Issue 18:
Superhero Information Initiative
By
Amdnarg Toh
We all know that the biggest source of the Super-angst that Kal-El, Man of Steel, often experiences is his titillating romantic tension with Lois Lane. When he’s Superman, Lois gives him puppy eyes, but as Clark Kent, he’s basically ignored. What’s a poor super hero to do? Millions of fans were hanging onto the hope that one day they would turn the page, Superman would finally tell Lois his secret, and they would live happily ever after. Alas, most of us were continually disapointed, as our hopes were never realized. Until one fateful day…On the way home from the 7-Eleven, with the latest issue of Superman in my grubby fifth grade hands, I was ready for my monthly update of the goings-on in Metropolis. I was salivating over the image on the cover – Clark Kent kissing Lois Lane and confessing, (finally), “I am Superman!” What? Can this possibly be? My mind was racing with possibilities!
The story I read introduced me to the alternate universe called Earth-2, where Superman and Lois Lane are married, where the Green Lantern is not Hal Jordan, where the Flash wears a pie-tin hat, and looks like a brawny construction worker instead of Barry Allen, the Fastest Man Alive… What I was to learn in later issues was that Earth-2 was essentially composed of the heroes of the “Golden Age” – basically versions of the familiar heroes we all know and love, only as they would be in modern times if they started their careers in the 1940’s instead of in the then-modern, (to me), 1970’s. Thus Superman was older, and had finally grown a set and confessed his love to Lois. As time progressed, more of the mainline series started to publish stories that were tied to this new world, and stories involving Earth-2 heroes were exposed to a much wider audience. The modern heroes, as I had come to know them, lived on Earth-1, with Hal Jordan as the Green Lantern, a younger Superman, etc. These heroes came to be known as the “Silver Age” heroes. Their timeline was more consistent with modern events, political realities, and popular culture. I found my attention now focused not on one story, or one hero, but now between two entirely different self-contained universes. In fact, in honor of the plot device that every science fiction series containing multiple universes has used, there were even a couple of not-so-clever stories involving crossovers between the two worlds, with the heroes from Earth-1 meeting heroes from Earth-2.
Although I was intrigued by the possibilities of multiple universes, as I read stories set in these alternate realities – yes, there were more than two - it started to get confusing. These “what-if” scenarios would sometimes grow and evolve into a self-sustaining story line, which left some readers expecting the story line to continue. Demand from fans for follow up on these separate storylines drove writers to spend more and more energy and precious page space on continuing the story of an increasingly more complicated multiverse.
Most of us like some sense of consistency in the fiction we read. In fact, that is often what draws most of us into these make-believe worlds. A little bit of fantasy to escape to, but something that makes sense. Set the story up, tell us about the characters, define some of the parameters about how their world operates, wind it up, and let it go. But with the multiples of possible realities, chaos ensues. Fracture our make-believe world too much and we’ll lose interest.
This is exactly what happened to DC Comics. There were simply too many different story lines to maintain. In business terms, they lost focus on their core competencies and diversified too much. By 1985, with sales lagging, Crisis on Infinite Earths was used by DC as an opportunity to wipe much of its slate clean and make major changes to many of their highest revenue-generating comic book series. What they did was essentially set up the following story, which spanned twelve issues and involved almost every DC comic hero from every alternate universe:
- Introduce a really bad guy from the antimatter universe that wants to destroy our universe and all of the associated parallel universes.
- Heroes from several universes combine their might to stop the really bad guy
- During the conflict, most of the parallel universes are destroyed by the really bad guy
- The heroes from the remaining five universes combine one last time and defeat the really bad guy
- During the final battle, the remaining five universes are effectively combined into one, combining heroes and features from all five worlds.
- Many heroes that were unique to certain universes died during the crisis, and during the merging of the universes
New comic book lines, detailing the “new” universe and its heroes were introduced, and DC comics’ lagging sales, (in comparison to Marvel comics, which was doing quite well), took a turn for the better. With the reboot complete, DC could focus on the more popular, and thus, revenue generating story lines and characters. Twenty years later in 2005, due in part to the dark tone of many of the new story lines, DC decided to attempt another reset, and ran a series called Infinite Crisis, which set some of the elements of the new universe more in line with fan demand.
Hmmm. Let me get this straight… Whenever the creative juices run dry, and you want to write outside of the known set of realities, you can simply invent another universe for your story to be set in? Just borrow the most popular elements of a familiar story line, measure out a cup of “What-If,” (industrial strength), mix liberally with a few egg whites, and you’ve got an awesome alternate-universe pie. Just don’t serve me a slice and expect me to say “Mmmm… Good – can I please have another?”
