Comic Flashback: Uncanny X-Men #289

My favorite era in X-Men comics is without a doubt the Blue and Gold team period from the early 1990s. I like this era because this is when I started collecting all the X books Marvel put out and I couldn’t get enough of the art of Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld, Larry Stroman, and Whilce Portacio.

Even after all these years, I still have a fondness for Portacio’s run on Uncanny X-Men. I enjoyed every issue he drew, but if I had to pick my favorite Whilce Portacio Uncanny issue, it would have to be Uncanny X-Men #289 (cover date June 1992). The issue was written by Scott Lobdell, with art by Whilce Portacio, and inks by Scott Williams.

I bought Uncanny X-Men #289 at the old New England Comics in Quincy Ma during one of their (then) rare 50% off sales. As soon as I saw the cover featuring Storm and Forge, I grabbed the issue. The image of the two heroes kissing was so simple, but striking at the same time. For a 14-year-old kid who was teaching himself how to draw, this was the type of cover art I dreamt of drawing myself one day.

Uncanny #289 held a lot of surprises other than the cover. For one thing, this issue features almost no action scenes. Instead, Scott Lobdell chose to focus on the relationship between Forge and Storm. Everything starts off with a tour of the X-Mansion for the newest team member, Bishop. After the tour, he tries to flirt with Storm but gets shot down. Here Bishop realizes that something else is bothering her.

Elsewhere in the mansion, Forge and Iceman are chatting as Iceman gets ready for a big date. As the two talks, Iceman notices something seems to be bothering Forge. Later, Archangel runs into a younger version of Angel shows up, dressed up in Angel’s old uniform. Archangel attacks the impostor taking out his frustrations on his younger self. After taking the beating, the younger Angel changes shape to reveal Mystique.

The commotion spills into the hallway where Storm, Bishop, and Forge were talking.  Storm reprimands Mystique (as does Xavier mentally). But Forge leaps to Mystique’s defense saying she was only trying to reach out to Archangel. The argument then shifts to Forge and Storm, revealing that the problems affecting them earlier have to do with their relationship.

Forge admits to Storm that his problem is how since she has resumed leadership of the X-Men. she’s made no time for them. Storm agrees she’s been distancing herself from him, but not intentionally. Forge wants Storm to prove her felling for him. He professes he loves her and finishes by asking Storm to marry him.

Reading this in the car on the way home, I was in absolute shock. Sounds silly now, but keep in mind this was back when comic companies didn’t advertise moment like this one. This was before publishers leaked every detail to USA Today or the New York Times ahead of time. Back in 1992, there weren’t 150 variants to mark the occasion. So for 14 years old me, Forge’s proposal came out of nowhere.

I had only been reading the X-Men books for a few months, so I had no idea there could be issues like this with little action and a ton of emotion. It was also cool seeing doing normal things like getting ready for dates. Another nice feature was seeing parts of the mansion that you normally didn’t get to see, including the array of old photos Professor Xavier had around the house.

As for the art, it was awesome as usual. Except for one panel where Storm yells at Mystique, and for some reason Storm’s head is in black and white. I never found out if this was a printing error or something else. Either way, Whilce Portacio knocked it out of the park in this issue. Some fans might say his best work is with action scenes, but I thought he did a great job with the quiet scenes, especially with the proposal.

 

All in all, I think Uncanny X-Men #289 is one of the X-Men’s most underrated issues. If you’re a fan of character-driven stories, this is the comic for you. Or even if you’re just a Storm fan, you’ll probably really enjoy this and the next issue, which sadly was Whilce Portacio’s final issues. Nearly 27 years after its release, Uncanny X-Men #289 remains one of my favorite X-Men comic of this or any era.

Advertisements

I paid to see that: She’s All That

Seeing how today is Valentine’s Day and love is all around, I thought I should write about one of the many horrible romantic comedies I’ve paid to see over the years. As luck will have it, the late 1990s to early 2000s saw a ton of teen romantic comedies hit theaters.

I guess we saw a lot of teen comedies around this time because they were cheap to make and the studio could turn a quick profit. However, the quality of these teen romantic comedies varied from good, to “oh my god, why was this made?” One of the movies in the latter group is 1999s “She’s All That.”

