Friday, April 20, 2018

My non long winded Avengers Infinity War review

https://robomonkey147.deviantart.com/
Gonna open up this posting with this newly discovered classic ROM (IDW you still suck!) and Ms. Marvel (or Captain Marvel if you prefer) team up fan art piece and as you can see I also included some ROM vs Thanos themed fan art by the same artist who goes by the handle robomonkey on deviant art.


April 28th Update: Just got back in from seeing it and I have only one word . . .apocalyptic. With an even bigger and grander ensemble cast then Civil War and even more gut wrenching tragedy then Logan Avengers Infinity War will be the fastest two hours and forty minutes of your life. Not to mention the wait for the end credits scene. An end credits scene which is quite ironic for me considering the head line fan art I found for this posting only about a week ago. To be honest with you, what few complaints I do have are hardly worth mentioning. Mostly a few little logic gaps and a couple things that could have been explained a bit better and so on.
The writers did a good job of striking a nice balance of screen time with all the characters and I also liked how the story line broke up all the various characters into different settings in order to create new interactions and even personality conflicts to explore. A lot of themes were also explored as well that tested our heroes. We saw some of the unlikeliest characters coping with issues of fear, sacrifice, self confidence and even the challenges of coping with really shitty stuff that's inevitable. Aside from all that and despite this being a very dark film we still got a lot of the humorous banter we've all come to enjoy and expect from the MCU.


When it comes to Thanos (and his crew), DC could have borrowed a page from Marvel's play book when it comes to developing villains on the big screen who have been around for many years in the pages of comic books but are not house hold names yet. I really fear for the DC cinematic universe at this point I just feeling like the rapid successions of hits from Marvel is practically steam rolling whatever they can come up with. But getting back to Infinity War, it leaves you with a lot of questions and in general a lot to process because of all the shit that goes on for that nearly 3 hour running time if you include the end credits scene. I suppose that can be a good thing or bad thing depending how you might want to look at it. It really sucks to think of how long we might have to wait (hopefully no more then a year) for the sequel because I want to see it now . . .dammit.


After I got out of the theater and turned my phone back on I had this photo waiting for me that a friend sent me while he was at an event at Levi Stadium in Santa Clara. Would have been cool if he had actually been able to talk to the owner about this van.


And speaking of signature vans from the 80s here's the the one the A-Team drove around in. I took this photo almost two years ago while passing through a random neighborhood in San Francisco. I love it when a plan comes together.


I'm not a gamer or into the whole Halo thing so I must have passed by this toy with out ever noticing what it's called probably over a dozen times in the past year. But by random happenstance a few days ago it finally caught my eye.
Left click to enlarge


Here's a little something from my past I feel like sharing today. This little place in San Leandro used to be the first comic shop I ever went to. It opened in 1980 but it wasn't until 82 or 83 that my dad first started taking me there and it was at this shop where I had my first opportunity to start finding the ROM back issues I needed. I even remember seeing issue #1 boarded and bagged up on the wall going for $5 which was a lot of money at the time for a kid who was around 10 or 11 especially with the cover price of comics being only 65 cents back then. By the late 80s and through out the 90s it wasn't that uncommon to find ROM #1 in a dollar box but today the asking price for a copy even in fair condition seems to start at around $25.

Sunday, April 8, 2018

Finally! An animated series from marvel that doesn't suck. The Black Panther


I'm only 2 episodes into this 6 episode Black Panther series and I'm already convinced that this is the first good animated series from Marvel Comics in over 20 years! What makes it so good exactly? I'm glad you asked. First of all, it's well written. And not just because it's boarder line R rated with shit like booby traps that impale people and villains seeing prostitutes. It's funny with out being campy, touches on social issues like religion and race in a very fearless way and is heavily steeped in history and international politics in something of a James Bond kinda fashion. It takes everything that was good about The Black Panther movie and expands on it but at the same time it feels a little more like the Black Panther you grew up with in the Marvel Comics universe. I usually expect this type of sophistication in animated features from DC so it was nice to see it in Marvel for a change.


Did I mention all the appearances by other characters in the Marvel Universe? Even within the first few episodes you'll see over a half dozen of those. Here's Captain America while on a covert mission in Wakanda having something of a misunderstanding with Black Panther during WW II.


