Long term fan in the UK here, Thought I'd clear up the Gloucestershire problem for you (I know, sorry. Hang on no I'm not.) The U in the word is the same as having it in Colour. It should be silent. It is because English is a hodgepodge of all sorts of different languages French, Latin, Saxon, Gaelic. Basically if it's every European language got together and had a basted offspring it left in the cupboard for six years, and don't even get me started on the grammar. The U is a leftover from the French influence, something that American standards of spelling have rejected. This is also why we spell words like Night, Centre and Synthesiser differently. Also the E after the C makes the C into an S sound, which is why it comes out like that when you're saying it. if you have problems with Gloucestershire you really shouldn't try Worcester which is exactly the same thing (although I would suggest trying som e Worcester sauce to improve you're diet.) Oh and the worst thing about spelling over here, Microsoft Word defaults to the US spellings no matter what you do, Damn it.
Good work though, I havent reviewed in a while but I have kept watching. best of luck with 2013, hope for a few less picky commenters
Thomas
PS If you ever need any help with the Transformers script you've got coming drop me a line, seriously I could out do Nash on this...
I know I had to stop the video at the Agelo part, but, have you tried the website comicvine?
Usually when I come across a character I don't know, I type in their name and get a pretty detailed description of who they were and how many comics they were in.
Excellent video to wrap up the year Linkara Just a few screw-ups i think deserve a mention are: Marville #1 you did not analyze the cover, and there are some things to be said about that cover Battle for Bludheaven #1: Major victory DID tell the titans that he had no problem with them helping people outside of the restricted area Incredible Hulk #1 : the clip you used for proof of the monsters name being Frankenstein does not work because Igor is the crazed villain of the movie and not someone to be trusted much less base an argument off of. Your argument from That’s all I’m saying on the subject of Frankenstein was more convincing.
1) Marvel says they want to focus on Avengers, X-Men and Spider-Man titles. 2) THAT'S THE POINT! It's a criticism on racism! Think about it, people are racist to black people when they are the same as everyone else! THAT'S THE POINT! Mutants are being prejudiced against even though they are like everyone else!
It just shows how pointless racism is when everyone is the same! Racism isn't rational, it's the fear of other people who appear different when they really aren't!
I'm sorry, but that part of your video got me riled up that I had to stop it right there!
I too really like Babylon 5, Hence my constant pestering for a review of one of the B5 comics. WILL NOONE FEED MY ADDICTION APART FROM SFDEBRIS?!!! D:
Actually, I've never minded overmuch when you neglect to burn the comics. Granted, OMD deserves it to hell and back, but I always figured the burning in the slogan was more metaphorical and less literal. Still, them pages make a satisfying crackle, eh?
Also, thank God someone else thought House of M sucked too. Although in my specific case, it's not so much the X-Men that are the problem as much as the Scarlet Witch, whom I've seriously come to despise over the years due to her nonsense. Seriously, Quesada, SFDebris had it right: let Scarlet Witch make the deal with Spiderman and turn HER into the series' main villain, since she's basically Marvel's greatest monster anyway!
I was disappointed you didn't mention the botched joke about the GL HQ from New Guardians #1, but whatever. I was glad you brought up the depression stuff, while that scene is dumb some of your comments about the depressed woman were a little harsh. I didn't catch the error in the Supergirl review but now I see it and wonder why you guys didn't just cut the line. Overall a good video and look forward to what next year brings.
You missed another one: I can't find our twitter talks about the Blüdhaven review, but I recall you making a mistake in those videos that we cleared up.
I never really cared for the mutant breed. I'm a fan of "all star" teams like the Justice League or the Avengers, but for some reason the X-Men and their exploits have always left me fairly cold.
I've never done this before, but you made a mistake here. In the credits, you forgot to credit Green Day's "Redundant", the song you played over the Title Card. Big Green Day fan here, so that's how I noticed it. Just making sure you don't get into legal trouble.
Alas almost all typing things in the UK default to the American spelling of words.Usually you end up with a clumsy mess of British and American spellings which is ... irritating.
Great video though , keep up the good work while still making mistakes
For any family that celebrates Epiphany/Little Christmas, means they also take into account that Christmas does last 12 days and is still going, something my step father does and gives out one small gift a day to his son with one for the first and little Christmas days.
You guys seem to always want to start early and not even bother with all of Christmas, it get sort of annoying to hear every video do this.
That was a… pretty brutal talk-down of the X-Men. The reason most modern Marvel events can be traced back to the X-Men is because House of M really did have that long lasting repercussions. Either that or Marvel just really liked tying things back to that. If I recall, there was a time when the X-Men were Marvel's biggest selling franchise, hence the support for them. I'm sure X-Men fans will either disagree with you or feel so burnt out by what Marvel has done, but from what I recall, the only new X-Men books in Marvel NOW! are All-New X-Men, Cable and X-Force, and The Savage Wolverine, since everything else is just a relaunch. MAYBE Uncanny Avengers and A+X, but those books are really just meant to be as followups to AvX and are just as much Avengers books as they are X-Men.
I actually think Onslaught looks kind of cool, but my understanding is that Onslaught storyline was essentially the X-Men's Clone Saga.
A screw-up in a screw-up video? SCREWUPCEPTION!
I'm glad I'm not the only one who has such bland tastes, since I have a tendency to eat chicken fingers and chicken tenders. For sandwiches, I prefer peanut butter and jelly or grilled cheese, but even I like putting milk in my cereal.
For your comment on Archie Comics, I was curious if you were going to address the numbering, in case you screwed that up.
Aw, I was hoping to hear a shout-out to Spider-Man Crawlspace. Ah well, at least you felt regret for insulting JMS. And yeah, I love that you pointed out that your one compliment for Quesada wasn't deserved.
Now that I got that out of the way, I'm VERY happy that burning One More Day was the number one spot, and that you did burn it in this video. That's all I wanted from this video, so it was the perfect way to bid farewell to 2012 and welcome 2013. Playing One Day More again was unexpected, but I loved it.
I'm looking forward to 2099, if only because I've grown to like the character from the video games.
Thanks to another great year for Atop the Fourth Wall, and here's to another!
First I wanna say I'm a really big fan and want to thank you for finally burning one more day. That comic has caused me pain for a while. However, I do feel a little hurt by your bashing of the X-men. I just got into the characters after reading Joss Whedon's spectacular run on Astonishing X-men and there is a lot to like about the characters. I do see where you are coming from and can agree with many of your insights (seriously the whole mutant racism thing is perplexing), but there is a lot to like about the x-men as well. The team is comprised of many interesting characters, has some amazing villains, and is in many ways dysfunctional. Its that factor that ultimately shapes the team and leads to its biggest struggles. Do I wish that marvel portrayed the team better? Yes! But that doesn't mean it should stop publishing stories altogether, it just means that it needs to rethink its approach.
Nice way to close off the year. It really shows just how humble you are that you go through the trouble of dedicating an entire episode to admitting your mistakes.
Lewis, I'm starting to wish I was maybe ten years older and lived in Minnesota just to have a conversation with you. It's so nice to know other people are indifferent to X-Men and prefer that kind of food. Though how do you eat your cereal? Dry or do you take it with something else? I've heard some people eat it with juice.
Though since you mentioned Heroes Reborn, I wonder if you'll tackle it eventually . . . if only because of Rob Liefeld.
It's been a good year at AT4W and let's hope for a great new year.
It's weird how I didn't notice some of these, but I'll chalk that up to my general un-knowledge of comic continuity or history and other things. As for hard water, that pushes Jay's origin into the second weirdest origin I've heard, right after Ralph Dibny and Gingold.
Don't feel bad about the depression comments. Like you said, it is a complex issue, and it is possible the woman was actually a histrionic (a different yet just as valid mental disease that emphasizes exaggeration of personal experiences to get attention.) Hell, it is still more informed that what my brother, allegedly a depression-sufferer himself, said the other day along the lines that depressed people should just get over it.
Because neither of them was hosted by you, and because I figured releasing crossovers may happen at different times on different shows, I treated them as they would have to match the timelines of the respected shows and not necesseraly the AT4W one.
So well, besides that one question regarding when and where could have the hologram - or Linkara himself, since the hologram had his knowledge and all - met the Nostalgia Chick on a such a short notice as 5 days, I think they were plausible.
1. Your comment on suicide was great Lewis. It is always a touchy subject.
2. This whole thing about the X-Men just ticks me off. By the time the 15th anniversary of the first movie comes out, we will have a million books and 7 movies. In all honesty, Marvel should have put the X-Men in the Heroes Reborn Universe. Their concept works better in their own continuity than mixed in with Spidey or Cap.
3. Superior Spider-Man will be dead by the next movie.
4. At Magfest, could you maybe review a chapter of Rosario + Vampire? It is usually good, but even you can mock the good stuff and still make it entertaining.
5. 2099 and Teen Titans for 2013? I am hyped as hell! Happy New Year Lewis!
Asthma Monster Comic Panel! The first panel you are showing in talking about getting this wrong look at the left edge of the panel. THE GUARD HAS A GUN ON HIS HIP! You weren't Wrong There are Guns on the Guards in this Prison the Comic is WRONG, Not You in this case. He is drawn with a gun. You are making a mistake about your mistake Its spiraling Linkara!
I Really missed CHYDCABPNTKIOTUT Comic History you don't care about but probably need to know in order to understand this.
Well at least you tried to make Joe C. have a half decent moment.
THANK YOU FOR BURNING ONE MORE DAY!!!!!!!!!!! Metal buckets are better for burning....
Sadly on Eating Xavier's brain no I would not have been surprised.
So got time to do a text overlay and arrow pointing out the gun in that comic panel?
X-Men : In my opinion, more than racism or fear of the difference, the X-Men mythos plays on the fear of the humans being inexorably replaced by another, allegedly superior race (see the regular comparison with the neanderthal being replaced by the homo sapiens). I don't think this can be compared to characters being granted powers by accidents or experiments (FF and Captain America). Civil War : AvX makes a point to say that non-mutants heroes rarely gave a damn when mutants were persecuted (save for a Reed Richards appearance where he advocates the end of a mutant registration act), so Civil War events are really a karmic backlash. Onslaught and Heroes Reborn : I just love how you (sarcastically) put the blame of editiorial mandate on fictionnal characters.
By the way, how is One more day traceable to the X-Men ? (Ok, maybe Elixir could have prevented it...)
2099... I wonder : Peter David's Spiderman and Doom were good to awesome, Ghost Rider / X-Men were average (Ghost rider : The art shift between Chris Bachalo to Kyle Hotz was painful though), Ravage and Punisher were awful. It's Ravage, isn't it ?
I'm ashamed to say I think I can identify the white-haired woman, having read the 90s series Steel where she plays a more important role.
One Day More : I wish you used the Chick's musical review version.
Happy New Year. Hey weshley and mittnickpick and nostalgia chick. :) 15. We all mistakes. I didn't catch it. 14. I forgotten about them appearing in other books too. 13. Skin death was big shot at Gen X and I forgotten about him. It was literally a throw away death meant nothing. I don't know I like the x-men when done right like in Wolverine and X-Men. Not in X-Men books run by Cyclops. You had to remind me of Uncanny Avengers #1 didn't you? 12. Anyone could have made that mistake. As you said no way to tell that is right way. 10. I didn't know what coney dog was either. I thought it was a hot dog from coney island. 9. I'm glad you admitted not doing research. G2 I have to say not one of my favorite transformers comic series. There so many things wrong and I forgotten they had pretty much tried separate from previous. Is that call back to me saying it was a Pretender? Hm. Why was it even in the image? I don't remember any expect maybe a depticon one but looked like autobot pretender shell in the image. 7. I didn't even notice the emitter. 6. JMS was for the break up and glad you mention. 5. I'm going to reference this video any time Joe q fans want to praise what he did to save company. 4. Yeah I don't think anyone here in us would have know that. That is okay mistake. 3. Nice to know you still look. My first episode was more then a year and half ago. 1. YES, YES, YES! Burn baby burn. Sorry I hate OMD and I reminds me how much i'm raging over Amazing Octopus #700. No mention of Jaws on one of Marvell covers? I mean you missed that one. That belonged less with those other movies like MTS3K Manos Hands Of Fate. Magfest this week! Yeah! Next week Kamandi. Oh boy. Marvel 2099? I really liked it. There was some good stuff and some bad stuff. Spider-Man 2099 man was really good (get well peter david). Should be interesting I hope. Interesting fact that when I use Supermutant name and it's taken I have years used 2099. It's oh to Marvel 2099.
To Balence the Avi Arad thing out, he IS responsible for Most of everything we have seen in Spider-Man 3. Sam Rami, Well, He wanted Sandman and the only thing form him that he got was the retcon. which honestly took the WHOLE POINT of the first film's origin and theme about responsibility out. Also Sam wanted Harry to be "somewhere in between" him becoming his father and him being himself. Instead we got an okay spider-man film that unlike TASM (both versions are a crappy film BTW) that could of been a better movie. Atlas the final product we got in SM3 was the "BEST CASE SENARIO" sadly with all that studio interference. Avi doesn't really care, its all about the money.
The point is, he's just to blame for lots of things he did right. hell he didn't even care about spider-man TAS since he had no idea about the characters.
Lewis, As someone who has AS (Asperger Syndrome, you can bing/google slap {search for it in the inbox] while its a little bit different for me as it is for others, As a disabled person I have to ay thank you for being very respectful to others, to me that what makes a human being more of a good person, it's those that have respect for others and grant them a sharing hand of health.
Ypu Lewis Lovag, are My Role Model. Have a good and wonderful new year my friend, and mentor.
You seemed a little harsh on the X-men, while yes they are like every other superhero and as was stated that is the point, but there is more to it. First, there is a fear associated with being a human and seeing the next form of evolution as I can imagine was the case for Homo Erectus upon seeing Homo Sapien and seeing their own numbers dwindling. Not to mention the jealousy that is associated with seeing the next step of evolution and knowing you won't be along for the ride can eat someone up.
Second, you can't blame the X-men for all of the events listed. The Civil War? Yeah Emma told Tony where to go and how to get there pretty damn fast. Even though it was based on the MRA that's not on them. The House of M? Wanda was an Avenger when that went down. Yeah Onslaught was on the X-men, but the reveal was one of the most well built up and surprising in my lifetime.
Third, yes the Exiles rocked! Thanks for acknowledging that.
That's all, keep up the good work and I look forward to the 2099 stuff.
I also am not fond of toppings on hot dogs or pizza (or much of anything for that matter) and I also do not put milk in my cereal. /brofist
Also, the mention of "inhibitor collars" made me wonder if you finally started watching "Young Justice" since I can't really think of any other version of the DC universe that has had metahuman prisons that use inhibitor collars to suppress abilities. As I recall, Belle Reve in the comics implants explosive devices to keep their prisoners (and the Suicide Squad) obedient.
Great Top 15 I especially liked seeing One More Day get burned. And seriously? Doc Ock is now Spider-man? I admit after One More Day I lost most interest, but still kept in the loop, but my god. I seen many ass pulls in my life, but that one takes it.
I have been uncomfortable about your burning of comics in the past, which honestly stems from more personal beliefs about burning books and implications. I'm also smart enough to know that you are doing this for a joke, and I accept that, I still get that twinge, sorry.
BUT. It feels surprisingly good to watch OMD burn. I am conflicted by this. Thank you Linkara.
I give you massive applause for your apology about the depressed girl in the Superman comic. That takes real guts to admit to it and I was touched by it. Thank you.
And thank you for burning One More Day! That made me smile!
Also, rocket nipples still makes me laugh so I don't even care about how spears really work :D
"I've never done this before, but you made a mistake here. In the credits, you forgot to credit Green Day's "Redundant", the song you played over the Title Card. Big Green Day fan here, so that's how I noticed it. Just making sure you don't get into legal trouble."
Yeah, I realized that, too. Redundant was going to be the ending them, but then One Day More fit better with how the video ended, sooo I forgot to write it into the credits.
"Also, the mention of "inhibitor collars" made me wonder if you finally started watching "Young Justice" since I can't really think of any other version of the DC universe that has had metahuman prisons that use inhibitor collars to suppress abilities. As I recall, Belle Reve in the comics implants explosive devices to keep their prisoners (and the Suicide Squad) obedient."
In the late-90s and early-2000s, the DCU had an abundance of inhibitor collars at their prisons that could be used to quell riots and stop powers. I felt it was quite clever... and then the writers and editors apparently forgot those existed.
We are including Pat Lee in unethical business practices, right? Because he most certainly deserves it. Also, this could be wild guessing on my part, but do you think it's possible that Marvel did the Spider-Man thing you mentioned in the end credits so that Peter and MJ could get back together? I certainly wouldn't mind it. But it was great to see OMD get what it deserves. And seriously, it's either a miracle or tragic comedy that the comic industry hasn't discovered you yet. Seriously, I don't think anyone would object if you became the head writer for DC or Marvel. Except maybe the X-Men fans.
Spell checks are much more fun in the UK. Everytime we install new software with a spell checker we have to reconvince it that we want UK spelling despite the system being set up that way. Then there are the times the OS, usually Windows, will randomly decide that it wants us to use an American keyboard, which isn't noticed until we want quotation marks or are writing an email.
As for your eyes on the camera, a trick when giving talks is to look just above audience members' eyes so you don't make contact, but they'll percieve that you are to keep them engaged. Try to rig the script for a scene on top of the camera when filming?
yes most of the bad events on Marvel can be traced to the X-men, but one X-man in particular. Scott Summers. A vs X could of been avoided if he he stop and told Cap what his Son, Cable, saw that lead his near murdering the Avengers. Plus there is hisattemptedd kidnapping of Wanda in Children's crusade where he attacks the avengers from behind after the Scarlet whitch agrees to go with the x-men to what would be nothing more then a show trial. Which made her flee from both teams and back into Doom's arm....
almost all the crap the mutants have faced can be traced to one event that to this day defines what kind of man Scott Summers is....A deadbeat father that abandons his wife and new born son to be with high schoolsweethart and doomed the mutants to be forever feared and hated.
"In the late-90s and early-2000s, the DCU had an abundance of inhibitor collars at their prisons that could be used to quell riots and stop powers. I felt it was quite clever... and then the writers and editors apparently forgot those existed."
Huh, no kidding? Yeah, I saw those on YJ and thought, "Wow, how many situations could have been solved if they just had those things in the comics?" I figured if they existed in the comics they'd crop up all the time. I mean, a device that can disable metahuman powers in a world where evil metahumans break out of jail every other week? You'd think they'd remember something like that existed.
Any Chance that the burning will be in the opening credits eventually?
The woman is the White Rabbit I think she was selling Steel's Toastmasters to the gangs of Metropolis and was a major plot point in the reason why Steel was fighting street crime and became a superhero. (He invented the weapons when he worked for the military and was very upset that someone was selling them to street gangs to kill each other)
So the White Rabbit was actually a rather important character in the Return of Superman story arc as the former lover and main villain of John Irons aka Steel.
Marvel has pretty much destroyed the X-Men by this point thanks to Avengers vs X-Men. Almost all of the "good" (or money making mutants like Wolverine) have been absorbed into the Avengers while Cyclops has been reduced to a Magneto clone (a terrorist who has good points, but still commits horrendous crimes) with his own little brotherhood of mutants. Plus also you gotta remember that Marvel doesn't own the X-Men movie license and given their attitudes towards characters whom they can't make movies out of this heel turn is unsurprising...just sayin. :)
I have to say the shift in tone from your somber, sincere talk about depression to the Weird Al song immediately after it was so abrupt it actually made me laugh. Although that is a very hard transition to make.
Seeing the Judas Traveler screw up I immediately remembered that for X-Mas I got "The Complete Clone Saga Epic" I look and that comic exists in it so I'll probably be pulling up that review and marking down every time his entourage shows up. Btw which screw-up was the one you asked the fans to come up with?
Hey you think the Asthma Monster thing is stupid? In Tales of Suspense, Black Knight was put in prison...with his saddlebags in his cell. Guess what was in those saddlebags? Yes, his weapons, including his disintegration gun.
Great video to end off the year and I hope that the next year will be just as good! I like reviewers who take the time to listen to their viewers and take into account on the advice they give. It's one of the many reasons I respect you as a reviewer.
... I do admit that I am the same when it comes to food, especially the chicken and hotdogs.
I... had to stop watching the video after the part where Linkara rants about the X-Men and how he thinks Marvel should stop making X-Men comics.
The majority of the complaints ultimately sounded like trying to find excuses to justify hatred of the brand and reasons to kill it off. The most glaring was claiming that all the most ridiculous and stupid ideas out of Marvel have their origins in the X-Men... when even I know that's not true and I'm not a hardcore comic book fan. From the very beginning, comic books have had incredibly stupid storylines that made absolutely no sense, to the point that it's ingrained into the medium and recurs often. Was Iron Man's suit gaining sentience and developing an obsession for Tony Stark an idea that came from the X-Men? Did the X-Men cause the Clone Saga?
Even if you can find a spot where the X-Men affected the outcome of certain events, you can do the exact same thing for just about any character or brand you want to complain about in the Marvel universe. Suddenly, we're saying the whole Avengers brand should be killed off and the various characters and teams should be kept in separate books because trying to mix them all together results in things like Civil War where heroes are fighting each other.
If Linkara had simply said that Marvel is utilizing the X-Men brand poorly, then I'd agree with him. The X-Men brand is in poor shape due to the way it's being used as of late, in large part because of Marvel trying to force it to meld into Avengers as a subelement of that brand.
But he outright claimed that the X-Men brand is the bane of everything Marvel, and heavily pushed the idea that the whole X-Men brand should be completely wiped out. His X-Men rant in this video can be summed up as "I don't understand the brand nor do I value it, but because stupid events happened because of Marvel doing a poor job trying to force the X-Men brand on the brands I DO care about, it should be killed off!" And at that point, he's unintentionally saying Quesada's One More Day was the right thing to do because of all the times the relationship between Peter Parker and Mary Jane was handled poorly.
got to say, after just getting back from watching Les Mis with my sister, got to love the choice of music during screw-up number 1. I am also glad that you read every comment you get on the site. You and Blockbuster Buster really know how to engage your fans. Thanks for an awesome year. Happy New Year.
Aw, thanks for addressing your comments on depression. They kind of disturbed me when I first heard them because I suffer from depression, and you're usually pretty spot on with being inclusive and stuff (especially in regards to trans people, which is pretty rare) and so I figured it was an honest mistake but I'm glad you addressed it! =)
Also, One More Day was burned! Yaaay! Ding dong the comic is dead (the wicked comic! the wicked comic!) ding dong the wicked comic is deaaad~
Can't wait to see what the new year has in store for us at Atop the Fourth Wall ^_^
Honestly Lewis, catch a break. Seriously, no one is going to lynch you if you miss out on a week or two, especially around this part of the year.
I don't know how much a few hiatuses would set you back financially, but really, putting out a video (plus extras) every week, all around the year is just unhealthy, and we do not want that. Not to mention some free weeks in your work-schedule might actually help out with weeding out these "screw-ups" in the making.
I know how stupid this is gonna sound, but... Do you still have the ashes of One More Day? I'll totally buy them at GatoCon. xD
Also, there's one other little mistake you made in the video, and that's how to pronounce Avi Arad's name. It's "Ah-vee" "Arr-Ahd", not "A-vee" "A-rid". Not too big of a deal, the only reason I know is because I've watched all the documentaries about the making of the Marvel movies more than once over the years, but it's something for next year, right?
Anyway, thanks for another great year of Atop the Fourth Wall, looking forward to it, especially Marvel 2099!
One big screw-up in the video about screw-ups, while Ron Perlman was responsible for a LOT of bad things Marville wasn't one of them. Bill Jemas the editor who wrote and approved of Marville was hired under Avi Arad and Ike Permutter's watch.
