#Batman was the star of his thesis film

[shrub-jay]

Bruce Wayne, but he’s REALLY into puppetry. Fighting? He can’t do that. But his puppet named Batman can. Bruce Wayne who puppets his weird little marionette Batguy OC throughout Gotham with hidden, comically large levers.

[cyanide-sippy-cup]

Finally watched Caped Crusader and I have ✨thoughts✨.

Oswalda is straight up iconic. Loved every scene with her. I actually laughed out loud when the dude goes "Thorne got you to kill the wrong son?" and she responds "Not that!" I'd let her lock me in a suitcase and throw me in the sea. She gets a gold star ⭐

I like that we get to see Selina's origin. I like the classic suit. That's kinda it though. A bit sad that Bruce didn't feel any connection with her. Just not a huge fan of her character here. She doesn't feel like Selina (a problem most of this show faces tbh).

I was loving the Harley stuff. The bit with Renee was so cute, and I love that she really was passionate about helping Bruce move past his trauma. I really like that she's Barbara's friend. Was really upset at the fakeout death but at least she was just joshin. The villain stuff felt like fetishes which like okay. I guess Bruce needed to put in something to replace BruceBabs. Anyway, that's the final dig towards him. As much as this Harley episode wasn't my favorite, a promise is a promise. Although I do gotta ask, WHY CAN'T RENEE CATCH A BREAK IN HER LOVE LIFE >:(((

No fucking way the moral of episode 7 was "the system is totally not screwed, it's just a few bad apples and also a criminal is a criminal and should be jailed". Barbara literally says the system sucks cause the cops can do what they want and get in anyone's pockets and then nearly gets killed by a cop and then they end it with "actually, I think you do"?! I mean yeah that specific guy deserved prison but ending it on that note of Barbara feeling betrayed and confused on her morals tells a very not-so-delightful message. Glad the show backtracks on all that immediately but it's still weird and definitely could've used some revising to fit in with the rest.

Onomatopeia was awesome though. I remember people claiming his shtick couldn't work when he appeared in Superman and Lois. They said that it only worked in comics and would be too silly out loud. Happy to report that they're wrong.

I feel like I'm the only one who was excited to see Waylon but that's okay cause I got enough excitement for everyone. Love to see my mans kicking the shit out of potential perverts. You go, Waylon!

Dick, Jason, Steph, and Carrie. Definitely an interesting combination. But it's also so nice to see a Jason who grew up in a different environment and is therefore adorable with no rage in his heart. As opposed to Carrie who was ready to kick some ass. The ending to episode 8 really understood Batman, what with him saying he can't leave her there, carrying her and shielding her under the cape, and then asking about her later.

The Harvey bit is kinda cool but 1, I've always been iffy on the shotty DID stuff and 2, I think they coulda gone further. Just watch The Long Halloween for a better Two Face plot.

I like Harvey helping that guy get his stuffed animal back. That was a nice small character moment. If we had more stuff like that and Bruce being unable to confess his emotions to Alfred, I think this whole thing would be better. This one made up for episode 7's little message by having Barbara tell Harvey that it's not so cut and dry and that he deserves help too. I'm glad they went back to that after the whole "sometimes things are black and white" bit. Batman is about helping people just as much as Superman is and I feel like sending a message that "nope, bad is bad and he should just punch people" doesn't fit the entire thesis of Batman.

This finale really encapsulates how this show doesn't quite understand the character of Batman. It may be comic-accurate for him to be an asshole and put on the voice randomly, treat Alfred like crap, and randomly break character with stuff like "don't start growing a conscience now, Dent" but as I said it goes against the whole thesis. This is more along the lines of the Nolan films with the "Bruce Wayne is the mask" bit. And we all know how I feel about those films.

And then it ends on a boring cliffhanger with the boss guy and then a shitty Joker teaser. Boo.

In short, this show is good but it's not anything special. I do really like the classic Batman aesthetic, but that's pretty much it. It doesn't really understand the characters like MAWS and WFA, the overarching plot is kind of uninteresting and it doesn't feel like we're building up to something great. I feel like this show really wanted to use the episodic style to take a look at all these different elements of Gotham's world with references to existing characters and aspects. But whereas MAWS smoothly slid those into its narrative and setting, this just kinda feels like a villain of the week show instead of working towards this grand narrative. And that can be a good thing, I mean I'm a Scooby Doo fan for crying out loud, but in this scenario, it just doesn't work that exceptionally. If it gets a season 2, I'll probably watch it. But this isn't something I'd be excitedly waiting to see new episodes of.

[rinn-e]

Tagged by: @lithugraph thank you dear <3

What book are you currently reading?

I finished the last pages of Different Seasons by Stephen King today, a collection of novellas featuring Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, the novella the film The Shawshank Redemption is based on, and, man, it reminded me why I love Stephen King so much.

What’s your favorite movie you saw in theaters this year?

Did I even watch a movie in theaters this year? lol. Okay, I remembered - The Batman, which I liked a lot (but I'm a Batman fangirl, so no surprises there).

What do you usually wear?

Jeans and a blouse or shirt, a hoodie on top if I'm cold. But I also really love dresses in summer.

How tall are you?

168 cm, so 5’5” for you Americans :P

What’s your Star Sign? Do you share a birthday with a celebrity or a historical event? 

Scorpio! I share my birthday with Emma Stone and Ethan Hawke, among others. No interesting historical events.

Do you go by your name or a nick-name?

Usually my name, but my closest childhood friends and my sister have a nick-name they sometimes use :)

Did you grow up to become what you wanted to be when you were a child?

Nope. I wanted to be an actress :P Though, as I also wanted to be an author, you could say that I'm getting closer to that dream (very, very slowly).

Are you in a relationship? If not, who is your crush if you have one?

Yes! Three years and going strong.

What’s something you’re good at vs. something you’re bad at?

I like to imagine writing and drawing are skills I'm better at than your average guy/girl and I'm exceptionally good at worrying about stuff and feeling stressed :P Bad - I'm clumsy, so the opposite of that. Also throwing a ball.

Dogs or cats?

Cats!

If you draw/write, or create in any way, what’s your favorite picture/favorite line/favorite etc. from something you created this year?

Art I hate as soon as I post it, though I have lots of written lines I adore :)

I really like the opening lines of Desperate Times:

Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Obi-Wan had always considered the saying somewhat cliché, an excuse to justify whatever cruel or little thought-out plan was set in motion. How did you recognize desperate times? Weren’t all measures desperate if taken in a state of despair? How did you decide on the measures to be taken, whether desperate or not? And, in the end, would history prove them right?

He still didn’t know the answers to those questions. However, for the first time maybe, he found himself whispering those words with relief, for they were short and comfortable, and they offered an explanation he could cling to when ignoring what his heart was telling him. They dampened the regret. They made it easier, when, in reality, nothing was easy at all.

Also, most of the epilogue of What You Are And What You'll Never Be.

What’s something you would like to create content for?

I have a Bridgerton fanfiction in progress feat. Anthony and whump (I have a thing for smug male leads getting knocked down a peg), though I doubt I'll get many readers :P Also, maybe, Jesus Christ Superstar.

What’s something you’re currently obsessed with? 

Josh Young as Judas in the broadway revival of Jesus Christ Superstar. Damn, that man can sing.

What’s something you were excited about that turned out to be disappointing this year?

The My Chemical Romance concert I couldn't go to because it was postponed on short notice and the new date didn't work for me :))

What’s a hidden talent of yours?

I hope it's my singing skills :P

Are you religious?     

I was confirmed, but I don't really practice it, so I guess not so much. Though, I do like the general sentiments of helping one's neighbour.

What’s something you wish to have at this moment?

My bachelor's thesis done :( But I'm on schedule, so that's something.

Tagging: (Don't feel obligated to do this of course) @buzzingbugger @jovialkidbonktrashsh @currently-kraken @rosesnblueberries @sparkie96 @willshowerthots @kratosfan6632466 and whoever else wants to do this :)

[icemankazansky]

Ice's death in tgm left me in a weird place mentally too. I have zero complaints with the movie itself. Its my own feelings Im trying to untangle - to see ice die from the thing that's made val so sick. It was a respectful send off for the character but it also makes me feel some kind of way considering val's situation. I also wanted to ask you if you dont mind since youve been a val fan longer, what according to you are the most striking things youve observed about him?

I understand completely. It's ... I don't know, maybe it was cathartic for him. I wonder what Jack and Mercedes felt, fake attending their own father's funeral after he fake dies from the thing that actually made him so sick and has completely altered his life ... Who knows, maybe they're all more emotionally well-adjust than we are.

Oh, Val. Come with me, I have a feeling this is going to be a long one.

The Artist

First off: I believe Val Kilmer is the most underrated actor of his generation. And I'm not alone in thinking that. While doing research for my thesis, I came across a number of people in the industry who describe him exactly that way. I also read an extremely unkind article that posited him as "the failed Tom Cruise," and in addition to just being kind of ugly, it kind of misses the point of Val altogether. Val Kilmer never wanted to be a movie star. Val wanted to be an actor. From his days at Juilliard and decades after that, Val considered acting to be a serious art, and what he wanted as a professional was to explore that art and challenge himself. He wanted to do Hamlet. (And he did, in 1988 at the Colorado Shakespeare Festival. But that was his goal since he was a teenager, when he started pursuing acting formally.)

Some people he has worked with have called him difficult, but at the center of these accusations, I read Val trying to do his job well. The directors of Top Secret!, Val's first film role, complained that he asked them for more direction, and that, "this really isn't that kind of movie." Val was 23 years old. He had just graduated from Juilliard a few years earlier. He was doing what he was taught to do, and he was trying to do it well. As an actor, expecting a director to direct you seems ... like what their job is? IDK. In the '80s and '90s, he got cast in some leading man type roles because he looks like that, but if you look at his filmography, he's also choosing smaller, meatier or more complicated roles, or roles that let him work with people he wanted to work with. At the same time as he was playing Batman in the highest grossing movie of 1995, he was shooting Heat because he wanted to work with Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino. (When they approached him for the role, they told him they couldn't pay him much above day rate, what can we do to keep you? and he was going to do the movie anyway because he wanted to work with the cast and crew, but he asked, "Can I be on the poster?" and that is an answer to a question that you didn't ask, but that is why Chris Shiherlis is so large on the Heat poster.)

Curious

This is related, but Val has an insatiable curiosity. He is always trying to learn new things, not only about acting, but about other forms of art, about the world around him. There are many stories of Val trying to learn from his colleagues on movie sets; he annoyed Sam Shepherd enough with his questions on the set of Thunderheart that Sam basically told him to fuck off, but he also spent a lot of time speaking to Chief Ted Thin Elk, less about acting and more about his life experience and his experience as an Indigenous person, something Val has a lot of curiosity about because he was told his whole life that his paternal grandmother was full Native, but that was really as much as he'd been told. (I think that probably helped him get into Ray Levoi's shoes, and his performance in that film is one of his subtlest, so much said with expressions or posture or the way he holds the silence... ugh, don't get me started, Ray.)

And his curiosity has shaped his life and his career. He wanted to explore what he could do with his voice, and eventually found he was able to mimic Jim Morrison's voice so well that members of the band couldn't tell Morrison's tracks from Val's. In The Doors, he sang live on film, take after take. That's ... it's a little insane, in a very Val Kilmer kind of way. When he lost his voice, he started discovering ways he could act without it, and he started new ventures with other kinds of art.

