That’s my Scott Pilgrim avatar. I have totally bought into the hype.
Well, I guess not totally because I haven’t bought any of the comics, but I liked the avatar thing.
Tonight I celebrated an area of my geeky-ness with Dean and a couple new friends. I have many different geek sides:
There’s my Dungeons & Dragons side – I prefer to play a cleric.
There’s my table top gaming side – Warhammer 40k primarily & I stick mainly to the Games Workshop line of games even though it’s been years since I’ve actually fielded an army.
There’s my music geek side – It’s hard to stump me when it comes to song names and the bands who performed them.
There’s my sci-fi world knowledge – movies & TV shows mostly with the occasional book world thrown in.
But the side that got it all started, the side that I found interesting as a concept and not just as a play idea, was comic books. I mentioned in an earlier BLOG about my first issue of Iron Man and how it got me started on the Golden Avenger and that interest hasn’t really waned since 1983. Even when I was bitter and not collecting I still peeked at issues out of the corner of my eye.
Tonight my comic side was indulged as we geeked out about comics, storylines, movies and T.V. shows that were all about super heroes and the books they were drawn from. This culminated in going through Dean’s long boxes and remembering the good ol’ days of the late 80’s and early 90’s before Image came – before the dark times.
You’d think that my picture today would be of our comic book archeology. You’d probably think that it would be grate to have an image or two of the rare comics in Dean’s collection – some of which I had never seen before in person – or of the signed issues by very famous and infamous creators, but no:
Today’s picture is of Dean’s sink after we covered it with anti-ant & roach powder.
It looks like Tony Montana sneezed on his counter top.
As you’ve probably noticed these blogs are REALLY late. I’m going to pretend that I’m writing on Monday.
Today was an uneventful Monday.
I did some organizing, but there wasn’t much going on.
There was so little going on that this is my picture today:
My tiki head, carved sailor and Mighty Mugg Iron Man. They are like the three little tiki Gods that watch over me. One is crazy and magical, one is drunk and peg-legged and the other is Iron Man. A person could do worse.
Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there! Hope it was wonderful. Rene and I spent the day with her family which includes her parents and her brother and sister-in-law and the nieces. There was a tremendous amount of food to keep with the tradition of moms stuffing their children full, but I’m rushing this part because it’s family stuff. If you had a good time with your mom and family then you know how our day went and there really isn’t any new ground to cover on that. Although we did make Shrinky Dinks, and I’m pretty sure that it makes our day just a bit more fun. Here’s a picture:
I also had my second viewing of Iron Man 2, this time with Rene. I feel like this movie is going to benefit from distance and multiple viewings. Because of the speed of the dialogue and the amount of material that they shoved in this movie seeing it a second time allowed me to catch things that I missed before, like the self tanner all over Sam Rockwell’s hands, which I thought was a particularly fun touch.
Recovery – Something you do after you give up addiction, something you do after surgery, and something I do after seeing a midnight screening of Iron Man 2. I sat in front of the computer today like a zombie. Calls were made, texts returned, emails read/sent, I even made it to a meeting, but I was far from 100% today.
I think the days of midnight movies – especially double features – no matter how much fanboy love I may have for the movie’s subject – may be coming to an end. even as I write this it is almost midnight and I feel like I’m only awake because my body is too tired to sleep.
This is today’s picture:
You’d never know that I was barely functional, would you?
Let me start this off by saying that this post is NOT an Iron Man 2 review. It’s not. I’m way too much of a fan, and I’ve only seen the movie once and it was the midnight showing so it is impossible for me to look at the movie as anything other than, “oh-my-god-iron-man-is-the-most-awesome-ever!!!!!111!!11!!!!!” That being said this will be a discussion about the experience of going to see the midnight screening of Iron Man 2.
It was 9:15pm and I was already late. Dean had been at the theater since 7pm waiting in line and I was teaching from 7-9 (8:45, really, since I took away the 15 minute break we usually take in the middle of class). I was very grateful that he saved me a seat and I did my best to stumble to it without making too much of a fuss for the other viewers. Seeing the first movie again, with digital projection, in a room full of happy fans was a great way to start off the night. Even though media is changing over to on-demand home presentations there is something about the theater going experience that can’t be replicated at home, especially when it’s a movie that you really like! I was decked out in my classic Iron Man t-shirt and definitely ready to get my geek on.
There was a trivia contest between movies. It started as I was in the lobby getting a hot dog, popcorn and a Cherry Coke. I came back and Dean was like, “Dude, they’re giving away posters.” And I was like, “Awesome! I got this.”
Question #1: How many years was the first Iron Man movie in development? Tough question. I remember the first articles coming out in the early 90’s, I guessed ’92 so I said, “18 years!”
Wrong.
The correct answer? 17 years. GAH!
Question #2: What was the name of the terrorist organization that kidnaps Tony Stark in the first movie. I got my hand up first and yelled,”The Ten Rings!”
