X-23 1 review

With a bit of distance between now and when All-New Wolverine was still releasing, my opinion on the series has changed a bit. I still contend that it was for the most part, the best X-Men comic on the market at the time. I still feel that Orphans of X is the best X-23 related story in years, and the opening arc, the Four Sisters, is a close second. But at the same time, several arcs felt too short, and as the series went on, it became a bit too much about Gabby and not enough about Laura at times. There were moments when Gabby almost felt like a parody than an actual character, as entertaining as she is. But that’s not unusual for writers who end up creating a fan-favourite character. You could even say the same of X-23 when her creators put her into a couple team books from 2005-2010. And near the end of the series, the writing got way too political, to the point where it interfered with the storytelling.

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Comics of July 11, 2018

I’m feeling kind of sore today, but it’s the kind of sore that will be good for me in the long run. Long story short, I did inspection at work yesterday. That involves nearly 8 hours straight of moving around 50 pound car parts. And then I went straight from work to a lane swim in a 50m pool, where I proceeded to swim all 10 races Michael Phelps swam in the first 4 days of the Bejing Olympics (the year he won 8 gold medals). That’s 2 400m IM’s, 3 200m butterflies, 4 200m freestyles and 1 100m freestyle. A total of 2.3 km swam, all within 90 minutes. I did it just to see if I could, and it kind of excites me that I succeeded. The fact that I still managed to get to work today means that I’m improving my physical shape at a quicker pace than I expected. I’m kind of shocked that I’ve made it this far considering I only swam my first ever 200m butterfly just over a month ago. A year ago today, I still couldn’t do one 50m butterfly in a 50m pool.

Anyway, it’s time to talk about comics. Today, I picked up X-23 1, The Amazing Spider-Man 1, Superman 1 and Red Sonja 18. Here are my first impressions, and my review (most likely of X-23 1) will be added in a link when it’s posted.

X-23 1 review

007 – In-between movies: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service

I wasn’t sure what else to call this month for my James Bond blogathon. This month I’m working on a major book edit – possibly even two edits if I find the time. As such, I’ll only be looking at the official James Bond movies with the short-lived actors. Today, it’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, the only Bond movie to star Australian actor George Lazenby. Later this month, I’ll look at the two Timothy Dalton Bond movies.

Not only is On Her Majesty’s Secret Service unique in that it stars the only one-off James Bond actor, but other aspects of this movie are unique for the series as well. For one, most of the movie takes place in a single location and its surroundings. More specifically, the Piz Gloria restaurant in Switzerland, which was at one point the highest altitude restaurant in the world.

Comics of July 4, 2018

For any American readers, Happy Independence Day. To the rest of you, happy new comic day. So this past weekend, I swam three 200m butterflies, all negative split, all in a 50m pool, and two of them were within 20 minutes of each other. Still had enough energy after that for an aggressive 200m individual medley. I think it’s safe to say that I’m on the right track with improving my general fitness. But enough about that – it’s time to talk about comics.

The comics I picked up this week include Avengers 4, Star Wars 50, The Man Of Steel 6 and I Hate Fairyland 20. Here are my first impressions.

Pixar Movies 20 – The Incredibles 2

The Incredibles 2 released very recently – about 2 weeks ago in fact. As such, there isn’t a lot of background information available just yet, so this won’t be as detailed of a blog post as some. Also, I only just saw the movie in theaters, and it’s hard to watch clips of the movie to help out with certain aspects of a review like this. Instead, this is just going to be how I thought of the movie.

That said, there is at least a bit of background information available. Following the release of 2004’s The Incredibles, director Brad Bird started working on his next Pixar movie, Ratatouille. Around the time of Ratatouille’s premier, Bird said he’d be open to a sequel to The Incredibles, but only if it could be even better than the first.

“I have pieces that I think are good, but I don’t have them all together.”

Comics of June 27, 2018

I’ve decided that instead of my originally planned 5-6 entries in my odds and ends month for my James Bond Blogathon, I’ll only be covering three official entries. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, The Living Daylights and License To Kill. If I feel like it, I could do a month dedicated to unofficial entries and odds and ends instead. Why? Because it’s Camp NaNoWriMo next month, and I plan on doing a major edit for the second book in my vampire/werewolf series based on some very helpful feedback I received earlier this year. That and I’m also working on moving things over to my new computer. Nothing wrong with my old one – it’s just that because I’m getting paid enough now, I’m going all-out with what will be a top of the line gaming PC. I’ve never had a job paying me enough to do that before, and it’ll be a lot harder to do after I buy a house. Might as well do it now.

Anyway, the comics I picked up this week include Thor 2, The Man Of Steel 5 and Red Sonja 17. Here are my first impressions.

DreamWorks animated movies 6 – Shrek

As I’ve talked about during my Disney Animated Movies Blogathon, the early 2000’s were not kind to the studio. Their last majorly successful animated movie, Tarzan, released in 1999. It was in the early 2000’s when they entered what a lot of people call their second dark age. And unlike the first, where there are some good movies that just didn’t do all that well, most of Disney’s movies between 2000 and 2005 were lackluster at best. A couple of them like Home on the Range (I hate that movie) were even terrible.

At the same time, DreamWorks really started to rise in popularity. No other movie encompasses this more than 2001’s Shrek. Loosely based on the 1990 fairytale picture book by William Steig, Shrek stars an ogre who finds his swam overrun by fairytale creatures. In order to get his privacy back, he agrees with Lord Farquaad to rescue a princess for him, so he can marry and become a king. But it turns out that Shrek and the princess end up falling in love. The rights to the book were originally bought by Steven Spielberg back in 1991, before he co-founded DreamWorks. He thought of making a traditionally animated movie based on the book. Soon after founding the company, Jeffery Katzenberg convinced Spielberg to put the movie into production.