HALL OF FAME! (applause)

Rules Recap:

  Hey everyone after surfing around the forums for a while and how many heroes and villains would be revered or who would win in a battle, the main thing that always comes up as the silver bullet in all battles is Superman. So i figured i would spend this blog post focusing on some more likely scenarios in which i would finish off the man of steel. 
 
  Option 1: Im a book worm type. if i end up going into a game or taking someone on in an argument i like to be prepared for what is to come. now being a person with no powers going up against someone who has the powers that close to a god. but there are ways around it. and its the 2 main weaknesses that superman is vulnerable too. 
  So while studying up his weaknesses i would try to find any book of arcane magic. all i need is anything that would grant a magical poison that would paralyze the body. which im sure with the unlimited possibilities with magic that i would find one. 
          next step is to take an ordinary switch blade and enchant this blade with the poison, thus making the weapon magical. now not to make sure that it would be traced back to me. I would go to the local underground bars where most criminals would hang out or members of the Inter gang and use them to get a hired thug to rob a person in metropolis and use the switchblade on the man of steel only thinking it is a regular cheap dime store knife. thus paralyzing him but also allowing the blade to penetrate his skin. 
       Reason for this: Magic and Magical objects operate at a chaotic wavelength that superman can not match nor can he see. if he could see then the switchblade being hidden, superman would not think twice of it being a threat. though the alloy of it is something that normally would not harm superman in any shape or form, but being enchanted by magic makes the alloy run at the chaotic wavelength of the spell. thus a good stab to the chest or simple cut to the hand to get the spell active.
 
 Option 2: Kryptonite is the major weakness to superman and should be to humans, but seeing how there is only 5 pieces of kryptonite and one of them belonging to batman. one of the krytonite pieces would probably be in a museum under close study or for display. to me the first part is that i don't need to steal the kryptonite but to see it but only for 10 mins. explained later.
        Next step is that i create a simple device that would be placed in all points of metropolis from roof tops as not to harm regular people out and about these devices would look like simple weather stations. while this act against superman would not work immediately it would work over time. one day the man of steel would fall out of the sky or end up having many years of his life taken away from many days of slow kryptonite poisoning.
       
         Reason for this: the 10 mins i would have used with the kryptonite would have used a spectro-analyser to find out the frequency and wavelength at which kryptonite would ressonate. not the element itself. because radiation effects and degrades us on a cellular level that this would be replicated in a form of ultra sonic waves set to that of a low setting that all superman would experience at first is very very small blurring of his vision, or some minor effects which would go away after he had finished his patrol over the city.  with the weather stations as disguise and placed on every building it would only affect him. as everyone else below the skyline would be fine. 
 
  And thats how i would do it. though many of you would disagree with me and my methods that is fine. I also welcome to hear other ideas and opinions in how you would do it. or if you would ever do it at all. I understand the many problems that would come with the death of superman, pretty much all hell would break loose and there would be no silver bullet to protect the planet from cataclysmic dangers.

  Its been many cycles of the great sun, and many seasons has passed since my tribe has joined the ranks of the horde, though my tribe long dislikes much of the fighting it was myself with the help of our brothers and sister and my adopted brother that we fought to keep the centaurs away from our people. I pass this story onto you my children so that one day you would tell others of the power of totem that was once given to us by the great An'shee. 
 
  It was years before the great cataclysm and the return of Deathwing, Morgra the elder crone of our tribe had just left at that time after accepting to join Cairne and his Bloodhoof tribe into the Horde which was ruled back then by Warchief Thrall, to us we had never heard of him until the horde came. many of the orcs layed praise on his fighting ability and his battle against the demons. My adopted brother and I just came back with a horde raiding party on a centaur camp that was trying to summon demons in our home at the Stonetalon Mountains, They instead summoned many fire elementals which burned down the great valley and turned it to ash. 
 
