7 Days in May | Tomorrowlands and Tesseracts

Tomorrowland (2015)



Brad Bird's latest film is getting mixed reviews and I understand why. It has great ideas and I love the way it encourages not only optimism, but doing something with optimism. Really it's about action more than it is about how much water there is in a glass. The problem with the world isn't cynicism; it's laziness. I can imagine a way that cynicism can also spur people to action, but Tomorrowland decidedly picks optimism and inspiration as the best way and I subscribe to that belief. If nothing else, I love the conversations that Tomorrowland is creating.

Not that its ideas are all that the movie has going for it. It has terrific actors and a few great set pieces. And there are moments when it's as affecting as I hoped for it to be. Not as many as I wanted, but some.

It does have some big problems though, and it's probably my least favorite Brad Bird film so far. There's no need for a human villain in a movie like this, but we get one and his motivations make no sense. And the community that gives the movie its name never quite lives up to its role as a source of encouragement. I don't think I want to spoil anything by saying more, but we can get into that in the comments if you want to.

Overall, Tomorrowland is trying to do more than it's capable of and that's disappointing. But I'm glad it tried.

Thor (2011)



The Marvel re-watch continues and watching them in chronological order I realized that the pre-Avengers films end the way they began: with the Norse gods. The earliest thing we see in one of these movies is the Red Skull's invading a Norse temple and stealing an artifact. The last thing we do before getting to The Avengers is explore the gods in more detail and see that artifact reenter the plot. It's a nice bookend.

I often hear Thor listed as people's least-favorite Marvel movie, but I love it. That undoubtedly has a lot to do with my dual crushes on Chris Hemsworth and Natalie Portman, but I'm also a sucker for the character arc that Thor goes through. It's very similar to the one Tony Stark experiences in Iron Man (and maybe that's why people don't go for it), but I'm not one to dismiss a story just because I've seen something similar. As long as both are done well, there's room for both. And Thor is done really well. It's main character may go through a similar journey to Tony Stark, but he does it surrounded by different people. His father, his friends, and especially his brother all make Thor a significantly different experience from Iron Man.

Or maybe it's just how dreamy Hemsworth and Portman are.

The Avengers (2012)



So the Tesseract makes another appearance as the focus of an adventure. In First Avenger, Hydra was primarily interested in it as an energy source and The Avengers reveals that that's what SHIELD wants it for, too. But of course - as we saw in First Avenger when Red Skull touched it - it also has the ability to open a hole in space.

One of my main reasons for doing this re-watch is to track the Infinity Stones through the series. As of The Avengers, they still haven't been mentioned by that name even though two of them actually appear in the movie. I'm trying to avoid talking too much about them before I get to the movies that reveal those details, but it's useful to track that the Tesseract and Loki's Scepter are powered by Stones.

The Tesseract obviously has power over space, so that one's easy to figure out. Loki's scepter, given to him by Thanos, is a little more difficult since it seems to have multiple abilities in The Avengers. In addition to their primary abilities, both the Tesseract and the Scepter simply give off enormous amounts of power. It's easy to focus on that as Hydra and SHIELD have been doing, so when Loki uses the Scepter, a lot of times he's just using it as a generator for destructive power. The Scepter's true purpose though is what he uses it for when he touches someone with it and takes over their mind.

That didn't become obvious to me until Age of Ultron, but I should point out that I have zero prior knowledge of the Infinity Stones and what they do. I've been aware that there was something called the Infinity Gauntlet and that Thanos wanted to control it, but I'm playing catch up on the details and doing that is a lot of what's fun to me about the Marvel movies. I'm enjoying watching this story unfold without a clear vision of where it's going.

There's so much more to talk about with these movies, but I feel like these capsule reviews aren't really the place. I kind of want to do a longer series at some point that tracks the individual characters and sees what makes them tick. Black Widow is especially a favorite, but there's a lot to say about all of them. One day.

Batman (1943)



Having finished the Captain America serial, I started the first Batman one. I've seen this one a few times and it's one of my favorites. It was one of the first serials I ever watched, come to think of it.

