Once More With Movies: Buffy Gets A Reboot

In case you didn't catch the Buzz of the Day, Buffy the Vampire Slayer has been confirmed for a reboot film.  As I am typing this, thunder is booming ominously in the background.  Whether it is a portent or merely an interestingly timed result of Michigan weather pattern, only time will tell.

That's right, you read that first sentence correctly.  There will be a Buffy reboot.  If that shocked you, than brace for impact: Joss Whedon is not involved.  Buffy's new writer will be Whit Anderson, of whom I honestly don't know enough about to comment.  Joss Whedon has already reacted to the news.

I really have mixed feelings about this.  At this point, there just doesn't seem to be enough information for meaningful speculation.   In her interview with the Los Angeles Times, Anderson says that "While this is not your high-school Buffy, she’ll be just as witty, tough and sexy as we all remember her to be."  This could mean that Buffy won't be back in high school for the reboot, but in context with the rest of the article, it could also mean simply that it won't be the same Buffy you remember from when you were in high school.  Not exactly a crammed full of information, are you quote?  At least it says "just as" instead of "even more."  That's a good sign.

The popular TV show ran for seven seasons and was itself a reboot of a far less successful 1992 film, so this film will actually be a reboot of a reboot and will be joining Spider-man in his tangled web of reboots.  The TV series also spun-off a continuation in the form of the comic series Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season Eight, so people who want more Buffy but not without Whedon ought to check that out if they haven't already.


So, because I love bullet-points so much, some things to speculate about despite my assertion that there's not enough info:

• The Setting: I guess I already covered this above, but still.  Will it be high school, college, or neither?  While the original concept was based on the motif of "high school is hell," the TV series hit on all of these times in Buffy's life.  I personally think high school would be the most logical choice, but, hey, you never know.
• The Friends: will the Scoobies (Buffy's friends/side-kicks) be in the film, with new interpretations of Willow and Xander, or will Buffy have new friends?  Over the course of the series, the Scoobies became extremely popular among fans in their own right, so will they be carried over?
• The Cast: this one's pretty obvious.  Since Whedon's not involved, we probably shouldn't expect any of the TV series' cast to return either.  There's also the fact that the series ended seven years ago and the cast has continued aging regardless.
• The Villains: will they be reinterpretations of villains from the series or all-new?
• The Love-Interest: will there be one?  Will he be undead?  Will he be all-new or Angel?  Or would they be so radical as to make it someone from the series who isn't Angel?
• The Vampires: will they return to the campy masks, or-- wait, stupid question.  Here's a better one: how will their appearances differ from their televised counter-parts?  Will their abilities, weaknesses, and lore be different?
• The Story: will it be new or from the series?  While there are plenty of interesting story arcs in the series to choose from, I rather doubt they'll go that route.  Many of them built up over a long period of time and would be difficult to introduce new viewers to, like the Dark Willow Saga.

Those are what I'm wondering about for now.  I'd say more, but I need more time to process this and figure out whether I should be afraid, excited, or both.  At this point, I really don't know how to react, which is probably the proper reaction.

Here are the relevent links once more:

Announcement!
Interview with a Writer!
The Creator's Response!

Remember When SG-1 did that Spoof Episode: SGU Season 1 Retrospective (Also: Guess Who Won The Hugo)

First of all, the Hugo awards have come and gone and I never said anything so: congratuations on getting two "Best Graphic Story" Hugos in two years, Girl Genius!  Keep up the amazing work!  I sadly was unable to complete the Captain Britain and MI13 post before the winners were announced, and should apparently never mention what I'm planning on writing a post about in advance because it never happens.  I am still going to write the point, but don't expect it soon.

Anyway, I've been wanting to compare Stargate Universe with the Stargate SG-1 episode "200" since the series premier, so I figured I may as well do this before I catch up on season two, which just recently started.  "200" the two hundreth episode of Stargate SG-1 spoofs many different science-fiction cliches, tropes, and trends, and I shall be going through the episode looking for ones that have been used in season 1 of SGU, and some SG-1 and Atlantis as well (not all of those, though. that would make this way too long).  This will be done completely from memory, so if I miss any, feel free to post a comment.

WARNING: There will be spoilers and I shall be poking gentle fun at series that I love.  People who that everything seriously all the time be warned!

Let us begin!

Update Time: Read Comics in Public Day and More!