  But that story is for another time, after Morgra left for the thunderbluffs my brother just joined the horde but convinced the overlord to set up an outpost near our home so that he could be closer to his family, that agreed he had an Orc friend and a Troll priest. Struma Kor was a female orc, light green skin which reminded me of the colors of the grass fields in the waterfall valley in stonetalon, She was a proud woman, often have competitions with my brother about how many demons and centaurs each other has killed on each raid or when those four legged foul barbarians attack our settlements. Nol Vajshir was a long lanky blue skinned troll, He was a strange troll that worshipped the sun and how its power brings light to him and empowers him to heal others and bring light to dark places, we too have tales of the sun spirit whose name was An'shee. I much enjoyed his company for the debates we have as i gather power from the spirits and the elements , while he believes he gets power from a sun god, when i know its not a god but just a spirit like anything else just a more powerful spirit. 
 
   Your uncle (my brother) and his friends were sent on a mission to the northern part of Stonetalon mountains near the border into the Night elf forests of Ashenvale. I decided that a strong Shaman should be needed on this patrol, but i was unaware that this would be more than patrol, took us many of a few days to traverse on foot across the mountain range, nor did I expect to see Satyr demons wondering around in our territory, "Probably a legion scouting party" Struma told us. we had to wait till night before we would try to make an attack on their encampment. 
 
   That night though we had the element of surprise, a few of the demons got away. they headed back north through a tunnel into Ashenvale. we followed suit so that they would not warn others of our attack. I being the clever one managed to gather help from the earth spirits to stop them in their tracks. we finished off the stragglers but kept one alive. The troll seem to take pleasure in torturing the demon for information, though many hours later the demon did give us some information, they were looking for an artifact. From my understanding at the time it would have been able to protect the legion from most of the powers of nature that the night elves and most of the members of the horde use. 
 
   What ever it was we had to find this item first or at least disrupt the demons search until we let others in the Horde know what is going on with the legion. but the rest is for a tale to tell some other time.

  So someone asked me recently after a few of the reviews is why i don't talk much on new or recent marvel issues. though in the past i have done few and select issues of the publishers series. Mainly i could say one person. or i could say its many things. to me as well to others marvel has gone down the path cheap sell out and rarely does anything good now. this could be due to the fact that they have tons of writers many of which are freelance writers who are not actually on a full payroll, that by example can sometimes lead to crap shoot stories which can go absolutely nowhere. 
 
   Continuity is starting to become a big issue for me....heh.. issue...ANYWAYS! take Chaos Wars and Thanos Imperative. with the whole thing with the cancerverse spilling out and the chaos king tearing apart the fabric of reality itself. how and where does it fit into continuity. to me something THAT big would end up spilling into other titles. but low and behold it was barely touch at all except a few one shot titles which mainly evolved around dead team members. Though i have no problem with Alpha Flight being back, BUT what i don't get is that Dead Avengers may actually get its own series. I mean how do you plan to explain this with in the main continuity. We should have seen this coming from Spider-man Clone Saga. 
 
    Next I pick on the person. yes the person who I can pour all my anger and frustration into. The man who took a once great universe that ran fairly well together and slapped some makeup on it and put it to work on the street corner. for which i refer to Joe Quesada......(breathes deeply). Now those who know me well, you know I don't like to talk about .... that nameless series where a certain super-hero revealed his identity to the public, and then decided to make a deal with the devil to make everyone forget.... so we won't talk about that. but since he took the reigns as Chief Creative Officer of Marvel comics its just been down hill from there. We have so many titles out now for marvel its not even funny. they are pushing out so many titles at 3.99 they are quite literally shooting themselves in the foot. And im not saying this Just cause i despise the man. im saying this as a comic store employee. when it comes to new readers they get overwhelmed by the Marvel rack they just end up going to DC cause its easier to get them started on any title, To which for marvel i have to point them to the essentials and say start there.
 
