#regretadayagain

I regret that I’ve lived this much of my life without knowing the joy of THIS Tumblr:

It’s ridiculously goofy, random scenes that never actually happened between the members of the Traveling Wilburys.

You know, the late 80′s supergroup that included a Beatle,

a wannabe Beatle (or as they’re known in the wild, a WannaBeatle),

a young guy who ripped off Bob Dylan’s vocal delivery, an old guy who ripped off Bob Dylan’s vocal delivery even more

& a guy who was at least partially responsible for all of their careers.

Yep. It’s all those guys, but filtered through Bizarro world. Reading through the Incorrect Wilburys entries, it’s like a twisted, all male version of “Golden Girls” set in a mirror universe. 

It’s one of those ideas that I regret I didn’t do first. Flash fan fiction that’s brilliant in its self-awareness of how wonderfully rock geeky & intentionally rock stupid it is. 

I don’t know. Maybe I’m overselling it. 

HERE IT IS.

I regret stumbling upon the sublime artistry of Hexeosis.

I’m just...speechless over here.

I could stare at this stuff for hours.

I could lose sleep staring into it.

I could lose my job because of how much time I waste glaring into it.

In fact, I’ve been gazing at these for so long, I’m starting to regret that I don’t live inside these infinite worlds.

I also regret that all I do is write, as opposed to creating something as badass as this.

You win this round, Hexeosis.   You win THIS round.

This fucking bullshit needs to get the fuck out of my head:

The worst part about this is that I essentially wasted 15 minutes of my life researching Strawberry Alarm Clock just to see if there was more to this band beyond this psychedelic poseur pablum.

SPOILER ALERT: THERE ISN’T.

There’s so little creative substance to this band of fake hippies that they’re forced to relive their heyday in the most embarrassing ways.

Sidenote: I never match my socks. And here’s why: what’s the point?

I feel like we already go through our lives doing meaningless, menial shit. By not taking the time to gather them from the dryer, match them up & put them away, I’m somehow adding days/weeks/months to my life in the long run.

And yet, I regret that I’ll enjoy 15 minutes LESS on my deathbed because of the fucking Strawberry Alarm Clock.

THIS guy knows what I’m talking about:

Ditto THAT guy with the sitar (sort of):

But not THESE guys:

This is Keith Giffen.

I’ve been stupidly obsessed with him since he was a writer on THIS comic back in the 80′s:

But as fate would have it, I’ve been unknowingly collecting his work since the 70′s, since he was an artist on one of the first issues I ever read:

Like a lot of artists back then, he was hired to bring his best “Kirby” to the title. And let’s just say that he did NOT disappoint. 

I mean, it’s clearly NOT Jack Kirby, but it’s damn close. But the point is, I was digging on Giffen back when I wasn’t even aware of it. 

Later, he made a dent with his run on Legion of Super-Heroes. But I actually became aware of him as an artist when I picked up an issue with THIS issue:

The meta nature of this thing was groundbreaking to me, not to mention his style, which was like nothing that was out there at the time. 

Hell, his plotting & panel composition alone caused readers to have to stare intently into pages for minutes just to make out what was going on.

It’s like it was a game to him, seeing how minimal he could make each panel.

Sort of a deconstructed approach. Which only got more & more deconstructed year after year, until you got awesome shit like THIS:

I guess where I’m going with this is that I’ve had a Giffen checklist for a number of years. And I’ve essentially bought runs of comics, as well as individual issues, based on the fact that he illustrated them.

Even titles I wouldn’t normally buy.

Which is where we’re at today. 

I just read THIS issue:

This Jonah Hex spin-off tossed him into 2050, where he battled post-apocalyptic weirdos, armed with only his six-shooters.

I only own a few of the other Giffen drawn stories.

And now I regret that I’ll probably end up buying the entire run of this, even though that only requires me to buy, what, 15 more issues?

Still, that last panel where he discovers a stuffed version of himself from the past 

will probably make me buy everything AFTER that, too.

That’s right. Another Pink Floyd regret. 

(Happy 4th, BTW. Stick around if you want. We’re firing up the grill in a little bit.)

So, this has to do with the accompanying interview section from THIS little gem of a concert film:

First off, even if you’re NOT a Floyd fan, you should watch this thing. It’s a rock spectacle like no other, 

which transcends not only the original album, but also the initial concerts in LA & the UK.

But the interview section is like manna from Heaven for Floyd fans. It’s just two old friends (drummer Nick Mason & bassist Roger Waters) sitting in a pub, shooting the shit, while answering questions from fans from all over the world.

After all the blow-ups & in-fighting that I’ve read about this band over the years, I find it extremely touching.

Given, very little of this animosity was supposedly between Nick & Roger. They’d been thick as thieves since architectural school. 

Let’s just say that this interview session might’ve taken on a less cordial, less jovial tone if it’d been David Gilmour & Waters. 

Although they’re both older now & a lot of the shit between them has obviously been buried. 

Still, as I watch this interview session with Nick & Roger, I kind of regret that all three of them weren’t sitting there, answering questions.

I also regret that the interview didn’t include ALL the questions that were sitting there on the table. I mean, look at that stack. 

