The Red Hulk (Rulk) has been around since the latest Hulk reboot. A lot of clues have been dropped about his identity but many of them were "red" herrings. The biggest clue was overshadowed by one of those red herrings.
The two most obvious candidates are Leonard Samson and Thunderbolt Ross. At one point they even showed Samson's coat, irradiated with gamma radiation and stretched out as if someone grew while wearing it.
Both Ross and Samson have appeared with the Rulk.
I haven't spotted many other clues but there are a few. He likes guns. He seems to know a lot about SHIELD LMDs (Life Model Decoys). He knows Samson and Ross.
There is one other clue but it's a negative one. Samson vanished for a few issues when they were dropping strong hints that he was Rulk. At the same time he vanished, a crushed body turned up that was quickly identified as SHIELD agent Clay Quartermain. Almost nothing else was said about this.
So, why kill off a character who has been around since 1967? I don't think that they did. I think that Quartermain is the Rulk. He was with Samson at the time that Rulk appeared. Samson was involved, maybe even responsible. A body, or even a fake body, was planted to explain his absence. He even led a team of Hulkbusters at one point. Who better?
I'd say that you heard it here first but a Google search shows that someone else thought of this a few months ago. He also thinks that Quartermain has green hair when he is himself. This is incorrect. Issue 14 shows four people talking together. One has green hair and the other three are wearing caps. We see one of the figures in a cap go into an alley and change into the Rulk. During the change you can see his hat fall off and it is lying on the street when he finishes his change. Later we see that Samson was the one with green hair (and no cap) and Ross was one of the people with a cap.
Next question - who is the red She-Hulk? She quotes military strategy. She could be Betty Ross, back from the grave. That was my first guess. Her father is a general, after all. It seems too easy.
Since Quartermain is a secondary character that they slipped in, I think that the Red She-Hulk is another secondary character, possibly another member of SHIELD. Her torn outfit looks a little like a SHIELD uniform which supports this. I'm guessing Maria Hill, former deputy director of SHIELD.
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Iron Man and Transistors
Every comic book featuring Iron Man from the early 1960s has constant references to transistors. Unless you grew up in the 60s, this will go over your head so I thought I would go into a little detail.
During the first half of the 20th century, electronics used vacuum tubes. These had a few wires inside a glass tube which kept the air out. Air acts as an insulator so they had to have a vacuum. These were big. The smallest ones were as big as a tube of lipstick. The big ones were as big as a light bulb. They took minutes to warm up before they started to work. They were heavy. They needed a lot of power. There was no such thing as a portable radio back then. The best you could get was a car radio which ran off of the car battery (and could run it down if the motor wasn't running).
The transistor changed that. It was tiny, durable, and only used a fraction of the power. Suddenly portable, battery-powered radios and even TVs were possible. Of course, the radios were still the size of a paperback book, AM-only, and they only came with an earphone for one ear but you could carry one around with you for the first time.
So, transistors were a "big" thing.
Now, Stan Lee didn't really understand what a transistor was. He just knew that they were responsible for miniaturization. He figured that you could attach a transistor to a magnet and boost its power. And he was really confused about the relationship between transistors and batteries so Iron Man was constantly "charging his transistors" instead of his batteries.
No one talks about transistors, these days. They were replaced with integrated circuit chips which hold the equivalent of many transistors. If you are carrying a smart phone then you are carrying millions of transistors around with you. That's why the Iron Man movie changed the focus from his transistors to his power source.
During the first half of the 20th century, electronics used vacuum tubes. These had a few wires inside a glass tube which kept the air out. Air acts as an insulator so they had to have a vacuum. These were big. The smallest ones were as big as a tube of lipstick. The big ones were as big as a light bulb. They took minutes to warm up before they started to work. They were heavy. They needed a lot of power. There was no such thing as a portable radio back then. The best you could get was a car radio which ran off of the car battery (and could run it down if the motor wasn't running).
The transistor changed that. It was tiny, durable, and only used a fraction of the power. Suddenly portable, battery-powered radios and even TVs were possible. Of course, the radios were still the size of a paperback book, AM-only, and they only came with an earphone for one ear but you could carry one around with you for the first time.
So, transistors were a "big" thing.
Now, Stan Lee didn't really understand what a transistor was. He just knew that they were responsible for miniaturization. He figured that you could attach a transistor to a magnet and boost its power. And he was really confused about the relationship between transistors and batteries so Iron Man was constantly "charging his transistors" instead of his batteries.
No one talks about transistors, these days. They were replaced with integrated circuit chips which hold the equivalent of many transistors. If you are carrying a smart phone then you are carrying millions of transistors around with you. That's why the Iron Man movie changed the focus from his transistors to his power source.
Friday, February 19, 2010
The Evolution of the Avengers
I've been taking advantage of Marvel's digital comics to reread the early issues of the Avengers. I hadn't read most of these comics since the 1960s so it I have a different perspective.
For now I'm covering issues 1-9. The first eight of these were Lee/Kirby with Don Heck taking over as artist with issue nine.
First, general impressions - Marvel had three team comics during this period - the Fantastic Four, the Avengers, and the X-Men. Even though Lee and Kirby did the early issues of all three, each had a very different feel. They were all pretty early in the overall evolution of Marvel. Pages were broken up into regular panels - four or six to a page. Stories were self-contained but there was some continuity between issues.
The FF and the X-Men were almost families. The Avengers was different because it was a collection of heroes who already had their own books. They barely knew each other and none of them shared his secret identity with the others.
In some ways, the Avengers was a marketing ploy. Each issue introduced all of the characters enough that you could pick up their own books and know what was going on. There was always a couple of panels of Thor as Don Blake, often with his nurse, Jane Foster. You always knew that Iron Man was really Tony Stark and that his armor had to be recharged regularly or he would die. Issues with the Hulk usually included Bruce Banner and often included General "Thunderbolt" Ross and his daughter.
The Avengers spent a lot of time fighting each other and the Sub-Mariner. They joined to fight the Hulk. In issue #2, an alien impersonated different members making them fight some more. In issue #3, the Hulk quit and fought the Avengers, escaped, fought then joined the Sub-Mariner, and finally the two of them fought the Avengers. In issue #4, the Sub-Mariner tossed the piece of ice containing Captain America into the ocean. Later he and some of his Atlanteans fought the Avengers. In issue #5, the Lave Men pushed a "living rock" into the surface world in the South-West. The Hulk appeared and fought the Avengers (again) in the middle of this. Finally, in issue #7, Thor was magically hypnotized into attacking the other Avengers.
Not many memorable characters were invented during this period. Baron Zemo was introduced when Captain America was revived. We first saw him in issue #7 and he died in issue #15 although his son is still around.
Issue #8 finally created a memorable new (sort of) character - Kang the Conqueror. Kang had actually appeared twice before as the FF villain, Rama Tut, but here he was given a new name, costume, and technology. Between his advanced armor and his space/time ship, he was able to take on the Avengers single-handed.
Issue #9 introduced Wonder Man. He died at the end of the issue but came back from the dead several times, even having his own comic book for a while.
Issue #9 also marked the end of Jack Kirby's run and the beginning of Don Heck's. I always thought of Kirby as the superior artist but this issue surprised me. I realized that I have been judging Kirby by his later work. In 1964, Kirby was still a conservative artist. Heck's work was much more dynamic. He did not limit himself to regular panels or angles. It would be another couple of years before Kirby's work changed.
One last thing that struck me was how difficult it was to balance a team with Thor. Often either Thor or Captain America would end up separated from the others. In fact, Thor was much more powerful than the other Avengers put together so most plots had to work around this somehow. I suspect that this was one reason that Stan changed the line-up after a couple of years.
For now I'm covering issues 1-9. The first eight of these were Lee/Kirby with Don Heck taking over as artist with issue nine.
First, general impressions - Marvel had three team comics during this period - the Fantastic Four, the Avengers, and the X-Men. Even though Lee and Kirby did the early issues of all three, each had a very different feel. They were all pretty early in the overall evolution of Marvel. Pages were broken up into regular panels - four or six to a page. Stories were self-contained but there was some continuity between issues.
The FF and the X-Men were almost families. The Avengers was different because it was a collection of heroes who already had their own books. They barely knew each other and none of them shared his secret identity with the others.
In some ways, the Avengers was a marketing ploy. Each issue introduced all of the characters enough that you could pick up their own books and know what was going on. There was always a couple of panels of Thor as Don Blake, often with his nurse, Jane Foster. You always knew that Iron Man was really Tony Stark and that his armor had to be recharged regularly or he would die. Issues with the Hulk usually included Bruce Banner and often included General "Thunderbolt" Ross and his daughter.
The Avengers spent a lot of time fighting each other and the Sub-Mariner. They joined to fight the Hulk. In issue #2, an alien impersonated different members making them fight some more. In issue #3, the Hulk quit and fought the Avengers, escaped, fought then joined the Sub-Mariner, and finally the two of them fought the Avengers. In issue #4, the Sub-Mariner tossed the piece of ice containing Captain America into the ocean. Later he and some of his Atlanteans fought the Avengers. In issue #5, the Lave Men pushed a "living rock" into the surface world in the South-West. The Hulk appeared and fought the Avengers (again) in the middle of this. Finally, in issue #7, Thor was magically hypnotized into attacking the other Avengers.
Not many memorable characters were invented during this period. Baron Zemo was introduced when Captain America was revived. We first saw him in issue #7 and he died in issue #15 although his son is still around.
Issue #8 finally created a memorable new (sort of) character - Kang the Conqueror. Kang had actually appeared twice before as the FF villain, Rama Tut, but here he was given a new name, costume, and technology. Between his advanced armor and his space/time ship, he was able to take on the Avengers single-handed.
Issue #9 introduced Wonder Man. He died at the end of the issue but came back from the dead several times, even having his own comic book for a while.
