We’re back with more B-roll goodness! Mike and Casey are joined in the studio with Sam Mulvey of Ask an Atheist and his brother, Mike Mulvey for a wide-ranging bullshit session.
We dig into contests with pop culture prizes that never materialized, like guests spots on Star Trek: the Next Generation, and the Captain America Broadway musical that never was. We chat about film director/walking human garbage Uwe Boll’s challenges to literally fight his critics and perceived rivals.
We discuss the recent reboot of Archie Comics, as well as the character’s past and current encounters with the Punisher and the zombie apocalypse. We get into why we all dig Netflix’s Daredevil series, even if a lot of the current comic book TV shows aren’t setting our worlds on fire.
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I’d really encourage you to check out The Flash and Arrow, and also to give Agents of Shield a shot. From your skepticism of the CW shows it sounds like you may still have PTSD from Smallville. Be assured Flash and Arrow ate nothing like that. They are unapologetically comic book shows that are not afraid to say the names of the characters and show them in action. They each have romance plots, but not really much more than the comics themselves. Flash is a super fun sci fi superhero show where he’s out there facing rogues, the reverse flash, and learning new speed tricks while becoming a more publicly known superhero.
Arrow is darker, about Oliver Queen as a vigilante whose own worst enemy is basically himself. It’s much less comic booky and not as fun, but has good action and intrigue, and is a great origin story as you see both his superhero origins in real time and his back story of surviving on an island simultaneously, through flashbacks. For me in the first episode when he and his friend are kidnapped, he breaks loose and fights the kidnappers, then grabs an escaping one, says “no one can know” and snaps his neck, that kind of set the tone of “OK wow, this is not what you think of a typical CW show, and this sure as shit ain’t Smalville”.
Finally Agents of Shield, I’m not sure what you’ve heard, but it’s a good standalone product. The first half of the first season was somewhat creatively hamstrung by the movies because they had to wait for The Winter soldier to come out which changed the status quo of Shield, and couldn’t tell stories before that point that would affect much change because of how integrated Shield was in the upcoming movie. After that the show is really let loose, featuring a top secret Shield vs a top secret Hydra with Coulson and his Agents trying to stop Hydra plots. If you liked the action in Daredevil, a lot of the action in Agents of Shield season two is just as good. AoS doesn’t have much affect on the marvel movies? Well here the dirty secret about the MCU. None of the films really have any effect on the others apart from maybe a handwavy reference, and it doesn’t matter. They’re all stand alone stories designed specifically so someone won’t have needed to see the others, and usually ignore whatever is inconvenient from the stand alone films. So I don’t particularly know why anyone should mind that the agents of Shield characters have an “affect” on anything. None of the films have an affect on anything either. Daredevil certainly doesn’t, and it’s a great standalone story. AoS does do things like introduce the Kree, Inhumans, and terrigen crystals before they show up in the movies.
Out of the three shows, Flash is definitely the one I think you’d enjoy most, and consistently high quality with only a couple of clunkers. Do you want to see Mark Hamil play the Trickster again, hamming it up and going full animated series Joker? Want to see Flash try and use a supersonic punch against Grodd? Or save the passengers from a derailing train while captain cold escapes? This is the show for you.
Agents of Shield is my favorite after the first season, with consistently strong writing, well developed characters, the awesome Kyle McLachlan owning every scene, and amazing action and logical spy plot twists. I think there a total of one bad episode in there. On Netflix in June.
Arrow is also pretty good, especially the first two seasons, though the third season just has a ton of problems for which I’d have to triple my word count.
I appreciate the recommendations. I suppose the overriding barrier that prevents me from seeing these shows is something I’m just now figuring out.
Mainly, I don’t think I like watching superheroes under 30. Well, superheroes under 30 that aren’t specifically designed to be “young” or “teen” heroes, like early Spider-Man or the Teen Titans.
For whatever reason, it just normally drowns in the sort of relationship angst that usually typifies characters at that age – and I just feel allergic to it.
With Daredevil, all of the characters are ADULTS and more than the blood and violence in that series, their age is what gives that show its maturity.
With Agents of SHIELD, I’ve just heard so many negative things, plus it feels like a SHIELD show that doesn’t have Sam Jackson as Nick Fury is just small potatoes and inconsequential. I think the idea of a worm’s eye look at the Marvel Cinematic Universe has the potential to be really cool, but I also know that because the movies are the important things, they aren’t going to be allowed to deal with much of it unless the movies address it first — and they certainly won’t be allowed to introduce any major Marvel Universe plot points on it, so it sounds like a show that lives on table scraps.
With Daredevil, it IS a small scale story, but it’s introducing elements like the Kingpin, the Hand and the entire mythos of the DD series, which is exciting to see in live action and done really well.