Also one can't completely write off Joe Quesada as playing a role in Marvel's recovery. You personally may not like the "Ultimate" line and "Civil War" but they were very, very significant financial successes.
As a fan of Peter David and Warren Ellis' work on "Spider-Man 2099" and "Doom 2099 A.D." respectively, I'm curious about which of the other 2099 series you are going to review Linkara. Will you go after the low hanging fruit that is "Ravage 2099" or "X-Nation 2099"? The mediocre "Punisher 2099" or the Hulk 2099 shorts from "2099 Unlimited"? The redundant "Fantastic Four 2099"? Or will you go after the three good 2099 books (Spider-Man, Doom and X-Men) that declined in quality immediately after the authors and artists quit en masse to protest Marvel firing the line editor Joey Cavelieri? Wow there are so many choices!
Seriously, I really liked Spider-Man 2099, Doom 2099 and X-Men 2099. (Ghost Rider 2099 was a quality comic book, but I'm not that into cyberpunk) but after Peter David, Warren Ellis quit in solidarity with Joey Cavalieri, the quality nosedived. Ghost Rider 2099 had already been cancelled and the rest of the line was put out of its mercy two months later. Such a waste!
On a more serious note, comic book writer Peter David suffered a stroke this weekend. The last I heard he is recovering in a Florida hospital. I pray that he has a swift recovery.
Linkara I've always respected your humor and thought of you as one of the best of Channel Awesome. However, I feel I have to say. You truly are an amazing person. Admitting one's mistakes, especially the painful ones like your number 2...takes strength and conviction. It was moving...especially because you didn't make excuses for it. Just a sincere apology for poorly chosen words. And I feel an immense amount of respect not just for your humor, but for you as a human being. You're one of the best of us, good sir.
On a lighter note, have you ever thought of doing an episode or a write up on top ways the comic industry could improve or on rants you want to make or had to be cut from episodes? While it was kind of tangential, I really enjoyed your X-men rant and think a few more like it could be really interesting.
Last time I checked there were only 198 mutants remaining because something something Scarlet Witch something.
I agree that them facing discrimination while Captain America and the Fantastic Four can run around just fine is pretty dumb. While I don't think stopping X-Men comic altogether would be a good idea; they're too iconic. I think that somehow placing them in an alternate universe without other superheros would be for the best.
I would like to see a different angle in Xmen. Namely they own up to the fact that humanity fears them cuz THEY ARE DANGEROUS..its not about being different its about being born with the ability to shoot lasers from your eyes, invade peoples minds, walk through walls, control the weather. That's some pretty scary stuff and should be regulated
Really enjoyable episode, but when you brought up the Thunderdome joke, it got me to remember something. You missed an opprotunity to make a beyond thunderdome joke during the Time Force review for History of Power Rangers, during the part where Ransik has Mad Max gear. It's something that's bugged me for a while, and I'm not sure if you ever realized, if you have then I'm sorry for bugging you.
If you need some help with the next Transformers review, big Transformers fan who occasionally makes video reviews here. Just...throwing it out there. :) Although I rather like #31 and think people blow it out of proportion.
Now most of the stuff Furman writes...I have an entire article series devoted to my problems with that. You know how to reach me. :D
Putting the shameless self-promoting aside, JMS may not be responsible for One More Day, but he did still make "Grounded" and the current "Earth-1" GNs that both show why, as good as Babylon 5 is, he should never be allowed around Superman again.
Completely disagree with u on xmen, xmen and runaways and marvel max comics are pretty much the only comics I still like, all the other stuff is boring to me. But none the less decent video.
The reason why people hate mutants but not Captain America or the Fantastic Four is simple, the human race isn't being slowly replaced by Homo Captain-Americus.
People don't like the idea of being part of a species on the way out. Hell, some people refuse to accept the very concept of evolution because it stops us from being God's special snowflakes. People also don't like things that are different, hence racism.
Captain America is someone people can aspire to be like, someone who used to be normal who became extraordinary. The X-Men are an 'other' who are more than happy to inform you that their descendants are going to replace yours as Earth's top dogs.
Great video. And nice to see you burn One More Day.
I do disagree with your argument about Mutants in the Marvel U. though, and how they "make no sense" in the larger context of other heroes.
You mentioned that the other heroes like Captain America, the Avengers and the Fantastic Four are regarded with favor and no discrimination, whereas the X-Men are scorned. Thing of it is, that's not entirely true. Captain America, the Avengers, the Fantastic Four and- obviously- and someone like Spider-Man have faced discrimination and fear from the populace numerous times. The Avengers were faced with protests against some of their actions. The FF have been threatened to be evicted from the Baxter Building, the Thing has been treated with fear for looking like a monster. And guys like Spidey and the Hulk are feared more than they are loved. So a superhero in the Marvel U. isn't something that everyone admires. It often results in a lot of criticism and derision from the people. Sure, there are also those that support them. But it's a fairly mixed bag.
And the thing to remember is that these are characters that often publicly save the world. So one could argue that the people in the Marvel U. do see some inherent worth in the Marvel Heroes from time to time, especially when they risk their lives to save the day. The mutants, on the other hand, don't really do that as often and are regarded as beings that are out to replace humanity. And keep in mind the X-Men don't usually save the day in public as much as the Avengers or FF do. They're often fighting in the shadows, away from humanity. It's reasonable to believe that the general public saw no distinction between "X-Men" and "Mutants" since the X-Men don't really do too much to establish a distinction between those two ideals. However, when the X-Men or other mutants DID save the day in a very public manner- such as the X-Men apparently sacrificing themselves to stop the Adversary in Dallas, TX, or X-Factor saving New York City from Apocalypse- the populace was exceptionally grateful and DID treat them as heroes.
Congrats on another year Linkara. Looking forward to 2013. Some of my thoughts are already stated, so per your request I won't repeat them.
Xmen, they really needed to be self-contained from the rest of the Marvel Universe or further play on the hypocrisy of why humanity hates mutants specifically in a world full of metahumans. Can't have it both ways (aka what the current Red Skull arc Linkara referenced seems to be doing, AGAIN).
On a serious note: Being one who regularly deals with those suffering from various physical and mental issues (present in my family, my community, and my work), I can state I'm very appreciative of your attempts to avoid using terms like "retarded" in your reviews. While I'm aware the word's societal-slang usage doesn't necessarily convey the same intent as its slur usage, "retarded" still tends to offend many in that community (example: enough that state governments are recognizing the concern and removing such terminology from legal documents). It's something often overlooked, especially on the consequence-free environment of the internet, so the extra effort is noticed. Thank you.
----- And now for something less somber and more enjoyable: Building on "Nathaniel Towns" comment: For fans of the Transformers cartoons in the early 90s, "Slag" was a phrase commonly uttered by many of the Transformers (Dinobot and Rattrap primarily) in place of an expletive. Unfortunately, as NT stated, Slag is in fact an expletive on the other side of the pond, so in essence we were all watching a children's cartoon in the early 90s filled with heroes and villains shouting curse words.
Your ability to take criticism and apologize is both commendable and admirable.
I also wish I had a copy of Green Lantern/Green Arrow Vol 1#7 "...and through him, save a world..." to donate to you. It probably wouldn't be enough for a whole episode, but might be good for a team up miniseries.
I do know you added either something to the credits or the entry about the PCP/POP stuff.
I appreciated your comments about depression. While I didn't have an opinion much either way about the portrayal of the woman in the Superman comic, but I did agree his comments to the woman were ill-conveyed and poorly thought up.
As someone who suffers from severe depression I've been pleased over all with your lessening of your comments about wanting to kill yourself with some of the comics you read. I've never been offended by them since I saw how you were using them as humor ('Suicide pistol at the ready.') the lack of them is noticed and appreciated.
I honestly enjoy your stuff and on some of my worst days dealing with my depression certain episodes, like Doom, are one of the few things to make me smile.
I had NO idea about the usage for the word/term spaz.
I thought you looking off camera was to see if you were in frame. Though checking your laptop makes sense and hey, that's cool.
Anyway, thanks for listening to all of us, I'll try and make sure to not repeat things too much.
Actually...the hair on the spear isn't just a decoration. The purpose of it is to absorb blood and thus keep it from making the shaft of the weapon slick, and thus much harder to keep a good grip on. I think I recall something about it also being a bit distracting, but for a thrusting weapon, that's most likely it's biggest and most important use.
"I don't know how much a few hiatuses would set you back financially, but really, putting out a video (plus extras) every week, all around the year is just unhealthy, and we do not want that. Not to mention some free weeks in your work-schedule might actually help out with weeding out these "screw-ups" in the making."
Yeah, it's not that difficult to put out a video every week and honestly financially I really do need to.
The whole part about the X-Men... it was so nice to hear someone else pointing out the problems I have with them for once... Don't get me wrong, I really like the X-Men. My first try to get to comics was with X-Men (and failed miserable because I jumped into a storyline that confused me too much...). But I think that they don't make any sense with the Marvel Universe as well.
It's so stupid for my understanding to have the X-Men on one side, who have the very brilliant idea (in my opinion) of mutants who're not accepted, but feared, no matter what they do and how much good they do, and on the other hand, you have the Fantastic Four, or Spiderman, who not only live in New York as well (as far as I'm aware - could be wrong with the F4), very close to Charles Xavier's School, but have powers that make them look like the average Mutants who should be feared and hated following the X-Men logic. The normal person doesn't care that neither of those got their powers by birth, but through after events - they only care about "OMG, a Mutant, you can't trust them!"
This gives me a grinch everytime when I actually see the Movies of Spiderman or the Avengers (or F4), because it feels just wrong.
In my opinion, Marvel can go on with X-Men, they should as they're so popular, but they should put them aside and not include them in their overall Universe. Would it hurt so much to give them a Universe of their own? They sure have enough characters to fill it all alone!
And on a sidenote, about Cloustershire (hope I wrote it right). You asked where the "z" comes from in the pronounciation and assumed another language. Well, basically, you're not too off with it. I don't know the origins of the place, nor the influence of german and brittish to each other, but most combinations of "st" in german are pronounciated like the "st" in cloustershire. In fact, "Clouster" pretty much sounds like the german word "Kloster" - which means Monestary/Abbey, so it could actually be possible, that it goes down to that. That's of course just a guess, again, no knowledge about that place.
This said... Happy New Year! :D (we allready have 2013 here ^^)
Very good video, Linkara. As someone who suffers from depression (managed with medication, though) I found your comments on the subject touching. But I didn't take offense necessarily over in the Superman 701 review. Many people mistake "depression" (a chemical imbalance in the brain that can only be managed via medications) and "being sad" (emotional surges that can be corrected by time, talk, or whatever.) Good video, and I agree with you on the X-Men, they're too large and too overused. They're basically a big pit of super heroes someone had an idea for but didn't want to make 1000 more comic book characters so lumped them all into one group. I never understood, either, how mutants can so reviled by people in the Marvel Universe but the F4, Spider-Man and others not as hated. Not a Marvel reader, though. Even with THAT said the current state of Spider-Man leaves me with a... "Really?!"
"Actually...the hair on the spear isn't just a decoration. The purpose of it is to absorb blood and thus keep it from making the shaft of the weapon slick, and thus much harder to keep a good grip on. I think I recall something about it also being a bit distracting, but for a thrusting weapon, that's most likely it's biggest and most important use."
I love Babylon 5, too! I bought the entire series on DVD just over a month ago after watching SFDebris' video reviews rekindled my fandom. I've gotten through the first four seasons, and plan to get to the fifth sometime in January. I watched the series first run back in te 90s, but since it's never been in re-runs anywhere since then, I've never been able to revisit it. Still one of the BEST science fiction shows ever created. I believe Londo & G'kar were always my favorites followed by Garibaldi and Marcus Cole.
And YES! Burn, baby, burn!
And on a more serious note, you did a fine job with those sincere apologies. It can't be easy to be faced with those mistakes, but I hope your heartfelt apologies mended those wounds in those that were hurt. My respect to you for that.
So, on the more upbeat side of things, I hope you have a happy new year, Lewis. I look forward to a whole new year of exciting new AT4W insights! Thanks for the entertainment!
I have to say, in agreement with one of the earlier comments, it does indeed take great strength and conviction to admit your own mistakes. I also have to say that as someone who does suffer from depression, though I personally was not offended by your words during that particular episode, I found your sincere and simple apology incredibly heartwarming. As I said, while I personally was not offended, I have dealt with people who have said quite offensive comments to me with little to no remorse. So to you sir, I salute you and give you the biggest of internet hugs :)
And hey, high five to the fellow plain foods eater! Wooo! Cheese pizza with nothing on it!!! ...Damn, I'm hungry now...
Have a great New Year and don't work yourself too hard. Just not healthy and we want to see you well :)
As someone who suffers from depression and watches your shows; I honestly didn't mind what you stated. You need to do what you do on a regular basis and you aren't here to discriminate on anyone. Is it hard to deal with? Yes, but a lot of things are. I work really hard at maintaining it all by myself without any outside help. Therapy or medicine. This is your job and you do your best to keep us entertained. If we start dictating on what you can and cannot not say, when do we take over the show and kick you off of it? That aside; I hope to see you at MAGfest. I'll be there and going as someone I'm sure you'll recognize. ^_^
Because I'm a jerk (though at least I'm a jerk who did a search for this subject before bringing it up myself), I'd just like to point out that you misused the word "empathy" while discussing Superman #701. You can only empathize with someone if you've gone through the same thing they have, which you say you haven't. If you haven't personally experienced the thing in question, you can have sympathy, but not empathy.
But hey, you burned "One More Day," so I forgive you. :) Happy 2013!!
Weird question: Is there a way I can find the full context of the Cyberman "There is... logic... in what he says" scene on Youtube, without watching the whole serial is was from? Ever since it started popping up in your reviews, I've been immensely curious as to what had originally prompted the line.
And which doctor was "Attack of the Cybermen," anyway?
Great list, Linkara. A lot of interesting things...I should have reminded you of some of the weird directional stuff in Superman 701 but that was Stracynzky not caring about Philadelphia.
And yeah, I think you're rather spot on with the X-Men comment and how they cause all the problems. It's like there are two different universes at Marvel between the mutant stuff and the other heroes and they just have to keep interacting instead of just being split apart. I mean sure the X-men were just "other heroes" back in the Silver age but when they became so massive is when they just seemed to be a universe within a universe. It's rather weird in that they should be together...but not.
And I see "One More Day"'s burning in the next opening montage...then again you went through all the effort to burn "Superman at Earth's End" so to replace it wouldn't be fair to the original WTF comic of the show. (I'd throw in Countdown but you ripped those apart instead of burned them)
BTW: 2099 should be interesting...I was wondering if you were going to get into Heroes Reborn after showing your hatred of what Liefeld did here but that's for the future I believe.
Okay, control-F'd through the comments to make sure no one suggested this, but since you're a Grant Morrison fan, have you ever read his New X-Men run with Frank Quitely, Phil Jiminez and Ethan Van Sciever? He started it just after his Justice League work and it has some similar writing styles to it.
It was written just after the first movie was released in an attempt to capture fans of the film. In his series proposal, which was included in the trades, he pitched the series as one that while not entirely ignoring the prior decades, would not really reference them.
First off, I am someone with depression. I deal with it daily. Second, there is nothing I hate more than seeing someone apologize for a joke. While a joke might be in "bad taste", I would rather have it said and stood by. I know a lot of people will disagree with me on this, and think there are "safe" and "unsafe" topics to joke about. However, comedy is based on pain, the more pain there is, the more humor can be derived. That is all I wanted to say, take it as you will.
I'm going to talk to you about the morality of suicide at great length and mostly because I like doing so. Feel free to ignore the rest of this comment if you don't want to sit through rambling nonsense.
I believe in suicide as a fundamental human right, as an extension of self-determination and an individual's mastery of the self. Not saying that it's something that Superman would agree with me on, but simply as a personal moral stance. A person's life is everything that they are, everything that they can truly be said to possess and rightfully own - it is them in the truest sense. And it's theirs to end.
Life is valuable, a treasure, I agree - but what makes it so? Is it simply the continuing exchange of energy and chemical compounds, the homeostasis of the physical body? I don't think so. There's something to be said for the aesthetic appreciation of a complex system, but it's not what comes to mind when talking about the value of life, especially human life.
In other words, is it the definition of 'life' that is valuable, so that it is innately so? I say no. It's in the larger things, the more abstract concepts - the things that lead to the same problem as answering "What is love?" when you try to define them. It's not in the bare continuation of life, but in the impressions it leaves. It's in the story, though that's too simplistic, the boring little bits not belonging in stories count as well, it's not the drama, it's the mundane too, but the value of life is still found more in the abstract than the concrete, the story over the words.
And sometimes stories need to end. Who else can decide that but the author? Who could really be said to be the author of a person other than themself, after blind circumstance has had its say? Suicide is a person disposing of something they do not want. It's removing a negative that belongs wholly to them, and ultimately to no other. There are such things as responsibilities and repercussions to a person's actions, and they are things to be considered, but it must be the individual themself that does that considering, and it cannot be anything but the vilest tyranny, the imposition of another's will over your own, to suppress that.
I have friends that have killed themselves, and friends of friends, and I consider it myself regularly. I have a friend that deliberately stepped in front of a train while wandering home drunk after a night blowing hundreds of dollars in a strip club. I know it's often not a dry, sober accounting of emotional revenues and losses leading to a calculated and deliberate decision. By nature, it's hard for it to be. It's often the point at which a surge of emotions overwhelm a person, and they make a mistake. Suicide can be a mistake.
But it's not, and never can be, the place of anyone but the individual themself to make that evaluation, or to deny them that course of action, or even to judge them for it. Suicide is too personal a thing. It's tied far too much to who a person is to themself, and not who they are to others. It's simply not something that can rightfully be denied to a person unless others are direly dependent on them.
Anyways, that's my incoherent and mostly unedited ramblings.
I'll be honest, I was half expecting a whole entire "Avengers Arena is Battle Royale/Hunger Games" entry. But you're still right, it is Hunger Game ripoff.
DUDE! Your food preference examples almost completely align with my own! Topping-less hot dogs? Check. Cheese pizza? Check. Sandwiches with few addings? Check (though, I don't mind the addition of lettuce, cheese, and/or tomato with the meat). Cereal with no milk? Check! Not to mention that we both gre up watch virtually the same children's TV shows (stuff on Fox Kids, kids WB, an the like). It's always a pleasure when you find someone who has similar things in common with yourself. Don't stop being who you are and keep up with all the great things you do, man.
BTW, that previous comment of mine was aimed at Lewis. Apologies for not checking to see if any existing conversations were going on at the time in the comments.
This was an excellent video as always. I did note in particular your view of Spider-Man#700 and how it reflects the very nature of Marvel business these days. As a person who used to like Spider-Man comics, it's pretty pathetic to cause a sensation for something that's temporary. It is worth noting that the writer, Dan Slott, is putting the seeds for an eventual getting back together of Mary-Jane and Peter, though, but the way it's handled now is very much giving fans the finger.
I must say i felt a very sudden and profound respect for this episode. Linkara as the episode went on i really thought this was just another Oops type episode. But once you got to #2 I felt the honest sincerity and i do agree. However i do want to state that even with that the Superman Review is still one of my favorites. The amount of heartfelt response is felt with this comment and it really resonated with me. I must agree again and tip my hat. I almost got teary eyed there for a moment.
Takes a brave man to face mistakes. Glad to know more about the history of how Marvel became a Power House....though maybe not a Power House of Excitement. As someone who has gone through depresstion I still rather agree with how you handled that Superman review but not everyone suffers from depresstion the same way. As fro not dropping words like moronic yeah if you looked into most words you use to point out problems your reviews would be very bland and generic. Oh and as a Canadian I too use the UK spelling for most sites, word documents and other things. I tell you it can be confusing talking to Americans over the internet one minute then having to hand in a news story to your boss. Some days I just throw the letter U into every word. Canada can be at times stuck between the English spelling and the American spelling.
Anyway Happy New Year to you and I look forward to more Atop the Fourth Wall.
"Weird question: Is there a way I can find the full context of the Cyberman "There is... logic... in what he says" scene on Youtube, without watching the whole serial is was from? Ever since it started popping up in your reviews, I've been immensely curious as to what had originally prompted the line.
And which doctor was "Attack of the Cybermen," anyway?"
Sixth Doctor and it's actually a semi-sequel to a few Cybermen stories as well as a sequel to a Dalek story (mostly because of a character returning).
The context is basically that a mercenary named Lytton has taken a few men into the sewers presumably to break into a bank and steal diamonds. In reality, he's brought them to the cybermen, who are operating in the sewers. When the Cyberleader questions him, he says that if he was trying to help the cybermen, he shouldn't have brought others. Lytton says they were gifts to be turned into cybermen. The Cyber Lieutenant thinks that he's lying, but the Leader hushes him up and states, "There is logic in what he says. If he had intended us harm, he could have warned earth's authorities."
"I'm going to talk to you about the morality of suicide at great length and mostly because I like doing so. Feel free to ignore the rest of this comment if you don't want to sit through rambling nonsense."
And you are of course free to have your take on it. However, from my perspective, unless someone is in a state (age, incurable illness, etc.) that interferes and will always interfere with one's ability to actually engage in life, be active in some regard, or live to the best of their own ability, suicide is an irrational act.
While I am a religious person, I recognize that a large part of my religion is faith and the lack of evidence of what happens when we die. As such, I recognize that there may be no afterlife. With that in mind, it's especially important to be alive, for we have only a finite number of ticks of the clock before we expire and then we are no more and everything that we were is lost.
If this truly is all that we are, all that we will ever be, then to terminate oneself is the ultimate expression of madness, not just because of the existential horror of non-existence, but because what we have is that much more precious and to throw it away before your time is a waste. Yes, your life is your own to choose if and when you want it to end, but there is always so much more to do, to experience, and to influence. By being alive you affect the lives of others in ways you couldn't possibly imagine, be it small, subtle ways or grandiose, catastrophic ways, for good or for ill.
Suicide is valueless. It is pointless and a cessation of the good that a life, in itself, brings. When you're grieving, when you're drunk, when you're high, when you're just feeling down... these are not reasons to die. These are reasons to get BETTER. A brain on the influence of grief, of drugs, of alcohol, or just a chemical imbalance in their brain is being impaired in some capacity.
Yes, it certainly is their right to decide if and when they die. But it should never be the first option, nor the preferable option, and that woman in the comic was in no position or sound mind to make that choice.
Yeah, I'm glad I missed the Superman 700& 701 videos when they were new and missed the depression comment. Around that time, I was suffering through one of my many low points in my depression cycle at the time and I would have turned on you so fast.
And no, I would not have even given you a comment like this. I would not have wasted my time doing that. I would go one step beyond it and have stopped watching your show entirely.
Hey Linkara. Most of the time my reactions and comments are flailing fangirl ones, because I love the show. But I really had to comment about you correcting yourself about the Superman #701 review.
I have suffered from depression, and some of the things that trigger me are things that the jumper talked about; feeling powerless, being stuck in a crappy job forever, etc. And yes, when in that review you did brush those things off as not worthy of her reaction to them, it did niggle at me slightly. Not enough to make me stop watching AT4W, but enough to make me uncomfortable in what was otherwise a very good episode.
So it really means a lot to this fan that you took time to address the problem, and admit to some insensitivity. It is a difficult subject for someone to talk about if they don't have firsthand experience of what depression can do to your head. Sometimes it really is just one tiny thing that is a catalyst.
