WEDNESDAY WHIMSY

By @hmsbeefnuts

Hello, welcome back. This week I am going to focus on books, comic books and the normal type. I don’t usually have a lot of time for reading, but recently, I have found myself reaching for a few books, and even finishing them! I know, how exciting. It is true, the majority of these books have been graphic novels, but still, they count, they definitely count. So without too much fuss, lets just get on with this blog shall we?

BATMAN THE BLACK MIRROR

This was the first time I had read a Batman story that didn’t involve Bruce Wayne, apart from the Knightfall saga. Dick Grayson is our Batman in this tale of serial murder, crime bosses, dead whales, villain auctions and sons gone bad. I would not want to spoil anything for you, it really is that good. At first I wasn’t sure if Batman would be as compelling without Bruce Wayne, but I needn’t have worried. Dick Grayson is a different kind of character, but no less compelling as the Dark Knight. His past as Robin, Nightwing and a police officer in Bludhaven all come in to play in some sublime story telling by Scott Snyder. In many ways this is the first comic since Batman: Year One that features the Gordon character in such a brilliant way. His story is just as compelling as Batman’s and sometimes even more so. This is one of the best Batman graphic novels I have ever read, and I really didn’t think I would be saying that about a Batman comic that didn’t have Bruce Wayne in it. I urge everyone with an interest in Batman to seek this out, it really is rather special.

OLD MAN LOGAN

In the world of the future, there are no heroes anymore. Most of them have died, and the few who are left aren’t in the hero business anymore. Logan AKA Wolverine, is older, has a family, and hasn’t popped his claws since the supervillains took over. He works a farm that is under the control of The Hulks, and he owes them a lot of rent money. When Clint Barton AKA Hawkeye comes to him with a proposition, Logan takes the seemingly easy job, so he can get the Hulks off his back. Basically a futuristic western, this has The Man With No Name flavour all over it. It is a fantastic tale, which I will not spoil here, that shows us the end of the Marvel heroes as we know them, and an adventure with Logan and Hawkeye. the first of which refuses to release his anger and claws, but you just know that at some point, someone is going to push him too far, he is Wolverine after all. I loved this book, and I would recommend it to anyone. As it doesn’t take place in comic continuity, you don’t need to know loads about the Marvel Universe but a basic knowledge will serve you well.

THE INFINITY GAUNTLET

As soon as I saw The Avengers (I refuse to call it Marvel’s Avengers Assemble), I knew I had to find out who that purple dude with a massive jaw line was. Well turns out he is Thanos, the Mad God, and this was the most recognisable Thanos book out there. Basic story is, after collecting all the Infinity Gems, and placing them in the Infinity Gauntlet, Thanos tries to impress his lady love Death. The gauntlet and gems give him ultimate power over everything and everyone in the universe and beyond, a power he uses to try to get the attention of the afore-mentioned Death. Of course this causes many problems for the heroes of Earth and beyond, so it’s time for a huge super hero smack down to stop Thanos before he destroys everything. This was my first proper taste of intergalactic Marvelness, and I have to say, it was pretty amazing. I love a good hero team up, and when all of Earths mightiest heroes team up with the galaxies strongest, fun is sure to be had. I will admit to not knowing a few of the characters back stories, but as I have been reading some classic Marvel recently, I knew most of the characters featured. I think that sometimes, diving in to a graphic novel fresh, can be a bit daunting, but it pays off often, and leads you on to discover more amazing adventures featuring characters you may never have thought about before. The Infinity Gauntlet is well worth checking out, particularly if you have an interest in the possible future direction of Marvel Phase Two movies.

That’s just about it for this week, I’ll see you again next week for more Whimsy of a Wednesday variety.

Wednesday Whimsy: My Latest Obsession

By @hmsbeefnuts

 

As a child, I was never into comics. Sure I knew who all the main guys were, from Captain America to Wonder Woman, I watched all the TV shows and cartoons, played with the toys, but I never really read comic books. As I grew a little older, I was introduced to Batman and Superman comics with Knightfall and The Death and Return of Superman, which I enjoyed, but I didn’t really have the ready cash to really get into comics in a big way. It wasn’t until after university that I really began to collect graphic novels, and my tastes were, shall we say, rather limited.

