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London Bloggers [Comic Blogs][Other Blogs] | 19 June 2014
[life] Has David Birnbaum solved the mystery of existence?… engrossing profile of “outsider thinker” David Birnbaum … ‘There is no shortage of people who would say no, at least in Birnbaum’s case. His work, said a commenter on the Chronicle’s website, “reads like L Ron Hubbard had drunken sex one night with Ayn Rand and produced this bastard thought-child”. One scholar who became professionally involved with Birnbaum described the experience as “unsettling, unfortunate and, to my knowledge, unprecedented in academic circles”. Another just called him “toxic”. But then again – as Birnbaum pointed out to me, more than once, during the weeks I spent trying to figure out exactly what he was up to – just suppose that a scrappy, philosophically unqualified Jewish guy from Queens really had cracked the cosmic code, embarrassing the ivory-tower elites: well, isn’t this exactly the kind of defensive response you’d expect?’
18 June 2014
[comics] Alan Moore’s Lost Comic Miracleman Has Returned … ‘A Dream of Flying is lovely, but the truly jaw-dropping stuff is just a few months away. You’ll get to see “Scenes From the Nativity,” in which Moran’s wife gives birth to a superpowered infant in an infamously (and, in its way, beautifully) graphic manner. You’ll experience the astounding conclusion of Moore’s run: a city-demolishing fight between Miracleman and Johnny Bates that will turn your stomach and expand your mind, followed by an issue in which Miracleman assumes his rightful role as a god and creates a worldwide quasi-socialist utopia. You’ll delight in Gaiman’s series of short stories about life in that utopia – one of which is a gorgeous little tale narrated by an undead Andy Warhol. You’ll read about modern myths and see better worlds. And soon, God (Miracleman?) willing, you’ll find out how it was all supposed to conclude. ‘
17 June 2014
[tv] Hannibal, slasher TV for the chattering classes … The Guardian On Hannibal … ‘When Hannibal – or CSI: Whitby Goth Weekend as I like to call it – aired in America earlier this year the cascade of acclaim spewing over its beauty and poetic themes was pretty spectacular. As an intellectual myself, I can only agree. Clearly, us highbrow types can’t get enough of juddery flashback scenes set to sinister circus music, or martinis made from children’s tears, or frosty psychopaths muttering weird jokes as his guests tuck into lung sushi. A body turns up, scooped out like a kiwi and filled with poisonous flowers. A thousand clever viewers politely applaud the artistry of it all.’
16 June 2014
[comics] The Joker’s Utility Belt … I wonder what the Joker does with the small cork? …
15 June 2014
[comics] Five Great Comic Book Adaptations Of Movies … some great comics to watch out for on this list. On Kirby’s 2001: ‘It’s hard to imagine two sensibilities more opposite in tone than those of Jack Kirby and Stanley Kubrick. Kirby’s grandiosity acts as a stark contrast to the calculated distance of Kubrick and for this alone, his eight-years-after-the-fact adaptation of 2001 really shouldn’t work. Against everything, though, the adaptation succeeds by choosing to take a new path, mashing up three different versions of the material — novel, screenplay and final product — and adding Kirby’s off-kilter dynamism to create a final product that’s as wonderful as it is “wrong.”The original film is (obviously) full of space, figuratively and literally. Kubrick allows the camera to rest, giving the audience an opportunity to breathe in the recycled air and vastness of the universe. An absence of dialogue and narration helps further the film’s atmosphere, providing a base from which the stunning visuals stand out even more. This draws the audience in, forcing them to pay attention to what’s not being said just as much as what is. This sort of subtlety is exactly the sort of thing that Kirby has no interest in; he’s going to tell you the story. With words and pictures. Deal with it.’
14 June 2014
[scifi] Wikipedia’s List Of Fictional Living Planets … ‘This is a list of fictional living planets, planets in fiction which are said to be alive, and in some cases, intelligent. This includes worlds covered by a single immense organism (such as Solaris) or whose biosphere is composed of organisms which are linked into a hive mind.’
13 June 2014
[politics] Five myths about UKIP … that should make the Conservatives happy … debunking some widely held ideas about the UKIP…‘Myth two: More Britons wish to leave the EU than in 2009 – The opposite is true. Five years ago we divided narrowly in favour of a complete withdrawal from the EU; today, by a modest margin, we prefer to remain a member…’
12 June 2014
[comics] Neil Tennant’s FURY… a fascinating look at a 1977 Marvel comic edited by Neil Tennant from the Pet Shop Boys … ‘The covers of Fury were also similar to the ones Battle had been running. Powerful images with a punchy message. None punchier than the brilliant one shown at the top of this post by Carlos Ezquerra. The artist had produced many similarly strong images for Battle’s covers so it was quite a coup for Marvel UK to commission him for Fury. Unfortunately, the company were not given a budget by their American owners to produce British strips so although Fury looked like a traditional UK war comic on the outside, the interiors were a different matter…’
11 June 2014
[people] 27 People Who Have Better Job Titles Than You … ‘Lonnie Johnson – Professional Snuggler’
10 June 2014
[comics] “A Funny Kind Of Relationship” … Alan Moore On Iain Sinclair … ‘So Iain had a profound effect upon my writing style, it’s probably more evident to me than to other people. It was more the fact that after reading Iain’s work I felt that I had to man up, I had to shift things up a gear, because knowing that prose of that quality was possible, unless you tried to address that, any other response is like, cowardice, or defeat, surrender… It was like when I read Burroughs as a teenager. It made me realise that prose was capable of doing certain other things than things that I had previously attributed to it. Later on I found that Iain’s kind of literary genealogy is not a million miles away from my own, its just that his has got a much finer eye attached to it and a much greater body of knowledge, but I think we were both inspired by the energy of the Beat writers and the culture that spread out from them.’
