X-Ray Vision

After watching Justice League and Justice League Unlimited extensively, I have come to a very important conclusion. Hawkgirl is the worst superhero ever. She is just an angry flying lady with a mace and I hate her.

First off, Hawkgirl betrays the entire Justice League when her home planet of Thanagar invades. It turns out she was just an advance scout for them the entire time! That is not very heroic behavior if you ask me. Plus she knocks out Green Lantern with a sucker punch after she uses her feminine wiles on her. That made me angry.

Finally, Hawkgirl just sucks as a hero. She just flies around and hits things with her mace. When it came down to it, 6 Justice Leaguers took out the entire invading force of Thanagar, each of them as strong as Hawkgirl. That gives me the sense that she has been the weak link in the group for quite some time now. She has no redeeming qualities, and I have decided that she even makes Aquaman look good. Even Hawkgirl costumes look bad. Speaking of, don’t forget to suggest a costume for my friend Billy for the chance to win a cool (as of now unspecified) prize!

-        Gonzo

So before I get into today’s topic I’d like to remind everybody to give Billy costume ideas . Now that that is out of the way, let’s got to it! It seems that there was a time when animal superhero sidekicks were quite popular. You may remember such names as Ace the Bat-Hound and Krypto the Super Dog, but my favorite has to be Hong Kong Phooey.

I know what you’re thinking, Hong Kong Phooey was not a comic book character. Well this is my blog and I’ll include some non-comic related characters, dammit! Now to justify this to myself here are some pictures of Ace and Krypto.

Now back to Hong Kong Phooey. This show was just amazing with Penry the mild mannered janitor going out and using his kung fu to save the city. Hong Kong Phooey was bumbling, quirky, and most of all lovable. He would try his best to stop criminals while talking to the audience, then get himself in a sticky situation. On cue, Spot the cat would save the day and Hong Kong Phooey would get the credit. Classic. Plus Hong Kong Phooey had the greatest intro ever.

-        Gonzo

It seems that my good friend Billy is in need of a Halloween costume idea. Since Billy is awesome, he has decided that he wants to dress up as a comic character. Unfortunately he has ruled out most characters because he does not want to wear a spandex costume. He is afraid the bulge will distract from the details of his character.

This is where I am asking everbody who reads this to throw in ideas. Who are your favorite characters (or just coolest looking) that Billy could spend from now until October creating? The best ideas will be featured in a future post, and there might be a prize for whoever comes up with the best idea. That depends on whether I can talk Billy into creating/buying a prize for the winner.

-        Gonzo

I have decided that my favorite hero (for the rest of the week at least) is Darkwing Duck. Yes, he in fact did have a comic so he fits here. On the other hand, I have never read a single issue, but the show on the Disney Channel was enough to win me over.

Darkwing Duck is one of the greatest hero parodies I have ever seen. He takes the dark broodingness of Batman, yet remains goofy enough to be entertaining as a kids show. Plus Launchpad McQuack is a way better sidekick than Robin.

I suggest that everybody goes to youtube and watches as many episodes of Darkwing Duck as they can. It remains as entertaining now is it was when I was 10 years old, and you just might find some comic references you never noticed before.

-        Gonzo

I hope that many of you are familiar with the works of Neil Gaiman. He is the author of such award winning novels as Anansi Boys, Neverwhere, and American Gods. He is in my list of top 5 authors and best of all, he wrote an entire comic series.

Neil Gaiman wrote The Sandman, an award winning series that actually made the New York Times Bestseller List. The Sandman follows Morpheus AKA the Lord of Dreams through his 70 year imprisonment and subsequent journey to essentially better himself. This is not your typical beat ‘em up masked heroes comics, and much like in his novels, Neil Gaiman makes you think about what you are reading.

This is not a series to skim over, but if you are looking for an in depth story line with original characters this is the way to go. Introduce yourself to Morpheus and Death, see Gods such as Odin and Loki and how they interact with their world. This is one of the most engaging reads I’ve ever found in the world of comic books.

-        Gonzo

Here’s another Watchmen post for you to enjoy! For those of you who found the movie to dark and slow paced have no fear, there is now an alternative available for you. I proudly present the Watchmen animated kids show.

No longer will you have to deal with blue genitals, sex scenes, or political and philosophical differences. Plus Nite Owl is a good dancer, Ozymandias is not killing millions of people, and the only sex the Comedian has is consensual and off camera!

The best comment on this video is definitely by an individual who identifies themself as greenpenguino: And all the bad guys will look up at me and shout, ’save us!’ And I’ll whisper… I’M TOO BUSY CLOWING AROUND!  

-        Gonzo

Sorry for going so long without a post, but I have been recently traumatized. I watched the 1990 Captain America movie and almost lost my faith in comics. I love bad movies (I sat through Doom) but I could not bring myself to finish Captain America.

It took 2 viewings of the Dark Knight and 1 of Spider-Man to restore my faith in comics and the related movies, but I have returned triumphant. There will be more posts soon, I promise.

-        Gonzo

Following the great example set by Gorilla Grodd , Marvel decided that they too should get some super powered simians on the scene. What better way to do this than to create an alternate dimension where all your established and popular heroes just happen to be monkeys? The answer of course is none.

With the super hero team of the Ape-Vengers living in Monk-hattan and battling such villains as Ooktavius, great puns are plentiful. There’s even the Amazing Spider-Monkey! This is obviously a ridiculous story line, but if you aren’t afraid of a little ridiculousness this is a great series of comics. There’s even a good amount of over the top violence, and monkeys eating each other. Yes, it gets a little dark at times for comics featuring monkey versions of heroes, but it’s a good way to pass the time.

Well I don’t really have much left to say about this series, but here are some pictures of monkey versions of heroes for you to enjoy.

-        Gonzo

What is cooler than a person with superpowers? A monkey, or technically an ape, with superpowers. I am of course talking about the one and only Gorilla Grodd. While new comics are showing up with monkey versions of superheroes and villains (more on that later) there is only one original.

Grodd was introduced in Flash #106 when an alien gave super intelligence to a group of gorillas. Grodd happened to also get the powers of mind control, telekinesis, and evil. Thus when the gorillas created Gorilla City (they are smart, not creative) Grodd decided that he should take over.

Inevitably, Flash came in to save the day and a great rivalry was born. Since then Grodd has devoted his life to taking out mankind. Grodd is a true inspiration for all simian serial criminals. You just can’t beat the original ape villain, the only way he could be better is if he had a feces flinging attack.

-        Gonzo

So I finally decided to catch up on some comic reading and I got through the New Ways to Die story arc in Spider-Man. Introduced is a new psycho symbiote, cleverly named Anti-Venom.

Eddie Brock, the original Venom, was dying of cancer and then he gets touched by Martin Li (AKA Mister Negative) and becomes Anti-Venom. The introduction of this new character added a nice twist to the story line, and I have to say I had missed the original Venom. Anti-Venom literally cleanses cells through touch, such as removing symbiote cells. While the new Anti-Venom wants to help cure people, i.e. removing the symbiote from Mac Gargan, he also wants to cleanse Spider-Man’s blood. Of course this would be problematic as it is the radioactivity that makes Spider-Man who he is.

I always like to see a wild card entered into the mix and I am expecting big things from Anti-Venom and Eddie Brock in the future.

-        Gonzo