Wonder Woman 2017

Saw Wonder Woman movie last night. From the beginning I couldn't believe what I was seeing because most of my life everybody acted like Wonder Woman's the one character you can't adapt in modern times. It's too big of leap of faith and somehow Green Lantern isn't? That they portrayed Paradise Island and set it in a non-contemporary time in World War I. It was too much for me to hope for World War II because of Marvel's stake on it and there can never be no Justice Society ever, but how often do we see any movie that's during this time that wasn't made during the silent era , or early talkies before World War II drowned it out?

They reaffirmed my faith in Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman. I'll never forgive the self-misogynist women and the typical men over that outcry. I bet those same women are the same ones who freaked over the possibility over Adam Driver as Nightwing, but are now over the moon over his portrayal of Kylo Ren, the abuser. You all are obvious in your shallowness.

They made me like Chris Pine in a role. Not Steve Trevor, I already liked the character. Chris Pine has never done it for me as Captain Kirk. I'm so glad to not see him play some cocky blonde guy asshole. He played Trevor just right. He had guilt and the occasional misplaced protectiveness, but wouldn't you if you worried for someone whether they were capable, or not? Here's hoping they don't do some nasty great-great grandson as love interest Sharon Carter bullshit for the sequel. They better not recast him as Hal Jordan either unless they're really serious about that Tom Cruise rumor, in which case, fine cast Pine.

Seeing Remus Lupin as Ares, while an interesting twist instead of William Stryker wasn't as bad as people made it, but I am sick of this idea that Ares has to be portrayed by a British guy. No offense, but the British actors they pick are never scary and imposing and what was with the Burt Reynolds porn mustache in the flashback where he was in chains?

My only real criticisms with the film is the Zeus twist that you could see coming from a mile away, but I give them props that they left the whole conceived, or breathed life into distinction alone. Nothing she knows is necessarily wrong, just that she's the Godkiller, not the sword. For all we know she was still made of clay and had life struck into her as she said previously, like the animated film, but I also know they love Wonder Woman to deal with big lies and maybe I'm just clinging in denial because I want to like this movie. It's odd too me that even with Wonder Woman reclaiming her appeal with women they have to drop the goddess patrons always in favor of Zeus. It's sort of gross and the basic derivative origin to all and every Greek myth hero.

One thing that's telling though is that this film didn't want to piss off the two different factions that are fans of a character named Wonder Woman. I still say Azz's is WWINO and you can fight me. However, I notice that they kept the Marston/Perez Mars/Ares as her archenemy. They left her as the only child on Paradise Island to ease any question of of amazon sex pirates, however making her the only child reinforces that stupid Zeus twist, so… At least we didn't have to see broody origins of the other children bullying her as a freak of nature, so win.

Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2

Saw Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2 yesterday and all though it's more popcorn fair and changes a lot of the source material, I'd call it a solid flick and one of the few properites I still look forward to at Marvel besides Black Panther.

The choice of music isn't as good as the first movie, but I dug the Come A Little Bit Closer scene, Father And Son and The Chain. Even My Sweet Lord was used well even if it's not a favorite. I liked the score too and wouldn't mind a soundtrack of that for writing music.

I know I'm going to get heat for this, but I liked the father/son theme more than I thought I would because even if I saw it coming, I still liked that it subverted the common Star Wars redemption arc that never challenges viewers anymore. It's always a forgone conclusion in Star Wars that love of shared blood equals redemption (hopefully it's subverted with Kylo Ren), which is why they'll never have the balls to just make Palpatine Anakin's blood father. That would have made the saga better. Luke redeeming his father from the abuse of his grandfather.

Anyway, this movie does what comics do well, but movies don't touch on often, bring home the point of your family is your bond and not just because of heredity. I liked that they fleshed out the complex relationships between Peter and Yondu as father and son and Gamorra and Nebula as sisters, both adopted forms of family. Both Peter and Nebula have awful biological fathers compared and contrasted with Peter's tenuous relationship with his adopted father and Gamorra's complex issues with her own adopted family, her adopted father a tyrant and her sibling relationship damaged by that as a result. Love it.

Why Nate Heywood When You Have A Vast Library Of Better Characters?