I saw “She’s All That” opening weekend at the General Cinema in Braintree MA. The movie was my then girlfriend’s choice, and it was one of the last movies we saw before breaking up a few weeks later. To be fair though, I don’t think her making me see “She’s All That” had anything to do with the breakup.

Anywho, in case you blocked out the movie from your memory (it has been 20 years after all), “She’s All That” was directed by Robert Iscove and starred Freddie Prinze Jr., Rachael Leigh Cook, Paul Walker, Jodi Lyn O’Keefe, Anna Paquin, Kevin Pollak, and Matthew Lillard.

Freddie Prinze Jr. played Zack, a smart kid who has the third-best grade point average in his class and is also the captain of the soccer team. Probably because making a football player would not have been realized. Nothing against Freddie Prinze Jr. but the doesn’t look like he could take a football hit.

Regardless, Zack is a lucky guy. Not only does he run the school, but he is also dating the most beautiful girl in class, Taylor (Jodi Lyn O’Keefe). But early in the film, Taylor breaks up with him after going to Daytona Beach and meeting Brock Hudson (Matthew Lillard), star of “The Real World.”

Thanks to her new boyfriend’s fame, Taylor is sure she’ll be crowned prom queen. That’s when (for reasons I still don’t understand), Zack’s buddies bet him he can’t take another girl and turn her into a prom queen. He accepts the bet and chooses Laney (Rachael Leigh Cook), a quiet nerdy girl who paints in her basement.

Had I known what “She’s All That” was about beforehand, I might have fought to see something else. But I didn’t, so there I sat, one of only a handful of guys in the theater. As the movie unfolded before me, I thought to myself “This plot is very familiar.” Then it hit me: “She’s All That” is basically “My Fair Lady,” but without a talented cast and award-winning score.

“She’s All That” uses the classic formula of turning the ugly duckling into a swan. The problem is that acting-wise, Rachael Leigh Cook is no Audrey Hepburn. I could believe Hepburn was this poor, uneducated girl because her performance was so captivating. I couldn’t buy into Rachael Leigh Cook the same way because I’d seen her on TV before and she is quite beautiful, to begin with. Plus her character here isn’t as endearing as Audrey Hepburn’s was.

Freddie Prinze Jr. as Zack is certainly no Rex Harrison. I’m not saying Prinze Jr. is awful, but in “She’s All That” he seems to have only one facial expression. Even in the scenes where he was supposed to be vulnerable, he just couldn’t pull it off. Prinze lacked charisma in the role, but maybe that’s the script’s fault. Come to think of it, out of all his friends, the only one who has any charisma is Paul Walker as Dean Sampson.

To be fair though, not everything in “She’s All That” was bad. For once, the senior prom wasn’t the central theme of the movie, but simply a subplot. Cast-wise, I really liked Anna Paquin as Zack’s sister, but she wasn’t in the movie nearly enough. Paquin was already an Oscar winner, so I’m not sure why you wouldn’t give her a larger role. I also liked Kevin Pollak as Rachael Leigh Cook’s pool cleaning dad.

One of the only times “She’s All That” made me laugh, was when Prinze Jr. brings a soccer team to clean Rachael Leigh Cook’s house so she doesn’t have to. During all of this, Kevin Pollack is into an episode of “Jeopardy” that he doesn’t even notice all the strange people in his house. That is until one of the soccer players shouts out the right answer to one of the “Jeopardy” questions.

But I can’t help but feeling that “She’s All That” should have been a better movie. There are some good ideas here, and the cast would have been great with the right material. In the end, though, I get the feeling someone at the studio or one of the filmmaker decided to play it safe when it came to the finished product.

Meanwhile, my girlfriend LOVED “She’s All That” and thought Freddie Prinze Jr. was the best thing ever. The man could do no wrong in her book, she went as far as to say his performance touched her soul. Part of me wanted to ask her if we saw the same movie, but when she told me Prinze Jr. was on her list to cheat with. I replied back “Can Rachael Leigh Cook be on mine?” Let’s just say that line didn’t go over very well.

Heartbreak Hotel

February 14th has never been one of my favorite days. There are several reasons for this, but our of all of them, perhaps the strangest Valentine’s Day I’ve ever had happened in 1999. It all started a little over a week earlier on the night of February 5th when my then girlfriend Kristen and I decided to grab dinner at a restaurant near her house.

