The Problem with Michael Bay

The state of your shit is: REAL For illegal paramilitary foreign action, press 1, to say a catchphrase, press 2, to hear all options...

There have been many  words shed about the recent, disheartening Ninja Turtles script leak. I was sitting at the fence of this one topic, thought not out of choice. I had written previously a long article about the silliness of changing the Mutants to Aliens, but I never got it on time.

It raped my childhood DURING MY CHILDHOOD!

It wasn't the change per se. At it's core, we have to understand that TMNT has been readapted a crazy amount of times for a franchise that isn't that old. It's got more adaptations and origins and reboots that most franchises have in their entire history. In it's short existence, there have been less years than there aren't TMNT products present in some form of media than not.

And it's somehow almost never wrong. The Original comics and the 80s Cartoon are, at a glance, ridiculously different, and while many argue that the toon is a disservice to the books, both have their fans. The 2k3 series is quite different from both of those, and it stoll found it's adepts. The more grounded Live action movies are quite a leap from the magic warrior fest of the CG movie, and it's not the difference makes either of those bad.

Happy 300th post!

In essence, the Turtles are a malleable franchise. Which is why I thought perhaps this alien thing was much ado about nothing. Besides, Bay isn't even directing this thing! I kinda liked Battle: L.A.

But here's the thing: Look at the filmography of Francis Ford Coppola. Now look at  John Mc Tiernan's. Now Look at Michale Bay's. Do not compare the quality of the films(please, don't. For your own sake). Compare the variety of them.

Michael Bay  at some point got enough money and clout to do whatever kinds of films he wanted.  Surely, it must not have been an entirely mercenary desition to enter the movie world? There must be somethings that Michael Bay likes that he's rather make a film about? Why yes there are. Of his eleven directed movies, none of them do not contain:

America(playing the best-country-in-the-world angle)

Beautiful Cars(that are also paying Michael Bay by being onscreen)

Beautiful Women(that I'm sure some of them at least sleep with him.)

Over the Top action( by over-the-top I mean falling from a building and walking it off.)

Military Equipment and hardware

Juvenile Humor

 There is no problem with any of those things.NONE OF THOSE THINGS ARE BAD. Hell, most of them work pretty well in Bad Boys(although I think it's the only movie that stopped the whole action to show rats having sex. Seriously, what are you, 14?)


 The problem is that at a very early portion of his career, he realized that he didn't have to try to experiment. He could do the things he liked, and WE seemed to like it, judging by how much we where going to see it. The Island is a pseudo remake of an old movie where people are harvested for body parts, and he is unable to put any message about it except Boomaction! Pearl Harbor is a historical American tragedy and he can't deliver it without selling it off as WOOO AMERICA WINS! Michael Bay is not going to direct a medieval movie, because he can't get any U.S. army action in there. Michael Bay isn't  adapting any children's franchise if he can't have something humping something else.

So when you give him Transformers, or Ninja Turtles, he isn't thinking of the best way to make that story into a movie. That's priority number 56.  He's thinking how much Pro-America, how many Beautiful Cars and Beautiful Women, and Over-The Top Action and Military Equipment amd Juvenile Humor he can put in there. Because that's what he likes, and he assumes you want that too.

So it's not about the change about aliens being ridiculous anymore. This leak script proves that  Michael Benjamin Bay probably convinced the writer( who is an underling of the producer, and must follow his-er guidelines) to put all the things he likes in there. Cautious optimism isn't working out anymore. The  movie's obviously in the wrong hands, hands that shall not switch because hands payed money for it.

So if your like I was , and have not given up on all possibility that the future movie would be at least possibly not as bad as it could be, take heed: Michael Bay is no fan, Michael Bay is no artist, Michael Bay is no innovator, and Michael Bay only cares about Michael Bay. He's to hollow to put some heart into it, too selfish to just do his own fantasy franchise, and the only thing between him and the movie he wants is aparently us. Huh.

Stop him?

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5 Awesome characters (that where disappointing to play as)

I mean, how could it possibly be bad?

The folly of  hype: sometimes your favorite characters just aren't as awesome to play as in a videogame as they are to read as or look at or masturbate to. I mean, really, sometimes it's not the character's fault, but often expect so much of characters that are awesome as NPCs, unplayables or villains, but by the time it happens, you end up wondering: what happened?

5) Magneto: X-Men 2: Clone Wars

 

 When you think Magneto in terms of videogames, you think awesomely broken or bad Engrish quotes. But Magneto's debut in playability was decidedly more humble. 

