Superman Renounces U.S. Citizenship

In the landmark 900th issue of Action Comics, the magazine where Superman came to life, the iconic hero has announced he's renouncing his US citizenship - he is American no more. It follows his presence at a protest rally in Iran, where he joined the protest though he took no 'super' actions.

Of course, with the cost of that comic book at 6 dollars, I wish he'd renounce such high prices too. I've always been a comics fan, though when prices starting hitting 3 bucks a pop some years back, I stopped buying them. But I still like them for the most part - they are a fascinating collection of pop art and pop culture which has been constant in the country since Clark Kent, aka Superman, hit the stores in 1938 - and I do read them when I can.

And since comics are also a major source of movies too this is shaping up as a pop culture Event for Supes to chide the world for dividing and attacking each other on nationalistic ideals. (And a way to keep Supes comics selling and to appear popular and topical).

I'm sure the Controversialists of FOX News and such will wail and bemoan such an iconic change, even if it is just one of those "durned heathen funny books". Tennessee has a historic political tie to comic books, thanks to TN Senator Estes Kefauver's infamous Congressional hearings on them back in the 1950s. A Madisonville native, the Democrat senator was charged to probe the effects of comic books on young people and found, of course, they were horrible.

Action Comics number 900 would likely make Sen. Estes Kefauver's head explode.

(Personally, I sort of expected trouble for Superman when he donned a hoodie and started walking across America last fall - an Emo Superman is not a pretty thing.)

Pop Fiction has to change to keep up with Pop Culture - or it becomes dull. Even fictional heroics are defined by the times.

I never was a big fan of Supes - he had too few flaws and too much perfection to drive a storyline. I've been more of a Marvel Comics kind of guy - especially the X-Men, which has this nice subext about life for minorities.

More here at Wired

"In an age rife with immigration paranoia, it’s refreshing to see an alien refugee tell the United States that it’s as important to him as any other country on Earth — which in turn is as important to Superman as any other planet in the multiverse."

And here via a FOX News site:

"Besides being riddled with a blatant lack of patriotism, and respect for our country, Superman's current creators are belittling the United States as a whole. By denouncing his citizenship, Superman becomes an eery (sic) metaphor for the current economic and power status the country holds worldwide.

Fanboy meltdown!

(hat-tip to TGW for alerting me to this story)

Camera Obscura: Comic-Con News; Miyazaki's 'Ponyo'; Scorsese's 'Shutter Island'

Filmmakers and fans and media reps from all corners have been busy at the Annual San Diego Comic-Con this week. When first held in 1970, a few hundred fans and comic creators attended and the event was barely noticed - except among fans and creators. And it grew quickly.

In the last few years, all major movie studios, every news agency, agents, actors, writers, artists, fans and fans and more fans swirl about the convention center in the must-see and must-be-seen event.

From Time magazine, writer Lev Grossman spoke with legendary animators Hayao Miyazaki and John Lassiter - though the newsman can barely contain his fan-boy appreciation for Miyazaki, whose newest animated feature (as always a hand-drawn movie) "Ponyo" is set to hit American theaters in a few weeks, boasting a cast of top name Hollywood talent:



Grossman writes:

"I find it doesn't help to get fanboyish in situations like this -- it just freaks famous people out -- so I keep it together, helped by Miyazaki's translator -- she's a calming presence. I'm not going to run through the whole interview, which I have to save for the print magazine for now. But we talked about where Ponyo came from -- she was a frog before she was a goldfish, and her story to some extent parallels that of the Little Mermaid, a story Miyazaki loved as a child, though he didn't like the ending. ... We talked about the cartoons Miyazaki loved as a little kid.

At the very end I broke character and thanked him for everything he's done, and how Totoro is the first movie my daughter and I really loved together. I am not a stone."

Fans get more than a chance to learn the latest news about projects they like, such as the long anticipated "Avatar" from director James Cameron, another long-in-planning production for a sequel to "Tron", the new movie "District 9" from producer Peter Jackson and they can get into a Q and A with some very famous directors (Sam Raimi, Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez) on breaking into the business:



Cinematical and IGN have very complete coverage on just about all topics, panels and news from the Comic-Con.

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Director Martin Scorsese works once again with his favorite actor in recent years, Leonardo DiCaprio for "Shutter Island", based on a novel by Dennis Lehane and set in a grim (what else for Scorsese??) asylum for the criminally insane located on a island. The preview for the movie follows:

Camera Obscura: The Superhero Decadence of The Watchmen

It is most satisfying to see so many news and media outlets talking about writer Alan Moore's 1986 graphic novel "The Watchmen", which is arriving as a big-budget studio movie this weekend across the nation and the world. Moore - who no longer owns the rights to the story he created and won't see a penny from the movie or the merchandise - must still take some joy in the fact that his work is creating an even larger debate today than when it was first released.

