Hot Nerd Girl

Category: Comics

  • Gratuitous Nerdity – “Gotham”

    What’s that you say? It’s been months since a “Hot Nerd Girl Podcast” and almost a year since a “Gratuitous Nerdity” post and you just can’t live without the glowing banter that is Tracy and Darcy? Well wait no longer! Tonight we had the opportunity to Instant Message about last nights Gotham premier. Premie? Premiere.

    Thanks for letting me write the intro, Trace. You most likely won’t regret it! – Darcy

     

    Darcy: Ugh… Gotham… pilot…. so bad… 80’s B-movie bad….

    Tracy: Really?? I liked it!

    Darcy: Ah, Tracy…. the eternal optimist… I’m going to keep watching, buuuutttt….

    Tracy: It’s gonna be great, I have faith 

    Darcy: You should do a blog post about new shows called “Keep the Faith”

    Tracy: Hahaha! I watch so few new shows though. Only got to watch Gotham because I had to make buttons for Long Beach Comic Con this weekend.

    Darcy: It’s a fast show too.

    Tracy: Yeah it is. seems like a lot of the focus will be on Cobblepot which is interesting. I wish that we had seen more of Selena.

    Darcy: They intro’d a loooot of main villains in an hour. Too many, in my book. And honestly, I don’t think they had to kick off the series with the Wayne’s deaths. That could have been a midseason thing. or like, episode 3. I don’t know, I’m just not seeing a ton of creativity with it yet.

    Tracy: Is Fish Mooney a new character? I’m a Marvel girl but I used to read some Batman and I don’t remember her from the comics. I thought they were introduced pretty organically though. We barely saw Riddler, for example.

    Darcy: Yeah, barely. And Ivy, barely. And Selena too. I just think they were rushed. And wanted to get enough hooks in because, I suppose, Gordon isn’t enough of a hook?

    Tracy: Well, I feel like it’s a cop show that just happens to be set in Gotham. The Boy Scout cop and the “is he or isn’t he crooked” cop partner. They don’t like each other but they start to grow on each other by the end. All cop shows start off with the case, this case just happens to be the Wayne’s murder.

    Darcy: Yeah, that’s what it’s supposed to be. I just think starting with the Wayne’s is too easy, I guess.

    Tracy: I think they did that because we all know what happens, why not get it out of the way?

    Darcy: To me, that’s midseason or finale time. After your attached to Bruce and can feel his loss.

    Tracy: Is it a requirement that we HAVE to see Martha’s pearls bouncing around?

    Darcy: Yeah, but that’s my point. That’s a short hand assumption. That we all know what happens to the Wayne’s. That’s not good story telling. It’s why Man of Steel sucked.

    Tracy: Who doesn’t though?? Cave dwellers?? Man of Steel is a whole other bag of worms lol. We never get to know the Wayne’s though, either in the movies or the comics, they need to maintain that air of mystery, that we’ll never know exactly what Bruce lost. We experience his relationship with them through his pain and his vengence. He basically becomes a psychopath, if we get to know his parents then we’ll have opinions of them and that’s counterproductive to the story.

    Darcy: Isn’t that a fresher take though? Otherwise, why are we bothering? Gordon is getting changed because we have, through this show and other comics, his past. When he first showed up, he’s the Commissioner. Why bother going back? ‘Cause it’s unexplored territory. And if they’re going to keep retreading the same ground again and again, they have to find new stories to explore. Batman Begins did. At least somewhat.

    Tracy: They are mixing it up though. We’ve never seen Bruce as a kid except in flashbacks and the brief murder scene. They are taking inspiration from the comics, but for the most part, everything is different.

    Darcy: That’s not enough of a reason NOT to show his parents though. They probably will flashback; I just disagree with how they’re handling it right now.

    Tracy: The Wayne’s aren’t the focus of the show though, the aftermath of their murder is – why drag that out?

