All that comes with it

Note to self: Laptops and children jumping on the bed do not mix. I might not be around much for a little while.

Recently Lee, my antipodean pop culture guru, has been running a series of interviews with his readers about their comic book reading habits. He has very kindly agreed to let me publish my answers here as part of Superhero Week.

I probably should warn you that this post is about as geeky as it gets. In fact there is a real risk that unless you have at least a passing knowledge of comics then you will only understand about every third word. But in the immortal words of that woman who sang that song:

It’s my blog and I can geek out if I want to.
Geek out if I want to, geek out if I want to.
You’d geek out too if it happened to you.

So here we go true believers, my answers to Lee’s excellent questions:

Favorite regular series right now?

Right off the bat I’m having to start spouting exceptions and caveats when answering this questionnaire. I don’t actually follow a regular series at the moment. I get all of my comics either from Lee’s cousin Larry or by sneakily reading graphic novels in Borders. As a result I tend to read comics in big blocks of back issues rather than waiting for monthly installments.

The comic that I’m most enjoying at the moment which is currently a regular series is probably Batman Confidential. It chronicles Batman’s adventures in the early days of his crime fighting career. Like Legends of the Dark Knight the stories aren’t strictly canon, but that sort of stuff has never really bothered me anyway as long as the feel of the character was right.

I haven’t quite reached the more recent issues in my reading, but if they are anything like the earlier ones then this title is well worth taking a look at.

Comic book character you only recently discovered/started reading?

I’ve recently started dipping my toe into the waters of Marvel, focusing mainly on the Ultimate line of books. I’m really enjoying the Ultimate Fantastic Four at the moment, which is suprising as I’ve had nothing but contempt for them in the past.

If you could draw/write one character who would it be?

Assuming I suddenly developed enough talent to pull it off I’d love to write a Blue Beetle/Booster Gold team-up book.

They kept on promising one in the letters pages of Justice League International, but it never got delivered. Damn their eyes.

The new version of Blue Beetle is pretty cool, and I like what they are doing with Booster at the moment. But nothing will ever compare to those glorious days of Giffen and DeMattis.

Are you a fan of the big Multi-issue crossover extravaganzas.

I must admit I do get a little fanboy jolt of excitement every time “The world’s mightiest heroes team up to face the greatest danger they have ever known!!”.

However, every time DC hold a Crisis on Infinite Zero Hour Armageddon event they end up killing or ruining one of my favorite characters. Hawk and Dove, Blue Beetle, Elongated Man, The Question - all victims to the murderous editorial staff at DC. Why can’t they ruin characters that I’m not interested in, like Wonder Woman or Aquaman. It’s a conspiracy to drive me out of comics I tell you.

Last comic book series that you dropped and why.

I think it was probably Batman. I dropped it purely because I could no longer justify spending two or three pounds a month in order to gain about five minutes of reading pleasure. That was about five years ago now.

As I say, these days I get all my comics from Lee’s cousin Larry. It’s immoral I know, but I’ve made my peace with it. I really wouldn’t be reading comics otherwise.

Favourite Character?

The Ted Kord version of Blue Beetle, hands down. Closely followed by Booster Gold, Batman, Robin, Mister Miracle, the Martian Manhunter and of course Gnort.

Are you a DC or a Marvel?

DC all the way baby.

Do you remember your first comic/series

In my early teens DC used to put out a Batman reprint anthology in Britain. This was the only American style comic available in our local newsagents and I eagerly swopped my subscription for the Beano for it, even though it came out only monthly and the Beano was weekly.

Is Watchmen the movie going to be as good as the comic book?

I think it has the potential to be, as long as you haven’t read the comic. If you see the movie first then the development of the plot and characters will be fresh. If you’ve already read the book then you’ll start to focus on the inevitable flaws.

Favorite Comic Book movie?

Batman Begins. In order to protect myself I’d managed to keep my expectations pretty low for this film, and as a result I was completely blown out of the water by it.

The Dark Knight was damn good too, but it was the first movie that made me believe in a celluloid bat again and so it will always have a very special place in my geeky heart.

