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Supernatural: Origins

(Apologies for the lateness of this post. This was a difficult one to write.)

Greetings once again, citizens! Though much of my focus has been on comics and superhero related media, I do have many other interests, like a normal person. Not that I claim to be normal, mind you, but I do have some of those traits. I like other aspects of popular culture, especially movies and TV, and it’s because of my other interests that I picked up today’s offering.

About a year ago, I moved in with a close friend after some rather difficult personal trials. As part of her effort to keep my spirits up, we began watching a TV series, Supernatural. I had seen a few episodes of the series before, but I never really got into it. However, my friend and I began watching it and riffing on it, and the experience was a lot of fun.

For those unfamiliar with the series, I’ll give a brief primer. The show centers on the adventures of two brothers, Sam and Dean Winchester, who go around the country killing monsters. Pretty simple premise, but they keep it entertaining by varying the plotlines, introducing new characters, and having a lot of different monsters. Vampires, werewolves, djinn, wendigos, demons, even gods, the show features a wide variety of foes for the Winchesters. There are also a lot of plot elements that I’m leaving out, because I don’t feel like putting up spoiler warnings.

The series became popular pretty quickly, so of course a comic adaptation was planned. Supernatural: Origins was a limited series published by Wildstorm, a now-defunct imprint of DC, released in 2007. Instead of being an adaptation of some episodes of the show, it instead provides some background on John Winchester, Sam and Dean’s father, and how he became a hunter. I was pretty interested in reading it, since we see a lot of Sam and Dean’s backstory in flashbacks, but John is rarely ever seen. So, let’s get started with issue one.

Let’s get my thoughts on the art out of the way up front here. I am not a fan of this artwork at all. Everything is really blocky and minimalistic, which are not traits I especially like in my artwork. I love details, and have a great admiration for any artist who’s able to add in all the little details that really sell a scene. I also don’t really feel that this style works with the source material. There’s always little references to the greater world of Supernatural in little details in the background (or foreground) and in the dialogue. The lack of detail makes everything seem more flat and disconnected from the mythos behind the show. The blockiness I can ignore, because that’s just a personal preference. There’s also a heavy use of shadows in the artwork, which I approve of because it’s something that matches the aesthetic of the source. However, there is one problem with it; all the characters are suffering from Youngblood’s disease.

Youngblood’s disease, for those unfamiliar, is a trope in comics where characters are depicted without eyes for some reason. Whether they’re squinted to the point of non-existence, soulless white orbs, or hidden in shadows even in bright light, the disease detracts from the artwork of a story.

Anyway, let’s talk about that plot. We start off with John staring out over a lake at sunset, narrating about how he couldn’t bring himself to have a funeral for Mary. This is immediately followed by a two-page spread of Mary burning on the ceiling of the nursery at their home. Well, the comic is certainly sticking close to the show in terms of overusing the same imagery. John says goodbye to Mary, while narrating about how he’s feeling lost.

John talks to various people over the next few days, trying to find out more about what it was that happened to Mary. He doesn’t have much luck, but we see people are starting to worry about him. He alleviates their worries by going to a bar and hustling some pool. Yep, that’s the way to earn money to take care of your family. Screw your job, just scam possibly drunk guys out of money, how could that go wrong?

Oh… right.

So even though John’s an ex-Marine, he doesn’t make that guy eat his own boots. Instead, the situation is defused by Missouri Moseley who then begins telling John she was drawn there tonight by him and other clichéd psychic mumbo-jumbo. John dismisses her as nothing but a con artist, until she tells him to say hello to Sam and Dean.

Two weeks later, we see John at Missouri’s place of business. She gives him a spiel about how the world isn’t all sunshine and unicorn farts, and then performs a séance. They receive a vision of a house (along with several helpful clues for finding the place) and a message painted onto the walls.

Well that’s not threatening at all! John freaks out though and rushes there with Missouri, who gives him a warning about how he won’t be able to back out if he goes through with this, but he goes ahead and does it anyway. They reach the house and find the message scrawled on the walls of the basement. However, it seems they only got part of the message.

They rush out of there and head to the place where John left Sam and Dean. They find the woman watching the boys dead, but the boys themselves are fine. Wow, that was an anti-climactic warning. Why not just skip going to the other house, and just have the vision send you here to begin with? If the thing had been intent on the boys and wanted John out of the way, that’d make sense. But the boys are fine, the only purpose this served was to get John on the trail of this thing. How does he follow the trail? Well, Missouri finds a tooth with some stuff etched into it, and that’s where this issue ends. There’s also a backup story, but I’ve got five more comics to get through, so I’m skipping it.