Spiritual / Loving

Val's faith is an important part of his life. I admit to not knowing much about Christian Science, but I have read and heard Val talking about how he understands faith and his relationship with the world, and the word that he uses is Love. He seems to genuinely have an incredible relationship with his children. He's just constantly delighted by them, and he loves them so, so much. And I think that he views the whole world with an open heart, and that he loves more than just his family or his work or his faith: He loves the wonders of nature, and animals, and he loves art and the whole world, really. He has a sense of childlike wonder that is unexpected and refreshing in the hard, cynical world we live in. He finds beauty and fun and hope in so many things. In his memoir, Val quotes his then-wife Joanne Whalley as saying, "You have a crush on everything." And he admits that he does. And you get that sense from him. When I went to meet with him, he was incredibly kind and caring and curious and warm. He didn't have to meet with me. He agreed to for his own reasons. After he greeted me, he asked me why I wrote the book, why him, and when I explained it to him, he seemed genuinely touched. I thanked him for getting me through a rough time in my life, and he took my hand in his and squeezed it, and just inclined his head. This was after he'd gotten sick, but before he got the stoma, so he could speak, but I could tell it was difficult, and I imagine now that it was probably painful. His handler has asked me to bring several copies of the book, and I did, and I had one for Val, which he accepted very graciously, and the rest I was going to give to his handler because she hadn't said what she wanted them for, but she said no, keep those, and Val insisted on signing them all. He had a little vase with a yellow rose in it in his room, and he insisted on signing the vase for me, as well, and giving me both the vase and the rose because, "Women should have flowers." And he made sure we got a picture together, which I hadn't even thought of, because it was just a private meeting, like, in his space, but he wanted to give me that. I'm an empath, and I pick up on people's emotions really, really easily, and at no point did I ever get anything from him that wasn't warm and caring. He had never met me before. He only knew I existed for a few months. But he went out of his way to be kind to me, to make me feel heard and appreciated. That is a rare thing.

[imperaptorfuriosa]

just saw your tag about the transgenderism of schwarzneggar films and now i need to know more

omg omg thank you for asking!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i previously talked about my thesis that 80s action hero democratizes/deconstructs masculinity in this post, but when talking about arnold schwarzenegger, there's a few specific points i like to dig into >:)

arnold got famous in the body builder community first. he had already won mr olympia seven times before his big break in the documentary pumping iron (1977). while he first appeared in hercules in new york (1970), his voice was totally dubbed and he was credited as “arnold strong.” they needed him for his body, but his identity was obscured because he was seen as too foreign. his first successful acting role (and the only one he won an award for) was as a body builder in stay hungry (1976). 

throughout his work in the 80s (conan, terminator, commando, predator), his body is constantly on display. multiple shots of his muscles/arms/body are often shown before his face. his heroism, and identity as a star, are inherently tied to his body, which he famously built with his own hands. terminator doubles down on this idea by 1) introducing him totally in the nude and 2) having him play a literal construction aka robot.

to get back on track: all this means that, in theory, anyone could build themselves into a hero, a myth, a leading man. these films argue that your own mythic gender can be self-made.

older images of heroism/masculinity (presented by john wayne, jimmy stewart, james cagney etc etc) always seemed to be something special that the man was born with. maybe he learned his way on the streets, or was taught how to shoot, but his heroism came from within. 80s arnold says: fuck that. make your own body and your own myth and your own masculinity. 

also, the majority of arnold's movies at this point dont have much in the way of love interests. there's no heteronormative romance arc to re-establish that he's a man BECUASE he fucks women. all the focus is placed on his gender expression. (commando specifically is one of those action movies (like top gun) that is super homoerotic lmao)

((predator also get a special shout-out because its the movie where arnold plays a final boy :) other people have written much more extensively about the queerness of final boys, so ill just say that predator is about a guy who is broken down to the point of being almost an animal. there is nothing left but what he can make with his hands. his body is his only tool and he is in complete control of it. he even literally dictates who gets to see it once he realizes that the predator’s sight is informed by heat signatures/body heat))

by the 90s, when people got tired of "toxic” action heroes, there was this switch to less overtly "hard" men, with less muscle and more romantic/familial desires. this is the era of kindergarten cop, twins, jingle all the way, batman & robin, last action hero, AND JUNIOR.

for anyone who doesnt know, junior (1994), is about a couple of fertility scientists (arnold and danny devito) who decided to secretly go ahead with human testing when the fda says they cant. long story short, its a movie about arnold having a baby. while certainly of its era and by no means perfect, junior is one of the only examples of a mainstream hollywood movie positively depicting male pregnancy. a bit like sleepaway camp, the story treats the characters with such sympathy that the transphobic idea (a comedy about how "crazy" it would be for a man to have a baby) loops back around to being actually really cathartic and comforting.

terminator 2: judgement day (1991), is another touch-stone of arnold transgenderism for me because it completely swaps the roles of the final girl (sarah connor as played by linda hamilton <3) and the hard-bodied action man (arnold). we see sarah’s sweaty, muscular body before her face, just like we did so many times before with arnold. the terminator becomes a father figure, playing with john connor and learning how to experience human emotions, while sarah is reloading machine guns and looking badass and trying to murder people for the sake of “the greater good.” its a complete reversal of the archetypes, which is fun already, but it also proves that the argument made in the 80s (anyone can become Action Man) is true. sarah worked hard and now she is the action hero instead of arnold. the gender of her role in the movie has totally changed. 

i could go on, but that’s the gist of it!  arnold’s post-governor films haven’t read as transgender as he early work (for me anyway), but it has been a while since i really properly studied his work so i might have more to say about them someday.

and literally anytime anyone anywhere wants to talk about this stuff, or to see me shoot my transgender beam at a specific action movie, dont hesitate to reach out!!!!! i mean it!!! 

[thebatmarino]

The DCEU’s next Batman should be played by Dick Grayson

Batman and Robin.  Words that have gone together like Peanut Butter and Jelly for around 80 years.  Everybody in the world knows that Batman’s younger sidekick is Robin. Many know that Robin is Dick Grayson, fewer know that Dick grew up to become Nightwing, and even fewer still that he has spent time as Batman. With the recent activity in DC film, I want to talk about my favorite superhero, what makes him great, and most importantly, why I believe Dick Grayson is the answer to the DCEU’s Bat situation. To start, we’re going to rewind to 1940, when Robin was introduced to the world in Detective Comics #38.

Batman was created in 1939.  A grim figure of the night, Batman spoke very little, a trait that has held through to this day. At the time however, legend has it that Bill Finger and Bob Kane were tired of drawing thought bubbles for him, so they needed to give him someone to talk to.  But who? Well, Batman was a Sherlock Holmesian figure, it was Detective Comics after all, so they needed to give him a Watson.  A character who’s intelligent, capable, and a proxy for the readership so they can join Batman on his adventures. The readership at the time (target readership, we know girls love and read comics too, but this was 1940) was 12 year old boys, and who might they look up to? Robin Hood starring Errol Flynn came out in 1938, he seems pretty cool. And a Robin keeps up the motif of flying animal that Batman started.  And there you have it, Robin the Boy Wonder was born.

The creation of Robin is also the birth of the Teenage Sidekick. Since then, every teen sidekick from Bucky to Kid Flash owes a debt to the creation of Robin.  As more and more sidekick characters populated the comic scene, something happened at DC Comics in particular that is one of my favorite things about the brand: the idea of Legacy Characters.

Consider the Justice League for a moment. Let’s look at the big 6: Wonder Woman, Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, Flash, and Aquaman.  These characters are the Greek Gods reborn.  They are iconic, they are mythological.  Each one of them proudly displays a symbol that they adhere to.  “I believe in love and equality”, “There is hope for everyone”, “I will drag myself through Hell for justice”, “by force of will, I will overcome all fear to save the world”, “I will always make time to help people”, “I will be the great uniter of disparate people”, or whatever you interpret the thesis of these characters to be. They are perfect embodiments.  The problem with perfection is that real people can’t attain that.  We can try.  We can stumble and fall. And that is exactly what the Legacy Characters attempt to be. These characters are absolute representations in ways that humans are generally not. They are aspirational.  That’s why there’s merchandise out the wazzu (do people still say that?), so you can see a person on the street with that Green Lantern symbol and know that person wants to overcome fear.

Dick Grayson was the first.  For many years Dick was happily Robin, going on strange adventures with Batman and friends, whupping ass in green short pants. He even formed a team of sidekicks, known as the Teen Titans along with Wonder Girl, Kid Flash, Aqualad, and Speedy.  All teenagers struggling to live up to their “parents”.  These perfect people who’s symbols they have taken as their own and sworn to uphold.  Then something interesting happened.  In 1984, in Tales of the Teen Titans #44, Dick Grayson debuted his Nightwing persona.

Dick Grayson had been growing up.  Which is a thing yet again, never done in comics before.  For some time now, a rift had been growing between the Dark Knight and his Squire. Dick had gone off to college, formed his own super-team, and was going through the typical growing pains of a young person trying to step out on their own. No longer feeling the identity of his 12 year old fancies were fitting, he picked an adult, darker name that still reflected and honored where where he came from (the origins of this name are toyed with and retconned, but the connections between Bats and Wings of the Night cannot be denied).

As Nightwing, Dick Grayson was his own man, ran his life and heroics how he saw fit, and most importantly, didn’t answer to Batman.  Until Knightfall happened.  In the events of this story, Bane broke Bruce’s spine, resulting in Bruce choosing a man named Jean-Paul Valley as the new Batman.  Jean-Paul went nutso and nearly killed Bane and begun a reign of hyper-vigilante terror in Gotham, so Bruce badassed his way back to walking because comic books, and whupped his ass.  Before restoring himself as the one true Batman, Bruce asked the one man qualified in all the world to take up the mantle to do so: Dick Grayson.  Yet again, we have a comic book first: a legacy character fulfilling their legacy. This didn’t last long however, Bruce did what he had to do, and Dick dutifully (and reluctantly) filled in as long as required.

Nightwing then got a brilliant solo series by Chuck Dixon and Scott McDaniel, which to this day is probably the most influential run on the character. Before we move on in his publication history though, I think it’s important to understand WHO Dick is, and WHY he is.  After all, what makes this 12 year old boy so special that he becomes Batman’s right hand man in a war on crime?

Richard John Grayson, aka Dick, was born to John and Mary Grayson of the legendary Flying Graysons of Haly’s Circus.  The reason they were legendary was because they flew without the safety of a net.  Dick grew up on the trapeze with no net.  No fear, no cares in the world, except being a child star performer. After a mob boss tries to unsuccessfully extort money from the circus, they murder the Graysons by tampering with the trapeze before Dick’s very eyes. The young orphan was observed by another orphan in the crowd, Bruce Wayne, who took him in.  It wasn’t really successfully explained why a 12 year old seemed okay to take out fighting crime until the two part episode of Batman: The Animated Series, Robin’s Reckoning. Like a young Bruce, Dick was consumed with his parents’ murder.  Each night, unfulfilled by the guardianship of an absentee Bruce Wayne, Dick would sneak out and try to track down leads on his parents’ killer.  Eventually he got in over his head and Batman bailed him out and returned him to the Batcave. This boy knew no fear.  He would return to the streets night after night.  He would get himself killed.  Unless he was trained how to not die by a certain… bat themed expert at not-getting-killed-by-criminal-scum.  Bruce revealed his identity to Dick, which also explained why he was busy so much of the time, and in the Batcave, Dick swore an oath by candlelight to uphold justice and everything Batman stood for. The training was gruelling. Probably inhumane. But eventually Dick was allowed to accompany Batman on the streets as his sidekick.

Dick Grayson was saved by Bruce Wayne. Where Bruce was in uncharted territory sorting his rage, vengeance, and pain, Dick Grayson had a guide.  A Mentor.  Someone who had been exactly where he was, and could keep him from being consumed by darkness.  And that’s reflected in their uniforms.  The bright boy and the dark man. Adding to that, the Wayne’s murderer got away. There will be no vengeance or justice for Batman, just a gaping wound.  Dick got justice for his parents. He saw that what they did worked, and that he could keep doing it for other people.  Whereas Batman is driven by a desire to hurt those who hurt others, Dick is here to help.  That’s something Tom King wrote into his character over and over during his run, the words “how can I help”.  And if you look at the jobs he’s held down since striking out on his own: Police Officer, Guidance Counselor, Personal trainer, even bartending at a cop bar where he could give these guys relief (as well as pick up some leads) are all acts of service towards others.  Which when the time came, made him a very different Batman.

The time eventually came.  Bruce Wayne was “dead” (as dead as anyone is in comics), and Gotham City was in chaos. Initially Bruce left instructions for Dick not to become Batman. Because Nightwing was strong enough.  He was his own man and Bruce believed in what he was doing.  However, Gotham needs Batman, the symbol.  And for the first time truly, not just putting on the cape and cowl, but deep in his bones, Dick Grayson became Batman. Fulfilling the legacy.  He is not Bruce Wayne, just like we cannot be Bruce Wayne, but he can do his best to live up to what the symbol of The Batman means to him, just like us.  Which brings me to where Dick Grayson is the future of the cinematic Batman franchise.

