Friday, March 31, 2006

No pics yet.

No one can win with the "My baby's cuter than your baby" battle.

So I will impress you with numbers:

Born 10:53pm, March 30, 2006.
6 pounds 3 ounces
19 inches long
25 hours of labor.

Conner Lewis Richmond. I know, not a number.

Baby and Mother are both fine. Mom is doing exceptionally well, and is already walking around, arranging things, lifting Volkswagons over her head.

Conner is very pink and extremely cute. He has a lot of spikey blond hair. Came out with a mohawk. Billy Idol is not the father.

He's still got a little fluid in his lungs, so he's grunting a little while he breathes. He's on oxygen to help him out for the time being, but we're very optimistic. When he's being held by Mama, his oxygen saturation shoots up to 100% and the grunting stops, so Mom is going to be camping out in the nursery. His breathing dramatically improves just by being in physical contact with her and hearing her voice.

He smiled when Mom stroked his arm.

He's very hungry, but can't feed yet until his lungs are stronger. Until then, he's on an IV.

Thanks to everyone for the help, calls, and prayers. Pictures are forthcoming.

Now for a nap.

Thursday, March 30, 2006

D-Day

Baby being induced today.

Not sleeping.

Nothing ready.

Incapable of complete sentences.

Updates when more coherent.

Wednesday, March 29, 2006

Where am I? And why am I wearing mittens?

Long night last night. Got to spend most of it at the hospital. Mrs. Badger's pregnancy is not going optimally. The doctors were -this- close to having the baby inducted. Which would have meant I would be a new daddy this morning.

Needless to say, nothing is ready. We didn't even pack any clothes.

We get to go back for more tests today.
And tomorrow.
And probably the day after that.

I can already tell I can write off sleep for the next month. Seems like a good time to start taking hallucinogenic drugs and start writing my masterpiece. Working title:

Adventures in Baby-having.

Friday, March 24, 2006

Not Thinking Words.

Quote for the day, courtesy of today's installment of the ingenious webcomic, Concerned:

"I don't have any idea about a lot of things."
-Gordon Frohman

Thursday, March 23, 2006

Three days, three acres, three thousand men


I don't know if you read Achewood, but if you don't at least read the Great Outdoor Fight story arc going on right now, you're not a real man.

The violence started on January 25.

Ray and Roast Beef, jeeps doing wheelies, gasoline, and handguns.

This was a webcomic about cats and stuffed animals, at one point. No clue what happened.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Go Read This, Then Rent A Sinbad Movie

No, not that Sinbad.

Neat interview with Ray Harryhausen at the Onion.

It feels like he needs some sort of title of nobility. You can't just say Ray Harryhausen, it should be Master Animator Ray Harryhausen, or Lord Of Creatures Ray Harryhausen.

Monday, March 20, 2006

Thinking Words

"The promise of the internet is that we all become publishers (if we choose)...from news, blogs, games, music, and movies....this is the "New Economy". The "Old Economy" is dominated by the gatekeepers, the middlemen--the ones that own the means of distribution, starting with railroads."

-ChenLing from Slashdot

Fine.

So Don called me out.

Yeah, there are still decent superhero books out there. And surprise, some of them are even coming from the Big Two.

There are a few superhero books that I enjoy consistently: Invincible and Planetary. Nextwave may join that list, I'll see what the Director's Cut looks like. I guess Hellboy counts as a superhero book. I also buy and like Ex Machina, although I'm not in love with it.

So what's my problem with superheroes? They're an American tradition. They're icons. Name one kid who hates Spiderman. Superheroes are cool.

And yet... they've been around (in their current, cheap newsprint form) for nearly a century. And they don't age well. Or maybe their readers don't age well.

I loved Rob Liefeld comics when I was a kid, heaven knows why. Maybe it was the angsty feathering on everything. Maybe it was the crazy posture and anatomically impossible contortions of the characters. It was pure fluff. But I dug it.

And then I hit puberty. I grew up. And I look back at that stuff and I gag. I can't believe I spent money on (had a subscription to!) X-Force.

Gah. My head hurts just thinking about it.

Sitcoms. Comics are so similar to sitcoms, this will make my non-existent point much clearer. They're a dime a dozen. When they're truly original and funny, they age well. When they suck... well, they suck. And each new sitcom tries harder and harder to be funny, because the premises are so dried out, but statistically well-proven: Goofy, boorish man marries hot woman and they argue about man and woman stuff and how they're different. Where have we seen this? King of Queens, Everybody Loves Raymond, Family Guy, Mad About You, Home Improvement, Married With Children, Just the Ten of Us, Family Matters, the Cosby Show.

Simpsons, I whisper, fearfully.

Bewitched.

I Dream Of Genie.

I Love Lucy.

