Slightly Misplaced Comic Book Heroes Case File #63: Bulleteer

She has some…obvious assets.

From 2005-2006, writer Grant Morrison had an interesting narrative experiment going on at DC Comics.  He took the old concept of the “Seven Soldiers of Victory” story from Silver Age JLA/JSA team-ups, and did a new version.  Original foe of the team the Nebula Man was back, though not as the main villain.  Other hallmarks of the original group were brought up, but the main idea was Morrison would take seven DC heroes of varying levels of obscurity and put them on a team that needed to save the world.  To make things more interesting, the seven heroes would never meet.  Yes, aside from one or two brief run-ins between a couple members of the group in the last chapter of the story, the Seven Soldiers Morrison was using would be off doing their own things, each of which would add up to ultimate victory against the evil Sheeda and their queen Gloriana.

One of the Seven was a new hero named Bulleteer.  She would have preferred not to get involved.

Going Through The DCAU Part Seventeen

And we’re back with more cartoon superhero talk with Tom and Jimmy.

This week, we’re covering “Zatanna,” “The Mechanic,” and “Harley and Ivy”.

Geek Review: Batman V Superman

Like many people, I saw Batman V Superman:  Dawn Is A Dish Detergent over the weekend.  I actually went with a small group and got a small range of opinions.  My group included:

• Me.  Duh.
• My thirteen-year old niece.  She’s a sucker for the Marvel movies, and since I was going home for Easter, I asked her if she wanted to see the movie.  She said yes.
• My brother.  Another geek, mostly.  I had initially asked him if he wanted to come along with our niece and myself and bring his oldest son (age 9) too.  My brother wanted to see the movie first before he took his son.  Understandable.  Then he asked me to get another ticket when I bought them.
• The open seat.  Here’s where everything got complicated.  The original person I got this for was my sister-in-law, who is not a geek.  At all.  But, she got sick Saturday.  My brother asked his son.  The kid wanted to go at first, then changed his mind for some reason no one understood.  The last ticket was eventually used by my brother’s father-in-law, of little geek persuasion.

So, tickets in hand, this motely group went to see the movie.  Review and SPOILERS after the cut.

[A note from Jimmy: I’ve hijacked this post and put my thoughts at the end.  They are spoiler free, but since you have to read through Tom’s excellent review to get there…I guess it matters little.]

Going Through The DCAU Part Sixteen

And we’re back with those wacky cartoon enthusiasts Tom and Jimmy for more of this feature.

This week, they’re covering the Batman the Animated Series episodes “The Man Who Killed Batman,” “Mudslide,” and “Paging the Crime Doctor”.

Slightly Misplaced Comic Book Heroes Case File #54: Gypsy

When you look this good, you don’t want to be invisible.

The Justice League has been DC’s all-star team from its earliest founding.  That is, unless you’re aware that the original purpose was to give exposure to the company’s lesser-known heroes, which would be why Superman and Batman only made sporadic appearances in the early missions because they were too busy to actually attend missions and meetings.

Some days I wish I could use that excuse to get out of meetings.

But, you know, in retrospect, the League was the all-star team.  Then, around 1984 or so, Aquaman told the big names to take a hike if they were too busy to help and recruited some new heroes to fill the ranks for a period while operating out of Detroit.  Those new recruits included Gypsy.

Another Day Another Batsoup Trailer

How the mighty have fallen. “You know, I used to have my own invisible jet.” “Sure lady, and I had my own invisible cruise ship where Aquaman and I would make sweet, sweet love. Now sit down and fasten your seatbelt.”

We’re less than two months now from the release of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, so the ad campaign is really kicking into high gear.  After the cut, a new trailer (that doesn’t really show much new besides Diana on a plane).  The trailer had me mostly until Lex showed up with his horrible “The red capes are coming” line.  Seriously, WTF is going on with Luthor in this movie?

Also after the break, an image from a recent issue of Empire magazine that could be a huge (though not unexpected) spoiler.

Slightly Misplaced Comic Book Heroes Case Files #51: Danny Chase

Looks like a pre-teen, kinda evil version of Tim Gunn, doesn’t he?  Make it work, Danny.

Creating a credible kid sidekick isn’t an easy task.  The basic concept is always to give the younger readers a character they can personally identify with.  The problems there are legion.  For starters, readers want to be Batman, not Robin.  Furthermore, the sidekick has to have the correct amount of competence.  Too much and the character can outshine the hero and readers don’t like that.  Not enough and the sidekick will need too much constant rescuing.  And then there’s the issue of older writers trying to write “hip” dialogue for a character much younger than themselves, as was the disastrous case of Snapper Carr when he first arrived on the scene as the Justice League’s sidekick.

Good sidekicks and younger characters can be done.  But for every successful Robin, there’s probably three or four (at least) Danny Chases.

Year In Anticipation: What We’re Looking Forward To In 2016

The face of every Geek on at least some of the things on this list.

2016.  Did any of us think we’d live this long?  Yeah, probably.  We’re Geeks, not morbid.

So, what sort of Geek Entertainment has us here at Gabbing Geek at least a little curious?  See behind the cut, with some items getting some expert Geek Commentary from the Geek Guru himself, Jimmy Impossible.

Slightly Misplaced Comic Book Heroes Case File #47: Bloodwynd

“I am the real terror that flaps in the night!”

The 90s have a lot to answer for.

During this time, superhero comics went for “edgy” characters that often had large guns, excessive pouches, and names that were often misspelled on purpose that suggested dark origins and the like.

Yeah, that’s where Bloodwynd came from.

Slightly Misplaced Comic Book Heroes Case File #45: Faith

I think she got the power of heart to form Captain Planet.

A common theme to many a Misplaced Hero is that many times there’s only a single creator who’s really enamored with the character.  Oh, other writers and artists may have a decent run with the character, but often once the original creator moves on, the character is quickly relegated to the background or written out of the book entirely.  That is more or less what happened to Snapper Carr.  Creators showing favorites is nothing new, such as how Geoff Johns dealt with Black Adam, or Brian Michael Bendis’ clear love for Luke Cage.  But sometimes the creator love goes to a new character that doesn’t always stick around long.

One such example there is Faith.