The Suicide Squad goes nuclear

Ya know with all this shit going on with north korea and their nuclear program not to mention renewed tensions with russia and the threat of islamic terrorists trying to get their filthy hands on that shit for years now it got me thinking about Firestorm 64 written by John Ostrander. The issue came out in 1987 in which the Cold War was still going on here in the real world even though it would be only a few years later that the soviet union would collapse. For about the next two decades or so we really didn't think about nuclear war as something that we had to worry about any more.
So this issue was part of a story arc in which Ronald and professor Stein (who was dying of a brain tumor at the time) as Firestorm attempted to coerce the nuclear armed nations of the world into dismantling their nuclear arsenals under the threat of doing it for them if they didn't comply. A some what similar premise to the awful Superman 4 film which ironically also came out in 1987. Yeah that didn't go over to well and as a result Firestorm was declared an outlaw and become subject to arrest. As a result Captain Atom (prior to this issue), Task Force X, The Justice League mixed it up with Firestorm in an attempt to end his crusade.
The story line continues and comes to a head in Firestorm annual 2 in which The Squad and The League start to fight each other. Adding to the mayhem The Parasite who at the time was in The Squad goes rogue. Firestorm manages to deal with The Parasite and make his escape only to be confronted in the Nevada desert by a russian super powered agent named Pozhar. The show down happens shortly before professor Stein's tumor finally kills him and disrupts the Firestorm bond in the process which happens only seconds before both the U.S. and Soviet governments try to nuke both combatants. Good stuff, makes me miss the 80s all that much more.

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/marvelmasterworksfansite/suicide-squad-the-complete-ostrander-run-1st-time--t24588.html

Enter The Tiger

By artist Craig Cermak

I like this, Bronze Tiger has almost a Bruce Lee kinda vibe going on here.

Gal Gadot at Justice League panel with Wonder Woman cosplay fan

Just a heads up, there's a ton of 2017 Comic-Con videos containing panels of just about every up coming sci-fi/comic book movie and TV series both on cable and NetFlix this year. It's astonishing how many big time A list celebrities are at this event in San Diego now. Back when I went in 1994 it was pretty big but nothing like it is now. A Hell of a lot easier and cheaper to get into back then as well, now it's almost like you gotta know somebody on the inside in order to get into the con.

By the way have I ever mentioned here how much I fucken hate donald trump? Big thanks to Calvin's Canadian Cave of Cool which is where I found this funny ass cartoon . . .

 http://calvinscanadiancaveofcool.blogspot.com/

Entertainment Weekly Magazine presents The Ultimate Wonder Woman Guide

I picked this up a couple of days ago at a local super market. It's pretty cool not only does it have a bunch of great stuff in regards to the production and cast of the Wonder Woman movie it also in general covers the history and evolution of the character in a very comprehensive and detailed way. The guide goes all the way back to the guy who came up with the Wonder Woman character (also the inventor of the polygraph) to the classic Linda Carter TV series, Wonder Woman's countless appearances in multiple forms of media over the years, her impact on pop culture and even the upcoming Justice League movie.

The back cover has some pretty sweet art work at first I thought it was John Byrne but it turns out I was mistaken. It was done by Jose Luise Garcia according to some research done by fellow blogger Dale Bagwell http://dbsuniverse.blogspot.com/

A fun photo spread with Gal Gadot, Chris Pine, Connie Nielsen and director Jenny Jenkins

You'll find a lot of nostalgia in this issue along with at least a few other things even some of the more hard core Wonder Woman fans out there might be surprised to see.

One other thing, my wife loves charm bracelets and started busting my balls for a Wonder Woman one ever since we saw the movie.

One of the most bad ass scenes ever in a comic book based movie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIEwkn-Q2Oo

Adam West passes away at 88

Adam West as The Gray Ghost

Just heard the sad news (leukemia) a couple hours ago and I wanted to get a posting up this weekend with a little bit of my thoughts on West's career. As a kid I kinda used to like the original Batman TV show because like Spiderman on The Electric company it was one of the very few live action outlets available for some of my favorite comic book characters. As I got older I won't lie I did develop a certain degree of disdain for the show because of it's campyness although I certainly never felt that way for West himself who by all accounts has always been a stand up guy in his personal life.
I'm really glad that over the years he managed to in part rejuvenate his show biz career despite his type casting handicap with voice acting work on The Simpsons and The Family Guy. As some of you may remember he was also the voice actor in The Grey Ghost episode of the Batman animated series. That series brought a lot of critical acclaim and respect to the super hero genre and that episode in particular was certainly one of the best if not the best episode of the series. Ironically, West plays an out of work actor who can't couldn't find new acting gigs due to a type casting handicap but would go on to help Batman solve a series of crimes carried out by some psychotic fan boy using sophisticated remote controlled toys.

Ya know I have to admit even though I came to grow weary of the original Batman TV show I always maintained my fondness for the classic Batmobile from that series (I dug the Batboat to). I used to have the original die cast ones from Corgi but at least I still have a couple packaged ones from a Hotwheels release some 8 or 9 years ago which I saw in a Dollar store of all places. Looking back I should have picked up more of them. As a crime fighter you probably don't want to drive around seated in an open canopy (not much protection from gun fire) but that's ok it was such a cool design I still love it till this day.