Issue #9 also marked the end of Jack Kirby's run and the beginning of Don Heck's. I always thought of Kirby as the superior artist but this issue surprised me. I realized that I have been judging Kirby by his later work. In 1964, Kirby was still a conservative artist. Heck's work was much more dynamic. He did not limit himself to regular panels or angles. It would be another couple of years before Kirby's work changed.
One last thing that struck me was how difficult it was to balance a team with Thor. Often either Thor or Captain America would end up separated from the others. In fact, Thor was much more powerful than the other Avengers put together so most plots had to work around this somehow. I suspect that this was one reason that Stan changed the line-up after a couple of years.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Lost - the final season
We are three episodes into the final season of Lost. The producers promised no more flashbacks or flashforwards. Instead we get Flashback-and-to-the-sides. We see the surviving cast in "real time" and we see what would have happened to them a few years ago if the flight hadn't crashed. It's hard to say where they are going with this. Will this continue to be a parallel universe, unconnected to the one we've been watching or will they somehow converge at the end? Is this just a way of confirming what Locke/Smoky said - that they all had pitiful lives and were better off on the island? (Not counting all of the ones who died.)
Speaking of Smoky, we now know that he is the second John Locke. We've seen him appear as dead people before. I think that the only time he has previously appeared to multiple people at once was as a horse to Kate and Sawyer (assuming that was him).
We've see the circle of powder that keeps Smoky out before. The first time Locke went to Jacob's cabin he crossed a line of the same powder. We saw the powder again when he tried to find the cabin but it had moved.
Hopefully the people in the temple are related to Ben's people. It would be too weird to have two groups living on the island. Ben's group seemed to support Jacob over Smoky and the temple group seems afraid of Smoky and the island.
Dogen, the head of the temple, said that he was afraid that the island's spirit had sunk into Sayid and tried to poison him because of it. Is this what Locke (the real one) was communicating with? Claire was last seen with Jack's father, Christian. Now, we are told that the island's spirit sunk into her and poisoned her. She seems to have become the new resident mad-woman. There are parallels between Claire and Rousseau, the previous mad-woman. Both had her child taken from her. Both ended up living alone in the jungle. It appears that both spend their spare time setting traps to catch the others.
Speaking of Smoky, we now know that he is the second John Locke. We've seen him appear as dead people before. I think that the only time he has previously appeared to multiple people at once was as a horse to Kate and Sawyer (assuming that was him).
We've see the circle of powder that keeps Smoky out before. The first time Locke went to Jacob's cabin he crossed a line of the same powder. We saw the powder again when he tried to find the cabin but it had moved.
Hopefully the people in the temple are related to Ben's people. It would be too weird to have two groups living on the island. Ben's group seemed to support Jacob over Smoky and the temple group seems afraid of Smoky and the island.
Dogen, the head of the temple, said that he was afraid that the island's spirit had sunk into Sayid and tried to poison him because of it. Is this what Locke (the real one) was communicating with? Claire was last seen with Jack's father, Christian. Now, we are told that the island's spirit sunk into her and poisoned her. She seems to have become the new resident mad-woman. There are parallels between Claire and Rousseau, the previous mad-woman. Both had her child taken from her. Both ended up living alone in the jungle. It appears that both spend their spare time setting traps to catch the others.
Thursday, February 04, 2010
Hero vs Hero
Back in the 1960s, it was a cliche that any time two Marvel heroes met, they had to fight, first. Digging through some of Marvel's Digital Comics, I looked up some examples and I can remember some others.
Marvel started small, adding one character or group at a time. Stan Lee was a genius at cross-promotion. As new heroes were created, they met well established heroes. This exposed the new characters to a wider audience with the idea of increasing sales. It also laid the foundation of the Marvel Universe. DC had a wide variety of characters. Most of them never crossed paths outside of the JLA. At Marvel, most of them lived in New York City so they often made cameo appearances. Spider-Man might be knocked off a lamp post by Thor's jet stream.
My focus here is the more formal appearance. Some of them were straight guest shots. Ant Man was called in when the FF faced a microscopic enemy. More often they were fights.
The Hulk's first appearance with the FF was an obvious cross-over. It happened near the end of the run of the Hulk's original comic. By that point, Bruce Banner would run to his hidden lab and expose himself to gamma rays in order to turn into an intelligent Hulk. In this case, the FF was called in to investigate acts of sabotage. General Thunderbolt Ross was sure that the Hulk was responsible but Banner and Rick Jones insisted that someone else was. After a rocket sled was wrecked (while the Thing was riding it), the FF found a series of caves and tunnels. In one of these they ran into the Hulk and tried to capture him. The battle was pretty evenly matched until a hidden ray knocked out the Hulk. The FF tracked it to Banner's assistant who was a communist saboteur (he even carried a membership card in a subversive organization in his wallet).
A few months later the Hulk was added as a backup to Giant-Man in Tales to Astonish (several early Marvel comics started out as science fiction/horror comics and it was easier to keep the original name and add the hero). The issue before the Hulk was added, he fought with Giant-Man. Here's a bit of trivia for you - this issue was the first time the Hulk said, "The madder I get the stronger I get."
Not a lot happened in this issue. It mainly introduced the cast and set up that the Hulk was now changing when he got angry. Giant-Man and the Wasp went looking for the Hulk to see if he wanted back into the Avengers. Banner assumed that they were hunting him, got angry, and changed into the Hulk. An old Giant-Man villain, the Human Top (now known as Whirlwind) orchestrated the fight and arraigned for the military to fire a nuclear shell at the Hulk, not knowing that Giant-Man was also present. The Hulk caught the shell, threw it in a different direction, and vanished.
When Captain America was added as a backup feature with Iron Man in Tales of Suspense, they had the prerequisite fight. Iron Man was testing the underwater capability of his armor and stumbled across Kraven the Hunter and the Chameleon. He captured Kraven but the Chameleon escaped. Shortly after that, Captain America appeared at Stark's office in a torn costume. He said that he had been captured by the Chameleon who absorbed his memories and planned on attacking the Avengers. Iron Man rushed to the Avenger's mansion to confront the imposer. Of course, the guy in the torn costume was the Chameleon and Iron Man was fighting the real Captain America. Eventually Giant-Man and the Wasp broke up the fight.
Spider-Man ran into the Hulk during his first fight with the Green Goblin. The Goblin convinced a movie director to make a movie in the southwest featuring a fight between Spider-Man and the Goblin along with a trio known as the Enforcers. It was all a trap. Spider-Man and the villains went off to rehearse in a cave. The Enforcers blocked the entrance and attacked. They were quickly subdued but during the fight with the Goblin, the Hulk appeared. They had chosen his cave to fight in. Spider-Man tricked the Hulk into unblocking the cave and escaped, carrying the unconscious Enforcers with him. The Goblin escaped. The most notable thing about this issue was that it clearly established power levels. Spider-Man hit the Hulk as hard as he could and nearly broke his hand. The Hulk wasn't fazed.
The biggest fight/launch was Avengers #1. Thor's enemy, Loki, saw the Hulk and decided that he had a chance of killing Thor. This was during the Hulk's smart phase. Loki use an illusion to lure the Hulk into wrecking a train. The Hulk's friend, Rick Jones, tried contacting the Fantastic Four with a ham radio but Loki changed the frequency of their message to one that Thor was listening to. As it happened, Iron Man and Giant-Man were also listening to the same message. They converged on the Hulk and fought with him until Loki was revealed. Then they decided to form the Avengers.
In Avengers #2, a shape-shifting alien came to earth an assumed the forms of different Avengers, causing them to fight each other again. At the end of the issue the Hulk quit the group. In a later issue joined forces with the Sub-Mariner to fight the remaining Avengers.
The X-Men fought the Fantastic Four. This issue was special to me. It was the first Fantastic Four comic I read and my third Marvel comic. This time the Mad Thinker and the Puppet Master joined forces. Under the Thinker's direction, the Puppet Master took control of Professor X using a radioactive clay doll. The Professor convinced the X-Men that his telepathy had uncovered a plot by the FF to take over the world. He sent the team to approach the FF then attack them. Under the Professor's direction, the X-Men captured Sue and brought her to an island the Thinker had already prepared. The X-Men were clearly outclassed but the Thinker's traps gave them an edge. After the FF was subdued the pair revealed themselves and the Puppet Master used the Professor's telepathy to render the X-Men unconscious. The Beast resisted long enough to crush the Puppet Master's doll. The FF was released and the Thinker and company had to flee.
Thor and the Hulk fought in an issue of Thor. This was a straight "who's strongest" knock-down, drag-out fight. It was actually an extended flashback from a two-panel fight the two had in an early issue of the Avengers (see above). The two got separated from the main fight and Thor wanted to prove who was the better warrior. He asked Odin to be able to fight without his hammer. Odin gave him five minutes. The battle was still going on when the time ran out and Thor recovered his hammer. The implication was that the hammer gave him an edge but the flashback trailed off there. The Hulk and Sub-Mariner vanished before the fight could conclude.
1968 started what I think of as Marvel 2.0. Reed and Sue got married. The Avengers got a new line-up. Tales of Suspense retired the Human Torch and the Thing for Nick Fury, agent of Shield and Tales to Astonish swapped out Giant-Man for the Sub-Mariner. As the lead-in for this, the Sub-Mariner fought Daredevil.
When the character was revived, the Sub-Mariner found that his people had abandoned the city of Atlantis. In FF Annual #1 he found them but they abandoned the new Atlantis because of Manor's divided loyalties. He found them again and assumed his role as ruler. He decided to settle his dispute with the surface world in court and ended up with Matt Murdock (Daredevil) as his attorney. The court ruled that his suit was out of their jurisdiction. At the same time, Namor was informed that there had been a coup. Warlord Krang had seized control of Atlantis. Namor tried to escape. Daredevil fought him and lost but out of respect for a valiant foe, Namor departed peacefully.