The crowd may have teased me for my geek-aptitude, but in the end I walked away with a free poster. Which happens to be today’s picture:
Then the beach balls started flying! I don’t know that I’ll ever understand the attraction of beach balls in a large crowd, but the mob mentality can be addicting. I was trying to eat a hot dog as the ball bounced around the room and there were more than a couple times when the ball just landed right in front of me. I couldn’t reach it so the guy next to me had to get up to toss it back around. The crowd boo’d but then a guy one row ahead of me stood up and said, “He’s trying to eat a hot dog! Give him a break!” Thus, my name for the rest of the night was “Hot Dog.” The ball would flop down behind me, “It’s by Hot Dog!” The ball fell next to me, “Ahhh, Hot Dog!” It was the most attention I’ve ever received while eating a hot dog.
Then Iron Man 2 started! I’ve read the reviews. I’ve seen your complaints. You are all wrong! This movies was awesome and funny and awesome! And I think I had a full geek-gasm when I saw the after credit sequence. After I’ve seen it a second time I might be able to give a more impartial review, but for right now…
With Iron Man 2 on the way I’m starting to get Iron Fever! I’m planning a midnight movie trip and am trying to see if there’s a way to do the Iron Man/Iron Man 2 double feature offered by AMC. My fanaticism knows few bounds. It knows some, but not a lot of them. Ever since 1983, issue 173, I have loved Iron Man. I know that part of what drew me to the character is the design, with the color combo of red and gold, but it is odd that the story in issue 173 managed to capture my attention. Written by Denny O’Neil, famous for his run on Green Lantern Green Arrow which was heavy with social commentary, he took Tony Stark from arrogant hero to hopeless drunk… for a second time.
Iron Man fans will know the Demon in a Bottle storyline, a seminal tale that is “must” reading for the character, by Bob Layton and David Michelinie with art by a personal favorite of mine, John Romita, Jr. It tells the story of Tony Stark’s fall into alcoholism. After a few issues, and the help of Bethany Cabe with a few well plotted montages, he was better and back to being a hero. The Stane Saga was Tony’s major relapse and I found this explanation of the story on ToonZone.com:
Underneath the strong armor of Iron Man inhabits an all-too fragile man. For all his wealth, handsome looks, and genius, Tony Stark is an alcoholic. At one point, the power of drink threw him into self-destruction. Fortunately Tony stopped drinking. But there is no cure for Alcoholics. Sobriety is a life-long struggle. Obadiah Stane knows that. A chess master, he attacks Tony emotionally and physically. He kidnaps his friends, attacks his business, and nearly pummels his armored ‘bodyguard’ with his powerful Chessmen. Pushed to the edge, Tony finds solace in a beautiful woman. But then Stane reveals his Queen, sending Tony to despair and liquor. Plunging deeper into booze, he fails to care as he loses his business, his fortune, his dignity. Even the mantle of Iron Man is taken from him, by his best friend!
The second ‘alcoholism’ saga, I thought this was a better story than the Micheline-Layton ‘Demon in the Bottle.’ There, Tony just goes drunk for one issue and than everything’s fine next issue. This storyline is one slow development. A prototype for the Post-Crisis Luthor, Obadiah Stane ruthlessly takes down Stark, hits him hard, flaunts his abilities and takes almost everything away from him. And poor Tony goes from one embarrassment to another (fighting Machine Man under the influence, attacking a baddie sloshed and in his underwear, etc.). It is also Tony’s last adventure in his classic armor, setting up Jim Rhodes as the second Iron Man (and eventually War Machine). A rather underrated story.
This issue is the middle of the story and the Iron Man armor is barely in it. Tony Stark is a royal mess and gives up half way through. None of the characters are freshly introduced, you’re expected to know who they are, and to top it all off when Stane’s men come to find Tony, drunk in an alley and being assaulted by gang members, one of Stane’s men shoots a gang member through the hand. It was the most provocative thing I had ever seen and the image from that panel fascinated me for days. But in the end Luke McDonnell’s version of the Iron Man armor stuck with me and, to this day, is one of my favorite versions of the classic armor.
A few years later Iron Man 173 became the first issue in my nearly complete Iron Man comic book collection (I gave up when “young Tony” showed up and again right around 2000). You might think that the picture today would be of that issue from my collection, and you’d be right that it would be a good idea, but I didn’t have access to my long boxes and Target has a really cool Iron Man 2 toy display with a mirror that has the new armor minus the helmet so you can take a picture like this:
Now if you’ll excuse me I have some fanboy-ing to do.
As the week winds down, oddly enough to a rather dramatic business cliffhanger, there’s one thing two things dominating my mind.
One is this:
And the other is: Crap in a hat! We’re supposed to be shooting Cheerleaders Must Die! soon! Normally I wouldn’t even mention something like that in this blog, but the “date pressure” for the movie is heavier than the “date pressure” that I’ve felt for any wedding, even my own.
I’ve never been so excited for It’s been a long time since I’ve been this excited/nervous for a Monday.
I had to go to Target today to pick up some new socks and underwear. Nothing spectacular or important, just stuff you need. As Rene and I were shopping we rounded the corner and saw todays picture hanging on the end cap:
I bought them.
I tried them on at home and Rene snapped some pictures.