I was among those who bought each issue of The Watchmen when it came out, one at a time, waiting each month for the next chapter, a process which took over a year to complete. The nerdy fanboy in me knew that Moore's creation was based on superhero characters from the old Charlton Comics company. And I had already become a fan of the very imaginative narrative experiments in comic book form Moore had created in his run on the odd tale of "Swamp Thing." He took a minor character and made a mythic, Lovecraftian phantasmagoria whose sum far exceeded its parts. Those familiar balloons inked with the dialog and thoughts of comic book characters were turned into prose, rupturing those balloons into a near-Joycean stream of consciousness.

He was the New Kid in Town and was beyond bold in his approach.

There were countless hours in 1986 and 1987 spent lounging about the boxes and stacks of plastic-wrapped comics and magazines in a variety of local comic shops where we would dissect and debate each issue of The Watchmen. The story of this limited series was a murder mystery, but it was also a dense and layered commentary on comic books, comic characters, heroics and myths, power and the abuse of power, satire, politics, science fiction, tragedy, and even on the very structure and form of comic books. (See here for more)

The cover illustration by Dave Gibbons on that first issue, shown above, was a sly pun in itself -- meant to indicate the "doomsday clock" closing in on midnight, it is also a spatter of blood on a smiley face button, a remnant of the murder of a brutal and hateful 'retired' superhero named The Comedian. And it rests in the gutter, in a pool of blood from the dead Comedian. It's also, like a movie, the first 'shot', and each image after on that first page is a 'dolly-out', as if the camera were pulling back further and further, which then places the button as a but a tiny speck seen from the window of the Comedian's apartment, now a murder scene.

There was nothing like it before. There were a few old school comic fans who did not like Moore's work one bit. In a way, Watchmen was too hip for the room, but sales of the issues and collected graphic novel were huge. DC Comics earned some credibility among us discerning readers - which they promptly trashed by invoking a clause in Moore's contract that allowed them to keep the rights to the tale simply by publishing reprints year after year. Moore lost control and eventually accepted his fate and demanded his name be removed from future printings.

For many years tales of movie adaptations rose and fell away. However, this weekend will see a 163-minute version of the story hit movie screens. Critics just do not know what to make of this movie -- will audiences get it even if they didn't read the books? Will they like it if they did read the books? Is it a good film, a great one, a mindless jabber of ideas? As cinematic as much of the design and imagery of the comic might be and adaptable to movies - it was a creation specifically for comic panels and colors and mythology.

I hope it sends even more new readers to the novel.

I hope audiences and fanboys and critics talk and debate the movie for some time.

There are ideas in the story which are meant to disturb and rattle the status quo. And I have always been a supporter for that. Someone asked me once, "Why do you like to rattle people's cages?" and I replied "Why are people living in cages?"

Camera Obscura: The Age of Superhero Decadence

I had the chance to read through some of the posts at the much-hyped Big Hollywood web site, the creation of conservative writer/web mogul Andrew Breitbart (the man who helped launch both The Drudge Report and Huffington Post).

Conservatives like Breitbart have a history of decrying art and entertainment for not having a solid core of American conservative political belief and therefore are instead guilty of destroying the moral fiber of the nation. Yawn.

At least he's not calling for a return of congressional hearings into comic books (like that led by Tennessee Democrat Senator Estes Kefauver) and the movie industry -- not yet anyway, but I get the feeling some would love such a thing. Those events were dismal, dark days in our history, allowing for hysterical Inquisition-style theatrics which destroyed lives and celebrated ignorance.

I suppose this is a continuation of the so-called culture wars in America, as if the body politic needs to alter the creation and distribution of works of art and the imagination so that it conforms to a single perspective. Yeah, we so need an anti-imagination campaign. Because, well, conservative ideas are all mangled by art and media whose only goal is to express America-hating and commie-loving views. (Conservative political Myth Numero Uno.)

I stumbled into Big Hollywood after reading about a column by comic book writer Bill Willingham published there. Willingham is moaning that we are in the age of "superhero decadence" and longs for a return to the days when all comic book superheroes were ... well, just better:

"Old fashioned ideals of courage and patriotism, backed by a deep virtue and unshakable code, seem to be… well, old fashioned."

Willingham adds:

"It’s time to make public a decision I’ve already made in private. I’m going to shamelessly steal a line from Rush Limbaugh, who said, concerning a different matter, “Go ahead and have your recession if you insist, but you’ll have to pardon me if I choose not to participate.” And from now on that’s my position on superhero comics. Go ahead and have your Age of Superhero Decadence, if you insist, but you’ll have to pardon me if I no longer choose to participate.