When it was decided to give the Silver Surfer his own book, Stan felt that he was too powerful. In an issue of the FF, the Surfer decided to unite humanity by giving them a common enemy. He attacked the Earth. A special missile was sent after him. It was supposed to drain his power then use it to explode, killing him. The FF saved the Surfer from the missile and he called off his attack but was left weakened.
One last fight deserves mention. The Sub-Mariner and the Hulk shared Tales to Astonish for some time. Before they got their own comics, they had one last fight. This one actually had a winner. The Sub-Mariner beat the Hulk by creating a whirlpool around him.
Marvel heroes would continue to fight but this marked the end of promotion through cross-over fight.
Marvel started small, adding one character or group at a time. Stan Lee was a genius at cross-promotion. As new heroes were created, they met well established heroes. This exposed the new characters to a wider audience with the idea of increasing sales. It also laid the foundation of the Marvel Universe. DC had a wide variety of characters. Most of them never crossed paths outside of the JLA. At Marvel, most of them lived in New York City so they often made cameo appearances. Spider-Man might be knocked off a lamp post by Thor's jet stream.
My focus here is the more formal appearance. Some of them were straight guest shots. Ant Man was called in when the FF faced a microscopic enemy. More often they were fights.
The Hulk's first appearance with the FF was an obvious cross-over. It happened near the end of the run of the Hulk's original comic. By that point, Bruce Banner would run to his hidden lab and expose himself to gamma rays in order to turn into an intelligent Hulk. In this case, the FF was called in to investigate acts of sabotage. General Thunderbolt Ross was sure that the Hulk was responsible but Banner and Rick Jones insisted that someone else was. After a rocket sled was wrecked (while the Thing was riding it), the FF found a series of caves and tunnels. In one of these they ran into the Hulk and tried to capture him. The battle was pretty evenly matched until a hidden ray knocked out the Hulk. The FF tracked it to Banner's assistant who was a communist saboteur (he even carried a membership card in a subversive organization in his wallet).
A few months later the Hulk was added as a backup to Giant-Man in Tales to Astonish (several early Marvel comics started out as science fiction/horror comics and it was easier to keep the original name and add the hero). The issue before the Hulk was added, he fought with Giant-Man. Here's a bit of trivia for you - this issue was the first time the Hulk said, "The madder I get the stronger I get."
Not a lot happened in this issue. It mainly introduced the cast and set up that the Hulk was now changing when he got angry. Giant-Man and the Wasp went looking for the Hulk to see if he wanted back into the Avengers. Banner assumed that they were hunting him, got angry, and changed into the Hulk. An old Giant-Man villain, the Human Top (now known as Whirlwind) orchestrated the fight and arraigned for the military to fire a nuclear shell at the Hulk, not knowing that Giant-Man was also present. The Hulk caught the shell, threw it in a different direction, and vanished.
When Captain America was added as a backup feature with Iron Man in Tales of Suspense, they had the prerequisite fight. Iron Man was testing the underwater capability of his armor and stumbled across Kraven the Hunter and the Chameleon. He captured Kraven but the Chameleon escaped. Shortly after that, Captain America appeared at Stark's office in a torn costume. He said that he had been captured by the Chameleon who absorbed his memories and planned on attacking the Avengers. Iron Man rushed to the Avenger's mansion to confront the imposer. Of course, the guy in the torn costume was the Chameleon and Iron Man was fighting the real Captain America. Eventually Giant-Man and the Wasp broke up the fight.
Spider-Man ran into the Hulk during his first fight with the Green Goblin. The Goblin convinced a movie director to make a movie in the southwest featuring a fight between Spider-Man and the Goblin along with a trio known as the Enforcers. It was all a trap. Spider-Man and the villains went off to rehearse in a cave. The Enforcers blocked the entrance and attacked. They were quickly subdued but during the fight with the Goblin, the Hulk appeared. They had chosen his cave to fight in. Spider-Man tricked the Hulk into unblocking the cave and escaped, carrying the unconscious Enforcers with him. The Goblin escaped. The most notable thing about this issue was that it clearly established power levels. Spider-Man hit the Hulk as hard as he could and nearly broke his hand. The Hulk wasn't fazed.
The biggest fight/launch was Avengers #1. Thor's enemy, Loki, saw the Hulk and decided that he had a chance of killing Thor. This was during the Hulk's smart phase. Loki use an illusion to lure the Hulk into wrecking a train. The Hulk's friend, Rick Jones, tried contacting the Fantastic Four with a ham radio but Loki changed the frequency of their message to one that Thor was listening to. As it happened, Iron Man and Giant-Man were also listening to the same message. They converged on the Hulk and fought with him until Loki was revealed. Then they decided to form the Avengers.
In Avengers #2, a shape-shifting alien came to earth an assumed the forms of different Avengers, causing them to fight each other again. At the end of the issue the Hulk quit the group. In a later issue joined forces with the Sub-Mariner to fight the remaining Avengers.
The X-Men fought the Fantastic Four. This issue was special to me. It was the first Fantastic Four comic I read and my third Marvel comic. This time the Mad Thinker and the Puppet Master joined forces. Under the Thinker's direction, the Puppet Master took control of Professor X using a radioactive clay doll. The Professor convinced the X-Men that his telepathy had uncovered a plot by the FF to take over the world. He sent the team to approach the FF then attack them. Under the Professor's direction, the X-Men captured Sue and brought her to an island the Thinker had already prepared. The X-Men were clearly outclassed but the Thinker's traps gave them an edge. After the FF was subdued the pair revealed themselves and the Puppet Master used the Professor's telepathy to render the X-Men unconscious. The Beast resisted long enough to crush the Puppet Master's doll. The FF was released and the Thinker and company had to flee.
Thor and the Hulk fought in an issue of Thor. This was a straight "who's strongest" knock-down, drag-out fight. It was actually an extended flashback from a two-panel fight the two had in an early issue of the Avengers (see above). The two got separated from the main fight and Thor wanted to prove who was the better warrior. He asked Odin to be able to fight without his hammer. Odin gave him five minutes. The battle was still going on when the time ran out and Thor recovered his hammer. The implication was that the hammer gave him an edge but the flashback trailed off there. The Hulk and Sub-Mariner vanished before the fight could conclude.
1968 started what I think of as Marvel 2.0. Reed and Sue got married. The Avengers got a new line-up. Tales of Suspense retired the Human Torch and the Thing for Nick Fury, agent of Shield and Tales to Astonish swapped out Giant-Man for the Sub-Mariner. As the lead-in for this, the Sub-Mariner fought Daredevil.
When the character was revived, the Sub-Mariner found that his people had abandoned the city of Atlantis. In FF Annual #1 he found them but they abandoned the new Atlantis because of Manor's divided loyalties. He found them again and assumed his role as ruler. He decided to settle his dispute with the surface world in court and ended up with Matt Murdock (Daredevil) as his attorney. The court ruled that his suit was out of their jurisdiction. At the same time, Namor was informed that there had been a coup. Warlord Krang had seized control of Atlantis. Namor tried to escape. Daredevil fought him and lost but out of respect for a valiant foe, Namor departed peacefully.
When it was decided to give the Silver Surfer his own book, Stan felt that he was too powerful. In an issue of the FF, the Surfer decided to unite humanity by giving them a common enemy. He attacked the Earth. A special missile was sent after him. It was supposed to drain his power then use it to explode, killing him. The FF saved the Surfer from the missile and he called off his attack but was left weakened.
One last fight deserves mention. The Sub-Mariner and the Hulk shared Tales to Astonish for some time. Before they got their own comics, they had one last fight. This one actually had a winner. The Sub-Mariner beat the Hulk by creating a whirlpool around him.
Marvel heroes would continue to fight but this marked the end of promotion through cross-over fight.
Wednesday, February 03, 2010
Digital Comics
I recently subscribed to Marvels' digital comic books. I also have a couple of DVDs of collections - one for the X-Men and one for the Fantastic Four and the Silver Surfer. I'd like to compare them with each other and with the paper editions.
Comic books were designed to be on paper. There are no two ways about this. This is also the only form that they have any collectible value. That said, there are disadvantages to having them on paper. They take up a lot of room and they require careful storage to keep up their value. Finding an individual issue can be difficult unless you spend a lot of time filing them and you can't carry them everywhere without risking damage.
The biggest disadvantage of comics on paper is that it is expensive and difficult to read issues that you missed.
The DVD collections have scanned comic books in PDF format. Each book is converted to a scanned image, exactly as it appeared including ads and letters pages. This is a fairly pure experience. You see everything as it was. You use your PDF viewer to zoom in and out, up and down.
Marvel's digital comics take a different approach. They are stored in Flash format with navigation buttons at the bottom for going forward and backwards. The Flash animation has been preset to zoom in or out to make the comic easily readable. The images have been cleaned up. There is no yellowing, no folds, no staples, and nothing but the story itself. You do not buy the digital comics. You buy access, either by the month or by the year. As long as your subscription is valid you can read everything in their library which is being added to daily.
I've been using the PDF images for my FF blogging. Last night I read the FF's first meeting with the Hulk and the first four issues of Thor's return from Marvel's Digital Comics. My impression is that the PDF images work fine for older comics but will not be as convenient for newer ones. The old comics stuck pretty much to a six panel per page format. This was later changed to four panels with some oversized panels. On my PCs, the screen is smaller than the original comic so I zoom it to something like the original size then move the page up and down to read. Newer comics mix panel size constantly. One page might be divided with one panel taking up most of the page and a couple of smaller panels inserted on top of it. This does not lend itself as well to the PDFs.
The Digital Comics will zoom in and out, up and down, trying to follow the story while letting you see the layout of the page. This works fairly well although some word balloons are a bit hard to read when it is showing the full page. You can also override this, scolling the page up or down and changing the zoom. Ironically, the Digital Comics have problems with the older issues. The pages might have been divided into six panels per page but the viewer does not always synchronize properly. There were several times that a word balloon was cut off at the top and I had to scroll up. This is only a minor complaint.