Along time ago (April), and far, far away (Japan), I posted about how excited I was that both Captain  Britain and MI13 and Girl Genius were nominated for Hugo awards and that I would ramble about both series "sometime in the near future."  While I did do the Girl Genius post, I must shamefully admit to not having the Captain Britain post completed in a timely matter.  Fortunately, the Hugo awards ceremony isn't until Sunday, so I'll hopefully have the post done by then.

Anyway...

You may of heard that Saturday was International Read Comics in Public Day, a day dedicated to, well, unashamedly reading comics in public.  Despite being too lazy to blog about it (I was working on the Captain Britain thing, I swear!) I happily participated:

The website DC Women Kicking A** challenged women to participate and created a "Women Read Comics in Public" Tumblr "dedicated to showing off the passion and diversity of female comic readers." If you have any such pictures, they're currently accepting pictures taken anytime.

So, that's it for the quick update!  I should probably get back to packing for tonight's flight back to reality papers school!  Before I go, here are a few other geeky highlights from this past weekend:

• A fifty-something-year-old lady walking towards the restrooms backpedals and exclaims "Oooh, Marvel!"  She picks up a book and flips through it for about thirty seconds before putting it back, telling me that Marvel's her favorite, and completing her journey to the restroom.
• A little boy carrying around his Jaime Reyes Blue Beetle happy meal toy and treating it as his Most Favored Toy of the hour.  Aww...
• Having a nice conversation with my nine-year-old brother about Godzilla movies.  As in the old Japanese ones.  His favorite is the original one.  There is hope for the future!

Later, folks, and hopefully I'll have something more interesting to say next time!

Alas, Poor Mayday: The End of Spider-Girl as We Know It

While this isn't one of the posts I mentioned last time, I thought I would take the time to babble about one of my favorite superheroes, Spider-Girl! Alternate-future Daughter of Spider-Man!  Marvel's Longest-running Female-lead in a Comic Series to Date!  Reason for the Creation of the MC2 Universe!  Soon-to-be Replaced Character!

Sorry, Mayday, but it seems your time as the friendly neighborhood web-swinger is over!  Y'know that new on-going Spectacular Spider-Girl series that I mentioned before?  The one I was really, really looking forward to?  It was changed from on-going to a four-issue limited series before the release of the first issue, and tomorrow (or today, depending on your time-zone), the one-shot comic Spider-Girl: The End will be released.  According to Tom DeFalco her co-creator and only writer in her thirteen-year history, this one shot will end all of May "Mayday" Parker's adventures for the foreseeable future.  Not only that, but it seems that Araña, a spider-themed super-teen from the main Marvel continuity will be taking over the title of Spider-Girl with a new series this November (here's info on the first issue).  Not that I have anything against Anya, but she's just not Mayday.

Since she seems to be going away for a while, now seems like a good a time as any for me to ramble about one of my favorite superheroes: 

This is neither the first time Spider-Girl's been canceled, nor the first time it was supposed to be permanent.  After an eight-year run, her first series was supposed to end with her death and the destruction of her home universe, a plan that was fortunately scrapped and I really hope wasn't revived for this issue (since Tom said that she may be brought back in the future, I don't think it was, but in comics you never know).  Her second on-going series, Amazing Spider-Girl, was canceled after thirty issues and her Spectacular Spider-Girl back-up feature in Spider-Man Family and Web of Spider-Man ran for twelve issues.  All together, Spider-Girl fans have nearly one hundred and fifty issues to horde cherish.  I actually feel kind of lucky to have come so late to the scene; most of Spidey's adventures are still new to me and waiting for me to read them for the first time.

I first ran across Mayday pretty much by accident.  When a friend introduced me to superhero comics Ultimate Spider-Man was one of the first series he loaned me and I used Wikipedia to look up information on the different versions of the characters (a dangerous technique that should not be employed by anyone who doesn't want a face-load of spoilers), and thus I learned of Spider-Girl's existence (y'know, the fictional kind).  Sometime later, I stumbled upon a volume of Amazing Spider-Girl in a friendly-neighborhood bookstore and flipped through, eventually buying it and becoming completely hooked on Mayday's "old school" style adventures.

