric tries to take the blame Alexandria runs off. Kids dressed up as states have been filling the halls and they bump into one dressed as Texas and he yells "NO ONE MESSES WITH TEXAS" I laughed at that. What? It's funny. Go to hell, port. Alexandria ends up getting caught and is punished. Eric tells his friends about all his good deeds and they are willing to be tutored! Best of all Guilderstern is safe. 

FINAL VERDICT: Revisiting this show was a blast. Orlando Jones, 3J from Family Matters was great as Fillmore. So was Tara Strong as Ingrid Third. Horatio Sanz voiced a character but I'm going to assume he was terrible because he's like a very low tier SNL guy. Port probably loves him. Also the most famous movie he was in was Boat Trip and if that doesn't say everything you need to know about him than I don't know what will. 

Comic Review #45: What If #34 (1992)

 

When I started this blog I would do three mini reviews of three different comics. I had chosen What If and called them What If Wednesdays. I don't really like those reviews because reviewing more than one thing at one time feels lazy most of the time. Like I'm sure I could have had a lot more to discuss with each and every one of those stories, so I'm sure you will see them redone for your amusement. I don't know when or how but I do plan to try to review a What If comic every Wednesday. Also I had an ongoing thing for DC's equivalent of What if's Elseworlds, I plan to incorporate them into the Comic Review. I want this Comic Review thing to have so many reviews that you'll go 'Wow thats a lot of comic discussion" then you read them and go "Wow thats a lot of poorly constructed comic discussion" and you'd be right!

I got a pretty interesting little comics writer for the main story (the only one of the two that is actually memorable) Scott M Gimple. Who worked with Disney, Simpsons comics and The Walking Dead. He was born in 1971 and is 50 years old now. He created the Disney cartoon Fillmore! which will totally be discussed on The Final Episode because that show was a damn hoot. I'll wait for that Final Episode to discuss it! It might bypass my no shows past 2000 rule but I'll break that anyway because It's my blog and I can do whatever I want. Anyway there are about 52 artists doing parts of this comic magazine so I don't think I'll be picking just one to discuss. Sorry art men!

As you can tell from the Watching doing the Marilyn Monroe pose from that movie I never watched because it didn't have a giant monster or Richard Pryor in it yet I still know that scene. It's weird how that works out. It's much less sexy with the Watcher in Marilyn Monroe's spot, unless you are into blankless eye big headed men with greek robes. If thats your thing well good for you but I certainly don't understand it. Anyway you can tell this is a humor issue and oddly enough issue 34 of What If Vol 1 was also a humor comic. And it was funnier. 

The Scott M. Gimple story involves Galactus being turned into a human being who looks like Elvis Presley circa the 1960s and everyone believes he is Elvis. I guess Thanos was being nice when he used the Infinity Gauntlet to turn Galactus into Elvis. Is Thanos a Elvis fan? I like to think he is because it actually amuses me to see him trying to dance like Elvis. This is not a bad little story and has a few cute amusing moments but it just up and ends when Adam Warlock just gives Galactus the okay to stay as Elvis. Isn't Galactus like a big thing that needs to stay around in the Marvel Universe? I'm pretty sure thats the case. It does end with this great image:

The Watcher there in some fancy flannel makes the best thing ever. This is pretty much the reason I will tell you to buy this comic because the rest is pretty bad. I think this story with an ending that just doesnt feel like it popped out of nowhere and was a bit longer it would have been great instead of decent. That's just me though. The other story in this comic is a weird one involving Spider-Man and Mary Jane Watson-Parker having a baby spider that's this weird grossly drawn thing. Spider-Man has to take care of the freak baby and also fight crime. The baby helps him beat the bad guys. There that's the story. It's not funny or good.

The rest of this book is just one panel things which was what the first book was about just the first one had better gags for the most part. The original book had one that was like What if Wonder Man was a woman and Power Man was a girl? and there was a cease and desist letter from DC comics right in the middle of the thing. It's a nice little gag. The gags in this comic were like WHAT IF HOWARD THE DUCK WAS A VULTURE? clearly they threw some jokes together at the last moment and only one of them works, at least works for me. I'll post it here because why not.

