I haven't written a regular review of comics and graphic novels since "The Newsletter of Artistic Influence" stopped printing several years ago. However, I was recently given the opportunity to take a preview of the new multi-platform media project "Parallel Man", specifically the comic book mini-series "Invasion America: Issue 1 of 7."

The premise of the Parallel Man is a return to the Multiverse Theory postulated by Quantum physics. Our Universe is like a pearl on a chain, side by side with a potentially infinite number of parallel universes. Like the television series "Sliders" and like one of my favorite role playing games from the 1990's "TORG: The Possibility Wars", the engine of the story is partially fueled by the ability to travel between these universes of possibility.

The method in Parallel Man is by far much more precisely controlled than "Sliders" or "TORG" however. During World War II, the Allied Forces in one parallel Earth developed the ability to travel from one parallel world to another.  The Ascendancy used this ability to defeat their version of the Axis by traveling to nearby universes they then mapped for resources, equipment and technology. They didn't stop there though. With a sinister name like the Ascendancy no one would be shocked to find that they proceeded to declare war and eventually conquer several of their adjoining parallel Earths.

When we come in to the story, the Ascendancy leader, third generation dictator Warren Cartwright III is issuing an ultimatum to Barack Obama. Meanwhile, one of the Ascendancy's undercover operatives has decided to go rogue. A squadron of Ascendancy peacekeepers is hot on his tail in no time at all though. He is pursued by female version of evil Jerry O'Connell, and daughter of fearless leader, Mackenzie Cartwright through a thrilling series of alternate Earths. I especially wanted to spend more time in Chinamerica Chicago, purely for unwholesome interests.

Visually, the comic book has a pulp style that is warmly reminiscent of Saturday morning cartoons from the eighties and early nineties. The vehicles, weapons, and costumes place the style in a romanticized pop sci fi period that reminds me of being a kid again. I mean seriously, who can resist an airship that looks like it belongs with the G.I. Joe team flying over alternate Chicago with Bronze age dinosaurs on other dinosaur's backs.

Tomorrow night it returns once more. Welcome with me the Super Moon to our humble sphere. Looking for submissions of poetry dedicated to love, magic, & our friend, the Super Moon.

This was the last time that I met up with the Super Moon.

Super Moon: Balladeer

Damian Sheridan

Bone-bleaching White

Unterrestrial Distant

Considering the agent

Of space-clouds white

Whisper me your song

You’re the Moon

Immaculate and grand

Beautific and arcane

Eldritch like snow

Casting the net of what we

As objects of the Stellar

Derived from and are driven toward

Burning star love

Passion Ancient

Grinding out loud

The whisper of Unimpressable Time

Majestic Planetoid

Inspiring and Watching

Wan the Moon

 

Long Lost Brothers..Reunited?

 

Are Groot from "Guardians of the Galaxy" and Station from "Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey" secretly brothers?  I leave it for you to decide.

Okay at first glance I know what you are thinking.  Station is clearly a rather beaky alien hominid or two of animal origins.  Groot on the other hand is some kind of ambulatory hybrid plantlike thing.  Okay, point against them for first impressions.  These guys look nothing alike.  One clearly takes after dad, the other looks more like mom.

Delving deeper though, I think you will begin to come around to my way of thinking.

Firstly; Station is, according to lore, the most brilliant creature in the galaxy.  Whenever anyone talks to him/them though all they get is the name "Station".  The funny thing is though that people he's talking to understand what he means even though all he keeps saying is "Station".  They realize that "Station" can be everything they need to say to get their point across.  I "Station" you, dude.

Groot travels with Rocket Raccoon. When you strike up a conversation with Groot all he seems to say is "I am Groot".  However, first Rocket and then later other members of the Guardian team begin to realize the subtle nuances of  the phrase.  They start to realize when he says "I am Groot", he is really stating or asking a host of other things.

