Great review as always Mr. Lovhaug but Wolfgram stole the show, were did you find him. Snowflame was even more entertaining then the ninja style dancer, I hope he comes back. Also I think the trumps might have been a reference to the fact they were supposed to be the old guardians’ trump cards
The scary thing is the stereotypical things the villains are saying is similar to what a lot of right-wing extremist say now except they replace white people with whatever Americans for this country and the local ethnicity or nationality for others, it’s pretty old rhetoric even then. Also At the time few republicans were defending Oliver North at the time when he was selling weapons to the Iranians and using the money to support contra terrorist in Nicaragua. You do not know much political history do you.
Harbinger died trying to save Supergirl from Darkseid's Female Furies. Ok, maybe that does seem pointless, but at least she died trying to defend a friend. This comic... God this idea was stupid. I was literally smacking my forehead. The bits you had with "Snowflame" were awesome. My favorite is him peering over your shoulder. I don't know why, but I love bits like that.
You know, the writer's lack of knowledge of STI's or STD's reminds me of a radio commercial I heard today that said that women shouldn't use men's razors because they can cut you your leg and raise the chance that you will get airborne viruses like, (and these are their words, not mine) HIV. That is not how people get STI's. Diseases like HIV are either transferred via sexual intercourse or via infected objects like needles that have had contact with infected blood and those are usually disposed of. Both the writer and the people who made that commercial have obviously never had Health 101
Huh, so that's how the guy who played Vice for you looks. Snowflame feels no Cold! So generally it's not by saliva, but by the other body fluids? Guess that makes some sense, considering all the bacteria and whatnot that is in spit. But if their blood was mixed in with the saliva, it can be a source of infection. Likely a sore or shallow cut. Hell, if that guy's teeth were sharp enough to break skin so easily, odds are he regularly makes puncture holes in his gum line. Okay, that's it. I can understand the Egyptian thing as a running gag, but the Saint Dragon God of Osiris' dubbed name came from Roger Slifer, one 4Kids's employees who worked on the dub. This could have been a better opportunity to make a joke at that company. It Sounds like Harbinger had something of a wasted death. Don't even remember her that well from CoIE. Where did the rest of these characters end up after this series?
It seems more like the writers thought aides could be spread like rabies. Also did you make the connection to hemoglobin, the stuff that makes blood red, and Hemo-Goblin? A villian that infect people with aides, that makes the Asthma Monster look dignified.
Snowflame is my god! No wait, I thought that was Celestia...or is it Om? GAH! TOO MUCH CULTURE! Sadly, the same can't be said for this comic, who desperately needs a large dose of class. And brains. Is that "Great Continuity[, Batman]!" clip gonna be a new running gag? Y'know, I seriously wonder what Snowflame was on*gets smacked in the head mid-n* Uh...anyway, great review. I really hope Snowflame becomes a new character. Also, now I have to read the label on this painkiller bottle I lost in my hand, but I can't because I'm a hologram. PS: I could rock out to Imperial March over (on?) Egypt all day. PPS: I see no dain bramage here. Move a log n.
I believe the statement about the Green Lantern Corp having a HQ on a hill is in reference to the events in the GLC comic at the time. The Corp was disbanded (can't remember why) and 6 or so Lanterns (among them Jordon, Katma Tui, Kilowog, Ch'p, Arisia Rrab, and Salaak)based themselves on Earth and primarily had adventures there (because, you know, that makes sense). They had a mansion located on a hill overlooking Coast City. It seemed dumb at the time and since there is no reference to that era today only seems to re-inforce that notion.
I think we can forgive the writers for being ignorant of AIDS, since it was still a very new disease at the time and the public was mostly ignorant about it. I was born in 1981 (the year the AIDS epidemic began) I can remember my parents and grandparents getting worried about people at restaurants not wearing gloves because they might get AIDS on the food. This would have been some time around 1987 or 88, right around the time the book was written, and I think it reflects a general public misapprehension about AIDS.
Eventually we need an AT4W plot that has to do with the EVIL OF ANCIENT EGYPT! Who knows, maybe the plot would be a red hearing crushing Linkara to find out all his theories that Ancient Egypt is NOT the source of all evil. Either way it would be fun.
I can help but laugh at the fact that a comic that is obviously trying to pass at being liberal and foreword thinking got it's information about HIV and AIDS completely wrong.
On that note, the hemo-goblin dying off AIDS due to his high metabolism doesn't make a lick of sense. AIDS kills because the HIV virus targets the T-Cells and disables a persons immune system leaving them venerable to a variety of other common disease. If anything having a high metabolism would possibly allow his immune system to restore itself at an accelerated rate giving him some sort of resistance to the HIV virus. In the worst case scenario he was shown to be in good health and shouldn't be affected any fast that any other AIDS patient.
I remember when New Gaurdians came out. I was real interested because they had done such a great job setting the characters up in the Millennium crossover (which was my favorite crossover event). Then I read the comics, and couldn't believe what I was reading. I mean, wow! No wonder the title only last twelve measly issues, I never even read the last one I had given up by then. The worst thing they did was the unnecssary death in a later issue, but I wont spoil it for people who may want to read this. Nice review!
Wait, wait wait. Both the heroes and villains favor eugenics? So, ah, as the reader, I'm rooting for the New Guardians just because I'm told to, because their creepy breeding experiments certainly isn't any more morally defensible than racist breeding experiments.
Also, Hemo-Goblin? Carrion called, and he wants his outfit back.
But Linkara, I like Jeph Loeb. Ignoring Ultimatum, he has done good work in the past with Tim Sale(Long Halloween and the like), also Hush , and his run on Hulk.
"But Linkara, I like Jeph Loeb. Ignoring Ultimatum, he has done good work in the past with Tim Sale(Long Halloween and the like), also Hush , and his run on Hulk."
Here's the thing about Jeph Loeb: just because he's done SOME good work doesn't mean everything he does is great. The Supergirl arc in Superman/Batman was bleh and personally I don't really think his work with Time Sale is all that great. I do like Hush and the other arcs of Superman/Batman that he worked on, but people in my audience not familiar with comics would only remember him from Ultimates 3 and Ultimatum, thus that's the connection I made.
"Eventually we need an AT4W plot that has to do with the EVIL OF ANCIENT EGYPT! Who knows, maybe the plot would be a red hearing crushing Linkara to find out all his theories that Ancient Egypt is NOT the source of all evil. Either way it would be fun."
*laughs* evil of ancient egypt? Oh, there is a nice variety of things to pick. Depends on the cut-off-date of Linkaras comics of choice, I could even imagine some Stargate-comics or jokes. ^^
Oh, the thing with aids - well, the Comic was released in 1988, and I remember even a Golden Girls Episode, where Rose was supposed to be infected with HIV, which caused them to let Sophia cry hysterically, that she has drunken from a cup, which had Roses name on it.
So I would guess, they knew extremely little of the virus and just made stuff up. That is extremely dated today and I do not know, how far the research was on the virus, but when they had believed that things like salvia would transmit the virus...
I guess, you could blame them, if they would pull stuff like that, today, but not when they had no to little idea, what the virus was. The only thing, you could blame them for, was the actual use of a topic, which they had no idea of.
"SNOWFLAME IS WATCHING YOU REAAAAAD!!"is probably my favorite line in the episode.
That said, just in case you were confused by Floro's "gnomes" and "Salamanders", the're basically the elementals he talked about earlier, see this wikipedia page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elemental
And I assume that the floating ball in issue 2 is probably either a sylph or a gnome.
still, they didn't explain that very well,and if I didn't have prior knowledge, that would've probably flew over my head.
On a side not: Gnomes is the traditional name for Earth Elemental (and Salamander for Fire elementals). Why Floric man who was IIRC stuck in the Green, could contact them (since, again IIRC, Swamp Thing need to pass trail to gain powers of the other elements, and he was a Elemental) something that confuses me.
I think Pillow Girls is a reference to those large pillows with Anime characters on them. They're called Dakimakura, and are commonly used by Japanese youth as security objects. That, or used by otaku as love pillows.
No, no, Extrano getting HIV makes perfect sense. That's what gay people do: get HIV and refer to themselves as "auntie". Do you know nothing of homosexuality????
Anyway, great review. I'd heard about the awfulness that is New Guardians before, but boy did this surpass all expectations. And it was nice to see the Ninja-Style Dancer again, if only for five seconds.
I'm surprised you didn't acknowledge the fact that the guy who declined to join the New Guardians is a pre-excisting DC character (meaning decades old). You know GL's Sidekick from the silver age, the one with the racist nickname, Pieface (or his real name Tom Kalmaku).
You have to keep Snowflame on a leash when it comes to the Ninja Style Dancer...it's his first moment since the whole Entity crisis and the coke-snorting looney ruined it! Besides, "Canned Heat" is awesome...just look at how it improved one of the stupidest comedies of our time!
Yeah...who the heck came up with this New Guardians mess anyway? It really felt like an attempt to try and become more "mature" with certain issues, probably in the wake of Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns...and all we get are a bunch of stereotypes and weirdoes who just want to have sex...with a plant, a robot and a gay guy. I think this is another reason why the Guardians of the Universe shouldn't be trusted, but that's me. (then again at least the Floronic Man is still evil-looking, seeing his evil grin of his cracked me up due to him supposedly being "good") And...somehow after seeing Gloss and her bizarre slutty ways, I think maybe it's a good thing we have more serious, respectable Chinese heroes in DC these days.
BTW: hilarious Snowflame, even with his interruption of the Ninja Style Dancer. I knew he would show up again to make the return of the "sex-obsessed heroes" more entertaining.
1)"Trumps" is a tarot reference. Englehart is (or was) an occultist. 2)Sleipner is not slipher, and in any case Sleipner is a monster from Old Germanic myth, not Egyptian.
A cyborg, a plant man, and a gay man are all a part of a teams that involves getting the female members pregnant... Sounds more like a set up for a hentai than a DC comic.
According to Wikipedia(I don't know anything about the character), Jet can manipulate electromagnetic or just plain electric energies, and I think she subconsiously heated her body to cauterize(or electrocauterize, as the case would be) her wound to stop the bleeding.
Why didn't the wound show up during the battle? Well she appeard to either have her hand over it, or was in full "flame on" mode, which may have obscured her skin, thus making the wound invisible from a distance.
Finally, when the battle was over, perhaps the wound was no longer bleeding, perhaps the blood had dried around it, or it was a giant blister.
I am as baffled as ever by the "we have to procreate. Time for sex," aspect of this comic as I was when you did Issue #2 a couple of years ago. Test tube babies have been being born since the late 1970's, and that's in our world, where we don't have super advanced tech like the DCU does. Wasn't Damian Wayne gestated in a glass tube or something? If they can do that, there is absolutely no need for any of the New Guardians to have sex with each other or even get pregnant by artificial insemination unless they want to. (Even assuming I'm mistaken about Damian or that's relatively new for the DCU, they could have hired surrogates - they were buying crappy motels for 15 million dollars after all). The whole "we have to procreate, and therefore have lots of sex" thing is potentially very angsty and could work ... but only in a setting where we could reasonably expect such technology not to exist (post-apocalyptic, historical, etc.) Not in the modern DCU (or 1988 DCU, as was pointed out many times).
This might sound odd, but if I were a comic writer, I could probably do something with snowflame. I don't know what, just that I could do something with him.
"Also At the time few republicans were defending Oliver North at the time when he was selling weapons to the Iranians and using the money to support contra terrorist in Nicaragua. You do not know much political history do you."
Wait, that was real? I thought it was something made up on American Dad! I guess you learn something new everyday.
Haha, yes minions, we have completely succeeded in fooling Linkara into thinking that the ancient Egyptians are to blame for the insidious, diabolic, ingenious, malevolent, and down right disgustingly wondrous plot that we have wrought upon the face of this globe!
...No 42, why are you recording my memoirs on Twitter?