I would totally buy a comic series with Punisher's family but it HAS to include Bullets the Wonder Pup.

FINAL VERDICT: I really can't say much because I'm sure someone out there thinks these one panel gags are hilarious but I really do not. So this comic pretty much fails. It has one amusing story and an amusing cover at most which is more I can say for What The?! Marvel's humor comic of the time. I really should discuss that one. and Not Brand Ecchh and Crazy Magazine. I have so many comic books to review and so little time. Anyway have a good day.

Comic Review #44: Marvel Voices: Pride #1

 

I would have liked to do a theme month for LBGT people seeing as this is gay pride month but I mean I'm sure I could do it via comic books and stuff but The Final Episode? My Weird b-movie review thing? I'm sure I could find some but enough for a full month of discussions? I dunno. I did try to put in as much information about the LBGTQZFMNLOP community as I could. Which just related too two comics and mentioning that GREAT ACTOR Wesley Eure enjoyed kissing men. Well he's still alive so I'm going to assume he still enjoys kissing men. It's not something you change about yourself.

Anyway Marvel Voices: Pride #1 is I think the 3rd or 4th issue of Marvel Voices. A series that involves letting people of different backgrounds get to write stories. One was Indigenous Voices, a comic I thought was pretty good but I didn't like the last story. I believe there was one involving black characters. There might have been something else but I'm not sure. They are planning on a Asian American Voices issue too. I plan to discuss that one too. I think everybody deserves representation and a story and characters and all that. I don't believe that it should be done poorly though.

This feels a bit different than than the DC one. A bit more character develop-y than action-y. I don't mind when superhero characters just have a story where they interact with each other. It's good to get to know how these characters feel so that I dunno you can get to like them or not. You gotta have character development or the action stories don't work because you don't give a peckered piss about what's happening. I don't know where the term peckered piss came from so I'll talk about a few stories from the book like usual because there are a LOT of them in this book.

I think the first story I will discuss is called Colossus and it's about a character named Prodigy who is one of the 97 hundred million billion thousand trillion X-Men characters that are now somehow all living on an Island together. Like Gilligan's Island. I like Gilligan's Island X-Men. It's a very interesting era for Marvel's merry mutants. Anyway this story is them talking about how they realized they were bisexual and Prodigy tells Speed (they are both boning each other). Speed is another mutant and one of the sons of the Scarlet Witch. Don't look into his backstory because it will cause some brain matter to squeeze out of your ears. I don't say that very much but it really will do that. So Prodigy talks about a crush he had on Colossus, a giant stacked piece of man meat. Still I don't know if that counts because EVERYONE is gay for Colossus. He's a big Russian teddy bear that if you get mad will kick ass. Who wouldn't want to kiss that??? anyway it's a cute and fun little story.

The next story is called Totally Invulnerable and it involves She-Hulk! But there's a twist. It's not actually She-Hulk but a lady that is cosplaying as her! I think heroes from Marvel should meet up with more cosplayers because I think it would make for funny interactions. Cosplay She-Hulk runs afoul of Titania who is angry that She-Hulk won't be a lawyer for her husband Crusher Creel the Absorbing Man. Of course she's the reason he was caught so it would be a conflict of interest. After they almost fight Titania realizes its paint not actual green skin. They then end up in a cafe talking about stuff and Cosplay She-Hulk tells Titania she is trans and likes She-Hulk because she was a strong and powerful woman which gave her confidence to be herself. It's sweet. . I also liked one joke where Titania says THE GENDER PEOPLE after finding out. It made me laugh. It ends with them going to beat the shit out of a Deadpool cosplayer which is clearly the way EVERY STORY SHOULD END THAT WAY.