Issue 2 starts off with the Winchesters on the road out of Kansas. Narration boxes give us some dialogue between Missouri and John, telling him to go see a man named Fletcher Gable in Arizona. Fletcher’s a guy who knows more than Missouri, supposedly, so John’s going to see what the tooth belongs to. Fletcher tells him that it’s the tooth of a black shuck, a kind of supped up hellhound. He also gives John a journal, which serves as an important item in the show. Though, I guess the artist didn’t know how it was actually supposed to look…

So John leaves, heading to California now on the trail of the last place Fletcher heard of a black shuck being. After John leaves, a mysterious man drops by Fletcher’s and asks what he told John. From there, we see John buy a shotgun and get himself a motel room for him and the boys. Not long after, a man named Jacob shows up, demanding to know what in the hell John is doing. This is something that’s kind of an odd point in relation to the established canon of the show. Jacob is referred to as “uncle Jacob” by Dean, and John says that Jacob was “like a father to Mary after her parents died.” However, we never get any kind of reference to him anywhere else. We see Mary with her parents in an episode of the show, and a brother is never mentioned. Hell, given what Mary’s family is like, it’s unlikely he’d be acting how he does. I guess he could be just like a family friend, but it still feels really weird that someone so close to Mary never even gets a token mention anywhere else. Well, anyway, he insists on accompanying John on whatever foolish thing he’s planning on doing, leaving Sam and Dean in the care of the motel manager. Jacob insists on taking his car, a 1967 Chevy Impala. The Impala becomes an important part of the show, one of the characters in my mind. Though this isn’t how John acquired it in the show. However, there is a reasoning behind John getting the Impala this way. Peter Johnson, the writer, wanted him to get the Impala while he’s becoming a hunter, as part of the whole transformation thing. Why does he get the Impala? Well…

They go to the graveyard that Fletch said the black shuck was last seen at and find a mausoleum with engravings similar to the ones on the tooth. Jacob opens is, and promptly gets a chunk bitten out by the shuck John is gripped with fear and unable to handle the shotgun, but before the shuck can get to John, a man dressed up like Harry Dresden saves him.

      (He never gets a real name, so I’m just gonna call him Dresden.)

 Dresden and John get out of there with Jacob, and Dresden convinces John to load Jacob into John’s car and dump it into the ocean. Why not just use Jacob’s car? Because the Impala’s far too nice to be a watery coffin, I guess. We end the issue with John being riddled with guilt, and Dresden telling him that the shuck didn’t kill his wife.

Issue 3 begins with a scene a few years in the future from when the issue takes place, but it’s irrelevant to the plot. To really begin, we have John explaining to Sam and Dean that they’re going on a roadtrip with Dresden. John is surprisingly trusting of a guy who showed up out of nowhere and convinced him to send a family friend to a watery grave. Maybe he never really liked Jacob. Anyway, they go off in search of a lead and end up at Harvelle’s Road House, a recurring location in the series. We get introduced to Ellen, who runs the place and offers to look after Sam and Dean for a bit. Dresden convinces John to go on a hunt with a guy named Ichi, to get some experience. It really doesn’t serve much point, except to show that John can’t kill a monster until Dresden tells him to turn his fear into anger. Oh, and Dean sees him kill something that looks like a man. This makes John realize that, gee, maybe bringing your children along on a quest for vengeance fraught with monsters is not a good idea. They leave the kids with some friends/family in Illinois, and the issue ends with John questioning whether he or not he can do this, and Dresden telling him he needs to see his wife again.

Issue 4 opens on a flashback of John and Mary’s honeymoon, followed by another hunt. This is just more filler. Screw giving us some moments where John questions his sanity or how his life came to be like this, just show us more irrelevant stuff. More than half the issue is devoted to filler. What in the hell? This could have good solid stuff about how John became a hunter and gained the reputation that he had, so why does is instead focus on just meandering about?

Oy vey. So, the plot resumes 12 pages in, where we find out what Dresden meant at the end of the last issue. They go to a priest in Minnesota, someone who can contact the spirits of the dead. He’s also someone who makes a brief appearance in the series, so of course we need ¾ of a page devoted to his backstory, even though he’s incredibly minor and gets killed off in his only appearance. Anyway, he calls Mary’s spirit back, and she gets to say goodbye to John. However, the shuck hijacks the summoning, and things get much less tender. John did get a clue from what was said however, and gives the tooth that he has another look over. He finds a sequence of numbers, which he guesses are coordinates. Follow it up with two more pages of filler and this issue is done.

For a nice change of pace, issue 5 does not start with filler. Hooray! Dresden and John are back in Arizona, paying Fletcher another visit. He shows them a map which he believes the coordinates will correspond to, showing the locations of Devil’s Gates all across the country. The coordinates point them towards a graveyard at Four Corners, an American landmark where 4 different states borders all meet. The rest of the issue is kinda trippy, with the terrain, weather and just about everything else changing every few pages, in spite of the fact that they’re in the same location. Honestly, nothing really that interesting happens, so I’m just gonna skip to the end. They reach their destination and they find the shuck. Wait… why are they still looking for the shuck anyway? Dresden already told John that it didn’t kill Mary, so what’s the point in looking for it? I guess if he thought that the thing was working for who/whatever did kill her, that’d make sense, but there hasn’t really been a strong connection between the shuck and Mary’s murder. Maybe the shuck just feels like fucking with John, it makes as much sense as it purposefully leading him back to its master. Which it does, and guess who its master is?