Point the second; Although not the smartest creature in the galaxy, Groot is a very thoughtful and intuitive giant plant-minid.  He is able to assess a situation and stimulate a host of biochemical changes leading to reviving stimulants, bioluminescence, active and passive defences, and even a host of offensive capabilities to protect himself and those he calls his friends.

Kind of similar to what Station was able to do with the stuff out of the back of Bill and Ted's van.  With a collateral run to the local hardware store enough pieces were put together to build good Bill and Ted androids to combat the evil ones and save the day...."Stayyshuuun"!

Thirdly; both Station and Groot, from small beginnings come big possibilities.

And.

So, setting their physical differences aside, inside Station and Groot are clearly blood/chlorophyll brothers.

In case you were still on the fence I would like to point out to you my fourth point that both Station and Groot love to dance. (Yeah, sorry I couldn't find the clip from the end of Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey where Station busts a move.  But it's there).

Quite Excited about my Indigo Rose tomatoes. Learned they're antioxidant high. That's why they have that great color. When ripe the purple black sun facing side will turn kind of black brown and the green bottoms will turn kind of traditional tomato red.

I posted my comment to the FCC. Did you?

In the matter of Net Neutrality or whether cable companies should be allowed to charge additional pricing points for services to corporations and larger organizations and provide better services than to the general public, pursuant. It is our firmly held belief that the internet should continue to be viewed and supported in this view as a public utility and not allowed to be privatized out of existence. Just as the public water works of a city doesn't offer polluted stagnant water to general customers and then offer a cleaner product filtered through the water treatment plant to corporations and the wealthy, the internet, (which never started as nor was intended to be at its start a private commercial venture) should be protected from Monopolistic price fixing and service partitioning by cable ISP providers.

I have bitten the bullet this month and jumped on the band wagon following the H.B.O. version of George R. R. Martin's, "Song of Fire and Ice" series of books. So this month I am binge watching the first three seasons on the way to following the Fourth season more-or-less as it broadcasts on H.B.O. I had certain reasons for not wanting to follow the series up to this point. For one, I didn't really want the H.B.O. series informing my mind's eye view of the characters and the locations from the books.

The H.B.O. series also represents a certain level of illiteracy.  A couple of years ago at Convergence I was invited to sit on a panel entitled "Game of Thrones" where fans of Martin's series got together for an hour talking about where they would like to see the series go.  Although there was talk about both the books and the series at one point I made a reference to the "Crowning of the Cart King" scene and was greeted by a room full of mostly blank stares and bewildered comments despite what a pivotal scene this was early in the series. I didn't understand at the time why no one seemed to get the reference.

This month having watched the H.B.O. series I realized that the whole "Cart King" sequence from the books was left out of the H.B.O. series. Though I was talking about Viserys Targaryen's death the room didn't get it because almost no one in that room had actually cracked a book.

For the most part though I am fairly happy with the interpretations from the series, having already formed my own opinions based on Martin's work. So far only the interpretation of the Eyrie as a massive stone eggplant on the Vale rather than the mountain redoubt on the top of the crags Martin describes in the books stands in glaring contrast.

However having started watching the series, it occurs to me there are a number of places where specific actors may have been miscast for certain roles.

Mads Mikkelsen should have been cast as Baelon Greyjoy. No particular offense to the actor they chose for the role, but he just isn't what I pictured for the role. Kind of milktoast for the character. Also Alfie Allen looks kind of like where Mads Mikkelsen's cheekbones went to die. Meaning, seeing the two actors side by side a viewer might infer a family resemblance between the characters. The three actors they have in the series playing Baelon, Theon, and Yara look like what they are, three completely unrelated actors who have nothing in common with each other playing roles where they are supposedly blood relatives. In addition, I know a not inconsiderable contingent of fandom, both female and some of them male, who wouldn't mind being Baelon's Salt Wives under those circumstances.

