CINDY & BISCUIT and THE CAMERA
August 9th, 2012
RECEIVING TRANSMISSION – “A LITTLE MORE POWER OVER THAT MEMORY…”
Sorry, what’s that? You were waiting for the second part of my Tygers and Lambs series? Well hey, thanks for checking in mum, glad you still read the site – that post should go up over the weekend! [1]
The rest of you are probably looking for more SILENCE! or more League of Extraordinary Gentlemen annocommentations or something [2], and who can blame you, but you’ll have to wait a while for all of that because right now we’re doing Dirty Thoughts From Other People’s Comments Section!
WITHOUT WARNING!
Okay, so over on The Comics Journal’s website, Sean Rogers wrote a review of Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely’s Flex Mentallo that posited the aforementioned comic as a prime example of the “strenuous vapidity” of Morrison’s writing. I think it’s safe enough to say that most of Team Mindless [3] are pretty into Flex Mentallo – the manifesto like “Candyfloss horizons” posts that graced the site during its early days are definitely written in the key of Flex Mentallo, with its “candy-striped skies” [4] – and I wrote about the book again when the freshly recoloured “deluxe” edition was released in April of this year. As such, bearing in mind that FEELINGS ABOUT COMICS ARE THE ONLY TRUE FEELINGS [5], I decided to have a go at taking Sean’s review apart.
Sean seems to think that Flex Mentallo is a guide to better living through superheroes, whereas I think it’s more like a Dennis Potter drama in two-dimensions [6], a strange story in which a grown man cracks and finds himself trying to make sense out of everything with reference to a lifetime’s worth of ruddy superhero comics.
My comment is up on The Comics Journal site if you want to check it out and see what you think.
SILENCE! #25
August 7th, 2012
THEY ALL FLOAT DOWN HERE…AND WHEN YOU’RE DOWN HERE WITH US, YOU’LL FLOAT TOO!
Hah hooh hah!
It’s that time of the week boys and girls, and Gary Lactus and The Beast Must Die are here to bring the melonfarming ruckus! Duck and cover for SILENCE! no.25
After an Olympic Pool-sized edition of SILENCE! News, the boyce let rip with some lovingly hand-crafted comics reviews. INCLUDING: Fraction and Aja’s Hawkeye no.1, Dial H from Mieville and co, Beasts of Burden from Dorkin and Thompson, Action Comics, Daredevil, Animal Man and Lactus has a diet-sized portion of Man V Comics with AVX.
There’s a special SILENT Question from Batroc Zee Leepair (with the answer including Bob of the Black Lodge and Pennywise the Dancing Clown).
Then there’s a meaty discussion of Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises aka Occupy Gotham (currently showing in magic lantern shows around the country.
Add in a vital clue in the ongoing saga to discover ‘lost’ Brit comics genius Barry M Freeman (Woodward & Bernstein get f*cked) and you have a meaty, beaty, big & bouncy edition of SILENCE!
Doctor Who: Fifty Stories For Fifty Years: 1978
August 4th, 2012
Sometimes, plans change…
When I was planning this entry, it was all going to be about how this is the story in which two figures who will be important to this narrative from now on enter — Douglas Adams, whose first story this is, and who would go on to write two more and script edit the next series, and me, because I was born two days before episode two of this story aired. So from now on, the entries will be slightly more personal, as I will remember at least some of them from the time of broadcast.
But instead of being about people entering the story, it has to be about people leaving it.
SILENCE! #24
July 31st, 2012
WE ARE THE DICK MILLER APPRECIATION SOCIETY…
Firstly, apologies if you are having trouble downloading this week’s SILENCE! Gary and The Beast are currently reaching their monthly bandwidth limit with their pod lords. It should be back to normal (at least for a while) on the 4th of August. At the moment they cannot afford to upgrade our account so perhaps they’ll set up some way of letting listeners chip in a bit of financial support in the near future but what do I know? I’m just a disembodied voice which magically appears here to tell you about the contents of the podcast…
Secondly – forget about all that whiny cry-baby sh*t! Let’s get some face time with the latest and greatest edition of SILENCE! – the show that snuggles up to you and looks awful cute, but one look into those cold black shark eyes tells you…this podcast is not your friend.
The Beast and Lactus get things up and running (then falling over) with the SILENCE! News, before taking a roll in the clover with some of this week’s very floppiest of floppies, including:
Axe Cop, Tank Girl from Martin and Mahfood, Eternity, Haunt, Prophet and JL: Dark. Lactus bites down on the belt strap and mainlines some more medicine in Man Vs Comics, taking on all sorts of unwanted AVX business in Wolverine and The X-Men, X-Men Legacy and AVX: The Avengers. There are probably more in there too. Beast also likes some of Paul Chadwick’s Concrete.