Issue 6 begins with Dresden do a whole “gotcha!” speech. Turns out he didn’t kill Mary either, but he did want John to become a hunter. He goes into his lair, with John following. Unfortunately, John is instead inside of his own mind head, facing down everything he’s been dwelling on the past… however long it’s been since Mary’s death. A couple months, by my guess. He sees Jacob again, fails to save Mary, suffers her fate, and ends up in a cemetery, looking over Sam and Dean’s graves. He gets conked on the head by Dresden, who ties him up and takes him to the roof of the lair… for dramatic purposes I guess. He gives John the whole “things aren’t as they seem” speech, kinda like Missouri did in issue 1. But apparently John doesn’t want to hear it again either, because he gets loose, kills the shuck, and then punches Dresden off the roof. John leaves, musing about how he can’t go back to a normal life because he’s seen too much. He also decides he needs his family, so he goes and gets Sam and Dean. Hooray for child endangerment! Thus ends our mini-series.

If it seems like I rushed through these, well… I did. But honestly, they weren’t all that interesting, and there wasn’t a whole lot to comment on during each one. There are a lot of moments that serve only to take up space, not to advance the plot. John’s actions feel kinda off, like the only reason that he’s doing this stuff is because the plot demands it. The plot also really doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Who the hell was the Dresden guy? Why was he so invested in getting John involved? It doesn’t really line up well with the source material. This would be an okay start to its own series, but as a tie in with an already existing story, it feels off. I really feel like they could’ve done a lot more with this, showing how John became a hunter, and given a better reason for dragging his kids down this dark path.

There are a couple of other comics that tie in to Supernatural, but I’m not sure if I’ll get around to reading them. If you haven’t checked it out yet, I recommend Supernatural. It’s kinda cheesy and dumb at times, but it’s a fun show with some good characters. It’s a shame none of them were in this.

(Two apologies before I begin today. First, this is gonna be a long one, so hold onto your butts. Second, no images today, as I was having a lot of issues getting screen shots.)

  Greetings, citizens! Today it’s Thanksgiving in the U.S. a day where everyone is supposed to give thanks for the joys in their life. Well, today I’m thankful that I never have to watch this movie again.

  I’ve been wanting to do a review of Man of Steel for awhile now. Hell, this was actually the first piece of non-comic media that I wanted to do a review for, back when I was deciding to do this blog. Why did I put it off for so long? Well, given that I have a strong negative opinion of this movie, and just about all the positive reviews for stuff I’ve done have been Marvel, I didn’t want it to seem like I just don’t like DC. While I still prefer Marvel, I do really like a lot of DC’s characters, and have been sampling a bunch of titles of theirs the past few weeks, with a lot of success. So, expect to see some DC positive attention paid to DC in the future. Until then though, let’s talk about the cinematic abomination that is Man of Steel.

  Work on Man of Steel began in 2008, when Warner Bros. started looking into doing another Superman movie, the idea eventually turning into a reboot of the franchise. They took pitches from some of the biggest name writers that they had access to, including Geoff Johns, Mark Millar, and Grant Morrison. Eventually though, they decided on the story that we ended up with, created by Christopher Nolan and David S. Goyer.

  I’m not quite sure what went wrong with the film though. Nolan and Goyer did excellent work with the Dark Knight trilogy. Director Zack Snyder’s movies haven’t exactly been fantastic, but they were visually quite interesting. What happened? Did these guys just have their talent sucked from their bodies during production? Did someone at Marvel make a deal with Mephisto? I’ve got no idea. I was hoping to listen to commentary from the makers of the movie, but unfortunately the copy I rented had no special features on it.

  But, enough background. May as well get this over with.

  The movie begins with Kal El’s birth, followed by Jor El telling the ruling council of Krypton that the planet is going to be destroyed. Unlike in the comics where Krypton was destroyed by Brainiac, this Krypton is going to die because the Kryptonians harvested the planet’s core in order to solve their energy crisis. So, we’re not even 5 minutes into the movie, and I’m already baffled by utter stupidity. What sort of morons harvest a planet’s core for energy, especially when they are presented with alternatives? Jor El points out one during the scene, saying that there are habitable planets within reach. They’ve clearly known about the problem for awhile, since coring a planet must take some time, so why did they not try finding a new world to inhabit? Or harvest another planet’s core? Was there no oversight committee for this immensely stupid plan?

  I am assuming that this is supposed to serve as an allegory for our own energy problems, and how we’re being short sighted and stuff. Except that we actually do have people trying to find other uses, and our planet won’t freaking implode if we don’t. So, it’s either heavy-handed and poorly executed allegory, or it’s intense levels of idiocy. Either way it makes for a bad plot point.

  But before we can dwell too long on how Kryptonians have moroned themselves towards an apocalypse, we get introduced to our villain, general Zod. Zod rightfully thinks that the council have been nothing but a bunch of worthless morons and attempts a coup. He asks Jor El to help him save his people, but Jor El thinks that Zod would pick and choose which bloodlines live. Yeah, apparently Kryptonians in this version don’t birth children and just clone them, which is another stupid plot point. Doesn’t cloning take more energy than birthing children would? Doesn’t it also mean that as a species, they’re going to be stagnant?

  Anyway, Jor El escapes and Zod’s forces give chase. Jor El manages to steal the codex, which contains the genetic makeup of every Kryptonian, and also drives the plot forward for the rest of the movie. He takes it back to his home, where he and his wife prep the ship to take Kal to Earth, but not before imbuing him with the codex, somehow. Here’s two more baffling plot points; why is the ship not big enough for Kal’s parents, and why did Jor El turn Kal into the codex? We never get any kind of explanation either of these. From my understanding of the comics, Krypton’s destruction came on much more suddenly, so Jor El only had enough time to construct a small vessel. But he clearly had a lot of time in this, so why not make it big enough for him and his wife?