The Final story I'm going to talk about is called Early Thaw and it tells the story of Iceman. Who is very angry and sad at himself for finding the Angel attractive. It's up to Magneto of all people to calm him down during one of his attempts to blow up Professor Xavier's face. It's actually a pretty sweet little story and I loved how it ended. Iceman just going "Xavier isn't even there". I wonder how many times that happens to supervillains. I'd be so pissed if I let out my cyborg gorillas that eat peoples faces and the person I wanted them to destroy was off somewhere else. 

The rest of the stories are fine but there's not much to talk about them. A lot of them are one or two pages and that's kind of why I liked the DC one better. I mean Marvel has a lot more gay characters it seems and they wanted to include as many as they could but I dunno I liked the more flesh out stories from DC Pride. Still none of the stories from either book is what I would consider bad. Just I can't really talk about most of these stories past one paragraph. It's kind of a shame. 

FINAL VERDICT: I thought the stories for the most part were pretty good but most of them were just too short.  Not a bad comic but I thought the DC Pride did it better. I do not think this was worth 9 bucks even if it was double sized. I think they should put this series in a trade soon. I'd pick that up. I think it's a bit easier to pick up trades of stuff now than actual comics but damnit a comic book still feels the best to hold in your hand. And are fun to collect. I don't know where I'm going with this. This is still a better comic than the one where Northstar comics out which was really bad and I don't like that they reprinted a good chunk of that comic.

The Final Episode #64: Flying Rhino Junior High (1998 - 2000)

 

I had originally decided to talk about Brand Spanking New Doug to annoy portnoyd, but I realized that I had told him that if he made me laugh in that Doug post I would leave that show for about 50 posts. It's not even 30 Final Episode posts since then. So he gets off the hook for that show at least. Then I decided to watch Mega Man but I wasn't really feeling that one either. No, I felt like discussing some thing weird and obscure so I decided to finally discuss Flying Rhino Junior High. The fact I can remember things like Flying Rhino Junior High is a blessing and a curse and I've decided to show you this cursed thing! 

The animation studio Nelvana was one of the Canadian Animation companies during the 1980s and 1990s. They started up shop on July 30th, 1971. Almost 50 years ago! Insane huh? Yeah I think it's insane at least. They were named after a Golden Age of Comics character called Nelvana of the North. I would review a Nelvana of the North comic if I could but I cannot. They also did live action series including one with Mr. T! It was called T&T and it was not very good. They are probably most famous for Rock N Rule, the second Care Bears cartoon, Babar, My Pet Monster, Rupert and The Adventures of Tintin. they worked together with an French animation company and a Scottish animation company for this series. It was also appeared on CBS of all places. I would watch this show and only this show on the CBS Saturday Morning thing. I thought it was fun.

Yes, I know I've said that French people are not funny but I'm going to assume that the other people working on this series made the comedy part of this series. I've seen Radioactive and The Wacky World of Tex Avery and I know that when it's just French people themselves it makes for some painful attempts at comedy. People who like Jerry Lewis as much as them are not to be trusted in any manner. Okay, enough trashing the sense of humor of French people. It's time to talk about the actual overall plot of this series. There's this kid you see named Earl P. Sidebottom who gets a D in shop class and then decides to go to the school's basement to live there in shame. He creates a machine that can change the school's environment to destroy the school or something I don't know. He now calls himself The Phantom. He is stopped by a group of four kids: Marcus Snarkis, his sister Ruby, Billy O Toole and Lydia Lopez. 

The Final Episode called "Seeing Double" which I think is a weird and not great title for this episode. You'll see in a little while. The episode starts with Marcus complaining about his weird puffy green vest and yeah I can easily see why he would not want to wear it. It looks goofy as fuck. I'm pretty sure everyone in the school would mock him for it but somehow they don't. Except Billy. That hooligan. Anyway Marcus goes to look in the Bathroom mirror and during that he breaks the sink. He runs off like a big turd and leaves Johnny to take the blame from the rhino principal. Yes, the principal of Flying Rhino Junior High is a Rhino. They go to class and learn about fantasy stories. They call Edgar Allan Poe fantasy and I don't think that's a really good classification for that guy but what do I know. I've only seen movies based on his work because I'm lazy. They also bring up Lewis Carroll and his Alice in Wonderland books.