Worst comic book movie?

Kerry and I watched Ghost Rider the other day. Sweet Jebus it was awful. That film undershoots the “so bad it’s good” barrier by about seven hundred miles. Apparently they are talking about making a sequel. May god have mercy on our souls.

Character you’d like to see in a movie?

I think there would be plenty of milage in a decent Nightwing movie. Lighter in tone than Batman, but still gritty and with a focus on his feelings of inferiority towards his mentor.

Series that you’d like to see on TV?

A really good quality Teen Titans live action show with high production values. The Warner Brothers animated cartoon is fantastic, but there would be room for so much character development in a live action show aimed at late teens/adults.

As long as they keep all the bloody intrigue out of it that is. I’m fed up of mysterious Smoking Man-esqu characters in my Sci Fi. Can’t we have a show without a bloody conspiracy for a change? Swop subterfuge for explosions, that’s my motto

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So there you go. Tomorrow: The Mighty Wombat

It’s day one of Superhero Week here at All That Comes With It. I can almost hear the thud of my statcounter falling from here.

Still, I’m committed to it now; and anyway, I find these theme weeks invaluable in kick starting my blogging creativity. And I’ve certainly felt in the blogging doldrums for the past couple of months. Forcing myself to sit down and come up with six or seven takes on the same subject is a good way of stimulating my creative juices. And as you know, there is nothing I enjoy more than stimulating my juices.

A couple of months ago I mentioned in a guest post over at A Family Runs Through It that I was more qualified to teach my children about my favorite Batman villains than algebra or geography. Jeff rather foolishly commented that he’d like to see that list of villains. So this post is your fault Jeff. I hope you’re very proud of yourself.

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5) The Riddler is the epitome of the silly Batman villain. There have been various attempts to darken him up and give him more menace and credibility, but in my mind these have been to no avail.

And that’s no bad thing. Batman has a heritage of kookyness just as much as grimness, and the Riddler represents this era to me. The greatest screen Ridder was of course Frank Gorshin in the 60’s TV show. In fact, according to the mighty Wikipedia, the character was relatively obscure before he took up the mantle, having only three appearances in two decades in the comics. So perhaps its Gorshin’s hyperactive portrayal which actually cemented the Riddler in the cultural conciseness, and him who we have to thank for his longevity.

Apparently David Tennant has expressed interest in playing the Riddler in the next Batman movie, which would be fantastic. Johnny Depp has also been linked to the role. While Depp is a good enough actor to pull it off, I think his name would over-shadow the character somewhat. And anyway, Tennant is British so it stands to reason that he’d be better in the role.

4) The Penguin is another example of a Batman villain with a history of campness. Sporting trick umbrellas and commanding flocks of trained birds, the 60’s Penguin was a comedy character with very little believability. Unlike the Riddler however, this version of the character doesn’t really appeal to me. Nor does Tim Burton’s mutant sociopath as played by Danny DeVito in Batman Returns .

No, the Penguin I like is the current comic’s version. A devious criminal strategist and owner of the popular underworld haunt, the Iceberg Lounge nightclub. The Penguin has a almost unique position within Batman’s Rogues Gallery, in that he is completely sane. Sure he has a bit of an umbrella fetish, but when compared with characters like Two-Face, the Scarecrow, and the Ventriloquist, he is the very picture of good mental health.

Additionally I like the complex relationship Batman has with the Penguin. They are adversaries first and foremost obviously, but the villain also is a valuable source of information for the Dark Knight; albeit usually tinged with a liberal dose of unscrupulous self interest.

Christopher Nolan has ruled out the Penguin’s appearance in any of the new Batman Films, although Philip Seymour Hoffman’s name was attached to the character for a while.

3) The Joker is one of the few members of Batman’s rogues gallery who has had any significant negative impact on his life. Not only did he manage to kill Robin (the second Robin, Jason Todd, that is), but he also permanently paralyzed Batgirl from the waist down. Not bad for a guy in clown makeup.

Joker was created to be the polar opposite of Batman. Where the Dark Knight is grim, disciplined and principled the Joker is lighthearted, anarchic, and utterly psychopathic.