  Back with the “plot” Zod comes in, demands the codex, and he and Jor El fight. In spite of Zod being a highly trained and skilled warrior, he’s beaten pretty handily by a scientist. I’d complain more about the fight, but it’s probably the best one in the whole movie. However, Jor El gets distracted by the majesty of sending his son off to live by himself on a world where he’ll be an outsider, and Zod stabs him. For some reason, Jor El isn’t angry or upset by being stabbed, merely mildly surprised.

  Zod orders his forces to shoot the ship down, but in an ironic twist, the council’s forces shoot down the ship that was to do the shooting. We see Zod and his lackeys get sentenced to spend some time in the Phantom Zone, and then Krypton explodes.

  We briefly see Kal’s ship landing, but who cares about that? We need to see some Deadliest Catch! It’s now 33 years later, and Kal (henceforth referred to as either Clark or Supes) is working on a fishing boat. The boat gets contacted about an oil rig that’s going to explode and they head there. By the time they arrive though, the Coast Guard is telling them that the rig’s gonna blow and that the men still there are dead. Clark figures there’s still something he can do though, and goes off to save the day, which he does. However he gets blasted into the water, and we see our first Jesus shot, because who doesn’t love heavy-handed symbolism?

  This is where the plot decides to slow way the hell down, and also stop progressing in a linear fashion. We start jumping back and forth between the present and Clark’s past. The only noteworthy thing about his past is in how his adoptive father tells him to use his power. Or rather, how he tells him to not use it. Yep, Jonathan Kent tells Clark to not help people, because that might bring attention to him. This is a change that I’ve heard a lot of people complain about, and rightfully so. Jonathan and Martha Kent are supposed to serve as the foundation upon which Clark built his morals, which is why he chooses to be Superman. In this though, he chooses to good because… it’s encoded in his DNA? We don’t know. I mean, yeah people can choose to do good for any number of reasons, but we never get any kind of inclination as to why Clark does. Hell, he got bullied a lot as a kid, it wouldn’t surprise me if he had become a villain.

  Oh, also, Jonathan dies in a tornado. Clark could’ve helped, but Jon told him not to.

  In the present time, Clark hears about some sort of weird investigation going on in the arctic, so he decides to see what that is. Of course a reporter from the Daily Planet is sent to do a story on this, even though it seems like the government is trying to keep it a secret. Who is this reporter? Why, none other than Lois Lane of course. At night, while she’s taking photos (in spite of the -40 degree temperature and lack of light), she spots Clark going for the site and follows him. Turns out that the thing that the government is investigating is a Kryptonian ship that’s twenty thousand years old. Clark finds his way onto the ship and inserts the AI thing from his ship into it. So wait, Kryptonian technology didn’t advance for twenty thousand years? Looks like I was right about their stagnation. A defense robot shoots Lois, but Clark destroys it and cauterizes her wound with his heat vision. The ship then activates, and we see Lois dropped off on a glacier or something. She then starts investigating who Clark is, while Clark talks to a hologram of Jor El.

  So Clark learns about his heritage, and also gets his suit. Apparently, it’s not an S on his chest, but the Kryptonian symbol for hope, because that’s totally plausible and not contrived. Lois gets a bunch of accounts of Clark and goes to his dad’s grave. Conveniently, after getting his costume and learning about his heritage, he goes to his dad’s grave.  They talk, and Lois decides to abandon the story she wrote accusing him of being an alien. Too bad she already had it published online though.

  Anyway, Clark goes to see his mom and while there, Zod hacks into Earth’s communication systems and broadcasts a message, asking for Clark to be turned over to him. The military takes Lois into custody, in order to try and find Clark. Clark uses the power of plot convenience to know all of this, and also know exactly which military base to go to.  He has a dull, meaningless conversation with Lois before agreeing to be turned over to Zod.

  Zod sends a ship to pick up Clark, but they also demand Lois to be taken as well. Why? Well, you see, they uh… Obviously they uh… Why the hell do they want Lois? Do they know about her article? If they do, why do they care? Because she’s close to Clark? So is his mom, but they don’t bother to demand her either. Other than for the sake of the plot, what is the reason for grabbing Lois? Ugh, this movie makes my brain sad. So Clark and Lois are brought onto the ship, but not before Clark hands off the codex to Lois, because of course they won’t search her, since they’re not highly trained soldiers or anything. Clark meets Zod, but then collapses because he’s not accustomed to Kryptonian atmosphere. That would make sense, if he’d collapsed right after getting onto the ship, instead of having to wait to be brought to the bridge.

  So while Clark’s unconscious, Zod and him have a conversation in Clark’s mindscape or something. How are they doing this? When we see Clark wake up, he’s not hooked up to anything, and we haven’t seen Kryptonians displaying any kind of psychic powers? Maybe it’s just part of Clark’s plot convenience related powers. We get a bunch of plot exposition about how Zod got here (which I’m skipping because it’s pointless). Anyway, Zod wants the codex so they can start cloning Kryptonians, and he’s going to use a terraforming thing called a world engine to turn Earth into a new Krypton, wiping out all life on Earth in the process.

