SILENCE! #201

November 2nd, 2016

 
 

I DANCED MYSELF RIGHT OUT THE WOMB, IS IT STRANGE TO DANCE SO SOON?

Morning has broken, like the first podcast… Yowza dear listeners, you’re staring down the barrel of the earliest-recorded SILENCE! yet. Will Gary Lactus & The Beast Must Die be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, or bleary-eyed and bushy-bearded? YOU DECIDE.  Imagine a bowl of crunchy, nutritious comics flakes, sodden with the milk of human opinion, and that’s this week’s show.

<ITEM> There’s a whole heap of admin for the upcoming Thought Bubble festival, including SILENCE! TO ASTONISH live, and the Sound & Vision panel. Jinkies! Add in a bit of hasty sponsorship and you got yourself some prime admin.

<ITEM> Through the dreamsqueezers threshold  and into The Reviewniverse. Only two men singing this time – it’ll never be the same again… it’s brief but nutritious with talk of Johnny Ryan’s Angry Youth Comix, Stray Bullets, Brendan McCarthy’s Dr Fate, Shade The Changing Man and maybe a bit more. Or a mit bore?

<ITEM> The Beast recounts his visit to see John Carpenter live.

NO MORE ITEMS. See you at the festival!

 

@silencepod
@frasergeesin
@thebeastmustdie
@bobsymindless
[email protected]
You can support us using Patreon if you like.

This edition of SILENCE! is proudly sponsored by the greatest comics shop on the planet, DAVE’S COMICS of Brighton. It’s also sponsored the greatest comics shop on the planet GOSH! Comics of London.

SILENCE! #198

August 11th, 2016

 

 

YOU JUST HAVEN’T EARNED IT YET BABY

It’s that time people. A time of change. A time of peace. A time of war. A time of hope, of laughter, of tears. A time of tests. A time of trials. A time of twins. A time to live, a time to die. A time to kill. A time of hours, of minutes and seconds. A time to sleep. A time to wake. A time to eat. A time to fast. A time to slow. A time of potential. A time of possibility. A time of depair. A time of…TIME>

WHAT TIME?

Time for SILENCE! you worms.

<ITEM> Gary Lactus & The Beast Must Die are not going to let time and space get in the way. Gary is broadcasting from the Edinburger festival up in sunny Scorchland while the Beast is broadcasting lieve, live from the Work Hive! All to bring you the most 5 star super fun and hot and zzzzzexy comics chat.

<ITEM> Sponsorship? Why not, with a guest shout to DeadHead Comics and some self-promotionalistaion for Gary’s FREE one man show at Edinbruge: https://tickets.edfringe.com/whats-on/fraser-geesin-jack-of-all-polymaths

<ITEM> The Reviewniverse you saps, so you better shape up. Talky talking about Kill Or Be Killed, Papergirls, Shade The Changing Man, Frank Miller’s Cheeseburger comics, Robocop Vs Terminator, Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur, Batman, Walking Dead, Andrew O’Neill and Comedy Posters. GET SUM.

Hoo boy. I wouldn’t want to be here when your Mum gets home…

Click to download SILENCE! #198

 

@silencepod
@frasergeesin
@thebeastmustdie
@bobsymindless
[email protected]
You can support us using Patreon if you like.

This edition of SILENCE! is proudly sponsored by the greatest comics shop on the planet, DAVE’S COMICS of Brighton. It’s also sponsored the greatest comics shop on the planet GOSH! Comics of London.

SILENCE! #185

April 28th, 2016

  

 

WRAP MY TONGUE ROUND A BUMBLEBEE MOUTH

…strange news from a distant star incoming… beaming live transmissions from the satellite heart… set..set the controls for… the blackstar … we are one nation, a nation of millions, one nation under a groove…  it takes…millions… of nations… this is major… can you hear me… can you hear me…?

<ITEM> What? Who? Why? HOW?

It’s only a right rowdy ruddy great episode of SILENCE!