Kristen and I had been dating for nearly nine months but had hit a rough patch since the holidays. By the time February 1999 rolled around, we were fighting more and more and working at the same place just made the entire thing worse. Anyways, back to our night out on February 5th.

This restaurant had karaoke night once a week and she wanted to try it out. All night she kept trying to get me to sing with her, even telling me she’d let me pick the song. I’m glad to say though, I never accepted her offer. But Kristen was adamant that she wanted to sing and she got up there and dedicated Eagle-Eye Cherry’s “Save Tonight” in my honor.

Her song was strange because she had told me several times she hated that song. But at the time, I didn’t think too much of it. After I got her home that night, I decided to give her an early Valentine’s Day: tickets to Disney on Ice. 

Two days later we had a morning meeting at work, and as the meeting was winding down, my friend John called to ask me if we were still on for that afternoon. We had made plans to go into Boston for lunch and wrestling event. But while I was talking on the phone, Kristen grabbed the phone out of my hand and demanded to know if it was another girl. John was of course confused, and Kristen got angrier and slammed the phone down.

From there she told me she saw me a couple of months at school eating lunch with another girl. This was true, she was my assigned lab partner in Biology, but nothing more. But the more pressing matter was how Kristen saw me. After all, we didn’t go to the same college. That’s when she told me she’d been following me to make sure nothing was going on at school. That was the final straw for me, and I told her I was done. I couldn’t deal with it anymore. I broke up with her at work in front of everyone.

Although I was still pissed off, I kept my plans with John and drove into Boston. After the wrestling event, I checked my messages and there were 17 from Kristen. I’m sure you can imagine the stuff she said to me. The only message that made me laugh was the one when she told me she was keeping the Disney on Ice tickets, and taking our co-workers with her.

Over the course of the next couple of days, I learned that she had been seeing our coworker for quite some time. In other words, she was seeing him at the same time she was accusing me of being unfaithful. In a weird way, I was kind of relieved. Maybe it wasn’t my fault after all, and the guilt I had been feeling since the holidays wasn’t needed.

Valentine’s Day eventually arrived and I was at work when my ex and her new love interest showed up on the way to Disney on Ice. I jokingly told her I was glad to give them both a good Valentine’s Day, which she didn’t seem to appreciate. But she made sure to tell me they were going to a nice romantic dinner afterward. The next day one of my co-workers told me Nick had taken her to Burger King which made me laugh for the first time in a long time.

As I said earlier, Valentine’s Day has never been a good day for me. Ever since I was a little kid in elementary school, I’d give my classmates cards but rarely got anything back. In high school, the girl I had a crush on laughed at me when I dared to ask her out. And I’m not even going to mention what a mess I made of Valentine’s Day during my twenties.

But for some reason,  Valentine’s 1999 always sticks out as a good day. Yeah, it was sad that my relationship ended, but I still think it was for the best. And besides, I really didn’t want to go see Disney on Ice.

Daredevil #1 Review

Daredevil #1  
Written by: Chip Zdarsky
Art by: Marco Checchetto, Chip Zdarsky
Cover Art by Julian Tedesco
Release Date: February 6, 2019
Cover Price: $4.99
Published by: Marvel Comics

What it’s about…

KNOW FEAR.

What I thought about it…

I was somewhat reluctant to try another Daredevil #1 from Marvel Comics. This is after all the sixth or so relaunch for Daredevil since 1998. But while I was at my comic shop this weekend, I heard good things about Daredevil’s new book by Chip Zdarsky
and Marco Checchetto, so I decided to give it a shot. And boy has things changed for good old Matthew Murdock since I last read his book.

As Daredevil #1 opens, Matt’s life is a mess. I might go as far as saying this is worse than ever before. But instead of feeling sorry for the guy, I actually liked seeing Matt down on his luck and in pain. This is something we don’t see out heroes go through often, and it reminded me that despite all his gifts, Matt Murdock is still human.

Chip Zdarsky makes that point even clearer as he writes Matt Murdock as a man recovering from a difficult physical trauma. We’re not told everything that has been happening, but Murdock is desperately trying to get back to normal as quickly as possible. Or perhaps it’s more like forcing himself back to normal?

Anyways, Zdarsky slowly shifts the story back and forth between Matt’s brooding darkness today, and Matt as a kid. This issue has some nice Daredevil action as well, but I gotta say that my favorite part of the book was seeing a young Matt Murdock before his accident.