    Darcy: Depends on how much time they’re going to spend with Bruce. I don’t think you have to spend a TON of time, but I think assuming we give a crap about Bruce because we all already know the backstory is lazy writing. This is long, but if you ever get a chance, you should check it out: http://badassdigest.com/2013/07/03/film-crit-hulk-man-of-steel/

    Tracy: See, I disagree. I think there were areas that were lazy writing (why does the mob ALWAYS have a meat locker, for example) but I don’t think starting the show off by killing the Wayne’s is lazy, I think it thrusts us right into the heart of the story and the whole reason why we’re there/watching it in the first place. I don’t need to see Martha be the perfect Mom and Thomas playing catch with his perfect son. I want to see the nitty gritty world of Gotham and see Alfred have to step up and be Bruce’s rock and Bruce have to grow up too quickly.

    Darcy: It’s all just choices. I’d like to see some slightly shady stuff on the Wayne’s part, perhaps, that he wasn’t the cleanest nicest guy in the world. Or at the very least, dialogue that doesn’t sound like it was written by a 10 year old in the 80’s.

    Tracy: Ok, well THAT sounds interesting to me. Like Bruce sees his parents as perfect, but there’s a reason why Thomas is the richest guy in town. The seedy side that we never know about and Bruce never knows about. The dialogue sounds very 1940’s gangster movie to me.

    Darcy: Yeah, it was pretty rough.

    Tracy: I think it was miles ahead of a CW show though. But this is FOX, so instead of 10 seasons of superhero origin story, it’ll probably get canceled halfway thru the first season.

    Darcy: Really? I like Arrow.

    Tracy: I like that not everyone is perfectly pretty. That differs from the CW.

    Darcy: Well, I didn’t like Arrow to start, but it’s gotten better.

    Tracy: I’ve been told I need to give Arrow another shot. I gave up after 2 episodes. I will say that DC is doing way better on TV than in the cinema ‘verse.

    Darcy: Yeah, I’m almost all the way through Arrow. I watch it while I run. Flash I’ve seen the pilot, which also moves at a break neck pace. I’m just a firm believer that most of the time you need two hours. Imagine if Star Trek: The Next Generation had a one hour pilot as opposed to a two hour pilot.

    Tracy: To establish the characters and the universe.

    Darcy: Yeah.

    Tracy: Well, the 2 hour pilot of Star Trek: The Next Generation was God awful sooooo…. lol

    Darcy: Yeah, it might improve it actually.

    Tracy: You should watch Flash while you run, might motivate you to run faster 

    Darcy: Ha. Ha. Ha.

    Tracy: So do you have hope for Gotham or do you think that it’s all downhill from here?

    Darcy: I have hope. Arrow has improved. If Parks and Recreation can overcome what I thought was a fairly flawed, shit copy of The Office from the first 1.5 seasons, then any show can do it.

    Tracy: I know that I’m the eternal optimist (most of the time) but I have hope too. I think compared to many pilots, it’s a pretty strong start and now they can get into the meat of the story. And hopefully FOX gives it a good shot before they up and cancel it if it doesn’t immediately get great ratings, but I think it’ll be ok in that regard, at least in the beginning. As always, thanks for nerding harder with me 

    Darcy: Always 

    –

  • Marvel Cinematic Universe Podcast (World’s Best Podcast)

    It could happen….

    About a week before The Avengers came out in theatres I participated in a World’s Best Podcast discussion about the Marvel Cinematic Universe films. We discussed Hulk (briefly), The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Iron Man 2, Thor, and Captain America. We also got into why the Marvel movies seem to be outdoing the DC movies (with the notable exception of the Christopher Nolan Batman films).

    I was still sick when we did this so there are moments when my voice cracks and I sound like a 13 year old boy going through puberty. Since I typically dress like a 13 year old boy it was actually pretty fitting.

    You might also notice that I got really excited and more talkative during the Thor part. What can I say? He’s my favorite comic book character 😉

    Thanks to Isaac and the guys at World’s Best Podcast for another fabulous evening of nerd talk. It’s always a pleasure!  Hope you enjoy our discussion:

    As per usual, if the above player takes too long to buffer, just click here to listen: http://tinmanfrisbie.podbean.com/2012/05/17/season-4-episode-19-part-1/

  • My birthday present to you…a Batgirl photoshoot!

    Nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh – BATGIRL!

    Tomorrow is my birthday (don’t even bother asking, I’m not going to tell you how old I am) so I decided to give YOU, my awesome readers, a gift for sticking with me for the past year and a half.