Filmed and released in the middle of the US' involvement in WWII, it has Batman working for the government and fighting fifth columnists in Gotham City. The bad guys are a bunch of disgraced and disgruntled industrialists led by a Japanese mastermind named Daka, who's working on behalf of his nation to undermine ours. And let me tell you, it's super racist. The characters, including the heroes, use every slur I've ever heard against the Japanese and several new ones. There's even a point where the narrator talks about how the "wise government" rounded up all the citizens of Gotham's Little Tokyo district and got them out of there, creating a ghost neighborhood.

Because the serial was created during wartime and is expressing anger towards an enemy nation (though in a very misplaced way, no doubt), I'm largely able to compartmentalize my feelings about that from my enjoyment of the mad science (it's filled with ray guns and mechanical zombies) and the portrayal of Golden Age Batman driving around in his normal sedan and trying to keep his fiance in the dark about his secret identity. It's weird and fun.

I also immensely enjoy the character of Captain Arnold, who sort of sits in for Commissioner Gordon. Gordon's not in the serial, so Arnold is the head cop and he has a cool attitude towards Batman. He's envious of Batman's ability to bring crooks in, but also cynically good-natured about it. If he can't have Batman on the force, he's content to just take credit for Batman's work. And he's very open about doing that. He's a delight and one of my favorite things about the serial every time I watch it.

My Top 10 Movies of 2014

10. X-Men: Days of Future Past



I don't know if I like it more for continuing the story of the First Class cast or for rescuing the original cast from the sourness I associated them with after Last Stand. I don't think I like DoFP as much as First Class, but it's a worthy sequel when it could have been an enormous mess. That's faint praise, I know, but I really love both generations of these characters and it was great to see them all treated well. And that Quicksilver scene alone earns it a spot in my Top 10.

9. Noah



I grew up with this story and I know it very well, so I'm extremely impressed and appreciative that Darren Aronofsky was able to make me think about it in a new way. And not just because he threw in some Ents. I wrote a full review of it, but to sum up: the movie makes powerful statements and asks deep questions about the relationship between humanity and nature, the inscrutability of God, and the perils of thinking you've got him all figured out. It has flaws, to be sure, but it moved and provoked me more than any other movie last year.

8. Begin Again



Wow, Keira Knightley had a good year. This is my favorite thing she did though. It looks and smells like a romantic comedy, but it's not. For one thing, though it's funny, it's not really a comedy. For another, though it'll try to fool you a couple of times, romance between the leads isn't the point. The point is about music: both the creation and the business of it. It's only 20% about the music industry though and 80% about what music is and what it means to us. There's a beautiful scene early on - really two different interpretations of the same scene - where Knightley performs a song live and we experience it first from her point of view as the nervous, insecure musician, and then from Mark Ruffalo's point of view as a music producer in the audience. It shows in a powerful way how the same song can give different experiences to different people. There's another moment later on that nails the feeling of putting on headphones in public and letting music change your perception of the world. With such wonderful groundwork laid about what music is, the movie's then able to comment on the way it's commercialized. And it does all this with some great and likable characters, including Knightley and Ruffalo's, but not limited to them.

7. How to Train Your Dragon 2



The first How to Train Your Dragon is one of my favorite animated movies of all time. It's funny, exciting, and emotionally stirring. I had no hope at all that the sequel would top it. And it didn't. But what it did do was go in a whole new direction: an epic fantasy that opened up the world of the first film and raised the stakes. It's a more serious, less joyful film, which means that I didn't enjoy it as much as the first one, but it's just as awe-inspiring in its own way.

6. The Lego Movie



When I was on the Nerd Lunch podcast last year talking about the 75th anniversary of Batman, one of the topics that came up was our favorite Batman movies. I'll never understand how I forgot to rank The Lego Movie just behind Mask of the Phantasm. In fact, since The Lego Movie is actually a Batman/Star Wars crossover, I may have to rethink that number 2 position.