Super fun review:D I really liked Mr. WoIfgram's performance... How many energy drinks did you have to get in him for that? XD Although I wish his voice was a little closer to the gruff voice you used for SnowFlame in the NG #2 review. Speaking of which, the voice you do for ditzy female characters always gets a laugh out of me. If SnowFlame only took some coffee and your shoes, you should count yourself lucky, especially with all your magic items lying around..
So... I've only read the first 5 issues of New Guardians, and none of Millenium. I'm sorry in advance for the long post, but I'd like to get something crazy off my chest. The thing that's always baffled me about this series is why wasn't this written as a SPACE OPERA? When I first saw your New Guardians #2 episode, I actually thought it was at first, and that the Colombia trip was a detour. I don't know how I made that mistake, but seriously:
1. Instead of eugenics and changing humanity, the tone would be little more like a Noah's Ark of spreading human DNA in case of an Earth-destroying disaster. Or, in the case of perpetuating their "superior genes", it could be more like seeding (poor word choice, I know.)the universe with demi-gods, kind of like how the Greek pantheon was always philandering about. Its a little more benevolent and more importantly, less creepy. Well, slightly.
2. There might be actual races that are more compatible with Floro and Ram. Also, they could have technology so that the women of the team can spread their DNA without getting pregnant. Again, less creepy, and then there's no need to have actual child-rearing in the comic. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it makes the story simpler.
3. If these character are truely near gods, they need opponents that can rival their power. Cosmic monsters and alien races might be able to do that better than the Hemogoblin. In all the issues of NG that I've read it never feels like the group is ever in actual danger.
4. I appreciate that Mr. Englehart wanted to call things by their name; Cocaine instead of Fantasy Drug X and HIV instead of something made up that bore a resemblence to the disease. But its better to use allegories and metaphors if that's the only way to keep your story from getting dismembered by an editor.
5. And most importantly, it could still have had Snowflame! It would take more than a convoluted going to space backstory lay a scratch in his awesomeness!! I don't know, maybe he comes from an alternate earth where drugs are so ubiquitous, the only way to gain a new market is to sell them in space.
And seriously, Snowflame would have been a better choice for the team than that fat racist Kroef!! Maybe then the team might have accomplished their mission. SNOWFLAME IS COMICS' GREATEST WING-MAN!!!
#1 Snowflame was brilliant. Loved the inclusion, but above all the costume. It looks great. Loved the bit, and you used it just the right amount. I hope the neighbourhood wasn't too freaked out :p
#2 An odd one, but I'm saying it anyway: The green screen with Ninja Style Dancer was FANTASTIC. There was almost no bleed, the colour different from the yellowish-orange to black was perfect. The Snowflame portion was good, but the hair had some bleed due to reflection. Overall this was one of your best, and in fact one of the best I have seen from any Channel Awesome producer in a while.
I had just rewatched the New Guardians review (house sitting so I was bored :p), so it was nice to see this about a dya later. Great work as always
Shouldn't they just be off having sex or using insemination? Why are they even worrying about being a superhero team if they are just trying to pass on their genes. And if they are trying to just pass on their genes why aren't they trying to have sex with other people outside of their group, because giving how many of them there are if they just mated with each other I'm pretty sure that their superior genes would start to degrade due to some major inbreeding. This comic vexes me. Snowflame knows no pain!
"Does this mean you'll sell Snowflame as a slave in the eBegging auction?"
Okay, one - what?
Two - eBegging? For crying out loud, I'm not asking for donations - I'm getting rid of stuff I don't need and offering it to people who might want it and letting people know it's available.
Fun fact: last night, my brother and I made a surprisingly good drink by mixing Monster and Coke Zero. After watching this episode, I decided to call it the Snowflame. Because it's a Coke Monster.
"Here's the thing about Jeph Loeb: just because he's done SOME good work doesn't mean everything he does is great. The Supergirl arc in Superman/Batman was bleh and personally I don't really think his work with Time Sale is all that great. I do like Hush and the other arcs of Superman/Batman that he worked on, but people in my audience not familiar with comics would only remember him from Ultimates 3 and Ultimatum, thus that's the connection I made. "
I'm pretty suprised about that. I really love the way Supergirl was re-introduced. I thought it was a great way of brining Kara Zor-El back into the modern age, and I'm suprised it wasn't your cup of tea considering how effecitvly it used both Wonder Woman and Big Barda.
What did you think of the DCAU adaptation of that storyline Superman/Batman Apocalypse? It gave Supergirl a more active role... so I liked it more then the actual comic.
I deffinitly have some major issues with Loeb's writing... I've got three trades of his from Superman/Batman... and they're all flawed (even "The Supergirl from Krypton", though I think it's one of the best examples of his work, it has a direction and purpose).
He also failed to properly set a tone for the Supergirl character in the start of her own series, and I think because of that Supergirl's book suffered big time until Sterling Gates took over because every other writer couldn't make heads or tails of Loeb's "Is Supergirl secretly evil and out to kill Superman?" story.
Stories like Superman/Batman Absolute Power take the cake though, where he creates an alternate timeline just so he can have fun killing off characters.
About the "pillow girl" comment, it would not refer to Dakimakura (the anime characters on pillows for anime fans) as they did not start to appear until the mid 90's...this comic however is from the 80's. I have heard prostitutes referred to as pillow girls from movies from the 70's and 80's before so I assume that's what they are talking about.
Another...fun episode. Sometimes I'm glad I didn't read comics as a kid.
Is it just me or is that Kroef guy a bit like the bad guy from Lethal Weapon 2? They're just so similar; South African, grey suit, chubby, bald, kinda racist.
"Harbinger died trying to save Supergirl from Darkseid's Female Furies. Ok, maybe that does seem pointless, but at least she died trying to defend a friend."
This creates a contradiction:
in his "Top 15 Worst Things About Countdown" video, Linkara clearly said that, if superheroes have to die: "they better go down fighting".
Harbinger went down fighting, so Linkara should have liked her death and not consider it pointless. So, either he changed his mind since he made the Countdown videos, or he lied back then.
"So generally it's not by saliva, but by the other body fluids? Guess that makes some sense, considering all the bacteria and whatnot that is in spit. But if their blood was mixed in with the saliva, it can be a source of infection. Likely a sore or shallow cut. Hell, if that guy's teeth were sharp enough to break skin so easily, odds are he regularly makes puncture holes in his gum line."
By the way, both Jet AND Extraño got infected with H.I.V.
That's something Linkara got it wrong. So I guess saliva CAN be a source of H.I.V. infection, at least as far as this comic is concerned.
"A cyborg, a plant man, and a gay man are all a part of a teams that involves getting the female members pregnant... Sounds more like a set up for a hentai than a DC comic."
Yeah, but we need a catgirl and a 50 ft. tall woman to round up the team :)
"So what does the Mechakara hand coming back to life again in Nostalgia Chick's What Woman Want review mean?"
If anything, it means that Linkara's storylines FINALLY have consequences in the larger TGWTG universe.
And it was about time. I always found it stupid that Lord Vyce or the Entity would make the entire Earth dissapear yet the Nostalgia Critic or Spoony or Cinema Snob didn't seem to be affected by it in their own videos.
"Wasn't Damian Wayne gestated in a glass tube or something?"
Actually, in the original 80s comic that introduced Damian, he was the natural son of Batman and Talia Al Ghul. Since Talia lied about having a miscarriage, it stands to reason that she would also lie about Damian being a test tube baby.
A more accurate example is Superboy, who was created in a lab using Superman's DNA. But then again, this comic predates Superboy's existance, so maybe the technology just didn't exist at the time.
"Wait, why was the gay guy the only one to get HIV? That one raised an eyebrow from me."
Again: Jet also got A.I.D.S.
Linkara got that fact wrong.
"Jeph "Red Hulk" Loeb did Hush?
What the hell happened?!?!?"
Joe Quesada, THAT's what happened. No Marvel comic can be truly good (or at least, as good as it should be) as long as Quesada keeps running things. The man keeps killing superheroines and ruining relationships due to his own unhappy marriage, and he has no idea how to do a proper event comic.
Also, one last thing:
is it me, or without the modulation that he had for Lord Vyce's voice, Will Wolfgram sounds like Iron Liz?
I honestly spent the entire video convinced that it was Iron Liz playing Snowflame, and was shocked when I saw Wolfgram cedited instead of Iron Liz.
Sorry for the length, I hope it is worth your time. I have broken it up.
I liked Snowflame, the "watching you read" line was great. Although he didn't seem very snow flame esc to me, and such a character can very easy be annoiying, it was fun having him to mix things up a bit.
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I don't get the negative comment about eBegging, mainly because, well, you/Linkara aren't. I don't like it when people beg (be it for a charity or their own profit) in the show, or what they gloat about something, particulary girl friends, kids, acheivments or big ticket purchases. Hell, even needless multi parters annoiy me. Yet I never NEVER had that issue with AtfW. Oddly enough, I'm more likely to support you because you don't beat us round the head with it.
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On the topic of the comic itself, every time you mention the hemo-goblin, I am reminded of those funny talking cells from Bowser's Inside Story. "All your globin!"
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I also believe the idea of creating a comic to talk about sex, drugs and other 'taboo' subjects is a bit of a bad one. I will use games to explain why. Sex and drugs doesn't appear in games alot partly because American taboo's, but mostly because it doesn't really come up. It's only when it should happen naturally that it seems weird that it's not included. Like the censored drugs and fade-to-black 'sex' of Fallout 3. Saving the world from aliens and super villains every week doesn't link naturally to sex and drugs.
Plus, let's be honest, there is NOTHING that can be said about drugs that hasn't already been said to the point of cliche. Same with sex. Though there is some stories and issues with sexual fetishes or the issues surrounding prescription drugs and the side effects of taking them vs not taking them, as well as personality altering drugs, but those deal with the surrounding issues, not the sex or drugs themselves.
The "Latin American Wars" stuff may also be a reference, at least partially, to the School of the Americas (apparently since re-branded to "Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation"), which is responsible for giving top-notch US military training to all sorts of awesome raping, murdering monsters (and then setting them loose in various Latin American countries).
Certainly something worth criticizing, what with how completely FUBAR promoting crimes against humanity is, but I'm not sure if there could be anything much more out of place in any comic than that introductory text... what the hell was the writer thinking (even if it was only supposed to be a jab at Iran-Contra stuff)?
In the 80s, people knew next to nothing about AIDS and the media did little to inform people at the time. Mostly it fanned the flames of ignorance and stereotypes about the disease.
Ridiculing and making fun of gay people in the 80s was common place. Nobody thought twice about being rude or insulting to gays. As such, its' not surprising a stereotyped gay man appears in the comic. At the time it would have been considered, "edgy."
Reagan was embroiled in the Iran-Contra affair in '87/88, and should have been impeached for it.
All that aside, it does show how making a dated reference fails in comics. I'm surprised there weren't some Soviet communists in the book. :)
I'd love for you to do a series about what makes a good comic by looking at bad comics.
in his "Top 15 Worst Things About Countdown" video, Linkara clearly said that, if superheroes have to die: "they better go down fighting".
Harbinger went down fighting, so Linkara should have liked her death and not consider it pointless. So, either he changed his mind since he made the Countdown videos, or he lied back then."
It's not just "they have to go down fighting." Harbinger dies off-panel pointlessly. People above have argued that she died "while trying to save Supergirl," except that she failed miserably. Plus her death has absolutely no weight to the story. She's just killed off for no good reason. It could have been any random Amazon and it would have had the same effect.
"By the way, both Jet AND Extraño got infected with H.I.V.
That's something Linkara got it wrong. So I guess saliva CAN be a source of H.I.V. infection, at least as far as this comic is concerned."
*Shrugs* I haven't physically read ahead - I read on wikipedia and it only specified that Extrano got AIDS.