Then we go to The Phantom which is Earl P Sidebottom's alter ego. He gets very angry and decides to send the characters through the looking glass (a mirror) to an alterative universe where everything is a bit different. During there they meet their doubles. They see them for like 5 seconds and all that. I thought with that title you'd see like 5,000 doubles of one person and they'd have to find out which one was the real one and somehow get rid of the rest. I dunno that what comes to mind, not a alternative universe episode. They have to find a way out of the alternative universe after the Rhino Principal with A Beard decides that they should be cryonically frozen like Walt Disney. It's a very weird scene but this is a very weird show. To get even weirder the Rhino Principal With A Beard sends a robotic pig version of the regular pig version 

They get away from him and try to go back via the mirror in the bathroom but they find out they can't. They talk with the smart version of the dumb character of the regular universe and realize it's like a chess board so they create a 3D Chess version of the school with Marcus' little doohickey machine he has. He finds out that the place to escape is in the basement. This is where they find the good version of Earl P Sidebottom and his henchmen Ratticus. Earl sent the bad kids away because they would harrass and beat the shit out of him. He goes absolutely insane for Marcus' shitty vest that I had forgotten about. It's the Chekov's gun of this story people! Marcus gives him the vest and he agrees to send them home and bring back the bad versions of them.

During all of this the regular version of The Phantom is being annoyed by Ratticus trying to celebrate their 10th anniversary together as bad guys. Does this mean The Phantom is only like 20 something years old? Weird. The Phantom gets a damn flying camera smashed into his face and Ratticus just makes a joke. These guys are kinda jerks to each other. Oh, and Marcus finally admits that he broke the sink and it wasn't Johnny and gets in trouble for lying. He has to work with the pig Janitor (who's also a spy). This show was a lot weirder than I remembered.

FINAL VERDICT: I had fun watching this Final Episode but it wasn't anything amazing. It's just a little bit of fluff that I was able to discuss for several paragraphs. I am very good at bullshitting posts about things no one cares about, but not very good at most other things. Oh, and I learned this series was based around a bunch of books. Wild!

Comic Review #43: 1st Issue Special #2: The Green Team (1975)

 

I'm surprised I haven't read more of this series. I'm pretty sure I own like the entire run. I mean it's only 13 issues but still. 1st Issue Special was a try out book where they would put new characters into each issue. Or they would bring back an old character that hadn't been seen in a some time. Dr. Fate, Creeper and Metamorpho and the New Gods were characters that were brought back for this series. Every other character was a new character and since I want to discuss every character I can from  both Marvel and DC it's time for us to discuss The Green Team. I had two choices to go through for these obscure goofballs because they appeared in this comic and then in another comic series for about 8 issues in 2012. I chose this because I remember it being a ridiculously fun comic book.

It's time to discuss Joe Simon. Joe Simon was in comics for decades at this point. At least 3 maybe 4 decades. He worked with Jack Kirby and they created a simple little obscure character known as Captain America. They created Boy Commandos and Newsboy Legion. They really liked boy gangs because well they were both probably in a gang of boys going on wild adventures. I've always liked his comics because the vast majority of them were bugfuck crazy. He'd probably not like being called bugfuck crazy but this is one of the more normal comics he did and it's still pretty wild. Jerry Grandenetti did most of his work in war comics which is a genre I should discuss more. He also got his art stolen by so called artist Roy Lichenstein. Me I just call that guy what he is a fucking thief. No one wants to read me rant about that guy who would take comic art panels from other people without any money given to the other person and make them into "high" art. Fuck that smug thief asshole.