Despite the similarity of their code-names and costumes, there are quite a few differences between May and her father Peter.  Let's look at a few of them:

• While Peter was a constantly bullied by jocks for being a geek in high school, Mayday is both smart and athletic, being both a top student and a star basketball player.  She's also very popular and close friends with geeks and jocks alike.
• Unfortunately for her, though, May did not inherit her father's ability with a camera and her photography is terrible.
• Unlike Spider-Man, Spider-Girl gets mostly good press, even from J. Jonah Jameson, out-spoken Spidey-hater (some of you might remember him as that angry shouting guy from the movies).
• May's parents know all about her powers and secret identity.  It's not like it would be easy to hide: "Look dear, some girl about our daughter's age is swinging around town on webs, wearing something that looks a lot like your old costume!  Boy, I wish May was here to see this instead of having to run off on some mysterious errand!  I wonder who this 'Spider-Girl' could be?"  Some things are too much of a stretch even for comic books.
• Like Peter, Mayday became a hero and continues to dawn her mask because of her deeply ingrained sense of responsibility.  Unlike Peter, however, she does it so that no one will be hurt because she could have done something and didn't, not because someone already has.

Don't think that the list above means that the series is angst-less, though!  May is still a Parker and she inherited the Parker Luck: her secret identity wreaks utter havoc on her private life.  If she's battling it out with Crazy Eight or some other super-baddie, you can bet her friends will think she ditched them for something stupid and that she needs to straighten out her priorities.  Also, her parents knowing that she's Spider-Girl and her parents liking it are two very different things.  She still sometimes has to web-swing behind her parents backs.  And let's not forget love triangles; it seems it's impossible to be a Parker without them.  So, yes, Spider-Girl does have angst, though neither the same type as Spider-Man nor as much.

Even with the obligatory Spider-hyphen-angst, the series brings back some of the techniques and feel of the Silver Age of Comics, and is-- dare I say it-- fun.  The series has a lighter, more all-ages tone than a lot of comics out today, and I at least find it a refreshing series.  Growing up with manga, I have no problem with the "decompression" that's so popular in today's comics, but there's something refreshing about fast-moving plots.

Now that it's past midnight here, I guess I should get back to the topic at hand.  Here is a quote from the end of Tom DeFalco's interview with Newsarama:

"No one can truly predict the future. Is it possible that Mayday will return in a few years? I guess so. If I were to bet on it, I’d say one of our current readers will eventually grow up, break into the business and be the one who revamps Spider-Girl for a whole new generation," DeFalco said. "As far as I’m concerned, I truly believe that this will be the last time I ever write Spider-Girl."

Spider-Girl is coming to an end, but this that doesn't mean that Spider-Girl: The End has to mean "good-bye forever," though it is certainly the end of an era.  I can always hope that someday Spider-Girl will return for more adventures.

I'm not writing this to accuse Marvel of conspiracy against things I like or to tell everyone to hunt down this series and make it your favorite so it will be brought back.  I just want to babble a bit about something I like and to thank Tom for all his hard work over the years.  Also, it's not to late to check out this series for the first time; the first Spider-Girl series is being released in "digests" (collections slightly taller than a standard volume of manga) and Amazing and Spectacular are both available in trade paper-backs.  Check it out.  It might not be for everyone, but maybe you'll like it, and just maybe you'll gain a new favorite.

So, until next time, folks!

Make Mine Mayday!

Oh, and here are the links to the two interviews with Tom DeFalco again.  'Night, all!

SHE LIVES! or What Ryorin Has Been Up To

I seem to have fallen into The Pit Of No Posts again since returning to the U.S.  I have been catching up on wide variety of excellent books and television, as well as the whole of life as general, but I haven't forgotten the Computer Cosmos (or the wonder of bullet points) completely.  Here are a few plots to conquer the world things that I have planned for the foreseeable future:

• I have been reading the books from the Jawas Read Too! Summer of Series Reading Challenge, as mentioned here, I just haven't been doing so well on the discussion part.  I shall shortly post some thoughts on June and July's series.  There will be one post per series, hopefully going up within the next few days.
• I am still planning on rambling on about Captain Britain and MI13 as mentioned here.  It will be up before the Hugo winners are announced.  Really.  I just need to reread it a few more times... yeah...
• The two Syfy shows Warehouse 13 and Eureka are having crossover episodes this week.  This may cause me to be a bit more distracted, but hopefully I'll be able to work my way out of my happy daze and post a bit about it.

I am planning on more posts than the ones listed so far, but there is other writing that I've finally had a chance to do, so hopefully I'll be able to strike a balance where I'm doing a bit of both kinds of writing, but that may not be soon, so posts may be a bit short for a while.  While I will be doing my best to pull myself out of The Pit, I would greatly appreciate any ladders anyone feels like throwing me in the form of comments.