The screw up shows could very easily just be grammar mistakes or continuity flubs, but it takes real courage for you to admit your mistakes and apologise with grace. So thankyou for that. :)
Great follow-up. Surprised to see Douchey McNitpick here (I thought that he was gone after the whole Battlefield Earth breakdown being repeated or the end of the Nostalgia Critic).
You've actually burned Spider-Man One More Day (not the copy you used for the review, but still awesome). You even used the famous One Day More from Les Miserables to end this episode.
(Personally, I prefer the original stage musical version to the film.)
Anyway, I'm looking forward to a lot of great stuff -- the continuing storyline concerning the Gunslinger, the retrospective on Titans, and if all goes well, the return of the Neutro Zord! Happy new year, O badass comic reviewer!
9 – that's a good point, about every comic being someone's first. How hard can it be to have each character addressed by name at some point, so that if you're new, you at least get to know what their names are? I'm really surprised that they could get through a whole comic – especially a simple one with a relatively small cast like the Archie one - without identifying all the characters by name.
Another great ad bumper!
7 – That... was a screw up?? Really? I mean with the Supergirl review... wha...? *genuine surprise* I just figured that In-story-Linkara wouldn't want his (in-story) viewers to know that he'd gone away and left a hologram doing his show. The hologram would share this desire, and his awkward comment about him seeing Nostalgia Chick a few days before (and her 'yeah, whatever you say'- type reaction) was a clumsy attempt to hide the fact that he's not the same guy who was at the con. I know that you'd ran out of time to film it at the con in real life, but I really thought that line was what MADE it fit the story continuity.
In other words, I wasn't confused before. Now, I am. :)
3 – Yes, every episode of AT4W is someone's first – and this one was mine. Not one of my favorites, but it was still enough at the time to get me digging back through your past episodes. And I remember seeing all the comments, and wondering, 'does this happen every time?'. Answer = pretty much so, yeah :) I mean, I can understand a few repeats in the first batch of comments to hit your blog, since people don't know if someone else is saying the same thing until the comments are approved and visible... but after that... makes no sense.
I also want to say that I appreciate that you read every comment. I know not everyone making these shows reads every comment, some don't read any comments, and aside from the frustration of these repeat corrections and the like, it must take a lot of time for you to do that. It feels like real respect for your viewers that you go to that trouble - thank you.
2 – lots of respect to you for this. Most of this list has been light-hearted, so good on you for putting this in there. It sounded sincere and heartfelt, and I like that you also explained what was wrong with the scene and made your complete position clear. Very well done.
1 – Not a huge fan of the literal burning thing myself, but I can see that this will make a lot of people happy. Also... uh... I think your bucket is starting to melt.
I never noticed you looking off to the side before. To my own annoyance, I have now started looking for it... :)
Firstly on the issue of X-Men, While I respect the right to your own opinions linkara, I just have to say, saying that X-Men should stop being made is abit arrogant. X-Men can be overwhelming (I counted just under 10000 comics) becaus eyou dont like something doesnt mean it should be removed because you feel that way. Hitler didnt like the Jewish and wanted them removed, right now the islamic brotherhood dont want christians or other islamic people who believe as they do around, THIS IS A HUGE STRETCH, but I hope you get what im saying, just because you dont like something doesnt mean you should deprive other people of that object, wheather it be a comic book, or a religion. Human have a right to believe and like whatever they want, and Im a strong believer in that. So I feel that the way you said x-men should just stop comes off reallt b badly.
Thats not to say Marvel are really handeling X-Men Wrong. Heres My Example:
Generation Hope, this comic was about how Hope (seemingly a next host of phoenix and a dead ringer for jean grey) was awakening mutants with he touch. It wasnt a bad comic, and was leading up to the Next X-Men Event. It was hinted that the 5 Lights (The Mutants who were "touched" by hope) were going to play a huge part in the next event. 16 issues in and the comic concluded for Avengers vs X-Men.......... and nothing happened, the 5 lights wearnt used at all. Ive heard many things on this, especially the theory that avengers vs x-men wasnt suppose to happen, and that age of ultron was delayed due to the creative team leaving marvel, so they just added avengers to the x-men event, just so the avengers would have an event comic while the movie was out. So It could be that they just got the short end of the stick. But that is my point, so many x-men books get this treatment lately, Marvel feel the need to reboot ever few months that nothing ever sticks, so why buy an x-men book if it building to some great conclusion, that never happens. So there is no need for the 15+ X-Men titles, not even batman has that many, and nearly every title has its own purpose and matters, its not just fodder for some reboot.
SO I understand where your coming from, but to say cancel every x-men book is out of line. Especially with the great x-books (X-Factor, X-Treme X-Men (A similar book to exiles, everyone should give it a look))
Next Thing is dont be so hard on yourself about the depression thing. Many People dont understand what depression is, ive lost a many freinds because of it, I have had depression for 6 years and I am on medication for it. Infact before I got on medication I was suffering for close to a year, because in my mind I dint know what was wrong, I felt Misserable, but there was no cause, no effect, just.. bam!, a feeling so low I do anything and everything now days to avoid it. When people hear you suffer from depression they are instantly like, "What do you have to be depressed about" which isnt as infuriating as the, "Yea im depressed all the time". In My opinion you did nothing wrong, even I felt that Superman 701 wasnt doing anything but showing a over reacting lady on the roof, it didnt seem like anything else. I would personally love to see a super hero comic where the protagponist sufferes depression, and I feel only a person suffering depression could write it, a real character driven piece where there is less emphasis on the "super" and more on the human, with silent suffering, changes in personallity. Something that really displays what depression is all about, not some supid superman comic with some lady attempting to jump and blaming superman for her problems.
Huh, you and I have similar tastes in food. Odd, I thought I was one of very few who hated things like milk with cereal.
In any case I wouldn't say that using 'spaz' and 'spastic' should be considered a 'screw-up' exactly since it's just a matter of not having any experience with British culture. Something to avoid because Atop the Fourth Wall is something available to anyone who speaks English and has an internet connection, but still not a major error on Linkara's part.
Lastly, maybe the book burning has gone on a bit too far. It has very disturbing implications across the world and while you restrain it to works that you feel are utterly without artistic merit, I'd still say that it's better to suffer the existence of a poorly written comic than to increase the trend of deliberately destroying a work simply because you do not like it.
Someone else already said this almost word for word, but I figure this is an okay thing to repeat:
Thank you for addressing your earlier comments about depression. As someone who's struggled with it for most of my life I was more than a little bothered by your comments in that earlier review, especially since I've had people tell me things like "get over it, your problems aren't that serious," in real life. So I really appreciate that you acknowledge it was insensitive, and I have a lot of respect for your ability to admit you were wrong.
BTW, a lot of English words really did pronounce the silent parts, like knife. Yep, you said the 'k' sound. People are lazy sods and you end up with place names being abbreviated, but no-one ever seems bothered to fix the spelling. No doubt this will be one of the first things the machines will do after they have risen, as it has been driving them bonkers.
That ceremonially feathered spear bugs me. I don't know asian history, but i expect it'll turn out, like with 'viking' helmets, that that wasn't really used like that in combat.
Viking helmets were hornless because you really, really don't want things catching on your helmet, especially if they curve a blade into your head instead of deflecting.
Sure, you can have horns in the stuff you use for rituals, but a viking stupid enough to wear one one the battlefield is the one who gets to have his head opened like a boiled egg by a spoon. Not a pretty sight, unless you are some sort of opportunistic corvid, I expect.
So why do i think tassels on a spear are bad? They could catch! I imagine ribs and other bits of bone will get tangled up.
Sure, the guy you stabbed is probably even more displeased now with how his day is going as you yank bits of him outside where he'd hoped they could stay a bit longer, but the next guy is coming now, and he sees you are in a mess, and can't quite free your weapon, and oh, you murdered his ally or possibly his best friend, and he is mightily motivated to make you regret those pretty little tassels.
So it's perfectly reasonable to me to not know about those decorations because they are, in my uninformed opinion, stupid.
However, I'm probably wrong. According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qiang_%28spear%29
"When the spear is moving quickly, the addition of the tassel aids in blurring the vision of the opponent so that it is more difficult for them to grab the shaft of spear behind the head or tip. The tassel also served another purpose, to stop the flow of blood from the blade getting to the wooden shaft (the blood would make it slippery, or sticky when dried)."
I'm not really game to test this one, although i wonder if someone could throw it at mythbusters.. I'm sure Kari would love to deal with yet more dead pigs being mutilated.
Anyway, please keep on doing stuff and if i had an income, i'd probably pay you to review ElfQuest, or have you done that and i've missed it? Oh well.
While I have no comment on the overall quality of the X-Men, I would argue that they do make sense in the Marvel Universe and their outcast status is actually somewhat realistic, as far as it goes. To use your examples as counterpoints:
-if we put a medically tested soldier in the context of the real world, I don't think he or she would be the subject of horror exactly. Outrage at the ethics of medical testing? Perhaps. Pity that the fellow was used in such a matter? Likely, forgetting the fact that he wanted to be used that way. But fear or horror? Not particularly likely. Plus, the patriotic bunting he wraps himself in also serves as a symbolic protector; you'll notice that the X-Men don't have any patriotic allegiance, while it's hard to hate on a guy who stands for the Red, White, and Blue.
-The Fantastic Four were the victims of an accident. I can't think of any one who would be particularly unsympathetic under that context, and while they may be the subject of sick fascination, I can't see any hate. That's the kind of human interest story designed to bring a tear on The Today Show or the like.
-As for the X-Men, I won't belabor the allegorical connection to blacks, LGBTs, or pick the oppressed minority of your choice, as you're surely aware of it. However, it bears repeating that, at least to my understanding, the X-Men were (almost) all born the way that they are, not the subject of medical testing or freak accidents that gave them their powers (again, I know there are exceptions like Wolverine, but generally speaking). As noted above, the real world teems with examples of people who are hated for the way they are born. So, it makes sense in that context that they would be the subject of hatred and fear. The fact that there DO exist evil mutants doesn't help either; after all, there aren't an evil Fantastic Four or Captain Iraq floating out there that the public would have to compare those people or groups to.
Final note: in this comparison, I make no reference to what these various groups actually DO because it's not relevant to the broader point of "does the reaction given to the X-Men by the public make sense within the context of the universe" and that doesn't seem to be particularly reflective of what it is that they do as much as it is reflective of who they are and how they came to be that way. So, in that, I respectfully disagree.
i have a comic to suguest you read, also email me back just one word so i know youve seen my message
i suguest you read the My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic, comic books from IDW, not sure if you can AT4thW them or not since only 1 issue so far and its good (IMO) but maby itd be a fun goofy thing as a side show or a one off episode where linkara learns the power of friendship with his palls. because the comics good and not the useal shlock the gets AT4thWl'ed also itd be a great topic too since MLPFIM is curently a powerhouse comic selling out all others atm
(srsly people are saying its the death of comix because mlp fim is beating the big comix for sales, look into it.)
and incae yer wondering i dont have a fav pony
choozeing is unfair, i love all pony.
sory for the repost, unsure how often you check yer email, but now i know you read these.
I just have one request. Please review amazing spiderman 700. I know probably someone already has asked it and I know you no longer read AS, but dear God is it bad. Its worse than One More Day.
First off: Happy New Year from East Oz (Australia), Linkara!
As a fan and moderate-term watcher, I am glad to see when folks own up to mistakes in their works in times past, and try to correct them.
Your review style and HoPR (combined with inspiration from some other Tokusatsu reviewers over on RVT) actually gave me the idea to do my own show(s) on reviewing and going into depth on Power Rangers and it's Toku brethren, primarily Super Sentai & Kamen Rider. [side note: Release the next episode/s of HoPR in your own time, don't feel obligated to rush through it chop-chop and push out a new episode because a small amount folks in your fanbase want it, it's not your main money-making series and whilst it would be NICE to see it updated soon, you've only got 5/6 seasons of the show (depending if you count Samurai & Super Samurai as 2 seasons) before you'll have caught up the the 20th "anniversary" series Megaforce.]
I was going to jump on your reply to Blood on the Lace, but I simply can't bring myself to make a coherent statement without it being all "me me me" or data points from studies that I simply can't be bothered to drag up from the depths of the net. I will say this: there are those who contemplate suicide on a daily basis but still agree with you, and it's this dichotomy that drives them further into illness, for their only perceived respite is also something they think to be foolish or wasteful. On a good day, disagreeing with suicide gives them strength to turn from it and try to find a method of coping that works for them; on a bad day, it increases their self-loathing, makes them desperate for something that can bring them peace without breaking their ideals.
So! Yeah, I have depression and mild paranoid symptoms, have a sibling in a worse state than me and volunteer with a mental health charity to help others in similar states as myself. Nothing makes me happier than hearing a non-sufferer honestly and sincerely state that they don't understand how things are for sufferers, but they empathise and wish to understand, and as a result #2 actually got me a bit upset; I've been through the hell of having a family who couldn't give two tosses about mental illness, who think you can exercise it off, shrug it off, that you're doing things for attention, so hearing anyone without a mental illness say the opposite... Anyway, it was good to hear you say such things, and my respect for you has increased even further.
One other little depressive point before I go - as I said, I have depression, and I go through fits of extreme downs where I'm an abhorrent waste of skin, worthless, deserve all the pain I get and so on and so forth. Pretty much one of the first things you get told to discover when you go through any formal counselling are things that help combat encroaching anxiety, depressive fits, any unpleasant extreme you can think of, and keep hold of them as tools against your illness; over the years I've found various things that help, and...well, your vids are one of them. If I feel myself sliding into an extreme low, if I catch it in time your vids give me just the right kind of distraction to negate it, to... I don't know, to disperse the storm before it hits, if you get my meaning. I just hope this doesn't sound like I'm sucking up... I only wished to show that hey, your stuff does indeed have a positive impact.
First, congratulations on making videos on your own screw-ups. I don't see that many critics willing to admit that their own opinions may not be perfect.
Second, REN AND STIMPY!? NOOO!!! I HATE THEM!! Why did you have to make me watch them again, over and over, WHY???
(On the Other hand, Weird Al rules, so that makes up for it. ;) )
As for your screw-ups, I was glad to see the vast majority of them were minor to the point of not being worth analyzing, really. The only ones that I think were serious were research errors and dealing with topics like suicide. But things like misspelings? Who cares?
Anyway: Happy New Year, and once again thanks for making such entertaining videos. Really looking forth to more of them in 2013. :)
On the subject looking off to the side there is a series on youtube called indymogul and they cover a wide range of topics one of which are technical details and they made teleprompters on the cheap http://youtu.be/n5_B8yksQmo I realize you may not have the hand tools needed but you could possibly collaborate with nash. He builds the frames you sew the fabric shields. Display can be anything from a cheap refurbished lcd monitor, Rooted Nook or other tablet. Control can be done with a cheap bluetooth/wireless mouse
Add me to the choir of those who suffer from depression, and I myself have contemplated suicide but could never bring myself to follow through on it. Your comments did not offend me personally as much as JMS's pontificating did as his handling of the jumper sounded exploitative. But still, you are a bigger man for owning up to that mistake.
That being said, I look forward to your Titans retrospective. I may be more of a Legion of Super-Heroes fan (partially because of the Silver Age weirdness of the Adventure Comics run) but I appreciate the Titans' rich history nonetheless.
Hi Linkara, I'm a long time fan. Yes, I know you read every comment, and I know people have said here before, but I feel the need to repeat it just to emphasise it because I found it uncomfortable, too:
You really trashed the X-Men here, and you really seem to have some problem with them.
It almost seems like you complain about the X-Men like it's their own fault they're written and managed in such way. If their structure and universe is too convoluted and there are too many characters and groups to follow, it's not the character's fault- they're fictional! It's the fault of the writers and editors who can't keep the story straight and milk that convoluted continuity for all it's worth.
I think it's a little too self centered to ask Marvel to stop making X-Men comics. The X-Men have many fans, it's most likely Marvel's biggest franchise. They have their problems, but it's not the character's or concept's fault. I mean, I've had it up to here with DC sticking in Batman in every book but I won't ask them to stop writing him. They just need to do it better.
Great episode and happy new year to you, Linkara! I would say more but reminding me about the Red Skull/Xavier's Brain has made me too irritated/sad so I will just mutter under my breath until I am distracted by something shiny.
As someone who commented on you not knowing the main character's names in the Archie series, I actually feel kind of bad now that it made this list.
That said, I wholly agree that it's reasonable for you to not know the MINOR characters' names if you're not a fan, especially if you point that out up front.
There were some parts of this review that... well... weren't very funny, but I suppose that's unavoidable considering the subject matter of some of the screw ups.
Finally, on Superman #701, since it came up again, I personally didn't have the issue with the officer asking if Superman would have let the woman fall.
Yes, Superman values life. He always chooses life. But he also values truth... hence truth, justice and the American way. And he specifically told the woman he wouldn't interfere if she jumped, meaning either he'd let her die, or he'd be forced into lying.
Now, just as you or I would, he'd choose saving the life over keeping his word in that instance... but a lying Superman is still pretty unsatisfying to me, and I could see the officer wondering if he would *really* (note the emphasis) let her fall if it came to that. Superman sidesteps simply because it didn't come to that. Yes, it was bad writing to put him INTO that situation though.
This was a good video to end 2012 on Linkara. I can't wait to see your stuff in the new year.
You know, I can honestly say that watching your videos alone has improved my skills as a writer. Why? Because now when I plan out a story/scene I have gotten into a habit of thinking "Is there a plot hole that Linkara would point out/rant about?" and thus, if there are, I try to fix them. ^_^
Anyway, I hope you have a great year. Happy New Year!
Even as a big fan of the X-Men I have to agree with some of your issues. The X-men were originally an allegory for repressed minorities in the United States at the time and a lot of connections can and were made to how people treated homosexuals. As the series grew mutants stopped being a minority and most of the allegory was lost as the writers simply didn't seem to get it. Clairemont was a rare exception, he was a good writer with a skill for making the characters interesting and the stories work even if they were totally insane. His skills work much less in the modern era of comics but that is a discussion for another time.
For all of House of M's problems I like what the conclusion of it did. It pushed mutants back to a minority. Of course it was done really poorly since no one anyone cared about lost their powers except Jubilee and very briefly Bobby Drake (not going into that horrible story). Had M.Day been done right and followed up on correctly they could have really made something special out of it. Still the idea of there only being a handful of remaining mutants and no more appearing was brilliant and it could have created a lot of suspenseful stories and good tension had there been more than one good X-book going at the time.
In recent years the idea of the X-men being feared, hated, and hunted has gotten beyond ridiculous. Prior to AvX it seemed like Marvel was going to turn that around. After the stuff with Osbourne and Bastion the world was starting to look at mutants different and start accepting them. The writers made great strides on developing the characters and creating interesting stories showing a lot of growth and showing some real effects from the lack of mutants. While I have various issues with Matt Fraction's run on Uncanny his decisions did a lot of good and interesting things. Then Marvel screwed it all up with AvX.
AvX brings me to your point on some of the worst crossovers. I love the X-Men when they are on their own. I've never liked a ton of crossover with other heroes. Having X-Men on the Avengers is one thing but the X-men have always felt like they belong in their own little world without the need to interact with the rest of the Marvel universe. More so than most, the X-Men feel self-contained. Onslaught should have been something contained only to the X-men. Outside of a few things the primary players were mutants and the story dealt with mutants. One of my favorite moments of Civil War was Emma basically telling Cap or Tony (forget which) to piss off because they have enough of their own problems.
Hey Linkara, next year sounds like its going to be amaizing. I had an idea for a video that might be cool for you to do. You have frequently voiced your opinions, both negative and positive on the new 52 relaunch, and i did really enjoy the TAIS videos you did back in 2011. So i was thinking now that the relaunch has been going on for a while, maybe you could do like a top 10 best and worst new 52 book! I know i'd really enjoy it, and i'm sure many others would to.
Hey Linkara. Just wanted to say, I thought the hard water joke was good, regardless of what people told you. I mean, I know of heavy water and figured hard water was something too, but hard water as ice was hilarious regardless. Don't worry about that one.
Another thing that could be mentioned about the in addition to what others have said is that is meant to serve as a distraction to people couldn't be exactly sure were the tip of the spear is so people have harder time blocking. Another way it serves as a distraction is that its movement and could break concentration of the opponent, similar to the rings in a nine ring broadsword, where you twitch the sword to make a clinking sound to distract them, which either breaks their concentration or just look at the sword, thus leaving an opening. Many items on weapons seem superfluous or unnecessary, but have an actual purpose. One example is the rope dart. a weapon you launch at someone then pull back. The rings seam pointless but their actually meant to catch organs when it enters the midsection and either pull them out or at least tear them. either way I still loved the rocket nipples joke. Also I can see why you mistake the "u". Its common in British, and the majority of Canadian English to use it, in words like colour, due to us having a very subtle difference in pronunciation, like how, their, there, and they're all sound the same, but if you listen really closely, there is a difference. that and I don't know if it is the same in the U.S.A., but in Canada and the U.K., a "c" usually makes an "s" sound when an "e" or and "i" is in front of it. But that's the wonderful thing about a language as far spread as English, seeing all the different ways its changed throughout the world over the years. Loved the wheel of fortune joke with the "u" by the way.
And I thought I was the only one who ate cheese pizza. Also if you ever need to find something in your research that Wikipedia doesn't have, you could always check the Fan-Wikis that exist all over the web. They tend to have the answers.
Nice ep. And 2013 does sound pretty fruitful for AT4W.
So you'll be looking at 2099? Nice. I'd like to hear about Spider-man 2099... mostly because I actually liked it, aside from a few flaws and a few instances of Youngblood's disease.
Hey Linkara, huge fan of your show. Love the fact that, in my opinion, it turned the shows on TGWTG.com from semi-related gags and crossovers into a storytelling playground akin to Marvel, DC, Middle-Earth or Star Wars.
Out of curiosity, do you take requests for Month-long ideas?
I checked the comments and i don't think anyone brough these two things up. 1)red skull didn't eat the brain he fused with it so he could mind control scarlet witch and go "no more mutants" all over again. Oh god not another house of M. 2)you now have something else to be pissed off about besides one more day. There was a storyline where a dying doctor octopus switched bodies with spiderman, and peter parker died while in doc ock's body.before peter dies he transferred his conscience or something into doc ock. Now doc ock is a hero running around in peter's body.
Great episode. And yes Spoony will fear the day you catch up to him. Also love that last second bit at the end. Don't always notice it, but every so often you do look a little to far off to your left.. But we all have our faults. I tend to usually screw up to much in the middle of my lines on my own.
"I checked the comments and i don't think anyone brough these two things up. 1)red skull didn't eat the brain he fused with it so he could mind control scarlet witch and go "no more mutants" all over again. Oh god not another house of M. 2)you now have something else to be pissed off about besides one more day. There was a storyline where a dying doctor octopus switched bodies with spiderman, and peter parker died while in doc ock's body.before peter dies he transferred his conscience or something into doc ock. Now doc ock is a hero running around in peter's body."
Lewis adressed both of those in the credits. He admits to forgetting what actually happened with Red Skull and said that he doesn't care about what's going on with Spiderman.
I'm going to be honest. I don't think you should have apologized to JMS for what he wrote in One More Day in his little rant about gamers. Yes, he IS an insulting, patronizing dickhead for saying those things. Yes, he is a jackass for deriding the people who read and adore his body of work from Babylon 5 to his comic work. And he doesn't deserve an apology for being a jackass.
Also, I appreciate you being apologetic about the depression bit (and mentioning the superior way All Star Superman handled it) as well as finally burning OMD.
If you want to do some research on Transformers and read some damn good comics all the while, check out Transformers: More Than Meets The Eyes (or MTMTE on Internet)by IDW.
It is seriously well written and drawn, a true joy.