I’m strongly in favor of the origins of the Joker being shrouded in mystery. This is one of the many things that The Dark Knight got right about the character in my opinion. Unfortunately the comics appear to have gone with the origin suggested by Alan Moore in the seminal Batman: The Killing Joke. While it’s as good a backstory as any, I much prefer a bit more ambiguity in my clown faced psychotic killers.

2) Ra’s al Ghul is the most international of Batman’s villains. On the face of it Ra’s al Ghul’s motives are pretty ethical: he wants to protect the environment and achieve balance in the world. Unfortunately he believes that the only way to do this is by eliminating most of the human race.

Other villains may have a few henchmen kicking around to do their bidding, but Ra’s al Ghul has an entire secret society: The League of Assassins, who’s resources appear almost limitless. In addition he has access to various Lazarus Pits: natural occurring chemical pools which can rejuvenate the sick and even bring the dead back to life.

Not only does Ra’s al Ghul know Batmans secret identity, but he also considers him a worthy heir to his empire. Ghul’s daughter Talia also shares this opinion, and her on/off relationship with Bruce Wayne injects some seldom seen romance into the Batman mythos.

The thing I enjoy most about Ra’s al Ghul’s appearances in Batman stories is that it is seldom immediately apparent that he’s involved at all. He’s behind the scenes, manipulating and controlling events for diabolical reasons which are only revealed at the end of a twisted path of investigation and intrigue. He’s an ideal foil by which to highlight Batman’s detective abilities.

I think Ra’s al Ghul is thought to be dead within the current comic continuity, but in comics death is frequently a temporary state of being. No doubt he’ll be back at some point in the future.

1) Gotham City isn’t a villain as such. In fact I’m sure that Batman himself would argue that it is his greatest ally (If he existed that is, I may be a geek but I’m not a deluded geek). But I pick Gotham as my number one choice because my favorite stories are not based around Batman’s freakish costumed opponents, but around the grit, grime and squalor of the city itself.

Gotham fits the Dark Knight like a glove, just like the brighter and more optimistic Metropolis is the perfect match for Superman. In fact I would go so far as saying that once you remove the Caped Crusader from Gotham you loose a vital component of what makes him such a great character.

Batman is a longstanding member of the superhero team the Justice League, and as such fights interstellar spacecraft and supernatural demons from the bowels of hell. But to me it never feels quite right. Let Superman, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern fight off the alien invasions; Batman’s place is in Gotham beating seven shades of crap out of Eddy the Fence.

It was Gotham City that made Batman who he is. Gotham City that gunned down Thomas and Martha Wayne in Crime Alley (seriously though, who goes for a walk down a street called “Crime Alley” after dark?). And Batman belongs in Gotham, fighting the good fight against a relentless tide. He is a dark candle in a darker city.

Lets face it, it doesn’t get much cooler than that.

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Honorable mentions go to Killer Croc, Poison Ivy, the Ventriloquist, Two Face, Scarecrow, and Mr Zsasz; all of whom could have easily made this list if I’d written it on a different day.

I’m very tempted to follow this up tomorrow with a top 5 list of Batmans allies, but I don’t want this week to get bogged down in my fanboy rantings about the Dark Knight. Instead you can look forward to a riveting tale all about my key-ring. Hey, I never promised this week would be entertaining. Let’s all just keep our heads down and plough through it.

How to make meringue:

Take the whites of two eggs and whisk until firm.
Add 4oz of caster sugar a tablespoon at a time, whisking for 3-4 seconds between each spoonful.
Drop a spoonful of the mixture onto parchment paper and place in an oven set to 200ºC for 90 minutes.

Hang on…. aren’t they meant to be white?

Or as Amy put it: “Hey! They look just like poo!”

It appears that my recipe book has a slight misprint. Apparently the temperature should have read 100ºC, not 200ºC. The idea that the reason my cooking tastes so bad might be due to the book I’m following rather than my slapdash culinary techniques is a new one on me. And I must admit I find it rather appealing. From now on, every time my cooking produces toxic waste rather than gourmet meals I shall place the blame squarely on the shoulders of the recipe writers.