 

Magneto: Master of the Power Walk!

Featured heavily in the box art and in blurbs on the back of the box, the fact that you could now play as the Master of Magnetism in this Sega Genesis plataformer sequel was, in fact, hyped. The first thing you wanted to do was take this bad boy for a spin, flying and bending metal and tearing ass through the game.  But syke! You don't even to choose your first character! And it's probably Beast!

 

FUUUUUUUCK!

But by the time you get to the 4rth-ish stage and defeat Magneto. 's clone, you get to play as him. How awesome is it? Not very. He doesn't really fly. He hovers in place. He can shoot magnetic thingies that explode into little thingies that kill the bad guys, but there are no enemies that complex in this game that make it an advantage. What a gyp!

You don't know what this means to 9 year old me.

But an understandable gyp, for sure. Hey, it's a plataformer. Once you can fly, that's most of the challenge gone. And let's not talk of implementing magnetism in a  Sega Genesis game.

However, because the developers knew that someday someone might be reasonable to them, they  chose the stage after Magneto  became playable to be  the hardest possible stage for him: an uphill climb up a tower with falling rocks. It's already fucking annoying for most the other characters, but when the character you most likely chose because of how awesome he is has the power to "stand absolutely still in the  air" that you can activate with one of the 3 working buttons as rocks pelt him own and trolls knock him down to a lower ledge, you will understand what "disapointment" truly means.

4) Eggman: Sonic Adventure 2

 

The whole hand!

The Sonic series successfully made awesome playables out of Tails and Knuckles. So what happened?

After people kinda didn't like many of the playstyles Sonic Adventure had, Sega narrowed it down to 3 styles of play separated between two teams of different spectrums of morality. One of those styles was of Mecha driver, a spiritual successor to the aim and shoot antics of E-102. The good guys had Tails, while the bad guys had  mustachioed megalomaniac Dr Eggman.

But, you know, it was the first time you could play as Robotnik/Eggman in the main Sonic series. At this point, his brand as series villain had sort of devaluated as bigger, badder, and less memorable monsters took center stage. But it was still Eggman. NOT  on his hovering, variedly armed vehicles. Not converting animals into robot animals. But on a mech. Shooting shit. 

So it is a little sad that we got to control Eggman during his mecha phase, is what I'm saying.

3)Velociraptor: Turok 2

Seriously, stand still. I want to kill, too!

Raptors are a boon to dinosaur enthusiasts. Before Jurassic Park it was all about how huge they where and how many times over you fit in their mouth. But the Spieldberg movie put raptors on notice and said:" you know, even a smaller, faster dinosaur could wreck your day."

So when we learned that Turok 2 would have the carnivore berserkers as playable multiplayer characters, we thought it would be really awesome. How cool would it be to swiftly and mercilessly jump at your unwise, guntoting enemies and gut them with your huge ass toe-claws.

Berserker Barrage!

Of course, we had forgotten an important part of any FPS: The "S".

Of course Raptors can't carry  guns. That would be stupid. The Raptor makes up for this lack of opposable thumbs by sheer speed. Also, you will certainly lose the game by score, but you can always fall back on the old "Of course I died. I was a fucking Raptor, and you had a  a plasma gun!"

Alternatively: "Moooom! Dylan's not playing fair!"

2) Bruce Lee: Bruce Lee: Quest of the Dragon

Yeesh. There's a bad side of dying at one's peak, huh? 

I don't think there has yet been a great playable Bruce Lee. Ironically, the many imitators tend to be closer in spirit that any upfront attempts at bringing  the father of the Martial arts movie genre back to virtual life.

However, I guess if I had to pick out one, it would be the one I played: 2002's Quest of the Dragon.

Featuring a dinky story where Bruce has to rescue his father from Ninjas while working as a secret agent, there is nothing awesome in the clunky, unintuitive fights Bruce Lee gets in. There is no relief in the repetitive voice over use. There is no rest on  the biggest anticlimactic final boss fight the Xbox ever saw. But if you like the Black Eyed Peas, in the intro menu there's...

I mean, I liked it...but I know where you're coming from.

But this game was hyped from the start: back when Xbox wasn't more than a actual X-shaped box and a color scheme. But instead of joining Halo and DoA as Xbox mainstays, it joined  Alice and Maelstrom(Yes, EXACTLY)  as reminders that  concept doesn't trump execution. And that games need time and money to be good.

