If you must be so overtly gendered when marketing, don’t insult the target market in the press releases. Do what you usually do, and insult them with gendered roles in the merchandise.

Now back to sulking in my cave because all the comics I read bar Booster Gold got canceled on me, and Booster Gold is heading towards an epic fail story arc.

• The Punisher I:Dolph Lundgren Version

I’d also like to illustrate the subsequent Punisher films.

• The Punisher II: The Profit Margin
• The Punisher III (The BreakEven!

Where’s my sequel/franchise reboots for Elektra (break even) and Catwoman (narrow loss) since they returned much better investments that the first Punisher, and that saw two franchises?

In the words of Granny Weatherwax… I ATEN’T DEAD.

Not even pining for the fjords really.

Comics oughta be fun. Comic book conventions ought to, as well. But as long as harassment goes on and there is no clear-cut official written rules on convention behavior and what to do in circumstances or physical or mental assault, our hobby runs the risk of alienating and endangering those within it.

I’ve put a word across to a friend who’s involved in the business. If you’ve got contacts for events like these who work in the management teams, pass the link onto them, and pass the link around.

(Thanks to kalinara@WFA for the headsup)

Image via Wikipedia

Things have been slow on the DS front as things have not been slow on the real life front (Don’t ask about my word count. It frightens small publishers).

Comic Review 1: Robin/Spoiler.

I’ve just read the Robin/Spoiler special in all its awesometastic awesomeness.  Steph’s diary notes are squee worthy. A totally awesome combo would be Spoiler + Blue Beetle as a team up.  The Jaime Reyes and Steph Brown combo would be awesome.

I love Steph going “Tim Drake Wayne” in her diary. That’s awesome. Also, this version of Robin is much more the Robin I grew to like in the main DCverse.  BabyBatcontrolfreakTitanRobin doesn’t resonate with me as a Tim Drake that fits into the larger DCverse.

Blue Beetle 27

On the Blue Beetle Foreshadowing Hammer of Doom, could the end two pages of Blue Beetle #27 please, please not be a foreshadow? Not just for the sake of the characters, but for the sake of the sales and story writing quality of the title?

BATMAN:WIP and Trinity (1 to 4)

Meanwhile, DC Universe hits the almost but not possible combination punch with Trinity AND Batman RIP. I read both. I paid money for both. Side by side, they suck.  Side by side they are two of the worse comics series to experience back to back.

ndividually, I’m finding myself quite fond of Trinity, and Batman:RETCON IN PROGRESS is very cleverly shaking the foundations of the DC established known continuity.

Here’s the problem though – on the right hand, Batman is a mythic level centre piece of a year long arc.  On the other hand, it’s the end of the Batman as we know it *handclap* it’s the end of the Batverse as we know it *handclap* and the two storylines are on the shelves at the same time.

That makes them both suck.  It’s not even the MuliWolverine syndrome (Sixteen Skrulls and counting). It’s two totally divergent stories in allegedly the same continuity.  Together, they’re fail.  Separated by a year or two, they’d both be key parts of the DCverse.  Right now, you can’t take either as serious contributions to the mythos,

Batman:WIP Theory: Given the number of times the DC universe has been hit with time rifts, weirdness and reality mergers, I think the events listed in Batman#677 did happen – but happened on Earth n+1 rather than the main timeline.  This time crisis/infinite crisis  sort of thing should have resonant impact on key players like Batman.

Oh, and if Jezebel Jade is the villain and/or cops a fridging, DC needs to hire writers. Actual writers, not story recyclers.

Trinity: I couldn’t stop laughing at the open serious seriousness visions – and thinking “Oh hey, it’s baby from that time when Dick Grayson humped the TimeStream back in inFinite Crisis”. I think the Tarot card metaphor is straining at the edges by #4, unless they start putting together a full deck of DC cards. That has merchandise and mythos approval.

Booster Gold #10:

Good comic, and ouch ending. Oh man. Oh man. That part of the arc ain’t over though, because there’s just something that says things turn out in an unexpected way.

Rightio, that’s the monthly wrap up.  I’m going to run silent for a little while whilst on tour for my day job, and whilst I set to planning what to do next with the DS column.  Suggestions and ideas would be most welcome.

How can a species with no fear survive for so long?

Power Rings.

A spate of recent highly visible advertising campaigns using violent themes, imagery, and acts elicited heightened scrutiny after the 2007 Superbowl. There are a growing number of highly successful video games with violence at their core such as Grand Theft Auto, World of Warcraft, and Halo to name a few, that receive advertising support. There are also a growing number of advertising-based Internet games offered and freely accessible to even young children. Indeed, the success of entertainment vehicles is highly dependent on advertising support systems. The recent intermingling of advertising and entertainment content points to the pivotal role of advertising for defining cultural norms and influencing behaviors of violence, abuse to others and self, and neglect.

Journal of Advertising is one of the A level marketing journals, and they’re traditionally USA-centric in appproach. So, I’d like this call for paper to get a little more attention from outside the marketing academics mailing lists.   There’s a need for voices that aren’t from the usual suspects list (and I say that because on any gioven topic in marketing, we can name the ten most likely authors to respond to a special issue call for papers) and views that aren’t just white male middle class academics* on topics such as the Dehumanization in advertising, Stereotyping and degradation, Symbolic consumption of violence and New media, gaming and violence consumption as a contributor to active and passive child abuse.
Submission deadline: March 31, 2009.
*If anyone needs a WMMC marketing academic to provide the academy firepower as second or third author on a paper, I’m open to collaborations. It is what I do for a day job.

I ain’t all sweetness and light bub

Okay, so I’m not much sweetness or light for suggesting wolvering in a swimsuit. But hey, Wolverine swimsuit in a context so obviously trying for the cheesecake factor was a must say.

That said, the poll showed, most people wanted a swimsuit Nightwing.

Sure, Grayson’s pretty, but hey, Hugh Jackman is prettier :)

Want to place bets if the swimsuit poll happens, it’ll only mention the female characters?

“War Machine is in my list as a favourite, and he’s a reason for me to hang out for Iron Man 2″ – DS Post, Apil 18

Rhodey was awesome.  There’s a moment in the film where I was making incoherent squeeeing and fanboy flailing, and you’ll so totally have to see the film to know where and when, and OMG YAY! (A possibly spoilerish pic from IMDB helps with a clue)

In other news, as a Marvel lightweight, and mostly DC fanboy, this film seriously left me feeling that it’s pretty much over for DC now.  After Christian Bale hangs up the Batcape, the DC comics cinematic tour is over.  There’s nothing or no one in the stable that’s going to compare to the strength of the Marvel movie making machine.

There’s enough hat-tips and subtle cues in the Iron Man movie for deep level fanboy reference, and a damn fine ride of movie for the rest of the universe.  All up, it’s nice to have a comics movie that made me feel happy about comic books.

The Links

Keep up with Girl Wonder Blog posts about Free Comic Book Day :

You can discuss the upcoming festivities at our forum topic here. A roll call of possible participants would be great!

• Large Ask Me About Girl Wonder graphic, suitable for stickers, shirts and other large items
• Small Ask Me About Girl Wonder graphic, suitable for online use.
• Superheroine printable Girl Wonder flyer
• Flying Girl Symbol printable Girl Wonder flyer
• Printable Girl Wonder tear off tags to tape to the back of your wall flyers if you want to give people something to remember us by
• Free Comic Book Day official website
• A store finder for participating comic shops
• A list of the Free Comic Book Day free comics available to stores (supplies may vary).
• The Girl Wonder Free Comic Book Day flickr group