Also, Loras Tywin, the Knight of Flowers, is supposed to be the fairest, most atttractive male in all of the Kingdoms of Westeros.  So why does the actor playing Lancel Lannister look fairer? In the books he seemed rather non-descript to me. I think the actors should switch roles before its too late.  Oh no, too late!!! I am only about halfway through the second season at this point but know that both Baelon and Lancel are about to become historical footnotes.

Thirdly: Ian MacShane should have been cast as Roose Bolton of the Dread Fort. In the books,as soon as you are made aware of Roose Bolton, the master of the Dreadfort and the Banner Man of the Flayed Man; you feel like you should be hiding the good silverware and the good servants. In the series, the actor playing the character is kind of non-descript. Being so early in the series I am sure I just need to give him a chance to be diabolical. However, had they cast Ian MacShane for the part, Game of Thrones viewers would have known right away; here is a character you should trust to try and flay you the first chance he gets.

That is all for now. Thank you for your consideration.

"Winter's Tale" Take Two and "What's With the Baby in the Nutshell"?

Presently slogging through the center of "Winter's Tale" by Mark Helprin for the second time. I say slogging because the center of this book is pretty dense and hard to get through. Helprin introduces, discards, and then introduces again a huge array of secondary characters whose place in the grand scheme of things will only become apparent near the end. Characters like Jesse Honey, a west coast mountaineer that Hardesty Marratta runs into while hopping freight who belongs in a Looney Toons sketch. By the way, Hardesty Marratta is another one of those secondary characters.

I burned through the first third of the novel, with Peter Lake, the Penns, the Short Tails, Athansor and the Baymen. Beautiful, tight and touching reading. I have since gotten deeply bogged down by a center that feels more like filler than a necessary means toward driving the plot. I don't blame Helprin. This book came out at a time when all publishers and editors were driving their authors to print books as fat as could be. I can almost hear his agent whispering in his ear; "Did you see how thick King made "The Stand". Keep going Mark, keep going".

Back to Hardesty who falls in love with the second great beauty in "Winter's Tale". That's right, nearly every single female character introduced in this book is an ethereal beauty, mesmerizing or bewitching, incredibly bright and also enchantingly charming or she will grow into one soon afterwards. This causes all their male counterparts to fall for them completely, obsessively, with almost 'unable to control their body functions' abandon. Just as everyone eventually falls completely in love with the greatest, most beautiful, terrible, enchanting, mesmerizing city in the world; New York City. Yeah, I got it. All roads lead to Rome.

This is why I am proud to present on page 382 Juliet Paradise. God bless you and keep you Juliet. Juliet represents the first female character in Winter's Tale given more than a line or two who will not cause uncontrollable raptures in those who look upon her or speak with her. She is not achingly beautiful like Beverly Penn, Christiana Friebourg, or Virginia Gamely. She does not have great wisdom and the knowledge of an encyclopedia like the elder Mrs. Gamely.  Nor does she have a rooster named Jack.

Instead this is how we are introduced to Juliet. "He had been pursued for a full month by a monstrous unkempt woman from Tribeca, an intellectual who did not know if it were day of night, had never seen the ocean, and thought that a goat was a male sheep. Jaundiced and liver-colored, living only through books, tobacco, and alcohol, she had the face of a bullfrog, the brain of a gnat, and the body of a raccoon."

Which reminds me of a native New Yorker that I had the pleasure to meet. Years ago I was part of singles event group run by a good friend of mine. Somewhere along the way this group attracted the attention of a man of indeterminate age from New York who I will call Carl for no particular reason. Now Carl wasn't having very good luck finding someone in the Twin Cities.

Carl walked hunch shouldered, he was a pale little gnome with a thick accent from one of the boroughs or maybe Jersey, his speech patterns sounded like car horns bouncing off of trash can lids. When he attended events with the singles group he always complained about where we were going, badgered the wait staff, and said rude things about the other people attending the event. Also if we were meeting somewhere for dinner he always got there at least a half hour before everyone else so he could eat his dinner first and complain about being bored while the rest of the people ate and chatted.