Not a joke: This is your final boss battle.

1) Gannon: Smash Bros. Melee

Now, I was never deeply into the Zelda franchise. Started on some of the games, never finished them. But I know of it's boss. It's that pig guy `that sometimes looks like a green Adrien Brody, right? He's supposed to be a big deal, right?

 

On his defense, It ain't easy being a green man in a white dwarf's world.

So when I heard he was making his playable debut in Smash Bros Melee for the Gamecube, I thought it might be cool. It's the final boss to one of the most iconic franchises in gaming: how bad can you mess it up?

But it turns out...he's Captain Falcon.

Not even a little attempt at trying the model to the character he's supposed to be, no.  They put  a bit of Gannon  paint over Captain Falcon, took away Falcon's quotes, and there it is.

The whole point of Capn' Falcons moves was that he didn't have any. What's your excuse?

Now, here's the thing: remember that Phoenix Wright movesetI did? I used to do things like that all the time as a kid. I remember sitting in front of my school and  making moves for Disney characters and Sonic characters. And I'm sure I'm not nearly as talented and creative as the people at Nintendo and Hal studios.

As little I know of Zelda, I could  go on Youtube right now, watch two Gannon boss fights, and probably come up with  the  no more than 5 special Attacks  a Gannon character would need in Smash Bros. I don't know if they corrected it in future Sb games, but as it stands, they might as well have not put Gannon at all. And that's probably the saddest thing you can say about the inclusion of a character.

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THIS BLOOD'S FOR YOU!

"Lesse...Puch, pouch, pouch, pouch, gun, gun, gun, gun guuuun...sword, sword sword, sword dagger, boom! New character!"

We should count ourselves lucky. Used to be  superhero adaptations to the big screens ran into 3 key stumbling blocks, and most never rose up from there: "How could we put this on the big screen?" "How do we change this so its not stupid anymore?" and tertiarylly "how much money does it take?"

Now that Hollywood found the answers they've gotten to adapting superheroes left and right. But Kick Ass  aside, most of them have been the big popular ones from the big 2.

But perhaps thats all changing soon.

Rob Liefeld, celebrated creator of Deadpool and Cable is aparently about to have one of his million 90s superhero teams optioned for the big screen. The group is Bloodstrike, a commando of vampire blood fueled super commandos. Not to be confused with Youngblood, another Liefield team already optioned for film by complete monster Brett Ratner. Or Bloodwulf, Liefelds Lobo knockoff. Or Bloodbank, a character I just made up, but could totally be a Liefeld character.

Anyway, here is them.

Actually, I think crazy hairs up there is Bloodwulf. Maybe.

I for one cannot wait to finally see Sheeva, Wolverine and Deadpool onscreen. But I think Iron Monger and Hawkeye are lame so no praise there. I cannot wait to see Liefelds intricate original and stylistic designs come to life. Hopefully they will prove just as enduring as they where then.

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Panel's 2 and 3 of Hydroman's Origin speak for themselves

Why must everything I love explode!?

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Swing and a miss! Tim Burton's Batmovies

Black and yellow, black and yellow, black and yellow...

 It's about time we talked about Batman. I know this subject is  a fringe one and a taboo in the Internet, but we must break social boundaries of how acceptable it is to talk about Batman.

Dark Knight Rises is probably on it's way out of theaters( and I was entirely unable to catch it.) The end of the Nolan era for Batman, the innevitable reboot nipping at it's heels,  and the seeming endless ways Warner Brother can't get too far into it's Superheroes withouth returning to Batman are all the talk of the town.

Nestled between this conversations is a subtle discussion of Tim Burton's  two Batman films, and their underlying qualities. It tends to divide the geek populace into  two schools of thinking.

"Holy Crap, is your breath fresh!"

A) This movies are good, they opened the way for Superhero movies now, and are a reasonably good adaptation of the Batman mythos in a darker way than the old Adam West show.

B)This movies are bad, nothing like Batman, and are the inspiration for badly adapting Superheroes to the silver screen.

The only one who  likes this pairing is the guy on the left.

Not everyone holds this combination of opinions, but it's mostly what you'll find.

I could tell you that when I saw them I was very young. My dad dragged home a big old TV with awkward  microwave buttons so we could watch the Batman 89 movie before heading to one of my first remembered cinema goings(along with Pewee's Big Adventure. It's not my fault I'm a Burton enthusiast!) to Batman Returns.