Conclusions: All three ways work. If you are more interested in the story than the physical comic then the digital versions are a good choice. If you want to see the most recent issues then you still have to buy your comics on paper. If you want a wide selection that is still incomplete then the Digital Comics are a good choice. If you want a deep selection - everything for a single character then the DVD collections are good. The DVDs have the additional benefit of portability. You can take them anywhere that you take your laptop. The Digital Comics require a network connection.
Note: Don't even think about trying this on an iPad. It doesn't support Flash or external, optical disks.
Comic books were designed to be on paper. There are no two ways about this. This is also the only form that they have any collectible value. That said, there are disadvantages to having them on paper. They take up a lot of room and they require careful storage to keep up their value. Finding an individual issue can be difficult unless you spend a lot of time filing them and you can't carry them everywhere without risking damage.
The biggest disadvantage of comics on paper is that it is expensive and difficult to read issues that you missed.
The DVD collections have scanned comic books in PDF format. Each book is converted to a scanned image, exactly as it appeared including ads and letters pages. This is a fairly pure experience. You see everything as it was. You use your PDF viewer to zoom in and out, up and down.
Marvel's digital comics take a different approach. They are stored in Flash format with navigation buttons at the bottom for going forward and backwards. The Flash animation has been preset to zoom in or out to make the comic easily readable. The images have been cleaned up. There is no yellowing, no folds, no staples, and nothing but the story itself. You do not buy the digital comics. You buy access, either by the month or by the year. As long as your subscription is valid you can read everything in their library which is being added to daily.
I've been using the PDF images for my FF blogging. Last night I read the FF's first meeting with the Hulk and the first four issues of Thor's return from Marvel's Digital Comics. My impression is that the PDF images work fine for older comics but will not be as convenient for newer ones. The old comics stuck pretty much to a six panel per page format. This was later changed to four panels with some oversized panels. On my PCs, the screen is smaller than the original comic so I zoom it to something like the original size then move the page up and down to read. Newer comics mix panel size constantly. One page might be divided with one panel taking up most of the page and a couple of smaller panels inserted on top of it. This does not lend itself as well to the PDFs.
The Digital Comics will zoom in and out, up and down, trying to follow the story while letting you see the layout of the page. This works fairly well although some word balloons are a bit hard to read when it is showing the full page. You can also override this, scolling the page up or down and changing the zoom. Ironically, the Digital Comics have problems with the older issues. The pages might have been divided into six panels per page but the viewer does not always synchronize properly. There were several times that a word balloon was cut off at the top and I had to scroll up. This is only a minor complaint.
Conclusions: All three ways work. If you are more interested in the story than the physical comic then the digital versions are a good choice. If you want to see the most recent issues then you still have to buy your comics on paper. If you want a wide selection that is still incomplete then the Digital Comics are a good choice. If you want a deep selection - everything for a single character then the DVD collections are good. The DVDs have the additional benefit of portability. You can take them anywhere that you take your laptop. The Digital Comics require a network connection.
Note: Don't even think about trying this on an iPad. It doesn't support Flash or external, optical disks.
Tuesday, February 02, 2010
FF Blogging - FF Annual #1
It's been a while since I blogged about old issues of the Fantastic Four.
I started reading the Fantastic Four with FF Annual #2. It was years before I saw the first annual and I think that this was the first time I reread it.
Growing up in the 1960s, Marvel's annuals were a big event. DC put out super-sized collections of reprints but Marvel was too new for that. Their annuals featured a new, extended-length story, a reprint, and some extra material. At a time when DC shoehorned two stories into a regular-sized comic, the extended story was unprecedented. Stan Lee fit extra-large subject matter into the story, in this case, the Prince Namor, Sub Mariner.
The Sub Mariner was the first Golden Age hero that Stan Lee and Jack Kirby revived. The Human Torch found him as a wondering, amnesiac, derelict in FF #3. After giving him a shave and dropping him in the ocean, namor regained his memory and went to rejoin his people. He found their city deserted, apparently due to nuclear testing. He declared war on the human race, starting with New York City and the FF. He also developed a crush on Sue Storm.
At the beginning of the annual, Namor found his people again and took him place as their ruler. Lady Dorma and Warlord Krang were introduced and would go onto become long-time supporting characters in the Sub Mariner's own comic.
The FF combined a vacation with an investigation into some strange sightings at sea. This turned out to be a trap. The Sub Mariner captured them then sent them to the United Nations to deliver his declaration of war. During the UN session, a scientist explained the evolution of Namor's people and the circumstances of his birth. The scientist turned out to the the Sub Mariner in disguise. When the UN rejected his demands, he launched his attack.
New York quickly fell to the Atlantean invaders. The FF captured a few soldiers and Reed figured out how to disrupt the helmets that let them breath out of water. His army fled but the Sub Mariner invaded the FF's headquarters and captured Sue Storm.
The other three followed but were attacked by sea creatures commanded by Namor. They were at a disadvantage and about to fall when a jealous Lady Dorma broke the window of the ship holding Sue. Sue nearly drowned and Namor commandeered the command craft to take her to a human hospital.
When he returned, Namor found that he people had deserted him again because of his divided loyalties.
That's a lot of story! These days it would have been spread over multiple issues and later gathered into a graphic novel.
As a backup, the annual had a reprint story and some pinups.
I started reading the Fantastic Four with FF Annual #2. It was years before I saw the first annual and I think that this was the first time I reread it.
Growing up in the 1960s, Marvel's annuals were a big event. DC put out super-sized collections of reprints but Marvel was too new for that. Their annuals featured a new, extended-length story, a reprint, and some extra material. At a time when DC shoehorned two stories into a regular-sized comic, the extended story was unprecedented. Stan Lee fit extra-large subject matter into the story, in this case, the Prince Namor, Sub Mariner.
The Sub Mariner was the first Golden Age hero that Stan Lee and Jack Kirby revived. The Human Torch found him as a wondering, amnesiac, derelict in FF #3. After giving him a shave and dropping him in the ocean, namor regained his memory and went to rejoin his people. He found their city deserted, apparently due to nuclear testing. He declared war on the human race, starting with New York City and the FF. He also developed a crush on Sue Storm.
At the beginning of the annual, Namor found his people again and took him place as their ruler. Lady Dorma and Warlord Krang were introduced and would go onto become long-time supporting characters in the Sub Mariner's own comic.
The FF combined a vacation with an investigation into some strange sightings at sea. This turned out to be a trap. The Sub Mariner captured them then sent them to the United Nations to deliver his declaration of war. During the UN session, a scientist explained the evolution of Namor's people and the circumstances of his birth. The scientist turned out to the the Sub Mariner in disguise. When the UN rejected his demands, he launched his attack.
New York quickly fell to the Atlantean invaders. The FF captured a few soldiers and Reed figured out how to disrupt the helmets that let them breath out of water. His army fled but the Sub Mariner invaded the FF's headquarters and captured Sue Storm.
The other three followed but were attacked by sea creatures commanded by Namor. They were at a disadvantage and about to fall when a jealous Lady Dorma broke the window of the ship holding Sue. Sue nearly drowned and Namor commandeered the command craft to take her to a human hospital.
When he returned, Namor found that he people had deserted him again because of his divided loyalties.
That's a lot of story! These days it would have been spread over multiple issues and later gathered into a graphic novel.
As a backup, the annual had a reprint story and some pinups.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
iPad Second Impressions
The iPad got a surprising amount of bad press. This was quickly followed by hard-core Apple defenders rebutting the complaints. Wired lists 10 Things Missing From the iPad then dismisses them as nothing anyone would want, anyway. I'm going to take a closer look at Wired's list. I reordered the list and combined four items into one.
Wired has a point about OLED. It would have pushed the price point up too high. More on that later.
People don't really expect to do multiple things on their phone so multitasking wasn't a big deal. Even so, the ability to multitask is a selling point for Droid and Palm. The iPad is supposed to be more than a simple phone so why does it have this restriction? Wired assumes that anyone buying an iPad will be too busy watching movies to want email going in the background (which ties into the next point). Ok, if the iPad is going to be a personal movie device then you might not want email interrupting the movie but what about people who are using it to browse the web. I thought that most people multi-tasked these days.
The lack of a 16:9 proportion argues that the iPad is not primarily meant as a way of watching movies and TV. Wired points out that the logo and the home button are positioned for portrait, not landscape, which also indicates that video is more an afterthought than a goal. The lack of built-in HDMI says the same thing. It is possible that they positioned things the way they did so that the iPad would look like a big iPhone. Microsoft used 16:9 in the Zune HD and it looks fine in portrait and landscape. That makes the proportions really puzzling. It's even more puzzling if you assume that the iPad will mainly be used for web browsing. Most web pages look best in landscape. Did they design it around books? Or was my big iPhone theory correct?
This brings me to the real design factor in the iPad - cost. They wanted it to be cheap so they left a lot out. You can add USB, a keyboard, a camera, and possibly HDMI but you have to pay extra. These extra will add up quickly, too. A USB port and a docking station adds 20% to the base price. I'm betting that Jobs came up with a list of features that the iPad has to have to be considered functional and cut everything else out if it to save money. Some things are available as ad-ins. GPS was eliminated except on the higher-end version that can use cell-phone technology to approximate it. That may explain the 4:3 screen, also. It is probably cheaper than a 16:9. It certainly explains why the iPad is so light on memory. $500 only gets you 16 gig and the most you can get is 64 gig. That's not much for a device that is supposed to become your entertainment hub.
Sacrificing features for price is probably a good idea. A recent survey found that most people would not buy an $800 iPad. A $500 is much more attractive. Still, you really have to wonder how successful it will be as a media device? It's too big to be a dedicated MP3 player and it is pretty expensive as a single-person video player. The ability to download movies and TV shows and play them on your wide-screen TV without having to resort to a second computer or an expensive adapter seems like a missed selling point.
