As both the evangelical
anti-vampire rights activist Rev. Steve Newlin on HBO’s True
Blood and the writer of its
companion comic Tainted Love, Michael
McMillian is a huge player in the incredibly popular series. Known also for his
own title LUCID, McMillian is no
stranger to the world of comics. I recently got the chance to ask the writer a
few questions, and his answers don’t suck
– eh? Right? Sigh…
Last
week we talked about how the digital comics are changing the comic
medium as we know it. We established that change is good. But I wonder
if the digital medium will stay the same or will they continue to change
and revolutionize the way we read comics. As of now we don’t know, but
anything is possible. With technology always reinventing our daily
trivialities – I know comics are not trivial but you know what I mean – it’s not going to be long before a digital comic will give you more than your monthly stories.
Snowbird is one of the original members of Alpha Flight,
created by John Byrne and Chris Claremont, and first appeared in X-Men
#120.
She has a slew of powers and is an
Inuit Demi-God. After
the Gods of the North were exiled, they needed a champion to fight off
their long-time enemies, the Great Beasts. The goddess of the Northern
Lights, Nelvanna, decided to go to Earth and came back with Richard
Easton, whom she chose to mate with. After becoming pregnant from
Easton, Nelvanna returned him to Earth. When Easton returned, he quickly
learned that nine years had passed since he had been gone, despite it
only feeling like a few hours to him. He quickly went insane.
You can’t really go two
months without spotting a new comic event hitting the shelves – and more
importantly hitting your wallet. Currently, the Big Two (DC and Marvel) are
running Flashpoint and Fear Itself respectively. If you want to read all of the
issues of both events, you’re looking to spend well over $400. Fear Itself has
over 45 issues, with Flashpoint boasting a disgusting 72 issues including
tie-ins and one shots. So the question is which one deserves your money and
attention.
Why do I favor Steve Rogers as Captain America, you ask? Let me start by saying I don’t hate the alternate Captain America, Bucky. He actually did a great job and carried the title for a long time without the presence of Steve Rogers. There have been several Captains over the years including: Bucky the 1950s Cap, Nomad, US Agent and Nuke. They all had distinctive personalities, but none were like Steve Rogers.
In comics, death is just an annoyance for the majority of heroes. Almost every major player has died and returned, sometimes more than once. Upon their return, the mantle is picked back up and the hero continues on as though nothing happened. I have problems with this.
Think
digital! Comics are facing interesting times. For years the tone of
comics was in a transitional period in terms of maturity. The prices
began to go up and collecting comics became a bit of an expensive hobby.
With $3.99 for each issue, this meant that for some people some titles
needed to be sacrificed. Also, slowly the comic shops began to shrink in
numbers, some fans began to buy their stuff over the Internet or they
started taking a long commute to a comic store far, far away. Due to the
increasing technological advantages, comics got digital but at first it
wasn’t that attractive to fans. Maybe because you didn’t get a sense of
ownership or a way to read comics in a traditional way. Then the
tablets invaded the market and a new way to read comics was born.
After months of previews and ill omens, Spider-Man has opened on Broadway, and it’s not that bad! For everything that this show does horribly wrong, it also does something great. Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark has been reworked over the last few months, and while they didn’t change the silly title, they have revised much of the script, the directing, the music and lyrics. What’s good about the show comes late in game, and it’s sad that people who flake out during intermission will miss all of the fun. After a boring first act, and some embarrassingly bad supervillains at the top of the second, Spider-Man eventually swings his way to an amazing finale.
Riptide is a Marvel villain and member of the Marauders. Any X-Men fan surprised you’ve never heard of him? He’s been in sixty five issues and had only one very memorable moment: His gruesome death at the hands of the X-Man Colossus.
Riptide first appeared in 1986 in The Uncanny X-Men #210 in the form of a shadowy figure and had his first full appearance in the next issue. He was created by Chris Claremont, John Romita Jr. and Bret Blevins. In the comics Riptide is able to spin at high velocity. During this spinning Riptide’s skin produces shuriken which he uses to hurt his enemies.
Sometimes we go to the theater for grand drama or literature, but it’s also nice to walk into a theater and see cute girls punching robots, and that’s what you get from Galactic Girl in Attack of the Starbarians. Running in the Brick Theater’s Comic Book Theater Festival, Galactic Girl is a very silly show, but also a very good one. It’s a lot like watching anime, but with live actors right in front of you. Galactic Girl, and her team of bubbly space babes fight bad guys, pilot space ships, and shoot laser guns thanks to some excellent stuntwork, imaginative directing, and extensive use of multimedia on a large projection screen.
