Episode 166: The World’s Worst Detective, or: Rorschach, Meet Vibe

Marvel Studios’s latest Netflix series, The Punisher, dropped all at once a couple of weeks ago, and it was, in a lot of ways, very different than the series that have been delivered up until now. Sure, the other series dealt with adult themes – Jessica Jones tackled being a survivor of abuse, Luke Cage dealt with racism, and Iron Fist took on the perils of being a boring rich white guy no one likes – but none of those series featured a protagonist who stabs people in the neck just to watch them die.

So we spend a chunk of the show talking about The Punisher, how it handles themes of PTSD and how war destroys not only soldiers, but also their families… and how those weighty issues map to a story that delivers the cheap thrill of watching Jersey mooks having their legs broken by a man sometimes known as “Shooty Batman.”

But the money of the week is the release of the first issue of Doomsday Clock #1, written by Geoff Johns with art by Gary Frank. This is the real beginning of DC Comics not only sequelizing Alan Moore’s and Dave Gibbons’s Watchmen, but putting characters from the DC Universe onto a collision course with that universe. While we’ve both been enjoying DC: Rebirth, Rob is a huge fan of the original Watchmen, and thus has been DREADING the release of this book. So we break it down, and come to a couple of surprising conclusions.

This episode was recorded live to tape, with minimal editing, so if you’re looking for a podcast where the hosts are pretty convinced they came up with the moniker, “Shooty Batman,” you’ve come to the right place!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:29:17 — 74.0MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!

Episode 128: Show Me On The Doll Where Lee Majors Touched You

After yet another cripplingly busy week at the Crisis On Infinite Midlives Home Office (and, to be honest, after about a quart of single malt scotch and a few belts of mescal), we only had the time to discuss a few of the comics of the week. But that turns out to have been a good decision; since we didn’t have time to fully discuss and coordinate our choices, we wound up with a couple of polarizing choices upon which we didn’t really agree.

This led to a conversation that ranged from deciding where on the Kubler-Ross scale of grief we are with regards to Watchmen characters still appearing in DC: Rebirth books (Rob is at “Bargaining”, Amanda is “amused at Rob’s Bargaining”), how James Tynion IV made Rob care about Spoiler for the first time, whether there’s enough nostalgia in the world to make innovative visual storytelling enough to bring Steve Austin into the 21st Century, and how Amanda’s battle against scotch last night went (picture Amanda as Rocky and scotch as Apollo Creed).

So what comics do we talk about?

• Detective Comics #940, written by James Tynion IV with art by Eddy Barrows,
• Lady Killer Volume 2 #2, written and drawn by Joelle Jones,
• The Six Million Dollar Man: Fall of Man #3, written by Van Jensen with art by Ron Salas, and:
• Hadrian’s Wall #1, written by Kyle Higgins and Alec Siegel, with art by Rod Reis!

And, as usual, the disclaimers:

• This show contains spoilers. If you don’t want to find out who dies in this week’s Detective Comics (hint: it’s not Batman), then consider yourself forewarned.
• This show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. See that title? It’s because we talk about Lee Majors and a plaster cast. You want your boss asking about that? Then get some earphones.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:06:11 — 65.3MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!

Episode 124: Boston Comic Con 2016 Part One, or: Monetize My Fandom

Boston Comic Con, our local convention, was this weekend, and we went after it with both hands, hammer and tong… until we realized that we’d hit all the comics news panels by the end of the first day, collected all our commissions and desired books by midday on the second, and had one working hip between the two of us by the beginning of the third.

But our infirmities didn’t stop us from seeing the whole floor and attending some excellent comics panels. So we talk about this year’s show in general, some of the creators we met and the loot we scored, and then we talk the DC Universe Panel.