Over the last few years, we are experiencing a massive shift in how our male heroes are percieved.  In the 80s which gave birth to Dark Knight Returns, a huge influence on the DCEU Batman, we saw a trend of hypermasculinity in our heroes.  They were JACKED, strong, fearless, .50 Cal from the hip, Macho Men, stoic badasses that were too busy punching out teeth and blowing shit up to feel sissy-ass feelings.  And that is where Batman has lived for years in comic continuity. He doesn’t say I love you, he doesn’t hug, he doesn’t feel feelings, he’s a rage-powered badass dressed all in black that kicks in criminals’ kneecaps because he probably kind of likes it.  At the end of the day, you read enough of these comics and question whether or not Batman is actually a good man. Is he doing this to save the day, or inflict pain? Probably some of both.

As we survey the current landscape of masculinity, of heroism, of feminism, it’s important to question our heroes. It’s important to question, is this the ideal that we want people to strive for? In Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice, we saw that Frank Miller Dark Knight Returns in all his glory.  In my opinion, Ben Affleck’s portrayal of Batman was my favorite thing about that film. He was deliciously brutal, he was stubborn in his righteousness, he was extreme in his methodology, he was....murdering people? He was losing himself.  He was so caught up in his need for violence, his need for war that he attempted to murder superman with a freaking spear. I suspect Justice League was intended to have a more redemptive arc for the demon he had become, but in any case, he has still become a monster.  He has dwelled in hell so long that he has become the very type of devil he sought to destroy.

The best thing for Bruce Wayne would be to leave this life behind somehow. Pass the cowl on to the man who he trained for this very purpose. A hero that exemplifies modern healthy masculinity.  Who can say “I love you”, who wants to seek justice more than vengeance, who can maintain healthy friendships and relationships, who believes in kindness, friendship, and laughter.  I think it is time for Dick Grayson to take his place in cinematic history as Batman.

That doesn’t even touch upon the fact that the DCEU Batman is around 45 years old.  While incredible and imaginative, they’ve set him at a natural age to retire from jumping off rooftops and withstanding repeated head trauma. If you look at Batman as a pro athlete, you simply do not see them at his age and doing tremendously well.  Which when your sport is dodging gunfire and acting as bait for super aliens so other super aliens can clobber them, is not great.  I think DC Entertainment is looking for ways to have a more youthful Batman, and I believe Dick Grayson is part of that natural path.

And that doesn’t mean we won’t have Bruce Wayne stories.  As the news has just dropped, Matt Reeves is telling his own young Bruce tales.  But as far as the Batman that stands shoulder to shoulder with Wonder Woman, and Superman?  Here we have a young man in Dick Grayson coming into his own as a hero on the world’s stage, just like Diana and Clark.  A young man with the strategic mind of Batman, the physical training, the gadgets, resources, but without the blinding rage, pain, and cynicism.  A superhero that looks at the world and wants to genuinely help people. Not out of a deep psychological need to harm those who harmed him, but because he was broken and then saved, and he can do that for other people.  Being a good person is all the superpower you need. As a culture, I believe those are the heroes we need right now. And as for Dick Grayson, he’s a born showman, and I think it’s time for him to take the stage.

[dcarevu]

DCAU: Beware the Gray Ghost

“When crime haunts the night, a silent crusader carries the torch of justice. Those with evil hearts beware for out of the darkness comes the Gray Ghost!”

Batman meets his influence, while simultaneously, in a way, meeting himself from another universe. How is this possible? Find out next time, same bat-time, same bat-channel! Well, okay, maybe not, you could just scroll down… So was this episode a tired, old has-been or a star worth remembering?

Episode: 18 Robin: No Writer(s): Garin Wolf (Teleplay), Tom Ruegger (Teleplay/Story), Dennis O’Flaherty (Story) Director: Boyd Kirkland Animator: Spectrum Airdate: November 4, 1992 Grade: A

Beware the Gray Ghost is a fantastic episode of Batman the Animated Series with something there to satisfy the older and newer fans, bridging the gap between them. And in fact, historically, it kinda did just that, bringing new respect to a certain actor who guest starred in this one! It is also an episode that I noticed has a very distinct feel to it, turning it into a tribute to not only the old Batman show from the 60’s, but also just old, Twilight Zone-esque noir crime shows in general. The music, the plot, some of the more subtle details, it’s all there. But instead of using these to craft some sort of parody or critique, it all ends up being a very respectful look at days past while undoubtedly still being Batman the Animated Series.

“The Graaaaaayyyyy Ghost!”

Spectrum animation is back with this one (which is odd, because apparently they shut down after bankrupting themselves with Heart of Ice… Anyone know how this all worked?), but in addition to that, my copy of Batman the Animated Series on Blu Ray just arrived! I couldn’t be happier that the first episode we watched on Blu Ray was a Spectrum episode. This created a very noticeable leap in animation quality. I’ll go more into detail at the end of this post also, giving my basic first impressions on how the Blu Ray release stacks up against the DVD one. But yeah, I’ll say it right now, it makes the show go from beautiful to breathtaking. Some of the color-usage in this episode is the best the show had done up to this point, and a variety of styles was used.

We have the scenes which are in exclusively black and white (displayed when we get a look at the original Grey Ghost tv show), we have the sepia-toned bits showing Bruce Wayne’s childhood, we have the bloody reds when explosions and fires happen (fire count!), and then we have the typical dark-deco look of the show. They all flow together seamlessly, and you can’t help but admire how realized this episode must have been before it was finished and then aired on TV. I cannot think of a single way I would improve the look of this one, aside from one or two funky-looking shots of Batman. 

One of the few funky shots of Batman...

...but they’re made up for by how awesome some of the other shots are.

The closest to a perfect episode (animation-wise) you’re gonna get. Period. Char (again, my watching-buddy, and DCAU-virgin) pointed out the animation for when Batman and Grey Ghost are hauling ass away from the exploding remote-controlled cars too. Very dynamic angles were used that only studios like Spectrum and TMS could have pulled off.

If Akom worked on this scene, it would have been such a disaster. Speaking of Akom, now I’m thinking of their version of an explosion/fire vs Spectrum’s. Just for funzies, let us compare shall we?

From The Cat and the Claw (Part 2).

These next few are from Beware the Gray Ghost.

The difference is quite clear. One makes you jump out of your seat in awe. The other makes you jump out of your seat because you’re about to upchuck your breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

When I mentioned earlier something about this episode never straying into parody-territory, well, it does not necessarily look back at the genre/Batman show and play it completely seriously either. They walked a thin line between both and decided to put Bruce Wayne into a setting that we can all relate to; sitting in front of the tv, watching your favorite show before bed.

The Gray Ghost in this story isn’t an old, retired superhero, or a superhero turned villain. He’s an actor, and one that played in a somewhat dated, silly “superhero” drama. This immediately adds a sense of seriousness and realness to it while also managing to not let the cornier aspects go. Both worlds exist in this episode. The whacky Gray Ghost show, and the noir, gothic world of Batman the Animated Series. They don’t necessarily have to merge in a typical way and clash tones, because they are able to reference and display the Gray Ghost show as fictional. The way it’s used makes it all relatable, and it gives us a look at what influenced the dark knight, along with a borderline-tragic story about the downsides of fame and being known for one thing and one thing only. Batman may seem super-powered to the many thugs that he battles in the alleyways, but he is a human just like you and I, one that did have a childhood at one point. Even if that childhood was tragically ended with a few bullets. Batman feeling the level of nostalgia that he feels in the episode is so god damn adorable, and it’s another moment, much like The Cat and the Claw, where we see him being Bruce Wayne, not Batman, but also somehow being himself. It's that middle ground between the brooding, shadowy figure and the rich, chillax playboy.

A smile we rarely get to see.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me!” Bruce acknowledges the cheesiness of the explosion causes.

While Batman is enjoying his childhood tv show, at one point almost seeming to forget why he’s watching it in the first place, we see Alfred subtly bringing that memory to life even more. Batman may no longer have a father, but Alfred is the closest thing he could ever hope for. TV superheroes clearly are not Alfred’s thing. He even mentions that fact when he says he prefers his fireplace to a black and white screen. But that’s not the point. The point is that Bruce is being transported back to feeling the warmth and protection of a father figure, while throwing out all of his worries for a bit and feeling a sense of thrill and enjoyment. Alfred seems to understand this. He knows Bruce more than anyone else could. Almost all of the flashbacks we see in this show are sad ones. And that gives the ones like this so much more power.

Alright, now, for those of you who don’t know (like all two of you), this episode has the very special guest star, Adam West. To me, this elevates the episode immensely, and strengthens the central themes and thesis tenfold. We go from a story about an actor being kind of a one-trick pony to the same story being told by someone who lived it. We go from a story where Batman gets to meet his idol to that same story featuring that very idol. And not just an idol to Batman, but an idol to many kids and adults who were around when Batman was still airing. Even those who went back and watched it later! Hell, when I was 5 or 6, I watched the shit out of Batman: The Movie, and I’m only 23. And y’know, we have things like Catman in The Fairly Oddparents, and the Fearless Ferret episode of Kim Possible. I’m not knocking on those, but damn, Adam West had to get tired of Batman goofs at some point. In fact, the team behind Batman the Animated Series was a little bit nervous that he wouldn’t wanna participate. But I’d be willing to bet that this episode made him feel good.

The Gray Ghost kinda reminds me of Arthur from The Tick. Great shot here, by the way.

The Gray Ghost is posed in the same way as Batman in the end credits. Such a cool detail that I actually missed my first time watching.

I love that despite wanting to stay far away from 60’s Batman vibes, the team wasn’t ready to dismiss it as bogus. And I get the sense that maybe Batman’s reverence in this episode is not only representative of all the Batman fans’, but also that of the crew behind Batman the Animated Series. They wanted Adam West to feel welcomed, and like the show wouldn’t exist without him (because it likely wouldn’t). So honestly, hats off to them. To further show a lack of satire, it wouldn’t surprise me if that is why Bruce Timm’s voice and image was used for the main villain.

Bruce Timm’s voice acting wasn’t the best, and I’d be willing to bet that he hated doing it, hahaha. Still a really fun nutjob of a character.

I’ll relate it to the episode of The Nostalgia Critic where he squares up against Mara Wilson. Mara Wilson, in real life, saw a Nostalgia Critic video about one of her films, and was kinda offended by it. But through a series of events, she and Doug Walker (the main creator and actor of NC) ended up cool, and he even put her in one of his videos! To make it even better, he actually had her play the antagonist, or probably more accurately, the protagonist. She basically ended up embarrassing and getting even with the Critic character in the episode. It’s still one of Doug’s favorite episodes to this day, and I have a feeling that he set the plot up like this to show her that he actually respects her quite a bit, and to soften the blow of the shit he’s thrown her way over the years. The team behind Batman the Animated Series may have done a similar thing in making Adam West’s character, along with Kevin’s Batman, defeat Bruce Timm’s character together, and if that’s the case, I love it. Not only does Adam West get the admiration of their version of Batman, but he also gets to help Bruce Timm’s character get his comeuppance. And then, of course, West’s character gets the attention he deserves at the end.

I know this is a video release, but it looks a lot like a thicker Blu Ray case. Kinda like, well, the Blu Ray release of Batman TAS!

Oh wow, never noticed this foreshadowing either. Matt Hagen will be a name that we’ll see pop up in a couple of episodes.

Garin Wolf, Tom Ruegger, and Dennis O’Flaherty obviously treaded carefully, but likely without even thinking about it. Because it is so genuine-seeming and charming. And honestly, thank you, Adam West, for being such a great sport throughout all the time you were alive. I wish there could have been another official DCAU tribute after his death, but this being the one thing we got should be more than great enough for any Batman or comic book fan out there.

This dude was pretty obviously voiced by Alfred’s voice actor. Times when having a voice with so much character takes me out of the show!