Hopefully my next post will be written when I'm less tired and can think of more bullet points.  Or at least have the energy to comment on Ryan Reynolds costume in the Green Lantern movie:

 ...but then again, everyone else seems to have covered it, so perhaps it's just as well I'm so out of it.

Girl Genius: Agatha Heterodyne and the Return of the Hugo Award!

Alright: finals are done, I've had some more coffee, and Jethro Tull's playing. Let's get this started:

Adventure! Romance! MAD SCIENCE! These are the ingredients chosen to create the perfect little girl the story of Agatha Heterodyne: Girl Genius!

As I've mentioned previously, Girl Genius, comic/webcomic series by Phil and Kaja Foglio (colors by Cheyenne Wright), has been nominated once more for the Hugo Awards. This is a Big Deal. Last year Girl Genius won the first Hugo for the "Best Graphic Story" category, and when I say first, I mean ever. This year it's back with Volume 9, Agatha Heterodyne and the Heirs of the Storm:

Please excuse me for a moment as my joy demands to be released: Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!

Ahem.

Anyway, it is a world ruled by Mad Science! Failed experiments of mad scientists (more commonly known as "Sparks") wander the earth, dirigibles roam the skies, and mechanical "clanks" and Frankenstein-monster-like "constructs" are a common site. This is a world with lost cities, talking cats, rules of royal succession altered to account for reanimation, traveling theater companies that aren't quite what they seem, and cream pies with a strangely soothing effects. This world of brilliant color is also a world of many, many questions. And, of course, regularly twisted laws of science. It's a wacky adventure story (filled with romance and Mad Science too, of course...) set in a wacky, yet amazingly complex world, populated by amazingly fun characters and amazingly ridiculous machines.

Writer and co-creator Kaja Folio accidentally coined the term "Gaslamp Fantasy" to describe this world, and it fits perfectly. It takes the steampunk aesthetic, adds gobs of Mad Science and elements from fifties-style pulp sci-fi (think "Captain Proton" from Star Trek: Voyager) and buckets of Vernian influence, mix in liberal doses of humor and great characters, sprinkle in just the amount of explanation about the world and it's history, and then hand it over to the colorist for the final touch. For a simplified version of this recipe, see the top of the page (you know, the part that starts with "Adventure!" and then mentions "Romance!").  At ten-and-a-half volumes, this series is going strong, and I really don't see it slowing down anytime soon with so many questions left unanswered (I'm not going to try to list them off; you'll have to read the series and see for yourself)!

The story focuses on Agatha, a, well, a Girl Genius. A young student who can never get her clanks to work, she... well, she turns out to have a lot more to her than anyone thought. She ends up on a grand adventure spanning, airship cities, maniacal circuses (of doom!), insane talking castles, theater, and situations that only a good death ray (or a carousel) can solve, to avoid being manipulated or killed. Or turned into a "spunky girl sidekick."

Hi-jinx ensues, and it brought friends.

Agatha herself is an incredibly fun character, willing to tackle challenges even when her concentration is inhibited at the beginning. What's she do when she's mugged? She hits the attacker with a bottle. And when she's given the impossible task of cleaning the lab before the Baron arrives for a surprise visit in half an hour? She does it. After the story really starts, well, then she goes from great to incredible. As for the rest of the cast, it's tons of fun and filled with great characters. From the lazy Krosp, the Emperor of all cats, to the fun-loving warrior Zeetha, lost princess of the Lost City of Skifander, to insane pirate Bangladesh Dupree to Baron Wulfenbach, the tyrant with very good reasons for his actions, to... well, you get the idea.

I adore Girl Genius. The characters, the world, the technology, the mysteries, the humor, the art, the visual gags ("Turnips R Us"), the massive eyebrows... the concepts are great and the execution is wonderful, and they get extra points for pulling off a fun love triangle without angst. Now, that's awe-inspiring.  This is a genuinely fun series that I highly recommend to all, though I must add that the Foglios have self-rated the series PG-13.

I really doubt that I can do the plot justice (at least not without heaps of spoilers and few more weeks of editing), so lucky for us all the Book Smugglers posted their review of the first three chapters less than twenty-four hours ago.  Check it out; maybe the review and my rambling combined can come close to doing this lovely series justice.