While my little kid mind had to register a lot(and return from the lobby confused as to why Batman let  Catwoman lick his face.) of weirdness, I never the less considered it a great movie, and put it alongside Robocop, and Predator and Airplane as the best movies in the world.

But let's not make this about just me, or about the movies. The movies are qualified as being unnacurate to the books by many. And I sort of agree. But so what?

So what if Batman's "no killing code" gets switched to a "lot of times killing code?" So what if the films are rooted in impressionism rather than...whatever stylistic choice you're supposed to have for Batman. So what if the background of the character is changed and the origin, and it's not as dark as anything.



Let me tell you something. When Batman Returns was abuzz in the cinemas, my parents could afford 1 movie IN THE YEAR. The rest was black and white T.V.  And what did my local T.V. channels do as a response? EVERYTHING! They scrambled to run whatever Superhero show and movie they could, as long as we would watch. They Ran the Flash T.V. series and the old 70s Wonder Woman series. They Ran The Incredible Hulk. They ran Ultraman and I could swear they ran Kakero Spider-Man. They ran the Swamp Thing movie and they ran the TV show as well. They fucking ran the Adam West show.

Try harder, internet! I was mocking this before it was cool!

So, back to young me. I began absorbing. I did not know who Flash was in the comics if the movie was good. But I liked Flash. I liked Wonder Woman.  I liked the Adam West show.

Regardless of what the direct influence of Burton's movies, the indirect influence in my case was that a lot of  superhero elements where brought before me, which was good, because I could not even know where comics where sold, and when I saw them on the supermarket, coud not afford them(or my parents would not buy, because Batman looked like this, and had to perform surgery in a sewer on a baby. No, I could not forget that if I tried.).  My understanding of the superheroes would not expand much beyond what TV told me until the year 2000, where I discovered that internet people  would spend their time detailing the fictional life of Storm and Marrow.

What I'm saying is that Burtman(haha!) may be Batman in name only in a way. It may be campier than what we think. It might not fit our nerdy standards of today, where we sit down and pick aparts  which parts of Avengers are 616, which are Ultimate, and which are invented wholesale for the movie. The movies might only be enjoyable to me because I grew up with them. But they shaped me into the sexless, sociopathic nerd that writes too much about Tim Burton's wife I am today.

(Wait, is that a good thing?)

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7 Simpsons games I want to play

Still Better than Bart vs the Space Mutants

The Simpsons and videogames have a rich history together. I mean, not from videogames of the Simpsons, mind you. Those have been 80% garbage.  But of Videogames in the Simpsons.

 So with more than 20 years of gags, videogames where bound to come up more than a couple of times for America's favorite yellow skinned  family. But whether they're throwaway gags or key part of the plot, here are some Simpsons Videogames I want to play.

But don't JUST read this, guys. We live in an amazing era where tools for making most types of games can be found for at least cheap and often free.  Litterally all of this games can be realized, one way or another. Sure, someone out there is fan enough and crazy enough to bring at least one of this screaming into the real world. I mean, I know it's lazy to ask, but...I'm lazy. Give me...

Dash Dingo

Crikey!

Dash Dingo is an arcade Platformer, a parody of Crash Bandicoot, itself an obvious ripoff of Sonic the Hedgehog, itself a hodgepodge mix of Dragonball an Felix the Cat with a little Star Wars in there. It(Uh...Dash Dingo I mean) first shows up in the episode "Lisa gets an A"

While Videogames depicted in the Simpsons are usually not realistic depictions of gaming, Dash's eternal grimace is a love letter to badly animated early PS1 games everywhere. It even gets Crash's ultra cheap instadeaths!

Timewaster

It's own...fucking...wikia page...

Nothing is known about Timewaster. It is an arcade game in the background of a few episodes. But it's such a good name it needs to exist somehow.

Could it be some type of bullethell sidecrolling shooter about a time traveler? Or maybe it's about a murderous antropomorphic clock? Hopefully it's better than Time Killers if it does, though. Piece of crap....



Mortank Kombat

I'm just wondering if this is some commentary on Tianmen Square or not...

The Episode "Marge Be Not Proud" is one of the most game centric one of them all, with Bart's obssession with  Mortal Kombat Knockoff Bonestorm.

I am not going to talk about Bonestorm. 2 crazy Shokan beating the tar out of each other while bones rain down on them? Played it. But I will draw our attention to  it's advert.

The Ad has two kids who are bored to tears with their current videogame, until XTREME SANTA breaks  through the wall, and shoots Bonestorm in to their console with a bazooka.