    I wrote a little story to go along with the pictures…sort of a pseudo-comic if you will.  I hope you enjoy it.

    Oh, and please feel free to thank me for putting my friend into my Slave Leia costume.  I figured that if I have to rescue a damsel in distress, she might as well be scantily clad and amazingly hot.  Just looking out for you my friends.

    Anyhooters, here goes:

    The night is dark. Dark and dangerous. A lone heroine stalks the night keeping an eye out for trouble.

    She climbs over the rooftops, lithe and agile. She watches and waits.

    A scream tears through the silence.  Someone is in trouble!

    Oh no! A thug has a helpless damsel in distress in his grips!

    The thug eyes her skeptically. He doesn’t see her as a threat. He has made a horrible mistake.

    She shows him her mean right hook!

    The thug is stunned and doesn’t see it coming when she plants her totally practical stiletto boot square in his chest!

    HNG prevails. 

    The streets are safe once again.  At least for now…

    Don’t worry fair maiden, HNG will always be here to keep you safe.

    To the victor goes the spoils…wait…I mean, allow me to escort you home fair maiden…

    HNG takes to the rooftops once more.

    A Superhero’s work is never done.

    Bad guys beware: she’ll be watching. And waiting. And looking hot while doing it so don’t get any ideas buster.

    A HUGE thank you to Jon Upson for taking such amazing pictures (check out his website here) and to Darcy and Joy for joining in on the HNG shenanigans (as Jon would say).

  • I saw The Green Lantern on the brightest screen, in the blackest theatre

    After a weekend hiatus from writing movie reviews to visit Kirk’s birthplace (oh and go to my cousins wedding), I’m back on the horse with one of the summers most anticipated comic book movies The Green Lantern.

    (Side note: if you were hoping I’d review Super 8 this past Monday, have no fear.  I’m planning to see it at some crazy new theatre with D-Box seats on Wednesday night so, if I do, I’ll put something together for Thursday or Friday.)

    I was stoked to see DC bring Ryan Reynolds’ abs to their comic universe. Wait….. no, I’ll stick with abs 🙂

    Wrong movie, you say? Ask me how much I care.

    As you know, I spend a good amount of my time grading comic book movies on how successful they are with staying true to the content of their origins. The problem this time is that I don’t really know a whole lot about Green Lantern aside from the fact that I live in Sector 2814 (*cue me hanging my head in nerdy shame*).  So this review is going to get filled in with some good ol’ fashioned fun movie judging. Sit back, relax, and see why I thought The Green Lantern was kind of a middling movie.

    SPOILERS AHEAD

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oazFv302DIM&w=560&h=349]

    I want to kick this off by saying that I love Ryan Reynolds’ abs… I mean acting. Damn. I’ll fix that I swear. He has boyish good looks, a wry smile and a charming charisma that even you boys can say you like without sounding too gay. IMHO he’s got a kind of Nathan Fillion-esque quality to him. Maybe it’s the water that they give those boys in Canada? Who knows. He pulls off the action sequences quite well, and even the more touching scenes between him and Blake Lively are pretty decent.

    "See what they did with my hair in this scene? It means that while I'm sexy and girly, I can still fly a plane."

    The main problem for me is that Ryan seems to lack a real dark side. Perhaps it’s just his innocence-exuding face but when he uttered the line “Because I’m afraid” I just didn’t buy it. No one else in the theater did either. That might just be him or the fact that I had no idea what he was afraid of. I might have missed it, but he’s a fighter pilot that has no problem launching his jet into the outer reaches of the atmosphere before tumbling back to earth but he’s afraid of… dying? That just seemed odd. And once he overcame his fear it felt very much like “Ok, well, that was nice, now I’m going to kick your ass.” It never had quite the gusto that Christian Bale had in Batman Begins. Uhh, sorry every comic book movie made after 2005, but you sort of have to live up to Christopher Nolan’s genius. Suck it, k? Cause you do.