  So Supes is captured, and they throw Lois into a holding cell. Conveniently though, the cell has a port for her to stick the codex in, and she does so despite not knowing what the hell the thing is. Hologram Jor El appears and seems to know exactly where he is and what’s going on. Oh, and he can control the ship’s systems, because why would the ship have any sort of safety protocols for preventing unauthorized AI’s access to vital systems? That’d be intelligent, and Kryptonians have failed to demonstrate basic common sense. Holo Jor El brings the ship back into Earth’s atmosphere, thus re-energizing Supes, and allowing him and Lois to affect an escape. And here we have Jesus imagery #2, because subtlety is lame.

    Lois and Supes get back to Earth okay, but Zod’s gone to the Kent farm to find the codex. He doesn’t find it, and is about to do some terrible stuff to Clark’s mom, but Clark flies in and saves the day, pummeling Zod into town. However, Zod’s flunkies grab him before Supes can beat on him some more, so instead we have a fight scene between Zod’s two lieutenants. I’m sure they have names, but considering that’s about all they have, I’m not bothering to try and find out what they are.

  And here we have one of my major complaints. At it’s heart, this is supposed to be an actiony movie. I can forgive plot holes and bad acting if I just want a dumb action movie (I usually don’t, but that’s not the point). The problem is that I expect the action to be good, and this shit is… well, shit. The effects have a unique visual style, and by unique I mean bad. The movements all look like they’d be more at home in a fighting game, than as the focal piece of a summer blockbuster by a huge film studio about one of the most iconic characters in the world. I don’t quite know how to describe it, it’s like none of the textures quite match up to the ones of the actual things we see on screen. The movements also feel just too fluid. I’ve not seen effects so bad that they took me out of an action scene like this since Blade 2.

  They fight, the military gets involved but accomplish nothing, more fighting, dear lord this is tedious. The Kryptonians retreat, because one of them gets knocked unconscious by a missile, and the military commander guy declares that Clark’s not a bad guy. Clark goes back to check on his mom, but we’re saved from actually having an emotional moment by Lois advancing the plot some more. She says she knows how to beat them, because apparently Holo Jor El told her how to.

  Before we can find out though, we cut back to Zod and his people, who have learned that the codex is in fact within Clark all along. The genetic code of a billion Kryptonians is within Clark’s cells. I’m not a biologist, but I don’t think that DNA works that way. I could be wrong, but considering all of the other bullshit that this movie includes, I’m willing to trust my knowledge of biology over the filmmakers. So, since they don’t need Supes alive, they launch the world engine and start terraforming the planet. One part of it goes to the Indian Ocean, the other goes to Metropolis for the sake of plot convenience.

  Conveniently, Lois and Clark arrive at the military base right after this and cobble together a plan to use Clark’s old ship to send Zod and his people back to the Phantom Zone. While they begin enacting the plan, Zod goes to get that old scout ship that was found in the artic, since that has the cloning chamber that they’ll need. Supes goes after the part of the world engine in the ocean, and has to fight a bunch of microbots in a much less believable fashion than Big Hero 6. He manages to blow it up though, which means that Lois and the military can blow up the other part. Um, why did Supes have to do his one first? And why is Lois there? She’s a freaking civilian! It’s not like she has some kind of expertise that’s required for this mission, her job is to put the damn command key or whatever it’s called into the ship! And she screws it up! One of the other “characters” ends up doing it, and the plane carrying the ship crashes into the other part of the world engine. But not before Lois conveniently falls off of the plane to her safety. And somehow she’s managing to fall even though the wormhole to the Phantom Zone is sucking up debris from the ground.

  Zod showed up in the scout ship during that scene, not that it amounted to anything. Supes just knocked the ship to the ground, destroying the cloning chambers. Supes saves Lois, they almost celebrate, and then we see Zod’s still alive. Now it’s time for the great big superhero/supervillain battle! I’d be excited, if it weren’t as horribly disappointing as the last Kryptonian fight. Skipping to the end, Zod and Supes are in a train station or something, and Zod decides to try and heat vision some civilians to death. Why there are still people around, even though Metropolis has been getting obliterated for what must have been at least an hour, I have no idea, but they’re there. Supes is of course grappling with Zod, trying to save the people, but he can’t quite keep Zod’s death gaze from them. So he snaps Zod’s neck.

  Eyup. Superman kills Zod.

  This was another major complaint about the movie I heard, and I am in full agreement. This is a betrayal of the character’s core. Superman does not kill people. Especially not when there are simple alternatives! Fly upwards you idiot! Cover Zod’s eyes with your hand! Punch him in the dick! Any of those would’ve been better than snapping his neck! I don’t know what the hell they would do with him after, but I’m sure they could pull something out of their asses. Why not, they already pulled more than two hours worth of shitty film out, why stop there?

  After that, we see Supes bring down a drone and tell one of the military guys to stop trying to find out who he is. Even though it should be really freaking easy to do so. Lois managed it without much difficulty, and she didn’t have half the resources that the government does. The film ends with Clark starting his job at the Daily Planet.