But what where they playing that was so boring? A game (I've dubbed it as you have read, as it has no name and I'm not nearly as creative as I should be) that has Liu Kang, of Mortal Kombat fame, fight a tank! A TANK! With his fists and feet!

 This is a parody of a fighting game done by a parody of a fighitng game ad, and this is what it's saying you find  boring? What's the MUGEN comunity good for if not making ridiculous one second gags into full products?

 Death Kill City 2: Death Kill City Stories

A baseball bat AND a tire iron?

Acronymed DKC2: DKS, the true gameplay of this game is somewhat difficult to understand. It most certainly is a parody of Grand Theft Auto and it's ilk, with random violence errupting (a robot is fighting a hoodlum when a pink female ninja kills them both, and it's never clear which of the three is being played by anyone) in the titular city eventually only ended after all life on earth  is erradicated, marking THE end of level 1.

It's a cute gag, but I wonder what level 2 is like? I don't want to wonder, just give it to me!

Larry the Looter

Larry the Looter is a sidescrolling action game. As the titular malcontent, you must vandalize and rob until what I assume is some kind of ending, playing to, or perhaps lampooning, videogamer obssessions with collectathons. Why didn't Rockstart come up with that one? Why don't you?

Sure, we have plenty of open world games where you can shoot prostitutes, but we don't have a game explicitely for stealing useless material trappings outside of the Elder Scroll series(wait, that's how everyone plays it, right?)


Cat Fight

My dad never bought my affection....sob...

Cat Fight is a one on one fighitng game featuring an assumedly mostly female cast. Gameplay eschews tried and true tropes and tactics  of the genre like air juggles and combos, and instead  assumes a more realistic take on what women fighting actually looks like: Mostly hairpulls, scratches, slaps, and name-calling.

Well, the DLC would be crazy, that's for sure.

I mean, I've played plenty of female only fighting games, but none of them have presented me with an interesting mechanic for hairpulling!  It would be the most inventive game in the genre since Divekick got a publisher! I would just HAVE to dedicate it a spot on Fighitng Female February next year for sure!

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Did you wake up one day and wonder..?

"I'm not saying he's a greedy  asshole because he's Jewish, you guys. Duh! He's a greedy asshole who happens to be extemely Jewish! You racists!"

...If Foreskin man had a theme? Because the answer is aparently yes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bww5S5e3D_4

And it's sung by none other than Vulva Girl.

Sometimes...I wish the weather would change just for me. But I have to recognize I am neither in control of the weather nor the only one who needs it. But hearing the ridiculous proto disco tunes of  this song, as the singstress declares the most serious issue of how circumscicion affecting her enjoyment of sex with a person for whom she will obviously have to wait for if he's getting  that done just now, that I realize sometimes it stop raining just for me.

Thank you , Lord.

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Leaked in Early Secrets- Marvel's Dark, Tall, TALL new villain

We are so fuckin' spoiled these days...

Who didn't enjoy Marvel's Avengers movie? I'll tell you: that stupid crazy guy my brother gat paid to haul around. He's always asking if Ron Jeremy is in the Avengers. Dude, get help!

But that aside, everyone liked it, it made industrials amount of money before we even touch merchandising, and all is well in Marvel Land. Except for the books, those aren't selling.

Pachinko Wolverine is still not happy, though.

But you did not come to hear what you know, but Leaked in Early Secrets (my doctor said I should shorten it to L.I.E.S. so I don't get carpal tunnel syndrom. I don't remember if she said it while I did her and her sexy nurse at the same time, or after.) And so, get ready to hear the real, nonest for real future truth about the Marvel Universe.

If Fox doesn't start filming Daredevil anything by October 10, the rights to Daredevil return to Marvel, where  unless marvel stops making money and they sell it, it shall stay until the mountains wither and the rivers stop. And so, Marvel is already eyeing  the juicy, fruitful Daredevil fanchise for a future movie, right?

Oh, no! Marvel already has all the movies it needs set up to come out in the next few years. And let's face it, If Marvel wanted a street level hero, they've plenty of choice.

No the real sweet part of the deal is bringing back from the diaspora Daredevil's supporting cast. Guys like Kingpin, Bullseye The Hand, Elektra, and other's such have great applications within the movies and stories Marvel is already doing. So where am I going, exactly?

Jennifer Garner is cool, but crude, and Ben Affle-eck, is a party dude!