Anyway back to discussing the comic and not some big dickhead. This comic involves a bunch of boy millionaires. I like comic book rich people but not real rich people so I do like these little goofballs. The first kid we meet is Abdul Smith. He wants to join a team and he does end up joining these boy millionaires when a bank fucks up saying he has 500,000 dollars and he puts that money into the stock market and wins. Commodore Murphy is a boy real estate king who buys a damn town just to fuck around with his toy ship. The toy ship has its own REAL BOMBS and it blows the hell out of the town. What a weirdo. He meets up with his friend J.P. Houston, an oil guy and most stereotypical Texan I've ever seen. The last kid was Cecil Sunbeam who is a movie making kid. I love how all four of these look so goofy and I can't get enough of them.

They get brought in by a Professor Apple who wants to create The Great American Pleasure machine. A machine that will give any person who goes inside the greatest pleasure of all time. The boys go for it and when visiting the building area for the Great American Pleasure Machine they get accosted by David D. Merrit a broadway producer who's afraid the Great American Pleasure Machine will destroy his job. He actually gets a meeting with the Green Team and all he wants is 50k to piss off. I'd have given him that but it wouldn't have made for a very interesting ending to a comic book but the Boy Millionares decide to throw away even more money to distract his the people following David D. Merrit. He decides that he won't let the Green Team get him and decides to take a ride in the Great American Pleasure Machine, and wouldn't you know it. It drives him fucking insane. I guess too much pleasure is not good for you.

FINAL VERDICT: a very silly yet very fun little comic book. I will probably check out the other series made 3 and a half decades later sometime soon. I would also like to find a copy of Cancelled Comics Cavalcade where they have TWO other Green Team comics. I loved the goofy cartoony art and had a great time re-reading this and I just wish we had more of these goofballs. A very charming and fun comic book.

The Final Episode #63: Land of the Lost (1974 - 1976)

 

Today we go back to the well of "Shows I learned of thanks to Jump the Shark.com". I think we need to talk about more 1970s television and all that on this little blog of mine. So I decided that if we were going to talk about a Sid and Marty Krofft tv show because they were the most 1970s thing ever. A bunch of sci fi writers and hippies got high and made tv shows for children and if this show was any indication it was awesome. I also have to mention the 2009 movie for being the movie that killed the small sub genre of "Movies based around TV shows" for a decade. I can't think of any movie based around a tv series made between that movie and CHiPs and Baywatch. It takes a lot to make Hollywood go "Yeah maybe we should reign this in for a little while" but Will Ferrell (a guy who can be funny and likable in many movies) at his absolute worst can do that. At least for a little while.

Sid and Marty Krofft made like so many tv shows that I've been wanting to watch forever. They all sound like some kind of wonderful fever dream. Land of the Lost seemed to best one to go through because it seemed to be the least insane show they worked on. Despite it involving monsters, dinosaurs and even time travel. They even helped make what is considered one of the worst tv shows ever made called Pink Lady and Jeff but I definitely plan to talk about that series in its own blog post so you will just have to wait to hear all about that gem.

Land of the Lost was about a father and his two children on a raft riding expedition where they end up in well The Land of the Lost. The Land of the Lost was this crazy place where dinosaurs still lived. They had some weird smart monkey cavemen creatures called Pakuni and some crazy bug eyed creatures called the Sleestak. I think Sleestak was one of the coolest monsters ever. The most famous person on the cast was probably Wesley Eure. Famous for being on Days of Our Lives, dating Richard Chamberlain (most famous for being Allan Quartermain in some cheeseball Cannon films... at least most famous for that IN my mind), starring in such film classics as The Toolbox Murders, Jennifer and a live action Hanna-Barbera movie about a robotic dog called C.H.O.M.P.S. and yes I've never seen Lord of the Rings but I've seen those movies (and the remake of the Toolbox Murders too!!) He also worked on a Nickelodeon game show called Finders Keepers. It sounds really bad. Apparently he helped create the PBS kids show Dragon Tales. A pretty good and interesting collection of stuff.

