Nummy Thing Of The Day

Marvel's putting out a line of little pocket-sized "Marvel Adventures" books. They're seven bucks, they collect four issues of stand-alone, all-ages stories in a format about like the manga books that are slowly but surely taking over entire shelves at your local Barnes and Noble, and they're so much fun it hurts. I can't stress this enough--they are cheap, portable, light-hearted, all-ages comics. If they sold these things at super-market checkout lines, everybody in the world would be a Marvel fan.

They're very much worth tracking down.

Die-Cut 'Stigmata' Cover!

Not even sure what part of my comics-saturated brain came up with this one, but it's terrifyingly easy to imagine the New Testament as done by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. The covers practically draw themselves in your head:

Issue #15: Mary Magdalene kneeling by the body of Lazarus, saying, "NO! The Pharisee has killed Lazarus!" But standing right behind her, his fists clenched, is Jesus, shouting, "Not if I have anything to say about it!"

Issue #27: Jesus, struggling against two Roman Legionnaires, with a thought balloon over his head, saying, "It can't be! One of my disciples...has betrayed me! But WHO???" At the bottom, text reads: "You must not miss...the Kiss of Death!"

Issue #32: Jesus on the cross, his teeth clenched as a Roman Legionnaire prepares to thrust a spear at his ribs. Text reads: "64 pages! No ads! THE DEATH OF JESUS!"

Issue #35: The tomb in the hillside, with the rock that forms its entrance shattering from a blast of cosmic energy. Text reads simply: "Guess Who's Back?!?"

And of course, it'd all end with Jesus giving super-powers to his disciples before going off to have cosmic adventures in space, which leads to the spin-off series: The Disciples! "Disciples Determine!"

Amen, True Believers!




...i'm so going to hell for this...

Super-Heroes Were Insane In the Fifties

Reading a black-and-white digest volume of classic Silver Age Justice League stories, and...wow, it's some seriously crazy shit, here. I mean, Grant Morrison on his craziest day could not come up with anything this batshit insane. The Weapons Master has traveled back in time ten thousand years to test his super-arsenal out on the JLA (see, he's surrounded by cops, and he knows that one of his super-weapons can stop the police, but he doesn't know which one, so he's traveled back in time ten thousand years to figure out which one is the best, so he can then travel back into the present and use it on the cops. Just typing that sentence destroyed brain cells.)

So as I say, the Weapons Master wants to test his weapons on the JLA. His plan--trap the JLA in a force-field (which he won't use on those pesky cops), and then as they escape one by one, drop a cryptic clue as to his future whereabouts so they'll chase him there and he can test his weapons. The first clue, given to the Flash, is "When the ghost walks at Hesperus on the second day of the moonless month, I am waiting to do battle!"The Flash knows that "when the ghost walks" is theatrical slang for payday, and finds out from an encyclopedia that "Hesperus" was Homer's name for Venus. So from that, he instantly deduces that the Weapons Master will be attacking a planned rocket launch to the planet Venus from Florida that takes place February 1st!

And he's actually right.

Super-heroes were insane in the Fifties.

*wave*

Haven't posted much lately because I haven't had much to say--I've been filling my brain up with so much comics lore lately (Hint #1 about the book in a series! Collect them all!) that it renders it hard to think about anything else. I am, right now, one of the most boring conversationalists in the world.

Unless you happen to be into comics too.

Theodore Geisel's 'Serenity'

When River fights with Reavers, it's a River-Reaver battle.

When she cuts them with a cleaver and she hits them in the liver, it's a River-Reaver-liver-cleaver battle.

And when River fights with Reavers with her Reaver-liver-cleaver and she hits them in the liver and she slaughters them like cattle, it's a River-Reaver-liver-cleaver-cattle-battle.

Then she says, "Our fight is done sir, you're dead so I think I've won, sir."

(Next time on Theodore Geisel Theatre, we present "Theodore Geisel's 'X-Files'. "If sir, you sir, want to chew sir, on the black goo Krycek knew sir, do sir!")

No Wonder He Uses Mind Control

So exactly how does Charles Xavier sell Xavier's School For Gifted Youths to the average parent?

"Yes, it's a lovely campus, with small class sizes..."

"Accredited? Well, no, not so much accredited per se, but our staff is world-renowned. For example, well-known mutant terrorist and criminal Magneto once--"

"Students? Well, I started with five, but now we have well over a hundred children learning--"

"Graduation rate? Well, the initial five all graduated, and, um...one or two since then, I think, I'd have to go back and check. Oh, it's easy to speak with the graduates--most of them still live at the school, or at least hang out there. The surviving ones, that is."

"Oh, no, don't worry, our death rate is actually quite low! We've had a suicide recently, and a handful of gunshot victims, and of course the riot...but really, it's relatively safe. Most of them come back to life at some point anyway. Eventually."

"Tuition? Yes, I can see how you'd find it a bit high, but there are a number of expenses to consider. We have a supersonic jet to maintain, and of course the on-premises supercomputer, and the 'Danger Room'..."

"No, no, that's just a name. It won't actually put the students in any danger. The whirling blades, flamethrowers, energy blasters, and solid-light holographic simulated mutant killers are programmed to stop before they really hurt people. Although there was the one time that the computer developed sentience and tried to kill everyone..."