With the other shows, I just keep hearing really conflicted things about these shows even from friends of mine who regularly watch them. It’s like watching these friends have a really messy relationship telling me that I should try to have one too.
I love that the Flash is doing things like Gorilla Grodd and the Reverse Flash, rather than the dark and dour Zack Snyder stuff we’re seeing on the big screen. But there’s something about it that I can’t quite articulate that prevents me from watching the show — and I have watched clips of it. The age of the actors is one thing. I wish they were like 5-10 years older, but the second element I can’t quite put my finger on.
Come to think of it, TV Flash’s Barry Allen shares a lot more in common with Peter Parker than comics Barry. Which is good since comics Barry is maybe the only character even more boring then Hal Jordan.
TV Ollie is roughly thirtiesh, if he’s a college graduate when he gets stranded on the island for five years before the series begins. The older character you identify with in that one is John Diggle though, his bodyguard.
The more I think about it, the more I think that all Hollywood types who make sweeping pronouncements should be forced to prove their worth in single combat with Uwe Boll. Hell, let’s make it all celebrities. We could call it IN THE ARENA WITH UWE BOLL and the losers have to swear off all interviews for at least two years. If Boll loses he has to agree not to make a movie for another year. It would be a smash hit and the biggest success Boll has ever had.
The real winner, of course, is all of humanity.
The only directors I would put money on, in a fight, are those from the WW2 generation (and before), like Sam Fuller and William Wellman. Fuller was a combat vet, with the 1st Division and was not a guy to mess with. Wellman flew with the Lafayette Escadrille. After that, maybe John Millius, mostly because he is crazy and a gun nut. Anything after the 70s and the best action you are going to get is a fight where people through lattes at each other.
The Cap musical was no dumber an idea than It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane… Thankfully, it didn’t happen.
I wanted to like Agents of SHIELD; but, it is so underwhelming. The characters just don’t engage me,except Colson. The first season was a real slog to get through. On the other hand, Agent Carter was great. Loved the setting, loved Haley Atwell, loved the Howlers appearance. We need a Howling Commando/Agent Carter movie, where they explore what happened after Cap disappeared. My only criticism was in the Howler episode. As soon as they introduced Junior Juniper, it was pretty obvious who was going to survive the episode.
I’ve only watched part of season 1 of Arrow and its kind of hit and miss. It’s a nice idea; but the island flashbacks are far more compelling than the “present” stories. I haven’t finished watching it, though. I’ve heard things improved in season 2.
Flash is great, what I’ve seen, and most of what I’ve heard. Gotham disappointed me, apart from Oswald Cobblepot. I haven’t watched the whole season though, so I don’t know if things improved after the first few episodes. Most of the media attention seems to be on Cobblepot, though.
Shyamalan is trying to produce an Unbreakable tv series. I thought the movie was just “okay.” I just don’t see enough material for a tv series.
Funny you should trash TBS. They would kill to have the ratings that WCW pro wrestling used to have, on TBS and TNT; and, yet, they killed the promotion because they didn’t want low-brow wrestling on their network, after Ted Turner was pretty much pushed out (post AOL-Time Warner merger).
The one DC-based tv series I wanted to see come off was Starman. The series was optioned, during the James Robinson run; but, the series never happened. It would be a fantastic mix of character drama and action, without needing spandex (though you could do a little bit of that). Apart from that, I would kill for them to rescue Astro City from Developmental Hell.
Archie Meets the Punisher was pitched, by writer Batton Lash, who also writes Wolff and Byrd, Counselors of the Macabre. It was by far the best inter-company crossover of the 90s, with the possible exception of Batman/Grendel (though that was written in the late 80s and caught up in legal issues, after Comico’s bankruptcy).
Never get the love you whippersnappers have for the Transformers. Really stiff animation and repetitive plots. Thundercats, I get; but not Transformers or GI Joe.
Love and Rockets would make a great HBO series; could be a decent film. These are my comic book dream films or tv series: Mr. X, Grendel, Manhunter (Goodwin/Simonson version), Adam Strange, Starman, Jon Sable (done well, this time), Terminal City, Top Ten, Tom Strong, Iron Empires, Dominic Fortune, American Flagg, Nexus, Badger (would be a great tv series), Valerian (French sci-fi comic), Damage Control (tv series), Killraven, Master of Kung Fu (in the style of the classic Moench/Gulacy stories), New Gods/4th World, Grease Monkey, Eternals, Enemy Ace, Blackhawk (as a pulpy WW2 film), Ms Tree, Challengers of the Unknown, and Generation Zero (from Pepe Moreno and Archie Goodwin).