And… No more “do-overs” please. The only folks that still do those in the real world are golfers and I’m not too sure about the mental stability of folks with sticks chasing a small white ball around a nice park…
Issue 18:
Life in Space
By
Mr. Atoz, The Librarian
That Which Survives
Rating: “Fascinating”
Synopsis:
Kirk, Sulu, McCoy, and geologist D’Amato beam down to what appears to be a new, but uninhabited planet. As they are energizing, a woman appears out of nowhere and exclaims, “Wait! You must not go!” The heroes are already beaming down, but before their molecules are completely scrambled they see the woman touch the transporter operator, killing him. They beam down, but the planet begins to quake as they arrive, as does the Enterprise, sending the ship out of the strange planet’s orbit.
Unable to contact the Enterprise, the foursome explore the planet. D’Amato runs into the strange woman from the transporter room. She tells D’Amato she knows who he is and says she is “for” him. She then touches D’Amato, killing him. McCoy discovers the body and proclaims that every cell in his body has been destroyed. The strange woman appears again, this time on the Enterprise, killing a crewman named Watkins, once again saying she is “for” him and knowing his name. She appears again on the planet’s surface, prepared to kill Sulu, but Kirk and McCoy keep the woman from touching Sulu. Kirk asks who the lady is, and she says her name is Losira, commander of the planet. She then vanishes into thin air.
They follow to the area where it appeared she vanished, and they come to an opening in some sort of cave. Once inside, they find some sort of cube and Losira appears, saying she is “for” Kirk. McCoy and Sulu step in front of Kirk, but two other Losiras show up “for” McCoy and Sulu. Spock and a landing party arrive just in time to destroy the cube, or what in actuality is a projected image to protect intruders from the planet. The inhabitants of the planet were killed by a disease, but the computer continued to operate its “defense” system, which was replicating images of the actual person of Losira.
Confused yet? Believe me, this is one confusing episode, and undoubtedly a chief contributor to the Third Season’s moniker of the “Turd Season.” The funny thing is, I enjoy this episode quite a bit. I am able to overlook the hideous effects and the horrendous subplot of the Enterprise being hurled through space and all its technobabble. You will have to forgive me if you were just dying to know what Spock and Mr. Scott were doing to fix the Enterprise during Kirk and the gang’s exploits on the planet. I cannot remember the last time I actually paid attention to the subplot.It’s incredibly boring.
The rest of the story is not. I think the first couple of minutes really gets you hooked. The last thing you expect to see when the captain and the beaming party are transporting is a woman appearing all of a sudden and killing the transporter operator. When I first saw the show, I thought, “What just happened?” Then the next thing you know there is an earthquake both on the planet and on the Enterprise. Now, I could be in the vast minority here, but of all the natural disasters I think the earthquake is the creepiest and most sinister. Not only is it deadly, but it produces mass confusion.
Losira is an intriguing kitten. I’m not sure she qualifies as a true villainess, but for the sake of my critique, she will be classified as such. At the end of the episode, Spock, McCoy, and Kirk remark that she is “beautiful.” Now while she is played by former Miss America Lee Meriwether, I’m not sure she would qualify in my book as beautiful in the kabuki makeup and hairstyle that would suggest some sort of space witch. I think she’s the scariest-looking of all the female villainesses.
“Fascinating” is probably a generous rating because the episode plods a little bit. But I love the plotline of being stuck on a mysterious planet with a murderous woman stalking about.
Issue 18:
Sydney Brown's Sixty Seconds
By
Sydney Brown
I’ve been on a comedy kick lately, watching the stand-up work of Mitch Hedburg and Bill Hicks, and after discovering a ton of Andy Kaufman material on Netflix, (and being as I have only watched two real movies since my last column), I’m devoting this edition to the work of Andy Kaufman.
For those not in the know, Andy Kaufman was not a stand-up comedian, nor was he even necessarily a comedian, but a performance artist who did what he wanted when he wanted, and if you enjoyed his work, good. If you didn’t………well, you were in for a long night. His career lasted about a decade or so, (he passed away from cancer in 1984), and while he’s most well-known as Latka Gravas on the show Taxi, (a variation on one of his characters in his shows), he’s much more three dimensional than that.
Quite possibly the ultimate “love-it-or-hate-it” performer, in layman’s terms he’s a kinder, gentler Sacha Cohen, (Ali G / Borat), but had every bit of the “Is he serious?” vibe if not more so. And here’s a look at five shows either starring him or about him:
Man on the Moon (1999) Jim Carrey, Danny DeVito **
Okay, but pretty unspectacular biopic of Kaufman’s life that almost plays like a Reader’s Digest version of his life. A film that focused on one aspect of his career would have made for a great film, but cramming his entire life into two hours comes off as a rush job. Carrey does a great acting job, but the film is a major disappointment, especially when you consider most of the major scenes can be seen for real on DVDs and other media, (and usually aren’t even that close to how the film presents them.) The film is geared towards people who have never heard of him, and unfortunately it means things you are supposed to figure out for yourself are force-fed instead. Not a bad film, but a MUCH better one could have been made.