Seeing as this is a show I've seen for the first time I decided that I had to watch a few episodes of this show. So yep, another Extra Special Extra Sized Blog Post! It's like a comic book so I like to do these! The first episode was called Cha-ka in which the children Holly and Will find a pakuni creature named Cha-ka. He looks like a weird monkey caveman thing. I like him. I also like how he learns how to speak some English by this episode and the last one. That's a neat idea I think. He ends up hurting his leg and the kids and their dad have to help him and get him back to his parents. The second episode was called "The Sleestak God" and we first see the Sleestaks for the first time. Will and Holly get captured by them and it's up to Cha-ka and their dad to save them. We don't get to see the crazy looking monster the Sleestak's worship so I'm kinda peeved at that one.

The Final Episode however was called The Medicine Man and it starts off with Holly and Cha-ka making soup for the group, which now has their uncle Jack because the dad wanted more money because they started plastering his face on lunch boxes and stuff. I don't blame him. The pot with boiling water is stolen and we find out who the culprit was. It's a native American man named Lone Wolf. Yes, he's played by someone who is not a native American because this was 1976 and no one cared about anything then. He tells Uncle Jack that he needs to get back but he is too sick to go. They bring back Lone Wolf to the cave.

They learn about Lone Wolf being a Medicine man and taking medicine for his tribe. Will meets up with Elmo Diggs an Calvary man who is here to bring Lone Wolf back. I mean if they can even find their way OUT of the Land of the Lost which uh spoiler warning it's not really shown that they do. Elmo Diggs says that Lone Wolf has stolen the medicine but Lone Wolf says it was supposed to go to his tribe first. Elmo gets the FEVER FROM HELL and its up to Lone Wolf to save him. Lone Wolf goes off and everyone thinks he has left when he doesn't come back. 

Uncle Jack goes off to find Lone Wolf and finds him behind a large rock with Grumpy, a Tyrannosaurs Rex that tries to eat the cast all the time. Uncle Jack confuses Grumpy by sending a rock past him which causes him to go look for that while Lone Wolf escapes. Lone Wolf and Uncle Jack then go look for the stuff to help Elmo Diggs. Then they find the stuff and its the stereotypical scene of native Americans doing their thing. It's pretty wild. Elmo Diggs is saved and I think that just might be my favorite name of all time.

Elmo Diggs then decides to take Lone Wolf back to be put on trial and probably murdered until everyone is like "Bro he fucking saved your damn life" and he decides to not be a piece of shit. Elmo Diggs and Lone Wolf go off to find their way out of the Land of the Lost. We don't see them escape so I'm going to assume that they don't. Holly, Will and Uncle Jack don't get out either. Also Holly and Will were supposed to be in that terrible Will Ferrell movie I mentioned earlier but their cameos were cut out. I think that's pretty shitty but I also would be glad to have my cameo cut out of a movie that bad so It's kind of a weird moot point. I just wanted to point that out.

FINAL VERDICT: I would have watched the absolute shit out of this show if it had appeared in reruns during my childhood, but it's still fun to watch today as a so called adult. Oh, I also have to mention that Sid and Marty Krofft made Pryor's Place. Yes we gave Richard Pryor his own kids show. The past was a wild place.

The Final Episode #62: Astroboy (1980 - 1981)

 

You know if taking something from a different country and dubbing it somehow makes it Canadian content then Canada should have taken shows from all over the world, because I'm sure they would have been better than most of our actual home grown content. I need to start reviewing more of it but I really don't want to go look for it or even re-watch most of it. I just know when it was a live action Canadian show that's when the Super Nintendo got turned on and I played Donkey Kong Country 2 for a few hours. What I'm saying is that in our weird world Astro Boy counted as Canadian content because Canada did the dub and it showed on TV over here for like ever. It's probably the first thing I'd have ever seen that came from the Land of the Rising Sun. Except maybe Godzilla. It was probably one or the other.