I've got one: Worst villain origins. Not old origins like Joker, but one I'd personally say is terrible is Gail Simone's origin for Livewire. (Action Comics #835, 2006.) The animated show origin is probably one of the richest, most complicated and most painfully precise villain origins ever with a subtly arrayed set of details and insinuations about who Leslie Willis was before Superman's interference turned her into sentient electricity, especially in her expression before imminent death on the animated show being a very wide smile and in the insinuation that there's a distance between her inner perspective and her on-radio perspective on Superman and (therefore) superheroes in general. Her INNER perspective (logically) changes on Superman and ONLY Superman. (Her appearances in Girls Night Out and Justice League don't gel with that insinuation.) What we wind up with with Gail Simone: Simple stupidly misplaced aggression and some REALLY bizarre artwork choices.
Wow. #2 on that list was just incredible. In a world where people like Ray William Jonson thoughtlessly make comments or "jokes" about sensitive topics and then patronize the viewers who do find them offensive, I was blown away when you freely admitted that you were wrong. You showed maturity and respect for your fans, and that is something to be proud of. Seriously, you truly are the man. Here's to another year of atop the fourth wall.
Yay! 2099 is my favorite alternate marvel universe. If you need any issues I have ALL OF IT (except that stupid crossover with the spider-men which was out of continuity anyway).
DOOM FOR PRESIDENT. WHY SETTLE FOR THE MORE DEMOCRATIC OF EVILS? EVEN CTHULHU LETS YOU VOTE.
Wait, unless you mean that stupid reboot they did a couple years ago that made no sense.
I've been a fan for a while and I must say the #2 mark really took me by surprise. I saw the Superman 701 review and thought it was great.
Not going into detail about my health and past, I didn't feel offended by the original commentary about the woman committed suicide. At no point did I take it as someone was saying people who are suicidal are weak. Even if other people may have been hit by that sore spot, I think it's pretty clear you did not in any way mean harm by it.
I love Uncanny X-Force and Uncanny Avengers though. So I dearly hope your message of stopping X-Men to Marvel goes as ignored as the smelly kid in dance class.
As a fan, I have to say, I don't feel you owe anyone an apology for the depression comments in the Superman #701 review. I went back and reviewed it to be sure, and without a doubt, you said nothing wrong. Not only did you preemptively clarify that you understand how difficult and vital depression is to treat and that you weren't making fun of people who suffer from it, you indicated quite correctly at the end that the woman needed to be taken in to see a therapist ASAP along with some medication to help.
I myself suffer from Recurrent Brief Depression. Roughly once every month, I spend about 4-7 days in complete misery, even to the point of contemplating hurting myself. Whenever it strikes me, I'm rarely logical or able to listen to reason. Some of my friends suffer from clinical depression or bipolar disorder. When they experience their major episodes, the last thing they listen to is reason. More often than not, the feelings almost stem from nothing or a completely illogical/irrational base.
However, based on the standard criterion for depression set forth by the DSM-IV, the most credible diagnostic manual we have on mental disorders, the woman only met at most 2 of the 9 criterion, when most sufferers meet at least 5 for extended periods of time. Even after reading the comic myself, all I can see from this is a woman who is hysteric, desperate and not coping with the loss of her mother. We're given no introduction to the woman, no background beyond that she's in a bad state of life, and no basis to connect with her as a character. All she did was ramble on about how her life didn't pan out the way she dreamed it would, and whine about how life isn't fair. Not everybody who decides to commit suicide is depressed, contrary to popular belief. It's unfortunately uncanny how many people who are in stable mental health still fall to that decision.
As far as I'm concerned, you have nothing to apologize for, and any angry/hurt comments you received stemmed from either people who were listening selectively, got overly passionate when they shouldn't have, or (and I suspect this is most likely) have a shockingly minimal knowledge base for the actual condition, be they afflicted with it or not. I can only hope that people would take the time to get more informed about such conditions before becoming so incesnsed on a subject they scarcely understand.
I've had a lot of fun watching you, and being your privy to your appearances at Youmacon. Unfortunately I missed it this year, but I know you met my buddy Aaron there (Really tall, heavy guy wearing an Indy Jones hat, jean jacket and glasses if you remember). I hope you come back for Youma '13 though :) have a great year!
First of all Linkara very well done And as a person with a family history of Depression i did not find your Statement in 701 offensive because "Depression" Like ADHD is a term just thrown around and is used as a way for people to get attention.
Second of all My girlfriend says thank you for having similar food interests and for using One Day More at the end.
I'm slightly disappointed that there wasn't more of Mr. McNitpick. It would have been interesting to see him play off of your new-and-improved "trying to be a better guy" personae.
I tried to see if anyone posted this already but I didn't see it. The Fans who say the Horse-hair is decorative are right but also wrong. With the Spear the Horse Hair does have ceremonial value but have you ever asked, "why is it red?"
The Horse-Hair is red in ceremonial or decorative purpose because it harkens back to one of it's original purposes. The Hair itself actually acted as "blood barrier" which prevented a good deal of the blood from collecting onto the shaft of the spear and thus making it slippery and unwieldy. The hair is red to reflect this as the hair on the spear used in combat would grow more and more red with use.
Secondly the hair acts as a distraction. It causes the tip of the spear to become blurry and makes it harder for you to focus on it to accurately block or dodge.
Lastly, I've spent time with people who train on the spear and I've even played with it myself when I was active in Martial Arts. I can attest one thing as true, when I first saw the picture I thought it was a rocket fired out of the guy's nipple too until I saw the broken shaft.
Let me start off by saying I’m a really big fan, and have been for years, and I plan on remaining a fan for years to come. There isn’t a lot that can change that. I was however disappointed when you did - as you put it -- rectified your #1 error by burning a copy One More Day. I hated One More Day, and your feelings on it are very obvious. And I agree with you across the board. Except for the burning. I have trouble when someone burns a book. I totally understand your frustration, don’t get me wrong. And I know that a lot of that comes meeting fan expectations, trying to produce a damn good weekly show, and from playing a character (as an aside, let me state you do this better than most, some producers living behind well-blurred lines, much to their detriment). But as you’ve said, something I whole heartedly agree with, every comic is someone’s first comic. My first comic was Captain America #425. The art was serviceable, the story was a neat idea handled poorly, and it had a goddamn holographic cover. It’s not a very good book. And it was the first issue what is generally considered to be one of the worst story arcs for the good captain. And it is precious to me. The thought of someone destroying it, not even my physical copy of it, mind you, makes me sick. You love comics, it’s obvious. That’s why I really dig your show. You mock and deride and criticize comics failings because this medium is so important to you, and that shows. But your criticizing doesn’t need to go a place where you need to destroy something. I’m not asking you to change your theme, change your show, or really do anything different from what you’ve done for the last few years. I’m a fan of yours for a reason, after all. All I’m asking, even with thousands of other copies of something in the world is you just keep in mind how much harm physical destruction can do.
Thank you for correcting yourself about the whole jumper screw up. I im a life long sufferer of Bi-polar disorder, and at the time I watched your review for that comic I was going thought some tough times and your comments didn't help. Mind you that that is a VERY common thing said to me when im feeling that bad, so I was never mad at you just disappointed. Thank you again for your apology.
On another note way back in late 2009 a friend of mine showed me your "Ultimate Warrior" crossover with Spoony. I couldn't get enough and that led me to TGWTG. Much has changed since then and now but my enjoyment of you has stayed, and ill be here for the long haul as long as you keep us informed and entertained.
And finally, speaking of first's my first ever comic was a tattered copy of "Spiderman 2099" #1 given to me by a random kid while i was in the restroom while in the first grade (yes i know that's weird as hell). After losing it in a storm (my tree house blow over and destroyed my comic collection.)many years ago I've never read it again, only hearing off hand comments that the whole 2099 thing sucked on toast. as such i was GIDDY when i heard you mention 2099, and i will purposely not read them till then.
Don't feel bad about the Coney dog thing. Although I know what it was (Coney being my last name I had little chance of not knowing... grumble grumble high school grumble)I prefer to think Eminem was refering to a mutant rabbit/dog hybrid. A rabog if you will, or possibly a dobit. That is for mad science to work out. I feel like this post should have had more of a point....Oh well have a great day Linkara.
Actually, it isn't that synthesiser is the British spelling of synthesizer; rather, synthesizer is the American spelling of synthesiser. We use the S form in Ireland as well; it's also considered to be the correct form in Canada and Australia, though they consider the Z form to be an acceptable variant.
The UK version of MS Word is the same as the US version; there is an option somewhere to set the language to English (UK), among others, and yeah, it does autocorrect synthesizer to synthesiser. However, I think English (US) is still the default, and even if you do set it to English (UK), the menus are still in US English.
I'm totally with you on cereal, though for the opposite reason - milk sucks all the flavour out, leaving you with a bland, soggy, gloopy mess. Reading the comments, wow, it seems like all sort of dry cereal fans are coming out of the woodwork.
I think the Pretenders were in the G2 comic becuase they weren't dead at the end of G1.
Do start using asinine, it's a good word.
I've seen a few people seriously suggest that the X-Men be moved into their own universe so the issues associated with them can be properly explored without having to collide with all the other superheroes.
deigod.dragoness:
>First, there is a fear associated with being a human and seeing the next form of evolution as I can imagine was the case for Homo Erectus upon seeing Homo Sapien and seeing their own numbers dwindling. Not to mention the jealousy that is associated with seeing the next step of evolution and knowing you won't be along for the ride can eat someone up.
I wouldn't feel too bad about getting "Gloucestershire" wrong. England is full of surnames and places names whose pronunciation is wildly different from their spelling. Wikipedia even has an (extremely long) list of all of them:
Author P.G. Wodehouse (pronounced "Woodhouse" in case you were curious) wrote the "Jeeves and Wooster" book series, which made fun of a lot of aspects of British culture, including this. The main character has a friend whose name is Cyril "Barmy" Fotheringay-Phipps (last name pronounced "Fungy-Phipps"-- the g is hard as in "fungus"). So people call him "Barmy Fungy-Phipps"
Just wanted to say that, as some-one who has depression, I wasn't really offended by your comments in the superman review as Superman's little speech was pretty terrible which was the main problem with that whole scene.
Oh, and yes, the British spellcheck changes it to "Synthesiser".
I also wanted to ask; I tried tweeting you about it but I didn't get a reply, I was just wondering what recording of 'One more Day' you used both here and the One More Day review. Because I want to find it.
McNittpick is also full of it btw :P I still love the TGWTG site and actually, was watching other people's reviews more than I was the NC so... yeah XD nitpick him back!
As for X-men I only watched the 90s cartoon as a kid and even that I gave up on when it started crossing over with Spiderman and becoming insane. You're pretty accurate though, the whole prejudice doesn't make sense in the marvel universe. Personally I would've split X-Men from the rest of the Marvel universe altogether and keep it as its own seperate universe. Although then again the guys at Marvel's heads may explode if they tried to do that.
I also wanted to actually thank you for reading every single comment you get :D even if you never reply or acknowledge something. it just makes me personally feel better than feeling like I'm screaming into the dark you know? haha!
Anyway that's about it from me. Happy New year Linkara! I look forward to your future shinanegans!
(forgive me if this is a double post. My internet is being weird)
the x men universe is in-dead upside down and backwards but as a x-men fan who know about the character and if help is needed a google search could clear up a lot these are just my thoughts, but I do want to say that I enjoy watching your shows on tgwtg and can not wait for more do you have a direct paypal account to receive donations
As far as X-Men goes, I'm a fan of the characters, but I do think some the writers need to fix some stuff. (At least, from my casual reader perspective.)
Mainly, put Scott Summers/Cyclops down before he goes any futher on the crazy train (seriously, I don't even LIKE Cyclops and I have to admit, the writers are going a little far as they run the asylum...).
And, for more personal reasons, they need to BRING BACK FREAKIN' NIGHTCRAWLER! Seriously, they just killed him off in an event (and it wasn't the "main" death), brought freakin' Cable back (who died in the SAME EVENT), and then replaced him with his darker and edgier counterpart from AoA (furthering my belief that the writers are a bunch of AoA fanboys who want to use that universe as much as possible)! I thought he was awesome, and probably the most morally good character out of the team (making him MORE awesome).
...Sorry for ranting, there. I'm just irked they haven't inevitably brought him back yet...
I kind of blamed Iron Man for One More Day. After all, he made Spider-Man reveal his identity in the first place in Civil War, thus causing the events that led to that horrible retcon.
Oh! And you should soooo have a SNOWFLAAAME! ad bumper-thing sometime!
Happy New Year Lewis. Looking forward to another great year of ATFW.
Your eating habits/philosophy are similar to my father's. Although the no milk on cereal thing is new to me. I, like a lot of people I know, will only eat cereal with cold milk because I don't like it to go soggy. Is that the case with you?
Rhodoferax: Um, in regards to the X-Men, that's HIGHLY debatable. IF mutants actually existed in large enough numbers to breed at a fast enough speed, it's actually very plausible that they could overtake traditional humanity.
I know this comment doesn't belong to this video, but I just saw you singing a part of A Long December in Nash's New Year's Eve video. Love that song, thanks man!
Have you been reading Marvel Comics the Untold Story? When you started talking about Quesada and Avi Arad it sounded like it. I finished it a couple days ago, very interesting.
2099! It was around the time those were coming out when I was a kid, that comics started coming into my radar.
I just wanted to say not to worry about the depression thing: You're clearly well-meaning, and I don't doubt for a moment that your reaction to a badly-written comic book version of depression doesn't reflect for a moment how you'd act to someone really depressed.
Indeed, I know it's not. About three years ago, I had really, really, really ill for years, and had some pretty severe depression alongside it. I spent a year where I almost never went more than about 400 yards from my house. Because I couldn't. The long illness cost me most of my friends, and all I could do was try and fill time.
Your enthusiasm and humour helped me a lot during that time, and the one time I wrote you, you were really nice. That helped.
Shortly after that, I finally got some actual treatment, and my life started on an upswing. I'm not perfect yet, but things have vastly improved: I have multiple social groups, go out 3-4 times a week with friends, and, well, don't have attacks of suicidal thoughts anymore, which is usually considered a good thing. Things just keep improving.
So, yeah. You didn't know about depression. But you still managed to help someone going through it. =)
If it helps with the depression thing? I don't suppose you remember the person who sent you the Punch cartoons a few years ago, in thanks for helping him through a tough illness?
Yeah. Severe depression with regular suicidal thoughts, combined with an illness that made me unable to go more than about 400 yards from my house for months on end. Your show was a lifeline during then, keeping me in touch with something interesting and different outside myself and my life at the time.
Don't think I told you that, of course. Wouldn't tell you now if things hadn't gotten so much better - I now have multiple social groups, and go out with friends 3-4 times a week, am able to do physical activity again, and the suicidal thoughts just don't happen anymore. Admittedly, I have some ways to go - but I now have support for it, and am not alone.
So, thanks Linkara. Your show was there to cheer me up when I had little to be cheery about. Thank you so much.
Please don't see this as an insult but there are several reviewers that I enjoy more than you. That said, I must also say that I have more respect for you than those others, not meant as an insult towards those others.
I remember the review containing the woman who wanted to end her life. I also remember that I didn't like the things you said about that particular part.
I don't know you, of course, but I have seen most, if not all, of your reviews and I'm quite certain that you didn't mean anything by it, so I didn't post a comment. Now though, I felt obligated to.
I have suffered from depression for a long period of my life. I don't know how it is for other people who suffer or have suffered the same, but in my experience it never really goes away. It changes, lessens and can even be ignored for periods of time, but it's never truly gone for me. Having lived with this for some time now, I have come across many who simply don't understand it. It's only logical that they don't since they haven’t experienced it, and although it saddens me that this means that it often gets underestimated how profound an impact depression has on the life of a person suffering from it, it also means that they have never experienced it themselves, which is a good thing.
To me you come across as an honest and passionate person who will defend his opinions, without losing sight of the fact that others are entitled to have opinions that differ from your own. You recognize the mistakes you make and even make light of them. And lastly that when you truly feel that you’ve made a mistake on an ethical ground you will sincerely apologize. For that, I truly respect you.
I hope to see at least another 200+ episodes, and I'm sure I'll be watching every one of them as well.
Your favorite comic of all... could it be... The Technis Imperative ?!!!! *squeeeeeeeeeeeeeee* I bought that comic because of you, y'know. I've always been curious as to what you'd say about it beyond "I like it." Of all the cross-overs I've read, it is my favorite. (Although it takes second place behind Superman's Secret Origin for favorite comic.) Can't wait for the review... sorry, retrospective. ;)
Bravo, confronting mistakes in this manner is both entertaining for the viewers and also lets them know that you really are paying attention and trying to improve. As a viewer often "on the fence", I appreciate it.
Also encouraging is knowing that I am not alone in finding the X-Men so annoying. Besides the "science" of X-Men I think the biggest problem is with the concept of the "X-Men" themselves and Xavier's "dream".
Long story short (this post used to be over twice as long) the X-Men seem to do everything they can to be divisive and justify the fears of "prejudiced humanity". Xavier praises peaceful coexistence while forming a paramilitary strike forced composed of only his "own kind". If Xavier's dream meant something, I would expect the X-Men to be housed separately from Xavier's school and consist of merely "the best" of those that believe in Xavier's dream, regardless of how they received their superhuman abilities (if they had any)... and I wouldn't phrase it so that it reinforces that division he wishes to fight. How about just striving for peaceful coexistence; as you stated why are intentionally engineered super-powered humans and accidentally empowered humans viewed so differently from "naturally super-powered" humans?
When you brought up the auto-correct I immediately checked and yes it does change to the British spelling.
ReplyDeleteMy friend.
ReplyDeleteThis right here is my respect.
It's yours.
Is that thesis paper on the X-Men legit? Because I am totally on board for reading that.
ReplyDeleteIf you wanted to be extra cruel to your audience, you would've put the new movie version "One Day More" instead the actually good version of the song.
ReplyDeleteGod I hate the new movie.
I loved 90's Kid's little bounce that he did. That made the joke for me.
ReplyDeleteLong term fan in the UK here, Thought I'd clear up the Gloucestershire problem for you (I know, sorry. Hang on no I'm not.)
ReplyDeleteThe U in the word is the same as having it in Colour. It should be silent. It is because English is a hodgepodge of all sorts of different languages French, Latin, Saxon, Gaelic. Basically if it's every European language got together and had a basted offspring it left in the cupboard for six years, and don't even get me started on the grammar.
The U is a leftover from the French influence, something that American standards of spelling have rejected. This is also why we spell words like Night, Centre and Synthesiser differently.
Also the E after the C makes the C into an S sound, which is why it comes out like that when you're saying it. if you have problems with Gloucestershire you really shouldn't try Worcester which is exactly the same thing (although I would suggest trying som e Worcester sauce to improve you're diet.)
Oh and the worst thing about spelling over here, Microsoft Word defaults to the US spellings no matter what you do, Damn it.
Good work though, I havent reviewed in a while but I have kept watching. best of luck with 2013, hope for a few less picky commenters
Thomas
PS If you ever need any help with the Transformers script you've got coming drop me a line, seriously I could out do Nash on this...
I know I had to stop the video at the Agelo part, but, have you tried the website comicvine?
ReplyDeleteUsually when I come across a character I don't know, I type in their name and get a pretty detailed description of who they were and how many comics they were in.
It might be helpful for your reviews.
Excellent video to wrap up the year Linkara
ReplyDeleteJust a few screw-ups i think deserve a mention are:
Marville #1 you did not analyze the cover, and there are some things to be said about that cover
Battle for Bludheaven #1: Major victory DID tell the titans that he had no problem with them helping people outside of the restricted area
Incredible Hulk #1 : the clip you used for proof of the monsters name being Frankenstein does not work because Igor is the crazed villain of the movie and not someone to be trusted much less base an argument off of. Your argument from That’s all I’m saying on the subject of Frankenstein was more convincing.
Okay, about X-men comics.
ReplyDelete1) Marvel says they want to focus on Avengers, X-Men and Spider-Man titles.
2) THAT'S THE POINT! It's a criticism on racism! Think about it, people are racist to black people when they are the same as everyone else! THAT'S THE POINT! Mutants are being prejudiced against even though they are like everyone else!
It just shows how pointless racism is when everyone is the same! Racism isn't rational, it's the fear of other people who appear different when they really aren't!
I'm sorry, but that part of your video got me riled up that I had to stop it right there!
I too really like Babylon 5, Hence my constant pestering for a review of one of the B5 comics. WILL NOONE FEED MY ADDICTION APART FROM SFDEBRIS?!!! D:
ReplyDeleteActually, I've never minded overmuch when you neglect to burn the comics. Granted, OMD deserves it to hell and back, but I always figured the burning in the slogan was more metaphorical and less literal. Still, them pages make a satisfying crackle, eh?
Also, thank God someone else thought House of M sucked too. Although in my specific case, it's not so much the X-Men that are the problem as much as the Scarlet Witch, whom I've seriously come to despise over the years due to her nonsense. Seriously, Quesada, SFDebris had it right: let Scarlet Witch make the deal with Spiderman and turn HER into the series' main villain, since she's basically Marvel's greatest monster anyway!
I was disappointed you didn't mention the botched joke about the GL HQ from New Guardians #1, but whatever. I was glad you brought up the depression stuff, while that scene is dumb some of your comments about the depressed woman were a little harsh. I didn't catch the error in the Supergirl review but now I see it and wonder why you guys didn't just cut the line. Overall a good video and look forward to what next year brings.
ReplyDeleteHey, someone else who doesn't like toppings on hotdogs, pizza, or sandwiches. HUG ME KINDRED SPIRIT!
ReplyDeleteWait. You don't ever put milk in your cereal? GET AWAY FROM ME YOU FREAK!
You missed another one: I can't find our twitter talks about the Blüdhaven review, but I recall you making a mistake in those videos that we cleared up.
ReplyDeletesoooo... did you burn Cry for Justice??
ReplyDeleteFeels weird to do this with a screw-up episode, but it's pronounced Ah-VEE Ah-RAHD. Avi and Ari (Ah-REE) are common Hebrew names/ nicknames.
ReplyDeleteAddition to earlier comment: This is what I was talking about.
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/3llenseg/status/215106711873257474
I never really cared for the mutant breed. I'm a fan of "all star" teams like the Justice League or the Avengers, but for some reason the X-Men and their exploits have always left me fairly cold.
ReplyDeletei remember bunnie .she was in tha plot of steel and the guns
ReplyDeleteYou really have a massive hate on for the X-Men.
ReplyDeleteYou don't like Coney Dogs? BURN THE WITCH! BURN THE WITCH!!!!
ReplyDeleteKidding.
Keep up the good work and happy 2013!
I've never done this before, but you made a mistake here. In the credits, you forgot to credit Green Day's "Redundant", the song you played over the Title Card. Big Green Day fan here, so that's how I noticed it. Just making sure you don't get into legal trouble.
ReplyDeleteAlas almost all typing things in the UK default to the American spelling of words.Usually you end up with a clumsy mess of British and American spellings which is ... irritating.
ReplyDeleteGreat video though , keep up the good work while still making mistakes
Only one thing Linkara. Christmas isn't over yet.
ReplyDeleteFor any family that celebrates Epiphany/Little Christmas, means they also take into account that Christmas does last 12 days and is still going, something my step father does and gives out one small gift a day to his son with one for the first and little Christmas days.
You guys seem to always want to start early and not even bother with all of Christmas, it get sort of annoying to hear every video do this.