Since starting this diet (another 9lb lost since I last updated you) I’ve been spending a lot of time in the kitchen. Cooking nutritious and healthy food takes a lot more time and effort than chucking a frozen pizza in the oven. Still, I’m enjoying it and it gives me a chance to take a break from the kids and listen to my mp3 player for a while.

Unfortunately, despite me trying to mix it up everything is starting to taste the same. A lot of the dishes I’m preparing are basically quorn, tomatoes and vecon. This combination is labeled by Slimming World as either curry, chili, bolognese, hot pot, or jambalay depending on what spices they tell you to stick in it. It’s like that Monty Python sketch where you can have anything you like as long as it’s spam.

I did make my own tomato ketchup the other day which is very exciting. It tastes horrific mind you and Kerry refuses to touch it; but I’m slowly making my way through the pint and a half of it - my digestion powered by pure principle and stubbornness.

I think I’m going to have another go at the meringues again tonight. They aren’t exactly on our diet, but I’m going to try replacing the sugar with sweetener and see what happens. It’s that kind of pioneering chemical experimentation that gave us so many of the things that we take for granted today.

If you hear of a nuclear explosion taking place in Huddersfield you know what’s happened.

Kerry and I had a night out on the town on Thursday night. We started off by going for a Japanese meal in Leeds, and then headed on over to the City Varieties to see the comedian Rich Hall. I’d bought the tickets for Kerry’s birthday, but she saw through my ruse straight away; correctly identifying that I’d bought them more for me than for her. The only way I could have been more obvious would be if I’d asked her to babysit so I could take Dave.

Still, she got a new phone and a blog, what more does she want.

Rich Hall was good, but not as good as I’d hoped he would be. In the first half he kept stumbling over his material, but in the second he hit his stride a little more and the show took off. His interaction with the audience was top notch, and I preferred his spontaneous meandering to his scripted routines.

While we were waiting for the show to start Kerry got all rebellious and started taking pictures with her camera-phone.

As shocking as that was however, it wasn’t the full extent of our law breaking that evening.

Sitting in the passenger seat of my car on the way home (Kerry drove so I could drink. Happy birthday honey) I suddenly realized that there was something missing from the corner windscreen.

I had no tax disc.

I used to have a tax disc. In fact I remember putting it in quite vividly because it took me half an hour of wrestling to get it into the holder. But now it seemed I was discless.

When we got back home I had a route around the rubble in my footwell but it was still nowhere to be found. There was only one conclusion to jump to: some bugger has pinched it.

The only time I can think this happened is when my car got broken into in July. Which leads me to two conclusions: Firstly I’ve been very lucky to avoid the attention of the police and enthusiastic traffic wardens for the last three months. And secondly; I must have the observational powers of a blind wombat not to have noticed it’s absence before now.

I’ve rung my lease company and arranged for a replacement disc. It doesn’t look like I’m going to have to pay for it either, which I’m pretty happy about. I am, however, going to have to keep the car off the road for a week until It arrives, which is going to be a real pain in the arse.

It has been suggested by some that I drive the car anyway and risk getting spotted by the cops, the rational being I’ve got away with it since July so I’ll probably get away with it for a few more days.

I know better however. My karma doesn’t work like that and as soon as I started my engine I just know I’ll be descended on by half of the West Yorkshire police force on a special training day about how to catch car tax dodgers. The whole thing would end up in a dramatic car chase, culminating in me driving though the front window of Morrisons and embedding my car in the yogurt aisle.

I don’t fancy spending the next twenty years in prison; I’ve heard they don’t even get wireless broadband in there.

So for the next seven days or so I’m without a car. Or at least Kerry is, as I’ve now officially commandeered her vehicle. She’s at work all next week but I don’t have to go in to mine until next Friday. What if I want to catch an afternoon showing at the cinema or something? Or nip to the shop for some more diet coke? I think it’s important I am given the priority in such things. After all, it’s only a hour and a quarter train journey to her office.

Oh yes, I’m the perfect husband. I bet you’re all feeling pretty jealous out there huh?