No more superhero decadence for me. Period. From now on, when I write within the superhero genre I intend to do it right. And if I am ever again privileged to be allowed to write Superman, you can bet your sweet bootie that he’ll find the opportunity to bring back “and the American way,” to his famous credo."

Yeah. Wonder why Willingham's work isn't more successful since he guides his comic book writing by the light of Limbaugh's political views? Darn kids today just don't have much use for jingoistic tropes of nationalism in their durned heathen funny books.

Robot 6 has a good discussion of Willingham and his views on comic books.

But really, as a lifelong comic book fan, the superheroes usually were the least impressive creations. Basic storylines tend to follow a simple formula: Good Guy Encounters Bad Guy and Big Fight Follows. There are many, many instances in real life of just plain heroic - not superheroic - acts and individuals. Most recently, the pilot Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger III of the airliner which was forced to land in the middle of the Hudson River yesterday is a bona fide hero - maybe the only person in the world who could have landed that plane in a river without any fatalities.

And if Willingham feels he needs to inject conservative politics into his superhero fantasies, well that's fine by me. I wish him the best. But drama - good drama - requires some kind of conflict, and a character with flaws is more interesting than those without. Let's face it - a multi-millionaire Bruce Wayne, aka Batman, who decides to wear a mask and attack criminals is really just a vigilante who is making an end-run around the law and courts in order to exact immediate justice which only he defines.

I enjoy the movie "Dirty Harry" but in real life I do not want a policeman to act like Harry at all.

Reading through Big Hollywood all I found was a giant whine-festival - Hollywood is evil, media is evil, good moral values don't exist in art enough to satisfy me, etc etc etc.



I like some ambiguity in the fiction or movies or TV I see -- not everyone does, and with hundreds if not thousands of options available to us, we can all find something we like. And that ambiguity allows me a chance to ponder on the tale I am reading or watching - to react to it and weigh it and think about it. A work of the imagination is most often about the rejection of confinement.

Discussion and debate about the fictions of heroes and superheroes might best be started with Joseph Campbell's "Hero With A Thousand Faces" rather than the blather of conservative blogs. Your mileage may vary.

Spider-Man Meets Obama

For the first time ever, a U.S. President has admitted he likes comic books and his fave is Spider-Man. So Marvel Comics is printing up a special edition to mark the historic moment. The issue hits stands on Jan. 14th and of course real collectors can seek out the variant cover.

I wonder - was Obama ever a member of F.O.O.M.?

Camera Obscura - Neil Gaiman, Masters of Sci-Fi, Whedon Interview

Some quick TV notes for you to start off this Friday.

All day on Turner Classic Movies is a Vincent Price marathon. Many great performances and films are presented, including the weird "The Tingler" and his version of "I Am Legend", called "The Last Man On Earth." Tonight will bring some of his best known movies, the Roger Corman adaptations of Edgar Allan Poe stories as well as "The Abominable Dr. Phibes". (Phibes was the "Saw" series of it's day.)

I also love the marketing ploy used in "The Tingler" (the first movie to feature an LSD trip scene) as random theatre seats in movie houses across the country were fitted with honest-to-Pete electric shock gizmos. At certain times during the film, your seat would buzz and vibrate with a light shock and those in the seats would usually scream and jump up, which started some truly chaotic moments in the theatres.

Yeah, you could not do that today. Lawsuits would follow. The audience always got plenty of shocks in movies from producer William Castle, who would often provide a 'nurse on duty' during his movies, or offer you free life insurance in case you died of fear during his movies. Castle was the man who coined the advertising line "Just keep telling yourself, It's Only A Movie! It's Only A Movie!!"

Another TV treat is getting a very brief lifespan on ABCs on Saturday nights at 10 pm, "Masters of Science Fiction." This week's episode is based on a story by Howard Fast ("Spartacus") and is set in the war zones of Baghdad. Terry O'Quinn stars. The next two (of only four episodes) feature dramas based on the works of Heinlein and Harlan Ellison. NPR has a fantastic review of the show.

NPR also has a tasty segment on the delicious comedy show Robot Chicken, which starts it's third season on Adult Swim on August 12th. The geek in me is always impressed by the rapid-fire pop culture assault that RC provides in 10 and 15 minute bite-sized chunks.

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More proof I am a geek:

A week or so ago, I got an early birthday present. It's yet another t-shirt to add to my gigantic collection of clothing from movies and television. The shirt is simply the punchline from an online comic strip, PVP, from 2005 as a father and son debate Episode 3 of the "Star Wars" saga. (click to embiggen)



And the shirt is shown here.

Speaking of Joss Whedon, a jam-packed interview from the just completed San Diego Comic Con has plenty of details about his work on Buffy and Angel and Firefly and future projects. I have always had my own tag line for the man, taken from Marvel Comics -- "Make Mine Whedon!"