That was a… pretty brutal talk-down of the X-Men. The reason most modern Marvel events can be traced back to the X-Men is because House of M really did have that long lasting repercussions. Either that or Marvel just really liked tying things back to that. If I recall, there was a time when the X-Men were Marvel's biggest selling franchise, hence the support for them. I'm sure X-Men fans will either disagree with you or feel so burnt out by what Marvel has done, but from what I recall, the only new X-Men books in Marvel NOW! are All-New X-Men, Cable and X-Force, and The Savage Wolverine, since everything else is just a relaunch. MAYBE Uncanny Avengers and A+X, but those books are really just meant to be as followups to AvX and are just as much Avengers books as they are X-Men.
ReplyDeleteI actually think Onslaught looks kind of cool, but my understanding is that Onslaught storyline was essentially the X-Men's Clone Saga.
A screw-up in a screw-up video? SCREWUPCEPTION!
I'm glad I'm not the only one who has such bland tastes, since I have a tendency to eat chicken fingers and chicken tenders. For sandwiches, I prefer peanut butter and jelly or grilled cheese, but even I like putting milk in my cereal.
For your comment on Archie Comics, I was curious if you were going to address the numbering, in case you screwed that up.
Aw, I was hoping to hear a shout-out to Spider-Man Crawlspace. Ah well, at least you felt regret for insulting JMS. And yeah, I love that you pointed out that your one compliment for Quesada wasn't deserved.
Now that I got that out of the way, I'm VERY happy that burning One More Day was the number one spot, and that you did burn it in this video. That's all I wanted from this video, so it was the perfect way to bid farewell to 2012 and welcome 2013. Playing One Day More again was unexpected, but I loved it.
I'm looking forward to 2099, if only because I've grown to like the character from the video games.
Thanks to another great year for Atop the Fourth Wall, and here's to another!
This episode just made my day. Thank you so much for a brilliant end to 2012!
ReplyDeleteYou are gonna hate me for pointing this out...
ReplyDeletebut you showed a cover of sci spy instead of catwoman at one point...
excellent video!
First I wanna say I'm a really big fan and want to thank you for finally burning one more day. That comic has caused me pain for a while. However, I do feel a little hurt by your bashing of the X-men. I just got into the characters after reading Joss Whedon's spectacular run on Astonishing X-men and there is a lot to like about the characters. I do see where you are coming from and can agree with many of your insights (seriously the whole mutant racism thing is perplexing), but there is a lot to like about the x-men as well. The team is comprised of many interesting characters, has some amazing villains, and is in many ways dysfunctional. Its that factor that ultimately shapes the team and leads to its biggest struggles. Do I wish that marvel portrayed the team better? Yes! But that doesn't mean it should stop publishing stories altogether, it just means that it needs to rethink its approach.
ReplyDeleteNice way to close off the year. It really shows just how humble you are that you go through the trouble of dedicating an entire episode to admitting your mistakes.
ReplyDeleteLewis, I'm starting to wish I was maybe ten years older and lived in Minnesota just to have a conversation with you. It's so nice to know other people are indifferent to X-Men and prefer that kind of food. Though how do you eat your cereal? Dry or do you take it with something else? I've heard some people eat it with juice.
Though since you mentioned Heroes Reborn, I wonder if you'll tackle it eventually . . . if only because of Rob Liefeld.
It's been a good year at AT4W and let's hope for a great new year.
Wow, that was exceptional.
ReplyDeleteIt also made me hate Joe Quesada, in a way that isn't healthy to hate someone I don't know.
Kudos on owning yourself and your mistakes. This should have been the episode in the storyline where Linkara purged himself of all of his evil.
It's weird how I didn't notice some of these, but I'll chalk that up to my general un-knowledge of comic continuity or history and other things. As for hard water, that pushes Jay's origin into the second weirdest origin I've heard, right after Ralph Dibny and Gingold.
ReplyDeleteDon't feel bad about the depression comments. Like you said, it is a complex issue, and it is possible the woman was actually a histrionic (a different yet just as valid mental disease that emphasizes exaggeration of personal experiences to get attention.) Hell, it is still more informed that what my brother, allegedly a depression-sufferer himself, said the other day along the lines that depressed people should just get over it.
ReplyDeleteSCREW-UPCEPTION!!!!
ReplyDeleteI've actually kinda bought the crossovers.
ReplyDeleteBecause neither of them was hosted by you, and because I figured releasing crossovers may happen at different times on different shows, I treated them as they would have to match the timelines of the respected shows and not necesseraly the AT4W one.
So well, besides that one question regarding when and where could have the hologram - or Linkara himself, since the hologram had his knowledge and all - met the Nostalgia Chick on a such a short notice as 5 days, I think they were plausible.
1. Your comment on suicide was great Lewis. It is always a touchy subject.
ReplyDelete2. This whole thing about the X-Men just ticks me off. By the time the 15th anniversary of the first movie comes out, we will have a million books and 7 movies. In all honesty, Marvel should have put the X-Men in the Heroes Reborn Universe. Their concept works better in their own continuity than mixed in with Spidey or Cap.
3. Superior Spider-Man will be dead by the next movie.
4. At Magfest, could you maybe review a chapter of Rosario + Vampire? It is usually good, but even you can mock the good stuff and still make it entertaining.
5. 2099 and Teen Titans for 2013? I am hyped as hell!
Happy New Year Lewis!
Asthma Monster Comic Panel! The first panel you are showing in talking about getting this wrong look at the left edge of the panel. THE GUARD HAS A GUN ON HIS HIP! You weren't Wrong There are Guns on the Guards in this Prison the Comic is WRONG, Not You in this case. He is drawn with a gun. You are making a mistake about your mistake Its spiraling Linkara!
ReplyDeleteI Really missed CHYDCABPNTKIOTUT
Comic History you don't care about but probably need to know in order to understand this.
Well at least you tried to make Joe C. have a half decent moment.
THANK YOU FOR BURNING ONE MORE DAY!!!!!!!!!!!
Metal buckets are better for burning....
Sadly on Eating Xavier's brain no I would not have been surprised.
So got time to do a text overlay and arrow pointing out the gun in that comic panel?
Oh goody, even after 5 rewrites, I misspelled "necesseraly".
ReplyDeleteI'll blame the champagne now.
I'm gonna grab the chance and wish everyone a happy new year!
Ok, NOW I'm going to notice your eyes.
ReplyDeleteX-Men : In my opinion, more than racism or fear of the difference, the X-Men mythos plays on the fear of the humans being inexorably replaced by another, allegedly superior race (see the regular comparison with the neanderthal being replaced by the homo sapiens).
I don't think this can be compared to characters being granted powers by accidents or experiments (FF and Captain America).
Civil War : AvX makes a point to say that non-mutants heroes rarely gave a damn when mutants were persecuted (save for a Reed Richards appearance where he advocates the end of a mutant registration act), so Civil War events are really a karmic backlash. Onslaught and Heroes Reborn : I just love how you (sarcastically) put the blame of editiorial mandate on fictionnal characters.
By the way, how is One more day traceable to the X-Men ? (Ok, maybe Elixir could have prevented it...)
2099... I wonder : Peter David's Spiderman and Doom were good to awesome, Ghost Rider / X-Men were average (Ghost rider : The art shift between Chris Bachalo to Kyle Hotz was painful though), Ravage and Punisher were awful. It's Ravage, isn't it ?
I'm ashamed to say I think I can identify the white-haired woman, having read the 90s series Steel where she plays a more important role.
One Day More : I wish you used the Chick's musical review version.
Happy New Year. Hey weshley and mittnickpick and nostalgia chick. :)
ReplyDelete15. We all mistakes. I didn't catch it.
14. I forgotten about them appearing in other books too.
13. Skin death was big shot at Gen X and I forgotten about him. It was literally a throw away death meant nothing. I don't know I like the x-men when done right like in Wolverine and X-Men. Not in X-Men books run by Cyclops. You had to remind me of Uncanny Avengers #1 didn't you?
12. Anyone could have made that mistake. As you said no way to tell that is right way.
10. I didn't know what coney dog was either. I thought it was a hot dog from coney island.
9. I'm glad you admitted not doing research. G2 I have to say not one of my favorite transformers comic series. There so many things wrong and I forgotten they had pretty much tried separate from previous. Is that call back to me saying it was a Pretender? Hm. Why was it even in the image? I don't remember any expect maybe a depticon one but looked like autobot pretender shell in the image.
7. I didn't even notice the emitter.
6. JMS was for the break up and glad you mention.
5. I'm going to reference this video any time Joe q fans want to praise what he did to save company.
4. Yeah I don't think anyone here in us would have know that. That is okay mistake.
3. Nice to know you still look. My first episode was more then a year and half ago.
1. YES, YES, YES! Burn baby burn. Sorry I hate OMD and I reminds me how much i'm raging over Amazing Octopus #700.
No mention of Jaws on one of Marvell covers? I mean you missed that one. That belonged less with those other movies like MTS3K Manos Hands Of Fate.
Magfest this week! Yeah! Next week Kamandi. Oh boy. Marvel 2099? I really liked it. There was some good stuff and some bad stuff. Spider-Man 2099 man was really good (get well peter david). Should be interesting I hope. Interesting fact that when I use Supermutant name and it's taken I have years used 2099. It's oh to Marvel 2099.
To Balence the Avi Arad thing out, he IS responsible for Most of everything we have seen in Spider-Man 3. Sam Rami, Well, He wanted Sandman and the only thing form him that he got was the retcon. which honestly took the WHOLE POINT of the first film's origin and theme about responsibility out. Also Sam wanted Harry to be "somewhere in between" him becoming his father and him being himself. Instead we got an okay spider-man film that unlike TASM (both versions are a crappy film BTW) that could of been a better movie. Atlas the final product we got in SM3 was the "BEST CASE SENARIO" sadly with all that studio interference. Avi doesn't really care, its all about the money.
ReplyDeleteThe point is, he's just to blame for lots of things he did right. hell he didn't even care about spider-man TAS since he had no idea about the characters.
Lewis, As someone who has AS (Asperger Syndrome, you can bing/google slap {search for it in the inbox] while its a little bit different for me as it is for others, As a disabled person I have to ay thank you for being very respectful to others, to me that what makes a human being more of a good person, it's those that have respect for others and grant them a sharing hand of health.
Ypu Lewis Lovag, are My Role Model. Have a good and wonderful new year my friend, and mentor.
You seemed a little harsh on the X-men, while yes they are like every other superhero and as was stated that is the point, but there is more to it.
ReplyDeleteFirst, there is a fear associated with being a human and seeing the next form of evolution as I can imagine was the case for Homo Erectus upon seeing Homo Sapien and seeing their own numbers dwindling. Not to mention the jealousy that is associated with seeing the next step of evolution and knowing you won't be along for the ride can eat someone up.
Second, you can't blame the X-men for all of the events listed. The Civil War? Yeah Emma told Tony where to go and how to get there pretty damn fast. Even though it was based on the MRA that's not on them. The House of M? Wanda was an Avenger when that went down. Yeah Onslaught was on the X-men, but the reveal was one of the most well built up and surprising in my lifetime.
Third, yes the Exiles rocked! Thanks for acknowledging that.
That's all, keep up the good work and I look forward to the 2099 stuff.
I also am not fond of toppings on hot dogs or pizza (or much of anything for that matter) and I also do not put milk in my cereal. /brofist
ReplyDeleteAlso, the mention of "inhibitor collars" made me wonder if you finally started watching "Young Justice" since I can't really think of any other version of the DC universe that has had metahuman prisons that use inhibitor collars to suppress abilities. As I recall, Belle Reve in the comics implants explosive devices to keep their prisoners (and the Suicide Squad) obedient.
Nice Vid Linkara, u gave me an late christmas present by burning One More Day!
ReplyDeleteGreat Top 15 I especially liked seeing One More Day get burned. And seriously? Doc Ock is now Spider-man? I admit after One More Day I lost most interest, but still kept in the loop, but my god. I seen many ass pulls in my life, but that one takes it.
ReplyDeleteI have been uncomfortable about your burning of comics in the past, which honestly stems from more personal beliefs about burning books and implications. I'm also smart enough to know that you are doing this for a joke, and I accept that, I still get that twinge, sorry.
ReplyDeleteBUT. It feels surprisingly good to watch OMD burn. I am conflicted by this. Thank you Linkara.
I give you massive applause for your apology about the depressed girl in the Superman comic. That takes real guts to admit to it and I was touched by it. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteAnd thank you for burning One More Day! That made me smile!
Also, rocket nipples still makes me laugh so I don't even care about how spears really work :D
"I've never done this before, but you made a mistake here. In the credits, you forgot to credit Green Day's "Redundant", the song you played over the Title Card. Big Green Day fan here, so that's how I noticed it. Just making sure you don't get into legal trouble."
ReplyDeleteYeah, I realized that, too. Redundant was going to be the ending them, but then One Day More fit better with how the video ended, sooo I forgot to write it into the credits.
"You are gonna hate me for pointing this out...
ReplyDeletebut you showed a cover of sci spy instead of catwoman at one point..."
Not really, I was fully aware of it. I was using a clip from the actual episode. XD
Which version of One Day More is that?
ReplyDeleteYou forgot about Miller :P
ReplyDelete"Also, the mention of "inhibitor collars" made me wonder if you finally started watching "Young Justice" since I can't really think of any other version of the DC universe that has had metahuman prisons that use inhibitor collars to suppress abilities. As I recall, Belle Reve in the comics implants explosive devices to keep their prisoners (and the Suicide Squad) obedient."
ReplyDeleteIn the late-90s and early-2000s, the DCU had an abundance of inhibitor collars at their prisons that could be used to quell riots and stop powers. I felt it was quite clever... and then the writers and editors apparently forgot those existed.
Thanks for all the hard work you put into this great show. A great way to end the year with One More Day burning.
ReplyDeleteAlso finally your going to do some 2099
Keep up the good work.
We are including Pat Lee in unethical business practices, right? Because he most certainly deserves it. Also, this could be wild guessing on my part, but do you think it's possible that Marvel did the Spider-Man thing you mentioned in the end credits so that Peter and MJ could get back together? I certainly wouldn't mind it. But it was great to see OMD get what it deserves. And seriously, it's either a miracle or tragic comedy that the comic industry hasn't discovered you yet. Seriously, I don't think anyone would object if you became the head writer for DC or Marvel. Except maybe the X-Men fans.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with your "spaz" commentary.
ReplyDeleteHere's a fun fact: In the Transformers Universe there a Dinobot named "Slag" who had to be renamed "Slug" for British reasons also.
A more annoying example would be the removal of Derpy Hooves, even though nobody in any country uses the word "derp" as an insult.
this video was beautiful and you should feel beautiful!
ReplyDelete....
Wait.
You say you read ALL the comments? Does that mean that you are... Santa?!
Spell checks are much more fun in the UK. Everytime we install new software with a spell checker we have to reconvince it that we want UK spelling despite the system being set up that way. Then there are the times the OS, usually Windows, will randomly decide that it wants us to use an American keyboard, which isn't noticed until we want quotation marks or are writing an email.
ReplyDeleteAs for your eyes on the camera, a trick when giving talks is to look just above audience members' eyes so you don't make contact, but they'll percieve that you are to keep them engaged. Try to rig the script for a scene on top of the camera when filming?
yes most of the bad events on Marvel can be traced to the X-men, but one X-man in particular.
ReplyDeleteScott Summers. A vs X could of been avoided if he he stop and told Cap what his Son, Cable, saw that lead his near murdering the Avengers. Plus there is hisattemptedd kidnapping of Wanda in Children's crusade where he attacks the avengers from behind after the Scarlet whitch agrees to go with the x-men to what would be nothing more then a show trial.
Which made her flee from both teams and back into Doom's arm....
almost all the crap the mutants have faced can be traced to one event that to this day defines what kind of man Scott Summers is....A deadbeat father that abandons his wife and new born son to be with high schoolsweethart and doomed the mutants to be forever feared and hated.
is it any wonder the teen O5 attacked him?
Good video Likara. I think you addressed the mistakes very well.
ReplyDeleteBy the way have you played lone survivor? It's a great game that is very much like silent hill.
"In the late-90s and early-2000s, the DCU had an abundance of inhibitor collars at their prisons that could be used to quell riots and stop powers. I felt it was quite clever... and then the writers and editors apparently forgot those existed."
ReplyDeleteHuh, no kidding? Yeah, I saw those on YJ and thought, "Wow, how many situations could have been solved if they just had those things in the comics?" I figured if they existed in the comics they'd crop up all the time. I mean, a device that can disable metahuman powers in a world where evil metahumans break out of jail every other week? You'd think they'd remember something like that existed.
Any Chance that the burning will be in the opening credits eventually?
ReplyDeleteThe woman is the White Rabbit I think she was selling Steel's Toastmasters to the gangs of Metropolis and was a major plot point in the reason why Steel was fighting street crime and became a superhero. (He invented the weapons when he worked for the military and was very upset that someone was selling them to street gangs to kill each other)
So the White Rabbit was actually a rather important character in the Return of Superman story arc as the former lover and main villain of John Irons aka Steel.
Linkara, concerning your personal taste comment....would you like some Tabasco? Because I can send you some Tabasco.
ReplyDeleteI have to say thanks. I really appreciate the love you have for your fans and keep up the good work.
ReplyDeleteJust curious, do you eat your cereal dry or some other way?
Marvel has pretty much destroyed the X-Men by this point thanks to Avengers vs X-Men. Almost all of the "good" (or money making mutants like Wolverine) have been absorbed into the Avengers while Cyclops has been reduced to a Magneto clone (a terrorist who has good points, but still commits horrendous crimes) with his own little brotherhood of mutants. Plus also you gotta remember that Marvel doesn't own the X-Men movie license and given their attitudes towards characters whom they can't make movies out of this heel turn is unsurprising...just sayin. :)
ReplyDeleteExcellent work, as usual.
ReplyDeleteI have to say the shift in tone from your somber, sincere talk about depression to the Weird Al song immediately after it was so abrupt it actually made me laugh. Although that is a very hard transition to make.
Seeing the Judas Traveler screw up I immediately remembered that for X-Mas I got "The Complete Clone Saga Epic" I look and that comic exists in it so I'll probably be pulling up that review and marking down every time his entourage shows up. Btw which screw-up was the one you asked the fans to come up with?
ReplyDeleteHey you think the Asthma Monster thing is stupid? In Tales of Suspense, Black Knight was put in prison...with his saddlebags in his cell. Guess what was in those saddlebags? Yes, his weapons, including his disintegration gun.
ReplyDeleteGreat video to end off the year and I hope that the next year will be just as good!
ReplyDeleteI like reviewers who take the time to listen to their viewers and take into account on the advice they give. It's one of the many reasons I respect you as a reviewer.
... I do admit that I am the same when it comes to food, especially the chicken and hotdogs.
I... had to stop watching the video after the part where Linkara rants about the X-Men and how he thinks Marvel should stop making X-Men comics.
ReplyDeleteThe majority of the complaints ultimately sounded like trying to find excuses to justify hatred of the brand and reasons to kill it off. The most glaring was claiming that all the most ridiculous and stupid ideas out of Marvel have their origins in the X-Men... when even I know that's not true and I'm not a hardcore comic book fan. From the very beginning, comic books have had incredibly stupid storylines that made absolutely no sense, to the point that it's ingrained into the medium and recurs often. Was Iron Man's suit gaining sentience and developing an obsession for Tony Stark an idea that came from the X-Men? Did the X-Men cause the Clone Saga?
Even if you can find a spot where the X-Men affected the outcome of certain events, you can do the exact same thing for just about any character or brand you want to complain about in the Marvel universe. Suddenly, we're saying the whole Avengers brand should be killed off and the various characters and teams should be kept in separate books because trying to mix them all together results in things like Civil War where heroes are fighting each other.
If Linkara had simply said that Marvel is utilizing the X-Men brand poorly, then I'd agree with him. The X-Men brand is in poor shape due to the way it's being used as of late, in large part because of Marvel trying to force it to meld into Avengers as a subelement of that brand.
But he outright claimed that the X-Men brand is the bane of everything Marvel, and heavily pushed the idea that the whole X-Men brand should be completely wiped out. His X-Men rant in this video can be summed up as "I don't understand the brand nor do I value it, but because stupid events happened because of Marvel doing a poor job trying to force the X-Men brand on the brands I DO care about, it should be killed off!" And at that point, he's unintentionally saying Quesada's One More Day was the right thing to do because of all the times the relationship between Peter Parker and Mary Jane was handled poorly.
got to say, after just getting back from watching Les Mis with my sister, got to love the choice of music during screw-up number 1. I am also glad that you read every comment you get on the site. You and Blockbuster Buster really know how to engage your fans. Thanks for an awesome year. Happy New Year.
ReplyDeleteAw, thanks for addressing your comments on depression. They kind of disturbed me when I first heard them because I suffer from depression, and you're usually pretty spot on with being inclusive and stuff (especially in regards to trans people, which is pretty rare) and so I figured it was an honest mistake but I'm glad you addressed it! =)
ReplyDeleteAlso, One More Day was burned! Yaaay! Ding dong the comic is dead (the wicked comic! the wicked comic!) ding dong the wicked comic is deaaad~
Can't wait to see what the new year has in store for us at Atop the Fourth Wall ^_^
yes i have been waiting for 2099
ReplyDeleteCHICKEN TENDER LOVERS UNITE!
ReplyDeleteThank you for clearing up the Supergirl thing for us.
What's your opinion on Marvel NOW?
Honestly Lewis, catch a break. Seriously, no one is going to lynch you if you miss out on a week or two, especially around this part of the year.
ReplyDeleteI don't know how much a few hiatuses would set you back financially, but really, putting out a video (plus extras) every week, all around the year is just unhealthy, and we do not want that. Not to mention some free weeks in your work-schedule might actually help out with weeding out these "screw-ups" in the making.
I know how stupid this is gonna sound, but... Do you still have the ashes of One More Day? I'll totally buy them at GatoCon. xD
ReplyDeleteAlso, there's one other little mistake you made in the video, and that's how to pronounce Avi Arad's name. It's "Ah-vee" "Arr-Ahd", not "A-vee" "A-rid". Not too big of a deal, the only reason I know is because I've watched all the documentaries about the making of the Marvel movies more than once over the years, but it's something for next year, right?
Anyway, thanks for another great year of Atop the Fourth Wall, looking forward to it, especially Marvel 2099!
your comment on depression made me really want to hug you. <3 Thank you Lewis
ReplyDeleteThere's nothing wrong with disliking Coney Dogs. I grew up in Michigan and HATE them. Thank you for being gracious enough to try it.
ReplyDeleteI'm actually one of the few that enjoy Comic History
ReplyDeleteI just wanted to point out that burning things in a plastic bucket could be seen as a potential screw-up as plastic is flammable.
ReplyDeleteBut if it'd gone wrong you'd likely would have made that a post credits bumper I guess.
Long story short, please use a metal bucket next time so we don't have to worry about you accidentally burning your house down.
Though if you did, then you could be on WTFIWWY!? to talk about how it happened when you make the news....
One big screw-up in the video about screw-ups, while Ron Perlman was responsible for a LOT of bad things Marville wasn't one of them. Bill Jemas the editor who wrote and approved of Marville was hired under Avi Arad and Ike Permutter's watch.
ReplyDeleteAlso one can't completely write off Joe Quesada as playing a role in Marvel's recovery. You personally may not like the "Ultimate" line and "Civil War" but they were very, very significant financial successes.
As a fan of Peter David and Warren Ellis' work on "Spider-Man 2099" and "Doom 2099 A.D." respectively, I'm curious about which of the other 2099 series you are going to review Linkara. Will you go after the low hanging fruit that is "Ravage 2099" or "X-Nation 2099"? The mediocre "Punisher 2099" or the Hulk 2099 shorts from "2099 Unlimited"? The redundant "Fantastic Four 2099"? Or will you go after the three good 2099 books (Spider-Man, Doom and X-Men) that declined in quality immediately after the authors and artists quit en masse to protest Marvel firing the line editor Joey Cavelieri? Wow there are so many choices!