I don’t remember ever seeing him during this period before, and it was cool to see he’s always had that fighting spirit. Also, his friendship with the priest had some very touching, and some funny moments too.

The plot in Daredevil #1 is quite good, but what really sold me on this comic is the art by Marco Checchetto. With this being a number one issue, Checchetto was able to \establish a new look and tone for the series. Checchetto did an excellent job setting the mood throughout the first issue. In some ways, it reminded me of the Netflix Daredevil show, which is quite a feat to pull off in a comic book.

Parts of the art even have a hazy, dreamlike quality that makes Matt’s world that both realistic and unsettling. Also, Checchetto’s elegant figures capture the intensity and energy of Daredevil’s world. Whether he’s fighting crime or meeting a girl in a bar, Checchetto makes every scene look incredible. The man draws beautiful women too, and some great action scenes.

I don’t know what it is about Daredevil, but he seems to be a character that always brings out the best in any creator, and that’s exactly what’s happened with Chip Zdarsky and Marco Checchetto. Their Daredevil #1 works on a number of levels which will leave regular readers happy. But this issue is also a great jumping on point for new readers who want to see what Daredevil is up to these days. No matter which camp you fall into, Daredevil #1 was definitely worth the price.

Daredevil #1 score: A+

Better late than never review: Widows

Possible spoilers ahead!

“Widows” begins in modern-day Chicago when a team of armed robbers led by Harry Rawlins (Liam Neeson) are all killed during a job gone wrong. After Harry’s death, his widow Veronica (Viola Davis) comes to learn that Harry and his crew stole $2 million from Jamal Manning (Brian Tyree Henry), a crime boss who’s currently in the midst of a political campaign.

When Jamal pays Veronica a visit, he makes it clear that he wants his money back. He tells Veronica that she has one month to settle her late husband’s debt or she will suffer the consequences. Veronica has no other option but to accept the terms, and when she finds Harry’s plans for another job, she decides to put a crew together. To pull off the job Veronica recruits Linda Perelli (Michelle Rodriguez) and Alice Gunner (Elizabeth Debicki), widows to the other members of Harry’s team.

If the women are successful, they will settle their debt with Jamal and secure their futures. However, an already dangerous caper becomes all the more challenging when Jamal’s political rival Jack Mulligan (Colin Ferrell) and his dad Tom (Robert Duvall)  become part of the equation.

With all the talent involved, I had really high hopes for “Widows.”  But I’m sad to say, this film was a mess from start to finish. Part of me was hoping for a fun action caper, or at the very least, a captivating crime drama. In the end, I got neither because “Widows” doesn’t seem to know what kind of movie it wants to be.

The film’s tone is all over the place. Sometimes “widows” plays like a revenge thriller, but the next sequence it becomes a political drama or a sappy soap opera. The movie has very little in terms of action, with the majority of “Widows” composed of characters talking with one another.

I don’t have a problem going in that direction rather than with high-octane set pieces if the conversations mean something. But the movie spends too much time repeating itself. I lost count of how many times the women discussed needing a driver. And most of those scenes were just an excuse for Viola Davis to yell at the other women for the dumbest stuff.

 

Speaking of the cast, Viola Davis does a good job with the material she was given. She had the clearest motivation and was often underestimated by others. One thing I really liked about her performance as Veronica was how angry she became at her late husband. I got the feeling it wasn’t so much for being a thief, but because he lied to her for all those years.

However, Viola Davis is the only actor that gets a full story arc. Linda Perelli (Michelle Rodriguez) and Alice Gunner (Elizabeth Debicki), don’t get nearly the same amount of story as Veronica. All I remember about Rodriguez’s character is that she has kids and owned a business. Debicki meanwhile, has a subplot where she becomes a call girl, but I don’t remember this plotline ever leading to anything major. She was, however, the most sympathetic character.

As for the men in the film, Lian Neeson was collecting a paycheck, and Robert Duvall and Colin Farrell deserve better material than this. Brian Tyree Henry has a couple of nice scenes as Jamal, but the whole political race angle of the movie doesn’t have a satisfying payoff. In fact, I didn’t think any of the major plotlines had a satisfying end.

