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Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Recenly published in...

Comics Buyer's Guide #1650!

With the end-of-the-year deadline for Classic Home Video Games Vol. 2 looming large, I haven't had time to do much other writing, but I did manage to squeeze in a review of The Stand: Captain Trips #1 for CBG. I've been a huge Stephen King fan since I was a teenager, so I couldn't pass up the opportunity to review this comic book that is based on what I think is his best novel.

The Stand: Captain Trips #1
Marvel Comics
$3.99, color, 32 pgs., available now
Writer: Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa
Artist: Mike Perkins
Grade: 3 Stars (out of 4)

Despite its disappointing ending, which contains one whopper of a deus ex machina, The Stand is Stephen King’s greatest novel. It’s also one of King’s most popular books, thanks in part to a cast of fully realized characters, from lovable Frannie Goldsmith to everyman Stu Redman to rock star Larry Underwood. Thanks also goes to King’s deft descriptions of a post-apocalyptic landscape, including a harrowing journey through a nightmarishly cluttered Lincoln Tunnel.

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Issue #1 (of 5) of Marvel’s adaptation of The Stand does indeed introduce the aforementioned trio, but it’s too early to talk post-apocalypse. What we do have is set-up and impending doom, including an expanded (in terms of emotional impact) scene of the car ramming into Bill Hapscomb’s Texaco, which dramatically portrays the effects of the virus that kills almost as quickly as it spreads.

Aguirre-Sacasa’s script does a commendable job keeping the essentials (Frannie’s pregnancy) while leaving out the non-essentials (Frannie biting her tongue), and Perkins’ realistic style is an excellent fit for the story’s dead serious tone.

Saturday, December 13, 2008

Bettie Page R.I.P.


First Forry, then Bev, now Bettie. Hopefully, my next post won't be about the death of a cultural icon.

This obituary is reprinted from an L.A. newspaper:

Bettie Page, the brunet pinup queen with a shoulder-length pageboy hairdo and kitschy bangs whose saucy photos helped usher in the sexual revolution of the 1960s, has died. She was 85.

Page, whose later life was marked by depression, violent mood swings and several years in a state mental institution, died Thursday night at Kindred Hospital in Los Angeles, where she had been on life support since suffering a heart attack Dec. 2, according to her agent, Mark Roesler.

A cult figure, Page was most famous for the estimated 20,000 4-by-5-inch black-and-white glossy photographs taken by amateur shutterbugs from 1949 to 1957. The photos showed her in high heels and bikinis or negligees, bondage apparel -- or nothing at all.

Decades later, those images inspired biographies, comic books, fan clubs, websites, commercial products -- Bettie Page playing cards, dress-up magnet sets, action figures, Zippo lighters, shot glasses -- and, in 2005, a film about her life and times, "The Notorious Bettie Page."

Then there are the idealized portraits of her naughty personas -- Nurse Bettie, Jungle Bettie, Voodoo Bettie, Banned in Boston Bettie, Maid Bettie, Crackers in Bed Bettie -- memorialized by such artists as Olivia de Berardinis.


"I'll always paint Bettie Page," De Berardinis said Thursday night . "But truth be told, it took me years to understand what I was looking at in the old photographs of her. Now I get it. There was a passion play unfolding in her mind. What some see as a bad-girl image was in fact a certain sensual freedom and play-acting - it was part of the fun of being a woman."

"The origins of what captures the imagination and creates a particular celebrity are sometimes difficult to define," Playboy magazine founder Hugh Hefner said Thursday night. "Bettie Page was one of Playboy magazine's early Playmates, and she became an iconic figure, influencing notions of beauty and fashion. Then she disappeared. . . . Many years later, Bettie resurfaced and we became friends. Her passing is very sad."

In an interview 2 1/2 years ago, Hefner described Page's appeal as "a combination of wholesome innocence and fetish-oriented poses that is at once retro and very modern."

According to her agents at CMG Worldwide, Page's official website, www.BettiePage.com, has received about 600 million hits over the last five years.

