Jeph Loeb.....

Okay, so I just finished reading Buffy the Vampire Slayer #20, a stand alone issue written by Jeph Loeb. Buffy is exhausted from too much saving the world and not enough sleep. She finally dozes off, only to have a dream sequence in the form of Buffy the Vampire Slayer the Animated Series. Believe it or not, there actually were plans for a BTVS:TAS back in the day, and Jeph Loeb was heading it up. For whatever reason it did not work out, but a pilot was made and I've seen clips of it on youtube. This comic is the same script from the clips I saw. Turns out, Loeb recycles his work. Good to know. One would think that with all that extra time he would have been able to perfect it, but that is not the case. Loeb fails to capture the voice of the character or any character for that matter. I can say the one cool thing about this issue is that proceeds from it are being donated to the Sam Loeb Scholarship Fund. So for that alone people should go buy the issue. Don't read it though, just buy it.

I am beside myself right now, because I have no idea how this man keeps getting work. Don't get me wrong, he has written some great comics in the past. In the past. Because you did your job well in the past does not mean you should be allowed to continue doing your job if the present keeps failing. I hit a lot of home runs when I was in little league, I don't see any MLB team trying to sign me to a multi-million dollar deal. The Long Halloween, Superman: For All Seasons, even Superman/Batman were all very well written. Although there were a lot of complaints from fanboys and a lot of holes in the story, his Batman: Hush was extremely exciting and it got me anticipating each new issue. Then he left for Marvel and nothings been the same since. I wonder if DC sent him to Marvel to tank their characters? The only other theory I have is that he hates his job. He has managed to poison everything he's touched since signing to Marvel. The Ultimate fans saw their team castrated, he got fired from Heroes, and the Hulk just plain out sucks. I like the idea of the Red Hulk, but whoever let "Rulk" slide needs to be removed from office. The Hulk is one of my favorite characters of all time. What Greg Pak did with him with Planet Hulk and World War Hulk was simply amazing. There hadn't been that much excitement surrounding the character since just about ever. Then Loeb comes along and decides to crap out nine issues (so far) of immature nonsense, almost completely erasing everything that Pak had set up. The book reads fast and he has the Hulk talking and acting like someone who is pretending to be a stupid child. People with mental handicaps don't act this way. Now, they are jacking up the price another dollar! Are you kidding me? As I stated before, I love the Hulk but I am going to have to drop it until Jeph Loeb is off title.

Mr. Loeb, you have written some excellent comic books in your day, but not any recent days. I honestly think that you need to take a break from comics, get regrouped and refreshed, and then drop some masterpiece on us. I believe you can do it, because I have seen you do it. If you refuse to do that, then please stop writing the titles of characters that I love.

The Spirit

To be completely honest, I knew next to nothing about the Will Eisner crimefighter before heading off to the movies. So I decided to wikipedia him, and let me tell you that he has a full and rich history. Something that caught my eye was his nemesis the Octopus. Apparently, he never showed his face, only his hands. Sorta like the Claw from Inspector Gadget. Anyways, as we all know from the advertisements Samuel L. Jackson's Octopus is a very visual Octopus. That's really not as dirty as it sounds.
What Frank Miller does right here is with the story lay out and the visual effects. It is the same thing with Sin City and 300, it is like watching a comic book. All of these movies are visually stunning.
Even with that said, this was not the best of the three....not by a long shot. I went in to this movie wanting to like it, really I did. It is not that the movie was bad, but have you ever wished you waited until DVD or the dollar theater to watch a movie? That is how I felt through this whole thing. What worked for Miller's other contributions to Hollywood does not work here. The gritty grit dialogue that he is famous for doesn't work in the world of the Spirit. It would be like comparing The Dark Knight Returns to All-Star Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder. Just cause it works sometimes, doesn't mean you should do it ALL the time.


Side note: what the deuce is Miller's fascination with suicide, prostitutes, and Nazis? At least two out of the three appear in all his work. We get all three in the Spirt.


As for the acting, it was so over the top that the top wasn't even in sight. I was expecting it to be over the top, so that part didn't bother me. What did bother me was the Spirit himself, played by Gabriel Macht. I'm pretty sure he goes to the George Clooney School For Acting. Take that however you want. There were some pretty enjoyable scenes, the fighting was very well choreographed,and there were was pretty great one-liners. My favorite was in relation to the Spirit talking to the Octopus, "I'm gonna kill you all kinds of dead". It reminded me of the speech patterns of Superboy-Prime.
I didn't hate the movie, but I didn't love it like I was hoping to either. I'd pick this up in the dollar bin.

Merry Christmas, Wonder Woman, and Batman Teaser

Hi everybody. Welcome to the Pull List. First off I want to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas. If anyone received any comic related presents, feel free to comment below. I'm hoping for a couple of Superman items that I've had my eye on, but if you don't mention it to anyone it is kinda hard to get them.

On to business. If you are not reading Wonder Woman right now then you are doing yourself a disservice. I think Gail Simone is one of the best writers in the business. To be completely honest, I haven't been as blown away by this title as I was hoping to be. That is until now. This is how I read my comics, from worse to best. I start off with something that I know is going to be craptastic and I go that way leading to the book I'm most excited about. Example: this week I started off with Hulk (anyone who thinks this is a good book is a liar) and for the first time ever I ended on Wonder Woman.

It all started with last month's Wonder Woman #26, the beginning of the "Rise of the Olympian" story line. The Secret Society created some sort of creature that would be able to fight the Justice League, only it went horribly wrong as things like this tend to do. It is believed that they created a god. How does one do that? I'm sure that Ms. Simone will fill us all in in due time. The creature calls itself Genocide, because according to it, "It is what I do." and it does it very well. Genocide's first encounter with the super-hero persuasion was of course Wonder Woman.
Let me tell you something, I have seen Diana escape some close calls before, I have seen her lose battles, but I have never ever seen this. Even when she fought a mind controlled Superman, courtesy of Max Lord, fails in comparison against this. She at least held her own against the Man of Steel. In fact, I WANT to see Superman fight this thing. Make it happen, Gail.
Issue 27 is basically the fallout from her fight with Genocide, with special appearances by Donna Troy and Wonder Girl. Also the gods are back from wherever they ran off to a few years ago. I had no idea that gods traveled in spaceships so I looked it up. Apparently, according to Scientology, they do. So it's good to be able to read about accurate descriptions. Zeus makes a promise to Athena about helping to restore the Amazons, but then he goes and has a conversation with Diana's mom and I'm thinking Zeus is a few lightning bolts shy of being a Greek god.
Anyways, I'm excited about this book again and it is now at the top of my reading list along with Captain America. Yeah, it's that good. I'm interested in hearing what everyone else thinks of the current arc.

In other news......did everyone see that Batman teaser image? Holy flippin' cow!