Girl Genius is available to read both in print and as a free online webcomic, updating Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. If you're reading this you have internet access and thus no excuse not to check this series out, and if you're not pulled in by the end of the first chapter, you still aren't off the hook. The first chapter's good, in the second chapter it gets even better, and chapter three is when it gets really, really fun.  The series in completely in color with the exception of the first chapter, which is scheduled to be re-released in color soon.  There are currently nine volumes in print, with another volume-and-a-half available for reading online:

Follow This Elegant and Finely Crafted Link to Read!

Note to self: add the color version of Volume 1 to my birthday list.

For more fun, there's also Girl Genius Radio Theater, which is a pod cast of two comedic three-part episodes and one promo, done in the style of an Olde Tyme radio serial.  Oh, and the "Elegant and Finely Crafted Link" phase is commonly used at the Girl Genius website, something that should give you the tiniest taste of the Foglios' brilliance.

No, I really can't praise them enough.

Now allow me to leave you all with Phil and Kaja's acceptance speech for last year's Hugo Award:

Go read.  Now.

Conflict of Hugo Proportions: Brian Versus Agatha!

I am feeling conflicted.

Earlier today, I was looking at the news on Marvel's website when, lo and behold, I saw this!

Captain Britain and MI13 is up for the "Best Graphic Story" Hugo award for it's third volume "Vampire State", in which Brian (aka Captain Britain) and his stalwart cohorts fight vampire.  Who live in a castle.  On the moon.

This news filled me joy.  The world was filled with chocolate and rainbows, the birds joined me in song, and I promptly got a parody of Captain Planet's theme song stuck in my head ("Captain Britain!  He's a hero!  He'll take pollution down to zero because-he-was-a-Knight-of-Pendragon-and-that's-what-they-do-not-just-because-I-can't-think-of-an-other-line-really.")

So I decided to check out the Hugo Awards' official website and see what Brian was up against:

Girl Genius volume 9

And I stared.

Why does this awesome news make me conflicted?  I love Captain Britain and MI13, I really do.  I think it a horrible shame that it was canceled.  It would be wonderful if it got a Hugo.

But I absolutely love Girl Genius.  It may be my single favorite American comic series.  I was overjoyed last year when it was nominated for the category and was overwhelmed with happiness once again when it won, becoming the first graphic novel to win a Hugo.

And now if one wins, the other doesn't.

Fortunately, I'm not part of Worldcon and I won't have to choose between the two of them.  As such, I can take comfort in the fact that I love two of the five nominees for the category and can root for both of them, and that the nominations alone ought to bring attention to both books.

I guess my internal conflict, then, is not which to root for, but which I would rather have win: the winner from last year or the superheroes that were tragically canceled.

But when I really think about it, it doesn't matter.  I'm happy that both were nominated (and that Fables was, too, but I haven't read that volume yet).  I'll be happy with either one winning.

So, in honor of these two wonderful comic series being nominated, I shall follow up this rant with one gushing about Girl Genius (which I've been planning on doing anyway) and then another on Captain Britain and MI13.  As the previous post states, I'm rather busy at the moment, so I'm not sure when I'll have these posts completed, but it'll be in the near future.

Good luck to all the Hugo nominees!  May the Force/Spark/Self-confidence-that-now-fuels-your-powers be with you!

Brand New Movie Franchise: Spidey Gets a Reboot. Again.

As You may have picked-up on from previous posts, I am rather attached to Spider-man.  Because of that, I have a lot to say about this topic and this post is kind of long.  Please bare with me and feel free to get a snack at the intermission.  Thank you.

For those of you who didn't hear back in January, Spider-man, quite possibly the most popular comic-book movie franchise around, is getting a reboot.  That's right, folks, the fourth movie starring the world's favorite arachnid-themed costumed hero will ignore the previous three and will have a completely new director and cast.

The main reason for this change is apparently director Sam Raimi's lack of confidence in his ability to make Sony's deadline for a May 11, 2011 release, but there were apparently quite a few creative differences between the director and the company as well.  They wanted lots of villains, he wanted one, they wanted one script, he wanted another, etc. Apparently similar issues came up with the third one, and we all remember how well that turned out...  Any way, now Marc Webb will be directing instead of Sam Raimi.

Spider-man getting a reboot is hardly a revolutionary concept.  The poor guy seems plagued with 'em.  Let's take a look at his comic reboots from the past ten years:

Ode to the Absurd or Thank You, Cable & Deadpool!

Cable & Deadpool got me into superhero comics.