"If anything, it means that Linkara's storylines FINALLY have consequences in the larger TGWTG universe.
And it was about time. I always found it stupid that Lord Vyce or the Entity would make the entire Earth dissapear yet the Nostalgia Critic or Spoony or Cinema Snob didn't seem to be affected by it in their own videos."
Or that it means I don't expect EVERYBODY ELSE to drop what they're doing to follow MY show, especially since a lot of them, like me, rely on these videos as their primary source of income. It's why I lampshaded it in the stinger to the Electric Tale of Pikachu episode.
"Actually, in the original 80s comic that introduced Damian, he was the natural son of Batman and Talia Al Ghul. Since Talia lied about having a miscarriage, it stands to reason that she would also lie about Damian being a test tube baby."
Yes, except Morrison seemed to make it pretty clear that that's EXACTLY how he was born, since he said he never read the original story that people used as the reason for Damian's existence.
"Joe Quesada, THAT's what happened. No Marvel comic can be truly good (or at least, as good as it should be) as long as Quesada keeps running things. The man keeps killing superheroines and ruining relationships due to his own unhappy marriage, and he has no idea how to do a proper event comic."
Actually the prevailing theory is that Loeb's spiral of really, REALLY awful comics happened right after the tragic death of his son.
"is it me, or without the modulation that he had for Lord Vyce's voice, Will Wolfgram sounds like Iron Liz?
I honestly spent the entire video convinced that it was Iron Liz playing Snowflame, and was shocked when I saw Wolfgram cedited instead of Iron Liz."
Will only played the Lord Vyce suit; I'm the one who does the voice.
I don't get what's you'r problem with ancient Egypt
The original Hawkman, and Metamorpho got their powers from the Egyptian pantheon, and they are good guys And even Bastet used to be an ally to Wonder Woman at one point
All this talk of sex, drugs, homosexuals and AIDs in the wrong fashion and I think I'm more offended by the Hemogoblin eating that cat than all of that put together.
Also "Coffee is Cocaine in liquid form!" needs to be on a T-Shirt.
I don't think either Lewis nor his persona "Linkara" do have problems with ancient egypt pantheon - it was just a joke, based on Slifer, the Sky-Dragon (or in the japanese version: Osiris)... honestly, I think "Slifer, the Sky Dragon" sounds a little more WOW than just "Osiris", although Osiris is an ancient egypt God.
Linkara, you did Lord Vyces Voice? Do you do Pollo, too?
It's one thing to have a man dress up in spandex for entertainment. It's another entirely to have him go out in the public to do this, while it's snowing and performing acts to draw as much attention to himself as possible.
I'll admit he overshadowed parts of your reviee Linkara, but it was nice to see a return of a few older jokes like the doomsday pyramids.
You managed to work Snowflame into a review of a New Guardians issue that didn't actually feature Snowflame! Gotta give you props for that, you always manage to give us, the fans, what we want.
I hope you manage to work him into other reviews down the road; I think it'd be hilarious to see him interact with 90s kid
Since this comic was published in the 1980’s there is an excuse for the AID's mistake. I am not sure but when this was written there was a lack of knowledge about how AID's was transmitted leading to all sorts of rumours and theories about how it took place and the writer just used the most prevalent theory at the time.
And what is your problem with Ancient Egypt anyway? Great review by the way
I find it funny how a comic that seems to lean so favourably to the left of center is trying to support the concept of Eugenics within it. They didn't think this through did they?
Dude, between the terrible innuendos, the BNP/KKK villains, the ridicuous AIDs thing and having Snowflame present, I would like to personally congradulate you for neither corpsing or crying your way through this one.
Also, while the end credits where on, I opened my door to get a drink and found my mum dancing to the end tune. She says you have great taste. ^_^
"Also, while the end credits where on, I opened my door to get a drink and found my mum dancing to the end tune. She says you have great taste. ^_^"
Wish I could take credit for the idea. XD While I've heard this song before, never knew the name of it until I asked Todd in the Shadows for a suggestion for a dance song for the Ninja Style Dancer.
"I don't get what's you'r problem with ancient Egypt
The original Hawkman, and Metamorpho got their powers from the Egyptian pantheon, and they are good guys And even Bastet used to be an ally to Wonder Woman at one point"
Evil/bad things to come out from Ancient Egypt:
-pharaos such as Ramses enslaving Jews and forcing them to build pyramids and monuments
-Imhotep
-The Scorpion King (who turned evil right before turning into a scorpion mummy)
-Ananksunamun
-Black Adam (powered by the Egyptian gods)
-the evil god Apophis/Apep, the god of darkness, chaos, destruction and misery
-the god Kuk/Keku, the god of darkness, chaos and destruction
-Sekhmet, goddess of destruction, pestilence and war, who dressed in a blood-red outfit and had to be pacified instead of worshipped
-Set, the god of darkness and chaos
-Shezmu, the god of execution, slaughter and blood
-rich people having better funerals than peasants
-Userkhaf weakening the central goverment so much that, after his reigns, civil wars and famine started.
-Sensuret III slaughtering and conquering the Nubians
-Salitis invading and conquering the land, forcing everyone to move to Asia
-Hatsheput using manipulation to keep herself in the throne.
"I also believe the idea of creating a comic to talk about sex, drugs and other 'taboo' subjects is a bit of a bad one. I will use games to explain why. Sex and drugs doesn't appear in games alot partly because American taboo's, but mostly because it doesn't really come up. It's only when it should happen naturally that it seems weird that it's not included. Like the censored drugs and fade-to-black 'sex' of Fallout 3. Saving the world from aliens and super villains every week doesn't link naturally to sex and drugs."
This ties to the comments from "Top 15 Things That are Wrong with Identity Crisis": a comic overstepping its boundaries and coming up short as a result.
You CAN talk about sex, drugs, homosexuality and A.I.D.S. in a comic...just not in this kind of comic.
In order to talk about those subjects, you need a darker, more mature and more realistic comic. Something like "Watchmen", "V for Vendetta", "Transmetropolitan", "The Sandman", "American Virgin" or "Hellblazer".
But this ISN'T a Vertigo comic. It's a DC superhero title. As such, a regular superhero title can't handle this mature issues (or at least, handle them all at once) without a competent writer.
This comic did NOT have a competent writer, and it was aimed at a family audience, so it should have stuck with "superheroes vs supervillains" stories and forget about the mature topics.
"Actually the prevailing theory is that Loeb's spiral of really, REALLY awful comics happened right after the tragic death of his son."
Point taken, but still, if something goes wrong with current Marvel, it's most likely Quesada's fault. The man has no idea what makes comics great.
"Or that it means I don't expect EVERYBODY ELSE to drop what they're doing to follow MY show, especially since a lot of them, like me, rely on these videos as their primary source of income. It's why I lampshaded it in the stinger to the Electric Tale of Pikachu episode."
Wether you like it or not, the fact remains that we have a TGWTG Universe. After several team-ups, the "Warrior" reviews, and the Anniversary Videos, TGWTG Earth has now being created. Pretending it isn't there won't make them go away. It's like someone writing a Superman comic set in the main DC Earth where Darkseid unleashes the Anti-Life Equation on 30 % of the Earth's population, and then that writing pretending that only people from Metropolis are affected.
If you start portraying your storylines as having global consequences, then the other videos HAVE to be affected.
"I don't get what's you'r problem with ancient Egypt"
Because usually despite those heroes you mentioned: 1. You have undead mummies or curses that come after you for exploring Egyptian temples/ruins. Research what happened to some of the people who discovered King Tut's tomb. Unfortunately a lot of New Agers, Occultists, and Conspiracy Theorists believed they died from King Tut's curse.
2. You often have way more evil characters in fiction who get their powers or evil talismans from Egypt. Not just in comics, but in: Pulp adventure stories of the 20's/30's, manga, anime, cartoons, live action movies, fantasy novels, mass etc. Or they happen to be evil Egyptian gods/demi-gods: See the Aladdin TV series.
3. The sad thing of Egyptian mythology and religion being demonized by other religions. This happens to all cultures deemed as "pagan".
I do thank the brave soul way above for reveling the true ancient evil as outlined in Yugioh 5D's: Peru.
We all know that those giant Petroglyphs you have is just a welcome mat sign towards invading aliens! That or they seal evil Eartbound gods that will kill us all. I can never tell which is which.
Concerning unexplained mystery stuff, I would love to have Linkara go on about the "modern evil" that is the Denver International Airport as foretold by the great sage: Jesse Ventura.
The New Guardians is hands down one of the weirdest ideas I have ever heard of. Normally, that's a good thing with me. In this case however, it is not.
What the heck is this?
The premise of the series sounds like the plot of "The Justice Friends: The Porn Parody".
All that being said, its awesome to see Snowflame alive and well.
Exiled One- "But this ISN'T a Vertigo comic. "It's a DC superhero title. As such, a regular superhero title can't handle this mature issues (or at least, handle them all at once) without a competent writer."
That might be true, a good writer wouldn't have tried to shoehorn in such material. But the problem is not with the writer completely.
For me the problem is here "You CAN talk about sex, drugs, homosexuality and A.I.D.S. in a comic" You can TALK about them, but there's nothing really to SAY about the subject.
I will try to explain. If I said "Let's talk about drugs" what would we say that wasn't completely obvious to both of us? Not alot. But if I said "Let's talk about the legality of drugs." now we are getting somewhere.
The thing is, we are not talking 'about drugs' but instead discussing 'the legal and moral grey area around drugs'.
Jet - An English girl who could manipulate electromagnetic fields to a variety of effects. She was infected with HIV after being being bitten by an The Hemogoblin, a vampire with AIDS. After apparently giving her life to fend off an alien Invasion, Jet is now alive again and leading the Global Guardians.
It's like they made a conscious effort to design the worst superhero team ever:
Ugly costumes and visual designs. Egotistical characters who go on about their supposed superiority, despite how clearly D-List they are. A mission that amounts to getting laid, something that should be pretty easy, if you're easy.
I don't know which one of these characters grates the most. I'm thinking it's Extrano. Which is Spanish for "strange"...strange as in queer. Haha GET IT?
Nah, he was a gay stereotype but he didn't really seem to do anything here. He didn't piss me off as much as the two female ethnic stereotypes who hit the club talking like they were such hot stuff, only to quickly prove how ditzy they were. Although Floronic Man easily beats anyone on this team in sheer creepiness...
Hey Linkara, sorry to go off topic but, have you heard that DC are going to publish this year a 'prequel' to Watchmen? Its caled Before Watchmen. My initial reaction was WHATTHEHELLPLEASEDON'TDOITFORTHELVETHEBLESSEDVIRGI... until I saw Brian Azzarello was writing Rorschach and I'm honestly thinking of giving tia try. What do you think?
"Wether you like it or not, the fact remains that we have a TGWTG Universe. After several team-ups, the "Warrior" reviews, and the Anniversary Videos, TGWTG Earth has now being created. Pretending it isn't there won't make them go away. It's like someone writing a Superman comic set in the main DC Earth where Darkseid unleashes the Anti-Life Equation on 30 % of the Earth's population, and then that writing pretending that only people from Metropolis are affected.
If you start portraying your storylines as having global consequences, then the other videos HAVE to be affected."
Eh, no, he doesnt. For the same reason why Image comics doesnt have to.
""Wether you like it or not, the fact remains that we have a TGWTG Universe. After several team-ups, the "Warrior" reviews, and the Anniversary Videos, TGWTG Earth has now being created. Pretending it isn't there won't make them go away. It's like someone writing a Superman comic set in the main DC Earth where Darkseid unleashes the Anti-Life Equation on 30 % of the Earth's population, and then that writing pretending that only people from Metropolis are affected.
If you start portraying your storylines as having global consequences, then the other videos HAVE to be affected.""
Eh, no, he doesnt. For the same reason why Image comics doesnt have to."