The two get another celebrity quizzler in The Silent Question (and the answers involve Booster Gold and Jason Todd). Lactus continues his crusade to bring exposure to lost Brit comics savant Barry M Freeman, and The Beast unveils his Knightquest, as he dips into the Complete Batman: Knightfall. Oh, and Lactus unveils his headpourings on the ‘recent’ Amazing Spiderman film.
All wrapped up in an hour and a half of well proportioned comics fun. And look at the winning smile on the little blighter! So gather round and listen to Pappy as he turns up the radio on…SILENCE! no.24!
THE NEGATIVE ZONE: Saga #1
July 30th, 2012
The ‘S’ you may have seen is silent, actually, so we’re just going to call it by its True Name, Aga.
Welcome to the Star Wars comic where every character is Jar Jar Binks.
SILENCE! #23
July 25th, 2012
THIS IS NOT AN EXIT
Of course it isn’t silly! It’s a gaping entrance! An entrance into the world of SILENCE!!!
In this episode the pair who go together like strawberries and cream, millionaires and wards, and ‘interesting’ facial hair and threats of violence get down on their knees and pray for a rain of comics…and they get it!
After a heartfelt piece of Dylan-esque balladry about Man-Thing from The Beast, and a baggy edition of the SILENCE! news, there’s a twelve car pile-up of comics foolchat, covering:
the revamped Glory, Peter Bagge’s Reset, Paul Chadwick’s Concrete (and ‘Moving A Big Rock’), Saga (both the comic and the pensioner’s holiday scheme), Hanging with DB Cooper from Brian Churillo, Mind MGMT, Hellblazer and the recent hilarious Inkstuds Biz interview, Daredevil, The Shadow, JLA and an Infernal Man-Thing freestyle… oh, and Lactus takes on all the AVX related bizzo, in Man Vs Comics.
But let’s not forget the brand new feature The Silent Question in which the pair answer a Celebrity! Question! The Beast talks up Hookjaw and Lactus takes on Chester Brown and Canadian masturbation in general…
And there’s an appreciation of lost Brit comics genius Barry M Freeman.
Dear me, I’ve just wet me knickers! It’s all too much…let’s hope your undercrackers can handle the truth! It’s all wrapped up in the brain-burp that is…SILENCE!
And don’t forget to check below as well for the Silence Gallery…
I hope you’ll forgive me a little bit of Mindless Self Indulgence here since we’ve already covered the comic in question in some detail, but just try to imagine my surprise when after reading pages and pages full of brilliant, moving stuff about growing older in a world that is indifferent to your bewildered perspective in LoEG Century, I came face-to-face with the young Antichrist and discovered that he was me.
Of course, he was also Harry Potter and Will Stanton and Kevin the Teenager, but as he peeled his way out of the page…
…and started rambling away at our heroes in that deadened voice of his, I began to feel like I was watching myself rip my way through the comic. A spoiled young man raging against the story he’s grown up in?
Fuck! Yeah, okay – guilty as charged!
Mmmmmyesss! Click here to initiate contact with a Mindless antichrist!
The End of Time: Mister Attack vs. Transformers Regeneration One
July 20th, 2012
This review was fuckin’ tough to write. I mean that. I don’t mean just the usual typing and re-typing a section as you try to nuance a gag or make a point, although that was certainly part of it. No, what it entailed was something of a personal whirlwind akin to the opening of Apocalypse Now, but with less booze and more crying. Sometimes I would pause to reflect on how the fuck I got myself into this state over something so simple, because, really, the actual review was a breeze to write. It was what followed that was the problem.
When Simon Furman and Andrew Wildman announced their desire to resume the story of the Marvel Transformers comic, I have to confess I was curious, but I wasn’t burning to have it with never-ending desire. It did seem odd. Bin Generation 2? That odd beast of a comic with 75% more violent death and one of the most intriguing additions to Furman’s version of the mythology? Also, I’d not long finished catching up with Furman’s IDW run. A decidedly mixed bag that almost dips a toe into becoming brutally sublime when the cancellation kicks in and the steadily increasing pace that marked each limited series suddenly sees the last two issues ramp up into a fucking furious pace. Plot points not so much nailed as roadkilled. A tenuous reminder of the energies of past. Maybe he had the old ways in him, but I for one wasn’t sure.
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