"Bettie Page captured the imagination of a generation of men and women with her free spirit and unabashed sensuality," said Roesler, chairman of the Indianapolis-based CMG Worldwide, who was at Page's side when she died. "She was a dear friend and a special client and one of the most beautiful and influential women of the 20th century."

A religious woman in her later life, Page was mystified by her influence on modern popular culture. "I have no idea why I'm the only model who has had so much fame so long after quitting work," she said in an interview with The Times in 2006.

She had one request for that interview: that her face not be photographed.

"I want to be remembered," she said, "as I was when I was young and in my golden times. . . . I want to be remembered as the woman who changed people's perspectives concerning nudity in its natural form."

Bettie Mae Page was born April 22, 1923, in Nashville. She was the oldest girl among Roy and Edna Page's six children. Her father, an auto mechanic, "molested all three of his daughters," Page said in the interview.

Her parents divorced in 1933, but life didn't get any easier for Bettie.

"All I ever wanted was a mother who paid attention to me," Page recalled. "She didn't want girls. She thought we were trouble. When I started menstruating at 13, I thought I was dying because she never taught me anything about that."

After high school, Page earned a teaching credential. But her career in the classroom was short-lived. "I couldn't control my students, especially the boys," she said.

She tried secretarial work and marriage. But by 1948 she had divorced a violent husband and fled to New York City, where she enrolled in acting classes. She was noticed on the beach at Coney Island by New York police officer and amateur photographer Jerry Tibbs, who introduced her to camera clubs.

Page quickly became a sought-after model, attracting the attention of Irving Klaw and his sister, Paula, who operated a mail-order business specializing in cheesecake and bondage poses.

Under contract with the Klaws, Page was photographed prancing around with a whip, spanking other women, even being hog-tied. She also appeared in 8-millimeter "loops" and feature-length peekaboo films with titles like "Betty Page in High Heels."

"I had lost my ambition and desire to succeed and better myself; I was adrift," Page recalled. "But I could make more money in a few hours modeling than I could earn in a week as a secretary."

Her most professional photographs were taken in 1955 by fashion photographer Bunny Yeager. They included shots of Page nude and frolicking in waves and deep-sea fishing, and a January 1955 Playboy centerfold of her winking under a Santa Claus cap.

At 35, Page walked away from it all. She quit modeling and moved to Florida, where she married a much younger man whose passions, she later learned, were watching television and eating hamburgers.

Page fled from her home in tears after a dispute on New Year's Eve in 1959. Down the street, she noticed a white neon sign over a little white church with its door open.

After quietly taking a seat in the back, she had a born-again experience. Page immersed herself in Bible studies and served as a counselor for the Billy Graham Crusade.


In 1967, she married for a third time. After that marriage ended in divorce 11 years later, Page plunged into a depression marked by violent mood swings. She argued with her landlady and attacked her with a knife. A judge found her innocent by reason of insanity but sentenced her to 10 years in a California mental institution.

She was released in 1992 from Patton State Hospital in San Bernardino County to find that she had unwittingly become a pop-culture icon. A movie titled "The Rocketeer" and the comic book that inspired it contained a Bettie-esque character, triggering a revival, among women as well as men, that continues unabated.

With the help of admirers including Hefner, Page finally began receiving a respectable income for her work.

In an interview published in Playboy magazine in 2007, Page expressed mixed feelings about her achievements. "When I turned my life over to the lord Jesus I was ashamed of having posed in the nude," she said. "But now, most of the money I've got is because I posed in the nude. So I'm not ashamed of it now. But I still don't understand it."

She spent most of her final years in a one-bedroom apartment, reading the Bible, listening to Christian and country tunes, watching westerns on television, catching up on diet and exercise regimens or sometimes perusing secondhand clothing stores.

Occasionally, however, Page was persuaded to visit the Sunset Boulevard penthouse offices of her agents at CMG Worldwide to autograph pinups of herself in the post-World War II years of her prime. The agency controls her image and those of Marilyn Monroe and Princess Diana, among others.