The one unsolvable conundrum. Why are we supposed to care about Nate Heywood? He's Detroit League reject, a legacy of a 1970s Captain America expy with superstrength backdated into World War II and no matter how many time they try to make Steel a thing and happen by putting him in All-Star Squadron, or a modern Justice Society comic, or on Legends Of Tomorrow he leaves me cold. I mean I know I don't like Infinity Inc. characters, or most of  the Justice Society legacies they came up with in the 90′s, but they still could have picked anyone, but Nate, who's identity should have been left for use for John Henry Irons in Supergirl.

Honestly they could have given us anyone else new this season that would have served his function while being infinitely more interesting. They want a legacy that can bond with Vixen, they could have had Stargirl modern and retroactive in the past, they could have used Cyclone and introduced us Ma Hunkel in the past. They could have gave us Beth Chapel as the new Dr. Midnite they can make them related if they wanted to even though she's one of the rare Infinity Inc. members to not be a bloodline in the comics it'd work in the show where they play fast and loose with that stuff, Rick Tyler as Rex's grandson if they wanted a mystery there on who Rex had been involved with before getting involved with Amaya, but then that could have brought an icky Peggy/Sharon dynamic so no thanks. A Liberty Bell who's an Earth-1 Jessie Chambers, granddaughter to superheroine Liberty Bell and a normal guy named Johnny Chambers as a nice nod. A Jade who's the great-niece of Obsidian and possibly an improvement on the very lacking comic version. Fury who like Steel is a backdated golden age legacy, but could have given us some Amazonian plots and would work nice as an historian character. They could have retooled Silver Scarab, Nuklon (Atom Smasher being confusing), Jakeem Thunder, Amazing Man (another backdated golden age character with more interesting powers).

Anyone and they could have done something interesting with these I.P.'s DC can't be bothered to anything with, but to fill a trademark. They could have given us a toned down Dr. Fate, The Spectre, Johnny Thunder and reinvented them. This is thinking of the characters not used before like Black Canary, Wildcat, Mr. Terrific, Sand, Atom Smasher, Jay Garrick, Jessie Quick, Atom, the Hawks who are traditionally associated with the Society. Wonder Woman and Green Lantern of any kind is of course a no go.

They could have gone anywhere else more interesting than what we got with Nate as another hunky white guy with a generic Captain America aesthetic with none of the charm.

Why I'm Not Reviewing Supergirl

I've stopped doing any blogging habits outside of Tumblr where with the click of the button I can just regurgitate whatever someone else posted and add 2 cents if I'm charitable.

There's a lot of reasons I haven't written any posts. The anniversary of my mom's death came upon me a week ago. My aunt has cancer, my cousin's visiting. Food poisoning, friend's birthday, and I got a cold and a bad case of period hemorrhaging (won't be on hormone therapy for the foreseeable future) at the same time. Lovely.

So in between these times I've let my viewing of Supergirl slipped. Last Monday it was the birthday and the cold. This Monday, cold, ear ache and aforementioned hemorrhaging.

In the end though, I'm just sick of the Monel as the writer's choice of the ultimate love interest. No matter how much Monel changes the narrative still doesn't justify the reward. I wouldn't hate the character if they just left that off the table, but they won't stop pushing it.

The show has had better writing for the most part this season than last, but it's that damn character that ruins it. Contrast this with Flash where I'm devoted no matter what plans, or how sick I get. Last season is generally more well received than this season has been so far, but there's a big difference in my eyes for why I can stand it better in spite of the wasted Flashpoint potential that didn't need to happen to write this season, awful character dynamics, wasted Dr. Alchemy, stupid Savitar, wasted Iris, the quick resolution of Caitlin going off the deep end and other problems I can't remember to mention. What I will say is that what makes this season worth watching even more than last is that there's no Parry Spivot! Yeah that's a large factor, but I also like the stronger West-Allen in spite of my gripes with Iris being wasted, I love Julian in spite of my gripes with Dr. Alchemy, I love the cast in spite of my gripes with the character dynamics. I'm intrigued by the fallout of Savitar in spite of my wish for Savitar to go away.

I don't think Supergirl has many things left to keep me hooked, just enough to maybe marathon it in the future and then be disappointed by the end result that she's stuck with Monel, Winn will get with Lena and James might get with Lucy off screen. Yeah none of that interests me in the slightest. At this point I'm more interested in J'onn and M'gann in spite of feeling wrong saying that because I'm so used to M'gann being portrayed as martian teenager not as an equal to J'onn. Than again Monel is nothing like the sweet boyfriend he is in the comics to Shadow Lass either so both mine as well be two different chracters who share a similar name. I support Alex and Maggie, but I'm not really invested in them either. I hate to admit this, because I've wanted a gay couple in the CW superhero shows and have found the lacking of it odd when it's produced by a gay man and so many gay and bi actors are cast in the shows. It's also hard to be invested in Alex and Maggie when it's a writing device to play keep away with Alex and Kara time where she could use her support instead of relying on a tool.

