Mindless Ones

Before the sun sets on the comics week.

Batman and Robin #4
Published by DC Comics
Story – Grant Morrison
Art – Philip Tan, Jonathan Glapion

This was always going to be a let down from where I’m sitting. Batman and Robin under the pen of Quitely was without a doubt my favourite Superhero comic of the year, and very possibly my favourite superhero comic since the last time those two collaborated. Scratch that, truth be told I preferred those three issues to All Star Superman, because not only were Morrison and Quitely producing fabulous work, they were producing fabulous work on a Batman comic, and I do so love a bit of Batman. So, yes, I always knew this was going to be a letdown and that I would have to struggle to give it a fair hearing.

More after the jump

Wowzers!  We sure had a lot to talk about last time I visited Tymbus in my vault.  I’ve decided to give it to you in seven handy-dandy sections in the vain hope that it might make the whole experience less tedious.

vault-of-tymbus-12-1 (Fantastic Four # 570)
[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/vault-of-tymbus-12-1.mp3]

vault-of-tymbus-12-02 (Archie Comics # 600)
[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/vault-of-tymbus-12-02.mp3]

vault-of-tymbus-12-03 (Jack Kirby’s Captain Victory)
[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/vault-of-tymbus-12-03.mp3]

vault-of-tymbus-12-04 (Lion)
[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/vault-of-tymbus-12-04.mp3]

vault-of-tymbus-12-05 (Asterios Polyp)
[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/vault-of-tymbus-12-05.mp3]

vault-of-tymbus-12-06 (Blackest Night)
[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/vault-of-tymbus-12-06.mp3]

vault-of-tymbus-12-07 (2000AD # 1650)
[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/vault-of-tymbus-12-07.mp3]

LOOK AND LEARN! Click here for images relevant to the above audio…

I saw Crank 2 the other day.  I have never seen a film like it in my life, although admittedly I haven’t seen the first Crank film.  This trailer makes it look far less ridiculous than it actually is:

So anyway, Crank 2 is now the yardstick with which I measure all things.  With that in mind,

let’s look at some recent comics…

I used to have a friend who would perform his own peculiar brand of dance: DANCE FIGHTING

EXTREME RUBBISH!

I’ll let you in on a secret.

Every time a Geoff Jeans’ (his new name*) mega-event comes around, I know, just know, that this time, forget all the other times, I’m going to enjoy it. See, I understand the allure of holidaying in the DCU. There’s all those superpeople with all their superpowers, the tangled web of all those relationships and history. There’s The supernatural, outer-space, the far future… It sounds great on paper doesn’t it? Well that’s just it, IT’S NOT GREAT ON PAPER. IT’S SHIT ON PAPER.

Find out why after the jump

Phonogram Book 2: The Singles Club #4, by Keiron Gillen, Jamie McKelvie and Matthew Wilson

Not, by the way, going to allow this review to be coloured by how annoying those Pipettes at the next table in the cafe on Saturday were. Didn’t really notice myself, to be honest, I was wrapped up thoroughly in my weekly dose of Wednesday wonder (it’s the comic it’s OK to read in public! Best Aquaman ever!), but when I looked up my betrothed had her homicide face on, filled me in on the details later. One Pipette telling off another Pipette for not being Pipettey enough. Read: first rule of Pipette club – do not be a better singer than lead Pipette. Another line-up change on the horizon? How 2006.

Which I think is big of me

BRAKKA-DAKKA-THADOOOM!!!

Two  amazing podcasts!  One explosive post!  All these comics and more!

In #10 we look at the Marvel Heroes Power Lucky Bag that we bought in the pub along with a host of publications found in the recent reordering of the vault.  We select/reject gems/germs like Ultimate Fantastic Four, Mystery Men, Duplex Planet, A1, Hup, and more!

Click to download VOT#10

[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/vault-of-tymbus-10wav.mp3]

With #11 we review some recent comics including Wildstorm’s Red Herring#1, Marvel’s Lockjaw and the Pet Avengers, DC’s Red Circle: Inferno and Doom Patrol #1. Then, lucky listener we look at some old copies of Buster from 1980 which Tymbus goes on about at such tedious length I’ve had to put a musical bed underneath it to sweeten the shitty pill.

Click to download VOT#11

[audio:https://mindlessones.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/vault-of-tymbus-11.mp3]

Click for more pics and a whole episode of the brilliant Leopard from Lime Street…

A short, compressed piece on memory and Enid Coleslaw.

Falling…falling…..

When he woke up he thought he’d dreamed about a movie he’d seen the other day. But everything was different. The characters were black, so the movie in the dream was like a negative of the real movie. And different things happened, too. The plot was the same, what happened was the same, but the ending was different or at some moment things took an unexpected turn and became something completely different. Most terrible of all, though, was that as he was dreaming he knew it didn’t necessarily have to be that way, he noticed the resemblance to the movie, he thought he understood that both were based on the same premise, and that if the movie he’d see was the real movie, then the other one, the one he had dreamed, might be a reasoned response, a reasoned critique, and not necessarily a nightmare. All criticism is ultimately a nightmare, he thought as he washed his face in the apartment where his mother’s body no longer was.

– Roberto Bolaño, ‘The part about Fate’, p.234, 2666

This was originally notionally a piece called ‘Justify yr pull-list’, but I can’t seem to think of a more absurd enterprise than that, on reflection.

Hobbies include: pitying fools