During one such event in early 2006, Page needed about 10 minutes to get through the 10 letters of her name. As she pushed her pen over a portrait of her in a negligee with an ecstatic smile, she laughed and said, "My land! Is that supposed to be me? I was never that pretty."

She is survived by her brother Jack Page of Nashville and sister Joyce Wallace of Blairsville, Ga.



Bettie didn't like to be photographed after she had gotten older (she wanted people to remember her the way she looked during the peak of her modeling career), so I was interested to see this photo of her when she was 80 (and still looking lovely), sent to me by a friend.

Monday, December 8, 2008

R.I.P. Beverly Garland


First Uncle Forry, and now Beverly Garland.

This from the wire:

LOS ANGELES – Beverly Garland, the B-movie actress who starred in 1950s' cult hits like "Swamp Women" and "Not of This Earth" and who went on to play Fred MacMurray's TV wife on "My Three Sons," has died. She was 82.

Garland died Friday at her Hollywood Hills home after a lengthy illness, her son-in-law Packy Smith told the Los Angeles Times.

Garland made her film debut in the 1950 noir classic "D.O.A.," launching a 50-year career that included 40 movies and dozens of television shows.

She gained cult status for playing gutsy women in low-budget exploitation films such as "The Alligator People" and a number of Roger Corman movies including "Gunslinger," "It Conquered the World" and "Naked Paradise."

"I never considered myself very much of a passive kind of actress," she said in a 1985 interview with Fangoria magazine. "I was never very comfortable in love scenes, never comfortable playing a sweet, lovable lady."

Garland showed her comedic chops as Bing Crosby's wife in the short-lived sitcom "The Bing Crosby Show" in the mid-'60s.

She went on to be cast in "My Three Sons" as the second wife of MacMurray's widower Steve Douglas during the last three seasons of the popular series that aired from 1960 to 1972.

Her television credits also include "Remington Steele," "Scarecrow and Mrs. King," "Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman," "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman" and "7th Heaven."

Garland was born Beverly Fessenden in Santa Cruz, Calif., in 1926, and grew up in Glendale. She became Beverly Garland when she married actor Richard Garland. They were divorced in 1953 after less than four years of marriage.

In 1960, she married real estate developer Fillmore Crank, and the couple built a mission-style hotel in North Hollywood, now called Beverly Garland's Holiday Inn. Garland, whose husband died in 1999, remained involved in running the North Hollywood hotel.

She was the honorary mayor of North Hollywood and served on the boards of the California Tourism Corp. and the Greater Los Angeles Visitors and Convention Bureau.



Saturday, December 6, 2008

Forrest J Ackerman R.I.P.

Early this morning, I got this sad note from my friend, Bart Bush, of the Oklahoma Alliance of Fandom:

LOS ANGELES -Forrest J Ackerman, the sometime actor, literary agent, magazine editor and full-time bon vivant who discovered author Ray Bradbury and was widely credited with coining the term "sci-fi," has died. He was 92. Ackerman died Thursday of heart failure at his Los Angeles home, said Kevin Burns, head of Prometheus Entertainment and a trustee of Ackerman's estate. Although only marginally known to readers of mainstream literature, Ackerman was legendary in science-fiction circles as the founding editor of the pulp magazine Famous Monsters of Filmland. He was also the owner of a huge private collection of science-fiction movie and literary memorabilia that for years filled every nook and cranny of a hillside mansion overlooking Los Angeles. "He became the Pied Piper, the spiritual leader, of everything science fiction, fantasy and horror," Burns said Friday.

Every Saturday morning that he was home, Ackerman would open up the house to anyone who wanted to view his treasures. He sold some pieces and gave others away when he moved to a smaller house in 2002, but he continued to let people visit him every Saturday for as long as his health permitted. “My wife used to say, 'How can you let strangers into our home?' But what's the point of having a collection like this if you can't let people enjoy it?" an exuberant Ackerman told The Associated Press as he conducted a spirited tour of the mansion on his 85th birthday. His collection once included more than 50,000 books, thousands of science-fiction magazines and such items as Bela Lugosi's cape from the 1931film "Dracula."