The Andy Kaufman Story (2000) **1/2
Part live performance, (from a 1979 Catskills show), part documentary, this takes a rare look at one of Andy’s stage shows (with a less than forgiving audience), which is fascinating. What isn’t fascinating is the producer putting himself on camera way more than he has any right to, and what also isn’t fascinating are the anecdotes from “comedians” and people who never knew him in the first place. But this is one of the few places you’ll see Andy wrestling women, bringing his show to a dead halt by letting his family perform bad jokes and karaoke, and hear him intentionally botch the “Oklahoma” song, (a personal highlight.) An unedited stage show would have been much more interesting as the producer’s ego just gets in the way too much for this to be effective.
Soundstage: The Andy Kaufman Show (1983) ***
One of the last major Kaufman programs was this 1983 PBS special which is part kids show / part talk show. Don’t expect to laugh out loud, but do expect to wonder what the hell is going on. Highlights include the “Talk to a Has-Been” segment where Andy brings a former “star” back for one last hurrah in a segment that can be seen as poignant or utterly humiliating depending on how you take it, a bizarre dog food commercial involving a wind-up toy dog, and a talk show segment where Andy admits his dislike for his guest during the “break.” Only 58 minutes, but either you’re with him or you aren’t, (and it’s pretty clear even a lot of the audience isn’t either.)
Heartbeeps (1981) Andy Kaufman, Bernadette Peters ½*
One of the most annoying and boring films you’ll ever see. Imagine a full-length film where C3P0 talks to his female likeness for 78 minutes and you have this colossal waste of time. Kaufman and Peters are robots who leave their factory to discover the outside world. A police robot chases them. That’s it! That’s the whole freakin’ movie! They meet a miniature robot and are followed by a Jewish comedian robot, all of whom do nothing remotely interesting. So bad it’s bad. Even worse, small roles by Christopher Guest and Randy Quaid only show how wasted everyone involved was. The half a star is for the innovative makeup and John Williams score (which pretty much sounds like Star Wars outtakes.) Jerry Garcia voices the mini-robot for no particular reason. It would have worked as a 20-minute short, but as a feature, it’s painfully dull.
A Comic Salute to Andy Kaufman (1994) ****
Quite possibly the best tribute that could have been done for Andy Kaufman with virtually all the bases covered. Clips from all his famous and infamous TV appearances are here, including his seldom-seen temper tantrum that “ruined” a live episode of the ABC show Fridays. His specials, his wrestling career, even his busboy job are covered here. Amazingly, this was aired by NBC, and even more amazingly got very good ratings and an Emmy nod. Not available on video, but if you look hard enough, you can find it, and it’s well worth the look.
-Sydney Brown
Issue 18:
Spotlight on Technology
By
Dr. Roger Korby
As consumers we have found ourselves in a strange place when it comes to technology and content. Up until a little while ago, the limits placed on technology were “natural,” meaning engineers could create as cool or tricked-out a device as they wanted and the only limitation was their creativity and/or skills. Lately, though, a rather troubling trend has emerged. The people that create the content that is played by these devices have started exerting control over the design specifications of the devices themselves. DVD players must be approved by, I think, the FCC and the FCC will only approve players that include certain anti-piracy solutions. These solutions prohibit most of what we as consumers have grown to understand as fair-use, (ex: the ability to make a backup of a DVD so that the original doesn’t get scratched).
A good question to ask yourself is: “Whose interests are being served?” When Tivo makes the new version of their DVR, are they really trying to build the ultimate recording device for their consumers? Or are they caving to the demands of backbone-less content providers? For me, the ultimate TiVo would include the following features:
- The ability to quickly and easily move my recorded video onto a device such as an iPod Video or some other video playing device. (Note: this would require that Apple made the iPod more flexible than it currently is… again the technology industry is catering to the content providers instead of the consumers)
- The ability to quickly and easily move my recorded video onto a computer in my house to do things like edit out commericials, (assuming the ultimate-TiVo didn’t do this for me already)
- Maybe a built-in DVD burner to burn shows or movies to DVD
- WiFi enabled, (to easily move files to and from a computer or other wifi-enabled device)
- Support for high def video
- No DRM (Digital Rights Management)
Nothing in this list would be crazy difficult to implement. Ten engineers with a decent chunk of money could probably spit out a prototype of this device in a few weeks. A 13-year-old hacker dude could make his computer do most of what I’m talking about in one afternoon with software that is either free or relatively cheap. With a tiny bit of marketing, these would sell like frickin’ hotcakes too.