    Which, let’s be honest, is incredibly difficult to do with this content. These are characters that have a ton of back story that needs to be filled in, from the Lantern Corps, their home planet Oa, and the Guardians that created it, you’ve got a lot that you’re asking the average movie goer to swallow.  Trying to include a giant backstory in a very short period of time can be done very successfully if you dumb it down enough (see: Star Trek 2009) or less successfully if it is hurried through at the beginning (see: Serenity). This one took the later approach and honestly, nerd to nerd, I was just mildly lost. I don’t really know any major Green Lantern fans so there was no one around to help smooth out the rough edges for me. It seemed to just cruise through certain relationships without developing them when I really wish it had.

    Moving on to the special effects…I was fairly impressed with them. Oa was awesome, the Green Lantern suit was amazing (despite what anyone might say). I even enjoyed Blake Lively. I guess what I’m saying is that I wish a bit more time had been spent mainstreaming this movie for audiences. Perhaps I’m wrong, but I felt like a lot of stuff went over people’s heads. Everyone I went with walked out kind of saying “meh.”  It did make me want to spend some time reading more of the Green Lantern comic books though, so it had that going for it.  I have my hopes pinned on the next movie, if they do one. At the very least, I look forward to Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool if that one comes together.

    It’ll have abs in it…right?

  • X-Men: First Class – you got it wrong but I heart you anyways

    Hot Nerd Girl could be a superhero name…right?

    Oh Lordy do I love me some X-Men.  After Thor, it is probably my favorite comic book series.  No offense to Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, etc.  I adore you all but I had a particular hard on for X-Men growing up.

    So I’ll admit it.  When I first heard that there was going to be an X-Men prequel, my heart sank a little.  I’m generally pretty wary of prequels.  They scream “desperate attempt to make money off of a beloved franchise” to me.  But thanks to the successful prequel-ness of the latest Star Trek incarnation, I was willing to give it a shot.  That, and it couldn’t possibly be worse than Brett Ratner’s disjointed X-Men: The Last Stand.

    I wasn’t expecting to enjoy it as much as I did.  And despite the fact that it went completely against pretty much everything that’s been established by the comic books as far as character histories, I had so much fun watching it.

    So I’m structuring my review much like I did for Thor.  Because I can. Beware, I spoil the crap out of things….

    [youtube:http://youtu.be/frcCCHb9LHc]

    I pretty much fell in love with James McAvoy the instant he came on screen as Mr. Tumnus in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and my love for him only deepened when I heard him speak in his native Scottish accent.  Drool.  I don’t know what it is about Scottish accents but they sure do it for me.  He also happens to be a brilliant actor.  It’s the little things about him, the slight facial expressions, how he reacts to the other actors, those dreamy blue eyes *le sigh*

    He's so dreamy…

    Anyhooters…he was an excellent choice to play a young Charles Xavier.

    Main deviation from the comic books:

    In the movie, Charles comments about being glad that he still has his hair.  In the comic books his hair is gone by the time he finishes high school.  Too much mental power for it to stick around (be grateful Jean Grey and Emma Frost, that your mental powers didn’t do that to you). The idea of him growing up with Raven Darkholme was an interesting choice.  He actually grew up with his step-brother Cain aka Juggernaut, and they most definitely did not get along.  And Hank getting all of the credit for building Cerebro is ludicrous.  Xavier built Cerebro, Hank later enhanced it.  His first students did include Beast and Angel…but it was Warren Worthington III (later Archangel) not Angel Salvadore.  Another of the first class?  Scott Summers aka Cyclops, NOT his brother Alex Summers aka Havok.  Iceman and Marvel Girl weren’t cool enough for this movie apparently so they just got ignored altogether.  I’ve been asked more than once how Professor X became a paraplegic.  Well thank you Matthew Vaughn, because now all of those people probably think I’m a jack ass. Contrary to what First Class would have you believe, Charles was NOT crippled by a bullet intended for Magneto.  He was actually crippled by an alien named Lucifer who dropped a big ol’ boulder on his legs.  MUCH more believable thankyouverymuch.

    I vaguely remember Michael Fassbender from Inglourious Basterds but, to be honest, I never really paid much attention to him.  Until now.  Damn, that boy can act too.  I liked that he looked a little older than everyone else after what he’d been through during the holocaust and the scene in the bar in Argentina was one of my fave moments in the film.

