Too serious about comics.
In part one of our epic-geek-out Scott Pilgrim discussion, we looked at how the movie treated Scott’s relationships with Ramona, Kim, Envy and Knives. Now we turn our attention to Scott Pilgrim’s Finest Hour and the series’ antagonist, Gideon Gordon Graves. Once again, this post includes spoilers for book six. Lots of them, this time.
Part Two – Gideon’s Machinations
As you may possibly have noticed if you read, oh, any comics site in the world ever, Scott Pilgrim is currently the name on everybody’s lips – with the final book having been published a month or so ago, and the movie version out in US cinemas (with the UK release to come later this week), O’Malley’s series is exponentially more popular than it’s ever been and probably ever will be again. And at Comics Daily, as longstanding fans (alright, James longer-standing than myself) of the books, we’ve naturally got quite a lot to say about it all.
Although we’ve both read the last book, we haven’t yet got around to doing a proper “review”, as such – and since we’ve both seen the film, but have generally been bound in our roles as objective reviewers of it to treat it on its merits as a film rather than how it adapted the comic – we thought this site would be the ideal place to go into a bit more detail about how, as fans, we felt about Edgar Wright’s adaptation. And since it was also quite difficult to talk about the film without also talking about it in relation to the books – including the last one – we thought we may as well include our opinions on Scott Pilgrim’s Finest Hour as well. Returning to our “email conversation” format, we’ve managed to churn out a good few thousand words on the whole thing – so, to be kinder to you, we’ve split it up into chunks. And here’s part one. Be warned, of course, that the following will contain many, many spoilers for both the last book and the film – so it’s inadvisable to read it until you’ve read/seen one or both of them…
Part One – Book Vs. Movie: Scott’s Relationships
I’ve recently found myself in a position to, for the first time, read a pretty much complete set of Superman (and Action Comics and Adventures of Superman and associated tie-ins), kicking off with the first post-Crisis on Infinite Earths stories and running up to the Death of Superman era. Having only really read odds and sods before – namely, a combination of what DC have decided to collect in trades under the Man of Steel banner, a few issues I’ve picked up here and there, and the stuff that I read in UK reprints back in the late ’80s when they were among the first comics I ever read – it’s an eye-opening experience actually getting to experience the whole thing, in full context, as it played out. And it’s undeniably, especially in its early part, a very exciting and intriguing era – having kickstarted the relaunch with the Man of Steel miniseries, John Byrne was left with almost total control (as writer of both Superman and Action, while Marv Wolfman and later Jerry Ordway handled Adventures) of the franchise for two years, before a somewhat abrupt departure, and set about doing some very interesting things with it. And although plenty of it is now somewhat outdated (not to mention downright odd at times), those two years are nevertheless among the most consistently compelling runs that the “main universe” character has had in the last couple of decades – and it’s one from which present-day Superman writers could draw a fair amount of good inspiration. Read the rest of this entry »
It started in a box under a table at a sci-fi convention full of people dressed like Gerry Anderson characters and the Tom Baker-era Doctor Who. Back when no-one except you and the weird guy who smelt of weed at the video shop had seen any anime that wasn’t Akira or Ghost in the Shell, or at least, that’s the way it felt. I flicked through comics looking for something different. I didn’t know what, but when I saw it I’d know. And it turned out to be Channel Zero. Of course, I judged it by its cover, but how could you not? I read it on the train home while my friends slept. And then I read it again when I got home. And then I went to sleep for 2 hours, and read it again when I woke up. It was like nothing I’d ever read before. It was exactly what I needed, right when I needed it, and it changed my expectations of what a comic was. Read the rest of this entry »
Actually posted before the next issue comes out for a change, Chapter Nine of our look at the current X-Men crossover, Second Coming. Click behind the cut to read more!
This week! Because no-one else will talk about X-Men with me: Chapter Eight of our look at the current X-Men crossover, Second Coming. Click behind the cut to read more!
Terminator Too: #4 in a series.
Scud: The Disposable Assassin #19 by Rob Schrab and Dan Harmon, October 1997
A reference to the single greatest moment in Terminator 2, if not all cinematic history. To be fair, this reference was made in the 90s when Terminator 2 was still more or less the coolest thing in the world, as opposed to something which cool dudes aged 30-60 love to reference. And yes, that is Dan “Community” Harmon (!!) with a co-writing credit.