My short and to the point Wonder Woman review

Ok here's your one posting for this month on what is largely an inactive blog site these days. Well DC's cinematic universe was badly in need of a hit after some what of a let down with Batman vs. Superman and the catastrophe that was the Suicide Squad. But I think Wonder Woman may have come to save the day as it were. And I must say it's a point of personal pride to see Israeli Jewish actress Gal Gadot (and former Israeli Defense Force soldier) deliver the leading lady role as this iconic character in her first solo film.
Gal Gadot is to Wonder Woman what Hugh Jackman is to Wolverine. That was a big part of what made this movie good and it had a great mix of non campy humor, ass kicking action and good secondary character development. I also like how they tied the beginning and the end to Wonder Woman's appearances in Batman vs. Superman. All that aside, as someone who is not a fan of the Star Trek reboot films (fuck you jj abrams) it was nice to see Chris Pine's talents as an actor not squandered on a shitty movie for a change.
On something of a side note I wanted to also mention that this movie has been under attack by the antisemitic BDS (boycott divest sanction) movement against Israel. Ofcourse this is because the film's leading lady is an Israeli Jew and former IDF soldier. The hezbolla controlled failed state shit hole known as lebanon banned the film. But I'm happy to say the movie never the less is cleaning up at the box office this weekend and has enjoyed very positive reviews by fan boys and regular audience goers alike. Knowing that Wonder Woman has become the latest BDS fail makes seeing it that much more satisfying.

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NO RETREAT, NO SURRENDER. FOR SPARTA, FOR THEMYSCIRA.

Farewell 007

Roger Suave

So I'm just doing this spur of the moment posting on what is now mostly an in active blog site. Only heard the sad news about an hour ago about Roger Moore passing away at 89 from cancer. Right on the heels of Sound Garden's front man Chris Cornell no less but in his case his death was in some ways even more tragic given that he was only in his 50s. I figured I better throw something on the internet especially with all this russia/trump investigation and terror attack in Manchester drowning out all other news stories including this one. Again, what seemed to be one of those timeless celebrity icons from my child hood has left us. There's really not much of anything I can say that you don't know or haven't heard already if you know anything about Roger Moore's career so let me pivot a bit to some of the 007 toys I used to have when I was a kid.

Ya know I still see the 007 submarine car (Corgi) from time to time at comic and toy conventions, usually going for a pretty hefty price tag. Especially for the ones that are in better condition part of that being if the 007 logo sticker is still present and not too tattered and faded.

I also used to have both the large scale and smaller Moon Raker shuttle craft toys (also from Corgi). Both featured retractable landing gears and cargo bay doors that open. But the bigger shuttle also had a removable satellite which had extending solar panels where as the smaller shuttle just had a fixed molded piece in it but I loved both em just the same. I see the smaller shuttle once in a while at a con but have yet to come across the bigger one. I wonder if all these 007 toys will bump up in value now?

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Might as well throw this up here as well while I'm at it it's seldom I ever come across any fan art related to the Ostrander era and it's pretty original and other wise well done. If you want to get a better look at it go here... http://elena-casagrande.deviantart.com/art/Suicide-Squad-banner-for-Blastoff-Comics-625873780

Bill Paxton passes away at 61 so to the grim reaper I say "Fuck you asshole!"

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Unfucken believable! I literally only 30 moments ago just read the sad news about Bill Paxton having passed away during some sort of surgical procedure. Here we go again with yet another iconic actor from the sci-fi genre of the 80s passing away and we're not even done with February yet. Many people wouldn't know that his list of credits both in front and behind the camera is very extensive but I'm not going to get into a long winded posting about his fantastic career. But suffice it to say I loved Bill Paxton he's been in some great films both big and small that I've enjoyed since the mid 80s.
The land mark role that put him on the map no doubt was private Hudson from ALIENS but we actually saw Bill before that in a small part in the original classic Terminator film. Since then he's played in a number of great films like Tombstone, Apollo 13 and One False Move. He's also done some work on the small screen I remember him in particular most recently from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D when that show was actually watchable. Bill was also in another great yet little known film that's one of my favorites from his acting resume. The movie is a modern day vampire film from the late 80s called Near Dark in which Paxton plays a psychotic vampire with an entertaining and twisted sense of humor when it comes to hunting his prey and taking on his enemies.

As if 2016 wasn't bad enough it looks like 2017 is already becoming a shit year for celebrity deaths from my child hood in the science fiction genre. We also lost Richard Hatch to cancer earlier this month whom you remember from Battlestar Galactica, The Streets of San Francisco and most recently from Star Trek Axanar. I actually met him only about a year and a half ago at a convention in San Jose California.

Gordon Henley from the original Star Wars (A New Hope) film and also most recently in Rogue 1 thanks to inserted footage never used from A New Hope died from a bizarre and tragic choking incident during a meal last month.

Let me just throw this in here real quick let's see if you can figure out the Star Wars reference here in this Battlestar Galactica comic book clip art from Dynamite Entertainment.

Anyways, also last month we lost Miguel Ferrer whom Robocop fans certainly remember and perhaps even some Star Trek fans as well. Miguel died of throat cancer.