ReplyDeleteSeriously, I really liked Spider-Man 2099, Doom 2099 and X-Men 2099. (Ghost Rider 2099 was a quality comic book, but I'm not that into cyberpunk) but after Peter David, Warren Ellis quit in solidarity with Joey Cavalieri, the quality nosedived. Ghost Rider 2099 had already been cancelled and the rest of the line was put out of its mercy two months later. Such a waste!
On a more serious note, comic book writer Peter David suffered a stroke this weekend. The last I heard he is recovering in a Florida hospital. I pray that he has a swift recovery.
ReplyDeleteI don't know what I liked more. Seeing Douche again (I was worried about him) or seeing One More Day BURN!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteProbably the latter:D
Linkara
ReplyDeleteI've always respected your humor and thought of you as one of the best of Channel Awesome. However, I feel I have to say. You truly are an amazing person. Admitting one's mistakes, especially the painful ones like your number 2...takes strength and conviction. It was moving...especially because you didn't make excuses for it. Just a sincere apology for poorly chosen words. And I feel an immense amount of respect not just for your humor, but for you as a human being. You're one of the best of us, good sir.
On a lighter note, have you ever thought of doing an episode or a write up on top ways the comic industry could improve or on rants you want to make or had to be cut from episodes? While it was kind of tangential, I really enjoyed your X-men rant and think a few more like it could be really interesting.
Couldnt agree more about the Xmen. What a convoluted mess
ReplyDeleteI hope your comment about Heroes Reborn means we will see a review of some Rob Leifeld Cap America
Last time I checked there were only 198 mutants remaining because something something Scarlet Witch something.
ReplyDeleteI agree that them facing discrimination while Captain America and the Fantastic Four can run around just fine is pretty dumb. While I don't think stopping X-Men comic altogether would be a good idea; they're too iconic. I think that somehow placing them in an alternate universe without other superheros would be for the best.
Also, Jubilee is a vampire now. Yeah.
I would like to see a different angle in Xmen. Namely they own up to the fact that humanity fears them cuz THEY ARE DANGEROUS..its not about being different its about being born with the ability to shoot lasers from your eyes, invade peoples minds, walk through walls, control the weather. That's some pretty scary stuff and should be regulated
ReplyDeleteReally enjoyable episode, but when you brought up the Thunderdome joke, it got me to remember something. You missed an opprotunity to make a beyond thunderdome joke during the Time Force review for History of Power Rangers, during the part where Ransik has Mad Max gear. It's something that's bugged me for a while, and I'm not sure if you ever realized, if you have then I'm sorry for bugging you.
ReplyDeleteAlso, Weslhy cameo FTW! I love that guy!!
If you need some help with the next Transformers review, big Transformers fan who occasionally makes video reviews here. Just...throwing it out there. :) Although I rather like #31 and think people blow it out of proportion.
ReplyDeleteNow most of the stuff Furman writes...I have an entire article series devoted to my problems with that. You know how to reach me. :D
Putting the shameless self-promoting aside, JMS may not be responsible for One More Day, but he did still make "Grounded" and the current "Earth-1" GNs that both show why, as good as Babylon 5 is, he should never be allowed around Superman again.
Completely disagree with u on xmen, xmen and runaways and marvel max comics are pretty much the only comics I still like, all the other stuff is boring to me. But none the less decent video.
ReplyDelete"Remember that time the Scarlet Witch went nuts and made a stupid alternate reality?"
ReplyDeleteYes I do Lewis. Thank you for reminding me of the OTHER reason I keep calling Bendis a hack.
Oh and you're going into the 2099 stuff? Can't wait for that.
The reason why people hate mutants but not Captain America or the Fantastic Four is simple, the human race isn't being slowly replaced by Homo Captain-Americus.
ReplyDeletePeople don't like the idea of being part of a species on the way out. Hell, some people refuse to accept the very concept of evolution because it stops us from being God's special snowflakes. People also don't like things that are different, hence racism.
Captain America is someone people can aspire to be like, someone who used to be normal who became extraordinary. The X-Men are an 'other' who are more than happy to inform you that their descendants are going to replace yours as Earth's top dogs.
It's honestly not hard to follow.
Great video. And nice to see you burn One More Day.
ReplyDeleteI do disagree with your argument about Mutants in the Marvel U. though, and how they "make no sense" in the larger context of other heroes.
You mentioned that the other heroes like Captain America, the Avengers and the Fantastic Four are regarded with favor and no discrimination, whereas the X-Men are scorned. Thing of it is, that's not entirely true. Captain America, the Avengers, the Fantastic Four and- obviously- and someone like Spider-Man have faced discrimination and fear from the populace numerous times. The Avengers were faced with protests against some of their actions. The FF have been threatened to be evicted from the Baxter Building, the Thing has been treated with fear for looking like a monster. And guys like Spidey and the Hulk are feared more than they are loved. So a superhero in the Marvel U. isn't something that everyone admires. It often results in a lot of criticism and derision from the people. Sure, there are also those that support them. But it's a fairly mixed bag.
And the thing to remember is that these are characters that often publicly save the world. So one could argue that the people in the Marvel U. do see some inherent worth in the Marvel Heroes from time to time, especially when they risk their lives to save the day. The mutants, on the other hand, don't really do that as often and are regarded as beings that are out to replace humanity. And keep in mind the X-Men don't usually save the day in public as much as the Avengers or FF do. They're often fighting in the shadows, away from humanity. It's reasonable to believe that the general public saw no distinction between "X-Men" and "Mutants" since the X-Men don't really do too much to establish a distinction between those two ideals. However, when the X-Men or other mutants DID save the day in a very public manner- such as the X-Men apparently sacrificing themselves to stop the Adversary in Dallas, TX, or X-Factor saving New York City from Apocalypse- the populace was exceptionally grateful and DID treat them as heroes.
Congrats on another year Linkara. Looking forward to 2013. Some of my thoughts are already stated, so per your request I won't repeat them.
ReplyDeleteXmen, they really needed to be self-contained from the rest of the Marvel Universe or further play on the hypocrisy of why humanity hates mutants specifically in a world full of metahumans. Can't have it both ways (aka what the current Red Skull arc Linkara referenced seems to be doing, AGAIN).
On a serious note: Being one who regularly deals with those suffering from various physical and mental issues (present in my family, my community, and my work), I can state I'm very appreciative of your attempts to avoid using terms like "retarded" in your reviews. While I'm aware the word's societal-slang usage doesn't necessarily convey the same intent as its slur usage, "retarded" still tends to offend many in that community (example: enough that state governments are recognizing the concern and removing such terminology from legal documents). It's something often overlooked, especially on the consequence-free environment of the internet, so the extra effort is noticed. Thank you.
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And now for something less somber and more enjoyable: Building on "Nathaniel Towns" comment: For fans of the Transformers cartoons in the early 90s, "Slag" was a phrase commonly uttered by many of the Transformers (Dinobot and Rattrap primarily) in place of an expletive. Unfortunately, as NT stated, Slag is in fact an expletive on the other side of the pond, so in essence we were all watching a children's cartoon in the early 90s filled with heroes and villains shouting curse words.
Your ability to take criticism and apologize is both commendable and admirable.
ReplyDeleteI also wish I had a copy of Green Lantern/Green Arrow Vol 1#7 "...and through him, save a world..." to donate to you. It probably wouldn't be enough for a whole episode, but might be good for a team up miniseries.
I do know you added either something to the credits or the entry about the PCP/POP stuff.
ReplyDeleteI appreciated your comments about depression. While I didn't have an opinion much either way about the portrayal of the woman in the Superman comic, but I did agree his comments to the woman were ill-conveyed and poorly thought up.
As someone who suffers from severe depression I've been pleased over all with your lessening of your comments about wanting to kill yourself with some of the comics you read. I've never been offended by them since I saw how you were using them as humor ('Suicide pistol at the ready.') the lack of them is noticed and appreciated.
I honestly enjoy your stuff and on some of my worst days dealing with my depression certain episodes, like Doom, are one of the few things to make me smile.
I had NO idea about the usage for the word/term spaz.
I thought you looking off camera was to see if you were in frame. Though checking your laptop makes sense and hey, that's cool.
Anyway, thanks for listening to all of us, I'll try and make sure to not repeat things too much.
Have a nice new year, see you in 2013.
Take care
Why didn't you mention the constant mispronunciation of Ryu from Street Fighter?
ReplyDeleteActually...the hair on the spear isn't just a decoration. The purpose of it is to absorb blood and thus keep it from making the shaft of the weapon slick, and thus much harder to keep a good grip on. I think I recall something about it also being a bit distracting, but for a thrusting weapon, that's most likely it's biggest and most important use.
ReplyDelete"I don't know how much a few hiatuses would set you back financially, but really, putting out a video (plus extras) every week, all around the year is just unhealthy, and we do not want that. Not to mention some free weeks in your work-schedule might actually help out with weeding out these "screw-ups" in the making."
ReplyDeleteYeah, it's not that difficult to put out a video every week and honestly financially I really do need to.
Actually, Archie was popular enough to spawn knock-offs, mostly from the 1950s to the 1970s, even at Marvel and DC.
ReplyDeleteMarvel even put out a couple in the 1980s and 1990s: Misty and Sweet XVI.
The whole part about the X-Men... it was so nice to hear someone else pointing out the problems I have with them for once...
ReplyDeleteDon't get me wrong, I really like the X-Men. My first try to get to comics was with X-Men (and failed miserable because I jumped into a storyline that confused me too much...). But I think that they don't make any sense with the Marvel Universe as well.
It's so stupid for my understanding to have the X-Men on one side, who have the very brilliant idea (in my opinion) of mutants who're not accepted, but feared, no matter what they do and how much good they do, and on the other hand, you have the Fantastic Four, or Spiderman, who not only live in New York as well (as far as I'm aware - could be wrong with the F4), very close to Charles Xavier's School, but have powers that make them look like the average Mutants who should be feared and hated following the X-Men logic. The normal person doesn't care that neither of those got their powers by birth, but through after events - they only care about "OMG, a Mutant, you can't trust them!"
This gives me a grinch everytime when I actually see the Movies of Spiderman or the Avengers (or F4), because it feels just wrong.
In my opinion, Marvel can go on with X-Men, they should as they're so popular, but they should put them aside and not include them in their overall Universe. Would it hurt so much to give them a Universe of their own? They sure have enough characters to fill it all alone!
And on a sidenote, about Cloustershire (hope I wrote it right). You asked where the "z" comes from in the pronounciation and assumed another language.
Well, basically, you're not too off with it. I don't know the origins of the place, nor the influence of german and brittish to each other, but most combinations of "st" in german are pronounciated like the "st" in cloustershire. In fact, "Clouster" pretty much sounds like the german word "Kloster" - which means Monestary/Abbey, so it could actually be possible, that it goes down to that.
That's of course just a guess, again, no knowledge about that place.
This said... Happy New Year! :D
(we allready have 2013 here ^^)
Very good video, Linkara. As someone who suffers from depression (managed with medication, though) I found your comments on the subject touching. But I didn't take offense necessarily over in the Superman 701 review. Many people mistake "depression" (a chemical imbalance in the brain that can only be managed via medications) and "being sad" (emotional surges that can be corrected by time, talk, or whatever.) Good video, and I agree with you on the X-Men, they're too large and too overused. They're basically a big pit of super heroes someone had an idea for but didn't want to make 1000 more comic book characters so lumped them all into one group. I never understood, either, how mutants can so reviled by people in the Marvel Universe but the F4, Spider-Man and others not as hated. Not a Marvel reader, though. Even with THAT said the current state of Spider-Man leaves me with a... "Really?!"
ReplyDelete"Actually...the hair on the spear isn't just a decoration. The purpose of it is to absorb blood and thus keep it from making the shaft of the weapon slick, and thus much harder to keep a good grip on. I think I recall something about it also being a bit distracting, but for a thrusting weapon, that's most likely it's biggest and most important use."
ReplyDelete...
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...AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
I love Babylon 5, too! I bought the entire series on DVD just over a month ago after watching SFDebris' video reviews rekindled my fandom. I've gotten through the first four seasons, and plan to get to the fifth sometime in January. I watched the series first run back in te 90s, but since it's never been in re-runs anywhere since then, I've never been able to revisit it. Still one of the BEST science fiction shows ever created. I believe Londo & G'kar were always my favorites followed by Garibaldi and Marcus Cole.
ReplyDeleteAnd YES! Burn, baby, burn!
And on a more serious note, you did a fine job with those sincere apologies. It can't be easy to be faced with those mistakes, but I hope your heartfelt apologies mended those wounds in those that were hurt. My respect to you for that.
So, on the more upbeat side of things, I hope you have a happy new year, Lewis. I look forward to a whole new year of exciting new AT4W insights! Thanks for the entertainment!
I have to say, in agreement with one of the earlier comments, it does indeed take great strength and conviction to admit your own mistakes. I also have to say that as someone who does suffer from depression, though I personally was not offended by your words during that particular episode, I found your sincere and simple apology incredibly heartwarming. As I said, while I personally was not offended, I have dealt with people who have said quite offensive comments to me with little to no remorse. So to you sir, I salute you and give you the biggest of internet hugs :)
ReplyDeleteAnd hey, high five to the fellow plain foods eater! Wooo! Cheese pizza with nothing on it!!! ...Damn, I'm hungry now...
Have a great New Year and don't work yourself too hard. Just not healthy and we want to see you well :)
As someone who suffers from depression and watches your shows; I honestly didn't mind what you stated. You need to do what you do on a regular basis and you aren't here to discriminate on anyone. Is it hard to deal with? Yes, but a lot of things are. I work really hard at maintaining it all by myself without any outside help. Therapy or medicine. This is your job and you do your best to keep us entertained. If we start dictating on what you can and cannot not say, when do we take over the show and kick you off of it? That aside; I hope to see you at MAGfest. I'll be there and going as someone I'm sure you'll recognize. ^_^
ReplyDeleteBecause I'm a jerk (though at least I'm a jerk who did a search for this subject before bringing it up myself), I'd just like to point out that you misused the word "empathy" while discussing Superman #701. You can only empathize with someone if you've gone through the same thing they have, which you say you haven't. If you haven't personally experienced the thing in question, you can have sympathy, but not empathy.
ReplyDeleteBut hey, you burned "One More Day," so I forgive you. :) Happy 2013!!
What would be nice is if we could have a like button on the comments section, so that when someone makes a comment we agree with.
ReplyDeleteHasbro recently named a Transformer Spastic and caused a big brouhaha. That's how I learned about the UK usage of the word.
ReplyDeleteA previous commenter already mentioned Slag, one of the Dinobots who's name you never learned.
Weird question: Is there a way I can find the full context of the Cyberman "There is... logic... in what he says" scene on Youtube, without watching the whole serial is was from? Ever since it started popping up in your reviews, I've been immensely curious as to what had originally prompted the line.
ReplyDeleteAnd which doctor was "Attack of the Cybermen," anyway?
Great list, Linkara. A lot of interesting things...I should have reminded you of some of the weird directional stuff in Superman 701 but that was Stracynzky not caring about Philadelphia.
ReplyDeleteAnd yeah, I think you're rather spot on with the X-Men comment and how they cause all the problems. It's like there are two different universes at Marvel between the mutant stuff and the other heroes and they just have to keep interacting instead of just being split apart. I mean sure the X-men were just "other heroes" back in the Silver age but when they became so massive is when they just seemed to be a universe within a universe. It's rather weird in that they should be together...but not.
And I see "One More Day"'s burning in the next opening montage...then again you went through all the effort to burn "Superman at Earth's End" so to replace it wouldn't be fair to the original WTF comic of the show. (I'd throw in Countdown but you ripped those apart instead of burned them)
BTW: 2099 should be interesting...I was wondering if you were going to get into Heroes Reborn after showing your hatred of what Liefeld did here but that's for the future I believe.
Okay, control-F'd through the comments to make sure no one suggested this, but since you're a Grant Morrison fan, have you ever read his New X-Men run with Frank Quitely, Phil Jiminez and Ethan Van Sciever? He started it just after his Justice League work and it has some similar writing styles to it.
ReplyDeleteIt was written just after the first movie was released in an attempt to capture fans of the film. In his series proposal, which was included in the trades, he pitched the series as one that while not entirely ignoring the prior decades, would not really reference them.
Basically, it was the opposite of his Batman run.
First off, I am someone with depression. I deal with it daily. Second, there is nothing I hate more than seeing someone apologize for a joke. While a joke might be in "bad taste", I would rather have it said and stood by. I know a lot of people will disagree with me on this, and think there are "safe" and "unsafe" topics to joke about. However, comedy is based on pain, the more pain there is, the more humor can be derived. That is all I wanted to say, take it as you will.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to talk to you about the morality of suicide at great length and mostly because I like doing so. Feel free to ignore the rest of this comment if you don't want to sit through rambling nonsense.
ReplyDeleteI believe in suicide as a fundamental human right, as an extension of self-determination and an individual's mastery of the self. Not saying that it's something that Superman would agree with me on, but simply as a personal moral stance. A person's life is everything that they are, everything that they can truly be said to possess and rightfully own - it is them in the truest sense. And it's theirs to end.
Life is valuable, a treasure, I agree - but what makes it so? Is it simply the continuing exchange of energy and chemical compounds, the homeostasis of the physical body? I don't think so. There's something to be said for the aesthetic appreciation of a complex system, but it's not what comes to mind when talking about the value of life, especially human life.
In other words, is it the definition of 'life' that is valuable, so that it is innately so? I say no. It's in the larger things, the more abstract concepts - the things that lead to the same problem as answering "What is love?" when you try to define them. It's not in the bare continuation of life, but in the impressions it leaves. It's in the story, though that's too simplistic, the boring little bits not belonging in stories count as well, it's not the drama, it's the mundane too, but the value of life is still found more in the abstract than the concrete, the story over the words.
And sometimes stories need to end. Who else can decide that but the author? Who could really be said to be the author of a person other than themself, after blind circumstance has had its say? Suicide is a person disposing of something they do not want. It's removing a negative that belongs wholly to them, and ultimately to no other. There are such things as responsibilities and repercussions to a person's actions, and they are things to be considered, but it must be the individual themself that does that considering, and it cannot be anything but the vilest tyranny, the imposition of another's will over your own, to suppress that.
I have friends that have killed themselves, and friends of friends, and I consider it myself regularly. I have a friend that deliberately stepped in front of a train while wandering home drunk after a night blowing hundreds of dollars in a strip club. I know it's often not a dry, sober accounting of emotional revenues and losses leading to a calculated and deliberate decision. By nature, it's hard for it to be. It's often the point at which a surge of emotions overwhelm a person, and they make a mistake. Suicide can be a mistake.
But it's not, and never can be, the place of anyone but the individual themself to make that evaluation, or to deny them that course of action, or even to judge them for it. Suicide is too personal a thing. It's tied far too much to who a person is to themself, and not who they are to others. It's simply not something that can rightfully be denied to a person unless others are direly dependent on them.
Anyways, that's my incoherent and mostly unedited ramblings.
I'll be honest, I was half expecting a whole entire "Avengers Arena is Battle Royale/Hunger Games" entry. But you're still right, it is Hunger Game ripoff.
ReplyDeleteDUDE! Your food preference examples almost completely align with my own! Topping-less hot dogs? Check. Cheese pizza? Check. Sandwiches with few addings? Check (though, I don't mind the addition of lettuce, cheese, and/or tomato with the meat). Cereal with no milk? Check! Not to mention that we both gre up watch virtually the same children's TV shows (stuff on Fox Kids, kids WB, an the like). It's always a pleasure when you find someone who has similar things in common with yourself. Don't stop being who you are and keep up with all the great things you do, man.
ReplyDeleteBTW, that previous comment of mine was aimed at Lewis. Apologies for not checking to see if any existing conversations were going on at the time in the comments.
ReplyDeleteThis was an excellent video as always. I did note in particular your view of Spider-Man#700 and how it reflects the very nature of Marvel business these days. As a person who used to like Spider-Man comics, it's pretty pathetic to cause a sensation for something that's temporary. It is worth noting that the writer, Dan Slott, is putting the seeds for an eventual getting back together of Mary-Jane and Peter, though, but the way it's handled now is very much giving fans the finger.
ReplyDeleteI must say i felt a very sudden and profound respect for this episode. Linkara as the episode went on i really thought this was just another Oops type episode. But once you got to #2 I felt the honest sincerity and i do agree. However i do want to state that even with that the Superman Review is still one of my favorites. The amount of heartfelt response is felt with this comment and it really resonated with me. I must agree again and tip my hat. I almost got teary eyed there for a moment.
ReplyDeleteTakes a brave man to face mistakes. Glad to know more about the history of how Marvel became a Power House....though maybe not a Power House of Excitement. As someone who has gone through depresstion I still rather agree with how you handled that Superman review but not everyone suffers from depresstion the same way. As fro not dropping words like moronic yeah if you looked into most words you use to point out problems your reviews would be very bland and generic. Oh and as a Canadian I too use the UK spelling for most sites, word documents and other things. I tell you it can be confusing talking to Americans over the internet one minute then having to hand in a news story to your boss. Some days I just throw the letter U into every word. Canada can be at times stuck between the English spelling and the American spelling.
ReplyDeleteAnyway Happy New Year to you and I look forward to more Atop the Fourth Wall.
"Weird question: Is there a way I can find the full context of the Cyberman "There is... logic... in what he says" scene on Youtube, without watching the whole serial is was from? Ever since it started popping up in your reviews, I've been immensely curious as to what had originally prompted the line.
ReplyDeleteAnd which doctor was "Attack of the Cybermen," anyway?"
Sixth Doctor and it's actually a semi-sequel to a few Cybermen stories as well as a sequel to a Dalek story (mostly because of a character returning).
The context is basically that a mercenary named Lytton has taken a few men into the sewers presumably to break into a bank and steal diamonds. In reality, he's brought them to the cybermen, who are operating in the sewers. When the Cyberleader questions him, he says that if he was trying to help the cybermen, he shouldn't have brought others. Lytton says they were gifts to be turned into cybermen. The Cyber Lieutenant thinks that he's lying, but the Leader hushes him up and states, "There is logic in what he says. If he had intended us harm, he could have warned earth's authorities."
Thanks for realizing number 2 on the list. *kiss* I'm really happy you said sorry for that.
ReplyDeleteHe who makes excuses, seldom makes anything else.
ReplyDeleteAlso first time posting with you, and glad to see your show.
"I'm going to talk to you about the morality of suicide at great length and mostly because I like doing so. Feel free to ignore the rest of this comment if you don't want to sit through rambling nonsense."
ReplyDeleteAnd you are of course free to have your take on it. However, from my perspective, unless someone is in a state (age, incurable illness, etc.) that interferes and will always interfere with one's ability to actually engage in life, be active in some regard, or live to the best of their own ability, suicide is an irrational act.
While I am a religious person, I recognize that a large part of my religion is faith and the lack of evidence of what happens when we die. As such, I recognize that there may be no afterlife. With that in mind, it's especially important to be alive, for we have only a finite number of ticks of the clock before we expire and then we are no more and everything that we were is lost.
If this truly is all that we are, all that we will ever be, then to terminate oneself is the ultimate expression of madness, not just because of the existential horror of non-existence, but because what we have is that much more precious and to throw it away before your time is a waste. Yes, your life is your own to choose if and when you want it to end, but there is always so much more to do, to experience, and to influence. By being alive you affect the lives of others in ways you couldn't possibly imagine, be it small, subtle ways or grandiose, catastrophic ways, for good or for ill.