<ITEM> But hark? Where is the Space God? While Gary Lactus scrubs his helmet and prepares for his one-man war on comedy, The Beast Must Die is joined by Lord Nuneaton Savage for a special edition of SILENCE! Expect ramblings from beyond the stars…

<ITEM> Some sponsorship, including news on the great Comics & Book Exchange in Notting Hill. Savage also talks up his musical shanigans with the mighty meaty Teeth Of The Sea. The Beast Must Die Also Talks About Cerebus Again.

<ITEM> Sound the harmoniums and set the synths to stun as we enter The Reviewniverse with a swing in our step and a jaunt in our hearts. But wait! What’s this? The RETROVIEWNIVERSE??? Hold tight as we explore the highways and byways of longform comics rambling… taking in a whole damn bunch of stuff including, but not limited to Madballs, Transformers Vs GI Joe, Miami Vice Remix, toyetic indies comics in general, Ben Marra, Gi joe, Battle Action Force, Film /Comic Adaptations, Tim Burton’s Batman, Peter Milligan, The Programme, The E, aters, Shade The Changing Man, The Extremist, Bix Barton: Master Of The Rum & Uncanny, mike Baron’s The Butcher, and believe me when I say a whole lot more…Oh and The Beast Must Die Also Talks About Cerebus Again.

<ITEM> A special guest appearance from Dave & Emily and then it’s off, out and up. It’s an hour plus of stream of consciousness comics chat just the way you ordered it. So get stuck in.

click to download SILENCE!#185

@silencepod
@frasergeesin
@thebeastmustdie
@bobsymindless

You can support us using Patreon if you like.

This edition of SILENCE! is proudly sponsored by the greatest comics shop on the planet, DAVE’S COMICS of Brighton. It’s also sponsored the greatest comics shop on the planet GOSH! Comics of London.

SILENCE! #179

March 7th, 2016

 

IT’S A MUST THAT I TAKE THE STREETS BACK SO FAST, EVERYBODY THINKIN’ IT’S NOT GONNA LAST…

Okay big picture people, big picture only. Blue sky thinking, big picture stuff. Blue sky, big picture, out of the box stuff people. Big, blue, out-of-the-box thinking. Big picture, blue sky thinking, right out of the box, take the ball and run with it stuff people. Big runny blue balls, right out of the box. OK people? OK?

<ITEM> It’s the comics podcast that man, feels like a woman! It’s SILENCE! you lucky, lucky pea-pods.

<ITEM> Not just any episode, but one of our fabled Guesticodes featuring none other than Kelly Kanayama aka Maid of Nails. Scholar, Rob  Liefeld character, and Frank MIller gang member? Whatever, she’s here and she’s raising the bar. Limboing smoothly under it are old hams Gary Lactus and The Beast Must Die.

<ITEM> Sponsorship as usual, but with some red hot Dundee recommendations! Also The Beast has some life admin to share, and is ready to introduce…the Phantasmacats! Also, Team Poppet and the Final Solution?? Oh and Dicks. Don’t forget the Dicks.

<ITEM> Let’s go go go into The Reviewniverse, and it’s a humdinger. We talk The Discipline, Shade The Changing Man, The Extremist, Grant Morrison, Peter Milligan and bondage, Ted McKeever’s Pencil Head, Cerebus The Aardvark, problematic creators, Jiro Kawata’s Bat-Manga, Black Widow, Judge Dredd, Strontium Dog and a slab more.

<ITEM> Gary has to duck out early so The Beast and Maid of Nails sing it out in style…

GERTCHA!

click to download SILENCE!#179

[email protected]

@silencepod
@frasergeesin
@thebeastmustdie
@bobsymindless

You can support us using Patreon if you like.

This edition of SILENCE! is proudly sponsored by the greatest comics shop on the planet, DAVE’S COMICS of Brighton. It’s also sponsored the greatest comics shop on the planet GOSH! Comics of London.

SILENCE! #39

November 13th, 2012

 


YOU’RE THE ONE FOR ME, FATTY!