Well, I tilted my antenna just north of south(I'm bein litterall, I have antenna on my head), and I hear from my sources that whatever preliminary story work on Avengers 2 is being reworked to this new possibility. Thanos is being relegated to the Guardians of the Galaxy, and instead, the main badguy for Avengers is set to be the BIGGEST THREAT OF ALL! A REAL TALL ORDER OF A NASTY! THE ONE WHO LOOKS DOWN ON ALL THE HEROES! STILT-MAN!

Coming this Fall...

Wilbur Day, is a scientists assistant, who steals the invention and uses it to steal even more as the Stiltman, having incredible heights, enhanced durability, and affecting the probablity field of carnivals to make them less boring.

At the end of Captain America 2 they already have a teaser planned out, where Bucky, Cap and The Falcon are enjoying themselves at a circus, when they sort of look up and the ominous shadow of the Stiltman looms over them. There's gonna be a scene in Ironman where Tony Stark is making out with Pepper Potts in the 5th Floor of a hotel, and  STILT-MAN'S HEAD CAN BE SEEN PASSING BY THE WINDOW, UNCONCERNED!

Course, at the end of Avengers 2 Stilt-man calls into a Helicarrier's Intake and explodes, and we see his  funeral, we get a glimpse of his wife, and the following exchange ensues:


Maria Hill: Excuse me, lady? 

Glenda Day: "Lady?"

Maria Hill: We have questions about your husband, Stilt-man.

Glenda Wise: My husband's name was Wilbur day.

Maria Hill: He killed Black Panther and died a monster, lady. He was a monster.

Glenda Day: And I was his wife.  Ms Stilt-Man. Lady Stilt-man!


Wowser! Are yo excited, cuz I'm excited! It's unbelievable.  I mean, hardly believable at all. So great! And so, remember: I cannot tell a lie, but I can tell  many L.I.E.S.! Batzarro AWAY!

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Personal Challenge:A Fat Superheroine

In the next scene she splits a car apart with her fists.

The universe is made of forces clashing. Particles impacting each other,  gravity denying force, survival of the fittest. So too is Democracy.

Whoa, that was a good opener, huh? It makes what I'm about to write seem deeper. Recently some controversy has spilled over, in  the form of this one person tried to get people to hire her as an artist. And then somebody said that her Batwoman looks fat is the short story. I'll let myself steal the image under the veil of context. Sorry.

She must be one of those rap-guys' girlfriends...

I have many opinions on this, in particular. Is Batwoman supposed to be hot? I thought she was supposed to be some kind of Lesbian-ey Lesbian from planet Lesbian. I'm not saying I don't think lesbians aren't hot, just that that isn't the point of the character.

But moving beyond the picture, this has again sparked the debate of depictions of women in the media, particularly comics. I don't know how much I can say about that that hasn't been said, except lately I can't even be bothered to pirate comics.

I think we could have some Superheroeines that aren't extremely geared toward idealistic beauty. Could doesn't mean it'd be successfull, or that people could take to it, but there isn't really  a reason why it can't happen. Then a contest opened up in Deviant Art about the subject of creating  a fat Super Heroine.
In this post, I announce my intention to win the contest(against my own advise), as well the general process in which I  will.

I myself could not defend myself from accusations of being sexist. I Play Strip Fighter IV. FOR FUN. But I also think, much like King David(Or was it Solomon?) there is a time for everything. But never let it be said I don't take challenges seriously. So here is my process.

1)My Superhero has to have more than going for her than being fat.

Feel Empowered yet?

You know, I already made a fat Superheroine, the steel armored Girl-Ephant in my critically acllaimed(hey, one guy liked it!) Celemutant #1. I am not a stranger to reusing my thoughts of the past, but I will do a new one because I am just that awesome. Also, they don't want fat themed  Heroines.

But the point it, If you wanted this to be a character people would willingly give money to(and by definition, to you) it needs something more than being Superman, but a woman and also fat. The market for Superman-But-X is closed, okay?

Your superhero needs to be interesting in and of herself. And well...

2) You can't make the central theme being fat.

Uwe Boll is getting an Oscar someday.

You see, if you're going for the sort of people who read "The Mary Sue" and get outraged at something like this, you can't really make the character's central problem that she's fat.

See, the way I see It, Black people don't want a hero who is getting constantly discriminated by everyone and Gay people probably don't want their heroes to be constantly stopped from getting married and adopting kids, so fat people probably don't want a fat heroine who is constantly obsessed with her girth. If you push too much in that direction, you get into a "Helen Degeneres" effect where neither the  afflicted party and  those that aren't all feel it is too much.