9 June 2014
[books] When nature attacks! Pulp horror covers from the 1970s & ‘80s … A gallery of covers and commentary on the “When animals go bad” horror genre … ‘Guy N. Smith produced the insect horror of all horrors with Abomination in 1987, where pesticide causes every insect, worm, slug etc attack man. Smith more than any other author produced several “Nature Gone Bad” books with Snakes, Alligators, Locusts, the rather enjoyable Slime Beast, which may have come from another world, or may have been an evolutionary mutation created by man-made poisons, and The Throwback, where evolution goes wild. The structure of these books is usually the same. The opening has some poor unfortunate, often a down-and-out or a lonely alcoholic, sometimes a misguided scientist, as first victim. Their body goes undiscovered allowing the rats, slugs, crabs, spiders, etc. to go unnoticed. There usually follows a series of tableaux where couples making out, small children and mothers, sad loners, and ambitious yuppies are killed with ever increasing violence. This leads to our hero, often a teacher (Herbert), a pipe smoking expert (Smith), or a disgruntled government employee (Hutson), who notes the pattern of deaths, the tell-tale markings or slime trails, and commences the creatures’ downfall.’
8 June 2014
[art] Michelangelo’s David Correctly Oriented … a different way of viewing Michelangelo’s masterpiece … ‘Everyone has seen photos of Michelangelo’s David, but unfortunately the sculpture is invariably shown from the side view, rather than from the front. The image on the the right is an actual frontal view of David, as he coolly yet menacingly awaits Goliath, his sling at the ready over his shoulder and his face full of disdain. With this lighting, he actually appears to be sneering at the giant. The message of the sculpture is clearly, “You [Goliath, and by extension, Caesar Borgia and any other potential enemy of the Florentine Republic] are dead meat!” No living person has ever seen or photographed this primary view of the world’s most famous sculpture.’ [via As Above]
7 June 2014
[life] Tweet … Channelling Allen Ginsberg in 2014 … ‘I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by brevity, over-connectedness, emotionally starving for attention, dragging themselves through virtual communities at 3 am, surrounded by stale pizza and neglected dreams, looking for angry meaning, any meaning…’
6 June 2014
[comics] The Weirdo “NO HOPE” Diagram … by R. Crumb … ‘Proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that there’s No Hope!’
5 June 2014
[books] The Mr Men Inhabit A Godless Universe. It’s A Brutal Existence … Charlie Brooker on the Mr Men … ‘The Mr Men inhabit a godless universe. They chiefly fall into two camps – those with character defects (eg Mr Greedy) and those with afflictions (eg Mr Skinny). They all suffer in some way, except those too mad (Mr Silly) or too stupid (Mr Dizzy) to comprehend what suffering is. There is justice in their realm, but it’s applied inconsistently at best. Mr Nosey, for instance, has all his inquisitiveness literally beaten out of him when the townsfolk conspire against him. He hears an interesting noise behind a fence and pokes his nose round it, only to be smashed in the face by a man with hammer – who laughs about it afterwards. But Mr Nosey’s only crime was excessive curiosity, whereas Mr Tickle – a 1970s children’s entertainer with wandering hands who runs around town touching strangers inappropriately from dawn till dusk – goes unpunished.’
4 June 2014
[shops] Britain’s Soulless And Generic High Streets Under Threat … ‘Chef Carolyn Ryan said: “It’s terrifying to think that unless we act fast, our children will never know a world of mobile phone shops, Greggs and Clinton Cards.”
3 June 2014
[comics] 43 Out-Of-Context Comic Panels That Prove All Superheroes Have Dirty Minds … Wertham was right … ‘Captain America! I Command You To – ‘
2 June 2014
[ukip] Ukip founder Alan Sked: ‘The party has become a Frankenstein’s monster’ … a fascinating interview with UKIP’s founder… ‘Sked recalls, too, the letters of complaint he received from Salisbury, when Farage stood for Ukip in 1997’s general election. “I remember one that said, ‘I’m very glad your candidate believes in education, but until he learns to spell it, I’m not voting for him.’ That’s the kind of person people are voting for when they vote Ukip. Why does anyone have time for this creature? He’s a dimwitted racist.”‘
1 June 2014
[space] Technoarchaeology: How to revive a satellite … the amazing story of how communication has been re-established with a satellite last communicated with in 1998 … ‘This initial contact indicates that the satellite’s computer and radios are functioning. The next steps are to determine more fully whether its control systems work as expected and test its instrumentation and propulsion. The team must fire its rockets by mid-June to reposition ISEE-3. The next big challenge will come when the satellite swings around the moon onto its shadowed side and is cut off from the sun. The craft will power down for the first time in many years, and the team hopes when it sees it again, it will wake up and resume communications. It has lasted this long, and the group hopes for many more years to come.’