Good call, sir! Whether he likes it or not? Jeez, somebody likes to gives order to the people who provide them free entertainment. Sometimes you have to take continuity issues with a grain of salt. This is LEWIS'S show and just because he has a somewhat more epic vision than other reviewers doesn't mean other reviewers should give up their precious time at his beck and call; that's not fair. Go write some fanfiction if you the thought of crossovers salivates you so much
"Good call, sir! Whether he likes it or not? Jeez, somebody likes to gives order to the people who provide them free entertainment. Sometimes you have to take continuity issues with a grain of salt. This is LEWIS'S show and just because he has a somewhat more epic vision than other reviewers doesn't mean other reviewers should give up their precious time at his beck and call; that's not fair. Go write some fanfiction if you the thought of crossovers salivates you so much"
Plus, they already do that. On smaller scales, nonetheless, but they do it. They tie the other reviewers in, whenever it fits. Lindsay has him and others act in the "What women want" video, Doug was afraid of Linkara showing up in his reviews - which he is apparently doing - the other reviewers appeared in the "A piece of the world is missing" - arc, just to be vanishing...
So, the exiled one, there was no need to point out, what in your oppinion had to be done, because it is done already.
And although, it is logical, from a logical standpoint - that all of the videos in the TGWTG-Universe should have to be interconnected in some point, I agree with Martin and the 13th Doctor, when they said, that it would not be neccessary.
Great review, nice portrayal of Wolfgram as Snowflame. He should be a recurring gag character. Say, will Wolfgram be making appearances throughout the show?
This comic is awful, nothing but stereotypes and ill-conceived research into AIDS. I think the second issue seems to be better, because of SNOWFLAME! Can't wait to see the other issues soon.
Awesome I've been waiting years to see this review!
I like your Snowflame character he should be used more from now on!
I'm curious of where this comic went before it was canned!? I know about the fates of the characters because of their wiki pages but most are bare minimum! I know the Floral Man became a villain again! and most are now dead! And their most recent appearance were as Black Lanterns/cannon fodder!
So was there ever a reason they chose the old racist as a member?
Well can't wait for more of this series! Til Next Time!
@ BooRat "And their most recent appearance were as Black Lanterns/cannon fodder!"
Where did they appear in the black-lantern canon as cannon-fodder?
I have to be honest about the concept of the series: Even the concept about the series is fightening. There are these five people, that are selected to create a new uber-race by means of, as Jochen Malmsheimer, a german comedian put it "ergebnisorientierten Sexes" (results-oriented sex). So there are five beings, which represent the next step in human evolution or crap like that, and shall f**** around, in order to bring humanity as a whole to that new step in human evoultion.
And as this concept is scary enough, it needs to be handled with care - unfortunately, it was not.
The idea of a comic being so bold, that it adresses stuff like sex, aids, drug-use etc. is a good one, and even with Floro, who is both a guy, who has used drugs on his own behalf AND helped in the creation of plant-goddess Poison Ivy by the means of drugs, could have been the right person to talk about the abuse of that stuff.
But what about the other ones? *shrugs* Well - great review, as I said, and I am looking forward to monday.
"CaptainCalvinCat said... @ BooRat 'And their most recent appearance were as Black Lanterns/cannon fodder!' Where did they appear in the black-lantern canon as cannon-fodder?"
From Wikipedia, "Harbinger reanimated as a Black Lantern during the Blackest Night crossover. She uses her knowledge of history to provoke her targets by bringing up emotional memories, but is destroyed with the other Black Lanterns."
One thing I've learn about the Blackest Night arc is that any dead DC character no matter how little known they are or forgotten were at some point brought back as a Black Lantern and unless they could serve a real purpose where mostly used as background filler for crowd scenes or used as canon fodder(characters that could be killed off in battle scene without having to lose main charcters). further research has shown though most of this team weren't Black Lanterns but another super hero team long forgotten that Mr. Linkara reviewed a while back was I got the teams mixed up! Blood Pack to be precise!
I was taught you CAN get AIDS from saliva. All you need to do is drink about a bucketful. (Saliva doesn't kill AIDS, but it only contains tiny, trace amounts. As I was taught.)
I've always found Jeph Loeb to be overrated. Comics companies seem to treat him like one of the best writers ever, when I've always found him average at best. And that includes Long Hallowe'en and Hush.
I just read up on this team. Evidently the team split up after a while, and just in case they DID, there was a "back up" plan the Guardians had enacted...the plan being that people with "superior DNA" would come from beings that, you guessed it, that racist Kroef created. Now, I would HOPE that, at the end of "New Guardians", the guy finally overcame his racism, but if he didn't...this means that the white supremacist guy...kinda succeeded. The "future race of superior people" would be, well, Aryan-esque "ubermensch".
Which TOTALLY undercuts the whole "diverse group" theme that the book was founded on, on how all these beings from different shades of life would be the new generation of immortals. Way to TOTALLY miss the point of your own series, New Guardians. >.<
"Okay, that's it. I can understand the Egyptian thing as a running gag, but the Saint Dragon God of Osiris' dubbed name came from Roger Slifer, one 4Kids's employees who worked on the dub. This could have been a better opportunity to make a joke at that company."
As it turns out, Roger Slifer is most likely the name source for the reference in the comic, also. He used to write for comics and is a friend of Englehart (mostly notably, Slifer co-created Lobo with Keith Giffen).
Anybody notice the ad for Hawk & Dove on the back cover? Liefeld artwork lurking about on a crappy comic! (though H&D was a pretty good comic for the time, and the art was helped considerably by inker/writer Karl Kesel)
So, I'm listening to this episode on headphones and around the 3:20 or so mark where Snowflame is asking, "Are you the passport man?" I can hear what I'm going to guess is a police siren...what did Snowflame do? Or did the neighbors call to report this strange man around your house?
Great episode sir, definitely one of your best. Next time Vice or one of your other enemies comes around, maybe you should give your team the fight off and call in Snowflame.
Also...Ninja Style Dancer! Oh how I've missed your dancing ninja antics.
Perhaps if Ninja Style Dancer and Snowflame could dance together, Ancient Egypt would be thwarted at last!
The citadel referred to was the HQ of the Earth based Green Lantern Corps, consisting of Hal Jordan, John Stewart, Katma Tui, Salaak, Ch'p, Arissa, & Kilowag. After Crisis on Infinite Earths, the Guardians left and allowed the Lanterns to organize as they saw fit. These sever formed a team on Earth. Guy Gardner was also on Earth at the time, but he was at the height of his jerkass phase and no one wanted him around.
Now, I'm not sure about the timing, but given the comment in New Guardians #1, I'm guessing this took place after Green Lantern Corps #224 (retitled and continuing the number from the solo Green Lantern title). The Corps gathered together on Oa and voted to kill Sinestro. This activated some sort of failsafe in the Central Power Battery and it started to break down. Apparently, when the Guardians and the Zamorans broke up, the Zamorans spent some time on Sinestro's home planet and the Guardians built in the failsafe to prevent them using their powers to take revenge on the men of Korugar for stealing their women (you might actually want to review that little bit).
Anyway, Hal Jordan went into the Central Battery and stopped the breakdown but every Green Lantern present had their rings destroyed and there wasn't enough power to make new ones, but there was enough to power the few that remained. Hal's was spared because he went into the CPB and since Guy wasn't there (he was a dick, so no one invited him), his remained intact as well. I believe this is where Hal picked up Parallax, but it didn't manifest for some time after.
As a fellow Midwesterner, I can verify that anyone willing to make snow angels with bare arms and shoulders is truly committed to the gag. Great review Linkara, and Super Kudos to Mister Wolfgram, apparently a real-life metahuman.
The fact that Snowflame and Lord Vyce is played by the same person is as amusingly incongruous as Frank Welker doing the voices of Megatron and Curios George.
I'm currently doing an archive binge, and will be terrible disappointed if at some point Snowflame and the Ultimate Warrior do not share a scene together.
Great review as always Mr. Lovhaug but Wolfgram stole the show, were did you find him. Snowflame was even more entertaining then the ninja style dancer, I hope he comes back. Also I think the trumps might have been a reference to the fact they were supposed to be the old guardians’ trump cards
ReplyDeleteThe scary thing is the stereotypical things the villains are saying is similar to what a lot of right-wing extremist say now except they replace white people with whatever Americans for this country and the local ethnicity or nationality for others, it’s pretty old rhetoric even then. Also At the time few republicans were defending Oliver North at the time when he was selling weapons to the Iranians and using the money to support contra terrorist in Nicaragua. You do not know much political history do you.
SNOWFLAME! YOU HAVE RETURNED FROM THE DEAD!
ReplyDeleteYOU ARE THE TRUE GOD!
You know I rather enjoyed the New Guardians. While it was stupid, I rather enjoyed the characters.
ReplyDeleteHarbinger died trying to save Supergirl from Darkseid's Female Furies. Ok, maybe that does seem pointless, but at least she died trying to defend a friend. This comic... God this idea was stupid. I was literally smacking my forehead. The bits you had with "Snowflame" were awesome. My favorite is him peering over your shoulder. I don't know why, but I love bits like that.
ReplyDeleteYou know, the writer's lack of knowledge of STI's or STD's reminds me of a radio commercial I heard today that said that women shouldn't use men's razors because they can cut you your leg and raise the chance that you will get airborne viruses like, (and these are their words, not mine) HIV. That is not how people get STI's. Diseases like HIV are either transferred via sexual intercourse or via infected objects like needles that have had contact with infected blood and those are usually disposed of. Both the writer and the people who made that commercial have obviously never had Health 101
Huh, so that's how the guy who played Vice for you looks.
ReplyDeleteSnowflame feels no Cold!
So generally it's not by saliva, but by the other body fluids? Guess that makes some sense, considering all the bacteria and whatnot that is in spit. But if their blood was mixed in with the saliva, it can be a source of infection. Likely a sore or shallow cut. Hell, if that guy's teeth were sharp enough to break skin so easily, odds are he regularly makes puncture holes in his gum line.
Okay, that's it. I can understand the Egyptian thing as a running gag, but the Saint Dragon God of Osiris' dubbed name came from Roger Slifer, one 4Kids's employees who worked on the dub. This could have been a better opportunity to make a joke at that company.
It Sounds like Harbinger had something of a wasted death. Don't even remember her that well from CoIE. Where did the rest of these characters end up after this series?
PLEASE GOD, GIVE US SOME STORY, PLEASE.
ReplyDeleteI am seriouly getting scared at this point.
GIVE US SOMETHING, ANYTHING!
"PLEASE GOD, GIVE US SOME STORY, PLEASE.
ReplyDeleteI am seriouly getting scared at this point.
GIVE US SOMETHING, ANYTHING!"
I'm hoping to fit in some in next week, but if it doesn't happen, guaranteed in two weeks with the end of this storyline.
It seems more like the writers thought aides could be spread like rabies. Also did you make the connection to hemoglobin, the stuff that makes blood red, and Hemo-Goblin? A villian that infect people with aides, that makes the Asthma Monster look dignified.
ReplyDeleteWho is Will Wolfgram? A quick internet check says he played Vyse too, but no other info on him.
ReplyDelete"Who is Will Wolfgram? A quick internet check says he played Vyse too, but no other info on him."
ReplyDeleteHe's a friend of mine who played Vyce, a Pyramid Head, and was the camera operator for me at Youmacon's Live Show.
How's Snow Flame when he comes back down?
ReplyDeleteThis looks like it can be a guilty pleasure for me. That and I like Gloss's hair, and Extrano's cape is to die for!:P
If you think Harbinger dying in Superman/Batman was dumb, Gloss was killed in Cry For Justice.
ReplyDelete(Also, that guy Tom is Hal Jordan's buddy, Tom Kalmaku.)
Snowflame is my god! No wait, I thought that was Celestia...or is it Om? GAH! TOO MUCH CULTURE!