Before I go any farther I must say that this show is one of the top 10 theme songs for cartoons ever. this is not a thing that can be argued, if you disagree with that fact you are a big four eyed lame-o who smells like fish and I do not respect or like you. Sorry. You can listen to it here. Now we can get into the history of this show. It was based off a manga which is pretty much a Japanese comic book. I'm surprised I haven't reviewed more of them because some of them are incredibly fun and should be discussed. I'm too busy talking about obscure Marvel and DC characters that only I care about. Astro Boy is definitely one of the oldest things I've talked about as it dates all the way back to 1953. Astro Boy is older than most of my family members. I think that's pretty wild. It had an anime series in the 1960s and I don't believe I ever saw a single episode of that series. I'm sure it was awesome because Astro Boy was an incredibly fun tv series and manga-comic. I shall have to discuss the best Astro Boy manga story soon enough because it's great.

I enjoyed the hell out of this show when I was a kid. I don't know what channel it came on but whenever I would come across it I would watch it. Honestly all that sticks in my mind is the theme song which is still kicking rad and if you disagree you can eat something gross. Astro Boy is the story of uh Astro Boy a robot who fights evil. He was created by Dr. Tenma who made him look like his deceased son. He ends up in the hands of Dr. Elefun. I know that's not his Japanese name but I love that name. It's a lot of fun to say. This Final Episode involves a lot of stuff so let's get into it. 

It turns out that Dr. Tenma had a prototype design of a robot that would be created before Astro Boy. These designs get stolen and Astro Boy has to sneak into the country of Grotta to get them back. He's given a disguise and everything. It doesn't last long because he has to jump out of a train because people are being searched at the stop he has to make. So he finds the robot he was there to look for already in  a little girl robot named Nuka. I think you already get what's already gonna happen with that name. Anyway Astro Boy ruins his disguise by trying to break through the fence and gets lasered to fuck. 

Nuka has Astro Boy pretend to be deactivated and just brings him into the fortress. Fortress is a cool word and should be used more. Astro Boy and Nuka talk about how Nuka wants a robot friend and the other robots in this fortress are heartless. We see some weird lizard looking robots and I gotta say I love how they get like 1 minute of screen time and they still get a great look. They didn't mess around in this series. Every character gets a great look. They get around and get stuck in a trap. Dr. Rindolf comes on the screen and  Astro Boy finds out that Nuka is the robot he's there to find! We also find out that this trap room is a fucking rocket, just like that Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends series finale. Astro Boy can't get out because this trap room is magnetized and the rocket is being sent into the sun. Dr. Rindolf does not fuck around.

Nuka however did not go back is out side on the rocket letting Astro know about that thanks to Morse code. I wonder if I learned about things like that from cartoons instead of school. Nuka and Astro end up having to fight a praying mantis robot. As I said I love how every thing gets its own fantastic look and this scene is great. Astro gets the praying mantis robot to beat his own ass which is great. They meet up with Dr. Rindolf who has so many robots with NEUTRON BOMBS in them ready to be finished and created. So in his hubris Dr. Rindolf just destroys the damn design for the robots which does not make Astro happy so he breaks the FUCK out of his robot creating machine which comes crashing down on Dr. Rindolf.

Nuka lets Astro know that the bomb inside her has been started and Astro doesn't want to leave her. He gets Dr. Rindolf back up on his feet to disassemble the bomb which means the end of Nuka because he cannot bring her back due to setting the designs on fire. They finally dissemble the bomb with one second on the ticker left. We then go back to Dr. Elefun and Astro talking about what happened. Astro says that her legs were all that were left and wants his legs replaced with hers so that they can be together forever. Now that's a fucking bittersweet way to end this episode. Damn Japan I didn't want to be depressed today!

FINAL VERDICT: This is one of the best Final Episodes. Action packed, bitter sweet, wild designs. I had a great time to watching this even if it made be a bit sad at the end. This one comes Highly Recommended. I'm really gonna have to talk about some Astro Boy comics soon enough.