5. Maleficent



I had to see this one twice to appreciate it as much as I do. There are some serious problems with Maleficent, starting with Sharlto Copley's unbelievable character and including some awful CG with Aurora's fairy guardians. That stuff really distracted me on first viewing, but what still stood out was Angelina Jolie's performance as a woman who has been hurt to the point of deeply wanting to hurt back, but hasn't yet lost all capacity to love. It's a powerful struggle and she shows it beautifully and movingly. Meanwhile, Elle Fanning grounds the movie perfectly as the tether that holds Maleficent to... well, "humanity" may not be the right word, but you know what I mean. Anyway, my second time watching it, those are the things I focused on and I loved it.

4. Guardians of the Galaxy



I'd want to call it the Star Wars for this generation if we weren't getting a new Star Wars movie next year. And besides, it's not really the same tone as Star Wars, is it? It's much more snarky and irreverent, but it balances that out with moments of humor, wonder, and just plain coolness. Even though it shares a basic plot structure with many of the other Marvel movies, it does so in its own, joyful way.

3. Captain America: The Winter Soldier



Speaking of plot, that's the reason Winter Soldier nudges ahead of Guardians of the Galaxy on this list. Winter Soldier takes some brave chances, not only by changing the status quo of the Marvel Universe, but also by not being about a bunch of people trying to get the same, all-powerful, cosmic object. Instead, it's a conspiracy thriller and a dang good one. I also love Anthony Mackie and that no one tried to force Cap and Black Widow into a romantic relationship. Boys and girls can be friends! Who knew?

2. Godzilla



I had this at number one for quite a while. It was easily the best time I had at a movie theater last year. A lot of that was manufactured by me and David though. We undertook a massive Godzillathon in the months leading up to May 16, filling in as many holes in our viewing as we had access to. We even made it to a local screening of the 1954 original. When it came time to watch the new one, we had a boys' night out (Diane had a previous commitment) at our favorite theater with the cushy lounge chairs, the Dolby Atmos, and the 30' x 70' screen. We were primed. And the movie didn't let us down. We loved the slow build to the final battle and the epic moments in that battle. When Ken Watanabe says, "Let them fight," we were screaming and whooping and we - and the rest of our audience - just got louder and more excited as the movie went on. The only thing that bumped it down to number two was Aaron Taylor-Johnson. I don't think he's bad in the movie, but he's certainly the only thing about it that I didn't find completely exciting. And that's a bit of a problem when he's the lead actor.

1. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes



A perfect sequel. It continues the story of the first movie, expands on it, raises the stakes, and does all that in a way that's just as emotionally powerful if not more so. Incredibly, it met and exceeded my impossibly high hopes for it. I don't have one bad thing to say about it and that's why it's Number 1.

The LXB adds to my list of favorite films

I'm going to take the week off from the LXB (I'm unqualified to talk about reality TV treasure hunters), but won't let that keep me from pointing out that last week's Top Ten Movies assignment was super popular and successful.

I especially love the themed lists that three of the members came up with, so I'll list those first.

• Top Ten Monkey Movies [Cool and Collected]
• Top Ten Time Travel Movies [Cavalcade of Awesome]
• Top Ten Vincent Price Movies [AEIOU and Sometimes Why]

But, as predicted, there were lots of movies that could easily have gone on my own list.

• Pee Wee's Big Adventure, Summer School, Back to the Future, and Ferris Bueller's Day Off [Flashlights Are Something to Eat]
• Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure and Monty Python and the Holy Grail [Life With Fandom]
• Can't Buy Me Love and The Avengers (I debated including The Avengers on my list, but decided I needed some distance from it to give it an objective ranking. I'm glad to see not everyone was that shy, because my feeling is that it deserves to be there.) [Random Toy Reviews]
• Terminator, Die Hard, and First Blood [Movie Hodge Podge]
• This is Spinal Tap [That Figures, who gets bonus points for also picking Night of the Demon.]
• Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, Aliens, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, and Batman (1966) [My pal Erik Johnson]
• The Crow [Jason Vorhees]
• Lean On Me [Team Hellions]

Some of those were picked by multiple bloggers, so I linked to the one I saw first. Seriously, the LXB roll call on this one is full of great films, so if you're looking to kill some time, you should check them all out.