Even the one confrontation I was looking forward to from early on failed to deliver. When this scene finally arrives, it lasts maybe two minutes it not less, and what happens was a letdown.

When all is said and done, with that talented cast and a great director in Steve McQueen, “Widows” should have been a home run. There are glimpses here and there of what could have been a great caper film. But this movie needed some major script edits and maybe one or two fewer characters. More than once I was checking my phone to see how much time was left, and that’s not something I expected.

“Widows” score C-

Better late than never review: Mazinger Z: Infinity

Possible spoilers ahead!

“Mazinger Z: Infinity” takes places years after Koji Kabuto and Tetsuya Tsurugi piloted the mighty Mazinger Z and Great Mazinger super robots against Dr. Hell. his minions and their legions of mechanical monsters. The war took a toll on everyone involved, but eventually, Mazinger and Great Mazinger prevailed against the forces of evil and the world was safe once and for all.

Today, Koli and Tetsuya are older and wiser men, and their respective robots are retired museum pieces for the public to enjoy. The former Photonic Power Lab director Dr. Yumi is now Japan’s prime minister, and his daughter (and Koji’s old flame) Sayaka, is the Power Lab’s new director. Meanwhile, Tetsuya’s old partner Jun is now his wife and expecting his child.

However, the worldwide peace brought by photonic power doesn’t last. When Sayaka’s team discovers a new, bigger Mazinger, Dr. Hell and his army emerge from the shadows and attack the world once again. Soon, Great Mazinger and the latest Mazinger appear lost in battle, which means the time has come for Koji and friends to save the day one more time.

I have been a Mazinger fan since I was three or four years old. The “Mazinger Z” series is the first cartoon I remember following religiously. The show sparked my love for mecha, taught me right from wrong, made me laugh, and gave me and my friends endless hours of entertainment. If it weren’t for Mazinger, I may not be the nerd I am today.

Now, nearly four decades since I first discovered Go Nagai’s creation, I still try to catch anything Mazinhger related from animation, to magazines to toys. So why did it take me almost two years to see “Mazinger Z: Infinity”?

Simple: It took this long because I couldn’t find a copy of the movie anywhere. That finally changed last week when I found it online. My agonizing wait was over and at long last, I got to see “Mazinger Z: Infinity” in all its glory, and I loved everything I saw.

“Mazinger Z: Infinity” is interesting because it’s not only a sequel to the original “Mazinger Z” and “Great Mazinger” series but also progresses the characters. All the characters are older and several relationships have changed. Koji Kabuto has finally grown up in many ways, though he’s still unable to commit to Sayaka. Koli has even given up piloting Mazinger, passing the torch to little brother Shiro, who’s about the same age Koji was when he became Mazinger Z’s pilot. I loved seeing all of this play out, mainly because I wasn’t expecting it.

Yet, everything that I liked from the original show was still there. But now I got to see how the war against Dr. Hell affected each character. In fact, much of this movie is character driven, rather action driven. I even liked seeing Boss, Nuke, and Mucha running a noodle restaurant.

I will admit that I was a little surprised to see Koji’s on again off again girlfriend Sayaka as the new director of Japan’s Photonic Power Lab. But only because in the original Mazinger series she never seemed like the one who would take over for her father. However, she quickly grew on me and I liked how decisive she was in the role.

The only new cast member comes after Sayaka discovers another Mazinger robot buried at the base of Mt. Fuji. This Mazinger one is nearly ten times bigger than Mazinger Z, and inside this new Mazinger is a mysterious A.I. pilot named Lisa. She gives the film a lot of humor and heart. Her childlike innocence is funny to watch play out, but she can be a great ally in battle as well.

It was also cool seeing the villainous Dr. Hell, and his lieutenants Brocken and Baron Ashura, again. There was just something special about seeing all the core characters together again. The filmmakers even brought in Ichiro Mizuki (singer of the original Mazinger Z theme) comes in with a revised version of the song for the film’s opening
Credits.

Take note movie studios: This is the way a long-running franchise can reboot itself but still maintain what made it great in the first place.

“Mazinger Z: Infinity” is a fun and refreshing re-start for a character I’ve loved most of my life. This movie brought me back to being a kid who ran home from the school but so he could catch the latest episode of “Mazinger Z.” on television.