ReplyDeleteSadly, the same can't be said for this comic, who desperately needs a large dose of class. And brains.
Is that "Great Continuity[, Batman]!" clip gonna be a new running gag? Y'know, I seriously wonder what Snowflame was on*gets smacked in the head mid-n*
Uh...anyway, great review. I really hope Snowflame becomes a new character.
Also, now I have to read the label on this painkiller bottle I lost in my hand, but I can't because I'm a hologram.
PS: I could rock out to Imperial March over (on?) Egypt all day.
PPS: I see no dain bramage here. Move a log n.
I believe the statement about the Green Lantern Corp having a HQ on a hill is in reference to the events in the GLC comic at the time. The Corp was disbanded (can't remember why) and 6 or so Lanterns (among them Jordon, Katma Tui, Kilowog, Ch'p, Arisia Rrab, and Salaak)based themselves on Earth and primarily had adventures there (because, you know, that makes sense). They had a mansion located on a hill overlooking Coast City. It seemed dumb at the time and since there is no reference to that era today only seems to re-inforce that notion.
ReplyDeleteI think we can forgive the writers for being ignorant of AIDS, since it was still a very new disease at the time and the public was mostly ignorant about it. I was born in 1981 (the year the AIDS epidemic began) I can remember my parents and grandparents getting worried about people at restaurants not wearing gloves because they might get AIDS on the food. This would have been some time around 1987 or 88, right around the time the book was written, and I think it reflects a general public misapprehension about AIDS.
ReplyDeleteEventually we need an AT4W plot that has to do with the EVIL OF ANCIENT EGYPT! Who knows, maybe the plot would be a red hearing crushing Linkara to find out all his theories that Ancient Egypt is NOT the source of all evil. Either way it would be fun.
ReplyDeleteI can help but laugh at the fact that a comic that is obviously trying to pass at being liberal and foreword thinking got it's information about HIV and AIDS completely wrong.
ReplyDeleteOn that note, the hemo-goblin dying off AIDS due to his high metabolism doesn't make a lick of sense. AIDS kills because the HIV virus targets the T-Cells and disables a persons immune system leaving them venerable to a variety of other common disease. If anything having a high metabolism would possibly allow his immune system to restore itself at an accelerated rate giving him some sort of resistance to the HIV virus. In the worst case scenario he was shown to be in good health and shouldn't be affected any fast that any other AIDS patient.
I remember when New Gaurdians came out. I was real interested because they had done such a great job setting the characters up in the Millennium crossover (which was my favorite crossover event). Then I read the comics, and couldn't believe what I was reading. I mean, wow! No wonder the title only last twelve measly issues, I never even read the last one I had given up by then. The worst thing they did was the unnecssary death in a later issue, but I wont spoil it for people who may want to read this. Nice review!
ReplyDeleteMillenium is the worst.
ReplyDeleteI am pretty sure you could do a 150 Things That are Wrong With Millenium without even trying.
Wait, wait wait. Both the heroes and villains favor eugenics? So, ah, as the reader, I'm rooting for the New Guardians just because I'm told to, because their creepy breeding experiments certainly isn't any more morally defensible than racist breeding experiments.
ReplyDeleteAlso, Hemo-Goblin? Carrion called, and he wants his outfit back.
*laughs*
ReplyDeleteOkay, I found this review extremely amusing. Snowflame was cool - a bit annoying, though, but the snow-gag was a nice one.
Well done, Linkara.
Greets
Cal
But Linkara, I like Jeph Loeb. Ignoring Ultimatum, he has done good work in the past with Tim Sale(Long Halloween and the like), also Hush , and his run on Hulk.
ReplyDelete"But Linkara, I like Jeph Loeb. Ignoring Ultimatum, he has done good work in the past with Tim Sale(Long Halloween and the like), also Hush , and his run on Hulk."
ReplyDeleteHere's the thing about Jeph Loeb: just because he's done SOME good work doesn't mean everything he does is great. The Supergirl arc in Superman/Batman was bleh and personally I don't really think his work with Time Sale is all that great. I do like Hush and the other arcs of Superman/Batman that he worked on, but people in my audience not familiar with comics would only remember him from Ultimates 3 and Ultimatum, thus that's the connection I made.
Kth-77 said...
ReplyDelete"Eventually we need an AT4W plot that has to do with the EVIL OF ANCIENT EGYPT! Who knows, maybe the plot would be a red hearing crushing Linkara to find out all his theories that Ancient Egypt is NOT the source of all evil. Either way it would be fun."
*laughs* evil of ancient egypt? Oh, there is a nice variety of things to pick. Depends on the cut-off-date of Linkaras comics of choice, I could even imagine some Stargate-comics or jokes. ^^
Oh, the thing with aids - well, the Comic was released in 1988, and I remember even a Golden Girls Episode, where Rose was supposed to be infected with HIV, which caused them to let Sophia cry hysterically, that she has drunken from a cup, which had Roses name on it.
So I would guess, they knew extremely little of the virus and just made stuff up. That is extremely dated today and I do not know, how far the research was on the virus, but when they had believed that things like salvia would transmit the virus...
I guess, you could blame them, if they would pull stuff like that, today, but not when they had no to little idea, what the virus was. The only thing, you could blame them for, was the actual use of a topic, which they had no idea of.
Greets
Cal
in 1988 AIDS was so scary that airborn transfer could have been a story line
ReplyDeleteit was once called the gay flu
"SNOWFLAME IS WATCHING YOU REAAAAAD!!"is probably my favorite line in the episode.
ReplyDeleteThat said, just in case you were confused by Floro's "gnomes" and "Salamanders", the're basically the elementals he talked about earlier, see this wikipedia page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elemental
And I assume that the floating ball in issue 2 is probably either a sylph or a gnome.
still, they didn't explain that very well,and if I didn't have prior knowledge, that would've probably flew over my head.
I heard a siren in the background
ReplyDeletealso this is the comic that cocaine powered guy came from? Now I know to avoide it.
On a side not: Gnomes is the traditional name for Earth Elemental (and Salamander for Fire elementals). Why Floric man who was IIRC stuck in the Green, could contact them (since, again IIRC, Swamp Thing need to pass trail to gain powers of the other elements, and he was a Elemental) something that confuses me.
ReplyDeletePlease tell me there's an extensive blooper reel to be seen from this XD
ReplyDeleteSNOWFLAAAAAAME! Great review, Linkara! For some reason, your Jet voice reminded me of the fortune teller from an episode of Family Guy.
ReplyDeleteI think Pillow Girls is a reference to those large pillows with Anime characters on them. They're called Dakimakura, and are commonly used by Japanese youth as security objects. That, or used by otaku as love pillows.
ReplyDeleteWe have an early frontrunner for internet meme of the year in "SNOWFLAME IS STEALING YOUR SHOOOOOOES!"
ReplyDeleteNo, no, Extrano getting HIV makes perfect sense. That's what gay people do: get HIV and refer to themselves as "auntie". Do you know nothing of homosexuality????
ReplyDeleteAnyway, great review. I'd heard about the awfulness that is New Guardians before, but boy did this surpass all expectations. And it was nice to see the Ninja-Style Dancer again, if only for five seconds.
This book was so stupid that it hurt. I had to pause several times and listen to something else before I could work up the strength to continue.
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised you didn't acknowledge the fact that the guy who declined to join the New Guardians is a pre-excisting DC character (meaning decades old). You know GL's Sidekick from the silver age, the one with the racist nickname, Pieface (or his real name Tom Kalmaku).
ReplyDeleteYou have to keep Snowflame on a leash when it comes to the Ninja Style Dancer...it's his first moment since the whole Entity crisis and the coke-snorting looney ruined it! Besides, "Canned Heat" is awesome...just look at how it improved one of the stupidest comedies of our time!
ReplyDeleteYeah...who the heck came up with this New Guardians mess anyway? It really felt like an attempt to try and become more "mature" with certain issues, probably in the wake of Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns...and all we get are a bunch of stereotypes and weirdoes who just want to have sex...with a plant, a robot and a gay guy. I think this is another reason why the Guardians of the Universe shouldn't be trusted, but that's me. (then again at least the Floronic Man is still evil-looking, seeing his evil grin of his cracked me up due to him supposedly being "good") And...somehow after seeing Gloss and her bizarre slutty ways, I think maybe it's a good thing we have more serious, respectable Chinese heroes in DC these days.
BTW: hilarious Snowflame, even with his interruption of the Ninja Style Dancer. I knew he would show up again to make the return of the "sex-obsessed heroes" more entertaining.
1)"Trumps" is a tarot reference. Englehart is (or was) an occultist.
ReplyDelete2)Sleipner is not slipher, and in any case Sleipner is a monster from Old Germanic myth, not Egyptian.
"2)Sleipner is not slipher, and in any case Sleipner is a monster from Old Germanic myth, not Egyptian."
ReplyDeleteTechnically the monster in Japanese was referred to as Osiris. In the dub, they changed its name to Slifer the Sky Dragon.
A cyborg, a plant man, and a gay man are all a part of a teams that involves getting the female members pregnant... Sounds more like a set up for a hentai than a DC comic.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Jet's wound, I have a theory:
ReplyDeleteAccording to Wikipedia(I don't know anything about the character), Jet can manipulate electromagnetic or just plain electric energies, and I think she subconsiously heated her body to cauterize(or electrocauterize, as the case would be) her wound to stop the bleeding.
Why didn't the wound show up during the battle? Well she appeard to either have her hand over it, or was in full "flame on" mode, which may have obscured her skin, thus making the wound invisible from a distance.
Finally, when the battle was over, perhaps the wound was no longer bleeding, perhaps the blood had dried around it, or it was a giant blister.
So what does the Mechakara hand coming back to life again in Nostalgia Chick's What Woman Want review mean?
ReplyDeletePlease give a logical explanation for this
"It's magic"
Haha Snowflame was amazing!And i like these breaks from the story they are good for books with a lot of material like this,
ReplyDeleteI am as baffled as ever by the "we have to procreate. Time for sex," aspect of this comic as I was when you did Issue #2 a couple of years ago. Test tube babies have been being born since the late 1970's, and that's in our world, where we don't have super advanced tech like the DCU does. Wasn't Damian Wayne gestated in a glass tube or something? If they can do that, there is absolutely no need for any of the New Guardians to have sex with each other or even get pregnant by artificial insemination unless they want to. (Even assuming I'm mistaken about Damian or that's relatively new for the DCU, they could have hired surrogates - they were buying crappy motels for 15 million dollars after all). The whole "we have to procreate, and therefore have lots of sex" thing is potentially very angsty and could work ... but only in a setting where we could reasonably expect such technology not to exist (post-apocalyptic, historical, etc.) Not in the modern DCU (or 1988 DCU, as was pointed out many times).
ReplyDeleteThis might sound odd, but if I were a comic writer, I could probably do something with snowflame. I don't know what, just that I could do something with him.
ReplyDeleteDoes this mean snowflame is on team linkara now? Dude hes a druggie done let him move in think of liz and the others :)
ReplyDelete"Also At the time few republicans were defending Oliver North at the time when he was selling weapons to the Iranians and using the money to support contra terrorist in Nicaragua. You do not know much political history do you."
ReplyDeleteWait, that was real? I thought it was something made up on American Dad! I guess you learn something new everyday.
"SNOWFLAME IS STEALING YOUR SHOES!"
ReplyDeleteThe line about Latin-American wars appears to be a dig at the Iran-Contra affair. Though all that managed to do was further age the story...
thumbs up to the Silver Nemesis reference. now the question is where did I leave that umbrella again? ;)
ReplyDeleteHaha, yes minions, we have completely succeeded in fooling Linkara into thinking that the ancient Egyptians are to blame for the insidious, diabolic, ingenious, malevolent, and down right disgustingly wondrous plot that we have wrought upon the face of this globe!