Suicide is valueless. It is pointless and a cessation of the good that a life, in itself, brings. When you're grieving, when you're drunk, when you're high, when you're just feeling down... these are not reasons to die. These are reasons to get BETTER. A brain on the influence of grief, of drugs, of alcohol, or just a chemical imbalance in their brain is being impaired in some capacity.
Yes, it certainly is their right to decide if and when they die. But it should never be the first option, nor the preferable option, and that woman in the comic was in no position or sound mind to make that choice.
Yeah, I'm glad I missed the Superman 700& 701 videos when they were new and missed the depression comment. Around that time, I was suffering through one of my many low points in my depression cycle at the time and I would have turned on you so fast.
ReplyDeleteAnd no, I would not have even given you a comment like this. I would not have wasted my time doing that. I would go one step beyond it and have stopped watching your show entirely.
Hey Linkara.
ReplyDeleteMost of the time my reactions and comments are flailing fangirl ones, because I love the show. But I really had to comment about you correcting yourself about the Superman #701 review.
I have suffered from depression, and some of the things that trigger me are things that the jumper talked about; feeling powerless, being stuck in a crappy job forever, etc. And yes, when in that review you did brush those things off as not worthy of her reaction to them, it did niggle at me slightly. Not enough to make me stop watching AT4W, but enough to make me uncomfortable in what was otherwise a very good episode.
So it really means a lot to this fan that you took time to address the problem, and admit to some insensitivity. It is a difficult subject for someone to talk about if they don't have firsthand experience of what depression can do to your head. Sometimes it really is just one tiny thing that is a catalyst.
The screw up shows could very easily just be grammar mistakes or continuity flubs, but it takes real courage for you to admit your mistakes and apologise with grace. So thankyou for that. :)
Great follow-up. Surprised to see Douchey McNitpick here (I thought that he was gone after the whole Battlefield Earth breakdown being repeated or the end of the Nostalgia Critic).
ReplyDeleteYou've actually burned Spider-Man One More Day (not the copy you used for the review, but still awesome). You even used the famous One Day More from Les Miserables to end this episode.
(Personally, I prefer the original stage musical version to the film.)
Anyway, I'm looking forward to a lot of great stuff -- the continuing storyline concerning the Gunslinger, the retrospective on Titans, and if all goes well, the return of the Neutro Zord! Happy new year, O badass comic reviewer!
9 – that's a good point, about every comic being someone's first. How hard can it be to have each character addressed by name at some point, so that if you're new, you at least get to know what their names are? I'm really surprised that they could get through a whole comic – especially a simple one with a relatively small cast like the Archie one - without identifying all the characters by name.
ReplyDeleteAnother great ad bumper!
7 – That... was a screw up?? Really? I mean with the Supergirl review... wha...? *genuine surprise* I just figured that In-story-Linkara wouldn't want his (in-story) viewers to know that he'd gone away and left a hologram doing his show. The hologram would share this desire, and his awkward comment about him seeing Nostalgia Chick a few days before (and her 'yeah, whatever you say'- type reaction) was a clumsy attempt to hide the fact that he's not the same guy who was at the con. I know that you'd ran out of time to film it at the con in real life, but I really thought that line was what MADE it fit the story continuity.
In other words, I wasn't confused before. Now, I am. :)
3 – Yes, every episode of AT4W is someone's first – and this one was mine. Not one of my favorites, but it was still enough at the time to get me digging back through your past episodes. And I remember seeing all the comments, and wondering, 'does this happen every time?'. Answer = pretty much so, yeah :) I mean, I can understand a few repeats in the first batch of comments to hit your blog, since people don't know if someone else is saying the same thing until the comments are approved and visible... but after that... makes no sense.
I also want to say that I appreciate that you read every comment. I know not everyone making these shows reads every comment, some don't read any comments, and aside from the frustration of these repeat corrections and the like, it must take a lot of time for you to do that. It feels like real respect for your viewers that you go to that trouble - thank you.
2 – lots of respect to you for this. Most of this list has been light-hearted, so good on you for putting this in there. It sounded sincere and heartfelt, and I like that you also explained what was wrong with the scene and made your complete position clear. Very well done.
1 – Not a huge fan of the literal burning thing myself, but I can see that this will make a lot of people happy. Also... uh... I think your bucket is starting to melt.
I never noticed you looking off to the side before. To my own annoyance, I have now started looking for it... :)
Hey guys, ok so this might be abit long.
ReplyDeleteFirstly on the issue of X-Men, While I respect the right to your own opinions linkara, I just have to say, saying that X-Men should stop being made is abit arrogant. X-Men can be overwhelming (I counted just under 10000 comics) becaus eyou dont like something doesnt mean it should be removed because you feel that way. Hitler didnt like the Jewish and wanted them removed, right now the islamic brotherhood dont want christians or other islamic people who believe as they do around, THIS IS A HUGE STRETCH, but I hope you get what im saying, just because you dont like something doesnt mean you should deprive other people of that object, wheather it be a comic book, or a religion. Human have a right to believe and like whatever they want, and Im a strong believer in that. So I feel that the way you said x-men should just stop comes off reallt b badly.
Thats not to say Marvel are really handeling X-Men Wrong. Heres My Example:
Generation Hope, this comic was about how Hope (seemingly a next host of phoenix and a dead ringer for jean grey) was awakening mutants with he touch. It wasnt a bad comic, and was leading up to the Next X-Men Event. It was hinted that the 5 Lights (The Mutants who were "touched" by hope) were going to play a huge part in the next event. 16 issues in and the comic concluded for Avengers vs X-Men.......... and nothing happened, the 5 lights wearnt used at all. Ive heard many things on this, especially the theory that avengers vs x-men wasnt suppose to happen, and that age of ultron was delayed due to the creative team leaving marvel, so they just added avengers to the x-men event, just so the avengers would have an event comic while the movie was out. So It could be that they just got the short end of the stick. But that is my point, so many x-men books get this treatment lately, Marvel feel the need to reboot ever few months that nothing ever sticks, so why buy an x-men book if it building to some great conclusion, that never happens. So there is no need for the 15+ X-Men titles, not even batman has that many, and nearly every title has its own purpose and matters, its not just fodder for some reboot.
SO I understand where your coming from, but to say cancel every x-men book is out of line. Especially with the great x-books (X-Factor, X-Treme X-Men (A similar book to exiles, everyone should give it a look))
Next Thing is dont be so hard on yourself about the depression thing. Many People dont understand what depression is, ive lost a many freinds because of it, I have had depression for 6 years and I am on medication for it. Infact before I got on medication I was suffering for close to a year, because in my mind I dint know what was wrong, I felt Misserable, but there was no cause, no effect, just.. bam!, a feeling so low I do anything and everything now days to avoid it. When people hear you suffer from depression they are instantly like, "What do you have to be depressed about" which isnt as infuriating as the, "Yea im depressed all the time".
In My opinion you did nothing wrong, even I felt that Superman 701 wasnt doing anything but showing a over reacting lady on the roof, it didnt seem like anything else. I would personally love to see a super hero comic where the protagponist sufferes depression, and I feel only a person suffering depression could write it, a real character driven piece where there is less emphasis on the "super" and more on the human, with silent suffering, changes in personallity. Something that really displays what depression is all about, not some supid superman comic with some lady attempting to jump and blaming superman for her problems.
Thanks for reading
Meganubis
Huh, you and I have similar tastes in food. Odd, I thought I was one of very few who hated things like milk with cereal.
ReplyDeleteIn any case I wouldn't say that using 'spaz' and 'spastic' should be considered a 'screw-up' exactly since it's just a matter of not having any experience with British culture. Something to avoid because Atop the Fourth Wall is something available to anyone who speaks English and has an internet connection, but still not a major error on Linkara's part.
Lastly, maybe the book burning has gone on a bit too far. It has very disturbing implications across the world and while you restrain it to works that you feel are utterly without artistic merit, I'd still say that it's better to suffer the existence of a poorly written comic than to increase the trend of deliberately destroying a work simply because you do not like it.
Someone else already said this almost word for word, but I figure this is an okay thing to repeat:
ReplyDeleteThank you for addressing your earlier comments about depression. As someone who's struggled with it for most of my life I was more than a little bothered by your comments in that earlier review, especially since I've had people tell me things like "get over it, your problems aren't that serious," in real life. So I really appreciate that you acknowledge it was insensitive, and I have a lot of respect for your ability to admit you were wrong.
This was a lot of fun to watch.
ReplyDeleteBTW, a lot of English words really did pronounce the silent parts, like knife. Yep, you said the 'k' sound. People are lazy sods and you end up with place names being abbreviated, but no-one ever seems bothered to fix the spelling. No doubt this will be one of the first things the machines will do after they have risen, as it has been driving them bonkers.
That ceremonially feathered spear bugs me. I don't know asian history, but i expect it'll turn out, like with 'viking' helmets, that that wasn't really used like that in combat.
Viking helmets were hornless because you really, really don't want things catching on your helmet, especially if they curve a blade into your head instead of deflecting.
Sure, you can have horns in the stuff you use for rituals, but a viking stupid enough to wear one one the battlefield is the one who gets to have his head opened like a boiled egg by a spoon. Not a pretty sight, unless you are some sort of opportunistic corvid, I expect.
So why do i think tassels on a spear are bad? They could catch! I imagine ribs and other bits of bone will get tangled up.
Sure, the guy you stabbed is probably even more displeased now with how his day is going as you yank bits of him outside where he'd hoped they could stay a bit longer, but the next guy is coming now, and he sees you are in a mess, and can't quite free your weapon, and oh, you murdered his ally or possibly his best friend, and he is mightily motivated to make you regret those pretty little tassels.
So it's perfectly reasonable to me to not know about those decorations because they are, in my uninformed opinion, stupid.
However, I'm probably wrong. According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qiang_%28spear%29
"When the spear is moving quickly, the addition of the tassel aids in blurring the vision of the opponent so that it is more difficult for them to grab the shaft of spear behind the head or tip. The tassel also served another purpose, to stop the flow of blood from the blade getting to the wooden shaft (the blood would make it slippery, or sticky when dried)."
I'm not really game to test this one, although i wonder if someone could throw it at mythbusters.. I'm sure Kari would love to deal with yet more dead pigs being mutilated.
Anyway, please keep on doing stuff and if i had an income, i'd probably pay you to review ElfQuest, or have you done that and i've missed it? Oh well.
Good god man, don't read every comment! You'll go mad!
ReplyDeleteThanks for bringing up that scene from All-Star Superman, it always manages to make me cry.
ReplyDeleteIt's recomforting to know you read every single comment. For that, I thank you.
A loyal fan from Mexico.
While I have no comment on the overall quality of the X-Men, I would argue that they do make sense in the Marvel Universe and their outcast status is actually somewhat realistic, as far as it goes. To use your examples as counterpoints:
ReplyDelete-if we put a medically tested soldier in the context of the real world, I don't think he or she would be the subject of horror exactly. Outrage at the ethics of medical testing? Perhaps. Pity that the fellow was used in such a matter? Likely, forgetting the fact that he wanted to be used that way. But fear or horror? Not particularly likely. Plus, the patriotic bunting he wraps himself in also serves as a symbolic protector; you'll notice that the X-Men don't have any patriotic allegiance, while it's hard to hate on a guy who stands for the Red, White, and Blue.
-The Fantastic Four were the victims of an accident. I can't think of any one who would be particularly unsympathetic under that context, and while they may be the subject of sick fascination, I can't see any hate. That's the kind of human interest story designed to bring a tear on The Today Show or the like.
-As for the X-Men, I won't belabor the allegorical connection to blacks, LGBTs, or pick the oppressed minority of your choice, as you're surely aware of it. However, it bears repeating that, at least to my understanding, the X-Men were (almost) all born the way that they are, not the subject of medical testing or freak accidents that gave them their powers (again, I know there are exceptions like Wolverine, but generally speaking). As noted above, the real world teems with examples of people who are hated for the way they are born. So, it makes sense in that context that they would be the subject of hatred and fear. The fact that there DO exist evil mutants doesn't help either; after all, there aren't an evil Fantastic Four or Captain Iraq floating out there that the public would have to compare those people or groups to.
Final note: in this comparison, I make no reference to what these various groups actually DO because it's not relevant to the broader point of "does the reaction given to the X-Men by the public make sense within the context of the universe" and that doesn't seem to be particularly reflective of what it is that they do as much as it is reflective of who they are and how they came to be that way. So, in that, I respectfully disagree.
Nice list, and kudos for recognizing your error on the use of "spaz." It's difficult to admit an error when you've offended someone.
ReplyDeleteI didn't know it was an offensive term, either.
i have a comic to suguest you read, also email me back just one word so i know youve seen my message
ReplyDeletei suguest you read the My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic, comic books from IDW, not sure if you can AT4thW them or not since only 1 issue so far and its good (IMO)
but maby itd be a fun goofy thing as a side show or a one off episode where linkara learns the power of friendship with his palls. because the comics good and not the useal shlock the gets AT4thWl'ed
also itd be a great topic too since MLPFIM is curently a powerhouse comic selling out all others atm
(srsly people are saying its the death of comix because mlp fim is beating the big comix for sales, look into it.)
and incae yer wondering i dont have a fav pony
choozeing is unfair, i love all pony.
sory for the repost, unsure how often you check yer email, but now i know you read these.
btw i was the one who posted the mlpfim comix suguest, just had to update my profile so you know who i am actuly
ReplyDeleteAwesome video! Liked it very much.
ReplyDeleteI just have one request. Please review amazing spiderman 700. I know probably someone already has asked it and I know you no longer read AS, but dear God is it bad. Its worse than One More Day.
First off: Happy New Year from East Oz (Australia), Linkara!
ReplyDeleteAs a fan and moderate-term watcher, I am glad to see when folks own up to mistakes in their works in times past, and try to correct them.
Your review style and HoPR (combined with inspiration from some other Tokusatsu reviewers over on RVT) actually gave me the idea to do my own show(s) on reviewing and going into depth on Power Rangers and it's Toku brethren, primarily Super Sentai & Kamen Rider.
[side note: Release the next episode/s of HoPR in your own time, don't feel obligated to rush through it chop-chop and push out a new episode because a small amount folks in your fanbase want it, it's not your main money-making series and whilst it would be NICE to see it updated soon, you've only got 5/6 seasons of the show (depending if you count Samurai & Super Samurai as 2 seasons) before you'll have caught up the the 20th "anniversary" series Megaforce.]
Say, what about Marville anyway?
ReplyDeleteI hope you'll get back to it soon(ish).
I gotta say I have a grotesque curiosity how much lower it can sink. xD
I was going to jump on your reply to Blood on the Lace, but I simply can't bring myself to make a coherent statement without it being all "me me me" or data points from studies that I simply can't be bothered to drag up from the depths of the net. I will say this: there are those who contemplate suicide on a daily basis but still agree with you, and it's this dichotomy that drives them further into illness, for their only perceived respite is also something they think to be foolish or wasteful. On a good day, disagreeing with suicide gives them strength to turn from it and try to find a method of coping that works for them; on a bad day, it increases their self-loathing, makes them desperate for something that can bring them peace without breaking their ideals.
ReplyDeleteSo! Yeah, I have depression and mild paranoid symptoms, have a sibling in a worse state than me and volunteer with a mental health charity to help others in similar states as myself. Nothing makes me happier than hearing a non-sufferer honestly and sincerely state that they don't understand how things are for sufferers, but they empathise and wish to understand, and as a result #2 actually got me a bit upset; I've been through the hell of having a family who couldn't give two tosses about mental illness, who think you can exercise it off, shrug it off, that you're doing things for attention, so hearing anyone without a mental illness say the opposite... Anyway, it was good to hear you say such things, and my respect for you has increased even further.
One other little depressive point before I go - as I said, I have depression, and I go through fits of extreme downs where I'm an abhorrent waste of skin, worthless, deserve all the pain I get and so on and so forth. Pretty much one of the first things you get told to discover when you go through any formal counselling are things that help combat encroaching anxiety, depressive fits, any unpleasant extreme you can think of, and keep hold of them as tools against your illness; over the years I've found various things that help, and...well, your vids are one of them. If I feel myself sliding into an extreme low, if I catch it in time your vids give me just the right kind of distraction to negate it, to... I don't know, to disperse the storm before it hits, if you get my meaning. I just hope this doesn't sound like I'm sucking up... I only wished to show that hey, your stuff does indeed have a positive impact.
And so passes One More Day, Son of Quesada.
ReplyDelete... sorry, I've been watching Return of the King.
First, congratulations on making videos on your own screw-ups. I don't see that many critics willing to admit that their own opinions may not be perfect.
ReplyDeleteSecond, REN AND STIMPY!? NOOO!!! I HATE THEM!! Why did you have to make me watch them again, over and over, WHY???
(On the Other hand, Weird Al rules, so that makes up for it. ;) )
As for your screw-ups, I was glad to see the vast majority of them were minor to the point of not being worth analyzing, really. The only ones that I think were serious were research errors and dealing with topics like suicide. But things like misspelings? Who cares?
Anyway: Happy New Year, and once again thanks for making such entertaining videos. Really looking forth to more of them in 2013. :)
wow I'm the same way about food, you put it into better words then i could have... well other then the cereal milk thing, that is just weird.
ReplyDeleteOn the subject looking off to the side there is a series on youtube called indymogul and they cover a wide range of topics one of which are technical details and they made teleprompters on the cheap http://youtu.be/n5_B8yksQmo I realize you may not have the hand tools needed but you could possibly collaborate with nash. He builds the frames you sew the fabric shields. Display can be anything from a cheap refurbished lcd monitor, Rooted Nook or other tablet. Control can be done with a cheap bluetooth/wireless mouse
ReplyDeleteAdd me to the choir of those who suffer from depression, and I myself have contemplated suicide but could never bring myself to follow through on it. Your comments did not offend me personally as much as JMS's pontificating did as his handling of the jumper sounded exploitative. But still, you are a bigger man for owning up to that mistake.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, I look forward to your Titans retrospective. I may be more of a Legion of Super-Heroes fan (partially because of the Silver Age weirdness of the Adventure Comics run) but I appreciate the Titans' rich history nonetheless.
Hi Linkara, I'm a long time fan. Yes, I know you read every comment, and I know people have said here before, but I feel the need to repeat it just to emphasise it because I found it uncomfortable, too:
ReplyDeleteYou really trashed the X-Men here, and you really seem to have some problem with them.
It almost seems like you complain about the X-Men like it's their own fault they're written and managed in such way. If their structure and universe is too convoluted and there are too many characters and groups to follow, it's not the character's fault- they're fictional! It's the fault of the writers and editors who can't keep the story straight and milk that convoluted continuity for all it's worth.
I think it's a little too self centered to ask Marvel to stop making X-Men comics. The X-Men have many fans, it's most likely Marvel's biggest franchise. They have their problems, but it's not the character's or concept's fault. I mean, I've had it up to here with DC sticking in Batman in every book but I won't ask them to stop writing him. They just need to do it better.
Hey Linkara/Lewis Lovhaug,
ReplyDeleteJer here. You may not know me, but I commented on one of your videos a few months back on a comic you reviewed in September.
I'm curious to see if you could lend me a private review, via email, of a comic that I did for my Old Testament class-- it's from the book of Judges.
Also, I hope you have a Happy New Year! :)
BTW, I haven't seen the Top 15 video yet, but I want to when I have more time.
Great episode and happy new year to you, Linkara! I would say more but reminding me about the Red Skull/Xavier's Brain has made me too irritated/sad so I will just mutter under my breath until I am distracted by something shiny.
ReplyDeleteAs someone who commented on you not knowing the main character's names in the Archie series, I actually feel kind of bad now that it made this list.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I wholly agree that it's reasonable for you to not know the MINOR characters' names if you're not a fan, especially if you point that out up front.
There were some parts of this review that... well... weren't very funny, but I suppose that's unavoidable considering the subject matter of some of the screw ups.
Finally, on Superman #701, since it came up again, I personally didn't have the issue with the officer asking if Superman would have let the woman fall.
Yes, Superman values life. He always chooses life. But he also values truth... hence truth, justice and the American way. And he specifically told the woman he wouldn't interfere if she jumped, meaning either he'd let her die, or he'd be forced into lying.
Now, just as you or I would, he'd choose saving the life over keeping his word in that instance... but a lying Superman is still pretty unsatisfying to me, and I could see the officer wondering if he would *really* (note the emphasis) let her fall if it came to that. Superman sidesteps simply because it didn't come to that. Yes, it was bad writing to put him INTO that situation though.
This was a good video to end 2012 on Linkara. I can't wait to see your stuff in the new year.
ReplyDeleteYou know, I can honestly say that watching your videos alone has improved my skills as a writer. Why? Because now when I plan out a story/scene I have gotten into a habit of thinking "Is there a plot hole that Linkara would point out/rant about?" and thus, if there are, I try to fix them. ^_^
Anyway, I hope you have a great year. Happy New Year!
Unknown 8:28: I think if anyone's going to review the MLP comics, it's CR.
ReplyDeleteUhm... I'm pretty sure the X-Men comic line was a joke.
ReplyDeleteEven as a big fan of the X-Men I have to agree with some of your issues. The X-men were originally an allegory for repressed minorities in the United States at the time and a lot of connections can and were made to how people treated homosexuals. As the series grew mutants stopped being a minority and most of the allegory was lost as the writers simply didn't seem to get it. Clairemont was a rare exception, he was a good writer with a skill for making the characters interesting and the stories work even if they were totally insane. His skills work much less in the modern era of comics but that is a discussion for another time.
ReplyDeleteFor all of House of M's problems I like what the conclusion of it did. It pushed mutants back to a minority. Of course it was done really poorly since no one anyone cared about lost their powers except Jubilee and very briefly Bobby Drake (not going into that horrible story). Had M.Day been done right and followed up on correctly they could have really made something special out of it. Still the idea of there only being a handful of remaining mutants and no more appearing was brilliant and it could have created a lot of suspenseful stories and good tension had there been more than one good X-book going at the time.
In recent years the idea of the X-men being feared, hated, and hunted has gotten beyond ridiculous. Prior to AvX it seemed like Marvel was going to turn that around. After the stuff with Osbourne and Bastion the world was starting to look at mutants different and start accepting them. The writers made great strides on developing the characters and creating interesting stories showing a lot of growth and showing some real effects from the lack of mutants. While I have various issues with Matt Fraction's run on Uncanny his decisions did a lot of good and interesting things. Then Marvel screwed it all up with AvX.
AvX brings me to your point on some of the worst crossovers. I love the X-Men when they are on their own. I've never liked a ton of crossover with other heroes. Having X-Men on the Avengers is one thing but the X-men have always felt like they belong in their own little world without the need to interact with the rest of the Marvel universe. More so than most, the X-Men feel self-contained. Onslaught should have been something contained only to the X-men. Outside of a few things the primary players were mutants and the story dealt with mutants. One of my favorite moments of Civil War was Emma basically telling Cap or Tony (forget which) to piss off because they have enough of their own problems.
Hey Linkara, next year sounds like its going to be amaizing. I had an idea for a video that might be cool for you to do. You have frequently voiced your opinions, both negative and positive on the new 52 relaunch, and i did really enjoy the TAIS videos you did back in 2011. So i was thinking now that the relaunch has been going on for a while, maybe you could do like a top 10 best and worst new 52 book! I know i'd really enjoy it, and i'm sure many others would to.
ReplyDeleteIs it really wize to burn somethng in a plastic bucket?
ReplyDeleteBuckets can be expensive
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! Not Marvel 2099!!!! Are you insane?! You fool, you'll destroy us all!
ReplyDeleteHeed the words of Dean Winchester. What's dead, should stay dead.