   Last is the titles themselves. I just briefly touched on this in the last paragraph. reason i pick on this subject most of the time is because im somewhat of a cautious person. though i don't shower with a bathing suit on, or sleep in a bubble but when it comes to a fan base of die hard followers, its something I would take my time at and treat them with dignity and respect. but right now we have way too many titles for so few characters that actually deserve their own titles. I mean cover up Marvel and have some self respect. And though most of the ideas for the stories seem great they just end up having a dud for a conclusion. Take shadowland for an example. Shadowland in concept was a FANTASTIC idea. Matt Murdock becomes evil after he finally crosses the line and kills someone. thats good and i would buy it. but they went and pulled the whole Parallax bit and had him possessed by a demon. then we heard he would end up dead at the end of the series. nope... he needs to go on his David Banner journey/ hitch hiking bit (those of you too young to remember the show, talk amongst your selves). 
 
   Now a days I think i only read 4 titles coming out of marvel. when i see around the 30 items they put out a week on the shelves. Red Hulk, Deadpool, Amazing Spider-man, and Uncanny X-men. the only ones ill touch right now. Marvel may get temporary fans when they release a movie or tv show, but its not enough to sustain them for long when they can't keep things together for very long. and with being a dollar more than DC and some of the independent titles... i think im going to hang out at the other racks for a while. Now before I go. I just want to say im not knocking marvel fans, those who are die hard to the end all the power too you. but how long are you going to endure sloppy decision making before you decide your going to leave for a better brand or writer? Anyways im out. take care of yourselves and each other.

Based on news article : see here.
 

"It's all building to this big crossover with Flashpoint which takes the central character of The Flash and makes him the focal point of the DC Universe," Manapul said.

So im just sharing with you all my personal pulls off the shelves this week and why i bought them. some i follow the others just wanted to try something new. as a point of interest i have not read these issues yet so im just stating why im picking these up.
 
The Avengers #8 - Now im not much into the avengers series but based this week what was coming out i decided to pick it up anyways.cover picked me up as they replaced blackbolt as member of the illuminati with medusa. so i figure i might be worth looking into. hopefully it will be interesting. my guess is with the current story its the illuminati going "oh no the infinity gems are together again! we failed at protecting them"
 
 Green Lantern #61 - This series ive been following (mainly cause of larfleeze), and i think its about time we got the butcher into this. so im excited to see how this plays out. plus i want to see more of Krona after his last appearance in #60. plus the idea of parallax flash is cool.
 
 Brightest Day Green Arrow #7 - Im loving this robin hood theme they got going on with ollie. its a great arc to get into. now this forest is getting more mystically strange with the looks of the lady of the lake in star city. so im guessing she might be a spirit of the white lantern tree.... maybe.. or she is the actual lady of the lake from the old tales. maybe since we got gallahad i would not doubt it.
 
 HULK #28 - Ive been waiting for this issue. specifically im a fan of the red hulk with jeff parker at the helm. he took a character that only looked good and gave him a character that i can really feel for. this issue looks like either fin fang fooms foot, or if it connects rick jones story it might deal monster island. if it is monster island i think mole man would be an easy defeat in this book. but i don't think it would have anything to do with the scorched earth project.
 
 Flash #8 - Geoff Johns got me hooked on barry allen again. but this issue seems like the last issue which they had with captain boomerang mate!, so im expecting history lesson on reverse flash. so it looks pretty interesting i like learning more about characters myself so i think it will be a good read for me. ZOOM! ZOOM! ZOOM!
 
 Teen Titans #90 - I read a previous issue with damian joining the titans so i figured it would be more of him trying to be mr.big bad ass. personally i was going to skip this issue. but since i had a few bucks left over i figured why not. looks like they might be going to a high school to get slapped around by the drama club. maybe more personal feelings will be shared in the Teen Titans circle and get robin to open up more to the team. 
 
 
 So that is my pull list from this week. if anyone would like to share their list on what they bought this week just post it up here. ill be back next week with my next pull list and share what my expectations are of the comics. happy new years viners.

 
 This is a subject which probably has come to mind to many comic book readers. With things like the iPad coming out for domestic and commercial use and the ability to read e-books on there, we even seen demo's from marvel that were sent out a while back as free previews to get new readers into comics. With the way things are now in the world of comic industry, it would be a wonder if the paper comics will survive long enough for people to want to go back to the comics and actually hold them and collect them. 
 
