I saw John Carter this last weekend... It was a lot of fun. Ignore the critics and Disney's horrible marketing campaign and just enjoy the movie.

Here a fun clip with Woola!



-Swinebread

Disney Buys Marvel 3... ...and Swinebread's Thoughts

Disney buys Marvel and the pop culture world shakes… Some folks are upset, some think it’s great, some are wait and see. Me? I’m feeling a little worried about it as Disney can be quite a hog when it comes to pop culture. Plus, the house of mouse has an image that doesn’t exactly appeal to the average male. On the other hand Marvel has been screwing up most of their characters lately so why not. Disney could sure use the help too because it’s all but tapped out when it comes to creativity. The idea of Marvel and Pixar working together gets the fanboy similes going regardless.

The weird thing about all this for me is that it completes a setup of the big 2 comic companies that I think is backwards. DC has been a part of Time/Warner for a while now but you know what? It never sat right with me. Superman and Batman don’t belong with Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck imho. DC has always been the goodie two-shoes universe and so they belong with the goodie two-shoes Disney characters. I’ve always thought the nebulous morality of the LT cartoons lent them selves better to the angst ridden Marvel Universe. Warner has done some great things with the DC animated shows so my bias has been tamped way down but with the sale of Marvel to Disney it jumped back up to the forefront. Spiderman and the Hulk with Mickey and Donald? Yuck….!
And since Disney owns the Muppets too I just know they will come out with Muppet versions of the Marvel Supers too, although that’s not so bad.

Ultimately all this probably means nothing except that the Marvel Superheroes will eventually get overexposed and Marvel might get much more litigious.

I do have one caveat to all of this in that it was pretty cool when Duck Dodgers joined the Green Lantern Corps. Maybe will see Super Goof join the Guardians of the Galaxy?


-Swinebread

Disney Buys Marvel 2

--Dean Wormer
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Disney Buys Marvel

--Dean Wormer
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I had an interesting foodie experience at Trader Joes last weekend. The wife was feeding a sample of gnocchi to Jr. and he was enjoying it so much that I decided to give it a try as well. I grabbed a cup and while I brought a spoonful of the gnocchi to my mouth I noticed that there was some sort of tomato sauce with zucchini on it. Not thinking much of it, I popped the food in my mouth. I noticed that it had a wonderful sweet-earthy taste and I actually thought to myself this sauce was real peasant food. Then I had the image of Anton Ego’s reaction to eating Remy’s Ratatouille dish. After savoring another bite I thought, “hmmmm Ratatouille must really taste similar to this.” I looked over at the sample stand to see what the sauce was and the sign read Ratatouille.

I’ve never had ratatouille in my life… and I had no idea what it looked like or the ingredients in it beyond the Disney film. It’s weird. Ratatouille is a great film but I never realized that it actually had the power to impart what something actually tastes like.

see here for a picture of Trader Joe's Ratatouille.

-Swinebread

My New Comics

This week’s best cover is Army of Darkness: From the Ashes #3.


Jack of Fables #16, DC Comics. I liked the Jack O’ Lantern on the cover so I picked up this Halloween story in the sprit of the season.

Sword of Red Sonja: Doom of the Gods #2, Dynamite Entertainment.

Army of Darkness: From the Ashes #3, Dynamite Entertainment.

Battlestar Galactica: Pegasus #1, Dynamite Entertainment.

Men of Mystery: Spotlight Special The Nedor Heroes #1, AC Comics. Reprints a sampling of the Golden Age superheroes from Nedor comics including the Black Terror. They were popular comic books in their day but eventually Nedor went out of business and their characters became public domain. This black and white reprint would be of interest to folks picking up Dynamite Entertainment’s new take on the Nedor characters, Superpowers. That’s why I bought it, I had to special order it through previews though.

Trade Paperbacks:
Conan and the Midnight God Dark Horse.

El Cazador Disney. One of the best pirate comics ever! From the inside cover: “El Cazador the widely popular and critically acclaimed comic book series, sailed for a mere six issues from October to 2003 to June 2004, a casualty of the shuttering CrossGen comics. For the first time ever, all six stunning, high-octane issues are bound together to tell the story of Lady Sin and quest for vengeance.”

The Last page does says "to be continued." Could Disney actually be thinking of reviving El Cazador?

Magazine:
Alter Ego #73 TwoMorrows publishing. Came out last week. Interesting articles on the old Crime Does Not Pay comic from the golden age.


-Swinebread

Ratatouille

I demanded that my SO and I go see Ratatouille over the weekend. Happily she complied. Even though going to the movie theater is a struggle with all the rude hi-jinks going on, it still was an enjoyable experience.

There isn’t much more I can add to all of the positive reviews of the film. I enjoyed it. You can tell that the folks a Pixar really put time and effort into the story long before anybody started designing or animating anything. I’m a little more partial towards The Incredibles, for obvious reasons, but Ratatouille just might be the best movie they’ve come out with story wise. Plus the animation was fantastic.

Here is what I liked in no particular order (spoilers):

It’s not a Musical… I get tired of practically every animated show being a musical. I’m glad Pixar is continuing to break the mold on this.

The story is excellent.

Man, they really know how to animate hair correctly now.

Comic timing is rock solid.

The food looks really delicious.

Those of us who aren’t aware of what a professional kitchen is like actually learn something.

The Joy of food and cooking are well communicated despite that fact there is no smell or taste coming from the screen

Rémy the Rat is an entertaining character. In fact, this might be the first animated film were I like all the characters.

Those shots of Paris… Ooo La La

When Anton Ego tastes Rémy’s creation is a one of the best moments in the film.

Lot’s of little in-jokes about Parisian and French culture.

Of course, topnotch animation

When Colette Tatou crunches the bread

When Rémy makes the soup is another wonderful scene as well.

I could go on and on, but just go see it.

Here is what I disliked in no particular order (spoilers):

(I’m really scraping here)

The music wasn’t memorable. Funny, because I didn’t want a musical, but I still want memorable music.

Hmmmm… controlling Alfredo Linguini by his hair didn’t totally work for me, but this is a movie about a talking rat that make exquisite cuisine so who cares right?

Would Colette really go for a guy like Alfredo?

When is this movie set? Not that this is really important, but the time period is kinda’ nebulous.

Why do some folks have a French accent and while others do not?

Missed Opportunities (spoilers):

ahh... A few more shots of Paris…?!

-Swinebread