 In the end,  the robot battles in “Mazinger Z: Infinity,” look better than ever before, and the human characters have finally evolved. All of the pieces are here to make “Mazinger Z: Infinity” a must see for all Mazinger fans.

“Mazinger Z: Infinity” score: A

Polar Review

Possible spoilers ahead!!

The Netflix film “Polar” is based on the webcomic-turned-graphic novel of the same name by Victor Santos. “Polar,” tells the story of infamous assassin Duncan Vizla/The Black Kaiser (Mads Mikkelsen), who is weeks away from retiring after a long career. But the organization he worked for wants him hunted down before he can retire. Why?

Because the company’s leader, Blut (Matt Lucas) decides It’s cheaper to kill Duncan than it is to pay him the $8 million-dollar retirement pension he’s owed. Blut’s second in command, Vivian (Katheryn Winnick) repeatedly warns him going after Duncan is a bad idea, and suggests paying him is the smart move. That way she argues, they don’t have to look over their shoulder for the rest of their lives.

Blut refuses to take the advice, and instead sends his most elite squad of assains to take Duncan down. The foursome takes out anyone that may know where Duncan is living, but as the body count rises, Duncan is living a quiet life in his Montana cabin. However, the assassins eventually track him down, and when they involve Duncan’s innocent neighbor,  Camille (Vanessa Hudgens), he isn’t just out of retirement – he’s out for blood.

“Polar” was without a doubt a crazy film. This is not a movie for everyone, and it certainly wasn’t what I expected at all. The Jonas Åkerlund directed film is a wild ride from start to finish, with a ton of action, sex, and a massive body count. “Polar” was also a lot darker than I would have thought based on the trailers, but there are still a few laughs along the way.

One of the best things “Polar” has going for it is its lead, Mads Mikkelsen. It’s clear the actor put in the work to look like the killing machine Duncan supposed to be. He looks great in the fight scenes and convinced me he was someone to fear. But Mikkelsen also gives Duncan a nice amount of heart, which was nicely captured through his subplot with Vanessa Hudgens’ character.

While this type of relationship is another trope we have seen before in films like this. But, it still provided enough genuine dramatic moments that it kept me interested in the fates of these two characters. I’m no fan of Vanessa Hudgens, but she did a nice job with the part. This is certainly the most grown-up role I’ve seen her in and I appreciated that her relationship with Duncan was one of father figure rather than a love interest.

However, that subplot is simply a vehicle for the over the top violent action-sequences in “Polar.” Mikkelsen was fantastic in these scenes, with a nice blend of gun-play, hand-to-hand combat, and dark humor. He made the killing spree’s a ton of fun to watch. which I realize is a strange thing to say.

One of my favorite action sequences was the one where Duncan tells one of the assassins sent to kill him, “Try not to be afraid.” He says it over and over again in a calm manner, and even explains why he’s saying. With just a few words, he showed how menacing Mikkelsen could be without a gun. It’s a simple scene, but quite effective I thought.

As I said before, Mads Mikkelsen is the best thing “Polar” has going for it. But this comes at the expense of some of the other characters who get little to no development. I’m still not sure why Blut (Matt Lucas) refused to pay any of his retired assains. Maybe he was just cheap, but considering how much he was spending on killing his former employees, it might have been cheaper just to pay them off.

Some of the supporting cast of character are almost cartoon versions of killers including a quiet one, the sex-pot, and more. One of the assassins sent to kill Duncan has one job: seduce the target. So, of course, we get more than one sex scene with her and so many ass shots that I lost count. Some of her scenes were the type of stuff you’d see on Cinemax after dark.

The only supporting character that gets any sort arc is Vivian (Katheryn Winnick). For much of the film, we don’t really know which side she stands on. I got the feeling maybe Duncan had been some type of mentor to her, so she was well aware of what he could do to them, but I don’t recall if this was ever confirmed or not.

I also liked Vivian’s sense of style. I think she had a different look in every scene she was in. Unfortunately, we don’t get to see her in action. Most of the time she’s on the phone or yelling at Blut. But I liked her and was left wanting to know more about this mysterious assassin.

In the end, “Polar” is a roller coaster ride of a film with some good and bad parts. However, if you like ultra-violent assassin movies and don’t mind some borderline sex-scenes, then “Polar” is just right for you. If nothing else, it’s checking out for Mads Mikkelsen’s performance.

“Polar” score: B (speak)