It got so bad eventually that when people RSVP'd for an event if they saw Carl was also coming they'd drop out of the event. I never checked the RSVPs and would just call up my friend and ask him what was going on for that night and who was going to be there. Not wanting to be saddled alone with Mr. New York he just wouldn't tell me about Carl. So there were a couple times when it was just me, my friend, and Carl.

One time in particular we went to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts for their holiday tour. The whole time that the tour guide was guiding us through the period rooms and describing the art, architecture, and holiday traditions of the times, Carl would interrupt her to ask "Who's in that painting?" "Who's in that painting?" All the paintings on the walls had plaques discussing the artist and the subject if that person was known. Carl, however, was not interested in reading the displayed information. He was more interested in interrupting the tour guide every time he walked in a new room and spied another painting.

Finally the tour guide showed us one of the most prized pieces in the MIA collection presented specifically during the holiday tour season. She told us of how a particular European village's people were protected by an American unit and particularly one soldier during World War II. As a thank you, the village presented him with a grand nativity village that was one of the prized possession of the people of the town. Not only was there a nativity creche, there was an entire village of Bethlehem with townspeople, buildings, a well in the center of the town square. The three wise men were attended by a complete camel caravan loaded with supplies and led by bearers and personal servants decked out in the livery of those three kings.

At an estate sale for this veteran one of the buyers with the MIA saw the display and immediately bought it up knowing how rare and valuable it was. In centuries past these were not uncommon nativity displays cared for by all the members of the community. The one that is now in the MIA collection is one of only a handful of these intact villages still in existence. The tour guide gave us a few minutes to look it over in detail.

Then Carl pointed to the figures in the middle of the nativity creche and said "What's with the baby in the nutshell?"

It is in "Winter's Tale" that I may have found the perfect compliment for Carl. It is a shame she lives in the alternate New York of Helprin's imagination.

As much as he might like, there are no trips to the haberdashery for Chainsaw Minotaur. Not for a smart stetson or a cool fedora.  Once he dons his new lids their reduced to straw and felt.

Last night we braved the elements to see "The Knights of Badassdom" at the AMC theater in Coon Rapids. I want Peter Dinklage's "Pinball Wizard" shirt. Afterwards our friend Stephanie and I were suggesting to my wife that she would love Live Action Role Playing.  She said something about only doing something like that if she could stay in one place.  "Perfect" I said.  I had just the role in mind.

Participants go to the oracle when they want to know the lowdown on the other players.  If you think about it the oracle is always the character who has the skinny on all the other characters in the story.  The oracle just knows where everyone's skeletons are buried.

Just hang out at your booth and dish on the other players.  I give you, the LARPing Oracle.

"Beware of Maester Lohan's +3 Odorous Cloud of Personal Enveloping.  Smelling it won't kill you outright, but it may remove your will to live."

I went to see the film adaptation of Mark Helprin's "Winter's Tale" on Valentine's Day with my wife.

This is a book with complex resonance for me since I read it in 1983. A story that stuck with me and a style that both confused and intrigued.  Up until then I'd been picking up and reading mostly high fantasy and science fiction. I remember being curious because the jacket cover blurb mentioned something about a flying milk horse. I picked it up and started reading.

The book was an impressively detailed historical adventure novel with a wide cast of memorable characters and locations and occasional hints of all out magic.  After I finished the book I admit I was perplexed about how I felt about it. It was year's later that literature bean counters started gathering otherwise unrelated novels together and stamping them with the label Magical Realism. Books like the "Milagro Bean Field War" and "Kafka on the Shore". Given a name for what I had experienced, I was satisfied.