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Comic books continue their massive influence on Hollywood with the opening this weekend of the fantasy adventure "Stardust" written by one of the most popular comics writer and novelist in many years, Neil Gaiman. It's a more intense and scary version of "Princess Bride".

The reviews are very strong for the movie. It stars Michelle Pfieffer, Robert De Niro, Peter O' Toole, Claire Danes and Ricky Gervais. Director Matthew Vaughn, whose previous movie "Layer Cake" I have mentioned many times here before, may be about to take over another comic book to movie project for marvel, Thor. Get all the details on Vaughn and "Stardust" and "Layer Cake" here.

And if you haven't read any of his work, his novel "American Gods" is a fine place to start.

Now please excuse me -- I have TV to watch and other geek habits to employ.

Camera Obscura - The CIA and Jack Kirby; Hot Fuzz and More Movie News

There's a connection between the CIA, Spock's ears, comic book legend Jack Kirby and the Iranian Hostage Crisis from the Carter era. The story could and likely will be made into a movie soon, especially since Wired magazine this month has a story on how the CIA used all those elements in a daring rescue of hostages.

On Turner Classic Movies from time to time, they've shown a little behind-the-scenes movie about makeup master John Chambers, who did design and make Spock's ears, as well as creating the unique (at the time) latex mask method for the "Planet of the Apes" movies.

As the Wired article reports, agent Tony Mendez put together a fake movie production company they called Studio Six Productions with Chamber's help and made a plan to use latex masks to disguise a handful of the hostages and help them escape:

"All they needed now was a film — and Chambers had the perfect script. Months before, he had received a call from a would-be producer named Barry Geller. Geller had purchased the rights to Roger Zelazny's science fiction novel, Lord of Light, written his own treatment, raised a few million dollars in starting capital from wealthy investors, and hired Jack Kirby, the famous comic book artist who cocreated X-Men, to do concept drawings. Along the way, Geller imagined a Colorado theme park based on Kirby's set designs that would be called Science Fiction Land; it would include a 300-foot-tall Ferris wheel, voice-operated mag-lev cars, a "planetary control room" staffed by robots, and a heated dome almost twice as tall as the Empire State Building. Geller had announced his grand plan in November at a press conference attended by Jack Kirby, former football star and prospective cast member Rosey Grier, and several people dressed like visitors from the future."

Few thought the idea would work, and the story of how it all came together is fantastic. The magazine even includes some of the storyboard drawings used to fake the Iranians - and many in Hollywood.

Another behind-the-scenes movie master is the center of a new documentary, film and sound editor Walter Murch. Cinematical's James Rocchi got a viewing of the film and reports on it here. Murch is probably more responsible for the look and sound of movies today than any other person. He went from editing movies by hand on the Movieola system to computers, then on to Avid and the non-linear Mac based Final Cut Pro. His sound designs and creations also led to the 5.1 sound systems used today.

Still, his interests and intelligence go far beyond film. He was recently interviewed for the architectural blog, BLDBLOG, where he discusses cosmology and architecture and offers a theory that the Heliocentric Pantheon in Rome was a key used by Copernicus to create an accurate description of our solar system.

" ... I then superimposed Copernicus’s drawing over an image of the Pantheon’s dome – and found that the ratios of the circles in his drawing and the ratios of the circles of the Pantheon line up almost exactly. Seeing that alignment was one of those wonderful moments where you suddenly feel a strong current of connection with the past.."

Walter Murch just rocks, people.

---- In some other notable news this week, a scene was shot for the production of the Will Smith version of the "I Am Legend" movie which is being touted as the most expensive single scene yet made. The cost is a minimum of $5 million, but may in fact be much higher. It's no simple task to take over the Brooklyn Bridge for a few hours.

---- One of the funniest movies in recent years was the British zombie-comedy "Shaun of the Dead." And I admit it, they had me as soon as the Goblins' music from Romero's "Dawn of the Dead" started playing. And the movie just got better and better. This weekend, the same crew of filmmakers and actors turn to another genre to have fun with - the buddy-cop movie. Some behind the scenes talk for this weekend's new movie, "Hot Fuzz", with Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg can be heard here, at DVD Talk Radio. Other interviews on the site include Oliver Stone, Stan Lee, Kevin Smith and Eli Roth.

---- Rasslin fans get to see their faves blow up real good in a movie opening this weekend called "Condemned". I doubt if the script here will be any better than the scripts rasslers use on any given title match. However, the idea for this movie was much better when it was called "Battle Royale." Take my advice and seek that one out, unless yer rasslin love has you pinned.

---- Thank the good Freedonian for pointing out the very best ever moment in the history of the show "American Idol." Jack Black takes the show to it's peak.