YAAAAAAY! It’s nobody’s favourite self-aware AI, Disembodied Narratorbot X-15735 here to usher you into another aural barrel scraping edition of SILENCE! GET SOME…Ha ha.

Ha.

IN. THIS. EDITION.

<ITEM> Lots of self-promotion from the fleshy ones, with talk of Cindy & Biscuit and The Amusing Bros. For shame!

<ITEM> Then SILENCE! News, with sad boohoo news about the end of Hellblazer, and Gary Lactus straps on his geetar to sing ‘Goodbye John’. Too sad.

Then happy with special sexy review times. Woot hoot!
<ITEM> Deadpool no.1, Iron Man, Dial H, Legends Of The Dark Knight, Detective, Action, Animal Man, Battlefields and a special mention for Joe Kessler’s Windowpane, from new publisher Breakdown Press. Excite!

<ITEM> Silent Question comes from Moleman, and varied answers include Titan’s Tower and Shade The Changing Man’s crack in the pavement! Yes sir!

So no excuse for not-enjoymence, fleshy idiots!!!

Strap yourself in, put on Mummy’s dress and draw the curtains for …SILENCE! no.38

click to download SILENCE!#39

SILENCE! is proudly sponsored by the two greatest comics shops on the planet, DAVE’S COMICS of Brighton and GOSH COMICS of London.

Click below for the SILENCE! Gallery…

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SILENCE! #38

November 6th, 2012

 


MMM…SKYSCRAPER, I LOVE YOU

Can’t talk, busy busy busy! Disembodied Narratorbot X-15735 here to talk up the fleshy exploits of those lovable human rogues The Beast Must Die and Gary Lactus in their BOOM! WHIZZZ! BANG! extra special November 5th/Fireworks special (it isn’t really special, but Disembodied Narratorbot X-15735 likes themes and was away last week – just imagine there are fireworks going off while you listen and all will be special times. WEEEEEEEEEEEE!)

<ITEM>

SILENCE! News with tales of treason and the All-Beard himself, Alan Moore no.1 teen heart throb.

<ITEM> Weekly Haul reviewing trash pamphlets a-go-go:

Action Comics Annual, Lot 13, Ghosts, Happy!, Masters of the Universe and TMNT annual, with digressionary discourse about Kevin Eastman and Tundra. Good times! Bad Times! Both Times!

<ITEM>

Silent Question comes from Hawkman and Aquaman, and includes answers such as Flaming Carrot, Shade The Changing Man, Legends Of The Dark Knight, and long lost Brit comic, Crisis.

<ITEM> Beast’s Book at Bedtime isMarvel Comics the Untold Story from Sean Howe.

<ITEM> There are no more ITEMS!

Disembodied Narratorbot X-15735 OUT! (drops conceptual microphone and flounces offstage)

click to download SILENCE!#38


SILENCE! is proudly sponsored by the two greatest comics shops on the planet, DAVE’S COMICS of Brighton and GOSH COMICS of London.

Click below for the SILENCE! Gallery…

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SILENCE! podcast #1

February 8th, 2012

BRAND NEW!!!!!!

It’s the great new Skype chat show where The Beast Must Die and Gary Lactus talk to each other! About comics no less.

In this episode:

Whilst Lactus floats in his spaceship above the Earth (specifically above Brighton, East Sussex), the Beast is holed up in his brand new luxury swank pad inside a Sentinel’s head. The two Mighty Mindless’ conversation soon turns to comics, and they discuss Steve Ditko’s DC work, Pete Milligan and Brett Ewin’s Bad Company, Fatale, The Twelve, WA2CHMEN (totally psyched!!), and Action Comics amongst others, and in a truly interactive moment The Beast watches the Avengers trailer…LIVE!

Strap yourself in for two bite-size chunks of Mindless Poddery, and then join us back here next week for more. Or throw your headset down in disgust and punch your computer. THE CHOICE IS YOURS!