I don't mean I grew up in a world devoid of the light of comics. Heaven knows that's not the case. I was a kid fortunate enough to be born into a geeky family that recognized comics as a legitimate storytelling medium. I grew up in a household blessed with collections of American syndicated comics like Calvin and Hobbes and with two thick omnibuses of the French adventure comic Asterix and Obelix. We even had Maus laying around, though it was too dark for me to get through when I was little. Often, we would get Archie comic digests at the grocery store or borrow Tintin comics from our local library. Through middle and high school, I devoured manga like the ravenous geek who grew up on Dragonball Z that I was.

I have also always been interested superheroes. Sure, I watched Japanese superheroes save the galaxy a lot on Dragonball Z and Voltron and I always loved the Jedi of Star Wars, but I was always interested in the more conventional American superheroes too. I grew up watching mutant animals protecting New York in Ninja Turtles, the Justice League battle the Legion of Doom in Super Friends, the Thing unleash clobberin' time on Dr. Doom on Fantastic Four, and I even saw mutants overthrow the disgusting other-dimensional dictator Mojo in X-Men. I watched superhero movies like Spider-man, Superman, and even the infamous Batman and Robin. I knew the origins of the Fantastic Four, the Hulk, Spider-man, Superman, and Aquaman. I even knew who Doomsday was. I played the City of Heroes MMORPG and loved the few issues of the comic that we had (available in completely legal PDF form here; I recommend the Blue King run and the first twelve issues of the Image run, but the rest is fun too).

I just didn't read Marvel or DC comics.

Let's face it: Marvel and DC are intimidating. There are decades of history behind any one of their series and I didn't really have any friends who read Marvel or DC to explain it to me, just a lot of other manga fans. I had one friend in high school (another manga fan) who explained the basic plot of the Dark Phoenix Saga to me after we saw X-Men The Last Stand, but she had never read any of the comics either; she just had the X-Men Encyclopedia. For the most part, I ignored the Graphic Novel section of a book store except for the manga portion of it and, while I did go to my local comic shops, it was for manga and anime and Star Wars instead of, well, superhero comics.

And then I entered college. Cue dramatic music and, no, the Ninja Turtles theme song does not count.

Freshman year I was in the campus coffee shop talking to a friend of mine when the topic of superheroes came up. I mentioned how I had always been interested in superheroes but never found my way into the Marvel and DC universes. My friend (a real, live superhero comics fan!) asked me if I had ever heard of Marvel's very own fourth-wall breaking insane mercenary Deadpool. Last year, he finally loaned me Cable & Deadpool, along with some Runaways and Ultimate Spider-man. And now I am firmly entrenched within the worlds of Marvel and DC and I'm not planning on leaving anytime soon.

Let's just say that my friend hit the nail quite soudly on the head with his recommendation. I love series that aren't afraid to laugh at themselves, but can still have a strong plot. Cable & Deadpool is that series. Deadpool, as mentioned above, is insane. He's the comic relief of the Marvel Universe and is fully aware of his status as a character in a comic book. Cable, on the other hand is a Summers. He's Cyclops' time-traveling son with a Messiah complex from a dystopian future. He's a very ends-focused character trying to build a perfect world. He's got a ton of back-story, but I could still get into the series and know what was going on. And he and Deadpool balance each other perfectly.

Cable & Deadpool probably isn't the perfect gateway series for everyone. Both of the title characters have long, convoluted back-stories and major plots from the rest of the MU occasionally spill into the story (like Civil War and various X-Men plots). But for me, the series was perfect. It starred relatively obscure characters. It juggled serious moments and comedy. It had character development and a wide variety of character interaction. It had great art and wonderfully parallel first and last scenes. It occasionally breaks the fourth wall. It was over the top but still got me to think. And it allowed me to finally enter a printed world of superheroes.

Maybe I would have started reading Marvel and DC even if I hadn't heard of this wacky, lovable series. Maybe I would have browsed through the "Graphic Novel" section of my campus library and found Astro City and Doctor Strange and Sandman without having borrowed anything from my friend. Maybe I would have found Ultimate Spider-man and Runaways even without asking after my friend's earlier recommendation. But maybe not.

So I would like to thank Fabian Niciezan for creating such a ridiculous, wonderful series. You've given me the key to more wonderful stories and characters than I know what to do with.  Keep up the good work.

Is there a book or series you would like to thank for introducing you to something new?