A look at some of the Gray Ghost episodes. I’d kill for a Gray Ghost animated series, following what we have shown here.

Wow, that Batmobile is awfully close to the ground.

Just a nice still. Boy does he ever look like a classic pulp costumed crimefighter. They nailed his design. 

A picture of Bruce Timm after he saw the finished product of I’ve Got Batman In My Basement.

Before I go, I’d like to, yes, mention the Blu Ray copy of the show I just received! So far, I’m mixed on it. While the visual and audio quality is mostly superior, there are a few moments of a shot being too bright or whatever. Also, I don’t know, I think that the dirtiness is part of what made the original show look so charming, and it was truly meant to be seen on the technology that was around at the time. Everything is so crisp now, and it just doesn’t look as old as it once did. On the other hand…they got rid of the spot above Batman’s lip during the theme song! Hot damn! That makes it about 10x easier to sleep at night… From what I understand, there are also some new special features and such that I can’t wait to view. All of the old ones are there too, which brings me to the pilot, The Dark Knight’s First Night. I was really, really, really hoping that they would bring in the original sound for it. On the volume 1 DVD, I was always kinda weirded out that it said the original music and sounds were lost. I mean, as far as the music goes…it’s just music from the 1989 Batman film, how hard can that be to get ahold of..? Hell, one of the versions on Youtube has the original music and sounds, so what gives? Could it be a copyright issue or something? I don’t know, but this same problem exists on the Blu Ray release too. Kind of a shame. Oh, but wait, as a plus, this complete series doesn’t just include every episode, but it also comes with Mask of the Phantasm and Subzero! I hate when complete series box sets don’t come with the movies that are just as much part of the series. This is an incredibly consistent problem across basically every tv show ever, and I get why it’s a thing, but it still annoys me. This problem doesn’t exist with Batman the Animated Series any longer. Well. Kinda. Mystery of the Batwoman is strangely…not included? I know that this one was technically released much later, and I also remember it sucking, but it’s still a part of the show! Why not include it? Personally, if I were in charge, I also would have thrown in Batman and Harley Quinn too, but believe me, I wasn’t banking on that one. I can forgive its absence. Overall, though, I’m super happy to own this, and even though I’ve seen all of Batman the Animated Series already, this gives me something new to enjoy with it. Also, even though it’s not a perfect release, I think I still consider it a step up over watching the show on DVD. At least, if we’re talking flat screen TVs (watching the entire show on VHS would be awesome, honestly). I give the Blu Ray release a B. Maybe a low A.

Char’s grade: A Fire count: 9

Next time: Prophecy of Doom Full episode list here!

[helenofsimblr]

I have a LOT of catching up to do!

I was tagged to do the 57 facts thing by @fayts4 @tabbyrhsims4simblr and @midnightdevotions I think I got everybody if not you’ll have to forgive me my shoddy memory. But I have so many blogs to catch up on I am ready to cry!

1. Simblr is a secret thing for me, only my husband knows about it. Its my own guilty pleasure.

2. I recently became a parent and I am very much planning to have at least 1 more while there is still time!

3. I have done a lot of work on some really amazing stuff, none of which I can ever talk about due to secrecy agreements. 

4. I have a PhD in mathematics, so that proves I am super boring.

5. I tried my first cigarette at age 11, but didn’t touch it again till age 26 which was when I took it up, I would smoke anything from 0 to 10 cigs a day depending on the day I had. I quit cigs this year aged 32 in January. So hopefully didn’t do myself too much damage.

6. At age 29 I started smoking cigars on special occasions those are: my birthday, Christmas, New year, Valentines, and my wedding anniversary. Being the “badass” I am, I inhale every 5th drag for a little extra kick, even though you shouldn’t do that... I have not quit the cigars!

7. I have a younger brother and an older sister, I am the middle sibling.

8. I have only ever had 3 boyfriends in my life. And 1 “fancy man.”

9. I was engaged to be married to my second boyfriend, I basically twisted his arm into it because of my condition I was afraid I’d be some old woman called Ms instead of Mrs, he did not want to be married, not to me anyway. I should have realised that back then...

10. While I was engaged to boyfriend number 2 I had an affair which lasted about 8 months, it was with a colleague at work, and it was amazing! I don’t condone cheating, not in the least, but I realise, the sensible thing to do would have been to call off the engagement. 

11. I had giganstism (Acromegaly) as a child, I am 6 foot 7 inches tall bare foot. I do not like being this tall... not one bit. There are so many health issues that come with this, that it really isn’t worth it.

12. When I stopped growing, Acromegaly causes your face and hands and feet to carry on growing... I have size 14 feet. UK size. My hands are large enough that I can grip 4 tennis balls in one hand easily. 

13. I have no tattoos. I have never ever wanted a tattoo. I don’t actually like them very much.

14. I don’t have any piercings anywhere else beside my ears. I have 2 piercings in each ear.

15. I am a huge petrol head. I love cars and I will happily have a discussion with any man about them, or woman if she is so inclined!

16. Due to the facial changes caused by Acromegaly I decided to go and get cosmetic surgery in late 2017 to change my face back to a more softer look.

17. I love Star Trek. Captain Kirk is my favourite captain, he is the best. No discussion. If it wasn’t for Kirk there would be no Picard, no Sisko, no Janeway. None of those pretenders would be here!

18. I think Quentin Tarrantino and his films are vastly overrated and often incomprehensible and worst yet, non linear. 

19. I really dislike the taste of alcohol. The only drinks I get on well with are Guiness and Gin and tonics. Most others I don’t like. I hate wine.

20. I hated that stupid Pokemon Go craze!! The amount of people who walked into me in the street... That shit was dangerous.

21. My hair used to be naturally blonde, but in recent years its started to get darker, which is why I now use colouring to keep it where it was.

22. I should wear glasses to read, but I don’t bother.

23. While preggers I had gestational diabetes. Which was not fun at all.

24. I love swimming, but I hate the sea because I am afraid of whats in it. Sharks, jellyfish, all sorts of wonderful, yet horrid creatures designed to kill and maim!

25. When I was doing my PhD, somebody on my research team literally took about 80% of my thesis content and used it in their thesis. I had  no time to appeal or go through proper channels as I already had a job lined up, and was due to have my pituitary tumor removed, therefore, my only option was to redo 80% of my thesis. 

26. I am not religious (at least not in any organised way), however, I find the theory of how the universe came into being utterly laughable. A big bang... seriously?? If before the universe, there was nothing, where did the shit that exploded come from? Its bullshit. Truth is, nobody knows for sure, but we’re so desperate to know that scientists will happily invent theories to fit what few facts they have.

27. Despite not being religious, I firmly believe in existence after death. I say existence, not life, there is a difference. I have seen what would be colloquially referred to as a “ghost” when I was 13 years old.

28. I love the old pulp sci fi, things like Lost in Space, and voyage to the bottom of the sea

29. My favourite foods are pizzas. I cannot get enough of them! In particular just bog standard pepperoni

30. I suck at sports. Any sport, and I suck at it.

31. I often worry about things so much I lose my perspective, I cannot help but worry and it usually leads to a cascade of worry and I may make poor decisions. 

32. I am part German. I can speak German, to a fashion... its not very good as I rarely use it.

33. I have regular chiropractic care and I have to say its worth every penny. I feel better physically now than I have in years! As a bonus, the IBS I suffered with, since I have been seeing my chiropractor has actually cleared up! 

34. I am currently trying to complete something on my bucket list, I am attempting to watch EVERY John Wayne film.

35. I hated Star Wars the Last Jedi. Shit film!

36. I have a cuddly toy from I was a baby which I still have! (I don’t sleep with it of course)

37. I love inappropriate/dirty jokes.

38. I am, somewhat, anti-abortion. I understand there is a time and a place for everything however, but given birth control and access to morning after pills... 

39. I am not political, I loathe politicians. None of them have a clue what it is like to be in the real world. Also... why do we have Ministers of health who have never been a nurse or doctor? And so forth... doesn’t make sense!

40. I have been married 3 years now. 

41. I cannot bend over and touch my toes.

42. I recently took a woman to court and won! After she keyed (Scratched the car with a key) my Range Rover from bumper to bumper in the supermarket. 

43. I hate shopping. I find it so tedious and inconvenient. I honestly do not understand how other females can find this a pleasurable activity!

44. I have never tried any illegal drugs in my life.

45. Apparently I was late performing all my children milestones. Walking, talking and potty training. I took months longer than my siblings did.

46. I find it really hard to go to the toilet in a public toilet. It disturbs me.

47. I hate it when people tell me “You’re late.” As though I have no concept or track of time. I usually reply with “I was quite aware before you pointed it out.” I never apologise for being late, unless I know that my being late was definitely my fault.

48. I am often amused by simblr. Especially at all these “dramas” that pop up round here. Particularly over custom content and how it should never be uploaded by anybody but the creator or changed or whatever... did I mention how somebody took 80% of my PhD thesis and used it in their work? Oh yes. Point number 25.

49. If I go for ice cream, doesn’t matter where it is, I will always go for vanilla.

50. White chocolate is my favourite chocolate of all. So sweet and creamy...

51. I am allergic to penicillin.

52. I love superhero films. Particularly the Marvel ones. I think Marvel do better films than DC but DC do better animated films / television than Marvel do.

53. I think Nolan’s batman trilogy is overrated speaking of superhero films.

54. Speaking of films, only once ever have I walked out of the cinema. I remember I went to see Mr and Mrs Smith, and half way through I walked out. Have never seen the end of that film since.

55. My favourite Junk Food is bacon double cheeseburgers! 

56. Due to having acromegaly... every year... without fail... I have to go and get a camera up my ass! Yeah its great being tall(!)

57. I HATE pears. I mean hate them! I hate the texture of them in my mouth, I hate the feel of their skin, I hate EVERYTHING about pears. Even sat here typing this I get goosebumps. If I was trapped on a desert island where all there was to eat was Pears. I would starve to death!

I tag, @themoonglitch @rebelsoulsims @igglemouse and @flowers--girl  and @sparkiemonkey and @alittledaylight do this EPIC tag. If you think you can’t. or done it, or don’t want to cool. 

[graphicpolicy]

Review: Detective Comics #983

Detective Comics #983 places the Dark Knight on the defensive and challenges his preconceptions and reliance on young people to assist in his war on crime #comics

Beginning with a nod to the zeitgeist where “YouTubers” have supplanted television, film, sports, and music stars as the idols of youth culture, Bryan Hill lays out his thesis for his Detective Comics storyline and with artists Miguel Mendonca and Diana Egea and colorist Adriano Lucas adds explosions and obstacles to the team-up between Batman and seasoned principal, yet up and coming superhero…

[thegroovethief]

#TGTfeature 014: Black Market [High Noon Audio: Nashville, Tennessee, USA] Diving deeply into the classics in a uniquely dubwise fashion, following African reggae star Rocky Dawuni, here comes #TGTfeature 014 with the prolific Black Market, known for his reinterpretations of musical icons as well as iconic movie and television soundtracks. This and forthcoming #TGTfeature articles will highlight dedicated musical talents by featuring their recent work as well as an in-depth interview. Thanks for your patience dear readers, 2020 has been a delight… Black Market’s latest project, a spookily delightful re-approach to the film Phantasm, enjoyed a timely October release; prior releases range from Bowie to Batman, and from Talking Heads to The Twilight Zone. Aside from his most recent engagement, building the High Noon Audio studio, the discussion covered his raison d'être, a range of releases, favorite gear, and much more. A bit about Black Market: - A skilled sonic culturalist, he’s taken on 20+ remix projects with an astounding level of quality - Known for his era-defying dub-fueled “collaborations,” there’s truly an entry point for all listeners in this ongoing re-imagining of the collective musical past - Opening High Noon Audio studio (in Nashville, Tennessee, USA), aimed at supporting artists with a DIY aesthetic

The Beach Boys - Endless Dub by Black Market

TGT: How do you define your musical role on your “commercial” releases? Remixer, reinterpeter, rearranger…? BM: When wearing my ‘Black Market’ hat, I definitely see myself as a remixer/producer, but the more I think about it the more I think any of those adjectives could easily describe what I do. I try and imagine Bowie or The Clash approaching me saying, ‘Hey, we want to make a reggae album. What do we need to do?’ and from that point all the musical reggae decisions I make are filtered through that mindset. How would Bowie play a reggae bass line? How would Brian Wilson turn “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” into a reggae arrangement? TGT: You propose an intriguing thesis: “What would happen if The Beach Boys had The Wailers as their backing band instead of The Wrecking Crew? What if David Bowie spent the summer of 1975 in Kingston, Jamaica with King Tubby instead of Philadelphia? Michael Jackson meets Scratch Perry?” What is your motivation to approach such legendary artists, and how do you handle the technical side of this, especially when there’s no a cappella available? BM: Initially, I knew I was motivated purely by my love for Bowie and my desire to pay tribute to his music. It was only after releasing Bowie In Dub that I realized that this would be a great way to build a following as well. Who cares about Joe Schmoe’s new EP? Now, Ziggy Stardust dubbed into outer space? That’s a whole different story for most people. Even if they hate it, the curiosity is too much for a lot of fans. My hope has always been to use these remix projects as a springboard for my own music. I don’t think I’m quite ready to branch out into original material just yet, but I can see it on the horizon.