Try SILENCE! #1 part 1
[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/silence001a.mp3]
Click to download SILENCE! # 1 part 1

Not enough for you? Here’s part 2
[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/silence001b.mp3]
Click to download SILENCE! # 1 part 2

by Peter Milligan & George PerezDC Comics

(reviewed by The Beast Must Die)

Having danced the tango with Shade over in Hellblazer not so long ago, Peter Milligan takes the floor with his old flame again…but what’s this? It’s happening in the Jeansverse?!?! So I assume no menage-a-trois comedy of manners, and psychedelic sex/death ruminations are on the cards here? You’re in the Jeansverse now boy – we expect decapitation, mutilation and mind-rape. ALL THE TIME. You best not bring any of that late 80’s shoegazey, English faggotry with you here Milligan! Otherwise you’ll be hauled into DiDio’s office for some Jordan 101 classes:

“LOVE IS THE PREDATOR!
LOVE IS THE PREDATOR!
SAY IT! SAY LOVE IS THE PREDATOR!!”

So.

I guess there has *maybe* been a bit of hand-wringing about the fact that Swamp Thing, Shade and John Farkin’ Constantine have been dragged into the Jeansverse (wasn’t that whole ‘Nicest Day’ thing basically a way of bringing Sprout Bollocks back into the DCU? Wow. Wish I’d read that.) But you won’t find any of that angst here in Mindless HQ. No sir – I couldn’t give a fuck. The fact is, that ever since Alan Moore left Swamp Thing, the character has been treated like some sort of sacred pot-plant – no writer can use him unless the story is a load of wooly, tepid hippy bullshit about Elemental Quests and Cajun domestic disputes. It was like Gentle Ben with less bear. What people seemed to forget was that

a) the Bearded One set Swamp Thing firmly in the DCU, and had a lot of fun playing with the toys there

and

b) he could write an entertaining story.

Bringing Swamp Thing back to the DCU is not a problem. Making good use of him – well that’s a different issue. (James Robinson, for example, made particularly elegant use of parts of Moore’s Swamp Thing mythos in Starman, back when he could write and wasn’t trapped in the Jeansverse).

Ergo, there’s no problem with Shade being used in a similar way, especially if chaperoned by Milligan. There’s absolutely no reason that Shade superhero comics couldn’t be a lot of fun – Meta, the Madness Vest, the fact that he’s a temperamental little shit, the utterly psychedelic nature of his powers all could = heap big fun. In fact the DCU is in theory the perfect looniverse for such a character to work. But this ain’t the DCU as you remember it Grandad. It’s the Jeansverse.

But suffice to say I came to Flashpoint: Secret Seven with relatively high expectations. Milligan’s run on Shade holds a very special place in my heart. At it’s best (the ‘Hotel Shade’ arc, culminating in the genuinely devastating ‘Season in Hell’) it was a brilliant soap opera – surreal, literate, frightening rude and raucous. The art by Chris Bachalo was career best, and the fill in art by the likes of Glynn Dillon and Philip Bond was sublime. Shorn of the fairyland bollocks of most of his Vertigo peers, Milligan wrote comics that felt personal without being trite. Shade was the work of a man who loved comics, but wasn’t a slave to them. It was ace stuff. So any opportunity for him to return to Shade is going to be worth nosing out. His recent brilliantly self-pitying, pathetic cameo in Hellblazer was a joy. Troy Grenzer was back in all his narcissistic insane glory, ready to receive a spiritual kick to the balls from John ‘job’s a good ‘un‘ Constantine. How, then, would he shape up in the confusing splatter of Geoff Jeans’ not very good at all Flashpoint world?

George ‘suck my disco, bitch’ Perez drawing it too. Interesting. Perez’ hyper-detailed realism is a long way from Ditko’s confident psych swirls and Bachalo’s queasy distortion, but the motherfucker can draw. Out of all the Flashpoint bullshit, this was the only comic that was ever going to get my money.

Shame then, that it just wasn’t all that good.