And beside, such a theme can probably not hold interest for very long. Sure the character must deal with it from time to time, like Peter Parker dealt with guilt and being poor. But it can't become a somber study of life as a fat girl, especially since because I am a Man, I do not trust myself with such a topic.

3)The character needs to be visually interesting

For something!

 I cannot emphasize this enough. Comics are a visual medium. Your character(that you pretend sells comics) needs to look good and capture the imagination of the reader, probably while selling whatever gimmick you character has. There is some sort of a color code to character personalities, although it doesn't always follow an exact pattern.

Blue is serious characters, like Superman and Cyclopse and Captain America.

Red and other bright colors are for wilder personalities, like Deadpool, Flash and SPider-Man.

Black and gray is for grimmer, darker characters, such as Spawn, Batman, and Raven.

Normally, we could take some shortcuts by making the character visually attractive. But since we're circumventing convention, our design needs to be at it's strongest. The design needs to sell the idea quickly, lest peoples eyes dart over to whatever whackiness is going on in X-Men(OMG Xavier has WOLVERINE CLAWS NOW and he's using them to STAB BOLIVAR TRASK IN THE JUNK!) or Catwoman (OMG CATWOMAN IS HAVING SEX WITH THOSE CATS AND BATMAN IS CRYING ABOUT IT!) and forget about you. You're gotta have a clear, strong hook, and need to sell it quickly and strongly.

4)Your character needs to be explainable

Cannot be summarized in less than 5 sentences.

Your character can be some sort of deconstruction of jungian archetypes present in preclassic litterature and mysticism as juxtaposed by the postmodernist ideals of Generation X. But you can't put that in writting in a comic cover. You gotta cake the pretentiousness in simplism. You need  a fast sell, but a good sell, too. There needs to be some element that's recognizable in there for modern audiences. If you can make people think of Harry Potter, or Jason Statham by glancing at the cover quickly, you're already won their attention, which is what you want. Now, I'm not saying your character needs to be a rip-off of The Last Airbender to win. Just that, if your character gives the impression "Like a  mix between The Last Air Bender and  300 with some Battlestar Galactica thrown in", the character is more likely to gain adherents, who will think it's somewhat original since they've never seen all those elements together(or if they have, not like yours).

Since your character is new, you don't have to tie it down to any pre-existing franchise and you can therefore create your own mythology, your own world. But remember, that the audience DOESN'T  know what's in your head, and has to be guided into the world. You lay the rules out to them, and never assume they know what the hell is going on. They don't.

But most of all, you can't JUST think of your character. You gotta give it a little backstory, maybe a  quick supporting cast. You may not use all of it or may change it. Or maybe neither. Bottom line is, no character operates on a vacuum. Fat or no fat, your character needs setting to execute her amazing adventures in. Otherwise, what's the point?

So I'm somewhat ahead in my creation and hopefully I'll get some scanner soon and show you my work. Stay tuned!

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Don't Fear the Rip-off: Travesty and Roll Out

There is another world.

Under the glitzy, gajillion dollar hollywood super-blockbuster, but over the current of indie documentaries about dying of dyphteria in New Equatorial Guinea, it lies. Tiptoing the line between riding a recognizable product's coat-tales, and just straight up infringing them, knowing full well WB execs don't usually walk into Always 99.

In this world, you get shit like this.

The T-Bots Coloring activity book. Unafraid of any legal proceeding from Hasbro (after all, the concept of shape-shifting androids has already been copied several times without much consequence.)  the distributors burst right in. This is how you do it. Catch the confused step parents right before they can ask which one is Bumblebee.

But you may have some questions, seeing this cover. What exactly is inside? How do they expect kids to know what colors their ravenously plagiarized  characters are? Are there even characters in this? Why don't we let Schoolzone.com fill us in?

Take on the world with “T” Bots Morphing Robots. Give your child a pair of coloring books with a fun techno-twist. They offer a great break from more focused learning activities, plus, perforated, tear-out pages make for on-the-go coloring action and easy-to-display masterpieces

You got all that? This is a break from more focused activities, like eating paste and staring at their own noses. Don't be asking no dumb questions and buy or get out! Also, haha, you already bought it. But if you must know, this is what 55 Cents to 4 bucks get you...

Give me your face! Mine sort of sucks.