31 May 2014
[movies] The Shawshank Residuals … How the movie The Shawshank Redemption keeps making money… ‘On cable, “Shawshank” is at an age when the licensing value of many films diminishes, but its strength hasn’t wavered. “Shawshank” and other films are now being licensed for shorter periods to a bigger and hungrier universe of distributors. “Shawshank” has aired on 15 basic cable networks since 1997, including six in the most recent season, according to Warner Bros. Last year, it filled 151 hours of airtime on basic cable, tied with “Scarface” and behind only “Mrs. Doubtfire,” according to research firm IHS.’
30 May 2014
[comics] Fan-Made Live Action Akira Trailer … ’38 Years After World War III…’
29 May 2014
[illuminati] 15 Potential headquarters for the Illuminati: theories and conspiracies … ‘Big Ben, London – it all comes down to 2012 Olympics “false flag” attacks focused on Big Ben, which seems like an odd reason to make the location an Illuminati HQ. Anyway, The City of London is the hub for international control of economics, one of three City State corporations, the others being Washington DC (military headquarters) and Vatican City (religion).’ [via jwz]
28 May 2014
[dystopia] The 10 Best (Worst) Dystopian Fictions … ‘Next to 1984, Blade Runner — and by extension the novel that inspired it — is one of the most referenced dystopias in contemporary discourse, largely due to its bleak, sorta-exactly-looks-like-1980s-New-York-but-with-flying-cars urban setting. It’s not so much a meditation on our reliance on technology as it is a criticism of übercapitalism and the evils of war — not to mention racism, ignorance and intolerance.’
27 May 2014
[people] If Danny Dyer’s Tweets Were Motivational Posters … ‘Embrace your insecurities and contradictions… don’t let em drown the fuck out of ya…’
26 May 2014
[comics] “Kid… Comics Will Break Your Heart” … Jack Kirby by Dylan Horrocks … ‘In the 1980s, Romberger met Kirby at a convention in New York. Kirby kindly looked at Romberger’s work and then gave him a piece of advice: “Kid, you’re one of the best. But put your work in galleries. Don’t do comics. Comics will break your heart.”’
25 May 2014
[comics] MAD #21: Cover by Harvey Kurtzman (1955) … an incredibly dense cover of comic novelty ads … ‘It is one of the most glorious and ludicrous covers in comic book history.’
24 May 2014
[lovecraft] Lovecraftian School Board Member Wants Madness Added To Curriculum
“Fools!” said West, his clenched fist striking the lectern before him. “We must prepare today’s youth for a world whose terrors are etched upon ancient clay tablets recounting the fever-dreams of the other gods-not fill their heads with such trivia as math and English. Our graduates need to know about those who lie beneath the earth, waiting until the stars align so they can return to their rightful place as our masters and wage war against the Elder Things and the shoggoths!” 23 May 2014
[people] What has been seen cannot be unseen: Here’s Victoria Beckham Looking A Lot Like Cliff Richard.
22 May 2014
[email] How To Free Yourself From Email … ‘The key point: whenever you email someone you are intruding, stealing time that they could be spending with their family – or without their family. You certainly shouldn’t be blithely asking them for unpaid services. There’s one dreaded email, familiar to every professional writer, known as “Will you read my script?” The correct answer is, “Certainly. My hourly rate is”‰.”‰.”‰.”‰” Probably the best business secret Sir Alex Ferguson, the former Manchester United manager, will have to impart at Harvard Business School is what he once told Tony Blair’s aide Alastair Campbell: don’t let people steal your time with petty requests.’
21 May 2014
[politics] Among a crowd of political automatons, Nigel Farage is like a wacky neighbour in a sitcom … Charlie Brooker on Nigel Farage … ‘Farage says the unsayable. He says things so unsayable they’re said nigh-on constantly, often in large letters, on the front page of a newspaper. The sayable. He says the sayable. ROMANIAN STEALS WAR MEMORIAL. ONE IN THREE FOREIGNERS ISN’T BRITISH. NOW IT’S HALAL SMARTPHONES. That’s what he says. All of which means that, as well as being a bit of sore thumb stunt casting, he simultaneously represents familiarity; specifically the cosy familiarity of a world in which you could walk down an English high street without your ears getting bunged up with foreign accents, unless someone was doing a hilarious Gunga Din voice in order to mock the waiter in a curry house. That world is a corpse, but it’s a corpse that many want to revive…’
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