The Honeymooners.

It's a blueprint for success. And there's some seriously funny material in that list. But it's reached a straining point. The majority of it hurts my brain.

For every sitcom out there, there are probably an hundred superheroes, each one lovingly drawn at some kid's breakfast table. And they're all Superman/Batman/Wolverine clones.

I guess the punchline to this rambling is that the industry has made making comics harder than it really is.

It's hard to come up with really cool, original superhero. Even harder to come up with an original plot. If you can do it, and come up with truly original stuff, you're set. Either that, or you must cleverly disguise your rehashed material so that only the most intense Comic Book Guy notices that you're phoning it in. Maybe I am that Comic Book Guy, and that's why it bothers me so much.

So point one, originality.

Point two: continuity.
If your character has fought evil for fifty years, and hasn't aged or gotten killed, move on. No one is keeping score anymore. No, dying and miraculously coming back doesn't count.

Point three: maturity.
Here's a meaty one. Nearly every comic fan I know started out as a kid. They will nearly always maintain a level of affection for the books they grew up on, particularly their first books. I loved my jacked up copy of Gold Key Magnus: Robot Fighter #24. I was in love with the cover, particularly. I was probably five or six. What's not to love about this cover? Besides the gogo boots.



My tastes have changed. I want some serious writing in my comics. I'd also like some serious art. I don't mean serious, serious, I mean of a higher strata of creative effort. I'm looking for books from creators that pour as much affection into their work as I pour into enjoying them. Enough milk, I want some meat. Love is easy to recognize, and lasts. Love's not the right word: Passion is probably what I want. I want to open a book and say: "Wow, I bet that guy loved drawing that." If I see that passion, I'll spend the two or three bucks on the book without thinking about it.

A Brian Wood cover will do it.
A Cassaday full-page spread will do it.
An Ellis chunk of biting dialogue will do it.
A Diggle plot will do it.

I'm not trying to convince you of anything, I'm trying to convince me. I don't hate superheroes. I just really, really like new, original, craftsmanship.

But comics are a junk medium anyway, so I'm probably looking in the wrong place.

Nah, that couldn't possibly be it.

Friday, March 17, 2006

Comics Rundown: Nextwave #2


So, more Warren Ellis. Doing a superhero book.

I missed issue #1. It flew under my radar. I'll try to find it somewhere. Did I miss anything major?

Nextwave is a team superhero book. It feels like Ellis tearing apart everything he hates about team superhero books.

Fin Fang Foom, the mythical dragon who always looks more awesome when drawn by Art Adams, is destroying a city. He is a UWMD (Unusual Weapon of Mass Destruction).

I think there's some backstory about why Nextwave is fighting Fin Fang Foom, but I missed it. And it doesn't matter.

Warren Ellis, the series writer, is one of the superheroes in Nextwave, except he's called Machine Man. Naturally, he steals the show, because he hates humans, is alcoholic, and has sharp pointy objects inside him.

I rant against superhero books, because I hate them. I feel betrayed by them. I do not feel betrayed by Nextwave. I am reminded of Peter David's X-Factor run when reading it.

The art is serviceable. It's not terrific, but also not distracting. It's Marvel. It's colorful and light.

The writing? There might be a plot in there somewhere. Where Nextwave shines is the dialogue and scene composition. A giant dragon threatens to stuff you in his pants. I don't think that's ever been done before.

Let's not let that happen again.

I'll probably grab this one off the rack, but I don't think I'll add it to my pull list. I not-so-secretly hope the series is cut short, because it feels gimmicky. I can almost imagine the Marvel execs waving the fan of cash under Ellis' nose, cooing "One more superhero book... you won't feel a thing..."

And Ellis is muttering, "Fine, you want your superheroes? Here, deal with some of this madness..."

Comics Rundown: Fell #4


NIXON NUN MUST DIE.

Not buying this book is inexcusable. It's two dollars. It's a complete story. And it will hurt you. This book will hurt you, because after a few issues of the punishment that this series dishes out, you will realize two things:

1. People hurt other people.
2. There's nothing you can do about it.

Detective Fell has those steaming facts and a floating corpse shoved in his face in #4. And cuts a deal (more like a threat) with Snowtown:

"Every time you take one... I'm going to take one back."

Greasy crime fiction, with no real answers, based on real events that Warren Ellis dug up on some awful, mindbreaking newsfeed.

Templesmith offering up foggy streets that look like they want to mug you and cut your face off.

The format works. The story feels satisfying when you get to the end. Nine panels per page. I'm excited for Matt Fraction's Casanova series using the same price/format.

Two dollars.

No excuse.

Comics Rundown Update

Digging through the pile, I've determined that I've bought too many comics since January 17th. Reviewing them would take roughly the same amount of time that it would take me to singlehandedly building a pyramid. Not one of those pansy Mayan pyramids, one of those Gaza jobbers.