LXB | Avengers, but with spies, but without Steed and Peel

For nerds of a certain age, there can be some confusion around the name Avengers. Most people are going to think of the Marvel superheroes, but there's still a dedicated group of fans for whom the name automatically brings to mind Patrick Macnee in a bowler and Diana Rigg in a catsuit. I neither blame nor pity them. Those are excellent things to spring to mind under any circumstances. But when I say "spy Avengers," that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about my response to this week's assignment from the League of Extraordinary Bloggers. Inspired by the Joss Whedon movie, Brian asks:

What pop culture heroes or stories would make for the ultimate crossover?

My mind immediately went to that March Madness bracket we did with all the action heroes. How cool would it be to do The Expendables the way we all want to see it done? Not with new characters, but with Stallone actually playing John Rambo and with Bruce Willis playing John McClane. Clint Eastwood could still play a threatening Dirty Harry. Maybe Schwarzenegger could bring back Dutch from Predator. That would be something to see.

But as I kept adding in characters from that bracket, I grew less pleased with the result. Snake Plissken and Indiana Jones wouldn't work without a time travel angle that would take over the whole movie. It also makes my head hurt to figure out a plot in which cops, spies, and soldiers all have something to do and can interact with each other for an entire film. So I decided to pick one genre and expand on it.

I picked spies partly because Bond and Bourne did so well in the bracket, but mostly because a) it's my favorite of those three genres, b) it's easy to add women to the cast, and c) there have been a ton of spy movies lately. That last one is important because it means that it's much easier to believe that these characters are all active and available to team up. With Rambo and Dutch, we'd have to spend the entire first act explaining why they're still (or back) in the game.

I already revealed them in the header image, but my ultimate spy team would be a 50-50 male/female mix: James Bond, Natasha Romanoff, Evelyn Salt, Jason Bourne, Ethan Hunt, and Hanna. I stopped it at six to keep it manageable (and limited myself to movie characters), but there's plenty of room for additional characters in cameos or whatnot: Mallory Kane, Hubert Bonisseur de la Bath, or any of the surviving cast of Red. Maybe not Maxwell Smart, but Anne Hathaway as Agent 99? Heck yeah. You could even throw in some TV spies for fun: Michael Westen, Jack Bauer, Annie Walker, or Carrie Mathison, for example.

What do you think? Would you pay good money to see that? What would your ultimate movie crossover be?

Hydra New Year!

What's your evil resolution?

The Marvel 52, Part Four: Marvel Knights

I've never been especially fond of the name "Marvel Knights," but I don't hate it either and since Marvel's used it a couple of times to identify its street-level, edgier characters, it's recognizable. So I'll use it too.

22. Dakota North by Ed Brubaker and Phil Noto



I don't know much about Dakota North. I don't think I've ever read one of her adventures, but she's a private eye working in the Marvel U and that could be a lot of fun. Maybe it's similar to Alias - I've never read it either - but with Brubaker writing it, it could be a fun, adventurous, Marvel version of something like Gotham Central. I picked Phil Noto for the art because he knows how to give female characters cool attitude without making them obnoxious.

21. Kraven the Hunter by Gail Simone and Marian Churchland

I admit that I picked Gail Simone for this because of the wonders she worked on Catman and because Kraven's a similar character. But visually, Kraven's much cooler and I'd love to see her do something comparable with him; give him some kind of moral center instead of just being whackadoo. Marian Churchland's soft, elegant work would give the series a pastoral look that would reinforce the idea that Kraven's seeking peace, even when he's involved in violence.