The main reason we as consumers don’t have and will probably never get this wonderful machine is DRM. The content providers are terrified of piracy and in their eyes DRM is part of the solution. I think DRM is a terrible solution. It gives the content providers a gross amount of control over what we as consumers do with the content we buy. I’ve already written a whole article about how much I hate DRM, (to read it, go here), so I won’t go on about this too much longer. But to support some of the stuff in this article, here is a list of my main beefs with DRM:
- DRM breaks fair-use. If I buy music or a movie, I should be able to play it or convert it so that it will play on any device.
- DRM doesn’t work. Thanks to the so-called “analog hole” as long as we are still allowed actually to experience the content, (listen to it, view it, etc.), there’s a way to copy it, (recording it off the sound card, using a camera to record the video off the screen.)
- DRM is not needed. Every single drm’ed song or TV show that is available for sale online is also available DRM-free on some sort of p2p pirating website. It is not like putting DRM in a song will keep it from ever leaking out onto the web. Piracy has always been an issue and will always be an issue but there are ways to make a profit selling content without DRM. Not many have tried this, but eMusic is an example of a company that has Just Said No to DRM and is still doing incredibly well.
For consumers, buying from a legitimate online store is more convenient than searching for a pirated copy of the item they want. If I had to choose between A) searching for 15 minutes for a song and then downloading it from an unknown source at potentially slow speeds, and B) logging into a legitimate online store and pay a dollar or so to download the same file quickly, I’d choose option B every time… IF there was no DRM on the file. I wish more companies would follow on the path that eMusic has bravely blazed.
What I am asking for here is nothing short of complete interoperability between all the devices in my house, where applicable. To get this, digital content needs to be stored in open, non-proprietary formats. This would require a change in the mindset of all content providers. Start selling your content in open, non-DRM formats. If this happens, the people who make the technology that plays your content will be free to pull out all the stops and create some kick-ass hardware, hardware like the hypothetical Tivo described above. iTunes and eMusic have gone a long way towards proving that people are willing to pay money to have access to commercial free music, TV and movies. Imagine a future where you could download a TV show from iTunes for a dollar or two in HD with 5.1 surround sound and be assured that it would play on any TV or video-playing device in your house. Until the content providers get over their infatuation with DRM this sort of exciting technological future is basically impossible.
Issue 18:
Tournament of Villainy
By
Rascal Stallion
| Name: Johnny Lawrence |
|
Name: The Headless Horseman |
| Occupation: Martial Arts Student/School Bully |
vs. |
Occupation: Retired Hessian trooper searching for his missing head |
| Origin: The Karate Kid |
|
Origin: Washington Irving’s The Legend of Sleepy Hollow |
The Headless Horseman listlessly roamed the beach. He was weary from decades of searching for his lost head and finally decided he would claim the next suitable head he came across. As he trotted over a dune, he noticed a group of young men below him kicking a soccer ball around a campfire.
One of them in particular, Mr. Johnny Lawrence, had an exquisite head; a head that the horseman would soon claim as his own.
The Horseman approached the boys at full gallop and launched a flaming pumpkin at the gathering. The pumpkin reached its target and exploded into the back of Jerry and Tommy, killing them instantly. Dutch and Bobby looked up just in time to be trampled under the horse’s hooves.
Johnny jumped onto his motorcycle and the chase was on. The Horseman raced down the beach after Johnny, throwing flaming pumpkin after flaming pumpkin after him. Johnny thought to himself “where does he keep those things that he has so many to throw at me?”
Finally, the Headless Horseman’s aim was true and one of the pumpkins struck Johnny’s back tire, sending him crashing to the sand. Some sand even went down his shorts and I think we all know what a hassle that is.
The Horseman stopped and stood before Johnny. The horse’s nostrils flared as Johnny glared back. Johnny broke the silence “Okay, here’s your first lesson: how to take a FALL!” and with that he swept the horse’s leg.
The horse crumpled, his broken leg unable to hold his weight. The Horseman tumbled down and was met by a ferocious series of punches from Johnny’s trained fists. Johnny unleashed blow after blow to the horseless Horseman’s ribs, kidneys and solar plexus.
Just before delivering the coup de gras, Johnny said “Mercy is for the weak. A man confronts you, he is the enemy. An enemy deserves no mercy.” Johnny then reached his arm down into the gaping hole where the Horseman’s head used to lie and grabbed a handful of guts. Grabbing tightly, he ripped them out and flung them across the sand.
“No mercy, bitch” Johnny said as he walked away.
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