As a huge Batman fan, I delved into the most renowned adventures of the Caped Crusader, Year One, The Long Halloween, The Dark Knight Returns, loving them all I began to delve deeper, and right now, I have quite a large collection of Batman adventures, with a few stragglers here and there from Marvel or other properties. However, recently, things have changed, and my tastes have become far more eclectic. It started with a random visit to a budget book shop, where I found three Marvel Pocket Books. At first I dismissed them, but on closer inspection I realised that they were small page versions of the comic books, around half size, they reprint original runs of the most famous Marvel Characters. The shop had a Spider-Man and two Fantastic Four books, and the best thing was, they cost £1.99 each, make mine Marvel.

I devoured the first two Fantastic Four books which collected comic runs. It was interesting to read them in this way, as in normal graphic novels, the story is somewhat separated, but reading an extended run of the comics is very interesting. With the FF done, I reached for the Spider-Man one, The Night Captain Stacy Died, which was quite apt with the new movie coming out and everything. Out of comics, I turned to Amazon, and umm, well, lets just say, my credit card took another hit.

Searching on Amazon is very dangerous, they had around 20 more of these Pocket Books, including Spider-Man, Silver Surfer, X-Men, Iron Man, Captain America, Avengers, I was in hog heaven. I now have a very extended run of original Amazing Spider-Man comics to delve into, and all for under £4.00 each. The paper quality is good in these books, the covers nice, and although smaller than regular comics, it isn’t a disadvantage that they are, certainly not when one considers the price. However, these things often start small, but have a way of expanding a little out of control.

£3.99 is not very much money to spend on 6 + issues of a comic series, but £3.99’s add up, and even then I wasn’t finished. I had wanted to find out who the mysterious villain at the end of The Avengers movie was, was I added The Infinity Gauntlet to my basket, then Civil War, Platinum Avengers, a Wolverine novel, and a few Batman ones, just to prove I had never forgotten my first true love. Things were getting sillier. The comic podcasts I listened to had mentioned a Wolverine G.N. (graphic novel) called Old Man Logan, everyone raved about it, it was added to my basket. By this time, and remember, this was a virtual basket, the thing could barely contain the comic awesomeness contained within, I clicked buy, and thought, I’ll worry about the consequences later.

Now obviously, I haven’t even looked at some of the things Mr. Amazon sent me, but I am working my way through them. Currently I’m reading Captain America, and really loving it. It seems an odd time for someone to get heavily into comics, at the age of 31, but it feels right. The atmosphere is crackling with comic energy, the film world is obsessed, and to be honest, so am I. Recent Comic Con news hasn’t helped matters, it has just added petrol to a fire that was already burning way out of control.

But I think sometimes it does one good to indulge in a new obsession. It feels good, and doesn’t feel like I have wasted money, at least not yet. We can all geek out about stuff from time to time, at least I hope you can, you are reading this on a website called All Geek To Me. At the moment, I’m into all things comic book, and wouldn’t have it any other way.

As I type this, we are 3 days away from The Dark Knight Rises, and I am very excited to see how Chris Nolan has rounded off his trilogy. I’m sure it will be great, but until I finally get to see it Friday morning, I shall have to sate my desires by plunging into more and more comics. These things won’t read themselves you know. Till next Wednesday, so long folks.

Avenging April: Mutant Power

My Top 5 Mutants

By Geeky Gem

Not all Super heroes, come from another planet or just decide one day they want to fight crime, some, are very special indeed and are born with super powers. These heroes are known as mutants, they were born with their powers but may not have found out about them straight away. Here I would like to share with you my top 5 mutants, there in no real order they are just the ones I like the most.

 

Wolverine

Oh Wolverine, where would I be without Wolverine in my life. My first encounter with Wolverine was in the X-Men cartoon that I used to watch. Wolverine was created by Len Wein as a character in Incredible Hulk 180. John Romita Sr helped design his look, and Herb Trimpe drew his first appearance. Wolverine was born James Howlett and is commonly known as Logan. Wolverine is a mutant who possesses animal-keen senses, enhanced physical capabilities with three retracting bone claws on each hand and a rather nice healing power that will let him heal from almost any wound, disease or toxin at a fast rate, it also means he ages at a slower rate to humans. What more could you want, the problem is, as Wolverine has a healing power it means lots of people want to get their hands on him and experiment on him. This led to him being part of the Super Soldier program, which lead to his evolution as Weapon X where a near-indestructible metal alloy called adamantium was bonded with his entire skeleton without killing him. Meaning his once bone claws are now sharpe metal claws. Wolverine is a well rounded mutant, with a mind for trouble and an attitude to disregrade the rules. He is the best at what he does, but what he does isn’t very nice.