    Hey, that dorky hat comes in handy

    Main deviation from the comic books:

    Erik Lehnsherr (who was actually born Max Eisenhardt by the by) was not experimented on during the holocaust (at least, not that I remember, correct me if I’m wrong).  In a way, his experience was even worse.  He was a Sonderkommando.  For those who don’t read up on history as a hobby (yeesh, could I get any nerdier?) a Sonderkommando was a Jew whose job in the concentration camp was to dispose of the bodies of fellow Jews killed in the gas chambers.

    Yup, that’s bound to fuck you up a bit.

    He later met Charles while working at an Israeli mental hospital…around the time Charles knocked up a girl who had been in a coma.  Uhhh yeah…we won’t go into that.  Erik does get his hands on some Nazi gold that he uses to fund his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, but that was only after he had teamed up with Charles to defeat Baron Wolfang von Strucker.

    At least they got rid of that slightly slimy look

    As for the other good guys…it’s so funny to me how, in the movies, they took the scales and ran with it for Mystique.  I’m assuming it’s just an excuse to get away with seeing a hot naked chick while maintaining a PG-13 rating.  Mystique did briefly have scales in the comic books when she was exposed to radiation while saving Toad.  But the vast majority of the time, she’s just blue….and clothed…albeit scantily.  Her flirtation with Hank in the movie was cute but her true love was a blind, alien-looking chick named Destiny.  Jennifer Lawrence is a promising young actress though.  I’m super looking forward to seeing her as Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games next March.  Hank McCoy and the whole serum thing was pretty right on.  Although I remember Beast turning gray when he first sprouted hair. Nicholas Hoult (the kid from About a Boy) has grown into quite the handsome young dude!  I liked the sheepish nerd vibe he brought to the character.

    As for Lenny Kravitz’ little girl, Miss Zoe is still honing her acting chops but she did alright.  I’m just glad they didn’t show Angel laying eggs or eating her dinner like a fly.  Blech.  Oh, and she was rescued by Wolverine and brought to Professor X…not found by Cerebro. I already brought up how Havok should not be in the picture yet but I’ll add one more bit.  Much like Shaw, Alex has to store up energy in order to be able to send out blasts of plasma.  It’s not infinite.  So that whole bit about him being in jail because he can’t control himself was definitely manufactured for the film.  Sean Cassidy was another puzzling addition for me.  He had a whole life as a detective in Ireland and was involved in the whole IRA thing.  Banshee was a codename assigned to him by Factor Three who forced him to commit crimes by strapping a headband full of explosives to him.  Stylish, right?  He was later rescued by Professor X but not before he pissed off his brother, Black Tom Cassidy and lost his daughter, Siryn…all of which happened before he joined the X-Men.  I honestly don’t remember much about Darwin, other than him being a ghost for a while, but I’m pretty sure he never got killed off.

    Aaaaaaand…where do I begin with Moira???  First off, she is a geneticist, not a CIA agent.  Her last name should be Kinross at this point, not MacTaggert.  She is Charles first love and helps him found the X-Men and all but in the end she ends up with Banshee.  Seriously, my head was spinning with how off her character was.  BUT I LOVE Rose Byrne and she did a fantastic job.  And damn that girl looks good in a garter belt.

    They chose Sebastian Shaw to be the main villain.  It was a good choice.  Aside from Magneto, he’s one of the most prevalent villains in the X-Men ‘verse.  Kevin Bacon cracks me up.  He’s so good at being a snarky little shit.  He doesn’t disappoint here even though it’s a little bizarre seeing him as a Nazi.

    Emma and Sebastian sittin' in a reactor K-I-S-S-I-N-G

    Main deviation from the comic books?

    They beefed up his power a bit and I don’t remember him using his power to keep his looks youthful but otherwise they pretty much nailed his billionaire playboy attitude.  As far as I know he was never involved with the Nazi’s. He was, however, responsible for the mutant destroying Sentinels.  His first battle with the X-Men was during the Dark Phoenix saga.  At that point Sage was working for Shaw as a personal assistant while spying on him for Professor X.

    Anyone know how Shaw is connected to Iron Man’s dad Howard Stark?

    Sorry guys, I couldn't find a picture of Moira in the garter belt so you'll just have to settle for Emma. Tough, I know.