There are definitely two Milligans. The one who writes shit that’s funny, weird and engaging, utterly unique. And the one who writes shit. I don’t want to sound harsh – I could never, never write off the man who gave me Strange Days, Bad Company, Shade or X-Statix. And it’s not that superheroes are a problem for him – on the contrary, the elastic, silly spandex world offers endless opportunity for a writer as idiosyncratic as him. Nor is he incapable of turning in serious superhero work – his deeply under-appreciated run on Detective Comics and the Enigma are testament to this. But there’s the inescapable feeling that sometimes he’s treading water, that his heart’s not in it. And it genuinely surprised me that Secret Seven fell into the latter camp. Sadly though, I simply couldn’t locate Milligan’s voice in this comic. If someone had handed me it uncredited, I think I would have felt it could have been written by any of the Tonys or Judds that currently fill up the DC litter tray. Notionally it looks fun enough – Perez draws pretty, garish but ultimately contained looking craziness and does a decent enough job of storytelling (I mean seriously, what the fuck would this read like if Ed Benes or someone got their claws on it? Jesus Murphy!) but it’s hardly inspiring. And the sad fact is that he doesn’t draw the whole thing which bodes badly for the rest of the mini. I’m not going to rag on Perez for this – I think he has issues with his eyesight – but it does once again indicate the clusterfuck incompetence of the overall DC editorial.

The only genuinely Milliganesque aspect of the comic was Enchantress’ name – June Moone. And he didn’t even invent that.

It’s not as though it was terrible, rather that it was perfunctory. And as I unfortunately currently have no time for 98% of mainstream supercomics, perfunctory makes me want to throw the fucking thing down the shitter. It’s just a lot of wooden dialogue, shouting and whizz-bang. Like every other bloody thing. There’s none of the real weirdness that I expected. Maybe it’s those Didio correction sessions? Maybe Milligan has had his brain Jeansified to the point where Secret Seven will culminate in Shade punching his fist through Kathy’s resurrected face, screeching ‘SEXUAL AMBIGUITY IS PAIN!‘ I don’t know. I won’t be around to find out I’m afraid.

————————————————————————————

(reviewed by the Botswana Beast)

Well, that’s one view. However, the M-Vest allows Mindless Ones “to occupy more than one reality simultaneously.” This is my truth, tell me yours; alternatively, skip the second clause, likelihood is I’ll not give a fat one.

I’ve been through a lot this week – with DC, with the Jeansverse, oh the Jeansverse; a lot of pubescent rage, we all have. We all have. It’s been exhausting. Not a day ago, Amy Poodle, who – lest it be forgot – is the Zoo Crew of Earth-26’s Wonder woman, and presumably therefore as dedicated to pacifism as the Themysciran Amazon of clay wanted to “punch Didio in his face”. I kind of wanted the publisher to die and/or disappear up its own fundament. It may yet.

But then they said Batman Inc. was coming back, then they announced some magic or “dark” is it(?) titles that sound pretty alright – that sound like you’d maybe rather have a swatch of than gouge out your own eyes, anyway. Which is more than can be said for, etc. And now, we’re – you know, sorry, I don’t think the reviews here, either of them are really going to concentrate terribly much on this particular comic, on the technical aspects, so much as a… I don’t know, a battlefront, in which one periodical publisher may be about to do reasonably well in against their main competitor. Which is the occult. DC is winning the occult war, as of today. I’m as surprised as you are.

Plok was talking to me on twitter this week, you know, just sometime superhero readers, shooting the shit, and he was like “OK, you can publish 15 titles between the big two, they have to sell reasonably well, be plausible teams – so no Alan Moore – what are they?” and I got so far as 6-7 or so (Miller on Batman, Millar/Hitch on Superman, Morrison/Jimenez on Wonder Woman, Adam Warren on X-Men, Morrison/Marcos Martin on Spider-Man, Milligan and his best artistic partners – Allred, McCarthy, Fegredo, Ewins – on some tangential X-book where he does what he likes…) and then you’re kinda running out of space, so you go “Oh! Anthologies!” Immediately I wanted a magic one for both publishers, because those characters have been utterly ghettoised – or written by Bill “I ♥ Israeli Apartheid” Willingham, which is a damnsight worse – at DC and Marvel still can’t fucking do a good