I haven't talked about games yet. The assumption is that this will be a great gaming platform and possibly that is its real intended use. I'm still a little skeptical about that, too. I know that the iPhone has been embraced as a gaming platform but I wonder just how much fun it will be using a 1 1/2 pound game controller. I predict a lot of repetitive stress injuries.
- Flash
- Verizon
- OLED
- Multitasking
- 16:9
- USB, HDMI, Keyboard, Camera
- GPS
Wired has a point about OLED. It would have pushed the price point up too high. More on that later.
People don't really expect to do multiple things on their phone so multitasking wasn't a big deal. Even so, the ability to multitask is a selling point for Droid and Palm. The iPad is supposed to be more than a simple phone so why does it have this restriction? Wired assumes that anyone buying an iPad will be too busy watching movies to want email going in the background (which ties into the next point). Ok, if the iPad is going to be a personal movie device then you might not want email interrupting the movie but what about people who are using it to browse the web. I thought that most people multi-tasked these days.
The lack of a 16:9 proportion argues that the iPad is not primarily meant as a way of watching movies and TV. Wired points out that the logo and the home button are positioned for portrait, not landscape, which also indicates that video is more an afterthought than a goal. The lack of built-in HDMI says the same thing. It is possible that they positioned things the way they did so that the iPad would look like a big iPhone. Microsoft used 16:9 in the Zune HD and it looks fine in portrait and landscape. That makes the proportions really puzzling. It's even more puzzling if you assume that the iPad will mainly be used for web browsing. Most web pages look best in landscape. Did they design it around books? Or was my big iPhone theory correct?
This brings me to the real design factor in the iPad - cost. They wanted it to be cheap so they left a lot out. You can add USB, a keyboard, a camera, and possibly HDMI but you have to pay extra. These extra will add up quickly, too. A USB port and a docking station adds 20% to the base price. I'm betting that Jobs came up with a list of features that the iPad has to have to be considered functional and cut everything else out if it to save money. Some things are available as ad-ins. GPS was eliminated except on the higher-end version that can use cell-phone technology to approximate it. That may explain the 4:3 screen, also. It is probably cheaper than a 16:9. It certainly explains why the iPad is so light on memory. $500 only gets you 16 gig and the most you can get is 64 gig. That's not much for a device that is supposed to become your entertainment hub.
Sacrificing features for price is probably a good idea. A recent survey found that most people would not buy an $800 iPad. A $500 is much more attractive. Still, you really have to wonder how successful it will be as a media device? It's too big to be a dedicated MP3 player and it is pretty expensive as a single-person video player. The ability to download movies and TV shows and play them on your wide-screen TV without having to resort to a second computer or an expensive adapter seems like a missed selling point.
I haven't talked about games yet. The assumption is that this will be a great gaming platform and possibly that is its real intended use. I'm still a little skeptical about that, too. I know that the iPhone has been embraced as a gaming platform but I wonder just how much fun it will be using a 1 1/2 pound game controller. I predict a lot of repetitive stress injuries.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
iPad Impressions
The Jesus Tablet has finally arrived and it's a big iPhone with a clunky name - the iPad. This is supposed to be the device that saves publishing by convincing us to stop accessing the Internet with our PCs for free and start buying the content for the iPad, instead. It isn't going to happen.
Gizmodo has a list of things that suck with the iPad. I'm going to concentrate on a few important ones.
First, its web browser is crippled. It doesn't run Flash. That means that Youtube needs a special app to work and pages with embedded Youtube videos will not work.
Like the iPhone, it will only do one thing at a time. You can browse or your can check email but don't try to do both.
There's no camera so you cannot do a video chat with anyone either.
People are expecting the iPad to take over ebooks the way that the iPod took over music. It will not. It is too big and too expensive.
I don't expect it to cut into the Netbook market much either. It is lighter but it is missing a lot of functionality and it costs more. I'm using a laptop on my lap right now. The form factor is pretty good. I can type without it falling off of my lap and I don't have to hold it in place to see the screen.
Apple had great success with music and phones but they entered these markets with revolutionary products. Prior to the iPod, MP3 players had very limited memory and hard-to-use controls. Apple was the first to offer a music player that could hold an entire collection instead of a couple of CDs.
The iPhone was the first phone with a big touch screen. Every phone before it had a keypad that took up a lot of space.
The iPad does not offer new functionality. There are other tablets on the market that do more. For the starting price of an iPad, you can get a good notebook with ten times the storage and a full version of Windows 7. For less than the price of an iPad you can get a netbook with a fairly large hard drive, similar screen size and good battery life.
I don't doubt that Apple will sell a lot of iPads - at least a million by the end of the year. But I don't think that it will dominate any markets the way that the iPod and iPhone have done.
Gizmodo has a list of things that suck with the iPad. I'm going to concentrate on a few important ones.
First, its web browser is crippled. It doesn't run Flash. That means that Youtube needs a special app to work and pages with embedded Youtube videos will not work.
Like the iPhone, it will only do one thing at a time. You can browse or your can check email but don't try to do both.
There's no camera so you cannot do a video chat with anyone either.
People are expecting the iPad to take over ebooks the way that the iPod took over music. It will not. It is too big and too expensive.
I don't expect it to cut into the Netbook market much either. It is lighter but it is missing a lot of functionality and it costs more. I'm using a laptop on my lap right now. The form factor is pretty good. I can type without it falling off of my lap and I don't have to hold it in place to see the screen.
Apple had great success with music and phones but they entered these markets with revolutionary products. Prior to the iPod, MP3 players had very limited memory and hard-to-use controls. Apple was the first to offer a music player that could hold an entire collection instead of a couple of CDs.
The iPhone was the first phone with a big touch screen. Every phone before it had a keypad that took up a lot of space.
The iPad does not offer new functionality. There are other tablets on the market that do more. For the starting price of an iPad, you can get a good notebook with ten times the storage and a full version of Windows 7. For less than the price of an iPad you can get a netbook with a fairly large hard drive, similar screen size and good battery life.
I don't doubt that Apple will sell a lot of iPads - at least a million by the end of the year. But I don't think that it will dominate any markets the way that the iPod and iPhone have done.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
The Human Target
I never cared for the Human Target back when it was a back-up strip for Superman. The adventures of a regular guy who would disguise himself as people in danger in order to dodge assassination attempts was a poor fit for Superman and backup strips were usually too short to tell a good story, anyway.
Fox has adapted the strip as an action-adventure show which I like a great deal.
The concept has been totally retooled. The main character (Mark Valley) is now a bodyguard, accompanying the target rather than replacing him. He goes by the name Christopher Chance but it is clear that this is not his real name. In the first couple of episodes, they have dropped hints that Chance has a shady background and may have a death-wish. He is assisted by Winston (Chi McBride playing nearly the same role that he had in Pushing Daisies) and Guerrero (Jackie Earle Haley).
The show is basically an old-fashioned action/adventure/mystery with some comedy thrown in. This used to be a TV staple but now is mainly represented on network TV by Chuck. The two episodes shown so far involved a run-away bullet train and a pilot-less airliner.
I hope that this show gets a decent chance. Fox premiered it on Sunday then moved it to Wednesday at 9 with a special time next week on Tuesday. It may switch places with American Idol and move to 8:00.
Fox has adapted the strip as an action-adventure show which I like a great deal.
The concept has been totally retooled. The main character (Mark Valley) is now a bodyguard, accompanying the target rather than replacing him. He goes by the name Christopher Chance but it is clear that this is not his real name. In the first couple of episodes, they have dropped hints that Chance has a shady background and may have a death-wish. He is assisted by Winston (Chi McBride playing nearly the same role that he had in Pushing Daisies) and Guerrero (Jackie Earle Haley).
The show is basically an old-fashioned action/adventure/mystery with some comedy thrown in. This used to be a TV staple but now is mainly represented on network TV by Chuck. The two episodes shown so far involved a run-away bullet train and a pilot-less airliner.
I hope that this show gets a decent chance. Fox premiered it on Sunday then moved it to Wednesday at 9 with a special time next week on Tuesday. It may switch places with American Idol and move to 8:00.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Avatar, Race and Heroes
Is Avatar racist? Many think so. The story has been described as one of a series of movies in which a white westerner abandons his culture and embraces a new one, thereby becoming its savior. The implication is that the alien culture cannot save itself, it has to have a white outsider to save it.
This general plotline has deep roots.
One of the oldest and most common stories is about a young man who leaves home, finds a teacher or mentor, and becomes a hero. This dates back at least a thousand years. George Lukas bragged about using it in the original Star Wars movie.
A refinement of this has the man encountering a totally new culture and embracing it. This is a staple of novels, especially science fiction. Edgar Rice Burroughs used it for most of his heroes. This is the basis of Dune and the historic Japanese novel, Shogun.
The reason this is so common is that it allows the writer to introduce the new culture to us as it is introduced to the hero. The introduction becomes part of the plot.
During the Viet Nam war, a new variation grew up. The idea of a wise primitive culture resisting a cruel, technological culture was introduced. This mirrored the perception of a third world country being able to defeat a superpower.
In this variation, technology and culture have blinded the hero and he must learn the wisdom that his people forgot. The villains are normally either military or industrial with military accompanying them. They are contemptuous of the local culture but, when the final fight comes, the natives easily best the outsiders using their superior insights. Writer Alan Dean Foster made a career out of this as have other writers from the late 1960s and 70s.
This is what I grew up reading and James Cameron was born the same year that I was. You can also see the influence of this in other movies. In Return of the Jedi, Imperial soldiers are overcome by feral teddy bears. In Phantom Menace, a bunch of semi-primitives challenge a droid army. It is no coincidence that Alan Dean Foster wrote the first Star Wars novel.
The message here is debatable. It can be seen as a need for a white savior to rescue cultures that cannot save themselves, no matter how superior they are. An alternate view is that even someone from a decadent western culture can become enlightened if he leaves his culture behind and embraces a new one.