    January Jones wouldn’t have been my first choice for Emma Frost but I think she did a pretty good job.  I wasn’t hugely impressed with the effect of her in her diamond state, but as many a Twilight fan can attest…getting those damn diamond effects can be challenging.  I remember Riptide releasing little projectile stakes while spinning really fast…not so much for creating tornados and crap.  I’m not sure why they felt the need to change that, other than to bring down the stealth jet during the climax…which I guess is an ok reason.  That devil-looking guy that looks an awful lot like Nightcrawler and uses the same teleportation effect?  That would be Azazel.  And he looks like Nightcrawler because he’s Nightcrawler’s daddy.  Are you wondering why Nightcrawler is blue? That would be because Mystique is his mama…and threw him down a well after he was born.  Azazel is biblical and should TECHNICALLY be trapped in an alternate dimension.  Thanks to his teleportation skillz he’s able to come here every once in a while for just long enough to knock up a random woman.  Which he does.  Often.

    It may sound like I’m being critical but these are all details schmetails.  I really did LOVE this movie.  The Cuban Missile Crisis scene is fantastic and the cameos by Hugh Jackman and Rebecca Romijn were brilliant.

    Now please excuse me while I go drool over James McAvoy some more.

    Yup, still dreamy…

    4.5 out of 5 sci-fives

  • Great Scott Green Lantern!

    I’m going to be blunt because, well, I’m in one of those moods.

    CGI suit? errrr…..

    The new Green Lantern does not look promising.  In fact, it looks terrible.  Normally I would reserve judgment until a movie comes out but after seeing the trailer before Harry Potter, I’ve pretty much seen the whole movie.  Ryan Reynolds was not my first choice to play Deadpool in Wolverine Origins but, in the end, I thought he did ok.  When I found out he’d been cast as Green Lantern I was disappointed.  Pick a comic book character and stick with it, don’t be all jumping from franchise to franchise turning beloved characters into lame ass versions of yourself.  I know you think you’re riding some kind of pop culture wave and it’s so cool and macho to play superheroes and I’m sure all of your agents and managers are just thrilled to death at the prospect of sequels but COME ON.  Have a little self respect.  You’re married to Scarlett Johansen for Christ’s sake.

    (Chris Evans, you take note of this as well)

    Not only did the trailer suggest a complete rehashing of every comic book movie that has come out in the last 30 years (see Daniel O’Brien’s spot on article here: http://www.cracked.com/blog/why-new-green-lantern-movie-looks-so-familiar/) but someone got a little too excited about CGI.

    There is a reason why spandex was invented.

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hTiRnqnvDs&fs=1&hl=en_US]
    Nathan Fillion as the Green Lantern? Yes please.

    Too make our incredibly hot superheroes and supervillians look even hotter.  To give them freedom of movement while in battle.  To be a form of identity so that villains and victims alike know exactly who’s rescuing and/or pummeling them with just a glance at the color of their tights.

    CGI is not to the point yet where it can replace spandex mmmmkay?

    Despite the rehashing (which, honestly, I can deal with to a certain degree) the one thing that bothers me most about the Green Lantern is the CGI costume.  It is the fakest looking, most distracting part and sadly, it takes center stage during huge chunks of the movie.  And this is the origin movie.  When the quickly and poorly put together sequel inevitably comes out this ridiculous and garish costume will play an even larger role.

    *le sigh*

    I hope that when June 11th roles around I will be proved wrong and have to shove my foot in my mouth.  But, somehow, I doubt I’ll be tasting sock lint anytime soon.

    On another note, I was so NOT excited about the new Green Hornet movie and after seeing a trailer for it I’m actually slightly enthusiastic.

    Whudda thunk?

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHr9evQP89s&fs=1&hl=en_US]

  • Unicorn (the comic book villain, not the horse)

    I was sitting at my desk today and for some reason I started contemplating the Cold War and where we stand in our relationship with various foreign entities. Naturally, that made me think of Unicorn.

    WHHHYYYYY??? Why must I be named after something so girly??

    Oh, Cold War, along with threat of nuclear attack you brought along a vast array of Superheroes and Supervillains designed to both inspire people and feed on their fears.  And what better way to do that than by making the Soviet bad guy a Unicorn.