Held Friday, hosted by DC Co-Publisher Dan DiDio with panelists Aaron Lopresti, Phil Jimenez, Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti, the panel stayed away from DC: Rebirth news (other than providing some of the reasoning behind making the move), and focused more on the creators, their motivations, their inspirations, and how they managed to get some of their most high-profile gigs. And we not only talk about the panel, but we present audio direct from the show! It’s like you’re there! If you were there with two drunks able to stop the panel at will to interject with mouthy sarcasm!

And, before you ask: yes, we did attend the Frank Miller spotlight panel, and yes: we have audio. And we will present and discuss that panel during next week’s show.

And, the disclaimers:

• Due to limited time (the convention ended today, for God’s sake), we were unable to clean up the panel audio as much as we would have liked. It should still be perfectly audible and understandable, but we apologize if it’s a little muddy.
• This show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. One of our audio tracks is named “Scratch ‘N Sniff Beaver.” You are forewarned.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:57:16 — 113.8MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!

Episode 121: Underground Gozer Society

The new Ghostbusters movie opened this week, after a long production period marked by a non-stop screeching hate frenzy from Bill Murray fans, enthusiasts of old-school J. Michael Straczynski Saturday morning cartoons, and people who think that comedy has been redundant since Rick Moranis donned a track suit to dry hump the windows at Tavern on The Green.

We here at Crisis On Infinite Midlives have long and storied histories with the original Ghostbusters, from Amanda’s devotion to its scientific approach to the paranormal that led to her being interested in applying to Duke University’s Parapsychology Laboratory, to Rob’s appreciation of the flick as an teen-safe entryway to early Saturday Night Live and the National Lampoon. And even with that long and beloved history, we have long been looking forward to the more modern interpretation of the franchise.

So we discuss our feelings about the franchise at large, how we liked (and didn’t like) the new movie, what we’re hoping for from any possible sequel, and Amanda’s theory about how this movie not only doesn’t turn its back on the original movie, but actually makes the concept that it’s a sequel as likely as not.

Regardless, we have no sympathy for those who say that the new Ghostbusters has destroyed their childhood. And we’re not alone.

We also discuss:

• Nightwing: Rebirth #1, written by Tim Seeley with art by Yanick Paquette,
• Wonder Woman #2, written by Greg Rucka with art by Nicola Scott, and:
• Civil War II #3, written by Brian Michael Bendis with art by David Marquez!

And, the usual disclaimers:

• This show contains spoilers. If you want to avoid knowing whether every molecule in Melissa McCarthy’s body explodes at the speed of light in a total protonic reversal, consider yourself forewarned and forearmed.
• This show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. You want your boss to learn a whole new definition of “hard but fair”? Then buy some earbuds.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 2:05:29 — 125.8MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!

Episode 119: Wheatcakes!

It has been a busy week here at the Crisis On Infinite Midlives Home Office. Between the delivery of new cooking apparatus that can also conveniently act as an incendiary bomb, to unexpected day job responsibilities, to nearly getting caught up in an unexpected session of Cornhole, it was hard to keep up on a week that was comics news-light to begin with.

So we decided to keep things short and simple this week, and just talk about some comics. And while we have some general discussions about how it was a standard off week for Marvel’s Civil War II event (by standard, we mean that every Marvel comic had “Civil War II” on the cover, without advancing the main story a whit), and how DC’s Rebirth continues to be a pretty solid soft reboot that’s unfortunately wrapped in the wretched trappings of Watchmen characters, we pretty much focused on a few books:

• The Totally Awesome Hulk #7, written by Greg Pak with art by Alan Davis,
• Justice League #52, written by Dan Jurgens with pencils by Tom Grummett, and:
• Teen Titans #21, written by Tony Bedard with art by Miguel Mendonca!

And, as usual, the disclaimers:

• This show contains spoilers. So if you want to remain unspoiled on whether or not Lex Luthor will be a villain in DC Rebirth (The answer won’t surprise you!), consider yourself warned.
• This show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. You think your boss wants to hear details about Boston Cornhole (The answer actually will surprise you! But good luck convincing HR of that!)? Then get some headphones.
• As a reminder: We will not have a new show on the week of July 3, 2016. We’ll be back the following Sunday.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 58:45 — 58.0MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!