Despite what was suggested at the time though, Magical Realism is not a new genre. Merely a new name given to a class of novels that goes back decades. "The Tin Drum" by Gunter Grass is a novel from 1959, I would argue definitely fits into this classification. "The Master and Marguerita" by Mikhail Bulgakov is a novel from 1967 about Stalinist Russia that definitely rates highly if you are a fan of this genre.

"Winter's Tale" is a darling of the Magical Realist novel, however. The way Helprin's style smoothly transitions between breathtaking descriptions of New York in the early 20th century and a burglar on a flying horse trying to escape Pearly Soames and the Short Tail gang. It almost seems like a textbook definition for the writing style. In addition, it is also a novel that will lead you to fall in love with winter.

Life of Pi or Am I Still Alive...With Meerkats

Saw "Life of Pi" the other day on the Home Box Office. My wife the deal broker got us hooked up. I have to admit I thought it was really good. I also have to admit I've never read the book. Shamefaced if you could see it now.

Another Ang Lee movie I've heard a lot of muttering about.  Hey, stupid Hollywood people.  If you don't want an Ang Lee movie, don't hire Ang Lee to direct your movie? However, if you're going to shoot a movie about a boy alone on a boat with a ravenous Bengal tiger, he's your guy. He's not going to direct a Michael Bay clone for you or a film by Clint Eastwood.  Although Eastwood and Lee have a lot more in common stylistically than either of them have with Michael Bay. Meh, Michael Bay.

Anyway, I can't say anything about the movie. Don't want to spoil it for you if you haven't seen it and are curious. You wouldn't relate if I just tried describing it to you. That is the nature of this beast the Internet.  I could tell you two stories about the movie, and you could decide which one you liked better.

Rowlf the Dog....For Cialis

Been feeling annoyed by a particular commercial I have been seeing a lot recently.  In it, the Muppets all pile into a Toyota Highlander and then proceed to have a muppet-gasm about how spacious the interior of their luxury sports utility vehicle is.  It very well might be the very last thing I would expect the Muppet characters to have a muppet-gasm over.  Now I am aware from the tagline at the end of the add that it is a cross promotion for their new movie.   I could just go off on a rant about how commercial the Muppets have become since Disney bought the rights to pimp them muppets anywhere they see fit.

It's more complicated than that. Now when we were kids and the target audience of the muppets, I won't say how many years ago, we would have told you the "muppets are going to last forever".  Clearly, the marketing and merchandising people were hoping that too.  The fact is though that the fondest fans of these characters remain that original target audience.  Not their children, and not their grandchildren in some cases (gasp). 

With Fox Newsy News and the Republicagencia trying to convince half the country that Sesame Street was a communist plot from the get go and with the other characters firmly under Disney lock and key between movies, they really aren't reaching a younger audience the way Henson's original cast and crew did.

So maybe I just have to accept the idea that the Muppets fans are slowly aging out. That they really want to know if there is any room for boring in the new Toyota Highlander.  And maybe one day soon in a print add or in between segments of television programming, I will have this to look forward to.

Curious parallel today between what is going on internally and without.  Reading Haruki Murakami's A Wild Sheep Chase. Here we are first introduced to the Sheep Professor and Murakami's curious spirit totem the Sheep Man. Murakami describes him as a character who epitomizes something that is lost in Japan. Yet when I read his novels, I imagine the same character making his home here as well. Or maybe someone similar.

Running errands in the Saturn I came up the the overpass on 94th, I saw a person picking her way around the piles of snow thrown up by the plows.  She was dressed from collar to boots in camo silk screened for tall grass, like she was going duck hunting. On her head loosely flopped a stuffed hat with the round block ears of an ever trade marked rodent. She had the air of someone scurrying. I felt like I had glimpsed America's answer to the Sheep Man. Dressed not for warmth but for false security and denial of the self but at the same time tagged with mass marketed nostalgia. 

"I am dressed for confrontation but don't look too closely so that I might slip away.  Look at me, I am an individual, but the more you look the more I fade into my surroundings. I am told what I cherish."