His greatest achievement, however, was likely discovering Bradbury, author of the literary classics "Fahrenheit 451" and "The Martian Chronicles." Ackerman had placed a flyer in a Los Angeles bookstore for a science-fiction club he was founding and a teenage Bradbury showed up. Later, Ackerman gave Bradbury the money to start his own science-fiction magazine, Futuria Fantasia, and paid the author's way to New York for an authors meeting that Bradbury said helped launch his career. "I hadn't published yet, and I met a lot of these people who encouraged me and helped me get my career started, and that was all because of Forry Ackerman," the author told the AP in 2005. Later, as a literary agent, Ackerman represented Bradbury, Isaac Asimov and numerous other science-fiction writers.

He said the term "sci-fi" came to him in 1954 when he was listening to a car radio and heard an announcer mention the word "hi-fi." "My dear wife said, 'Forget it, Forry, it will never catch on,'" he recalled. Soon he was using it in Famous Monsters of Filmland, the magazine he helped found in 1958 and edited for 25 years. Ackerman himself appeared in numerous films over the years, usually in bit parts. His credits include "Queen of Blood," "Dracula vs. Frankenstein," "Amazon Women on the Moon," "Vampirella, " "Transylvania Twist," "The Howling" and the Michael Jackson "Thriller" video.

More recently, he appeared in 2007's "The Dead Undead" and 2006's "The Boneyard Collection." Ackerman returned briefly to Famous Monsters of Filmland in the 1990s, but he quickly fell out with the publisher over creative differences. He sued and was awarded a judgment of more than $375,000. Forrest James Ackerman was born in Los Angeles on Nov. 24, 1916. He fell in love with science-fiction, he once said, when he was 9 years old and saw a magazine called Amazing Stories. He would hold onto that publication for the rest of his life. Ackerman, who had no children, was preceded in death by his wife, Wendayne.
********************************************************************************
My family and I were lucky enough to meet "Uncle Forry" (as his most devoted fans called him) on a couple of different occasions, once at Comic-Con in San Diego, and once at his home in Hollywood (circa 2006).

Forry on a discussion panel with Famous Monsters cover artist Basil Gogos.

Forry entertaining guests in his Hollywood bungalo (a significantly smaller home than his previous residence), which some referred to as "Son of Ackermansion."

Forry back in the day.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Recently published in...


Comics Buyer's Guide #1649, where I review the following:
DC Universe: Decisions #1
Simpsons Comics #145
Daredevil #111
Golly! #1
Supergirl #34

Here's one of my reviews from the issue:

DC Universe: Decisions #1
DC Comics
$2.99, color, 32 pgs., available now
Writers: Bill Willingham, Judd Winick
Artist: Rick Leonardi
Grade: 2 Stars (out of 4)

Published in time for the real world presidential debates, DC Universe: Decisions #1 (of 4) finds the Justice League up against an unknown assassin. Instead of gunning for one presidential candidate, this bipartisan bomber is aiming to kill them all, including Davis Brewster, a radical leftist who gains official support from DC’s resident bleeding-heart liberal, Oliver Queen. The bomber’s motives are unknown, but his method is particularly heinous: strapping bombs to mind-controlled innocents who have easy access to the politicians in question.

Leonardi’s pencils are hit-and-miss at best, and sometimes downright awful (why is Wonder Woman sporting that goofy grin during Superman’s assassination speech?). Green Arrow looks fairly normal, but Superman, at least in certain panels, appears as though his bones have been broken and reset by a cross-eyed hunchback in a mad scientist’s laboratory. The story fares a little better, but superstar writers Willingham (Fables) and Winick (Green Arrow and Black Canary) could’ve dug deeper into the political realm. Lois Lane does espouse her views quite pointedly, however, and that was a nice touch.