Episode 117: You Grok What I’m Saying, Fat Bieber?

This week, The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman had an interview published in Rolling Stone where he chided George R. R. Martin for revealing the ending to A Song of Ice And Fire to the producers of HBO’s Game of Thrones. And it caused the predictable Internet uproar, but it also got us to thinking: we had six out of seven Fear The Walking Dead episodes unwatched on our TiVo. We’d been complaining for years that The Walking Dead comic’s pacing had been untenably slow. We’d been getting Kirkman’s Outcast in our pulls since it started, but we actually hadn’t been reading it, so we had no intention of checking out the comic’s new adaptation on Cinemax.

So we asked ourselves: have we reached peak Robert Kirkman? Has his work lost its mojo, at least for us? And we decided to test the question by burning through the remainder of Fear The Walking Dead season 2, re-reading the first issue of Outcast, and checking out the first two episodes of the adaptation. And having spent the weekend binging on Kirkman (eww!), the answer might surprise you!

We also discuss:

• Wonder Woman: Rebirth #1, written by Greg Rucka with art by Matthew Clark, Liam Sharp and Sean Parsons,
• The Flash: Rebirth #1, written by Joshua Williamson with art by Carmine Di Giandomencio, and:
• Daredevil #8, written by Charles Soule with art by Goran Sudzuka!

And, the disclaimers:

• This show contains spoilers. If you listen, you will learn how many Fear The Walking Dead characters Rob wants to hit with a chair (Hint: It’s a non-zero value).
• The show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. We talk about Superman’s dickie. Get some headphones.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 2:19:31 — 138.4MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!

Episode 116: They Lebowskied Superman

It’s the first full week of DC Comics: Rebirth, and not a single Watchmen character appears in those issues, so we decided it would be a good opportunity to complain again about Watchmen characters appearing in the DC Universe.

Specifically, it was revealed this week that DC Comics didn’t contact Watchmen artist Dave Gibbons to ask him his opinion about adding Watchmen characters to Dc Universe: Rebirth. So we talk about whether that was a bush league move (protip: yeah), some of the history around DC leaving Watchmen alone, and whether DC Editorial really had any choice in asking for Gibbons or writer Alan Moore for even a half-hearted blessing in using their characters in Rebirth.

Then, since we were on a Rebirth roll, we discussed all this week’s titles from that event:

• Superman: Rebirth #1, written by Peter Tomasi with art by Doug Mahnke,
• Green Arrow: Rebirth #1, written by Benjamin Percy with art by Otto Schmidt,
• Green Lanterns: Rebirth #1, written by Geoff Johns and Sam Humphries with art by Ethan Van Sciver and Ed Benes, and:
• Batman: Rebirth #1, written by Scott Snyder and Tom King with art by Miken Janin.

And, just so Marvel doesn’t feel neglected, we close the show by talking about:

• Civil War II #1, written by Brian Michael Bendis with art by David Marquez!

And, as always, the disclaimers:

• This show contains spoilers. If you want to avoid knowing how the DC: Rebirth books end (spoiler alert: no matter what happens, it probably won’t matter next month), then consider yourself warned.
• This show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. You want your mom to know what “giddy bottom” means? Get some ear buds.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:34:08 — 92.2MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!

Episode 115: Death, Taxes and Chris Hardwick

It’s the end of the week of May 25th, 2016: the Wednesday the Big Two drooled on themselves, shrieked “Excelsior!” into the Black Void, and keeled over. At least if you believe the Internet comments.

But before we talk about that, there was one major positive for comics fans this week: AMC debuted the pilot episode of their adaptation of Garth Ennis’s and Steve Dillon’s Preacher this past Sunday. We’re big fans of the comic, which really meant something to us… back when we were in our twenties, same as the characters back in the original 1990s comic. Both we and the comic are older now, with different lifestyles and priorities, so the question is not only whether or not Preacher is a worthy adaptation of the classic Vertigo comic, but can it have the same effect as it did when we were in our twenties?