Bowie in Dub by Black Market

TGT: I initially discovered you via your sci-fi projects, The Twilight Zone and Stranger Things specifically. You’ve also taken on The Outer Limits and most recently Phantasm. Phantas is fantastic! What attracts you to these spooky source materials, and what connects them to your dub-infused sound? BM: I am a gigantic sci-fi/horror nerd. I love horror movies so much, and many of them have such fantastic scores. A simple melody from a horror movie theme is sometimes all you need to go off of for a good dub track. Tackling stuff like that is also just a good way to break up the releases a bit, and to have a bit more fun with everything. When I’m remixing a major artist, I find myself being very focused on it because I really don’t want people to outright hate it. Horror fans are much more forgiving, and it gives me plenty of room to experiment with things and get weird with my music.

Phantasm by Black Market // Chudan

TGT: There’s always been a cheeky edge to your releases, despite their top-shelf production and cultural relevance. Given your prolific nature (25+ releases since 2015), which ones are you most proud of? BM: I release every EP with the assumption that it will either make people angry or they’ll just hate it. Luckily for me, that is usually never the case, but for that reason, I have to just be ready to laugh off whatever the reaction is to my releases. I try to do as good a job as possible, while at the same time not taking it so seriously that it isn’t fun. Black Market is a blast. If I had to pick a few favorites I would say Remain In Dub, The Outer Limits, Thin White Dub, and The Next Dub. Honestly, there are just too many at this point, I would like to think you could pick any one of them and get a good idea of what Black Market is all about. TGT: You’ve been hard at work on a new studio, High Noon Audio. What’s the process been behind creating that, what services do you aim to provide, and why’d you feel that was the right move now given all your other musical projects? BM: High Noon Audio is for musicians like me that make music on a shoestring budget, but want it to sound fantastic. It’s expensive to get studio time, and if you want your music mixed with outboard gear, or on an analog console, I would say 90% of musicians I know are priced out of that. I want to provide an affordable option for bands and artists who are DIY at heart and need someone in their corner to give their music the best chance possible to break through. Building High Noon Audio has been a crazy undertaking. I’ve always had outside mixing clients, but I’ve never had a reliable way for them to contact me or to see how much I’d charge. About a year ago I decided to start the process of giving my entire studio a rebuild from the ground up, which involved buying a console and tons of other analog gear. From there I contacted a friend of mine, Colin O’Shaughnessy Tucker, who does graphic design to help out with the look of the website and logo and I think he did a fantastic job. High Noon is just me, but someday I see it becoming a full studio with a tracking space and maybe another engineer. I’m dreaming big!

TGT: Any gear you’re particularly enamored with right now? How have you been using it, and is there a track or two where it’s prominently featured? BM: Yes! On the plugin side of things, the Magic Death Eye bundle by DDMF is incredible. Magic Death Eye is a compressor built by Ian Sefchick, who is better known as a lacquer cutting and mastering engineer at Capitol Studios in Hollywood. I got to know Ian a bit while I was working there and got to hear the real Magic Death Eyes in person, and they are incredible compressors. The plugin recreation by DDMF is a must-own. Ian makes all of his compressors himself (even hand-winding the transformers), so they routinely go for anywhere between $5,000-$10,000. The plugin does an incredible job of emulating the real thing, and I literally use it on more tracks than I can keep track of every time I start a new mix. As for analog gear, I recently purchased the legendary API 2500 Stereo Bus Compressor. It’s hard for me to add anything to what has already been said about this compressor. It’s a huge punchy sound that is perfect for a drum bus or a main mix bus. Crucial gear. TGT: It seems you are a strong proponent of the Patreon platform. How has your experience with that been so far, and what are the pros and cons of connecting with fans this way, given how decentralized musical access is online? BM: Patreon has been fantastic so far. It’s truly difficult to build (and keep) any kind of following doing what I do. Many of the more successful Patreon accounts pump out video or podcast content on a weekly basis, if not more often. I’m asking my Patrons to subscribe for something they will get once a month, and oftentimes I take breaks during the winter to recharge and plan for the year ahead like I am doing now. The cool thing is that the people who do sign up are usually genuine fans who like to engage with what I’m making and understand that they are supporting an independent artist. I’m so grateful for everyone who has signed up and I can honestly say that they all directly helped me create my new studio and workspace. Black Market and High Noon Audio are set to do amazing things in the coming year and much of that is due to my Patrons and supporters.

[daleisgreat]

Last Action Hero

Today’s entry will result in one of the quickest turnaround times of an older movie in my backlog box yet. A couple weeks ago I noticed Uproxx posted an article on how 1993’s Last Action Hero (trailer) was way ahead of its time (click or press here for the Uproxx piece). Once I noticed this story I tracked down a BluRay copy of it off Amazon and promptly watched it within 24 hours of its delivery. I did not read the Uproxx entry yet, but I will after I finish proofing this entry to prevent it from altering my current thoughts I am about to deliver and will post a little addendum at the end of this look back at Last Action Hero for some extra insight on how my take compares with Uproxx’s. I cannot remember how many times I watched Last Action Hero as a kid, but my gut tells me it may be near the double digits. Our family had the HBO and Starz movie channels as part of our cable package back then, and the way those channels primarily were programmed back then was a specific amount of newer and older movies were highlighted each month, and they would play each movie once every day or two to the best of my recollection. I remember being stoked for Last Action Hero. The turnaround time on movies from the theater back then in the early 90s was it would take about five to six months after the cinema release for a film to hit Pay-Per-View and home video. Several months later, or roughly a year after release it would hit the premium cable movie channels like HBO, Starz and Cinemax in their original form. Another year or two after that it would be available for local and basic cable channels, but usually in an edited and censored/FCC friendly format. Our family could only afford trips to the theater and video rentals so many times a year, so if we missed a movie in either of those formats and it wound up on HBO/Starz it was kind of a guilty pleasure in my childhood boredom days to pick an anticipated movie like Last Action Hero and watch it as many times as possible the first month it was available.

I have not seen it since then however when I was 11 and have not thought much about it since LAH is not as highly regarded as other Arnold Schwarzenegger classics even though it hit at the tail end of Arnold’s prime (which I consider to be from 1984’s original Terminator through 1994’s True Lies). When it hit theaters in 1993 I remember a ton of hype for it getting ubiquitous advertising and the requisite hot-summer-movie-licensed videogame and pinball table. The pinball table is part of the many licensed tables included in Pinball Arcade on PS4 which I also played a few rounds of before diving into the movie. In 1993 Arnold was the big name action star fresh off his Terminator 2 success. He also dabbled in the occasional comedy like Kindergarten Cop and Jingle All the Way. LAH marked Arnold’s first action comedy however. Schwarzenegger portrays big name action movie star ‘Jack Slater.’ Danny (Austin O’Brien) is Slater’s #1 fan on top of being a middle school film guru where he routinely cuts class to catch flicks at the local cinema where he is best friends with the old-timer projectionist there, Nick (Robert Prosky). Daniel is promised by Nick an after-hours exclusive showing of the wildly anticipated Jack Slater IV. To celebrate the special showing, Nick gives Danny a special ‘magical’ movie ticket that Nick states he got from legendary magician Houdini himself as a kid, but was too afraid to use it. Through cinema magic, the ticket activates and Danny is warped into the movie world of Jack Slater IV as his new reality when he winds up magically transported into the backseat of Slater’s ride in the middle of a cliché action movie car chase.

Danny is thrilled being immersed in an action movie world filled with the clichés and tropes of the genre that he gleefully points out and references past film lore to help Jack track down his latest bad guy. Slater has none of it and takes in Danny in for questioning. Slater’s over-the-top-gruffy captain, Dekker (Frank McRae) is impressed with Danny’s knowledge and makes him Slater’s new partner. Slater begrudgingly works together with Danny to track down Slater’s current most wanted baddie, Benedict (Charles Dance). The film unravels from there in a world jam-packed with the aforementioned clichés that Danny constantly breaks the fourth wall by showing off his action movie fandom by pointing out how all the women in this universe are hyper-sexualized, indulging Slater’s gratuitous one-liners, how Slater instantly pops up from battles unscathed and how the bad guy stereotypically monologues too long to give Slater a chance to make the heroic comeback. 11 year-old-Dale was the perfect target age for LAH when I first saw it in 1994. I experienced the filmed vicariously through Danny and I was right there with Danny for how wicked it would be to magically transport alongside your movie hero in his latest summer blockbuster and helping him bust bad guys and be in the middle of an extravagant chase scenes overstuffed with special effects. I think a big part of me held off forever re-watching this again because I dismissed LAH as a satire film over the years that I loved as a kid, but thought I thought I would outgrow over the years. After my recent re-watch however, I emerged surprised how wrong I was. Seeing it with a grown-up’s set of eyes significantly helped with a new understanding of filmmaking references and other off-color jokes that went right over my childhood head. I also got a whole new appreciation of the scene where Danny takes Slater to a video store in his universe to show him how awesome he is in Terminator 2 only to instead see in that world Sylvester Stallone landed the role.

Speaking of guest stars, the cameos are through the roof in LAH. There are some blink and you miss it surprise cameos, and then there are exponentially more in the final act where Danny takes Slater back into the ‘real’ world in time for the red carpet movie premiere of Jack Slater IV. The premiere sees the likes of Little Richard, MC Hammer, Jean Claude Van Damme and a few other recognizable celebrities of that era. Back in 1994 I was probably only lucky enough to recognize Van Damme from his role as Guile in the underappreciated Street Fighter, but reliving it again with a new set of eyes made that scene pop in a whole new way. Needless to say, Last Action Hero was a surprise delight to experience in 2020. If I had any nitpicks it is that it was not as brisk a watch as I recalled as it clocks in a little over two hours and I came out of it feeling they could have trimmed at least a good 10 minutes or so off. For as big a deal LAH was when it hit in 1993 it was a bit of a buzzkill to see the no-frills BluRay have a complete lack of extras. I would have loved all-star action movie director John McTiernan (Predator, the good Die Hard films) do a commentary track with Arnold and a few other bonus extras, but it regrettably was not meant to be. At least I have this Uproxx take I can now peruse that will have to suffice for a bonus of some degree…..

Alrighty, I just finished the Uproxx 27 years later take on LAH and we share a lot of similarities. Uproxx’s Mike Ryan thesis is that LAH was too meta and ahead of its time in 1993, but perfect for a 2020 viewing experience. I could not agree with him more, and he grinds out the little references and meta-details more eloquently than I can here, so I highly urge you all to give his editorial a perusal. One key takeaway from Ryan’s article on why Last Action Hero came and went back then was because it made the big time mistake of releasing one week after Jurassic Park. No wonder it is not brought up with other classic Arnold films over the years. I am right there with Ryan on how LAH is an absolute marvel of a film, and if it has slipped by you all these years later then now is the perfect time to watch it in these pandemic times with zero movies hitting theaters nowadays. 1993’s Last Action Hero is the ideal 2020 summer blockbuster! BONUS EXTRAS TO COMPENSATE FOR BLURAY’S ABSENCE OF ANY Click or press here to check out this awesomely through ‘Did You Know’ style breakdown of facts and backstage filming secrects from Mental Floss Here is an incredibly thorough two part oral history of LAH complete with interview excerpts from the cast and crew And I will leave you with Cinemassacre’s ‘Rental Review’ roundtable of Last Action Hero….

Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs 3 12 Angry Men (1957) 12 Rounds 3: Lockdown 21 Jump Street The Accountant Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie Atari: Game Over The Avengers: Age of Ultron The Avengers: Infinity War Batman: The Dark Knight Rises Batman: The Killing Joke Batman: Mask of the Phantasm Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice Bounty Hunters Cabin in the Woods Captain America: Civil War Captain America: The First Avenger Captain America: The Winter Soldier Christmas Eve Clash of the Titans (1981) Clint Eastwood 11-pack Special The Condemned 2 Countdown Creed I & II Deck the Halls Detroit Rock City Die Hard Dredd The Eliminators The Equalizer Dirty Work Faster Fast and Furious I-VIII Field of Dreams Fight Club The Fighter For Love of the Game Good Will Hunting Gravity Grunt: The Wrestling Movie Guardians of the Galaxy Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 Hell Comes to Frogtown Hercules: Reborn Hitman I Like to Hurt People Indiana Jones 1-4 Ink The Interrogation Interstellar Jay and Silent Bob Reboot Jobs Joy Ride 1-3 Major League Man of Steel Man on the Moon Man vs Snake Marine 3-6 Merry Friggin Christmas Metallica: Some Kind of Monster Mortal Kombat Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpions Revenge National Treasure National Treasure: Book of Secrets Not for Resale Pulp Fiction The Replacements Reservoir Dogs Rocky I-VIII Running Films Part 1 Running Films Part 2 San Andreas ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery The Secret Life of Walter Mitty Shoot em Up Slacker Skyscraper Small Town Santa Steve Jobs Source Code Star Trek I-XIII Sully Take Me Home Tonight TMNT The Tooth Fairy 1 & 2 UHF Veronica Mars Vision Quest The War Wild Wonder Woman The Wrestler (2008) X-Men: Apocalypse X-Men: Days of Future Past

[aion-rsa]

The Batman Who Laughs and the Culmination of 10 Years of Dark Knight Stories

http://bit.ly/2MWsAEq

Scott Snyder takes us inside the dark weirdness of The Batman Who Laughs

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Want to feel old? Scott Snyder’s breakout Batman story, “The Black Mirror,” was released almost 10 years ago. He was a rising star when he got the gig on Detective Comics, and that book led to him being handed the reins on the New 52 relaunch of Batman and turned him into the character’s defining voice of the era. Snyder's time with Greg Capullo on Batman helped him redefine Bruce Wayne’s world, landed him the multiverse-reshaping Dark Nights: Metal gig and eventually saw him get to steer the entire ship of the DC Universe in the pages of Justice League.

And while he’s busy building new multiverses and starting a war across time between the Justice League and the Legion of Doom in one book, he’s also penning a culmination of sorts to his Batman stories. The Batman Who Laughs started life as a Jokerized Bruce Wayne from the Dark Multiverse, in one of the most exceptionally messed up spinoff comics from the entire Dark Nights: Metal crossover. His migration to the main DCU gave Snyder a chance to reunite with his "Black Mirror" and Wytches art partner, Jock, and to launch a new top tier DC supervillain out into the world for other people to play with. We had the chance to talk to Snyder about The Batman Who Laughs, where it fits into his broader Batman story, what he’s seeding for Joshua Williamson and David Marquez in Batman/Superman, and what other Justice groups are coming to Justice League.

Please note: this interview has been lightly edited for clarity. Spoilers for Snyder’s entire Bat-ouevre are also contained within.

Den of Geek: What changed in your approach to these characters or how you craft a story that turns the output from the cerebral, meticulously tight Batman to the bonkers anything goes Metal/Justice League/Batman Who Laughs? Because this is wild.

Scott Snyder: You know, Batman Who Laughs is an interesting one for me because it's the closest thing I've done in a while to my early stuff, where it has a lot more needlepoint, dark, psychological character work and it's paced out differently. It's more grounded and, it sounds silly, because it also has this element of cosmic, bonkers horror, where different versions of Bruce Wayne are being brought here through these portals into the Dark Multiverse. The thing I love about the series is that it's a synthesizing of all the different things I've learned to do in superhero comics, and love doing.

read more: Everything You Need to Know About The Batman Solo Movie

I started on “Black Mirror” in Detective Comics and I always thought that that was going to be my lane to drive in. I never expected to do cosmic stuff. I never thought I'd get much of a chance, even in Batman, I thought I'd be more of a kind of crime, horror writer on the side.

Really what happened was that the opportunities opened. At first things that were within my comfort zone, Swamp Thing and then Batman, and other opportunities came along, like Superman. And then eventually, Metal and Justice League. What really happened was I just went back to the comics that I read growing up and I realized that so much of the stuff that had made me want to write wasn't the stuff that I had...wasn't just the kind of stuff that I think I started to gravitate towards fully in my own writing.

It was Infinity Gauntlet...and it was Silver Surfer and Galactus and Secret Wars and Crisis on Infinite Earths. These huge, soap operatic, majestic, Kirby-esque epics. So, I just became more and more attracted to the idea of getting to do those. And so when the chance came along to do Metal, and it was a story that was sort of a culmination of so much that Greg [Capullo, Snyder’s long time collaborator on Batman] and I had built. I felt we had to give it a shot, and so it involved Justice League.

The bottom line, honestly, if there's any kind of thesis to it for me, it's just I would feel really disappointed in myself if I just kept doing the thing that I loved doing at first or played it safe. I'm familiar enough at this point with kind of hard boiled crime or horror Batman that I could do it in perpetuity or at least for a very long time. And there are a lot of stories that I wanted to do, I didn't get to do, about Scarecrow and other characters.

read more - Inside the Sheer Insanity of Batman: Last Knight on Earth

For me, I think the key is to try and continue to follow in the path of the writers that I admire the most, who I probably will never compete with or people that constantly evolve and grow and change and push themselves. So, if you're not exciting to yourself as a writer and you're not pushing yourself to do things you didn't think you could do, then I don't see what the point is. I think Batman Who Laughs is almost the perfect kind of coming home, because it involves a lot of elements and a lot of ideas and a lot of aesthetics from my very earliest work at DC. It hopefully also displays this different level of confidence and maturity.

There's obviously a ton of Batman and a lot of Metal in there, but there's also James Gordon, Jr, there's Gates of Gotham stuff in there that I didn't expect to come back and it's really neat to see that it's a synthesis of the styles and all this continuity that you've built up over the years. And, speaking of synthesis, Jock is next level in this. He's wonderful, but he's playful in a way.

He is! He was one of the first artists to ever take the chance on me. [By] “Black Mirror,” he was already a big star. He had done Losers, and he had done a ton of movie stuff and he had done all these award-winning covers for Scalped. I mean, he had done Faker, all kinds of stuff and he had a big career in concept art, in film. I knew he was a person I wanted to work with on “Black Mirror” and I actually paid my own way to San Diego Comic-Con just to meet him, to be like, “Okay, will you please, please work with me on Detective Comics?” And he didn't know me from anyone, and we just went out and had a beer. And my whole mission in San Diego that year was just to try and win him over.

I remember just drinking with him, and he's much bigger than me, and taking beer after beer, seeing if I quit. I was worried he would think I'm a wimp and I'm not Batman ready yet, which is stupid because he would have been fine anyway. Raphael [Albuquerque] and I were both new when we did American Vampire, and so [Jock] was the first superstar to take a chance on me. We've become friends, we've known each other now ten years plus and he's watched my kids grown up, I've watched his kids grow up. Our wives are friendly.

read more: The Actors Who Have Played Batman

To get to work with him on a project like this, there's just a shorthand. We did Wytches together as well, we've done indie stuff, we've done superhero stuff. It's a pleasure because when you work with somebody who you know understands what you're going for and will give you more than you ask for, will elevate it and do something that inspires you, it's better than you ever expected. It frees you up.

I was trying to explain this when I was talking about Greg on Last Knight on Earth also. I feel like right now I get to work with these people, Jorge Jimenez, Jim Cheung [both artists on Justice League], and of course Greg. We're all friends and I know them and they see what I'm going for and they're like "you write the words, we just respond to it." When I picture what Jock can do on the page with Batman Who Laughs or what Greg is going to do on the page with Last Knight, it inspires new ideas and new creations.

I wouldn't think of the Batman Who Laughs as a character if not for these artists. I get excited by what I think the possibilities are under their pen, and therefore, I can think of the idea. I keep trying to tell them, without inflating their confidence too much, so that they don't think that they need me at all, that they're much more responsible for the genesis of a lot of these story ideas, too than they think they are.

Is that a difference from when you first started working with them? You mentioned you've been working with Jock for ten years across multiple different companies, very dramatically different stories. You had a monster run with Greg Capullo, and Last Knight on Earth is kind of the culmination of that. Is that different now because you have their art in your head when you're coming up with the stories? Is their work flow different?

Yeah, it's totally different. And when I say that it's to their credit. When I started, I was really strict with myself because I was so insecure about writing full scripts, handing it to an artist and hoping they understood what I was going for. What I learned quickly with Greg and with Jock, while we were working...but with Greg especially on Batman, because he really...Jock likes to work from full script and Greg doesn't. Greg really taught me, and Jock afterwards as well, that you adapt to the artist. The fun is writing a script that inspires them and that means bending your style so that you lean in to certain areas of fluidity.

Read more: Why Batman Still Matters 80 Years Later

For example, Jock really likes having room to play when it comes to action. Whereas Greg really likes to have the acting, like the emotional scenes, written out pretty clearly. But, other scenes that are big set piece things wide open. And when you learn what your artist enjoys doing, where they enjoy having more room, less room, more direction, less direction, you get the best out of them and it gets the best out of you. I learned to be a better writer. And I'm very grateful to them for that mentorship.

Now it's much different. At the beginning, I used to just write the same kind of full script for everybody. Now I get on the phone with them...we talk about the issue...I run them through, they tell me their favorite moments, improvise a little bit. And then when I write up the script, the parts that they want loose, I make loose. The parts they want tight, I make tight.

There are still people like Jim Cheung who really like full scripts, so I write full scripts for him. I really just love being adaptable.

What about The Batman Who Laughs are you most excited to hand off to Josh Williamson?

Oh man, well I can't even begin to tell you how great the story is that Josh has plans for on Batman/Superman. There's a big hook at the end of Batman Who Laughs, it's always been there at the beginning. I'm nervous because it's dark, but ultimately, it's what we've been building towards and what it engenders in terms of Josh's story and then beyond, what it builds through Year of the Villain and to even bigger stuff come the fall into the winter. It's really out of control. I read the first four issues of Batman/Superman and it's incredible. He's going to kill it. And David [Marquez]'s art on it is just out of control. It's so good, you have to pick it up. It's gonna be a blockbuster hit, I promise you.

read more - The Best Batman: The Animated Series Episodes

What I hope people take away from Batman Who Laughs above all is this. I want it to stand with my best work. I'm deeply proud of it as one of my final meditations on what makes Batman so enduring and so tragic. [And] Last Knight is almost a great counterpart to this. This one is the darkest sort of notes in that same song in a way. But what it is is that I want it to stand singularly and individually as something that is one of my best books I've ever done and I've put everything that I have into it with this team and the team has as well.

If you're reading Justice League and you read Batman/Superman and you read Batman Who Laughs, those books literally come together as do a few more that we're going to surprise you with to really culminate in Year of the Villain with a giant, sort of Lex Luthor, Batman Who Laughs storyline. All of that stuff then sort of blows up into something that I can't even talk about yet because it's going to be so fun.

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Interview Jim Dandy

Jun 13, 2019

DC Entertainment

Batman

Scott Snyder

from Books http://bit.ly/2X7IrDH

[tyrantisterror]

^hey yo! what do you think of Van Helsing (2004)?