    Oh Stan, you wiley little devil

    That’s right, let’s demasculate the Ruskies by naming him after a fantasy horse beloved by little girls.

    Bravo Stan Lee!

    Unicorn is essentially a Cyclops rip-off created to be a pain in Iron Man’s behind.  He started out with no natural super powers and relied solely on his training by the KGB and a helmet with a laser pointer.  Later on he received some experimental medicinal aid in the form of tougher skin and increased strength, but even those came back to bite him in the butt when he developed accelerated cellular deterioration.  Oops.  But wait!  Yellowjacket has a cure!  Oh, insanity is the side effect?  Damn.  Note to villains, never trust an Avenger to cure you.

    Over the years Milos Masaryk and Tony Stark became comic book frenemies.  Milos attacks Tony, Tony defeats Milos (everytime).  Milos is apparently dim-witted and trusts other Super villains, allowing himself to be manipulated into their plots against Tony.  Then he realizes he was manipulated and helps Tony escape.  Tony tries to cure Milos but he ends up insane so Tony does the next best thing and puts Milos in stasis until a cure for insanity is found (how about some therapy, hrmmmm?)  When Milos wakes up Tony saves him from his own robot and then hides him away again.  Milos wakes up again when a fire breaks out at Stark Enterprises and insists that he must walk back to the USSR.  As in, walk across the ocean.  Tony watches Milos walk into the Atlantic Ocean where he drowns.

    Aquaman sad 🙁

    Aquaman belongs to the DC Universe and is, therefore, powerless to help.

    So the Russian guy is dumb, insane and willing to let pretty much anyone experiment on him.  I wonder what kind of propaganda we were trying to accomplish with this guy?  Of course, Colossus and Epsilon Red were also products of the Cold War and they both turned out all right.  Survive in space??  Yes please!

    I could get used to this

    Personally, I think that Unicorn is a little under-appreciated in the comic world.  He was excellent at hand-to-hand combat and could shoot a gun like nobody’s business.  Iron Man obviously felt he was a bit of a kindred spirit.

    As does Manicorn. (BTW Marvel has it’s own wiki. Check it out!)

  • X-Men Series II = greatest trading cards ever

    It might shock you to learn this.  But I was, at one time, the owner of a complete set of X-Men Series II trading cards.

    It’s true.

    I also collected baseball cards, because like any self-respecting tomboy I played baseball, not softball.  Softball is for chicks.

    But Series II was my most favorite set of any kind of cards I ever collected.  (I know this sentence isn’t grammatically correct and yet I choose to type it that way anyway. Deal with it).  The Fleer Ultra series was OK, but it just didn’t have quite the same magic to it.

    The tall, narrow type on top.  The dramatic action shot below.  The statistical data on the back.  They were pure perfection.  I even had the cards from the cartoon series with the film strip border.  They were great as reference material or for just sitting down and reading.

    And then one day my brother stole them.

    He also collected baseball and X-Men cards.  It was something we did together as loving siblings.  We would walk up Country Club Lane to the comic book store and buy them and trade them.  We also went through a pog phase but try not to hold that against us.  I kept my cards in the same navy blue binder in nice segmented card protector pages on a shelf in my bedroom.  They never deviated from that spot and I never took them outside.  At some point my brother lost a few.  I remember thinking, damn, that sucks for him, at least I still have all of mine.

    The next time I pulled my binder out, the ones he happened to be missing were now missing from my binder.

    WTF.

    I took mine back.

    He stole them again.

    Little shit.

    This went back and forth for years until he finally hid them where I couldn’t find them.  My brother, my own flesh and blood, saw fit to steal and hide my own X-Men cards from me and had the gall to claim that I had stolen them from him.  As if.  This is the kid who opened up his Superman death comic when he was explicitly told not to and the kid next door had a perfectly good opened one he could have read instead.  And he accused ME, who won’t even open the Star Trek Christmas ornament box?  Psssh.

    I never did find my X-Men cards after that.

    So I stole his star ships.

    Three beautiful Enterprise models, the Enterprise NCC-1701, NC-1701 refit and Enterprise NCC-1701-D.  All beautifully hand painted by our Dad.

    What?  He didn’t appreciate them anyway.