  Though i can not speak for the companies that create comics, yes we see all these movies out there based on comics, sometimes it leads into a quick surge into comic buying but never really sustains for long. and with prices going up in comics, it makes it harder for people to take multiple titles which would end up decreasing in sales of comics. While something like the iPad probably would allow people to download a comic for 99 cents per title. It makes you wonder with the difference in price that it would then raise the price of the actual comics because not many would buy the actual copy. 
 
  But that is purely just conjecture. Many people on this site can see the good and bad aspects of the iPad in how people can look at comics. in a way it can bring many new people into the realm of comics as things go digital, many of things today are part of a digital revolution. and many of the people who buy actual comics still will probably still stick with their all time favorites. but there is no lie that comic sales have gone down across the board in the US. if this trend continues. it would be hard to tell if the comic industry can survive at making real comics. and the old ways will probably be gone. 
 
   So after a talk with Val Staples, he mentioned that their has to be a tie in to the actual comics or making it more appealing to pick it up over just having it over an iPad and or computer. and to which it is true. another talk with Joe Krolik who has been working in the comic store industry for about 30 years. he says the same thing that if you offer a digital version of a comic or story, you need to make the paper one more appealing or advertise for it. 
 
    What does the future hold for comics themselves as a paper back that you can hold in your hand? well for one it does not look good right now. as it is sales are slightly depressed now, mainly it can be caused by the recession that most of the world suffered through. but by numbers over the past decade, sales have been slightly going down over the years. If comics become digital and do not pick up new readers buying into paper comics, then those comics price will go up ten fold as they will not come out as periodicals but as collector magazines much like trade paperbacks. the expense will be much higher as there would not be a need to keep printing new comics each week. they will be much like a resin statue that you collect putting it in a display case just to showcase and never read.
 
     Never has the future of comics come to an uncertain crossroads. if fans want to be able to keep their favorite series on the shelf rather than on a SD card or memory stick. their has to be a change in 1) the way the industry conducts itself with pricing and distribution. 2) getting new readers into comics. comics are not just for kids, and with current series they are mainly not aimed at kids. 3) finding a way to promote classic paper comics as being more appealing than just having a comic on an iPad. if something of these steps are taken we might have a shot at protecting what we love.
 
     Though from what I've said and presented to you fans of comics do you think that the future of comics looks bleak at all? or do you think that comics can and will survive long enough for people to want to keep buying the classic paper versions? what do you think that you could suggest that could help the industry to be able to survive a digital age in the future?  would you be willing to see all your favorite titles taken off the shelf?

 This is a story/poem that was inspired by the recent release of Larfleeze Christmas Special.this is for everyone who still believes in the child like ideals of christmas.

Modern Christmas Tale

By: Troy Martin (Trodorne)

It is the eve of Christmas, and im on the can; reading my Green Lantern, Red Hulk, and vintage comics by a guy named Stan. The wife is in the living room resting after putting down the toys; getting ready for tomorrow morning when we surprise the boys.

I come down stairs all dressed in green; in my green arrow outfit, which she says “that’s pretty obscene”. I just give her a wink and act all sly; kiss her all over reminding her why she married this guy.

So together we sat warm under a lit tree; enjoying the smell of pine, and peaceful as can be. From the corner of my eye what do I see; but some fat guy in red, in my kitchen making tea.

Slowly I got up and went to the kitchen door to take a look in; and spotted the fat ass in our Christmas cookie tin. He grabbed them by the fistful and off to the fridge; to pull out the jug of milk, slowly pouring into a large mug with a picture of the Golden gate bridge.

Though I thought he was an intruder, I did not know what to do. I looked back in, his fat ass gone and the cookies too. Turning to see where he went, he surprised me with a smile on his rosy red face; with a scared voice I said. “What are you doing here? Why are you in my place?”

Without a word, his stubby fingers pointed at the tree; but kids toys galore, and a vintage he-man action figure with a tag addressed to me. Though in my mind, this man could not be real; could it be santa in the flesh, seeing the toys I always wanted I just wanted to squeal.