If James Cameron had just left it at that, conservatives would have continued to jeer but that would have been the end of it. The problem is that Cameron couldn't leave it alone. He had to introduce a racial element. When he cast the movie he cast whites as the bad guys and people of other races as the natives. Avatar is not about the superiority of primitive, planet-loving cultures over modern technological civilization. It is about everyone else being superior to whites. But they still need a white guy to save them. If you are sensitive enough then there is something here to offend everyone. Whites - you are evil. Blacks, Indians, Asians - you need whites to save you from other whites.
With it's anti-colonialism and anti-Bush message, Avatar was considered a contender for the Best Picture Oscar but some ham-handed racial casting might turn off enough Academy voters to give the Best Picture to someone else (possibly someone who made a better picture).
This general plotline has deep roots.
One of the oldest and most common stories is about a young man who leaves home, finds a teacher or mentor, and becomes a hero. This dates back at least a thousand years. George Lukas bragged about using it in the original Star Wars movie.
A refinement of this has the man encountering a totally new culture and embracing it. This is a staple of novels, especially science fiction. Edgar Rice Burroughs used it for most of his heroes. This is the basis of Dune and the historic Japanese novel, Shogun.
The reason this is so common is that it allows the writer to introduce the new culture to us as it is introduced to the hero. The introduction becomes part of the plot.
During the Viet Nam war, a new variation grew up. The idea of a wise primitive culture resisting a cruel, technological culture was introduced. This mirrored the perception of a third world country being able to defeat a superpower.
In this variation, technology and culture have blinded the hero and he must learn the wisdom that his people forgot. The villains are normally either military or industrial with military accompanying them. They are contemptuous of the local culture but, when the final fight comes, the natives easily best the outsiders using their superior insights. Writer Alan Dean Foster made a career out of this as have other writers from the late 1960s and 70s.
This is what I grew up reading and James Cameron was born the same year that I was. You can also see the influence of this in other movies. In Return of the Jedi, Imperial soldiers are overcome by feral teddy bears. In Phantom Menace, a bunch of semi-primitives challenge a droid army. It is no coincidence that Alan Dean Foster wrote the first Star Wars novel.
The message here is debatable. It can be seen as a need for a white savior to rescue cultures that cannot save themselves, no matter how superior they are. An alternate view is that even someone from a decadent western culture can become enlightened if he leaves his culture behind and embraces a new one.
If James Cameron had just left it at that, conservatives would have continued to jeer but that would have been the end of it. The problem is that Cameron couldn't leave it alone. He had to introduce a racial element. When he cast the movie he cast whites as the bad guys and people of other races as the natives. Avatar is not about the superiority of primitive, planet-loving cultures over modern technological civilization. It is about everyone else being superior to whites. But they still need a white guy to save them. If you are sensitive enough then there is something here to offend everyone. Whites - you are evil. Blacks, Indians, Asians - you need whites to save you from other whites.
With it's anti-colonialism and anti-Bush message, Avatar was considered a contender for the Best Picture Oscar but some ham-handed racial casting might turn off enough Academy voters to give the Best Picture to someone else (possibly someone who made a better picture).
Monday, January 11, 2010
Doctor Parnassus
Most people know the Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus as Heath Ledger's last film. Forget that. Yes, Ledger is there in an important role but he isn't what makes the movie stand out. It's real claim to fame is that it is Terry Gilliam's return to the type of film-making he did in the 1980s. It is the first movie that he wrote and directed since The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988!) and his personal touch shows. Like a Tim Burton movie, there are a number of "Gilliam" images scattered throughout.
The movie is about a series of wagers between Doctor Parnassus, a former Buddhist monk, and Mr. Nick, the devil. Parnassus has a traveling show in which people go through a mirror and enter a world created by a combination of Parnassus's imagination and their own. While there, they are presented with a choice between salvation and perdition. Parnassus and Nick each try to influence the person's choice.
Over the centuries, Parnassus (Christopher Plummer) and Nick (Tom Waits) have made wagers with various stakes. To confuse things, Nick doesn't always want to win. Sometimes he has his sights on a different prize and Parnassus is a means to an end. The result of one of these wagers is that Nick gets to claim Parnassus's daughter, Valentina, at her 16th birthday. As the days are counting down, a new person enters the show - a man they found hanging beneath a bridge. It turned out that he wasn't dead. He had swallowed a tube which kept his windpipe from being crushed. The man's name is Tony, played by Ledger along with Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell. He seems to offer salvation but he has his own dark secrets.
While the acting is good, the real star of the show are the visuals. Parnassus's traveling wagon unfolds into a fantastic stage with clockwork figures moving back and forth. Other times it has an seemingly unlimited number of doors and hiding places. The Imaginarium itself is ever-changing. Many of the visuals are reminiscent of Baron Muchausen. There is also a dance number by policemen in drag that reminds you that Gilliam started out in Monty Python.
If you liked Baron Munchausen, Brazil and Time Bandits then you will like Parnassus. If they left you confused then so will Parnassus.
The movie is about a series of wagers between Doctor Parnassus, a former Buddhist monk, and Mr. Nick, the devil. Parnassus has a traveling show in which people go through a mirror and enter a world created by a combination of Parnassus's imagination and their own. While there, they are presented with a choice between salvation and perdition. Parnassus and Nick each try to influence the person's choice.
Over the centuries, Parnassus (Christopher Plummer) and Nick (Tom Waits) have made wagers with various stakes. To confuse things, Nick doesn't always want to win. Sometimes he has his sights on a different prize and Parnassus is a means to an end. The result of one of these wagers is that Nick gets to claim Parnassus's daughter, Valentina, at her 16th birthday. As the days are counting down, a new person enters the show - a man they found hanging beneath a bridge. It turned out that he wasn't dead. He had swallowed a tube which kept his windpipe from being crushed. The man's name is Tony, played by Ledger along with Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell. He seems to offer salvation but he has his own dark secrets.
While the acting is good, the real star of the show are the visuals. Parnassus's traveling wagon unfolds into a fantastic stage with clockwork figures moving back and forth. Other times it has an seemingly unlimited number of doors and hiding places. The Imaginarium itself is ever-changing. Many of the visuals are reminiscent of Baron Muchausen. There is also a dance number by policemen in drag that reminds you that Gilliam started out in Monty Python.
If you liked Baron Munchausen, Brazil and Time Bandits then you will like Parnassus. If they left you confused then so will Parnassus.
Thursday, December 24, 2009
How the Grinch Stole Christmas
We were watching the Grinch (the classic Chuck Jones cartoon, not the overblown Jim Carey movie) last night and marveling at how well it has held up. The show was made in 1966 and all of the principles have died (at ripe old ages) but the show still seems fresh.
Part of this is the source material. This was the only Seuss book that is really aimed at the entire family instead of very young children. It is similar to Dickens's A Christmas Carol with a lonely character having a life-changing experience revolving around Christmas.
Part of it is the animation. This is Chuck Jones at the top of his form. You don't have to see the credits to know that he directed it but it is not as stylized as some of his work. It is also the best animated Christmas special that I can remember from the 1960s through the 1990s. The Charlie Brown Christmas special was done on a very limited budget and even that was nearly twice what CBS paid to show it. It didn't make a profit until its second showing (which was once per year back then). The Rankin Bass programs like Frosty the Snowman were poorly done and got progressively worse into the 1970s. The Grinch is theatrical-quality animation.
Then there is the voice talent. I'm sure that Boris Karloff would be pleased to know that his best know work turned out to be a classic children's tale instead of horror roles. Then there is Thurl Ravenscroft who sang "You're a Mean One Mr. Grinch" and June Foray who did Cindy Lou Who. While best remembered for voicing Tony the Tiger and Rocky the Flying Squirrel respectively, these voice actors were mainstays of animation for decades.
The splashy new Christmas special this year was Disney's Prep and Landing. While very well done, you wonder if how it will hold up in 40+ years.
Part of this is the source material. This was the only Seuss book that is really aimed at the entire family instead of very young children. It is similar to Dickens's A Christmas Carol with a lonely character having a life-changing experience revolving around Christmas.
Part of it is the animation. This is Chuck Jones at the top of his form. You don't have to see the credits to know that he directed it but it is not as stylized as some of his work. It is also the best animated Christmas special that I can remember from the 1960s through the 1990s. The Charlie Brown Christmas special was done on a very limited budget and even that was nearly twice what CBS paid to show it. It didn't make a profit until its second showing (which was once per year back then). The Rankin Bass programs like Frosty the Snowman were poorly done and got progressively worse into the 1970s. The Grinch is theatrical-quality animation.
Then there is the voice talent. I'm sure that Boris Karloff would be pleased to know that his best know work turned out to be a classic children's tale instead of horror roles. Then there is Thurl Ravenscroft who sang "You're a Mean One Mr. Grinch" and June Foray who did Cindy Lou Who. While best remembered for voicing Tony the Tiger and Rocky the Flying Squirrel respectively, these voice actors were mainstays of animation for decades.
The splashy new Christmas special this year was Disney's Prep and Landing. While very well done, you wonder if how it will hold up in 40+ years.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Christmas Story
I haven't seen anyone mention it but the events in Christmas Story take place 70 years ago this year (1939).
The movie was not a big hit when it came out but it has gained a huge following thanks to repeated showings on cable, especially USA's annual 24 hour marathon.
I think that the secret to the movie is that it is a realistic depiction of Christmas from a child's point of view. While I was born too late for radio dramas, classrooms had not changed appreciably between the 1930s and the 1960s. And who among us hasn't had fantasies about what we will do with a new toy? Or had a classmate dare another one into doing something dumb?
The kids act like real kids but the adults don't act like real people. They act the way that kids think they act.
The movie was not a big hit when it came out but it has gained a huge following thanks to repeated showings on cable, especially USA's annual 24 hour marathon.
I think that the secret to the movie is that it is a realistic depiction of Christmas from a child's point of view. While I was born too late for radio dramas, classrooms had not changed appreciably between the 1930s and the 1960s. And who among us hasn't had fantasies about what we will do with a new toy? Or had a classmate dare another one into doing something dumb?