It’s fucking huge. 

Lastly, I regret that I’ll never see who wins in a fight: Roger Waters riding a dolphin or Nick Mason in a bear costume.

I already regret the queasy, uneasy feeling I’m getting in the pit of my stomach surrounding this recent announcement:

That’s right. A 13-episode live-action series about DC Comics’ Doom Patrol has just been ordered, based on the yet-to-be-released Titans series.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m actually a fan of some of the other Greg Berlanti series:

Not ALL of them, but some. And you know what? That’s enough for me. The strides this dude’s made with these DC characters is fucking phenomenal. 

Thanks to HIM, we got a live-action JSA for Christ’s sake.

That’s a MASSIVE achievement in my book. And yeah, some of the writing is a little hacky & tweenish.

But as a geek, I’ve been happy with what we’ve gotten from the good, old CW.

I mean, this is still DC we’re talking about. As a DC fan, I’m used to NOT getting my hopes up. Because in this universe, if you get too nit-picky, you get butt-hurt. 

I’m sure (like me) every DC fan on the planet is appreciative of the baby steps the TV series seem to be taking.

Because otherwise, we get served THIS:

But I digress.

Admittedly, I was a late-bloomer when it came to Doom Patrol. I only discovered Grant Morrison’s wonderfully twisted run a few years ago.

It’s like reading a comic on acid. With a peyote chaser. 

Morrison’s run put a serious zap on my head & made me rethink EVERYTHING I thought I knew about comics. A serious exercise in the untethered potential of storytelling in this medium.

I’ve even been collecting Gerard Way’s recent run.

And let me tell you something: it does NOT disappoint. Mainly because it does exactly what a revamp of a series does: provides an easy gateway for people who never read the original, while giving subtle winks to those who have. 

All that said, I regret the trepidation I’m feeling toward Berlanti’s upcoming series.

Sure, I want it. More than ANYTHING.

And yet, I’m worried that any patina or edge will be stripped or smoothed away. Which I’m sure will happen, since I hear Berlanti’s sticking to the original team, 

rather than the effed-up 90′s shit I love.

I guess I’m too close to Morrison’s source material. 

Well, maybe it’ll be fine. Maybe I’m worrying over nothing.

'Cause if they do it right & go all Legion on this series, it could be fucking EPIC.

I’ve been burning through THIS book lately:

Besides being written by one of the longest-running writers/showrunners of “The Simpsons,” Mike Reiss is (as you might guess) REALLY funny. He even starts the book out by saying that it’s structured like your average Simpsons script (& by that I mean any of the decent ones written within the first 9 seasons): 

it’s broken up into 3 acts & seriously delivers in terms of mixing the heart-warming with the hilarious.

There’s a treasure trove of Simpsons trivia & behind-the-scenes stuff that I could go into, but the only thing that applies to THIS post is what he said his Mom said about Mike’s birth.

Apparently, she was watching “Monsieur Hulot's Holiday” in the theater & she laughed so hard at what was going on in the film, she went into labor with him.

I had to look that film up once I read that passage because it sounded familiar. Or rather the character’s name did. Because it turns out to be the first film (out of 4) that features the character of Monsieur Hulot (played by the director of all the films, Jacques Tati).

The 2nd film turned out to be “Mon Oncle,” which I’ve seen before, although mostly in college dorm rooms thanks to THIS poster:

But I’ve never seen “Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday.” And I regret that, considering how goofy the trailer is.

You bet your ass I’m about to rectify that regret ASAMFP. Looks like it MIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT be on Netflix (??).

Okay, maybe not. Doesn’t matter. Because like everything, I’ll probably end up owning it.

And since it’s Criterion, I’ll probably go all-in for the box set.

So, we’ve been presenting some creative for a hospital lately. And the hospital’s agency of record has a name that’s REALLY close to the name of this game from the 80′s:

And now “CROSS-FI-YUHHHHH” is stuck in my head. But I don’t regret that. Hell, the slappy synth bass alone on this thing makes me INCREDIBLY happy. 

I essentially regret that I never owned this game as a kid.

A friend of mine did. I think we played it about 5 times during our entire friendship. And I sort of regret that we didn’t play it more. 

But like a lot of games that you don’t own, YOUR excitement is basically a boner-killer for the person who does own it. For instance, I used to sleep over at another friend’s place. A pair of brothers, who’d just gotten THIS the previous Xmas.

The entire weekend I was over, I’d pop out of bed around 4:30 am & play TimePilot. 

So fucking cool.

Well, eventually their mom got pissed that I was waking people up with all the noise, having just discovered after about 6 hours of playing the Smurf game that it was fucking horrible/unbeatable.

Well, it was that AND the fact that I was equally addicted to THIS piece of shit show for reasons that had NOTHING to do with Plastic Man:

Okay, so I’m getting off-topic. Back to the subject at hand.

“CROSS-FI-YUHHHHH!”

I also regret that I didn’t know that this obsessive game actually had a predecessor. 

Just look at those cool, fucking graphics.

But mostly I regret that even if I WANTED to play Crossfire today, I couldn’t afford to do so.