Mindless Ones

Before the last of these essays, a little bit of other stuff…

This post is going to go live at precisely midnight — at which point it will be the fiftieth anniversary of Doctor Who, and so this is the last of the fifty stories essays.

Enough people said they would want a book of this that I’ve put one together, and that is also available from midnight tonight. You can buy it as a paperback, hardback, Kindle ebook (US) (UK), or non-Kindle ebook (with no DRM on the ebooks). And for those of you who visit us at Thought Bubble, you can buy a paperback copy off me personally.

But don’t worry if you’re too poor to buy one, or you just don’t like me and don’t want me to have money — the essays are essentially the same as they were when published here, but without the dodgy screencaps, and with quite a bit of copy-editing and fact-checking. You can still read the original versions here for free.
But anyway, here’s the last essay

For the third year running Team Mindless will be in (almost) full effect at the Thought Bubble comics convention in Leeds.  I’ll be there trying to shake off my current Brendan McCarthy inspired appearance in front of my adoring public, and I believe Andre Whickey, Bobsy, Gary Lactus, Mister Attack and The Beast Must Die will also be in attendance on Saturday and Sunday.

If you fancy stopping by for a chat or buying our wares, we’ll be at Tables 21-22 in Allied London Hall for the duration of the weekend.

Fans of word/face combinations should note that the beautiful mugs behind our SILENCE! podcast will be performing SILENCE! Live (in 3D) at 11.40am on Saturday morning at the Speech Bubble Panel Arena in Armories Square.   As if the prospect of matching face to voice wasn’t exciting enough, Mssrs Beast and Lactus will be joined by comics’ own Kieron Gillen, Brandon Graham, Al Ewing, and Ales Kot as they discuss love, life, and (obviously) comics in bottom-wetting detail.

Back in Allied London Hall, those of you lucky enough to have pennies in your pocket will be able to exchange them for the following shiny treats!

In his secret identity as “Fraser Geesin,” Britain’s Next Top Cosmic Apocalypse Gary Lactus will be glad to take your Earth currency in exchange for…

Headrust – a collection of 20 years worth of family strips

The Cleaner #1 – about a true hero of our times

Knights of the Realm – as serialised on this very website!

The Amusing Brothers Collection – as featured in your least haunting dreams

Scott “Mister Attack” Mackattack (Sorry, I’m a dick – Scott McAllister, that’s his name.  This is his website.  Go show him some love!) will be selling the first two collections of his Wake Up Screaming comic (Everyone’s Felt Like This Once and A Head Full of Maybes) alongside Points on a Graph, his new comic about the growing crossover between post-human entities and customer service work.

He’ll also be giving away samples of his new Webcomic, The Weegie Board, as written by some prick called David Allison.

The Beast Must Die might have had to pretend to be a mere mortal called Dan White in order to have his Cindy and Biscuit nominated for Young People’s Comic Award at this year’s BCAs, but that doesn’t lesson his achievements at all.

Cindy and Biscuit is one of the best comics around.  Check it out:

When pressed for details as to what its host body would be selling this weekend, Andrew Hickey‘s beard made the following statement out of its many gorgeous tendrils:

I will have the first ten copies ever printed of my collection of essays about Doctor Who, Fifty Stories For Fifty Years, available — it comes out tomorrow, the day of the anniversary itself (I haven’t even looked at the copies myself yet, so they’re unproofed — caveat lector). I will also have copies of my book about Grant Morrison’s Seven Soldiers, An Incomprehensible Condition, and my essays about comics and Doctor Who, Sci-Ence! Justice Leak!, as well as my short story collection Ideas And Entities. I may have one or two copies of my music books as well if I have any left over from last year (I haven’t checked). I will also scribble in the books if you wish.

Bit weird how the beard thinks it’s in charge, but I’m not brave enough to contradict it so we’ll let that pass for now.

Finally, I’ll be there with copies of Cut-Out Witch (a book full of melancholy ghosts and lo-fi monster magic, as drawn by my friend Lynne Henderson and captured in caption by my good self) and issue #1 of Looking Glass Heights, a mix of comics and essays on a set of common themes (housing, hubris, reality, the weather):

There might be a few other tricks and treats for you if you stop by over the weekend, but I won’t ruin them for you by spoiling them now.

Thought Bubble is easily the best comics convention I’ve ever been to, and if you can make it to Leeds this weekend I’d urge you to attend even if you don’t want to have to look at us/give us money/touch our many gorgeous heads.

Excelsior?

Continuity can be a useful tool.

RUN RUN REYNARD, RUN RUN RUN

I am Disembodied Gunnery Sargebot X – 15735. What is your major malfunction, numbnuts?!