So far, I really can't say enough good things about this animated series and it's got me even more stoked for Avengers Infinity War later this month. Who doesn't love Storm right? And you'll get to see several other X-Men to.


Now if you'll excuse me I need to get back with my Black Panther binge watching today on Youtube. I'm trying to get through the rest of the episodes (just 3 more to go) before I have to go to bed it's Monday tomorrow and we all know what that means.

So here we are a few hours later and I managed to finish watching all 6 episodes and even our sweet little 12 year old corgi beagle mix (Chevy) enjoyed it. So much so that we managed to get her to hold still just long enough to get this adorable photo. So in closing folks this was some really good stuff and little did I know this series goes back to 2011.



Episodes 1 - 6
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ry8e5ldzLDQ&t=667s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGTw6pfKayg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWr5oIRueTQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lF2OWH7vghQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2Q721QWX2w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBm2-TPxIuY&t=2s



Also yesterday, I saw this on the news and it had me cracking up so I recorded it with my iphone and posted it on youtube.

Sunday, April 1, 2018

Avengers Infinity War and the deleted scene you never knew about


Thanos is not the only threat facing Wakanda, this is a still image from a deleted scene in Infinity War. In the scene trump also goes on to say that Wakanda is just another a "shit hole" country.

Left click to enlarge
Here's a cool photo of some of the smaller transports, freighters and fighters in my rebel fleet collection as seen in the battle of Scarrif from Rogue 1. Did I happen to mention how much I loved Rogue 1? It's the same as with Avengers Civil War I can't see either of those two awesome movies enough times. Oh Infinity War please don't suck!

Now that fan art is the ROM spaceknight we all know and love!
And yes I did hear the news about what will most likely be a ROM in name only movie possibly being in the works as part of a hasbro franchise cinematic roll out. As I said in the comments section in the previous posting in order for a movie like that to have broad appeal for a contemporary cinematic audience it's highly unlikely that it will be the ROM you remember from the 80s. I think the best we can hope for is for it to be a well written sci-fi movie that pays tribute to the comic book series in a thoughtful manner. A armor redesign that didn't totally suck (hint hint idw) would certainly be a step in the right direction.
Oh well I guess we'll just have to wait and see for now. But in the mean time I'm much more concerned about the disturbing reports in regards to a season 2 for Netflix's Defenders which is apparently not likely going to happen. I really think that fucken sucks, among other things I was really hoping to finally see Misty Knight with her bionic arm and a Punisher appearance.


Firefall seems to be a reoccurring theme with my postings lately. Far as I know, this Marvel Two In One issue 99 (1983) tribute art from Bob Hall is the only decent ROM related fan art to show up on the internet for the past month. Basically since my sketch card (see previous posting). But if there's something else out there I don't know about please feel free to let me know about it . . anyone? . . anyone?

So is anybody out there getting tired of me taking swipes at the married but no condom wearing porn star fucken trump on this blog? Or perhaps you're sick and tired of me for still bashing on idw's pathetic ROM reboot? Not happy about my lack of enthusiasm about the prospect of an upcoming ROM movie? Didn't see season 1 of  The Defenders or you did see it and didn't like it? Well then, if the answer is yes to any or all of the above questions then please say hello to my little friend.



April 3rd Update: Somebody today just brought this Marvel 70s tribute fan art to my attention. I had seen it before a couple of years ago or so but kinda forgot about and it for whatever reason and it doesn't really ever turn up whenever I do random internet searches for ROM related things. This is actually a cropped version of the original which included Deathlok along with ROM and Omega The Unknown (who!?) as you see here but I always felt like Deathlok never really worked in the scene for what was other wise a well done fan art piece. Compare this cropped version with the original and tell me if I'm making any sense here . . .
https://error-imagenotfound.deviantart.com/art/Return-To-The-1970-s-712259686



April 5th Update: These two beauties (Valkyrie form Thor Ragnarok and Misty Knight ofcourse) just showed up in the past couple days in the mail box. They're going to make a great addition to the Black Panther figurines displayed in my wife's office at work I can't wait to surprise her with them. Oh and by the way I also just found out today that Misty Knight will debut in Cage season 2 with her bionic arm so that certainly eases the pain of the bad news for The Defenders.