Wednesday Comics

This is one huge honkin’ comic book. And it’s one really beautiful comic book too.

Wednesday Comics was an experiment by DC Comics featuring tabloid sized comic pages featuring some acclaimed writers and artists presenting stories of DC characters…iconic and not-so-iconic…one page at a time published weekly (on newsprint no less.)

It seems unlikely to be repeated…16 tabloid pages for 4 bucks is probably too high a hurdle for a lot of comic fans to get over…but it was a grand little adventure just the same.

This big (17+” x 11+”) hardcover collects all of the stories on better paper and it’s a gorgeous comic book. All of DC’s big guns…Superman (with beautiful art by Lee Bermejo), Batman (a fine noir romance that might have needed a bit more room to breathe) and , Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, The Flash…are represented alongside of lesser-known (to the general public at least) classic characters like Hawkman, Sgt. Rock, the Metal Men, Deadman, Adam Strange, Metamorpho the Element Man, and Kamandi, the Last Boy on Earth.

The art is almost all wonderful and some of the stories are better than other. I was charmed by Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner’s whimsical Supergirl story featuring Krypto the Super Dog and Streaky the Super Cat (just go with it…:-), intrigued by Paul Pope’s pulp fiction re-imagining of the sci-fi hero Adam Strange, and engaged by the gritty WW2 Sgt. Rock story written by Adam Kubert and drawn by his legendary father Joe Kubert.

The rollicking Metamorpho adventure…by Neil Gaiman and Michael Allred…is also a great deal of fun as is the unlikely team-up of Catwoman and Etrigan the Demon by Walt Simonson and Brian Stelfreeze and Kyle Baker’s action-packed Hawkman story.

This book is pricey…it lists for $49.99…but it delivers in a big way. Wednesday Comics makes me happy and what more could you ask from a comic book than that?

The Dark Knight

(Fanboy mode on) WOW! (Fanboy mode off :-)

Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight is amazing. It balances the requisite action-adventure set pieces with a script that delves into the thin lines between heroism and villainy, between chaos and order, between the evil that men do because they can and the evil that men might do in the name of justice or for the sake of survival.

It’s atmospheric (it’s Gotham City after all), explosive and kinetic, fast-paced (despite its 2+ hour running time), brooding, brutal, and, yes, unabashedly over-the-top (we’ve had the discussion about the inherent preposterous in super-hero movies in this space before so I won’t bore you with it again.)

Christian Bale’s Batman is much more seasoned than he was in Batman Begins…he’s also more conflicted as his caped alter ego threatens to subsume his life; he’s also afraid that Batman may be the catalyst for as much madness as he is for goodness. Bale is great (especially when he puts on the Batman “growl” when he’s in the cape and cowl.)

The late Heath Ledger gives a bravura performance as the Joker. Where Jack Nicholson’s Joker did crazy with an impish wink, Ledger’s Joker is a full-on nihilist, a rampaging id bent on nothing less than creating as much chaos as possible. Ledger’s Joker is frightening, unpredictable, wily, disturbing, and mysterious (he gives a couple of different explanations of his origin along the way.)

Gary Oldman has some really nice moments as the conflicted Police Lt. Gordon and the other returning old pros…Michael Caine as the acerbic Alfred and Morgan Freeman as the wise Lucius Fox…also shine in their moments. Aaron Eckhart gets to display a wide range of emotions in his role of crusading District Attorney Harvey Dent (comic book fans will probably know where he’s headed and the movie goes there full on) and Maggie Gyllenhaal steps ably into the role of assistant DA Rachel Dawes (taking over the role from Katie Holmes who played the character in Begins.)

The Dark Knight tickled this fanboy’s jaded heart with an ending that, almost as a matter of course, leaves the door wide open for yet another sequel. Bring it on.

Movies Adapted from Comic Books

With Spider-Man 3 coming out a good year for movies adapted from comic books gets a whole lot bigger (Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and 30 Days of Night also in the offing this year with Iron Man, the Incredible Hulk, Hellboy 2: The Golden Army, Wanted, and Batman: The Dark Knight due out next year.)

The list of the top grossing comic book adaptations will change, of course…in fact it already has changed this year with 300 (#7), Ghost Rider (#19), and TMNT (#37) all jumping into the top 40 since this year began.

As of this writing, the top 10 biggest grossing movies based on comics from 1978 to the present (according to Box Office Mojo) are:

1. Spider-Man
2. Spider-Man 2
3. Batman
4. Men in Black
5. X-Men: The Last Stand
6. X2: X-Men United
7. 300
8. Batman Begins
9. Superman Returns
10. Men in Black 2

Spidey 3 seems likely to push MIB 2 out of the top 10 in fairly short order (300 just displaced Batman Forever down to #11.)

Looks like a good time to be a comic book geek :-)

Pop Culture Auction

I guess this is where I’m supposed to write something pithy like “up, up, and away!” :-) A Superman costume worn by Christopher Reeve in 1978’s Superman: The Movie was sold at auction for a heroic $115,000.

Profiles in History, a memorbilia dealer, racked up more than $2,000,000 at its auction of more than 700 pop culture items this week which also featured a latex Alien costume designed by H.R. Giger for the original 1979 movie Alien ($126,500), a Winkie guard costume from The Wizard of Oz ($115,000), a gown worn by Marilyn Monroe in There’s No Business Like Show Business ($92,000), Val Kilmer’s Batman costume from Batman Forever ($63,250), Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine claws from X2: X-Men United ($40,250), and Stevie Wonder’s Grammy for Innervisions ($37,350).

Man, that’s a lotta greenbacks for a bunch of old stuff :-)

Batman Begins

Batman Begins is, as its title so straightforwardly promises, a beginning. But my goodness, what a grand beginning it is! Christopher Nolan's film is stylish and atmospheric and intense...showing us young Bruce Wayne's childhood ended so abruptly by fear and by devastating tragedy to his journey to find a way to reimagine himself for a life of vengeance and justice to his first steps (and missteps) as Batman with well thought out detail and nuance. By the end of the movie, the status quo is set and a rather blatant foreshadowing of the villain for the next film is revealed.

Christian Bale is the first screen Batman who is able to fully inhabit both sides of Batman's persona (both Val Kilmer and George Clooney found Bruce Wayne's character in their own ways but didn't quite fully come to grips with Batman; Michael Keaton nailed Batman but played Wayne as a kind of bumbling dolt...kind of the way Christopher Reeve played Clark Kent in the Superman movies.)

The rest of the cast...Liam Neeson, Michael Caine (as the gently-acerbic butler, Alfred), Morgan Freeman, Katie Holmes, Gary Oldman (as Sgt..."someday I'll be Commissioner"...Gordon), Cillian Murphy (as the truly creepy Dr. Jonathan Crane)...is top-notch and each takes a plot-serving turn in the spotlight without detracting from the main players: Bale's Batman and the shadowy expanse of Gotham City (not as gothic as in Tim Burton's version but still daunting, foreboding, and a wonder to behold.)

I make no bones about being a fanboy when it comes to these things...but that enthusiasm isn't always well-met (*cough* Daredevil *cough*) when it comes to comic book heroes making the leap onto the big screen. Batman Begins joins the pantheon of cool comic book movies...along with Superman I & II, Spider-Man, Tim Burton's Batman, and X2...that appeals to both the fickle adult and the wide-eyed child co-existing in my cynical optimist's heart :-)