I call this guys Bestimus Primo. Presumably the leader of the T-Bots, Bestimus is clearly wondering about where Shia Lebouf  Michael Arangano is gone off to. Say what you will about him having a little Cylon in him, but they sure where commited to ripping of Transformer's motiff of them actually transforming into things, with the details like the wheels intact.(although with no actuall transformation as far as I could see) The could have just gone with some random, Transformer-ish robots and called it a day.

Of course, they gotta have some alternate forms, too. Otherwise it doesn't work.

The turbines are for flying, as penguins are known to do.

Yes! A Robot Penguin. We're clearly skipping right past Beastwars into Transmetals, because Iceborg here would not fool anyone if he apeared at your local zoo, trying to tap dance his way into freedom.

My skimming through the book showed me plenty of pages which uncluded animal forms, including a robot wasp and a robot whale.  Those things have happened, and probably could happen, respectively. But in all honestly, how do you color that? Do you color it off-color, like the kind of bad Waspinator knock off it presumably is? Is the robot whale the color of an actual whale?  

One thing's  for sure: the Tbots has trimmed a lot of the more obvious violence of the original, and instead opted more for characters posing and never doing anything more specific than that. While the parents are probably a little relieved that no one is getting his exaust port blown to pieces, perhaps you need to look at the other cover.

"Only one of my arms is guns...I'm such a failiure..."

"Gunblebee" here isn't to become your pet.  He's coming out of the war explosions with his hand out asking if you're perhaps join him in his dance with death. The T-Bot! It's exactly what meets the eyes!

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Son of a Pitch: Street Fighter 4 M.U.G.E.N. edition

Wat Stwengt! Bot Dun Fohgut dea many guyslike ew oll over dewowld.

You know, I've always wanted to make a fighting game. You have no idea. And when I first learned of M.U.G.E.N more than 10 years ago, I thought I'd finally be able to. Well, turns out it was a lot more complicated than I'd thought.



Still, I 've always had M.U.G.E.N. in my mind one way or another. It's been kept alive by a community that is as vibrant as it is overzealous, and even the makers of M.U.G.E.N going into Odinsleep couldn't kill the dream. Some truly amazing games and characters have been made by the community. But I think there's been a huge oversight.





Street Fighter IV. I don't think anyone has made stages, or chars of Street Fighter IV. But why? It's got cool characters and It wouldn't be any more work than any other M.U.G.E.N sprite ripped character. Hell, it's be even less, with the small amount of moves and frames the game has. It's just a Nes game for crying out loud!

Wait, you thought I meant THE Street Fighter IV made by Capcom in 2009? Silly me! I should have been more specific. I meant Gouder Co,'s 1993 Bootleg Street Fighter 4 for the NES.

They put the name on the character select screen just to fuck with you.

Mr Gouder must have known that making a fighting game for the NES was a bad idea. The system didn't have the input speed or graphic capabilities for something as complex as a fighting game. However, he must have liked money and facing legal charges for copyright infringement, because he chose to name his game Street Fighter IV, despite Street Fighter III not existing until several years later. I can just imagine being a kid in 1993 that has spent hours with Ryu, Ken and the rest of the gang from Street Fighter 2, suddenly being faced with a game that promises to skip over a whole sequel. However, the game is, unlike the Kart Fighter Nes Bootleg, only barely related to Street Fighter. This Bootleg went all the way, forging new ground into derivative plagiarism.

Shameku...Shoddyuken!

The cast consists of Shoto ripoff Goho Li, and his identical twin Cliff, Playboy Kitty Tracy and her doppleganger Bunny, Buddhist monk Moon and his smirking duplicate Chunfo, Twin Shotos Rober and Pasta, and tough army guys Ranboo and Stanlong.

They ruled out "Cobro", "Racky" and "Stepormamomwilshootyu" early on.

So what am I asking of the M.U.G.E.N. community? To remake a Nes game that had 4 Ryus and a Erin ripoff? Somewhat. I mean, I know you guys like frankenspriting and shotos. Well, how about if instead of making yet another version of Ryu, we frankensprite a new Street Fighter IV? We could figure all new ways to make Pasta different from Rober. I mean, honestly, there's less Shotos in Bootleg SFIV than there where in actual SFIV, and you guys still can't live without that Akuma.

It is dan all over again...

I, as I said, am no good at M.U.G.E.N. At any part of it. And what I learnt is that what the community most needs is coders. Which is part of what I'm terrible at. But maybe, if more than one of us gets their shit together, we can finally bring Tracy back. Who's with me?

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