Hey Linkara. Just wanted to say, I thought the hard water joke was good, regardless of what people told you. I mean, I know of heavy water and figured hard water was something too, but hard water as ice was hilarious regardless. Don't worry about that one.
ReplyDeleteAnother thing that could be mentioned about the in addition to what others have said is that is meant to serve as a distraction to people couldn't be exactly sure were the tip of the spear is so people have harder time blocking.
ReplyDeleteAnother way it serves as a distraction is that its movement and could break concentration of the opponent, similar to the rings in a nine ring broadsword, where you twitch the sword to make a clinking sound to distract them, which either breaks their concentration or just look at the sword, thus leaving an opening. Many items on weapons seem superfluous or unnecessary, but have an actual purpose. One example is the rope dart. a weapon you launch at someone then pull back. The rings seam pointless but their actually meant to catch organs when it enters the midsection and either pull them out or at least tear them. either way I still loved the rocket nipples joke.
Also I can see why you mistake the "u". Its common in British, and the majority of Canadian English to use it, in words like colour, due to us having a very subtle difference in pronunciation, like how, their, there, and they're all sound the same, but if you listen really closely, there is a difference. that and I don't know if it is the same in the U.S.A., but in Canada and the U.K., a "c" usually makes an "s" sound when an "e" or and "i" is in front of it. But that's the wonderful thing about a language as far spread as English, seeing all the different ways its changed throughout the world over the years. Loved the wheel of fortune joke with the "u" by the way.
And I thought I was the only one who ate cheese pizza. Also if you ever need to find something in your research that Wikipedia doesn't have, you could always check the Fan-Wikis that exist all over the web. They tend to have the answers.
ReplyDeleteNice ep. And 2013 does sound pretty fruitful for AT4W.
ReplyDeleteSo you'll be looking at 2099? Nice.
I'd like to hear about Spider-man 2099... mostly because I actually liked it, aside from a few flaws and a few instances of Youngblood's disease.
I still have the original copy of 'One More Day' in a place of honor upon my desk (yup, I'm the guy who bought it)!
ReplyDeleteHowever, if Linkara was all "Would you come onto the show so I can burn that thing you paid money for?", I'd totally consider it money well spent.
You could argue that the hologram was lying about them having been together, because NChick would have been suspicious if he hadn't mentioned it...
ReplyDeleteHey Linkara, huge fan of your show. Love the fact that, in my opinion, it turned the shows on TGWTG.com from semi-related gags and crossovers into a storytelling playground akin to Marvel, DC, Middle-Earth or Star Wars.
ReplyDeleteOut of curiosity, do you take requests for Month-long ideas?
I checked the comments and i don't think anyone brough these two things up.
ReplyDelete1)red skull didn't eat the brain he fused with it so he could mind control scarlet witch and go "no more mutants" all over again. Oh god not another house of M.
2)you now have something else to be pissed off about besides one more day. There was a storyline where a dying doctor octopus switched bodies with spiderman, and peter parker died while in doc ock's body.before peter dies he transferred his conscience or something into doc ock. Now doc ock is a hero running around in peter's body.
Great episode. And yes Spoony will fear the day you catch up to him. Also love that last second bit at the end. Don't always notice it, but every so often you do look a little to far off to your left.. But we all have our faults. I tend to usually screw up to much in the middle of my lines on my own.
ReplyDelete"I checked the comments and i don't think anyone brough these two things up.
ReplyDelete1)red skull didn't eat the brain he fused with it so he could mind control scarlet witch and go "no more mutants" all over again. Oh god not another house of M.
2)you now have something else to be pissed off about besides one more day. There was a storyline where a dying doctor octopus switched bodies with spiderman, and peter parker died while in doc ock's body.before peter dies he transferred his conscience or something into doc ock. Now doc ock is a hero running around in peter's body."
Lewis adressed both of those in the credits. He admits to forgetting what actually happened with Red Skull and said that he doesn't care about what's going on with Spiderman.
I'm going to be honest. I don't think you should have apologized to JMS for what he wrote in One More Day in his little rant about gamers. Yes, he IS an insulting, patronizing dickhead for saying those things. Yes, he is a jackass for deriding the people who read and adore his body of work from Babylon 5 to his comic work. And he doesn't deserve an apology for being a jackass.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I appreciate you being apologetic about the depression bit (and mentioning the superior way All Star Superman handled it) as well as finally burning OMD.
If you want to do some research on Transformers and read some damn good comics all the while, check out Transformers: More Than Meets The Eyes (or MTMTE on Internet)by IDW.
ReplyDeleteIt is seriously well written and drawn, a true joy.
I've got one: Worst villain origins. Not old origins like Joker, but one I'd personally say is terrible is Gail Simone's origin for Livewire. (Action Comics #835, 2006.) The animated show origin is probably one of the richest, most complicated and most painfully precise villain origins ever with a subtly arrayed set of details and insinuations about who Leslie Willis was before Superman's interference turned her into sentient electricity, especially in her expression before imminent death on the animated show being a very wide smile and in the insinuation that there's a distance between her inner perspective and her on-radio perspective on Superman and (therefore) superheroes in general. Her INNER perspective (logically) changes on Superman and ONLY Superman. (Her appearances in Girls Night Out and Justice League don't gel with that insinuation.) What we wind up with with Gail Simone: Simple stupidly misplaced aggression and some REALLY bizarre artwork choices.
ReplyDeleteWow. #2 on that list was just incredible. In a world where people like Ray William Jonson thoughtlessly make comments or "jokes" about sensitive topics and then patronize the viewers who do find them offensive, I was blown away when you freely admitted that you were wrong. You showed maturity and respect for your fans, and that is something to be proud of. Seriously, you truly are the man. Here's to another year of atop the fourth wall.
ReplyDeleteYou are man enough to admit you were wrong Linkara.
ReplyDeleteYay! 2099 is my favorite alternate marvel universe. If you need any issues I have ALL OF IT (except that stupid crossover with the spider-men which was out of continuity anyway).
ReplyDeleteDOOM FOR PRESIDENT. WHY SETTLE FOR THE MORE DEMOCRATIC OF EVILS? EVEN CTHULHU LETS YOU VOTE.
Wait, unless you mean that stupid reboot they did a couple years ago that made no sense.
I've been a fan for a while and I must say the #2 mark really took me by surprise. I saw the Superman 701 review and thought it was great.
ReplyDeleteNot going into detail about my health and past, I didn't feel offended by the original commentary about the woman committed suicide. At no point did I take it as someone was saying people who are suicidal are weak. Even if other people may have been hit by that sore spot, I think it's pretty clear you did not in any way mean harm by it.
I love Uncanny X-Force and Uncanny Avengers though. So I dearly hope your message of stopping X-Men to Marvel goes as ignored as the smelly kid in dance class.
Linkara,
ReplyDeleteAs a fan, I have to say, I don't feel you owe anyone an apology for the depression comments in the Superman #701 review. I went back and reviewed it to be sure, and without a doubt, you said nothing wrong. Not only did you preemptively clarify that you understand how difficult and vital depression is to treat and that you weren't making fun of people who suffer from it, you indicated quite correctly at the end that the woman needed to be taken in to see a therapist ASAP along with some medication to help.
I myself suffer from Recurrent Brief Depression. Roughly once every month, I spend about 4-7 days in complete misery, even to the point of contemplating hurting myself. Whenever it strikes me, I'm rarely logical or able to listen to reason. Some of my friends suffer from clinical depression or bipolar disorder. When they experience their major episodes, the last thing they listen to is reason. More often than not, the feelings almost stem from nothing or a completely illogical/irrational base.
However, based on the standard criterion for depression set forth by the DSM-IV, the most credible diagnostic manual we have on mental disorders, the woman only met at most 2 of the 9 criterion, when most sufferers meet at least 5 for extended periods of time. Even after reading the comic myself, all I can see from this is a woman who is hysteric, desperate and not coping with the loss of her mother. We're given no introduction to the woman, no background beyond that she's in a bad state of life, and no basis to connect with her as a character. All she did was ramble on about how her life didn't pan out the way she dreamed it would, and whine about how life isn't fair. Not everybody who decides to commit suicide is depressed, contrary to popular belief. It's unfortunately uncanny how many people who are in stable mental health still fall to that decision.
As far as I'm concerned, you have nothing to apologize for, and any angry/hurt comments you received stemmed from either people who were listening selectively, got overly passionate when they shouldn't have, or (and I suspect this is most likely) have a shockingly minimal knowledge base for the actual condition, be they afflicted with it or not. I can only hope that people would take the time to get more informed about such conditions before becoming so incesnsed on a subject they scarcely understand.
I've had a lot of fun watching you, and being your privy to your appearances at Youmacon. Unfortunately I missed it this year, but I know you met my buddy Aaron there (Really tall, heavy guy wearing an Indy Jones hat, jean jacket and glasses if you remember). I hope you come back for Youma '13 though :) have a great year!
But here's the think Linkara! If we didn't have Onslaught, we wouldn't have gotten the Thunderbolts!
ReplyDelete...and then Marvel had to completely reboot the Thunderbolts into being a team about Red Hulk, Punisher, Venom, Electra and Deadpool killing people...
...man, what's with Marvel hating villains who reform?
First of all Linkara very well done And as a person with a family history of Depression i did not find your Statement in 701 offensive because "Depression" Like ADHD is a term just thrown around and is used as a way for people to get attention.
ReplyDeleteSecond of all My girlfriend says thank you for having similar food interests and for using One Day More at the end.
I'm slightly disappointed that there wasn't more of Mr. McNitpick. It would have been interesting to see him play off of your new-and-improved "trying to be a better guy" personae.
ReplyDeleteI tried to see if anyone posted this already but I didn't see it. The Fans who say the Horse-hair is decorative are right but also wrong. With the Spear the Horse Hair does have ceremonial value but have you ever asked, "why is it red?"
ReplyDeleteThe Horse-Hair is red in ceremonial or decorative purpose because it harkens back to one of it's original purposes. The Hair itself actually acted as "blood barrier" which prevented a good deal of the blood from collecting onto the shaft of the spear and thus making it slippery and unwieldy. The hair is red to reflect this as the hair on the spear used in combat would grow more and more red with use.
Secondly the hair acts as a distraction. It causes the tip of the spear to become blurry and makes it harder for you to focus on it to accurately block or dodge.
Lastly, I've spent time with people who train on the spear and I've even played with it myself when I was active in Martial Arts. I can attest one thing as true, when I first saw the picture I thought it was a rocket fired out of the guy's nipple too until I saw the broken shaft.
if you ask me the correct reaction to seeing spoony's thunderdome count should have been "HOW??"
ReplyDeleteLet me start off by saying I’m a really big fan, and have been for years, and I plan on remaining a fan for years to come. There isn’t a lot that can change that. I was however disappointed when you did - as you put it -- rectified your #1 error by burning a copy One More Day. I hated One More Day, and your feelings on it are very obvious. And I agree with you across the board. Except for the burning. I have trouble when someone burns a book. I totally understand your frustration, don’t get me wrong. And I know that a lot of that comes meeting fan expectations, trying to produce a damn good weekly show, and from playing a character (as an aside, let me state you do this better than most, some producers living behind well-blurred lines, much to their detriment).
ReplyDeleteBut as you’ve said, something I whole heartedly agree with, every comic is someone’s first comic. My first comic was Captain America #425. The art was serviceable, the story was a neat idea handled poorly, and it had a goddamn holographic cover. It’s not a very good book. And it was the first issue what is generally considered to be one of the worst story arcs for the good captain. And it is precious to me. The thought of someone destroying it, not even my physical copy of it, mind you, makes me sick.
You love comics, it’s obvious. That’s why I really dig your show. You mock and deride and criticize comics failings because this medium is so important to you, and that shows. But your criticizing doesn’t need to go a place where you need to destroy something.
I’m not asking you to change your theme, change your show, or really do anything different from what you’ve done for the last few years. I’m a fan of yours for a reason, after all. All I’m asking, even with thousands of other copies of something in the world is you just keep in mind how much harm physical destruction can do.
Thank you for correcting yourself about the whole jumper screw up. I im a life long sufferer of Bi-polar disorder, and at the time I watched your review for that comic I was going thought some tough times and your comments didn't help. Mind you that that is a VERY common thing said to me when im feeling that bad, so I was never mad at you just disappointed. Thank you again for your apology.
ReplyDeleteOn another note way back in late 2009 a friend of mine showed me your "Ultimate Warrior" crossover with Spoony. I couldn't get enough and that led me to TGWTG. Much has changed since then and now but my enjoyment of you has stayed, and ill be here for the long haul as long as you keep us informed and entertained.
And finally, speaking of first's my first ever comic was a tattered copy of "Spiderman 2099" #1 given to me by a random kid while i was in the restroom while in the first grade (yes i know that's weird as hell). After losing it in a storm (my tree house blow over and destroyed my comic collection.)many years ago I've never read it again, only hearing off hand comments that the whole 2099 thing sucked on toast. as such i was GIDDY when i heard you mention 2099, and i will purposely not read them till then.
Don't feel bad about the Coney dog thing. Although I know what it was (Coney being my last name I had little chance of not knowing... grumble grumble high school grumble)I prefer to think Eminem was refering to a mutant rabbit/dog hybrid. A rabog if you will, or possibly a dobit. That is for mad science to work out. I feel like this post should have had more of a point....Oh well have a great day Linkara.
ReplyDeleteActually, it isn't that synthesiser is the British spelling of synthesizer; rather, synthesizer is the American spelling of synthesiser. We use the S form in Ireland as well; it's also considered to be the correct form in Canada and Australia, though they consider the Z form to be an acceptable variant.
ReplyDeleteThe UK version of MS Word is the same as the US version; there is an option somewhere to set the language to English (UK), among others, and yeah, it does autocorrect synthesizer to synthesiser. However, I think English (US) is still the default, and even if you do set it to English (UK), the menus are still in US English.
I'm totally with you on cereal, though for the opposite reason - milk sucks all the flavour out, leaving you with a bland, soggy, gloopy mess. Reading the comments, wow, it seems like all sort of dry cereal fans are coming out of the woodwork.
I think the Pretenders were in the G2 comic becuase they weren't dead at the end of G1.
Do start using asinine, it's a good word.
I've seen a few people seriously suggest that the X-Men be moved into their own universe so the issues associated with them can be properly explored without having to collide with all the other superheroes.
deigod.dragoness:
>First, there is a fear associated with being a human and seeing the next form of evolution as I can imagine was the case for Homo Erectus upon seeing Homo Sapien and seeing their own numbers dwindling. Not to mention the jealousy that is associated with seeing the next step of evolution and knowing you won't be along for the ride can eat someone up.
EVOLUTION DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY!
Have a very happy and prosperous new year!
I wouldn't feel too bad about getting "Gloucestershire" wrong. England is full of surnames and places names whose pronunciation is wildly different from their spelling. Wikipedia even has an (extremely long) list of all of them:
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_names_in_English_with_counterintuitive_pronunciations
Author P.G. Wodehouse (pronounced "Woodhouse" in case you were curious) wrote the "Jeeves and Wooster" book series, which made fun of a lot of aspects of British culture, including this. The main character has a friend whose name is Cyril "Barmy" Fotheringay-Phipps (last name pronounced "Fungy-Phipps"-- the g is hard as in "fungus"). So people call him "Barmy Fungy-Phipps"
Wait, did I hear correctly? You are going to be doing a retrospective on on your all time favorite comic?
ReplyDeleteDon't I remember hearing that you were saving your favorite comic for the last episode of ATFW?
Oh no! The show is ending!
Just wanted to say that, as some-one who has depression, I wasn't really offended by your comments in the superman review as Superman's little speech was pretty terrible which was the main problem with that whole scene.
ReplyDeleteOh, and yes, the British spellcheck changes it to "Synthesiser".
I also wanted to ask; I tried tweeting you about it but I didn't get a reply, I was just wondering what recording of 'One more Day' you used both here and the One More Day review. Because I want to find it.
McNittpick is also full of it btw :P I still love the TGWTG site and actually, was watching other people's reviews more than I was the NC so... yeah XD nitpick him back!
As for X-men I only watched the 90s cartoon as a kid and even that I gave up on when it started crossing over with Spiderman and becoming insane. You're pretty accurate though, the whole prejudice doesn't make sense in the marvel universe. Personally I would've split X-Men from the rest of the Marvel universe altogether and keep it as its own seperate universe. Although then again the guys at Marvel's heads may explode if they tried to do that.
I also wanted to actually thank you for reading every single comment you get :D even if you never reply or acknowledge something. it just makes me personally feel better than feeling like I'm screaming into the dark you know? haha!
Anyway that's about it from me. Happy New year Linkara! I look forward to your future shinanegans!
(forgive me if this is a double post. My internet is being weird)
the x men universe is in-dead upside down and backwards but as a x-men fan who know about the character and if help is needed a google search could clear up a lot these are just my thoughts, but I do want to say that I enjoy watching your shows on tgwtg and can not wait for more do you have a direct paypal account to receive donations
ReplyDeleteAs far as X-Men goes, I'm a fan of the characters, but I do think some the writers need to fix some stuff. (At least, from my casual reader perspective.)
ReplyDeleteMainly, put Scott Summers/Cyclops down before he goes any futher on the crazy train (seriously, I don't even LIKE Cyclops and I have to admit, the writers are going a little far as they run the asylum...).
And, for more personal reasons, they need to BRING BACK FREAKIN' NIGHTCRAWLER! Seriously, they just killed him off in an event (and it wasn't the "main" death), brought freakin' Cable back (who died in the SAME EVENT), and then replaced him with his darker and edgier counterpart from AoA (furthering my belief that the writers are a bunch of AoA fanboys who want to use that universe as much as possible)! I thought he was awesome, and probably the most morally good character out of the team (making him MORE awesome).
...Sorry for ranting, there. I'm just irked they haven't inevitably brought him back yet...
I kind of blamed Iron Man for One More Day. After all, he made Spider-Man reveal his identity in the first place in Civil War, thus causing the events that led to that horrible retcon.
Oh! And you should soooo have a SNOWFLAAAME! ad bumper-thing sometime!
...Okay, I'm done rambling, now...
Happy New Year Lewis. Looking forward to another great year of ATFW.
ReplyDeleteYour eating habits/philosophy are similar to my father's. Although the no milk on cereal thing is new to me. I, like a lot of people I know, will only eat cereal with cold milk because I don't like it to go soggy. Is that the case with you?
Wow, looking at the Marvel 2099 Lines? I actually loved those lines and still have my Hulk 2099 comics around somewhere. Keep up the good work!
ReplyDeleteRhodoferax: Um, in regards to the X-Men, that's HIGHLY debatable. IF mutants actually existed in large enough numbers to breed at a fast enough speed, it's actually very plausible that they could overtake traditional humanity.
ReplyDeleteI know this comment doesn't belong to this video, but I just saw you singing a part of A Long December in Nash's New Year's Eve video. Love that song, thanks man!
ReplyDeleteHave you been reading Marvel Comics the Untold Story? When you started talking about Quesada and Avi Arad it sounded like it. I finished it a couple days ago, very interesting.
ReplyDelete2099! It was around the time those were coming out when I was a kid, that comics started coming into my radar.
I just wanted to say not to worry about the depression thing: You're clearly well-meaning, and I don't doubt for a moment that your reaction to a badly-written comic book version of depression doesn't reflect for a moment how you'd act to someone really depressed.
ReplyDeleteIndeed, I know it's not. About three years ago, I had really, really, really ill for years, and had some pretty severe depression alongside it. I spent a year where I almost never went more than about 400 yards from my house. Because I couldn't. The long illness cost me most of my friends, and all I could do was try and fill time.
Your enthusiasm and humour helped me a lot during that time, and the one time I wrote you, you were really nice. That helped.
Shortly after that, I finally got some actual treatment, and my life started on an upswing. I'm not perfect yet, but things have vastly improved: I have multiple social groups, go out 3-4 times a week with friends, and, well, don't have attacks of suicidal thoughts anymore, which is usually considered a good thing. Things just keep improving.
So, yeah. You didn't know about depression. But you still managed to help someone going through it. =)
If it helps with the depression thing? I don't suppose you remember the person who sent you the Punch cartoons a few years ago, in thanks for helping him through a tough illness?
ReplyDeleteYeah. Severe depression with regular suicidal thoughts, combined with an illness that made me unable to go more than about 400 yards from my house for months on end. Your show was a lifeline during then, keeping me in touch with something interesting and different outside myself and my life at the time.
Don't think I told you that, of course. Wouldn't tell you now if things hadn't gotten so much better - I now have multiple social groups, and go out with friends 3-4 times a week, am able to do physical activity again, and the suicidal thoughts just don't happen anymore. Admittedly, I have some ways to go - but I now have support for it, and am not alone.
So, thanks Linkara. Your show was there to cheer me up when I had little to be cheery about. Thank you so much.
Why did you burn the comic in a plastic bucket. Wouldnt a metal or steel bucket do the job without risking in destroying the bucket or area around it?
ReplyDeletePlease don't see this as an insult but there are several reviewers that I enjoy more than you. That said, I must also say that I have more respect for you than those others, not meant as an insult towards those others.
ReplyDeleteI remember the review containing the woman who wanted to end her life. I also remember that I didn't like the things you said about that particular part.
I don't know you, of course, but I have seen most, if not all, of your reviews and I'm quite certain that you didn't mean anything by it, so I didn't post a comment. Now though, I felt obligated to.
I have suffered from depression for a long period of my life. I don't know how it is for other people who suffer or have suffered the same, but in my experience it never really goes away. It changes, lessens and can even be ignored for periods of time, but it's never truly gone for me.
Having lived with this for some time now, I have come across many who simply don't understand it. It's only logical that they don't since they haven’t experienced it, and although it saddens me that this means that it often gets underestimated how profound an impact depression has on the life of a person suffering from it, it also means that they have never experienced it themselves, which is a good thing.
To me you come across as an honest and passionate person who will defend his opinions, without losing sight of the fact that others are entitled to have opinions that differ from your own. You recognize the mistakes you make and even make light of them. And lastly that when you truly feel that you’ve made a mistake on an ethical ground you will sincerely apologize.
For that, I truly respect you.
I hope to see at least another 200+ episodes, and I'm sure I'll be watching every one of them as well.
Your favorite comic of all... could it be... The Technis Imperative ?!!!! *squeeeeeeeeeeeeeee* I bought that comic because of you, y'know. I've always been curious as to what you'd say about it beyond "I like it." Of all the cross-overs I've read, it is my favorite. (Although it takes second place behind Superman's Secret Origin for favorite comic.) Can't wait for the review... sorry, retrospective. ;)
ReplyDeleteBravo, confronting mistakes in this manner is both entertaining for the viewers and also lets them know that you really are paying attention and trying to improve. As a viewer often "on the fence", I appreciate it.
ReplyDeleteAlso encouraging is knowing that I am not alone in finding the X-Men so annoying. Besides the "science" of X-Men I think the biggest problem is with the concept of the "X-Men" themselves and Xavier's "dream".
Long story short (this post used to be over twice as long) the X-Men seem to do everything they can to be divisive and justify the fears of "prejudiced humanity". Xavier praises peaceful coexistence while forming a paramilitary strike forced composed of only his "own kind". If Xavier's dream meant something, I would expect the X-Men to be housed separately from Xavier's school and consist of merely "the best" of those that believe in Xavier's dream, regardless of how they received their superhuman abilities (if they had any)... and I wouldn't phrase it so that it reinforces that division he wishes to fight. How about just striving for peaceful coexistence; as you stated why are intentionally engineered super-powered humans and accidentally empowered humans viewed so differently from "naturally super-powered" humans?
Here's my response to linkara's remark about how the fear of the x-men in the marvel universe does not make sense.
ReplyDeletehttp://comicbookjudgements.blogspot.com/