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Recently published in...

Back Issue Magazine #31 (the special Steve Gerber tribute issue), which contains my 4000-word treatise on the early '80s action/adventure/fantasy cartoon, Thundarr the Barbarian.

Sunday, November 9, 2008

Back from Wizard World 2008

While my family was attending Texas vs. Baylor, I was at Wizard World Texas, where I had a great time visiting with friends, getting some great deals on books, attending a costume contest (always one of the best parts of any good comic con), and much more.


I usually don't buy sketchbooks (finished art gets the job done for me), but, thanks to a killer Flash cover (not to mention some nice interior work), I had to pick up this book from Ethan Van Sciver, one of my favorite modern artists.


Ethan showing off his new book.


I didn't vote for Obama, but this T-shirt painted by Alex Ross is pretty darned cool (as is most anything by Ross).


Corey Feldman, star of such films as The Lost Boys and Stand by Me, sitting with his wife, Susie, Playboy cover girl and co-star of the celebrity "reality" series The Two Coreys. Throughout the weekend, they chatted with fans and signed autographs.


Lou "The Incredible Hulk" Ferigno.


Peter Mayhew, who played Chewbacca in the Star Wars movies (looks like he's had a hair cut since then).


Participants lining up for the costume contest.


The Batman Returns rendition of Catwoman.


Poison Ivy, Catwoman, The Joker, and Harley Quinn.


Hellboy.


The Joker.


Master Chief, the protagonist of the Halo video game series.


Ms. Marvel.


The White Queen, Jean Gray, and The Scarlett Witch.


One of the highlights of the show was running into my cousin Randy, who drove in from Marshall, which is about three-and-a-half hours east of the Dallas/Fort Worth area where the convention was being held. When I was a kid, after the bigger kids had run off and I was stuck at the house with the adults, I would hang out in Randy's room for hours, reading his comic books. Randy's vast collection was my first exposure to more mature titles, such as Vampirella and Savage Sword of Conan.

Sunday, November 2, 2008

Wizard World Texas 2008

This weekend, Nov. 7-9, I'll be taking a break from editing Classic Home Video Games Vol. 2: 1985-1988 to attend Wizard World Texas 2008. I'll be covering the convention as a reporter of sorts for cbgxtra.com, which is a division of The Comics Buyer's Guide. The convention will be held at the Arlington Convention Center in Arlington,Texas, near The Ballpark at Arlington (where the Texas Rangers play) and in the shadow of the massive Jerry World (the as-of-yet unnamed future home of the Dallas Cowboys). Guest stars at Wizard World Texas include Lou "The Incredible Hulk" Ferrigno, Corey Feldman (The Gooneys, The Lost Boys), John Cassaday (Astonishing X-Men), and many others. For a preview of the show, check out Wizard World Texas 2008.

Saturday, November 1, 2008

Halloween 2008

I've been busy proofreading Classic Home Video Games Vol. 2, so I haven't had much time to blog, but I had to post this picture of my kids in their Halloween costumes. We had a great time trick-or-treating and visiting the neighbors. My wife's got the full report on her blog.

Ryan as a creepy skeleton (complete with oozing blood) and Katie as a cute '50s girl.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Pac-Man Pumpkin


We went to a pumpkin carving the other night, and I felt obligated to post this photo. I wish I could say I created the Pac-Man pumpkin, but I was too busy eating to carve one (though I did help scoop out some of the gunk).

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Recently published in...


Comics Buyer's Guide #1648, where I review the following:
Joker's Asylum: Poison Ivy #1 (3 out of 4 stars)
Super Friends #5 (1 star)
Fantastic Four: True Story #1 (2.5 stars)
Marvel Adventures Super Heroes #1 (3.5 stars)

Here's my review of Joker's Asylum: Poison Ivy #1:

Joker’s Asylum: Poison Ivy #1
DC Comics
$2.99, color, 32 pgs., available now
Writer: J.T. Krul
Artist: Guillem March

Starring an impossibly long-legged, usually half-naked (or naked altogether) Poison Ivy, “Deflowered!” finds The Botanical Babe once again stalking and killing corporate fat cats who make their living at the expense of others. Other plants, that is. And once again, Batman is on her tail (so to speak), investigating the deaths, trying to find a pattern.