  I said it before, and I’ll say it again; this film is drivel. The plot has more holes than a sieve, and suffers from the random ass flashbacks peppered throughout the middle. I didn’t even get into half of the ones I spotted, because I didn’t want this review to be ten thousand words long. The acting is almost non-existent, and most of the characters exist solely to deliver plot exposition. The visuals are just god-awful, with effects that are less believable than any I’ve seen in a comic film within the last decade. When a giant, green rage monster looks more believable than two human looking people fighting, you’re doing something terribly wrong. Beyond that though, the film suffers from a serious lack of color. It’s not as bad as I remembered it, but it’s still bad, with the only bright patches being natural elements, and Superman himself. All of these visual problems are accentuated by the lousy cinematography at play. It feels so inconsistent, one moment it’s going for shakey-cam style crap, the next a more traditional sort of style. The film tries to convey a sense of allegory, but the lack of subtlety or finesse with the execution just makes it come off as dumb and preachy, telling the audience what we should think, instead of letting us think for ourselves. Ironic considering how that was one of the reasons Jor El wanted to have an actual son. Finally, as an adaptation, this is just pure crap. It is completely devoid of the spirit of the character, instead focusing on trying to make things “realistic.” There is no sense of fun or hope to be found within, and I find it laughable that they wanted to make it seem as if there was. This film has squashed any enthusiasm I may have had for the planned DC cinematic universe. Unless I hear overwhelmingly positive reviews of Dawn of Justice, I have no intention of seeing that.

Greetings once again, citizens! This week, we continue our look at Superior Spider-Man, with issues 14-16. The series was only 31 issues long (technically 33, but I don’t know if I’ll do the last two or not), so this marks the half-way point in the overall review!

           Let’s start with the cover. This cover isn’t especially good, but it’s still better than some of the early ones. It’s just Spidey swinging from some webs with a bunch of guys in a matching uniform in the background. Actually, the goggles that everyone’s wearing make them remind me of the Monarch’s henchmen from Venture Bros.

  The only other noteworthy thing to point is that this is the first time we see Spidey’s new outfit. I kinda glossed over it in the last review, but while Spidey was on the phone with Goons R Us, he also ordered a new outfit for himself. I like this one more actually. There’s less red to it, making the parts that are red stand out even more, like the small touches on his hands and feet. The larger spider symbol is also neat. Not sure if it’s intentional or not, but it makes me think of Eddie Brock as Venom, who was supposed to be kind of an evil opposite of Spider-Man, which works giving Ock’s own inclination to darkness. The black eyes finish off the suit, once again adding to the darker tone of the suit, but also keeping the color scheme down to two colors, making it more consistent.

  Anyway, the issue opens with a man narrating to himself. He lives in Hell’s Kitchen, in the same neighborhood as the Kingpin’s fortress, Shadowland. The Kingpin, for anyone unfamiliar with him, is one of the major lords of organized crime in New York. He’s run afoul of a few different heroes, most notably Spidey and Daredevil. I find it kind of odd just how many superheroes there are in New York, and yet so few seem to give a damn about gangs.

  We jump to what’s going on inside of Shadowland, where Kingpin is going over the situation in New York with his minions. If you recall, back in issue #10, we saw that Spider-Man took down the heads of three different crime families. Kingpin’s talking about taking over their territory, in order to expand his empire. And then Spidey’s voice is heard, saying that Kingpin’s going down. Kingpin throws open his giant door to see what in the hell Spider-Man is doing, and he sees this:

             Yyyyep. Spidey’s piloting a mech and has an army of minions with him. Now’s probably the time to talk about this, the whole minions and mechs thing. Spidey is displaying behavior much more in line with a supervillain. And honestly… I like this idea. Sure, it’s not traditional superheroing, but so what? It’s a good idea. The heavy hardware like the spider tank things is good for situations like this, taking down an evil lair or other suitably large thing. The minions themselves can be utilized for crowd control with civilians, countering the villain’s goons, operations that require a wide area to be covered, etc etc. I can understand why other heroes don’t do that, since equipping underlings and paying them to do all this crazy stuff is prohibitively expensive, and there’s also a high level of cooperation with local authorities required. Spidey’s still got access to his accounts from back when he was Doc Ock, so the money is taken care of. Jameson’s being blackmailed to more or less give Spidey free license to do as he pleases, so the “cooperation” is taken care of.

  Anyway, the two sides fight, with Kingpin and Hobgoblin trying to escape. We also get to see a new addition to the Spider suit: cybernetic appendages. I personally think they’re really neat, not to mention useful. It’s strange that nobody seems to think that this is odd though. I mean, Spidey was fighting Doc Ock for years and never bothered getting his own, but now that Ock is “dead” he gets a set of his own? This should stick out as weird. Or maybe everyone just thinks Spidey was afraid that Ock would sue him for infringing on his shtick.

  But back with Kingpin and Hobgoblin, they head deep into the base in spite of the danger, and we see… the Kingpin?

                   Well, sort of. Turns out Kingpin took a guy, turned him into a genetic duplicate, and also altered his teeth to match Kingpin’s. Y’know, so that he could kill him and fake his own death, like he does here. After making sure his double is dead, he makes his way to a one-man sub. Hobgoblin realizes that he’s on his own and clears out. On his way out though, he runs into a Spider-bot. He’s about to destroy the thing, when he notices that it just ignores him. Turns out that Hobgoblin’s mask lets him take advantage of the Goblin protocol that the Green Goblin installed in the Spider-bots.