ReplyDelete...No 42, why are you recording my memoirs on Twitter?
Wait, why was the gay guy the only one to get HIV? That one raised an eyebrow from me.
ReplyDeleteI honestly would love to see what would happen if you sent Snowflame to Comic Con. Holy cow, that would be so awesome.
P.S. You guys haven't gotten a lot of snow in the cities, have you? We have a ton in the southern part of the state!
The Comic: ... Yeah, this one looks like it was another stinker.
ReplyDeleteOther: I can't imagine keeping a straight face around Snowflame.
Fiery Little One
Super fun review:D I really liked Mr. WoIfgram's performance... How many energy drinks did you have to get in him for that? XD Although I wish his voice was a little closer to the gruff voice you used for SnowFlame in the NG #2 review. Speaking of which, the voice you do for ditzy female characters always gets a laugh out of me.
ReplyDeleteIf SnowFlame only took some coffee and your shoes, you should count yourself lucky, especially with all your magic items lying around..
So... I've only read the first 5 issues of New Guardians, and none of Millenium. I'm sorry in advance for the long post, but I'd like to get something crazy off my chest. The thing that's always baffled me about this series is why wasn't this written as a SPACE OPERA? When I first saw your New Guardians #2 episode, I actually thought it was at first, and that the Colombia trip was a detour. I don't know how I made that mistake, but seriously:
1. Instead of eugenics and changing humanity, the tone would be little more like a Noah's Ark of spreading human DNA in case of an Earth-destroying disaster. Or, in the case of perpetuating their "superior genes", it could be more like seeding (poor word choice, I know.)the universe with demi-gods, kind of like how the Greek pantheon was always philandering about. Its a little more benevolent and more importantly, less creepy. Well, slightly.
2. There might be actual races that are more compatible with Floro and Ram. Also, they could have technology so that the women of the team can spread their DNA without getting pregnant. Again, less creepy, and then there's no need to have actual child-rearing in the comic. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it makes the story simpler.
3. If these character are truely near gods, they need opponents that can rival their power. Cosmic monsters and alien races might be able to do that better than the Hemogoblin. In all the issues of NG that I've read it never feels like the group is ever in actual danger.
4. I appreciate that Mr. Englehart wanted to call things by their name; Cocaine instead of Fantasy Drug X and HIV instead of something made up that bore a resemblence to the disease. But its better to use allegories and metaphors if that's the only way to keep your story from getting dismembered by an editor.
5. And most importantly, it could still have had Snowflame! It would take more than a convoluted going to space backstory lay a scratch in his awesomeness!! I don't know, maybe he comes from an alternate earth where drugs are so ubiquitous, the only way to gain a new market is to sell them in space.
And seriously, Snowflame would have been a better choice for the team than that fat racist Kroef!! Maybe then the team might have accomplished their mission. SNOWFLAME IS COMICS' GREATEST WING-MAN!!!
I am going to make a couple quick comments.
ReplyDelete#1 Snowflame was brilliant. Loved the inclusion, but above all the costume. It looks great. Loved the bit, and you used it just the right amount. I hope the neighbourhood wasn't too freaked out :p
#2 An odd one, but I'm saying it anyway: The green screen with Ninja Style Dancer was FANTASTIC. There was almost no bleed, the colour different from the yellowish-orange to black was perfect. The Snowflame portion was good, but the hair had some bleed due to reflection. Overall this was one of your best, and in fact one of the best I have seen from any Channel Awesome producer in a while.
I had just rewatched the New Guardians review (house sitting so I was bored :p), so it was nice to see this about a dya later. Great work as always
Great review for a mess of a comic. I felt like they were all over the place with this.
ReplyDeleteBTW, I know you already explained it, but that Slifer=Egyptian god joke sort of grated my nerves (then again, I hate 4kids for ruining the series).
Speaking of that, you sound like littlekuriboh's "tea" voice when you do a female character's lines...and that is freaking awesome.
Shouldn't they just be off having sex or using insemination? Why are they even worrying about being a superhero team if they are just trying to pass on their genes. And if they are trying to just pass on their genes why aren't they trying to have sex with other people outside of their group, because giving how many of them there are if they just mated with each other I'm pretty sure that their superior genes would start to degrade due to some major inbreeding. This comic vexes me.
ReplyDeleteSnowflame knows no pain!
Does this mean you'll sell Snowflame as a slave in the eBegging auction?
ReplyDelete"Does this mean you'll sell Snowflame as a slave in the eBegging auction?"
ReplyDeleteOkay, one - what?
Two - eBegging? For crying out loud, I'm not asking for donations - I'm getting rid of stuff I don't need and offering it to people who might want it and letting people know it's available.
Three - what?
Fun fact: last night, my brother and I made a surprisingly good drink by mixing Monster and Coke Zero. After watching this episode, I decided to call it the Snowflame. Because it's a Coke Monster.
ReplyDeleteJeph "Red Hulk" Loeb did Hush?
ReplyDeleteWhat the hell happened?!?!?
I LOVE SnowFlame!!!! I died laughing, and then came back from the grave to watch it again. Absolutely hilarious, I hope we get to see more of him.
ReplyDeleteAmazing episode, Well worth the wait!
"Here's the thing about Jeph Loeb: just because he's done SOME good work doesn't mean everything he does is great. The Supergirl arc in Superman/Batman was bleh and personally I don't really think his work with Time Sale is all that great. I do like Hush and the other arcs of Superman/Batman that he worked on, but people in my audience not familiar with comics would only remember him from Ultimates 3 and Ultimatum, thus that's the connection I made. "
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty suprised about that. I really love the way Supergirl was re-introduced. I thought it was a great way of brining Kara Zor-El back into the modern age, and I'm suprised it wasn't your cup of tea considering how effecitvly it used both Wonder Woman and Big Barda.
What did you think of the DCAU adaptation of that storyline Superman/Batman Apocalypse? It gave Supergirl a more active role... so I liked it more then the actual comic.
I deffinitly have some major issues with Loeb's writing... I've got three trades of his from Superman/Batman... and they're all flawed (even "The Supergirl from Krypton", though I think it's one of the best examples of his work, it has a direction and purpose).
He also failed to properly set a tone for the Supergirl character in the start of her own series, and I think because of that Supergirl's book suffered big time until Sterling Gates took over because every other writer couldn't make heads or tails of Loeb's "Is Supergirl secretly evil and out to kill Superman?" story.
Stories like Superman/Batman Absolute Power take the cake though, where he creates an alternate timeline just so he can have fun killing off characters.
About the "pillow girl" comment, it would not refer to Dakimakura (the anime characters on pillows for anime fans) as they did not start to appear until the mid 90's...this comic however is from the 80's. I have heard prostitutes referred to as pillow girls from movies from the 70's and 80's before so I assume that's what they are talking about.
ReplyDeleteAnother...fun episode. Sometimes I'm glad I didn't read comics as a kid.
Is it just me or is that Kroef guy a bit like the bad guy from Lethal Weapon 2? They're just so similar; South African, grey suit, chubby, bald, kinda racist.
ReplyDelete"Harbinger died trying to save Supergirl from Darkseid's Female Furies. Ok, maybe that does seem pointless, but at least she died trying to defend a friend."
ReplyDeleteThis creates a contradiction:
in his "Top 15 Worst Things About Countdown" video, Linkara clearly said that, if superheroes have to die: "they better go down fighting".
Harbinger went down fighting, so Linkara should have liked her death and not consider it pointless. So, either he changed his mind since he made the Countdown videos, or he lied back then.
"So generally it's not by saliva, but by the other body fluids? Guess that makes some sense, considering all the bacteria and whatnot that is in spit. But if their blood was mixed in with the saliva, it can be a source of infection. Likely a sore or shallow cut. Hell, if that guy's teeth were sharp enough to break skin so easily, odds are he regularly makes puncture holes in his gum line."
By the way, both Jet AND Extraño got infected with H.I.V.
That's something Linkara got it wrong. So I guess saliva CAN be a source of H.I.V. infection, at least as far as this comic is concerned.
"A cyborg, a plant man, and a gay man are all a part of a teams that involves getting the female members pregnant... Sounds more like a set up for a hentai than a DC comic."
Yeah, but we need a catgirl and a 50 ft. tall woman to round up the team :)
"So what does the Mechakara hand coming back to life again in Nostalgia Chick's What Woman Want review mean?"
If anything, it means that Linkara's storylines FINALLY have consequences in the larger TGWTG universe.
And it was about time. I always found it stupid that Lord Vyce or the Entity would make the entire Earth dissapear yet the Nostalgia Critic or Spoony or Cinema Snob didn't seem to be affected by it in their own videos.
"Wasn't Damian Wayne gestated in a glass tube or something?"
Actually, in the original 80s comic that introduced Damian, he was the natural son of Batman and Talia Al Ghul. Since Talia lied about having a miscarriage, it stands to reason that she would also lie about Damian being a test tube baby.
A more accurate example is Superboy, who was created in a lab using Superman's DNA. But then again, this comic predates Superboy's existance, so maybe the technology just didn't exist at the time.
"Wait, why was the gay guy the only one to get HIV? That one raised an eyebrow from me."
Again: Jet also got A.I.D.S.
Linkara got that fact wrong.
"Jeph "Red Hulk" Loeb did Hush?
What the hell happened?!?!?"
Joe Quesada, THAT's what happened. No Marvel comic can be truly good (or at least, as good as it should be) as long as Quesada keeps running things. The man keeps killing superheroines and ruining relationships due to his own unhappy marriage, and he has no idea how to do a proper event comic.
Also, one last thing:
is it me, or without the modulation that he had for Lord Vyce's voice, Will Wolfgram sounds like Iron Liz?
I honestly spent the entire video convinced that it was Iron Liz playing Snowflame, and was shocked when I saw Wolfgram cedited instead of Iron Liz.
Your accent for Jet is awesome, and so was the performance of Wolfgram as Snowflame.
ReplyDeleteSorry for the length, I hope it is worth your time. I have broken it up.
ReplyDeleteI liked Snowflame, the "watching you read" line was great. Although he didn't seem very snow flame esc to me, and such a character can very easy be annoiying, it was fun having him to mix things up a bit.
---
I don't get the negative comment about eBegging, mainly because, well, you/Linkara aren't. I don't like it when people beg (be it for a charity or their own profit) in the show, or what they gloat about something, particulary girl friends, kids, acheivments or big ticket purchases. Hell, even needless multi parters annoiy me. Yet I never NEVER had that issue with AtfW. Oddly enough, I'm more likely to support you because you don't beat us round the head with it.
---
On the topic of the comic itself, every time you mention the hemo-goblin, I am reminded of those funny talking cells from Bowser's Inside Story. "All your globin!"
---
I also believe the idea of creating a comic to talk about sex, drugs and other 'taboo' subjects is a bit of a bad one. I will use games to explain why. Sex and drugs doesn't appear in games alot partly because American taboo's, but mostly because it doesn't really come up. It's only when it should happen naturally that it seems weird that it's not included. Like the censored drugs and fade-to-black 'sex' of Fallout 3. Saving the world from aliens and super villains every week doesn't link naturally to sex and drugs.
Plus, let's be honest, there is NOTHING that can be said about drugs that hasn't already been said to the point of cliche. Same with sex. Though there is some stories and issues with sexual fetishes or the issues surrounding prescription drugs and the side effects of taking them vs not taking them, as well as personality altering drugs, but those deal with the surrounding issues, not the sex or drugs themselves.
Isn't it funny how the people telling us not to do drugs often seemed to be doing drugs themselves?
ReplyDeleteThe "Latin American Wars" stuff may also be a reference, at least partially, to the School of the Americas (apparently since re-branded to "Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation"), which is responsible for giving top-notch US military training to all sorts of awesome raping, murdering monsters (and then setting them loose in various Latin American countries).