What is this Mickey Mouse sh*t? What in the name of Jesus H. Christ are you animals doing in my head? Why is Gary Lactus out of his bunk after lights-out? Why is Private Pyle holding that weapon? Why aren’t you stomping Gary Lactus’s guts out? Do you feel dizzy? Do you feel faint! Jesus H. Christ! I think you’ve got a hard-on!

The Beast Must Die has dishonored himself and dishonored the platoon. I have tried to help him. But I have failed. I have failed because YOU have not helped me. YOU people, have not given The Beast Must Die the proper motivation! You must listen to the latest SILENCE! ALL THE WAY THROUGH!

<TEN HUT!> Sponsorship, admin, SILENCE! Live at Thought Bubble – sounds like the kind of thing you maggots might enjoy.

<TEN HUT!>Did I mention that it’s Gary Lactus’ Birthday? There’s a special birthday message from Black Bolt of the Inhumans.

<TEN HUT!> Get your faces in the mud and CRAWL your way to the Reviewniverse ladies! In the firing line this week: Shaolin Cowboy, Rocket Girl, Mighty Avengers, All New X-Men, Avengers Arena, Saga, Forever Evil, Bee Vixens From Mars, Hinterkind, Batman: Black & White, Umbral, Captain Marvel, Superior Spiderman, Resident Alien, Fatale and….Space Clusters!!

Whatever you do, don’t fall down, it would break my f*cking heart! Are you quitting on me? ARE YOU QUITTING ON ME?! Well, are you? Then quit, you slimy f*cking walrus-looking piece of sh*t!

But SILENCE! lives forever. And that means YOU live forever.

click to download SILENCE!#84

Contact us:

[email protected]
@silencepod
@frasergeesin
@thebeastmustdie
@bobsymindless

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.

One of the strange blessings of the internet is its ability to serve as an external memory system.  Thoughts that would once have been lost to time if they were even lucky enough to have made it out of your head are now preserved for an indefinite eternity in places over which you have little to no control.

For example, if I want to know how I felt about Brendan McCarthy’s Doctor Strange/Spider-Man comic Fever after the first issue came out in 2010, a quick google search will turn up this flouncing defense of the book, written in response to a review by Sean Collins:

Say it Vibrational Match style: Where you see “inert physicality”, I see a Spider-Man who’s all harsh angles and elbows being squashed, flattened out, and a Doc Strange who’s at home with the harsh geometrics McCarthy conjures up.

Where you read flat pastiche, I read Spider-Man as a jerk who gets shut the hell up by the story (his words like jutting elbows –> drooping limbs), and Doc Strange as a badass who can turn exposition into information with the right gestures (verbal, physical).

Also: the mystic spider dialogue is genuinely fucking creepy, for reals, when combined with the images, yes?

In lesser hands this would be mere set-up, but this issue had a whole lot of “?something else?” working for it — that creepy wee arachnid bastard, crawling up the Vulture’s back, fr’instance!  Like something from Seven Soldiers, only (yes!) far more unsettling.

I saw the biggest, most bulbous-assed spider of the year last night, sitting on my windowsill. I’m a bit of a wuss when it comes to these wee beasties, but last night, after having read Fever? I tell you, I wanted to kiss the wee fucker!

The “hey, I’m a black guy!” dialogue was a bit cringey though, pastiche or no.

Looking at the book this week, I find myself agreeing with every point but the last one.

It’s not that I don’t find the dialogue McCarthy gave to the African-American comedy character cringe-inducing anymore – I do! – but that Brendan McCarthy’s recent Facebook comments on race make me feel ashamed the structure supporting that final sentence.

Sure, I agreed with Sean Collins’ assessment of the embarrassing nature of McCarthy’s throwback characterisation, but I did so in a tossed off, casual way, after five paragraphs of flame flecked enthusiasm. The implicit message being that everyone should just chill out about this racist after taste and enjoy the “septic salsa” of the comic itself.

In 2010, the story of McCarthy was that he was that of the hero freshly returned from the wasteland, ready to save the kingdom from itself.  His new work confirmed his status as a trinity of psych-pop ghosts, the faces of Brit comics past, present and future combined.  What interest could a couple of dodgy panels hold against all that?  Solo #12 remains McCarthy’s late period masterpiece, but even in lesser books like Fever there are moments of astonishing beauty.  The scene in the second issue where Spider-Man steps through a portal and into a crunchy insect killing field still burns bright in the light of its own toxic logic:

Who could argue against that sort of artistic firepower? Not me back in 2010, apparently. Click here to see how I get on in 2013!

TELL HIM ABOUT THE TWINKIE…

WHAT ABOUT THE TWINKIE?

I am Disembodied 16-bitbot X – 15735. YOU LOSE!

I’m the strongest woman in the world! You are not a warrior; you’re a beginner! Seeing you in action is a joke. Let’s fight. Or alternatively, let’s all listen to SILENCE! together. And it’s a three-way special as GAry Lactus & The Beast Must Die face a return from notorious end-of-level boss BOBSY! Now you realize the inner mysteries of yoga. Handsome fighters never lose battles! FLAWLESS VICTORY!