So here's the deal. I'll review what I feel strongly about, either positive or negative. And I'll try to be specific about what the book works or doesn't work for me. And if I'm gonna keep buying it.

Solid?

Solid.

Frisbee Abuse

Neat article about the making of TRON.

Did I hit my brothers with frisbees after seeing this film?

Yes. Yes, I did.

Oddly enough, my marriage to my wife happened partially because of TRON. On our first date, within two minutes, I had discovered that she had never seen it. A fierce argument ensued. The date survived the argument, proving that this was a woman I could successfully argue with.

And now we're married.

And that mule went on to save Spring Break.

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

...

Thanks for the podcast recs. Slowly working my way through them.

Listened to the first Wordballoon cast with Brian Michael Bendis. I never want to read another Marvel comic again. Listening to Mr. Bendis answer questions like:

"Will Spiderwoman ever have a crossover with Ultimate Thunderbolts after the House of M?"

makes me realize two things. First, I came to the realization that I've gone through a series of certain special changes (called puberty) which have changed me from a boy to a man. Second, the mere idea of superhero continuity (either Marvel or DC) makes me want to pay a homeless guy to tie me to a chair and make me read every email in my Spam box.

I'm sure Bendis is a fine writer. I haven't read any of his work yet. He came on long after I ceased consuming Marvel products. But the idea of these soap-operatic universes meshing into one coherent travesty of a fictional world is ludicrous.

The editorial review process for DC or Marvel books looks like an exercise in madness. This character can't die, because they have a new series coming out. This character can't guest star in this story in Antarctica, because they're in Rwanda in their own book this month. You can't have Batman trace a supervillain by his fingerprints, because that villain had his prints burned off forty years ago in Superman's Girlfriend Lois Lane #45.

I'm surprised these two companies are still in business. Infinite Crisis #4 (of 7!) was the top selling book in January. 182,633 people bought it. Which means there are almost 200,000 people out there willing to eat literary feces.

You can't blame this on the kids. The kids are not reading this stuff, they're downing manga like crack fiends, for better or worse. These consumers are my age, or older. This is the demographic of the man-child. The gamer generation's taken a lot of heat for the "30 year old living in his parents' basement" stereotype. It's an inaccurate image. The 30 year old gamer got an education and a job. The 30 year comic guy is still in their parents' basement. The Simpson's Comic-Book-Guy stereotype is well-deserved.

How many issues of Desolation Jones #5 sold in January? 17,160.

I know, I don't have much of a right to whine "You don't like the same books I do!" I can't stop Fox from canceling Arrested Development if no one else watches it. I can't go into people's homes and make them turn off Skating With Celebrities.

I guess I'm coming to the realization that good art is rarely popular art. I've known this before, but I've not truly internalized it until now. I'm still growing up.

I think I'm done. I don't want continuity, ever again. I'll hold on to my Claremont X-Men storylines from my childhood, and call it good.

Again, I don't blame Bendis, or any other writer/editor/artist. I blame the market.

Keep on shoveling that crap.

Saturday, March 11, 2006

Placeholder

Yesterday was new comic day. Lots of stuff to review. I raided the 25 cent bin as well, to great and pleasing effect.

And of course, there's the pile of comics from last trip which remain unreviewed. I suck.

Fine.

I'll knock it out.

Soliciting Podcast Recommendations

Goodness, I need something interesting to listen to at work.

Particularly interested in comics writing/publishing themed podcasts.

Definitely open to other topics. Cinecast is interesting every so often, but much of the time I have very little interest in the films they review.

I've yet to try TWIT, mostly because sadly, at the end of the day, I'm all "tech"ed out. If it's really all that great, I'll try it. Leo Laporte's an okay guy, but I wasn't in love with him or anything when he was at Tech TV.

I'm liking Secondcast for the Second Life background, but the commentators give me a headache.

Enlighten me. I'll try just about anything at this point. Except gay vegan cooking shows. Or anything involving or remotely related to the word "spin."

English or Spanish will do.

Thursday, March 09, 2006

So in love.

Sometimes you gotta wake up and remind yourself just how awesome Project Gutenberg is.

Monday, March 06, 2006

How do you know if your game kicks Halo's butt?

When your enemies look like this:



Just wanted to eliminate any confusion. By the way, this is not a cutscene, it's an in-game shot.

Dear Dr. Breen, What up Dawg?


You should read Concerned, if you liked Half Life 2.

Or any video games.

Or are interested in machinima.

Or anything funny.

Of particular hilarity is Gordon Frohman's adventures in the lost Counterstrike server.

By the way, Half Life 2 kicks Halo's wimpy pansy tushy. Just so's you know.