The kids act like real kids but the adults don't act like real people. They act the way that kids think they act.
Monday, December 21, 2009
Zune HD Review
I got a Zune HD for my birthday. It is a fun device.
Previously I had been using a Sansa View and a Nokia n800 Internet Tablet for viewing media. The Zune falls somewhere in-between these. It has similar dimensions to the Sansa and can do a lot more than the Sansa but it isn't up to the Nokia. The Nokia has a larger screen and more applications. On the other hand, it is too large to carry easily and the battery life is too short.
The Zune is incredibly small and light and the battery life is rated similar to the View - up to 33 hours of music or 8+ hours of video.
Like other Zunes, the HD supports WiFi. It can use this for wireless syncing and it comes with a web browser. The browser is slow and automatically switches to mobile pages where available. It does not support Flash so you cannot watch Youtube on it. Besides Flash, I would also like to see an email application on the Zune. It does support a Zune-only messageboard. It also has an app that supports Twitter.
There are several apps available. The Zune Marketplace has some, both general and games. All are free but the games have ads that play when they start.
Microsoft has released a game developer kit and people have already used this to create some freeware. The best part about this is that it is not as tightly controlled as the iTunes store.
Microsoft has a special program for communicating with the Zune. This will automatically sync content or allow you to drag and drop. Personally, I prefer the directory model where I can move files directly into the Zune's directories.
As a media player, the Zune is easy to use. The touch screen makes navigation easy. I have a wide selection of videos I've saved from YouTube or ripped from DVDs. All of them played without any problems, even a couple that always caused my Sansa View to hang up for unknown reasons. The display is sharp and there is no sign of choppiness, even when playing a movie I had ripped for my netbook.
It is a long-standing rule of thumb that it takes Microsoft at least three releases before they get a product right. That puts the Zune right on schedule.
Update: I found a major limitation in the Zune's implementation of WiFi and the browser. Most hotspots redirect the first page to a form where you either log in or at least agree to their terms of service. The Zune will not connect with these. It just gives an error and tries connecting again. It does not connect with WiFi that requires a security key, either. The only place that it can connect is to a completely open WiFi. That makes it useless as a mobile browser since almost all hotspots have a redirected opening page. I hop that Microsoft issues a fix for this.
Previously I had been using a Sansa View and a Nokia n800 Internet Tablet for viewing media. The Zune falls somewhere in-between these. It has similar dimensions to the Sansa and can do a lot more than the Sansa but it isn't up to the Nokia. The Nokia has a larger screen and more applications. On the other hand, it is too large to carry easily and the battery life is too short.
The Zune is incredibly small and light and the battery life is rated similar to the View - up to 33 hours of music or 8+ hours of video.
Like other Zunes, the HD supports WiFi. It can use this for wireless syncing and it comes with a web browser. The browser is slow and automatically switches to mobile pages where available. It does not support Flash so you cannot watch Youtube on it. Besides Flash, I would also like to see an email application on the Zune. It does support a Zune-only messageboard. It also has an app that supports Twitter.
There are several apps available. The Zune Marketplace has some, both general and games. All are free but the games have ads that play when they start.
Microsoft has released a game developer kit and people have already used this to create some freeware. The best part about this is that it is not as tightly controlled as the iTunes store.
Microsoft has a special program for communicating with the Zune. This will automatically sync content or allow you to drag and drop. Personally, I prefer the directory model where I can move files directly into the Zune's directories.
As a media player, the Zune is easy to use. The touch screen makes navigation easy. I have a wide selection of videos I've saved from YouTube or ripped from DVDs. All of them played without any problems, even a couple that always caused my Sansa View to hang up for unknown reasons. The display is sharp and there is no sign of choppiness, even when playing a movie I had ripped for my netbook.
It is a long-standing rule of thumb that it takes Microsoft at least three releases before they get a product right. That puts the Zune right on schedule.
Update: I found a major limitation in the Zune's implementation of WiFi and the browser. Most hotspots redirect the first page to a form where you either log in or at least agree to their terms of service. The Zune will not connect with these. It just gives an error and tries connecting again. It does not connect with WiFi that requires a security key, either. The only place that it can connect is to a completely open WiFi. That makes it useless as a mobile browser since almost all hotspots have a redirected opening page. I hop that Microsoft issues a fix for this.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Platform wars
Things are getting interesting in technology. A lot of new players have entered the arena and there will be a lot of shake-out in the next couple of years. Lines are blurring between PCs, netbooks, phones, MP3 players, and digital book readers. All of these can now play music and most of them can browse the Internet.
The big loser is Microsoft. I'm not sure that they've noticed yet but they have become irrelevant to all of the interesting technologies. Yes, they have a new operating system out. You can run a crippled version on netbooks. That's about it. It doesn't do anything that the old versions of Windows didn't do and it doesnt' run on anything except PCs.
Microsoft did introduce a new touch-screen Zune which got good reviews. This may be their salvation if they can expand it into phones. It's long-term success is doubtful. Previous versions were easy to find at places like Walmart and Target. The new Zune HD is not. Walmart offers "ship to store" which means placing an order and coming back in a day or two. There is no sign of it at Target.
Regardless, touch-screen MP3 players are the little brothers to the new breed of touch phone. Microsoft has a version of Windows Mobile that runs on these but it is a third-tier player.
Several ebook readers came out this year. All of them have significant flaws. The biggest one is that you still pay twice as much for an ebook as for a paperback. On top of that, you don't really buy books. You buy the rights to read them on a specific platform or device. They only make sense if you carry a lot of hardbacks around with you. The real purpose of these devices is to tie you to one book-seller. I expect them to eventually vanish.
For the last few years Apple owned the touch phone market. That is over. There are a slew of competing phones on the market. I'm going out on a limb and predicting that Google android will be the eventual winner. The phone market right now looks a lot like the PC market did in the early 1980s and the lesson from that is that the operating system that runs on the most platforms wins. Google's Android is not tied to a specific phone company or manufacturer the way that all of the other phones are. They have also announced the Chrome operating system which is designed to run on netbooks. Nothing will actually run or be stored locally. Chrome will do nothing except run the Chrome browser and everything else will be a web service running somewhere else. This is a direct threat to Microsoft.
Microsoft practically gave away MSDOS in the 1980s in order to spread as far as possible. Google is giving away their operating system. Their goal it to get as many people onto their search engine as possible. With wide acceptance running across multiple platforms they could easily be the default operating system for everything smaller than a business workstation.
The big loser is Microsoft. I'm not sure that they've noticed yet but they have become irrelevant to all of the interesting technologies. Yes, they have a new operating system out. You can run a crippled version on netbooks. That's about it. It doesn't do anything that the old versions of Windows didn't do and it doesnt' run on anything except PCs.
Microsoft did introduce a new touch-screen Zune which got good reviews. This may be their salvation if they can expand it into phones. It's long-term success is doubtful. Previous versions were easy to find at places like Walmart and Target. The new Zune HD is not. Walmart offers "ship to store" which means placing an order and coming back in a day or two. There is no sign of it at Target.
Regardless, touch-screen MP3 players are the little brothers to the new breed of touch phone. Microsoft has a version of Windows Mobile that runs on these but it is a third-tier player.
Several ebook readers came out this year. All of them have significant flaws. The biggest one is that you still pay twice as much for an ebook as for a paperback. On top of that, you don't really buy books. You buy the rights to read them on a specific platform or device. They only make sense if you carry a lot of hardbacks around with you. The real purpose of these devices is to tie you to one book-seller. I expect them to eventually vanish.
For the last few years Apple owned the touch phone market. That is over. There are a slew of competing phones on the market. I'm going out on a limb and predicting that Google android will be the eventual winner. The phone market right now looks a lot like the PC market did in the early 1980s and the lesson from that is that the operating system that runs on the most platforms wins. Google's Android is not tied to a specific phone company or manufacturer the way that all of the other phones are. They have also announced the Chrome operating system which is designed to run on netbooks. Nothing will actually run or be stored locally. Chrome will do nothing except run the Chrome browser and everything else will be a web service running somewhere else. This is a direct threat to Microsoft.
Microsoft practically gave away MSDOS in the 1980s in order to spread as far as possible. Google is giving away their operating system. Their goal it to get as many people onto their search engine as possible. With wide acceptance running across multiple platforms they could easily be the default operating system for everything smaller than a business workstation.
Tuesday, December 01, 2009
Good by Mr. Monk
Something over eight years ago Tony Shalhoub came up with an idea for a TV detective. This one would be obsessive-compulsive name Adrian Monk - sort of an anti-Columbo. He would also notice and remember everything. The networks passed but USA picked up the show. The show was a hit, such a hit that NBC showed Monk reruns.
Monk had a fair amount of back-story. He was a cop who had married in college. When his wife was murdered, he had a breakdown and had to leave the force. When the show started he was trying to get his badge back and doing police consulting to make ends meet. He also had a full-time nurse who accompanied him everywhere and handed him hand wipes whenever he touched anything (or anyone).
The early shows featured crimes that only Monk could solve because he noticed and remembered everything.
Somewhere along the way the format changed, possibly when USA adopted their "characters welcome" promotion. Monk episodes were no longer about the crimes. The crimes were just a way of placing Monk in new and (usually) uncomfortable positions. Often the crimes were an afterthought. At the same time Monk seemed to pick up new phobias weekly. The writing became lazy.
When it was announced that Monk was in his final season, a few questions remained - would he solve his wife's murder? Would he get his badge back? Would he become involved with his assistant?
The series finale is a two-part episode. Prior to that they answered the question about the badge - yes he got it back but he decided that he preferred consulting and resigned again. This was very disappointing since it was something he had been working for the entire run of the series. Just a couple of episodes earlier he had been meeting with the review board.
As for his wife's murder, it was pretty obvious from the first part who had her killed and the episode ended with him about to receive the final clue. The big question is if he will survive since he was poisoned in part one.