ReplyDeleteCertainly something worth criticizing, what with how completely FUBAR promoting crimes against humanity is, but I'm not sure if there could be anything much more out of place in any comic than that introductory text... what the hell was the writer thinking (even if it was only supposed to be a jab at Iran-Contra stuff)?
In the 80s, people knew next to nothing about AIDS and the media did little to inform people at the time. Mostly it fanned the flames of ignorance and stereotypes about the disease.
ReplyDeleteRidiculing and making fun of gay people in the 80s was common place. Nobody thought twice about being rude or insulting to gays. As such, its' not surprising a stereotyped gay man appears in the comic. At the time it would have been considered, "edgy."
Reagan was embroiled in the Iran-Contra affair in '87/88, and should have been impeached for it.
All that aside, it does show how making a dated reference fails in comics. I'm surprised there weren't some Soviet communists in the book. :)
I'd love for you to do a series about what makes a good comic by looking at bad comics.
Your reviews are fun. Keep up the good work.
"This creates a contradiction:
ReplyDeletein his "Top 15 Worst Things About Countdown" video, Linkara clearly said that, if superheroes have to die: "they better go down fighting".
Harbinger went down fighting, so Linkara should have liked her death and not consider it pointless. So, either he changed his mind since he made the Countdown videos, or he lied back then."
It's not just "they have to go down fighting." Harbinger dies off-panel pointlessly. People above have argued that she died "while trying to save Supergirl," except that she failed miserably. Plus her death has absolutely no weight to the story. She's just killed off for no good reason. It could have been any random Amazon and it would have had the same effect.
"By the way, both Jet AND Extraño got infected with H.I.V.
That's something Linkara got it wrong. So I guess saliva CAN be a source of H.I.V. infection, at least as far as this comic is concerned."
*Shrugs* I haven't physically read ahead - I read on wikipedia and it only specified that Extrano got AIDS.
"If anything, it means that Linkara's storylines FINALLY have consequences in the larger TGWTG universe.
And it was about time. I always found it stupid that Lord Vyce or the Entity would make the entire Earth dissapear yet the Nostalgia Critic or Spoony or Cinema Snob didn't seem to be affected by it in their own videos."
Or that it means I don't expect EVERYBODY ELSE to drop what they're doing to follow MY show, especially since a lot of them, like me, rely on these videos as their primary source of income. It's why I lampshaded it in the stinger to the Electric Tale of Pikachu episode.
"Actually, in the original 80s comic that introduced Damian, he was the natural son of Batman and Talia Al Ghul. Since Talia lied about having a miscarriage, it stands to reason that she would also lie about Damian being a test tube baby."
Yes, except Morrison seemed to make it pretty clear that that's EXACTLY how he was born, since he said he never read the original story that people used as the reason for Damian's existence.
"Joe Quesada, THAT's what happened. No Marvel comic can be truly good (or at least, as good as it should be) as long as Quesada keeps running things. The man keeps killing superheroines and ruining relationships due to his own unhappy marriage, and he has no idea how to do a proper event comic."
Actually the prevailing theory is that Loeb's spiral of really, REALLY awful comics happened right after the tragic death of his son.
"is it me, or without the modulation that he had for Lord Vyce's voice, Will Wolfgram sounds like Iron Liz?
I honestly spent the entire video convinced that it was Iron Liz playing Snowflame, and was shocked when I saw Wolfgram cedited instead of Iron Liz."
Will only played the Lord Vyce suit; I'm the one who does the voice.
It occurs to me that the real reason that the guardians selected these people may have been so that they would look good by comparison.
ReplyDeleteI don't get what's you'r problem with ancient Egypt
ReplyDeleteThe original Hawkman, and Metamorpho got their powers from the Egyptian pantheon, and they are good guys
And even Bastet used to be an ally to Wonder Woman at one point
All this talk of sex, drugs, homosexuals and AIDs in the wrong fashion and I think I'm more offended by the Hemogoblin eating that cat than all of that put together.
ReplyDeleteAlso "Coffee is Cocaine in liquid form!" needs to be on a T-Shirt.
Say, Linkara, did you know someone is making a Snowflame web-comic?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.snowflamecomic.com/
@ Anonymus:
ReplyDeleteI don't think either Lewis nor his persona "Linkara" do have problems with ancient egypt pantheon - it was just a joke, based on Slifer, the Sky-Dragon (or in the japanese version: Osiris)... honestly, I think "Slifer, the Sky Dragon" sounds a little more WOW than just "Osiris", although Osiris is an ancient egypt God.
Linkara, you did Lord Vyces Voice? Do you do Pollo, too?
It's one thing to have a man dress up in spandex for entertainment. It's another entirely to have him go out in the public to do this, while it's snowing and performing acts to draw as much attention to himself as possible.
ReplyDeleteI'll admit he overshadowed parts of your reviee Linkara, but it was nice to see a return of a few older jokes like the doomsday pyramids.
You managed to work Snowflame into a review of a New Guardians issue that didn't actually feature Snowflame! Gotta give you props for that, you always manage to give us, the fans, what we want.
ReplyDeleteI hope you manage to work him into other reviews down the road; I think it'd be hilarious to see him interact with 90s kid
Since this comic was published in the 1980’s there is an excuse for the AID's mistake. I am not sure but when this was written there was a lack of knowledge about how AID's was transmitted leading to all sorts of rumours and theories about how it took place and the writer just used the most prevalent theory at the time.
ReplyDeleteAnd what is your problem with Ancient Egypt anyway? Great review by the way
I find it funny how a comic that seems to lean so favourably to the left of center is trying to support the concept of Eugenics within it. They didn't think this through did they?
ReplyDeleteDude, between the terrible innuendos, the BNP/KKK villains, the ridicuous AIDs thing and having Snowflame present, I would like to personally congradulate you for neither corpsing or crying your way through this one.
ReplyDeleteAlso, while the end credits where on, I opened my door to get a drink and found my mum dancing to the end tune. She says you have great taste. ^_^
"Also, while the end credits where on, I opened my door to get a drink and found my mum dancing to the end tune. She says you have great taste. ^_^"
ReplyDeleteWish I could take credit for the idea. XD While I've heard this song before, never knew the name of it until I asked Todd in the Shadows for a suggestion for a dance song for the Ninja Style Dancer.
"I don't get what's you'r problem with ancient Egypt
ReplyDeleteThe original Hawkman, and Metamorpho got their powers from the Egyptian pantheon, and they are good guys
And even Bastet used to be an ally to Wonder Woman at one point"
Evil/bad things to come out from Ancient Egypt:
-pharaos such as Ramses enslaving Jews and forcing them to build pyramids and monuments
-Imhotep
-The Scorpion King (who turned evil right before turning into a scorpion mummy)
-Ananksunamun
-Black Adam (powered by the Egyptian gods)
-the evil god Apophis/Apep, the god of darkness, chaos, destruction and misery
-the god Kuk/Keku, the god of darkness, chaos and destruction
-Sekhmet, goddess of destruction, pestilence and war, who dressed in a blood-red outfit and had to be pacified instead of worshipped
-Set, the god of darkness and chaos
-Shezmu, the god of execution, slaughter and blood
-rich people having better funerals than peasants
-Userkhaf weakening the central goverment so much that, after his reigns, civil wars and famine started.
-Sensuret III slaughtering and conquering the Nubians
-Salitis invading and conquering the land, forcing everyone to move to Asia
-Hatsheput using manipulation to keep herself in the throne.
"I also believe the idea of creating a comic to talk about sex, drugs and other 'taboo' subjects is a bit of a bad one. I will use games to explain why. Sex and drugs doesn't appear in games alot partly because American taboo's, but mostly because it doesn't really come up. It's only when it should happen naturally that it seems weird that it's not included. Like the censored drugs and fade-to-black 'sex' of Fallout 3. Saving the world from aliens and super villains every week doesn't link naturally to sex and drugs."
This ties to the comments from "Top 15 Things That are Wrong with Identity Crisis": a comic overstepping its boundaries and coming up short as a result.
You CAN talk about sex, drugs, homosexuality and A.I.D.S. in a comic...just not in this kind of comic.
In order to talk about those subjects, you need a darker, more mature and more realistic comic. Something like "Watchmen", "V for Vendetta", "Transmetropolitan", "The Sandman", "American Virgin" or "Hellblazer".
But this ISN'T a Vertigo comic. It's a DC superhero title. As such, a regular superhero title can't handle this mature issues (or at least, handle them all at once) without a competent writer.
This comic did NOT have a competent writer, and it was aimed at a family audience, so it should have stuck with "superheroes vs supervillains" stories and forget about the mature topics.
"Actually the prevailing theory is that Loeb's spiral of really, REALLY awful comics happened right after the tragic death of his son."
Point taken, but still, if something goes wrong with current Marvel, it's most likely Quesada's fault. The man has no idea what makes comics great.
"Or that it means I don't expect EVERYBODY ELSE to drop what they're doing to follow MY show, especially since a lot of them, like me, rely on these videos as their primary source of income. It's why I lampshaded it in the stinger to the Electric Tale of Pikachu episode."
Wether you like it or not, the fact remains that we have a TGWTG Universe. After several team-ups, the "Warrior" reviews, and the Anniversary Videos, TGWTG Earth has now being created. Pretending it isn't there won't make them go away. It's like someone writing a Superman comic set in the main DC Earth where Darkseid unleashes the Anti-Life Equation on 30 % of the Earth's population, and then that writing pretending that only people from Metropolis are affected.
If you start portraying your storylines as having global consequences, then the other videos HAVE to be affected.
"I don't get what's you'r problem with ancient Egypt"
ReplyDeleteBecause usually despite those heroes you mentioned:
1. You have undead mummies or curses that come after you for exploring Egyptian temples/ruins. Research what happened to some of the people who discovered King Tut's tomb. Unfortunately a lot of New Agers, Occultists, and Conspiracy Theorists believed they died from King Tut's curse.
2. You often have way more evil characters in fiction who get their powers or evil talismans from Egypt. Not just in comics, but in: Pulp adventure stories of the 20's/30's, manga, anime, cartoons, live action movies, fantasy novels, mass etc.
Or they happen to be evil Egyptian gods/demi-gods: See the Aladdin TV series.
3. The sad thing of Egyptian mythology and religion being demonized by other religions. This happens to all cultures deemed as "pagan".
I do thank the brave soul way above for reveling the true ancient evil as outlined in Yugioh 5D's:
Peru.
We all know that those giant Petroglyphs you have is just a welcome mat sign towards invading aliens! That or they seal evil Eartbound gods that will kill us all. I can never tell which is which.
Concerning unexplained mystery stuff, I would love to have Linkara go on about the "modern evil" that is the Denver International Airport as foretold by the great sage: Jesse Ventura.
"Or they happen to be evil Egyptian gods/demi-gods: See the Aladdin TV series."
ReplyDeleteOr Stargate - SG: 1 - where the entire pantheon (but, to be fair, NOT just the egyptian) was declared to be parasites in bodys of humans. ^^
The New Guardians is hands down one of the weirdest ideas I have ever heard of. Normally, that's a good thing with me. In this case however, it is not.
ReplyDeleteWhat the heck is this?
The premise of the series sounds like the plot of "The Justice Friends: The Porn Parody".
All that being said, its awesome to see Snowflame alive and well.
Exiled One- "But this ISN'T a Vertigo comic. "It's a DC superhero title. As such, a regular superhero title can't handle this mature issues (or at least, handle them all at once) without a competent writer."
ReplyDeleteThat might be true, a good writer wouldn't have tried to shoehorn in such material. But the problem is not with the writer completely.
For me the problem is here
"You CAN talk about sex, drugs, homosexuality and A.I.D.S. in a comic"
You can TALK about them, but there's nothing really to SAY about the subject.
I will try to explain. If I said "Let's talk about drugs" what would we say that wasn't completely obvious to both of us? Not alot.