20. Hercules by Greg Pak, Fred Van Lente, LeUyen Pham, and Alex Puvilland



There are a few reasons I'm not reading the current Herc series; none of them having anything directly to do with the creators involved. Indirectly though, I wouldn't be able to pass up a Hercules series drawn by the wife-and-husband team (I think they're married; doesn't matter) of LeUyen Pham and Alex Puvilland (Prince of Persia, Solomon's Thieves). They've got a strong, mythic quality to their work that's totally unique and exciting.

As for why Hercules is in this category: it's a tonal thing. He was the original street-level hero. In Greek mythology - a world filled with iconic, superpowered beings - Hercules was the grounded one whom people could relate to. That feeling is important to who he is and last time I checked in, Pak and Lente were already doing a great job of presenting him that way.

19. Shang Chi: Master of Kung Fu by Phil Hester and Mark Smylie

I love Phil Hester's writing because there's always a layer of something deeper going on underneath the action. That's crucial to Master of Kung Fu, a series that in the '70s was filled with as much thought and philosophy as martial arts and espionage. Mark Smylie (Artesia) would complement that balance beautifully. He can paint the most brutally violent battle scene in the most exquisitely lush and contemplative way.

18. The Falcon by Greg Rucka and Steve Rude

The Falcon is one of those characters I wish I knew more about and would totally jump on if some exciting creators told a story about him. He's got a great look and I've loved him in Captain America and on Super Hero Squad, but I'd love even more to get him away from the other superheroes and see what makes him tick. I think Rucka and Rude are the guys to do that.

17. The Sub-Mariner by Ed Brubaker and David Petersen



Some of you have already pointed out that Namor would fit in well in other categories and you're right. He's a versatile character. I've put him in Marvel Knights in great part because of his attitude. I like Namor a lot, but he's a nasty dude with some serious problems he needs to get figured out. I'd certainly want this to have some great, undersea adventure to it, but I'd love for the tone to be similar to what Brubaker did with Captain America. It's exciting and fun, but it's grounded in real emotion as Cap continues to struggle - even after all these years - with being a man out of his own time. Namor's dealing with even more than that.

I picked David Petersen because he's got a realistic style and could draw the hell out of some undersea life.

16. The Panther by Mark Waid and Amy Reeder

One of the things I love most about Waid is that he knows how to dig into a character and find the approach that best suits that character's strengths without having to go off in a radical, new direction. Recently, Black Panther has changed gender, painted himself like the US flag, and borrowed Daredevil's tag line, so it's pretty clear that he's lost his way and needs someone to center him again. That's why Waid. Meanwhile, Amy Reeder (Madame Xanadu) has a sleek, romantic style that could be really cool for a series about a jungle king who dresses like a cat.

You've noticed that I dropped the "Black" from the title. I don't think it needs it, but I could be persuaded differently if it helps identify him as a black character. Unlike Falcon, when he's in costume you can't tell just by looking at him.

15. She-Hulk by Peter David and Cameron Stewart



Peter David's an underrated writer these days and his time on She-Hulk was done too soon. He inherited the character at a time when she was just coming off the tragic events of Civil War and World War Hulk and not only did he deal with that, he made her dealing with it an integral part of the story he was telling. He was also vocal though about wanting to eventually move past that to get back to the light-hearted She-Hulk he really wanted to write. The series was cancelled though and he never got the chance. I wanted to read those stories, so I'd bring him back. Artwise, I've been a big fan of Cameron Stewart since I discovered The Apocalipstix and would love to see him draw this.

14. Daredevil and Elektra by Mark Waid and Hub

Like Wolverine, Daredevil's another character I don't have a lot of affection for, but it wouldn't really be Marvel without a series that featured him. I haven't read Mark Waid and Marcos Martin's current run at Daredevil, but I'm not surprised to hear that it's very good. In order to make this interesting for me, I'd keep Waid on it, but turn it into another two-character team-up book by having Elektra co-star. Not that I'm a big Elektra fan either, but the two of them together may be more interesting than either of them separately.

The final push though would come from having Hub (Okko) on art. As great as Martin is, I can't not buy a book by Hub. He's also really excellent at depicting a fantastic version of Southeast Asia that could come in...er, Hand-y (sorry) when doing a book about a couple of ninjas.