Even if the way that the series is closed is unsatisfying, at least it came to an orderly close. Many series, Columbo to name one, just trail off.
Monk had a fair amount of back-story. He was a cop who had married in college. When his wife was murdered, he had a breakdown and had to leave the force. When the show started he was trying to get his badge back and doing police consulting to make ends meet. He also had a full-time nurse who accompanied him everywhere and handed him hand wipes whenever he touched anything (or anyone).
The early shows featured crimes that only Monk could solve because he noticed and remembered everything.
Somewhere along the way the format changed, possibly when USA adopted their "characters welcome" promotion. Monk episodes were no longer about the crimes. The crimes were just a way of placing Monk in new and (usually) uncomfortable positions. Often the crimes were an afterthought. At the same time Monk seemed to pick up new phobias weekly. The writing became lazy.
When it was announced that Monk was in his final season, a few questions remained - would he solve his wife's murder? Would he get his badge back? Would he become involved with his assistant?
The series finale is a two-part episode. Prior to that they answered the question about the badge - yes he got it back but he decided that he preferred consulting and resigned again. This was very disappointing since it was something he had been working for the entire run of the series. Just a couple of episodes earlier he had been meeting with the review board.
As for his wife's murder, it was pretty obvious from the first part who had her killed and the episode ended with him about to receive the final clue. The big question is if he will survive since he was poisoned in part one.
Even if the way that the series is closed is unsatisfying, at least it came to an orderly close. Many series, Columbo to name one, just trail off.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
In Defense of the Little Mermaid
Wired's Geekdad listed Top 10 bad lessons from good movies movies. Number two was:
At least he included the movie as a good movie. In fact, this was arguably the most important hand-animated movie of the last fifty years. After years of shoddy animated movies, Disney probed that it could still make one as good as any produced under Walt. It was the first of two decades of great Disney movies.
Regardless, it has been attacked since it came out. Feminists didn't like it because Ariel chased a prince and was eventually rescued by him. It didn't matter that she saved his life twice and he saved her twice. They didn't give the movie much credit for presenting the first Disney prince with a real personality or the first time that Disney had an actual courtship between one of their princesses and her prince.
But, that's not Geekdad's complaint. His complaint was that Ariel became human in order to be with Eric. Is this a valid complaint?
Keep in mind that staying a mermaid was a deal-breaker with their romance. They could only have a tenuous relationship on the boarder between land and sea - an environment that was dangerous to both. The choice was transform or give up someone you love.
This is not the same as having breast enhancements. The closest equivalent is leaving your native country to marry someone.
I'm sympathetic to this. My daughter moved to England to get married. A close friend moved to America from Canada to marry his girlfriend. I used to work with a German woman who married an American serviceman and moved here. She had to give up her language.
By Geekdad's reasoning, all of these choices were appalling.
Also, it was established early in the movie that Ariel was fascinated with the surface. You got the feeling that she may not have been ready to make a deal with the devil but she would gladly have traded her tail for legs, even before she met Eric.
It's OK to completely change your physical appearance and way of life for the person you love, even if he makes no sacrifices at all (from The Little Mermaid). This movie has the single most appalling ending of any Disney movie ever made, which is a shame because, apart from that, it's a great film. I just cannot comprehend how anyone could make a movie in the late 1980s with this message, which is not exactly subtle: Ariel gives up her home, her family, and BEING A MERMAID because she loves Eric so. And he gives up … nothing. Yeah, that marriage is off to a great start.
At least he included the movie as a good movie. In fact, this was arguably the most important hand-animated movie of the last fifty years. After years of shoddy animated movies, Disney probed that it could still make one as good as any produced under Walt. It was the first of two decades of great Disney movies.
Regardless, it has been attacked since it came out. Feminists didn't like it because Ariel chased a prince and was eventually rescued by him. It didn't matter that she saved his life twice and he saved her twice. They didn't give the movie much credit for presenting the first Disney prince with a real personality or the first time that Disney had an actual courtship between one of their princesses and her prince.
But, that's not Geekdad's complaint. His complaint was that Ariel became human in order to be with Eric. Is this a valid complaint?
Keep in mind that staying a mermaid was a deal-breaker with their romance. They could only have a tenuous relationship on the boarder between land and sea - an environment that was dangerous to both. The choice was transform or give up someone you love.
This is not the same as having breast enhancements. The closest equivalent is leaving your native country to marry someone.
I'm sympathetic to this. My daughter moved to England to get married. A close friend moved to America from Canada to marry his girlfriend. I used to work with a German woman who married an American serviceman and moved here. She had to give up her language.
By Geekdad's reasoning, all of these choices were appalling.
Also, it was established early in the movie that Ariel was fascinated with the surface. You got the feeling that she may not have been ready to make a deal with the devil but she would gladly have traded her tail for legs, even before she met Eric.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Why Are They Showing This Now? - the game
It used to be that studios simply advertised movies. Now they market them with other movies. When I watch a movie on TV I tend to wonder, "Why are they showing this movie now?" You can make it into a game. Here are some examples from the last couple of days:
The Matrix Trilogy - the Directors have a new movie coming out on Thanksgiving.
Demolition Man - Two possibilities - Sandra Bullock as a movie coming out (The Blind Side) and has one out on DVD (The Proposal).
Almost Famous (a movie about a 1970s rock band) - Pirate Radio just came out (a movie about rock in 1966).
The Matrix Trilogy - the Directors have a new movie coming out on Thanksgiving.
Demolition Man - Two possibilities - Sandra Bullock as a movie coming out (The Blind Side) and has one out on DVD (The Proposal).
Almost Famous (a movie about a 1970s rock band) - Pirate Radio just came out (a movie about rock in 1966).
Friday, November 13, 2009
The Original Prisoner
It came and went forty years ago on American TV as a Summer replacement series. I was syndicated in the 1970s on independent stations. It went on to have a huge, devoted cult following. I'm referring to The Prisoner staring Patrick McGhoohan.
The premise was simple. A secret agent angrily resigns. As he is packing his clothing he is gassed. He wakes up on in the Village on an island where he is told that no one has a name, just numbers. He is Number 6. The island is governed by Number 2 (who changed weekly). Everyone on the island was under constant supervision. Many of the people there were there against their will. Others were spies. There was no way to tell who was who.
That's about all that we ever learned. We were never sure if Number 6 was abducted by his own government who suspected him of defecting or by a foreign government that figured that whatever made him resign must be important. It is possible that the Village was run by multiple governments as a sort of retirement center for spies who knew too much to be left out in the wild.
Every episode was different. Sometimes the new Number 2 would try a new interrogation technique. Sometimes he simply played mind games with Number 6, making him think that he was escaping only to fail at the last minute. A few times Number 6 played mind games with Number 2, doing meaningless activities designed that looked like a plot with the idea of implicating Number 2.
Prior to making the Prisoner, McGoohan had played a secret agent (Danger Man in the UK, Secret Agent in the US with the song "Secret Agent Man" as the theme song). We never learned if he was playing the same agent or if this was a different character. In fact, about the most we ever learned about Number 6 was that he built his car himself and it was one of his few prized possessions.
The show finally ended with Number 2 and Number 6 locked in a bunker until one of them broke. Number 6 won and was told that he was the new Number 2. In a surrealistic episode, he brought down the Village and escaped to London where he had the option of returning to his old life (symbolized by his apartment) or leaving (symbolized by his car). He drove off. The last shot had the door of his apartment closing automatically - something that the door in the village did.
The show was the only tv show or movie that the Beatles licensed a song to (All You Need Is Love in the final episode). They were big fans.
The show had long-term impact on other media. The Fantastic Four did a couple of issues inspired by the show. The Simpsons did a great parody. AMC is showing an updated version this Sunday.
Side-note: Patrick McGoohan turned down the chance to replace Sean Connery as James Bond. It was a wise move. The Bond movies of the 1970s were progressively sillier and he would have been a poor fit.
The premise was simple. A secret agent angrily resigns. As he is packing his clothing he is gassed. He wakes up on in the Village on an island where he is told that no one has a name, just numbers. He is Number 6. The island is governed by Number 2 (who changed weekly). Everyone on the island was under constant supervision. Many of the people there were there against their will. Others were spies. There was no way to tell who was who.
That's about all that we ever learned. We were never sure if Number 6 was abducted by his own government who suspected him of defecting or by a foreign government that figured that whatever made him resign must be important. It is possible that the Village was run by multiple governments as a sort of retirement center for spies who knew too much to be left out in the wild.
Every episode was different. Sometimes the new Number 2 would try a new interrogation technique. Sometimes he simply played mind games with Number 6, making him think that he was escaping only to fail at the last minute. A few times Number 6 played mind games with Number 2, doing meaningless activities designed that looked like a plot with the idea of implicating Number 2.
Prior to making the Prisoner, McGoohan had played a secret agent (Danger Man in the UK, Secret Agent in the US with the song "Secret Agent Man" as the theme song). We never learned if he was playing the same agent or if this was a different character. In fact, about the most we ever learned about Number 6 was that he built his car himself and it was one of his few prized possessions.
The show finally ended with Number 2 and Number 6 locked in a bunker until one of them broke. Number 6 won and was told that he was the new Number 2. In a surrealistic episode, he brought down the Village and escaped to London where he had the option of returning to his old life (symbolized by his apartment) or leaving (symbolized by his car). He drove off. The last shot had the door of his apartment closing automatically - something that the door in the village did.
The show was the only tv show or movie that the Beatles licensed a song to (All You Need Is Love in the final episode). They were big fans.
The show had long-term impact on other media. The Fantastic Four did a couple of issues inspired by the show. The Simpsons did a great parody. AMC is showing an updated version this Sunday.
Side-note: Patrick McGoohan turned down the chance to replace Sean Connery as James Bond. It was a wise move. The Bond movies of the 1970s were progressively sillier and he would have been a poor fit.
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