  So Shadowland is utterly destroyed, and Spidey goes out to make a grand display for the citizens of the neighborhood, talking about how awesome he is, and also how awesome Jameson is. We see the man who was narrating at the beginning talking to Spidey, and thanking him.

  However, things aren’t as rosy as they seem. The next day, we see a drug dealer in the neighborhood, bearing the mark of the Goblin that we’ve seen back in issue #10. We also see an assembly of a bunch of the Goblin’s minions, now including some of the ones that Kingpin had among them. Gobby declares that 52% of organized crime in the city is now run by him, making him the new kingpin of crime. The issue ends with a splash page showing the Goblin laughing over a shot of the city.

           Issue #15’s cover’s actually not bad. It’s an action scene, showing Spidey and Hobgoblin fighting. My only real complaint is that the setting seems more like the fight from the last issue, instead of what actually happens in this one. But it’s still pretty good looking, making the issue seem exciting.

  We open with Hobgoblin, still on the run from the previous issue entering an antique shop, run by the Tinkerer. The Tinkerer is one of those guys who supplies gadgetry to supervillains who aren’t technological geniuses. Hobby’s come in to get maintenance on his stuff, and some more bombs. Tinkerer passes the job off to a guy working for him, Tiberius Stone. There’s a backstory about Tiberius Stone, but unfortunately I couldn’t find any info about it. He was apparently hiding from Kingpin, but with Kingpin gone he can leave. However, he’s also got a beef with Hobgoblin, so he decides to do this last job for the Tinkerer, and also work on a little revenge while he’s got a chance. He’s got a few more people on his revenge list too, but I’ll get into that another time.

  So what’s Spidey up to? He and his men are digging through the wreckage of Shadowland, trying to find the bodies of Kingpin and Hobgoblin. Because the ninjas that Kingpin had don’t actually leave remains, they just need to find some remains. Carlie Cooper and Captain Watanabe are also there, incredulous that Spidey did this. They argue a bit about whether this was right or not, with Captain Watanabe using the “might makes right” quote, but Spidey countering with the whole “great power” one, showing a gross misunderstanding of what that actually means. It doesn’t just mean using your power for the benefit of others, but also using the power in a responsible manner, showing restraint. That’s an underlying conflict of the whole series, and one that I really like. I could go on about it for another thousand words or so, but I think I’d lose half my audience if I started acting like I was Alan Shore.

  Anyway, they find a body, and declare that it’s Kingpin. From what we get to see of it though, it looks like it could be either. Maybe the characters can get a better look, but it’s too morbid to actually have in the comic. After that’s found, Spidey swings off. Captain Watanabe and Carlie talk, discussing their investigation into Spidey not being the real Spidey.

  We cut back to the Hobgoblin, or rather his alter ego, Phil Urich. Phil Urich’s had something of a weird history as a character. He started out as a heroic version of the Green Goblin back in the mid 90’s. He unfortunately later became a villain, killing the guy going by Hobgoblin at the time. He’s currently renting the name of Hobgoblin from the original one, an idea that I believe I talked about before. He’s also currently working at the Daily Bugle, where we see him selling the footage of the Shadowland battle. Afterwards, we see him in his kitchen, where he gets a call from the original Hobgoblin, Roderick Kingsley. Kingsley’s wondering where the rent for this month is, but Urich says he’s short. Kingsley points out the obvious, and says that Urich can rob a freaking bank if he needs money.

  We get a splash page, showing off Urich’s one-man crime spree along the top of the page, and Spidey being unable to catch him, since his Spider-bots don’t recognize Hobgoblin. Urich complains about how being a criminal has become a job, and not even a pleasant one, which I just find kind of funny.

  Stepping away from recapping for a moment, I want to talk about the artwork. Most of the comments I’ve made about Humberto Ramos’ artwork have not been positive, which I feel kind of bad about. While the stylization that Ramos has in his artwork is not exactly my cup of tea, he is a good artist. He’s certainly a lot better than some of the other artists I’ve seen who still get work. I bring this up because after the splash page, we get a scene of Peter brooding within Spider Island, and it is really well done.

  Peter’s expression is an excellent mixture of frustration, weariness and introspection, perfectly reflecting Peter’s thoughts in this scene. His chair also has a bunch of cables attached to it, really making it seem like he’s sitting at the center of a web. In addition to the pencils, I’ve got to give credit to Victor Olazaba and Edgar Delgado, the inker and colorist respectively. The heavy shadows and red tint to everything lends to the thoughts that Peter’s having.

  What thoughts are those? Well, frustration at not being able to catch Hobgoblin, of course. He muses about how he feels that perhaps the reason he’s not had success is because of his dual lifestyle. He ponders maybe devoting himself fully to being Spider-Man, and abandoning the life of Peter Parker. He asks himself if anything of value would truly be lost, when Anna Maria calls, wondering where he’s been.