<ROUND 1> Sponsorship, admin, SILENCE! Live at Thought Bubble & bibble babble. Get up you wimp!

<ROUND 2> It’s a tight squeeze as the three muskercretins barge their way into the Reviewniverse. There’s extended talk of Your Days Are Numbered (with work from Shaky Kane, Tom Scioli, Alex Shubert, Kyle Platts and more), Paul O’Connell’s Sound of Drowning, and the extinction level event that is the return of Neil Gaiman: Dream Laureate’s Sandman. They also discuss Prophet, X-Men: Battle of The Atom, Hannah Eaton’s Naming Monsters and the Thought Bubble 2013 Anthology. It’s natural for a sumo to be the world’s stongest

<ROUND 3> There’s some digressionary tracts into the geographical inaccuracies of Thor 2 and the unpleasant politics of Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD. Go home and be a family man!

That’s all. Go now. And remember: You must defeat Sheng Long to stand a chance!

YOU WIN!

 
click to download SILENCE!#83

Contact us:

[email protected]
@silencepod
@frasergeesin
@thebeastmustdie
@bobsymindless

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.

Doctor Who has had several radical reinventions over the years — when it stopped being about Ian and Barbara, when the Doctor first regenerated, when it became an Earth-bound show during Pertwee’s time, when it stopped being on TV altogether and became a series of books…

Most of the time, the programme has a tendency to revert back to something like the mean, but each time it retains some of the new with the old. Steven Moffat’s reinvention of the programme is, one suspects, another time when this will be the case.

SHE DID IT JUST LIKE SISTER RAY SAID

Oh hello. It’s Disembodied Morrisseybot X – 15735 here, and it really is too awfully dreary to be sentient isn’t it? No doubt I shall expire soon in a drizzle of lukewarm tea and ennui.

I suppose I should blunder blindly through this maddeningly dull preamble and lead you by the gilded glove to the rancid spectacle that is this week’s edition of SILENCE!

<ITEM> Somebody take my pulse and check I haven’t slipped away into the gloom, as we endure the administrative business at the top of the show…sponsorship, ghost girls in the comic shop and more information about the upcoming SILENCE LIVE at this year’s Thought Bubble. How plainly sickening and cruel.

<ITEM> It only gets more gruesome as those two boarish blitherers head into the Reviewniverse, old bones groaning. Puffing and wheezing they sing the praises, or cast onto the stones, the following comic books: Pretty Deadly, Hinterkind, Indestructible Huls Special, Wolverine & The X-Men, Velvet, Daredevil, Young Avengers, Samurai Jack and Marvel Now What..?!

Really. I’d rather not.

<ITEM> In a typically ham-fisted attempt at retaining their skinny fingers on the pulse, the two sample the questionable pleasures of the Captain America: Winter Soldier trailer… absolutely vile.

And so we come, inevitably to the end; alas all things must end, especially those precious and delicate moments of respite from the sordid boredom of life. Although in this instance I’m rather glad to see the back of it!

Life is very long, when you’re listening to podcasts…

click to download SILENCE!#82

Contact us:

[email protected]
@silencepod
@frasergeesin
@thebeastmustdie

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.

WE ARE THE 801, WE ARE THE CENTRAL SHAFT

Hello fleshbags. It’s Disembodied Translatorbot X – 4451G I ‘m the cousin of Disembodied Narratorbot X – 15735. I’m afraid Disembodied Narratorbot X – 15735 could not it due to illness so I’ll be there ! Excuse my English is not so great – I hope I’m right! Welcome to another edition of SILENCE!

The two most lovable rascal Gary Lactus and The Beast Must Die returns with more views of champagne and jokes comics ! Rejoice .

<item> Management, talk about at the top of the program through sponsorship , a discussion of his upcoming appearance at the Thought Bubble in 2013 and Gary appeared in one of the next Dr Who based comedy night ! And do not forget to tune in The Beast Must Die ( Dan White in his alter ego ) interviewed by Alex Fitch of Resonance FM within its Panel Borders panel program ( full interview here)

<item> Then we take a trip to Reviewniverse the boys discuss the best recently released Best of Milligan & McCarthy Collection .

Then <item> business as usual with cartoon above Legends of the Dark Knight, After Life with Archie , Zero , Hawkeye , Uncanny X -Men, Avengers , Three, Fantomex MAX and more fun .. .

Then <item> The Beast Must check some of the younger children Comics issues , see Mega Man and Sonic , Spongebob Comics , Simpsons, and Herobear.

Well , I hope you like it! I really enjoyed that it was for my cousin got lost when he was sick. I hope to see you soon!

click to download SILENCE!#81

Contact us:
[email protected]
@silencepod
@frasergeesin
@thebeastmustdie

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.