As my vision became blurry, the old man did nod; “you been a good family man this year, and magic still exists here you silly sod”. His figure began to fade and the glow of lights became bright, I woke to the sound of my kids cheering to the new presents on sight.

The kids open their presents, as my wife sits next to me; I notice something in the corner, a present in the back of the tree. Though I reach and think “it is one of the kids toy’s gone astray”; but low its the same he-man toy, here plain as day.

Now I tell all those out there, with and open heart and mind; Wonderful and magical things can happen; especially those who are kind. And I go wishing you all a merry Christmas, as I spend this morning with my two boys; I’ll cherish the moments I have with them, as well as my kick ass He-man toy!

 
    So i was lucky to attend the Toronto Fan Expo this year as it would be the last one i would be attending in Ontario. Saturday was their biggest line up of guests and booths being set up. oh of which was Stan Lee, one of the creators of many popular comic characters in marvel comics. he has worked on many other stories in DC that being Flash, Green Lantern, Superman etc. his recent visit is also to promote his new comic coming out for Boom! studios called Soldier Zero. Stan was situated in the corner of the building. but what a huge corner it was. the line up was that of a roller coaster ride at a big theme park. getting in line for tickets was medium compared to the size for stan lee. and what a sport he was taking photo ops and chatting with his fans. 
 
   Tons of vendors from many of the local hobby and comic stores were on hand in the building, many of which i partaken in. one being of which Heroclix. a small miniatures game based on comic heroes and villians. others were of media giants like Nintendo, Microsoft, as well as promotions for movies and tv industries. at the Marvel booth there was a press showing of the new avengers animated movie that is going to be coming out. DC had showings for the new full length feature of Batman and Superman: Apokalypse. 
 
   Artist Ally was another hit from the expo with many artists from many spectrums of the comic book and art industry. I took the oppertunity to try to speak with Francis Manipul. he showed up an hour late for his shedule to do some signing i chalked that up to the DC panel he did based on up coming work during the brightest day series. I had my variant cover of Avengers #4, This fan expo exlusive has a art done of the Super hero team known as Alpha Flight. It has been hinted that Alpha Flight will be Chaos War event that is coming soon in marvel comics.
 
   But not all the expo was great and grand. Though those are some of the few things that was going on it does paint the entire picture. there were many instances of public outburst due to the security issues of the event. there were 3 levels being used for the convention center and on the main floor where people would be able to head up to the second where the main booths and events are happening the escalators were shut down by security and were allowing handfuls of people up one at a time. this made it apparently worse when few people cut through the crowd to flash passes to grant them full access outside of the crowd. 
 
   When it came to overall consideration and organization of the event by the hosts themselves. this was rated a 2.1 out of 5. the main booths were organized but information to the attending people and organization of their security monkey's were not best handled. The anger was so intense against security it would have been close to having the Geek riots of '81. don't remember? best that you don't spock ears and comic books everywhere.. it was horrible. 
 
   Outside of that. Many guests came down as Felicia Day from the hit internet series The Guild, was on hand to join in on the festivities with one of her cast mates, Tinkerballa from the show. The original Batmobile was on hand as well then later handled by the Dynamic duo themselves of Adam West and Burt Ward from the 1960's Batman show. those luck to be there for a photo op *cough cough* got to take part in it as well as meet the cast as well as Julie Newmar one of the few women who played catwoman in the original series. 
 
   The day ended, I and company headed home from the festivities with bags of gifts, memories and a handfull of comments on the use of security. another year has come and gone at the Toronto Fan expo. many celebrities, vendors and gaming going on, its hard to let silly things like security and bad management keep you down. and come on the costumes were amazing. yet i found i was one of 2 orange lanterns in attendance. and i came out with a cool raccoon with a lightsaber T-shirt so win win. 
 
   Sorry i don't have pictures posted ill get around too it later when i have the time. Thanks for reading the blog on the fan expo. ill see you guys in the reviews or future blogs. have a good day and good journey.

 8-bit Theater

The Story

The Pretty Colours

Overall thoughts