13. The Champions by Kurt Busiek and Becky Cloonan



The founding line-up for this short-lived team was Black Widow, Hercules, Ghost Rider, Angel, and Iceman. The Russian superhero Darkstar joined later. I didn't read this as a kid, but discovered it later thanks to my fondness for Black Widow. It's pretty cool that she was leading this team in the '70s. That's not as unique an idea now as it was then, but the line-up of characters is still unexpected and weird, especially having Ghost Rider on board.

Angel and Iceman aren't quite as interesting now as they were when the team debuted either. They were fresh out of the X-Men after the All-New All-Different team sort of pushed them out and they had something to prove. They were looking for a new home and since they were going through it together, they were able to talk about it and compare their new team to their old one. I don't know if I'd use the same two characters today, but maybe someone comparable. Characters who are immediately identifiable as X-Men, but could reasonably feel pushed out of that group for some reason. It sort of needs to be former X-Men because while that's not the most familial group of superheroes Marvel has (that would be the Fantastic Four), it's a big enough family that there are by necessity fringe members. Gambit and Psylocke might be good choices. Maybe Jubilee? Someone who's been central to the team in the past, but isn't anymore. It could be interesting watching them to try to adapt to life outside an X-group.

Anyway, Busiek is a writer who loves to try new things and would be perfect for this. Becky Cloonan has a gorgeous, gritty style that would work well for this street-level team as well.

On Monday, we'll wrap up with the last 12 titles: Marvel Heroes.

The Marvel 52, Part One: Marvel Pulp

I've kept pretty quiet about DC's whole New 52 deal up to now. For better or worse, I don't form opinions quickly, so I gave DC some time to get all their announcements out and respond to the first couple of waves of concerns. I will say that my initial reaction was positive though. I haven't followed DC comics for a couple of years now, so it doesn't affect me personally that they're cancelling everything and starting over. If anything, some of their new series sound really interesting. Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang on Wonder Woman, for instance. Barbara Gordon as Batgirl again, as another example.

My main criticism is that DC seems to be hoping to eat its cake and have it too in regards to balancing current fans with potential, new readers. The New 52's been promoted as an "all-in" approach to reinvigorating the line, while at the same time refusing to call itself a reboot and insisting that fan-favorite stories (an extremely loosely defined category) still count. That's not very "all-in" at all and I suspect that their wishy-washiness will cost them some of those potential, new readers they're wanting.

I don't expect that they'll lose many readers though. As much complaining as fans have been doing, they're still fans. They've stuck with DC through Countdown to Final Crisis; I expect that they'll stick around through this. And it's not like Marvel's got anything especially exciting going on to compete. Yeah, yeah, Marvel still routinely beats DC in sales; all I'm saying is that I don't expect current DC readers to suddenly start switching to Marvel as a result of the "non"-reboot. Whatever you think of DCnU, it's certainly interesting. Marvel, on the other hand, continues to publish the same kind of crossover stuff they've been doing for the last five years. I'm not saying that none of it's good, 'cause some of it really is, but seriously...their section of Previews the last couple of months hasn't been nearly as exciting and expectant as DC's.

I wish I'd thought of this myself, but it was Comics Should Be Good (Robot 6's sister blog at CBR) that came up with the idea of developing your own Marvel 52. I like DC's idea of creating smaller imprints within the DCU (JLA, Batman, Superman, Dark, Edge, etc.). so I used that for my Marvel list too. Not that DC came up with it. Marvel's done the same thing before with Marvel Knights, Tsunami, Marvel MAX, and whatnot. I even used some of those in my list.

Because this could get long, I'm going to divide this up into a series of five posts going into September when DC launches their stuff. That'll give me some room to talk about why I picked the concepts I did as well as the creators I'd love to see work on them. We'll start with a category I call...