  We cut away from the potentially tender moment to some more plot advancement. Underneath of New York, we see the Green Goblin talking with someone about the Hobgoblin situation. Interesting thing to note is that Gobby’s not in costume when we first see him, but we don’t get to see his face, so it’s not clear exactly which Green Goblin we’re dealing with. Anyway, he gives an order to have his people lie low for a bit, so that he can deactivate the Goblin protocols. He’s deactivating them because he’s worried that Urich’s exploits might cause Spidey to take a look at the Spider-bots, meaning he might notice the additional programming.

  Back to Peter, who’s in a meeting with Dr. Lamaze, the school’s chancellor, and Anna Maria. He’s told that, in spite of his frequent absences, he’ll be receiving full credit for his class, meaning that the only thing he has left to do for his PhD is his thesis. He gets out of the meeting, saying that it went better than usual. Anna Maria points out that it went better because his phone didn’t go off during it. Or rather it did, but Anna Maria picked his pocket for it earlier. He actually doesn’t seem too upset by this, but that could just be because it’s Anna Maria. But he still needs to attend to the alert he’s getting, and thus runs off.

  Back to the Hobgoblin, we see him robbing a check-cashing place, saying that this job will finally pay the rest of his bills. We also see Tiberius Stone watching, while looking at- is that a Pokédex?

  No time to dwell on that, because Spidey swings in! He and Hobgoblin begin to fight, but Stone uses his Pokédex to screw with Hobgoblin’s equipment. Hobgoblin decides to run like hell, getting away from Spidey long enough to ditch most of his gear, which had tracers on it. Urich then rushes to the Bugle, trying to get an advance for more Hobgoblin footage. He’s clearly not thinking straight, since he needs the money in order to replace the gear he lost, which is probably going to cost a hell of a lot more than he’ll get for any footage. Spidey’s using the tracers to listen in on him, but can’t quite pinpoint his location. So what does he do?

  He announces to the people of New York who Hobgoblin is, showing a picture of him, and asking for them to call a tip line if they see him, and the issue ends with everyone in the Bugle staring at Urich.

         We yet again have a decent, if misleading cover. Hobgoblin run through with his energy sword is pretty neat looking, though he never actually ends up getting aerated like that. Though if he did, it wouldn’t be terribly surprising, given how Spidey dealt with Massacre and Smythe.

  The issue opens where we left off in the previous one; Inside the Bugle with people staring at Urich, and Spidey on the TV. The people Urich is closest to at the Bugle start talking to him, and trying to keep the situation under control. Urich is definitely feeling the pressure though, and he develops a case of the giggles as the cops show up outside.

  Meanwhile, Spidey’s able to pinpoint where Urich’s hiding out and orders his nearest team of minions to the spot, but we see one of them getting abducted by some purple ribbons. While that’s happening, Spidey slips into the Bugle through a window. Urich, being a desperate fool, decides to whip out his energy sword and hold Norah Winters hostage. Norah’s is Urich’s girlfriend, by the way. What a class act, our Hobgoblin.

  We cut away from that in order to build tension- I mean, to see what’s going on with that minion who got abducted. The vigilante The Wraith, secretly Captain Watanabe, is questioning him. She interrogates him about how he’s being paid and such, giving her and Carlie a lead to continue their investigation.

  Back at the hostage situation, Norah proves that she’s something of a badass by rescuing herself from her dick of a boyfriend. Before Spidey can apprehend him though, Urich lets loose a sonic scream, hurting everyone in the area. He stops however, when he sees his uncle being harmed. Spidey then tackles him through a window, and out into the streets where Urich sees his face on every TV screen in view, realizing his life is ruined.

  And back to the Green Goblin. He’s intrigued by how much Hobgoblin’s gotten under Spidey’s skin, so he sends a minion out to get him, a woman called Menace.

  But enough of that, back to the action! Urich’s surrounded by police, and we see some of Spidey’s mechs hanging around in the background. Urich knows he’s beaten, so he drops the sword. Spidey is still “worried” about the sonic scream, so he picks up the sword, musing that there must be some way he could prevent the scream from escaping Urich’s throat. But before he can act on that, he gets a call from Captain America. Cap is concerned by his overtly villainous behavior, saying that they need to have a chat. Spidey deactivates the sword, and takes this opportunity to defuse all the questions about his personal army, by congratulating the citizens of New York on their vigilance and what not. Urich is taken into custody, looking exceptionally haggard by the experience.

  He’s not in custody for long though. Before his transport gets very far, it’s taken out by Menace, who takes her back to the tunnels beneath New York. He’s given the opportunity to join up with Gobby, being given new gear, a new costume, and even a new name. The issue ends with us being introduced to the Goblin Knight.

  Overall, these issues are pretty good. We get a lot more advancement of some of the background plots that have been going on up to this point, like Carlie’s investigation and the Green Goblin’s criminal empire. Now that Spidey’s no longer burdened by Ghost-Pete hanging around, he’s indulging more in some of his old habits. It’s an interesting way of approaching the business of being a superhero, and not necessarily a bad one. I actually think that it’s pretty cool, not to mention useful for some situations. The problem lies in Spidey not showing restraint. I would’ve liked to see more of a struggle with him trying to restrain himself, but at the same time, his arrogance is one of the reasons I like reading the character. I find arrogance to be an entertaining trait for characters to have, possibly because it’s something so very different from how I act.