That’s the good news. The bad news is that we also discuss:

• Steve Rogers: Captain America #1, written by Nick Spencer with art by Jesus Saiz, and:
• DC Universe: Rebirth #1, written by Geoff Johns with art by, well, many, many people!

And, as always, the disclaimers:

• This show contains spoilers. So be aware: if you haven’t been spoiled on the events of either Steve Rogers: Captain America #1 or DC Universe: Rebirth #1, then you clearly haven’t had any access to the Internet and therefore can’t read this warning anyway. But rest assured: we’ll be spoiling them.
• This show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. We recite Preacher’s recipe for making a homemade bazooka in this episode. You don’t want your boss to hear that any more than we want this episode entered into evidence in a Felony Menacing trial. So get some headphones.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:48:36 — 106.2MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!

Episode 104: Not Without My Wally

Open registration for San Diego Comic-Con 2016 came to us on Saturday… and it left us in less than an hour. As has become the norm, the convention completely sold out in less than an hour, and, like many of you, we were frozen out. So we spend a few minutes talking about how SDCC attendance has basically become a lottery system over which we attendees have no control, and discuss various options for making the con more available, from moving it to another city, to expanding San Diego’s facilities, to engaging in a mutually assured destruction nuclear showdown with the United States Navy.

Otherwise, the big comics news of the week was that DC Comics finally shared some details about their long-teased Rebirth event. And while story details are still scarce, we talk about how DC swears this isn’t a reboot (Even as all but two of their titles are being renumbered to #1), why DC needs to do something like this, what titles we can look forward to starting in June, speculate about what creative teams we’d like to see on those books, and complain that none of those books are Ambush Bug.

We also discuss:

• American Monster #2, written by Brian Azzarello with art by Juan Doe, and:
• Standoff: Welcome to Pleasant Hill #1, written by Nick Spencer with art by Mark Bagley!

And, the disclaimers:

• This show contains spoilers. While we try to shout out warnings ahead of time, be aware that you will hear more theories than you would like about the unholy nature of PuppyMonkeyBaby.
• This show contains adult, profane language, and this therefore not safe for work. You want your employer to hear about our devious plan that includes a Deadpool costume, Deely Bobbers and pointed questions about the toilet reading habits of particular members of DC Editorial? Then get some good headphones.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:49:22 — 101.8MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!

Episode 103: Nicolas Cage Is… Ambush Bug

The cold snap in Boston broke enough for us to not only enter our studio without dying of hypothermia or being drowned out by the roar of our furnace, but to head out into the countryside to our local movie theater to see Deadpool.

Deadpool is a movie that shouldn’t exist. It’s based on a character with a lower Q Score than Irving Forbush, who debuted in arguably the worst superhero movie not starring Dolph Lundgren and Louis Gossett, Jr, starring a man who normally spells the end of comic book franchises. It’s a movie produced and rated for adults, featuring at least three decapitations, two unfortunate prolapses, and one naked Morena Baccarin. And yet: 150 million American dollars in one weekend can’t be wrong, so we break the movie down from the comic fan’s perspective: what worked, what didn’t, why Deadpool doesn’t need an origin story, and why Rob desperately wants DC Films to put Ambush Bug on their schedule.

We also discuss:

• Public Relations #5, written by Matthew Sturges and Dave Justus, with art by David Hahn and Jose Marzan, and:
• Batman #49, written by Scott Snyder with art by Yanick Paquette!

And, some disclaimers:

• This show contains spoilers. While we try to shout out warnings ahead of time, be aware that you might discover that Deadpool is a knockoff of Deathstroke The Terminator.
• This show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. You think your boss would be more impressed with your performance if he heard about Amanda’s first exposure to George Michael’s I Want Your Sex? Then get some headphones.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:42:36 — 96.1MB)

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Thanks for listening, suckers!