But if I said "Let's talk about the legality of drugs." now we are getting somewhere.
The thing is, we are not talking 'about drugs' but instead discussing 'the legal and moral grey area around drugs'.
Jet - An English girl who could manipulate electromagnetic fields to a variety of effects. She was infected with HIV after being being bitten by an The Hemogoblin, a vampire with AIDS. After apparently giving her life to fend off an alien Invasion, Jet is now alive again and leading the Global Guardians.
ReplyDeleteIt's like they made a conscious effort to design the worst superhero team ever:
ReplyDeleteUgly costumes and visual designs. Egotistical characters who go on about their supposed superiority, despite how clearly D-List they are. A mission that amounts to getting laid, something that should be pretty easy, if you're easy.
I don't know which one of these characters grates the most. I'm thinking it's Extrano. Which is Spanish for "strange"...strange as in queer. Haha GET IT?
Nah, he was a gay stereotype but he didn't really seem to do anything here. He didn't piss me off as much as the two female ethnic stereotypes who hit the club talking like they were such hot stuff, only to quickly prove how ditzy they were. Although Floronic Man easily beats anyone on this team in sheer creepiness...
Great review as always, Linkara!
BVM,
ReplyDeleteHey Linkara, sorry to go off topic but, have you heard that DC are going to publish this year a 'prequel' to Watchmen? Its caled Before Watchmen. My initial reaction was WHATTHEHELLPLEASEDON'TDOITFORTHELVETHEBLESSEDVIRGI... until I saw Brian Azzarello was writing Rorschach and I'm honestly thinking of giving tia try. What do you think?
"What do you think?"
ReplyDeleteCheck my twitter for my response.
"...but Gloss asserts herself as the leader of the group because...uh...she shows more cleavage than everyone else?"
ReplyDeleteAnd you don't just mean everyone else on the team. You mean everyone else as in everyone else.
Am i the only one who would love to see a crossover with snowflame and the ultimate warrior.
ReplyDelete"Wether you like it or not, the fact remains that we have a TGWTG Universe. After several team-ups, the "Warrior" reviews, and the Anniversary Videos, TGWTG Earth has now being created. Pretending it isn't there won't make them go away. It's like someone writing a Superman comic set in the main DC Earth where Darkseid unleashes the Anti-Life Equation on 30 % of the Earth's population, and then that writing pretending that only people from Metropolis are affected.
ReplyDeleteIf you start portraying your storylines as having global consequences, then the other videos HAVE to be affected."
Eh, no, he doesnt. For the same reason why Image comics doesnt have to.
""Wether you like it or not, the fact remains that we have a TGWTG Universe. After several team-ups, the "Warrior" reviews, and the Anniversary Videos, TGWTG Earth has now being created. Pretending it isn't there won't make them go away. It's like someone writing a Superman comic set in the main DC Earth where Darkseid unleashes the Anti-Life Equation on 30 % of the Earth's population, and then that writing pretending that only people from Metropolis are affected.
ReplyDeleteIf you start portraying your storylines as having global consequences, then the other videos HAVE to be affected.""
Eh, no, he doesnt. For the same reason why Image comics doesnt have to."
Good call, sir! Whether he likes it or not? Jeez, somebody likes to gives order to the people who provide them free entertainment. Sometimes you have to take continuity issues with a grain of salt. This is LEWIS'S show and just because he has a somewhat more epic vision than other reviewers doesn't mean other reviewers should give up their precious time at his beck and call; that's not fair. Go write some fanfiction if you the thought of crossovers salivates you so much
"Good call, sir! Whether he likes it or not? Jeez, somebody likes to gives order to the people who provide them free entertainment. Sometimes you have to take continuity issues with a grain of salt. This is LEWIS'S show and just because he has a somewhat more epic vision than other reviewers doesn't mean other reviewers should give up their precious time at his beck and call; that's not fair. Go write some fanfiction if you the thought of crossovers salivates you so much"
ReplyDeletePlus, they already do that. On smaller scales, nonetheless, but they do it. They tie the other reviewers in, whenever it fits.
Lindsay has him and others act in the "What women want" video, Doug was afraid of Linkara showing up in his reviews - which he is apparently doing - the other reviewers appeared in the "A piece of the world is missing" - arc, just to be vanishing...
So, the exiled one, there was no need to point out, what in your oppinion had to be done, because it is done already.
And although, it is logical, from a logical standpoint - that all of the videos in the TGWTG-Universe should have to be interconnected in some point, I agree with Martin and the 13th Doctor, when they said, that it would not be neccessary.
It is logical, yes - but not really a neccessity.
Greets
Cal
Great review, nice portrayal of Wolfgram as Snowflame. He should be a recurring gag character. Say, will Wolfgram be making appearances throughout the show?
ReplyDeleteThis comic is awful, nothing but stereotypes and ill-conceived research into AIDS. I think the second issue seems to be better, because of SNOWFLAME! Can't wait to see the other issues soon.
I'm sure everyone has said this now but more SNOWFLAME! OMG, that was great. If you can actually make him do something that would be even better!
ReplyDeleteAwesome I've been waiting years to see this review!
ReplyDeleteI like your Snowflame character he should be used more from now on!
I'm curious of where this comic went before it was canned!? I know about the fates of the characters because of their wiki pages but most are bare minimum! I know the Floral Man became a villain again! and most are now dead! And their most recent appearance were as Black Lanterns/cannon fodder!
So was there ever a reason they chose the old racist as a member?
Well can't wait for more of this series! Til Next Time!
@ BooRat
ReplyDelete"And their most recent appearance were as Black Lanterns/cannon fodder!"
Where did they appear in the black-lantern canon as cannon-fodder?
I have to be honest about the concept of the series: Even the concept about the series is fightening. There are these five people, that are selected to create a new uber-race by means of, as Jochen Malmsheimer, a german comedian put it "ergebnisorientierten Sexes" (results-oriented sex). So there are five beings, which represent the next step in human evolution or crap like that, and shall f**** around, in order to bring humanity as a whole to that new step in human evoultion.
And as this concept is scary enough, it needs to be handled with care - unfortunately, it was not.
The idea of a comic being so bold, that it adresses stuff like sex, aids, drug-use etc. is a good one, and even with Floro, who is both a guy, who has used drugs on his own behalf AND helped in the creation of plant-goddess Poison Ivy by the means of drugs, could have been the right person to talk about the abuse of that stuff.
But what about the other ones?
*shrugs*
Well - great review, as I said, and I am looking forward to monday.
Greets
Cal
"CaptainCalvinCat said...
ReplyDelete@ BooRat
'And their most recent appearance were as Black Lanterns/cannon fodder!'
Where did they appear in the black-lantern canon as cannon-fodder?"
From Wikipedia, "Harbinger reanimated as a Black Lantern during the Blackest Night crossover. She uses her knowledge of history to provoke her targets by bringing up emotional memories, but is destroyed with the other Black Lanterns."
One thing I've learn about the Blackest Night arc is that any dead DC character no matter how little known they are or forgotten were at some point brought back as a Black Lantern and unless they could serve a real purpose where mostly used as background filler for crowd scenes or used as canon fodder(characters that could be killed off in battle scene without having to lose main charcters).
further research has shown though most of this team weren't Black Lanterns but another super hero team long forgotten that Mr. Linkara reviewed a while back was I got the teams mixed up! Blood Pack to be precise!
Great Hitchhiker's Guide reference, Linkara.
ReplyDeleteI was taught you CAN get AIDS from saliva. All you need to do is drink about a bucketful. (Saliva doesn't kill AIDS, but it only contains tiny, trace amounts. As I was taught.)
I've always found Jeph Loeb to be overrated. Comics companies seem to treat him like one of the best writers ever, when I've always found him average at best. And that includes Long Hallowe'en and Hush.
I just read up on this team. Evidently the team split up after a while, and just in case they DID, there was a "back up" plan the Guardians had enacted...the plan being that people with "superior DNA" would come from beings that, you guessed it, that racist Kroef created. Now, I would HOPE that, at the end of "New Guardians", the guy finally overcame his racism, but if he didn't...this means that the white supremacist guy...kinda succeeded. The "future race of superior people" would be, well, Aryan-esque "ubermensch".
ReplyDeleteWhich TOTALLY undercuts the whole "diverse group" theme that the book was founded on, on how all these beings from different shades of life would be the new generation of immortals. Way to TOTALLY miss the point of your own series, New Guardians. >.<
"Okay, that's it. I can understand the Egyptian thing as a running gag, but the Saint Dragon God of Osiris' dubbed name came from Roger Slifer, one 4Kids's employees who worked on the dub. This could have been a better opportunity to make a joke at that company."
ReplyDeleteAs it turns out, Roger Slifer is most likely the name source for the reference in the comic, also. He used to write for comics and is a friend of Englehart (mostly notably, Slifer co-created Lobo with Keith Giffen).
Anybody notice the ad for Hawk & Dove on the back cover? Liefeld artwork lurking about on a crappy comic! (though H&D was a pretty good comic for the time, and the art was helped considerably by inker/writer Karl Kesel)
I think this is my favorite review you've posted in a while. Good work, good sir.
ReplyDeleteSo, I'm listening to this episode on headphones and around the 3:20 or so mark where Snowflame is asking, "Are you the passport man?" I can hear what I'm going to guess is a police siren...what did Snowflame do? Or did the neighbors call to report this strange man around your house?
ReplyDeleteGreat episode sir, definitely one of your best. Next time Vice or one of your other enemies comes around, maybe you should give your team the fight off and call in Snowflame.
Also...Ninja Style Dancer! Oh how I've missed your dancing ninja antics.
Perhaps if Ninja Style Dancer and Snowflame could dance together, Ancient Egypt would be thwarted at last!
Have a great day,
Dark Patrician
The citadel referred to was the HQ of the Earth based Green Lantern Corps, consisting of Hal Jordan, John Stewart, Katma Tui, Salaak, Ch'p, Arissa, & Kilowag. After Crisis on Infinite Earths, the Guardians left and allowed the Lanterns to organize as they saw fit. These sever formed a team on Earth. Guy Gardner was also on Earth at the time, but he was at the height of his jerkass phase and no one wanted him around.
ReplyDeleteNow, I'm not sure about the timing, but given the comment in New Guardians #1, I'm guessing this took place after Green Lantern Corps #224 (retitled and continuing the number from the solo Green Lantern title). The Corps gathered together on Oa and voted to kill Sinestro. This activated some sort of failsafe in the Central Power Battery and it started to break down. Apparently, when the Guardians and the Zamorans broke up, the Zamorans spent some time on Sinestro's home planet and the Guardians built in the failsafe to prevent them using their powers to take revenge on the men of Korugar for stealing their women (you might actually want to review that little bit).
Anyway, Hal Jordan went into the Central Battery and stopped the breakdown but every Green Lantern present had their rings destroyed and there wasn't enough power to make new ones, but there was enough to power the few that remained. Hal's was spared because he went into the CPB and since Guy wasn't there (he was a dick, so no one invited him), his remained intact as well. I believe this is where Hal picked up Parallax, but it didn't manifest for some time after.
As a fellow Midwesterner, I can verify that anyone willing to make snow angels with bare arms and shoulders is truly committed to the gag. Great review Linkara, and Super Kudos to Mister Wolfgram, apparently a real-life metahuman.
ReplyDeleteHow do you manage to not just keep laughing when Will is jumping around as Snowflame?
ReplyDeleteDid the plushies being tossed at you require a few takes?
Still a very fun review.
19:38 Does it say "Prop Building" on the plaque in the middle panel?
ReplyDeleteThe fact that Snowflame and Lord Vyce is played by the same person is as amusingly incongruous as Frank Welker doing the voices of Megatron and Curios George.
ReplyDeleteI'm currently doing an archive binge, and will be terrible disappointed if at some point Snowflame and the Ultimate Warrior do not share a scene together.