Doctor Strange book, which is perhaps the sorest indictment of their evermore tedious “socially relevant, urban” editorial direction. Can’t do it. I’d prefer China Miéville or John ‘generic name, wrote some of the best 2000AD strips, Karen Berger does not like’ Smith to write them, but yeah, Milligan, a man who seems thoroughly capable of processing a metaphor. On this Justice League Dark; shit name, probably a stupid way to try and franchise the JL like Marvel have the Avengers, I’m not sure about the artist and the above-reviewing Beast has a billion times better title in Justice League Nowhere, but it’s something the continuity-obsessive, rulebound comics that have pretty much dominated superhero publishing from since I was born, in 1979, have been apparently terrified to foreground.

Milligan, though, it’s hard to place him – TBMD gives a rundown of his highlights above, which are pretty imperious, something you could stand against any one other writer of Western serial comics’ best – my own collection and taste is heavily accented toward him, behind the other two Ms, the mages Moore and Morrison, but he himself remains literally an enigma, and certainly one with an equally great amount of lowlights; moreso in the latter days of his career, too. I own the Toxin trade collection. I take ownership of my Venom/Carnage miniseries. Part of the pleasure of peripheral big publisher work, to me, is how it can work through, or around, or even transformatively with terrible banner events – Andrew Hickey details this with Morrison’s Animal Man doing so with Invasion, and the afore-cited Moore Swamp Thing with Crisis on Infinite Earths; this, and probably even simpler editorial dictat, has proven one stumbling block in Milligan’s career, his apparent inability to really do so. The other, and when you look at the British Invasion school and their progenitor, Moore (who, interestingly, is to my mind a massive and telling influence on all of except Milligan) is an inability to really develop a cult-of-personality, a persona; this is not because he’s necessarily almost invisibly craftless, like Ed Brubaker is, but likely because his central and continuing thema is the Shiftlessness of Identity, which is more exciting than it sounds in action, typically. It’s even in Toxin; it’s certainly here – a lead whose friends and loves are dead seeks to redefine himself again (Shade was always the perfect Milligan protagonist) with the aid of a woman who is two women. Whilst he is extant simultaneously in several realities. This is quite certainly a Milligan comic, despite its having a quote from Shakespeare instead of James Joyce. The only palpable difference is – and we could debate, is it witty enough, is it wry or playful enough? It kind of is, I think, without ever reaching the social satire zenith of his X-Force and even moreso, now knowing it’s leading up into something more than two disposable tie-in to an event I don’t give a stone damn about, I’m interested to see where it’s going – the only difference is, he seems to have demarcated a corner to do his own thing, to reconcile with whatever it is this month, God knows. If there’s anyone… apart from John Smith – if there’s anyone working in US serial comics meriting a breakout success or whatever the terminology they use is, a “game-changer”, it is Peter Milligan; this is a relatively humble beginning, but I hope it’s it.

Hellblazer #267 by Peter Milligan and Stefan Camuncoli

There is a pointed alchemical pseudo-mcguffin at the beginning, where a silver sliver of redemptive light presents itself, that we might beg to come back to later. There is a weakness in the reader, a clearly mistaken belief that despite the dimly-remembered arguments of 20 years ago the ‘anti-’ bit of ‘anti-hero’ should basically be swapped out to form ‘grumpyhero’. That every chain-swinging, chain-smoking, cheyne-stoking gritmeister from the last generation’s reboot of the comicbook protagonist is a mere modern gloss on the Gawainian pureheart formula. As was frequently reiterated even in Garth Ennis’ last, ultra-black run on the character, even the type’s posterboy Frank (in my house we call him Frank because ‘The Punisher’ is not a word that you want coming out of the mouth of a three year old girl) is basically a well-intentioned softy, dealing with a very nasty case of PTSD but whose faith in the innocence of sweet children is strong and clear enough to drag him back from the edge of brain damage every six issues or so.

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