This has been my frustration with the show and why I've become apathetic and have even missed two episodes in a row and will probably skip the next one. This show has everything going for it except for the central love story and friend support group that the first season did better in spite of some inconsistent writing. Don't get me wrong. I liked that this show expanded the world, included more aliens, gave Kara a job promotion, gave Kara another friend in Lena when Lucy couldn't come back, gave us Clark for a few episodes, and then Monel had to wake up and ruin all goodwill.

I'm pissed at the sidelining of James as the love interest after I've waited two decades for DC to to do something with that squandered potential only for them to mess it up with a gross white boy privileged stereotype taking on the name Clark bequeathed to a superior character in the comics who came from an awful xenophobic society and still with Clark's example of brotherhood, not forced through a one-sided toxic romance, became a better person.

I think it's a poor choice that the writer's decided Alex is going to ditch Kara's birthday to date Maggie instead of bringing her girlfriend along to her sister's birthday party and then take her out on more intimate dates later. This is supposed to be a move in maturity for Kara to realize her sister's not going to always be there, but they could have illustrated that lesson for something less than a birthday. I've noticed the shows gradual crumbling on the sister dynamic to make room for romantic relationship as if they can't coexist. In what world? Basically Maggie ends up being a means to an end to keep Alex away from Kara and that becomes transparent. Alex benefits here because she's not the one dating an asshole, but Kara's saddled with the inevitable foregone conclusion that she'll have to uphold the straight patriarchy. Why? It becomes a problem that they're using a sweet gay couple to distract us from a potential toxic straight couple and it's not working.

They also conveniently uses Alex as an impediment on Jimmy and Winn being upfront with Kara about their activities so that we the viewers can be blindsighted and then the topic of telling Kara can quietly be dropped. This is the writer's solution to have Kara's stuck babysitting an asshole, because where's Alex or Winn to talk sense into her? Insulting.

Tonight's Supergirl Was Great

Tonight's Supergirl was great. It reminded me of Star Trek and Stargate before Wynn referenced them. If CW can make desert sets and rubber masks and Legends can make the Waverider I don’t see why mainstream TV can't stretch further to make a main network Star Trek show.

Monel was alright this episode and best yet they didn’t do any obvious romantic stuff with him and Supergirl. My prediction that he's the Prince of Daxam is confirmed with the Dominator and other alien bowing to him.

Speaking of Romantic, Alex and Maggie get all kissy and happy until Alex blames her happiness for interfering with her work and Maggie gives her the ultimatum that this is her last chance at making it work. They have a beautiful hug at the end.

Harley-Quinn Smith appears and she and Supergirl get to hug. How many people get to hug their heroes like that?

Wynn has a crisis of conscious after getting beat up by thieves and then realizes that he got to go on another planet and survive to tell the tale. He’s living the dream Jimmy Olsen probably lived back in the day with Superman.

Snapper Carr's coming around to Kara.

Roulette was wasted in screen time that was taken up by her alien thugs, but she really proves to be wicked scum that will sell out humans to aliens who don’t seem concerned with how they sell each other out working for her.

I love Joe the alien who speaks in third person and got to go back to Earth with Supergirl and crew.

Review Supergirl Season 2 Episode 6 Changing

First of all Parasite kind of sucked and was wasted just like Metallo. I'm also shocked they actually addressed though wordlessly that Supergirl kills him. I feel like the global warming angle didn't earn itself as the topical cause of the episode, though. There's better villains that would have served that purpose while Parasite is wasted as a knock off Yeerk turned purple, hulking Red Skull. I feel like Flash's episode about Everyman does this concept more justice. Than again I feel Metallo was wasted too. A pattern perhaps.

They're getting Alex's development down and done better than last episode. This could be the first dreaded friend zone trope to apply to two gay characters on tv. Alex's rejection felt real, I can relate to the forget I ever said it should of kept my mouth shut sentiment. That her memories are filling in childhood moments of identity that were buried is also a common experience and it needed to be addressed. After many misdirects they actually have Kara supportive. There's never too many shows that have believable sisters that hits you. She also has time to work, and convince M'gann and Mon El to rise above themselves.