I made a whole post a while back about how I’d absolutely fuck up writing a Batman story despite the fact that I love Batman.  It was predicated on the idea that a person can love and genuinely understand a story in great depth and still fuck it up because they’re just not the right storyteller for the job - that being a fan of a story doesn’t mean you’re the right person to adapt it.

I mention this because Van Helsing is that idea in action.  It is Stephen Sommers’s “How I’d Ruin It” blog post, only in film form.

I was super psyched for that movie before it came out for a somewhat strange reason.  Universal released DVD box sets of all the Dracula, Frankenstein, and Wolf Man movies a few months before its release, and they all had promotional videos for Van Helsing in them.  The videos weren’t JUST giant ads, though - they were retrospectives about the characters, one for each box set.  Those retrospectives just happened to be hosted by Stephen Sommers, and also just happened to talk about how those characters would be appearing again on the silver screen for the first time in years in this new movie called Van Helsing.  And while this does mean the retrospectives were kind of there to shill a new blockbuster, well, they still feel remarkably genuine and informative.  Stephen Sommers loves those characters, and he loves them in a very deep, analytical way.  When he talks about them in the retrospectives, he doesn’t just talk about surface details - he goes into the psychology of the characters, their pathos, their dimensions, the core conflicts at the heart of each of them, etc.  A lot of directors handling a remake will say really surface level shit - “Optimus Prime is so cool, he’s an icon, lots of people love him, I’m so proud to bring this character to the big screen.”  Stephen Sommers isn’t like that - he actually has insightful thoughts on what makes the Universal Monsters work as characters.  And they extend beyond the original movies, too - he references the book versions of Dracula and Frankenstein in a good amount of detail as well, and has some comments that show awareness of the non-Universal film takes on the characters.  He’s both done his research, understood it, and clearly loves the property.  It’s everything you want the adapter of a property you love to do.

But then you have the end product.  And that’s when you come to the realization: no matter how much an artist may love and understand another artist’s work, there is no guarantee they can do it justice.  Sometimes, no matter how much thought and admiration is put into the act, the artist is just wrong for the material.  This, sadly, is the case for Stephen Sommers.

Don’t get me wrong - he doesn’t completely fuck it up.  Van Helsing has some genuinely great ideas mixed into it.  Sommers’s idea for werewolf transformations is a particular stand out to me - rather than simply growing hair and claws, his werewolves tear their skin open to reveal the wolf form beneath, and vice versa for their transformations back into humans.  Lycanthropy literally involves tearing yourself apart - a visual that is apt for a character who is defined by their violent internal conflict, which is exactly what makes the Wolf Man/Larry Talbot so compelling.  And Sommers knew that - he says it explicitly in the Wolf Man retrospective featurette.  It was an intentional, intelligent, well thought out artistic choice.

There are other, less “deep” choices that also work too - like making Dracula’s bat form human-sized so it’s more terrifying to modern audiences, while also reinforcing his demonic nature with the whole “giant bat winged humanoid” imagery.  That’s a very typical Hollywood style change, but it’s one that works.

However, these good ideas are hampered by the fact that Sommers just isn’t built to tell the kind of story Dracula and the others thrive in.  The Universal Monsters are Gothic Horror stars - they belong in a horror story, in a story with dread and tension and atmosphere.  Sommers, on the other hand, thrives with big, fast paced action set pieces, quippy dialogue, and an irreverent tone.  He’s an action movie guy, not a Gothic Horror guy.  He can understand the Gothic Horror, but he can’t replicate it.

He tries - he gives Dracula, Frankenstein, and Van Helsing a lot of philosophic monologues in an attempt to capture their character depth, but he’s clearly not comfortable enough with that to pull it off.   What was intended to be “deep” ends up just being a long violation of the “show, don’t tell” rule.

An example: in the Dracula retrospective, Sommers talks about how Dracula, for all his evil and wickedness, is ultimately tragic because he doesn’t enjoy any of it.  He is lacking in any feeling and he knows that - he’s hollow and he can feel the gap and it disturbs him how little substance there is to him in his un-ending existence.  That’s straight from the book and it’s an accurate reading of Dracula’s character.  Unlike the book, however, Sommers doesn’t show us this information - instead, Dracula has a big motive rant that basically feels like he’s reading us Sommers’ college thesis paper analysis of Dracula’s character, rather than, y’know, saying words an actual human would say.  It is not the only time this happens.

On the flip side, the scenes where Sommers is in his element - the action scenes with quippy dialogue and big set pieces and all that - are really not well suited to these characters.  Vampires and werewolves and frankensteins aren’t necessarily ill suited to action - but Dracula and the Wolf Man and Frankenstein’s Monster are.  A werewolf who hurdles over an exploding cart is fine, but the Wolf Man isn’t supposed to, y’know, have fun doing exciting action sequences.  The Wolf Man is supposed to be emotionally disturbed by the fact that he keeps killing people against his own will.

And sure, these characters have been placed in other genres before - but those stories have always been parodies, and the good ones still keep the characters themselves in tact.  Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein is funny because you have the juxtaposition of Dracula acting exactly like Dracula despite the fact that his victims are two ridiculous clowns instead of your typical horror protagonists.  Putting Dracula in a situation where Dracula normally isn’t present is inherently hilarious - which works fine in a comedy, but not so fine in an action movie, which requires you to be able to take the stakes seriously, but is structured in a way where a character like Dracula feels too out of place to be taken seriously.

It’d be like if Sauron showed up in Die Hard - Sauron is a credible threat in Middle Earth, but he’s a fucking joke when he’s next to John McClane because those two should not be sharing a story together.  Unless you’re intending to play this for comedy, it will not work.

And that’s the problem with Van Helsing - it’s an action movie made with characters who don’t belong in an action movie, and no matter how much love and thought the creator poured into it, that recipe was not going to work.  And a lot of love and thought was put into it - Sommers wasn’t just trying his best, he was trying his best with an absolute passion project.  But passion wasn’t enough - in the end, they just weren’t right for each other.

[icemankazansky]

Batman Forever Makes Men Very Uncomfortable

I wrote an essay about how men hate Val Kilmer’s Batman because he’s a female gaze object.  

When I was in grad school working towards my MFA in writing, I wrote an essay on Val Kilmer’s portrayal of Bruce Wayne/Batman in 1995’s Batman Forever.  My thesis was that Val wasn’t the best Batman in cinematic history, but he was certainly the best Bruce Wayne.  The professor had specified no guidelines for our choice of topic, and because in my other classes I was either writing lengthy, dry-as-melba-toast explorations on hermeneutics or painfully introspective memoirs on the worst things that have ever happened to me, I decided to do something ridiculous and fun for this assignment.  I thought that no one would object to my subject matter, which was a problem I was finding in critiques on my personal essays on mental illness.

I was wrong.

Most of the critiques on my BatVal essay went the way I anticipated: people found it amusing and occasionally edifying.  Then, a dissenter.  One of the male students taking this class as an elective outside his major responded with vitriol.  He went on a diatribe not about my craft or any of my arguments, but my basic premise.  I didn’t commit his outburst to memory, but I do remember him saying, “Val Kilmer ruined the franchise for a decade.”

My initial reaction, honestly, was, “U mad, bro?” but since then, I have witnessed many men respond in a similar way to the mere mention of BatVal.  I am not an avid DC fan, but I did do enough research into the matter to know that the tonal change from Michael Keaton’s Batman films to Val’s turn under the cowl had nothing to do with Val Kilmer, who signed on without reading the script, because he was on location when someone called and offered him the part, and the obvious answer for any of us is, “Hell yes, I will be Batman.”  Warner Brothers decided they wanted to make the movies more family-friendly because they felt they could make a lot more money in merchandising if the films weren’t as dark as the Burton pictures.  (They were right, though it turns out this philosophy went a little too far with the next installment, which starred George Clooney as the caped crusader and picked up the most Golden Raspberry nominations of 1997, with eleven total.  If anything derailed the franchise, I’d think it was the picture that was so bad they didn’t even bother making any more sequels to sell toys with, but what do I know?)  When I thought about why guys don’t like Val Kilmer’s Batman, I assumed it was because they preferred Christian Bale’s growly, uber-dark portrayal, which, you know, to each their own, but personally I’m with Liz Lemon on this: “Maybe things men like are boring to women. Football, motorcycles, steak restaurants, really dark superhero movies: these are things that suck.”

Recently, though, I rewatched Batman Forever, and I have a new theory.  The reason men respond so viscerally and so negatively to Val Kilmer’s Batman is because he is shown through the female gaze, and men get very, very uncomfortable seeing their superheroes that way.

Let’s break it down.

You are probably familiar with the term male gaze. Feminist author Laura Mulvey coined this term in 1975 in the essay, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” If you went to art school, film school, or have a major with “fem” in the title, you've read it.  If you haven’t read it, the basic premise is that (now, most; at the time, nearly all) cinema is given to us through a heterosexual male perspective, even down to the way the camera moves over the actors.  Women in films are presented as objects of male desire, both for the male characters in the film, and for the film’s audience.  It’s easy to recognize, though it’s so prevalent that you may not realize what you’re looking at.  Every time a camera pans slowly up an actress’s body, lingering like a lover’s touch, this is the male gaze in action.  Every time you’re watching a movie and notice that, even though she’s the one speaking, the camera is not centered on the actress’s mouth, but on her chest, that is the male gaze in action.  

The female gaze is a related, but not strictly analogous, term.  A lot of men mistake the female gaze as being any time a male actor is shirtless onscreen, etc., thinking it’s a direct correlation to male gaze, just centered on men.  The trouble is, what women see in a narrative, what they want to see, is seldom rooted in the idea of treating the male body as a sexual object.  There are a whole lot of reasons why, but it basically boils down to two things.  Number one: women are biologically and socially wired differently than men.  Number two: society still prioritizes heterosexual men.  In a million ways, from healthcare legislation to the ads you walk by in the supermarket, we are told that women’s bodies are objects.  It’s no wonder that the male gaze exists, because everything society is telling us is that the purpose of women is to be used to gratify men.  There is no existing correlation for women re: male bodies.  Male bodies are just parts of men.  Unlike women’s bodies, they belong to no one but the men themselves.  So when you’re watching a movie with a beefy, shirtless actor, they’re not there because of the female gaze.  They’re there because of the male gaze.  They look like that because that is how men want to see their heroes.  

My favorite example of this comes from a Tumblr post about the male gaze in superhero comics.  The point starts about the ridiculous, anatomy-defying, uber-sexual way female characters are drawn by male artists.  The discussion is quickly derailed by a male fan who points to muscled, flexing illustrations of Batman and He-Man to prove that male characters are also drawn in hyper-sexualized ways to titillate female readers.  User pmastamonkmonk reminds them that these, too, are part of the male gaze, and in order to differentiate the male gaze from the female, the best way is to look at publications specifically geared toward each demographic.  The example they pick is Hugh Jackman.  They show two magazine covers: one of the male-directed Muscle & Fitness, and one on the female-directed Good Housekeeping.

On the men's magazine cover, Jackman is shirtless, flexing, looking mean and sweaty and like one of those bully whippets with the genetic defect that codes for twice as much muscle mass as it should have. On the women's magazine, he’s smiling. His hair is bouncy and wavy, he is wearing a blue sweater, hands on his hips. He looks for all the world like he’s happy and well-rested, and he probably has a pot roast in the oven.

Val Kilmer’s Bruce Wayne is Batman in a sweater with a pot roast in the oven.

Honestly, I’m not entirely sure how this happened.  Usually when we talk about the female gaze in cinema, we are talking about films directed by women, but Batman Forever was directed by Joel Schumacher, who is a man.  The director of photography is also a man, as well as three of the four people with writing credits.  Is the source of female gaze BatVal the fourth writer, Janet Scott Batchler?  If so, I think we all owe her a debt, but since I cannot prove it, I’m not going to send her a muffin basket just yet.

Here’s what I mean.