Marvel Pulp



The idea behind this "imprint" is to focus on some of the great, not-quite-superhero concepts that Marvel's had over the years: Westerns, jungle adventures, period heroes, spies, and space opera. We'll do this in countdown format, so:

52. Gamora by Kelly Sue DeConnick and Sam Hiti

Gamora's got a lot of history in Marvel's cosmic comics, but the focus on this would be her traveling the universe as an intergalactic bounty hunter. Gamora's extremely hard to kill and has a wicked sense of humor. Kelly Sue DeConnick (Osborn, Supergirl) can deliver the goods on funny (and excitement) while Sam Hiti (Tiempos Finales, Death-Day) knows everything about drawing beautiful women and exotic, alien landscapes.

51. Guardians of the Galaxy by Roger Langridge and Shaun Tan

As fun as a Gamora solo-title would be, we also need a book that can capture the rest of Marvel's cosmic characters like Silver Surfer, Thanos, and Rocket Raccoon. Roger Langridge (Thor: The Mighty Avenger, Snarked!) has the imagination to make that incredible, while Shaun Tan (The Arrival, Tales from Outer Suburbia) has the ability to mix the real and the odd in a unique, believable way. He's not known for action sequences, so I'd be interested to see how he tackled that, but I can already imagine his depiction of the arrival of Galactus and it's mind-blowing.

50. Sabra by Carla Jablonsky and Laurenn McCubbin

Sabra isn't a well-known character, but I've been fascinated by her since I first saw her in The Incredible Hulk #256. Maybe because she took her Israeli heritage so seriously, yet didn't seem to have been created specifically to fill a slot as Israel's Superhero for Contest of Champions or something. She eventually became just another of the many, international mutants running around the X-Men's corner of the Marvel Universe, but I've always thought she was better than that. I'd love to see her in a series that focused on the issues of the Middle East in a thoughtful, objective way. Not that Sabra herself should be objective about them, but that the series could explore the region and its history in a way that educates as well as entertains. Carla Jablonsky's done something similar with Nazi-occupied France in her Resistance series, so I picked her to write.  Laurenn McCubbin has a great, realistic style that would complement that kind of story beautifully.

49. Black Widow by Kelly Sue DeConnick and Amanda Conner



I don't know if this was the right thing to do, but though I picked 52 visual artists for my list, I only picked 26 writers and gave them each two books. That was partly because most writers can handle multiple books in a month, but it was also partly to make list-making easier on myself. I'm sure I'll regret it later when I realize I've forgotten one of my favorite writers.

At any rate, this is the second book I'd give Kelly Sue. I promise that I didn't purposely match up women creators with women characters, but it worked out that way in Kelly Sue's case. I'd love to see her write Black Widow. As for Amanda Conner: I love seeing anything she draws, but one look at her variant cover from Secret Avengers #6 above and you'll get why I want her on a Black Widow comic so badly.

48. Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD by James Turner and Luc Jacamon

If you've read James Turner's Rex Libris or Warlord of IO, you know how insanely, awesomely inventive he is. Just the guy to put the "super" back into super spy. And Luc Jacamon (The Killer) knows all about drawing deadly people in diverse settings, both urban and exotic.

47. Mystery Men by Susan Kim and Guy Davis

I really hate not to have David Liss and Patrick Zircher continue the concept they started, but one of the criteria I wanted for my list was to have as many women as possible on it. So I'm giving this '30s-set heroic pulp series to Susan Kim, who did such a great job with her adventurous City of Spies set in a similar time period. And I'm aching to see Guy Davis do some more stuff like he did on Sandman Mystery Theatre.

46. Tigra by Greg Pak, Fred Van Lente, and Kerry Callen



The inspiration for this book is two-fold. First, I wanted a jungle comic and Tigra would work great in that setting. She wouldn't have to stay only in that setting, but it would be a great homebase for her.The second inspiration was this description by Kerry Callen of what he wanted in a Tigra series: "a fun-loving character whose cat-like curiosity gets her into interesting predicaments." Pak and Van Lente would be perfect for that and one look at Callen's blog and you know he's the only guy for the visual part of the job.