Maggie's presumptions and brush off aren't wrong, but condescending in trying to be a friend to a child kind of way. This Maggie while irritating in some ways is what I wish we would have gotten for a liveaction Renee Montoya than that plot device on that Fox show. While she has comic Maggie's confidence, she doesn't have her comic book backstory baggage. She does like comic Renee have an implied blink and you'll miss it drinks alone mention that could lead somewhere, or go nowhere as the writers choose. It didn't go so well for Laurel Lance so I don't think it will work here. Alcoholics rarelhy make compelling characters, especially on CW.

I'm sort of interested in how they resolve Mon El's kidnapping and his job as n enforcer. I was not expecting the enforcer angle, I thought they were going to go with not stripper, but maybe male model. I like to see him interact with James and more Winn. I'm glad Alex inspired him to be a hero, but maybe James and Winn got to show him how to be a proper human being since Kara's doing a fine job at it and Alex has her own problems besides the obligatory rescue that she and Supergirl will come up with.

I'm not sure what to think about James's vigilantism. I'd have rather they'd done a wacky gains superpowers for an episode to revert back to normal but most of those stories reek of a stay in your place mentality. If his should be a stepping stone for Winn's turn as the new Toyman than that'd suck.

I'm liking the slowburning development of J'onn and M'ann's friendship that could rip apart any second. One nitpick I have is that I like the actress who plays M'gann, but basically the symbolically oppressive white martian is doing the shapeshifter equivalent of blackface. I mean so is J'onn, but M'gann's race is explicitly genocidal and conquering (they're not only white, but they're coded white). It only works because of the initial misdirect and the actors are just that good. While I'm used to Miss Martian being a bright, sunny teenager with a shameful secret in need of a father figure, this Miss Martian whose distrustful, remorseful and older with a shameful secret in need of a friend, or something more works for me in a CW drama. I can see the Young Justice cartoon fans pissed as I was when they dumped Tim, Bart and Cassie, replaced it with Teen Titan characters and screwed up Kon, so fairs fair.

Review Flash #10

Up at 6 in the morning reading yesterdays comics to cheer me up. Reading Flash #10. The Shade returns and they introduced what I'm sure will be a one issue wonder villain in Papercut.

I'd like to comment that the art was good this issue. It's the first issue of The Flash in a long time where the anatomy isn't wonky, people have distinct faces, the line work is clean.

The Shade has come back, gone from dapper and good to appearing creepy grotesque and has lost hope, which is what turned him into a bad gut and gaining hope and friends turned him good. Not a lot more has been revealed yet as it ends on a cliffhanger, but the shadow effects look great. If I had to guess, the stealing of years has either reset Shade back to square one without his connections and without them he's lost, or he has enough awareness to know that a higher power can rip your life away and despairs because of it.

Now on to Papercut. Other than the unfortunate villainous albino aspect, he has potential. To be honest I'm not sure if he's a white albino with dreads and that would be unfortunate, or if he's intended to be black albino. He does have a cool costume and a cool power. In fact the m.o. sounds like something I would have created. He makes origami paper weapons because he can control wood. I'd like to see this rogue go up against Alan Scott, if his old powers/weaknesses were restored by Rebirth.

Flash Facts are back! At least in dialogue. Between this and Psylocke's mention of Psychic Totality this is a good week for old acknowledged catchphrases.

The little shit who must not be named better stay out my comic. Don't care if Kid Flash is on his team.

Meena might be alive, but I'm not digging the explanation for her staying away. There's got to be more to it. It'd suck if she only came back once Barry and Iris take the next step. Wish they'd resolve things before that happens. I actually like Meena as brief lover interest unlike Patty in the books and show even though both Patty's seem like different people to me.

While I find some of young Wally's impulsive actions annoying, I got to keep in mind that he's a teenager and they rationalize things weird, or maybe that's off writing either way I can overlook it, because other times he gives me the feels whether it's his joy of his powers and helping people (even when he doesn't always think of that when he's showboating a villain), distrusting Flash, not wanting to disappoint Iris,being withdrawn, trying to prove himself (though looking for trouble seems iffy to me). I also want more development on his friendship with Chunk.

Even though I think Barry keeping his identity from Iris is stupid, I suppose in this lost time of his life he can justify it. I dig the fact that Iris protects him when they're in danger. It sort of reminds me of Diana in Steve over in Wonder Woman.