First I want to talk about the general character design of Val’s Bruce Wayne.  First of all, he’s blond, which I know is not a big deal, but in 1995, Val Kilmer’s Batman was the only superhero I had ever seen who had light coloring.  It’s styled in a way that is dangerously close to the cut sported by every ’90s teen heartthrob from Jonathan Taylor Thomas to Rider Strong.  The part’s different and it’s a little more adult, but there is no escaping the fact that this is a cute haircut.  The costuming is also really soft for what we’re used to seeing from a male superhero.  It was the ’90s, which contributes a little, but all his suits are cut loose, and the man wears a black turtleneck in like fifty percent of his scenes.  It’s not a Steve Jobs black turtleneck, either.  This is a sitting by the fire in a ski chalet in Vail turtleneck.  It is loose and plush.  It might be made of cashmere, and if you look at it too long, you can kind of feel the hand of it between your fingers, which is not something anyone has ever said about anything Wolverine was wearing.  

The character of this Bruce Wayne, even this Batman, is also unusual for the male superheroes we’re used to seeing.  He is not hyper aggressive, not uber male.  Val’s Batman is low-key stalked by Dr. Chase Meridian, who is not only a woman, but is Nicole Kidman playing a female doctor who wears lingerie in half her scenes.  When Batman is speaking to her, he calls her doctor, and he looks her in the eye.  When Bruce Wayne is interacting with Dr. Meridian, he is similarly respectful, but on the rare occasion he does something hyper-masculine that wouldn’t be out of place coming from the male gaze superheroes we’re used to, he gets flustered.  Embarrassed.  Apologizes.  He hears what he thinks is an attack going on behind her office door, and he runs into save her, breaking the door off its hinges in the process.  When it turns out Dr. Meridian was just working out with a punching bag, he immediately looks sheepish and apologizes, putting the door back where he found it and looking supremely embarrassed.  

There’s a shoe-horned line at the end of the scene where he tells her, “I’m going to have to get you out of those clothes...” She gives him a look.  “...and into a black dress…” which, given the delivery of the line and everything else we’ve seen from this Bruce Wayne, is easy to read as trying for smooth flirting and missing by a mile, then regrouping awkwardly.  He is so respectful of her boundaries that it’s almost wild, given what we’ve seen from male protagonists in the twenty-four years since the film was released.  He asks her on a date; she says no, she’s met someone else, and he says, “lucky guy” and then drops it.  When they are on a date later, he sees she’s been profiling Batman, and he takes a step back, asking her if she’s sure she isn’t so interested in Batman that she really wants to see him, which is insane because he is Batman, but it’s also incredibly chivalrous.

Val Kilmer’s Bruce Wayne is also shown as a really solid, decent guy.  Unlike Christian Bale’s vain, clueless playboy, Val Kilmer’s Bruce Wayne is shown as a responsible, charitable man capable of running a Fortune 500 company and helping rehabilitate orphans.  He also actively discourages Dick Grayson from violence and indulging in his revenge fantasies.  Do you know how many action movies are about men indulging in their revenge fantasies and then murdering everyone?  A lot.  It’s practically its own genre.  And Val Kilmer’s Bruce Wayne tells Dick “Two-Face Murdered My Whole Family” Grayson that violence will destroy him, and he should just be a normal kid and go to college.  

So, BatVal: Respects women.  Good provider.  Good father figure.  Dude’s even going to therapy to deal with his Bat Issues.

This is the female gaze.

There’s also a very literal female gaze moment in the film that I cannot recall seeing anywhere else in mass market film.  Towards the end, when Batman is suiting up, there is a gratuitous closeup of his ass in the Bat Suit.  

I’ve seen similar treatment of women in suiting up montages—I remember watching Guardians of the Galaxy for the first time and thinking, during “Cherry Bomb,” why the fuck am I looking at Gamora’s ass right now? They didn’t show us anyone else’s ass—but usually if the camera treats a man like that, it’s for the sake of humor, and that does not seem to be the case here.  Sure, there are sexy, panning shots of men in movies.  Some of them, we’ve discussed, are actually the male body viewed through the male gaze, describing the masculine definition of the male ideal.  In some cases, I can say the intent is definitely to tantalize the female viewer—I’m thinking romantic “chick flicks” here—but you know what?  Almost always when this happens, the camera lingers on the man’s face.  Pans down slowly, giving a good view of his arms, his chest, maybe even his stomach, with a teasing look above the hips to remind the audience, hell yeah, this is a man and he’s got a penis down there … and then it’s over.  I have never seen the camera pay any sort of attention to a man’s ass when it wasn’t (a) for comedy’s sake, or (b) a gay movie.  And this.  Batman Forever, a mainstream superhero movie from the ’90s.   

So not only is BatVal seen through the female gaze in all the ways we expect when we use that term, but he’s also shown in a way usually reserved for women in film.  And I think all of that makes a lot of heterosexual male viewers very uncomfortable.  It isn’t just that this isn’t how they’re used to seeing their heroes.  It’s that this isn’t how they’re used to seeing themselves.  It’s that this isn’t how they’re used to seeing the world.  They’re used to viewing their media through a male filter, and when that doesn’t happen, it’s confusing.  Disorienting.  Possibly scary.  So I understand the visceral reaction I got out of the guy who hated my essay.  And I understand why a lot of guys cast aspersions on this movie and Val Kilmer’s portrayal.  It isn’t that they prefer Christopher Nolan’s movies.  It’s that Batman Forever scared the shit out of them by reminding them that there exist viewpoints outside their own.  By suggesting, if just for the fifteen seconds or so Schumacher’s camera lingers on that rubber-clad ass, that it’s possible for people to see them the way they see women.  It’s uncomfortable, and they’re not used to discomfort.  I get it.  Embrace it, boys, if only for Batman Forever’s two hour run time.  The rest of us have been uncomfortable our whole lives.  

[imperaptorfuriosa]

ngl I would absolutely love to hear more about trans allegories in 80s action movies

omg hi thanks for enabling me

there are films that i feel like are particularly interesting as trans allegories because of their particular plots/imagery (T2 and Bloodsport are big ones for me), but my main thesis is this: 80s action movies exaggerate masculinity to the point that the audience has to acknowledge that it’s a performance. 

before the 80s, images of “masculinity” in film mainly focused on skills and looks that, while often elevated by writing or effects, still seemed attainable. james cagney, james stewart, humphry bogart, etc. were all just some guy. meanwhile, in Commando (1985) arnold schwarzenegger’s character is introduced casually carrying basically a whole tree over one arm.

“normal” people can’t do that. it’s an act, a stereotype, a caricature--and thus something that anyone, regardless of gender, can perform. it’s democratizing masculine expression by making it a myth instead of a concrete reality. 

across the genre, there is a huge focus on bodies (which is also why these movies are so homoerotic lol), and these bodies are celebrated as constructions. the whole genre is filled with self-made men. 

schwarzenegger first got famous as a body builder. he had already won mr. olympia 5 times before starring in the 1977 documentary Pumping Iron that helped inspire the fitness/work-out craze of the 80s. films often show the audience his body/sweaty muscles before his face. his identity is less important than his body. 

even the goals/morals of heroism were connected to the constructed body. before Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985), stallone asked another famous body builder (i think it was lou ferrigno??) to get him into shape. this was almost 10 years after the first rocky movie, but he still needed to build a body that fit the new idea of what a heroic man looked like. it’s not really in the same genre, but during an Evil Dead II (1987) livestream i watched a few months back, bruce campbell mentioned that sam raimi forced him to work out for the role because he was the “hero.”

the body is so externalized that it eventually became a separate suit that is literally put on over the “real” person (see: Robocop (1987), Batman (1989)). these later movies came about because people saw the (argueably toxic) myth for what it was and wanted something more “natural” or “human” (the change between the killer robot T-800 in Terminator (1984) vs goofy father figure T-800 in T2 (1991) is one of the clearest  examples). 

tl;dr: 80s action movies accidentally create narratives that say “masculinity is a myth and the male body is constructed.” 

as a trans guy who didn’t really figure himself out until his 20s, im comforted by the idea that for every part of my identity that i was born with, there is another part that i get to make for myself.

but it’s really important to note that when you haven’t done the work to see these movies as deconstructive and not aspirational, the pressure of the mythic masculinity takes its toll by giving transmasc people an unrealistic goal to reach for in the name of being accepted. also i always have to acknowledge that there are lots of terrible nasty toxic cis guys who use these same characters and symbols to uphold their own views on gender/gun control/politics/etc. 

ive been staring at this for too long and i know ive got other points i didn’t get into here, but this is most of the big ideas. feel free to ask questions or anything i love talking about this :)

[evanbensky]

The Dark Knight

When the Joker unleashes havoc and mayhem on the citizens of Gotham, Batman is forced to face one of the most gruelling psychological and physical tests of his abilities to battle injustice. The Dark Knight, set a year after Batman Begins (2005), Batman, Lieutenant James Gordon, and new District Attorney Harvey Dent successfully begin to round up the criminals who plague Gotham City, until a mysterious and sadistic criminal mastermind known only as "The Joker" appears in Gotham, causing a new wave of chaos. The Joker executes a well planned bank robbery and blinds the Gotham mafia. He spends the money on a series of horrible and deliberate attacks against the city and its inhabitants, each one carefully orchestrated and directed at Dent and Batman while generating terror throughout the city. Meanwhile, thanks to Wayne Enterprises' connections with a shady Chinese lender, Batman believes he may have discovered a trail to The Joker, and this leads Batman and Alfred to Hong Kong. The Joker has no rules, but Batman has just one, and the Joker intends to force Batman to break it. It's impossible to talk about this movie without talking about Heath Ledger's performance of the joker.  In preparation for the film Heath locked himself away for weeks, keeping a diary which was subsequently shared with the documentary-makers behind 2012's Too Young to Die. The diary contained a wide array of manic musings, depicting hyenas, and clowns. In the documentary, his dad Kim said Ledger isolated himself to get into the deranged psyche of the character. He said: "He pretty well locked himself up in a hotel room for weeks. He galvanised the upcoming character. That was typical of Heath. He would do that. He liked to dive into his characters, but this time he really took it up a notch." Ledger also went all out physically, encouraging co-star Christian Bale (Batman) to actually hit him during an interrogation scene. Heath Ledger had the best performance of Batman I have ever seen and played the role to perfection. Harvey Dent was Gotham City's freshly elected district attorney. He was backed up by his lover, Rachel Dawes, who was in charge of putting many of the city's corrupt politicians and mobsters behind bars. However, both he and Rachel were apprehended and imprisoned in warehouses full of oil barrels, and though Dent was freed by Batman, the explosion scarred half of his face. Dent was driven crazy by a desire for vengeance for Rachel's murder, and he went after those he believed were guilty, eventually holding Commissioner Gordon's family at gunpoint. During his fight with Batman, Batman saved Gordon's kid, while Dent was knocked to the ground and died. To protect Dent's reputation, Batman accepted responsibility for his murder. The key symbol in this film that stuck with me was Harvey Dents double sided coin. The symbology is rather evident on the surface. Dent flips the coin to decide any questions that need to be answered, rather than making a conscious decision, he leaves his actions to fate. It's a quick method to express what's going on in his head before and after he loses his sanity. It demonstrates Harvey Dent's eagerness to cheat the system. After all, only he knows it has two heads, which allows him to deceive people into placing wagers he knows he'll win. He recalls a somewhat innocuous purpose for it early on—getting him a date with Rachel—but it soon becomes dark. It's quite dark. Dark, as in "terrifying a criminal schizophrenic into believing Dent intends to murder him." Of course, he's cheating: he's making rules he doesn't intend to obey in order to obtain the results he wants. But he feels he is acting in the best interests of the society. So Dent cheated with the coin, and we might have done the same in his situation. At the same time, he's essentially proving the thesis of the Joker. Except for the ones that individuals make up, there are no rules in this world. When they don't like them, they modify them or look for loopholes to get around them, thereby rendering them useless.That turns the system Dent has sworn to protect into a lie: the mild, forgiving hypocrisy that most of us accept as acceptable in an imperfect society, but which the Joker thinks turns each of us into a potential monster. All of this is contained in a single little coin carried by the clown's personification of the system he wishes to destroy. The whole time Joker is trying to destroy Gotham he is trying to make Batman break his one rule, he will never kill, and he really tests Batman's will to keep that rule putting him in easy situations to kill him. The dark knight is one of my top 5 favourite movies of all time and each time I watch it I like it more and more. I give The Dark Knight 5/5 a perfect score!!