45. The Savage Land by Joshua Fialkov and Jeremy Bastian

It's another jungle comic, but this one's different from Tigra. Her comic would be much more versatile with lots of guest-stars from other Marvel characters. The Savage Land of course would be set exclusively in the prehistoric world beneath Antarctica. At first I thought I'd call it Ka-Zar and Shanna (the first of several two-character comics you'll see in my Marvel 52), but then I remembered the temptation to take those two out of the Savage Land to interact with the rest of the Marvel Universe. Renaming it The Savage Land (which is a much cooler title anyway) removes that temptation.There's a whole world to explore there and as long as I'm fantasizing about my dream comics (as opposed to worrying about sales), I want to keep these characters out of the rest of the Marvel Universe. I don't care if other Marvel characters stop by for a visit, but I want the setting to stay consistent.

Josh Fialkov (Elk's Run, Tumor) does really well with setting and small casts of characters, so I pick him to write. Jeremy Bastian (Cursed Pirate Girl) draws lavishly and I'd love to see the creatures and landscapes he could fill the Savage Land with.

44. The Rangers by Alan Moore and J Bone

Based on another group of characters I once read about in The Incredible Hulk (#265 this time). The Rangers were a goofy team created by Bill Mantlo, but I liked their modern-Western concept and the sheer zaniness of it would be a great playground for Alan Moore. The team included Firebird (probably the most famous character to come out of the team) as well as modern versions of Red Wolf and the original Ghost Rider (renamed Phantom Rider to avoid confusion) and a couple of very Mantlo characters: Shooting Star (her gun shoots stars!) and Texas Twister (tornado powers). In keeping with making the series fun and versatile, J Bone can draw absolutely anything and make it look wonderful.

43. Gunslingers by John Ostrander and Leonardo Manco



Counterpoint to The Rangers, this would be a real Western set in the late 1800s. Really it's just a continuation of Ostrander and Manco's two mini-series, Blaze of Glory and Apache Skies in which they updated Marvel's classic, Western heroes for modern fans of Westerns.

Coming Monday: Midnight Sons!

Art Show: Zombie Spoor

Pirate



By Jim Silke. [Illustrateurs]

Mermaids



Artist Unknown. [Never Sea Land]

Tannhauser at Hoerselberg



By Willy Pogany. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

Namor Meets the Beatles



By Chaz Folgar. [Puffdoggydaddy]

10 movies I loved in 2010

So here they are. My ten favorite films from last year. Not necessarily the "best" in any objective way, but the ten I unabashedly dug the most.

Number 10



The other Leonardo DiCaprio movie that invites more than one possible interpretation. I like this one more though because though everything wasn't spelled out, it didn't need to cut away just before a crucial moment to deliver the ambiguity. We got the complete story. How we interpret it is up to us.

Number 9



Iron Man 2 got a lot of flack for not being Iron Man. And its critics are right that it isn't as tight a movie as the first one and feels like it spends a lot of time setting up The Avengers. But it was very entertaining in the process and though I never felt like Tony was actually going to die, I was engaged by the mystery of how he was going to survive. Which really, is as much as any adventure series with a recurring character can do. Besides, if nothing else, the film brought Scarlett Johannson as Black Widow and that's Top Ten worthy all by itself.

Art Show: All in a day's crimefighting

The Fugitives



By NC Wyeth. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

The Teamster



By James Bama. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

007



By Bob Lizarraga. [Art Jumble]



By George. [Art Jumble]

After the break: Batman, Black Canary, Black Widow, and Puck.

Arts Show: Fatal Femmes

Princess of Persia



By Meagan Vanburkleo.

Black Canary and Black Widow




By Mike Maihack.

Art Show: No jacket, Adam. You didn’t think it through did you?

Pirate Girl



By Katie Shanahan. [Art Jumble]

Undersea Agent



By Gil Kane. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

It's Valkyrie, Airboy!



By Fred Kida. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

After the break: Sandmen, Shang Chi and Friends, Wonder Woman, magic, creeps, and a space barbarian.