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Prometheus Eternal: New Reflections on a Classic Myth
Greek mythology is, it almost goes without saying, full of characters who incur the wrath of more powerful gods by violating their arbitrary rules. Most of those violations amount to stepping outside of the proverbial… [more]
Portraits In Alienated British Youth Circa 1989-90, Part Fifteen : Les Enfants Terrible
Debuting in the pages of the well-regarded (and, at least by some of us, much-missed) British comics anthology series Crisis — specifically in issue number 50, cover-dated September, 1990 — John Smith and Sean Phillips’… [more]
Sorting Through Tim Burton’s Promising Wreckage: The Death of Superman Lives: What Happened?
We have all probably heard, even if just in passing, of the great lost Superman film of the 1990s, but probably only rumours of goofy costumes and questionable casting. The recent independent documentary The Death… [more]
Portraits in Alienated British Youth Circa 1989-90, Part Fourteen : I Used To Think That The Day Would Never Come —
And you, dear reader, could be forgiven, what with the uber-sporadic nature of these posts in recent months (sue me, I’ve been busy), that the day would never come when yours truly would finally get… [more]
Sifting Through the Ashes: Analyzing Hellblazer, Part 36
Issue #45 “The Sting” Writer: Garth Ennis; Pencils: Will Simpson; Inker: Tom Sutton; Colors: Tom Ziuko; Letters: Gaspar Saladino; Cover: Tom Canty; In the comic medium, every character or series has moments that become paramount… [more]
Smorgasbord #30.1: Bunns of Steel
With Tom running amok in England, Shawn invites local Boy Wonder Hagai Palevsky to discuss the latest developments in comics, including Cullen Bunn’s brush with fandom drama, the Means-Shannon Mishap, a most unwelcome return at… [more]
Feminism on the Fury Road: Imperfect Tropes in Mad Max
As part of my continuing effort to catch up with all the summer movies I missed (my home theatre is more comfortable, equal in quality and a whole lot cheaper than going to a theatre,… [more]
The Flashback Paradox: How Comic Book Television Deals with Remembrance of Things Past
In the eight decades or so of American comic books, finding obscure things in dark corners to dust off and reinvent has become an industry unto itself. Indeed, one of the first known printed uses… [more]
Another Day, Another Dollar: Harvey Pekar’s Last American Splendor
For the last few years of Harvey Pekar’s life, he was on a creative roll. His American Splendor comic had never really gone away, but in the 1990s and early 2000s, Pekar was focusing more… [more]
Sifting Through the Ashes: Analyzing Hellblazer, Part 35
Issue #44 “My Way” Writer: Garth Ennis; Pencils: Will Simpson; Inker: Tom Sutton; Colors: Tom Zuiko; Letters: Gaspar Saladino; Cover: Tom Canty; American founding father Benjamin Franklin is famously known for the quote from a… [more]
The Goddamned: The Bible as You’ve Never Seen it Before
Anyone of a certain inclination who has read the Old Testament can’t help but come away thinking of it as pretty “metal”, to coin a phrase. Fights to the death, plagues, burning cities, vendettas, and… [more]
Looking Glasses: Sexual Dangers and Curious Responses in Carroll’s Alice Books and Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth, Part Two
Yet the Alice books do not celebrate our heroine’s change, as suggested by Alice’s several disturbing mirrorings with older women. Three of the four major women in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass… [more]
Southern Bastards #12: The Return of Earl Tubb
“Americans love a winner, and cannot abide a loser.” -Gen. George S. Patton We have to go way back to issue #4 of Southern Bastards to recall the story that’s picked up here in issue… [more]
Sequart Announces Its Third Annual Sci-Fi Week
On 14 December, Sequart will begin its third annual Sci-Fi Week, timed to coincide with that week’s release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Over the course of the week, Sequart will publish content focusing… [more]
Descender #7: A New and Bold Chapter
Sometimes, maybe all the time, compelling narrative storytelling is about constantly raising the stakes. For a book that started with the destruction of a major human civilization, Descender has fairly masterfully managed to raise the… [more]
Tomorrowland: I Hope
It took some time, but I finally got around to seeing Brad Bird’s fascinating sci-fi film Tomorrowland, and this morning I am somewhat shocked to discover that, when I have a quick gaze across the… [more]
Sequart Releases A Long Time Ago: Exploring the Star Wars Cinematic Universe
Sequart Organization is proud to announce the publication of A Long Time Ago: Exploring the Star Wars Cinematic Universe, edited by Rich Handley and Joseph F. Berenato. In 1977, the cinematic world was changed forever, thanks to… [more]
Sifting Through the Ashes: Analyzing Hellblazer, Part 34
Issue #43 “Friends in High Places” Writer: Garth Ennis; Pencils: Will Simpson; Inker: Malcolm Jones III; Colors: Tom Zuiko; Letters: Gaspar Saladino; Cover: Tom Canty; From a narrative perspective comic books offer many storytelling methods… [more]
Remembering the Fifth of November: V for Vendetta
It’s the fifth of November, so I offer my humble thoughts on one of the true classics of our favourite medium. This is by no means an exhaustive analysis, simply a reflection on the book… [more]
Looking Glasses: Sexual Dangers and Curious Responses in Carroll’s Alice Books and Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth, Part One
The seminal Batman graphic novel Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth, by writer Grant Morrison and artist Dave McKean, recontextualizes the themes and the motifs of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass… [more]
Smorgasbord #30: Fox Hunt
Tom and Shawn try to figure out what’s eating Ales Kot, 200 years still isn’t enough time to get anyone to care about Krypton, the first Previews of 2016 looks depressingly similar to the last… [more]
Home Invasion Movies And Women’s Fears
Horror movies scare us because they mirror what we fear – even the impossible, such as ghosts or supernatural monsters. But one subgenre of horror films tackles something more mundane: home invaders. The idea of… [more]
Rasputin #10: The River of Life and Death
As previously mentioned in our discussions of Rasputin, one of the more curious aspects of this historical figure is that we all know how he died. That’s the first and sometimes only thing we learn… [more]
Project Greenlight‘s Season Four Finale Shows Real Courage
For a season that crackled with energy and drama, the finale of season four of Project Greenlight ends on a note of resigned exhaustion. All the participants in this project, from executive producers on down… [more]