 

Gambit

 

Again Gambit is a a mutant I found through the X-Men cartoon, in fact all the mutants on the list are from the X-Men cartoon. Gambit’s real name is Remy Etienne LeBeau, he was created by Chris Claremont and the fantastic Jim Lee. Gambit’s mutant power is the ability to manipulate kinetic energy, he is also skilled in card-throwing, and hand to hand combat. Plus he also has a nice shiny Bo Staff which he pushes his power through in order to beat bad guys up. Gambit was a professinal thief before he joined the X-Men, he is often teamed up with Wolverine and has a on-off relationship with Rogue. One reason I like Gambit is that he is from Louisiana and speaks in a very thick Cajun accent. Which in the cartoon always sounded awesome.

 

Rogue

Rogue was always one of my favourtie X-Men, as her power sometimes leads to some upsetting things. Rogue’s name is Ann-Marie but her surname is still unknown. She was created by author Chris Claremont and Michael Golden. As with all the other mutants Rogue was born as a mutant. However she more so than most, considers her powers a curse: she involuntarily absorbs and sometimes also removes the memories, physical strength, and (in the case of superpowered persons) the abilities of anyone she touches. Which means for most of her life Rogue’s potentially fatal power has prevented her from making any physical contact with others, including her on-off relationship with Gambit, but after many years Rogue finally gained full control over her power. Rogue was a runaway who was adopted by Mystique and the Brotherhood, which meant she grew up as a villain, something that always interested me as nearly all the mutants have shady pasts. Well at leat the ones I like do. After Rogue permanently absorbed Ms. Marvel’s psyche and Kree powers, she reformed and turned to the X-Men, fearing for her sanity. Rogue for me always showed that not all mutants are glad they have pwers and some don’t only fear what they can do but fear themselves.

 

Nightcrawler

Now unlike the rest of the mutants on this list I did not come across Nightcrawler in the cartoon it was in fact in the X-Men 2 movie, from then I went on to watch the X-Men Evolution cartoon and this is where I wanted to find out more about the fantastic Nightcrawler and the first of 2 blue mutants on my list. Kurt Wagner is Nightcrawler’s real name, he was created by Len Wein (the man behind Wolverine.) and Dace Cockrum. Nightcrawlers mutant powers are the ability to teleport, invisibility in deep shadows, and adhesive hands and feet. He is one of the many mutants whose physical mutations include blue skin, two-toed feet and three-fingered hands, yellow eyes, and a prehensile tail. He is depicted as being a happy-go-lucky practical joker and teaser, and a fan of swashbuckerling fiction. Nightcrawler is a German Catholic and while this is not emphasized as much in his earlier comic book appearances, in later depictions Nightcrawler is more vocal about his faith. He often mentions his time in the circus, though it is never specified from where he originated, but who cares he’s blue and can teleport.

 

We are nearing the end of my top 5 mutants so last bu no means least is…

 

Beast

I told you there was more than one blue mutant on my list. May I introduce you to Sr. Henry Philip “Hank” McCoy. Also known as Beast, created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, Beast has to be on my list because he is awesome and blue, did I mention he is blue? Oh i did, okay then. Beast posssesses a ape-like superhuman physical strength and agility and oversized hands and feet, though he otherwise appears to be a normal human being. Throughout his life time, the Beast undergoes progressive transformations to his physiognomy, permanently gaining increasingly animalistic physical characteristics. These include blue fur, feline facial features, pointed ears, fangs, and claws. This leads to his physical power increasing to even greater levels, as do his senses. Despite his inhuman apperance, he is a brillaint man of the arts and science and is often found in his room hanging upside down reading a book and listening to classical music. While at the Xavier Insitute he teaches mathematics and is a bit of a prolitical activist. While he fights with his beastial inctincts and fears of soical rejection, Beast dedcates his life and his mind to creating a better life for humans and mutants a like. That is way I had to have Beast on my list, some mutants never believed that humans and mutants could live together, Hank did, and he wont stop untill that becomes a reality.

 

Well there we have it folks my top 5 mutants, I think this isn’t bad for my first top 5 anythimg, I can already hear Hmsbeefnuts pacing around trying to think of his top 5 mutants as well…