This story is like countless other Poison Ivy yarns, but for a couple of differences that make it stand out (at least to some degree). Instead of poisoning her victims with toxins, Ivy is making them suffer extra by having her plants stab them with thorns or choke them to death. In addition, though every fan knows Ivy favors fauna and flora, this story pounds the notion home (and makes Ivy a somewhat sympathetic character) by showing her shrieking in terror at hearing the plants, flowers, and trees cry with “sorrow and torment.”

An origin recap and surprise ending add to the horticultural hijinks. Book-ending the action in Crypt Keeper-like fashion is The Joker, whose appearance is purely superfluous.

Saturday, October 4, 2008

The Cowboys

I usually just post about comics, video games, science fiction, and the like, but I liked this picture of my wife and I taken at the Dallas Cowboys' game a week ago Sunday. The Cowboys lost, but we had a great time. We were on the 40-yard line 11 rows up, so we had a good look at Romo, T.O., and the rest of the 'Boys (there were probably some cheerleaders there, too, but I didn't notice).

OAF CON 2008

Just got back from OAF Con 2008, a gathering of seasoned (I was easily one of the two or three youngest people there) comics fans and pros buying and selling comics, pulp novels, movie posters, magazines, fanzines, and much more.(OAF stands for Oklahoma Alliance of Fans, an organization started during the early days of comic book fandom).

OAF convention organizer Bart Bush, who was a key figure in early comic book fandom (he published the OAF fanzine during the early 70s). Bart was kind enough to display my book at his table.


The highlight of the show for me was meeting special guest Bill Schelly, comic book historian and author of The Golden Age of Comic Fandom (among other books).


The Revised Edition of The Golden Age of Comic Fandom


Rick Kelsey, a friend who went with me to the con, talking with and getting some books signed by Bill Schelly.


The con had lots of cool collectibles for sale, including these Universal Monsters bubble soap containers from the 1960s (the Dracula bottle is a prototype).


Vintage Universal Monsters models.


The Bride of Frankenstein, my favorite Universal Monster.


Co-author Michael Cochran and publisher Russ Cochran selling their new book about Hopalong Cassidy.


A typical display of Golden and Silver Age comic books.

Friday, September 12, 2008

Recently published in...


Comics Buyer's Guide #1647, where I review I Kill Giants #1, Trinity #1-9, and Amazing Spider-Man #565.

Here's my Spider-Man review:

Amazing Spider-Man #565
Marvel Comics
$2.99, color, 32 pgs., available now
Writer: Marc Guggenheim
Artist: Phil Jimenez
Grade: 3 Stars (out of 4)

The “Brand New Day” cover banner has finally disappeared, making way for the new Kraven, who is dead set on making Spidey’s life a living (make that dying) hell. Unlike the original Kraven, who was a mustachioed brunette wearing a loin cloth with accompanying lion’s mane, the new Kraven is a bleach blond punk chick (!) whose dark, organic looking costume appears as though it were designed by H.R. Geiger.

The female Kraven is a skilled tracker, spying on Spider-Man as he teams with Daredevil (against Fracture) and then returns to his apartment, the latter providing Kraven with the clues needed to uncover Spidey’s secret identity. A super-villain ruining a super-hero’s life on all fronts is hardly a fresh concept, but the setup, enabled substantially by Phil Jimenez’ detailed renderings, is strong enough to warrant a look at the next issue.

Two niggling points: Peter Parker claims he doesn’t read comics (conflicting with previous continuity), and his spider-sense doesn’t warn him of Kraven hiding in the elevator.