The Awesome List: Strength, Courage, and a Fabulous Sunsword

Captain Marvel meets Superman



Dr. Hermes has the story behind this cool picture.

It's HERE!



I've been whining for years about not being able to buy Thundarr the Barbarian on DVD. Ken O reveals that I can finally shut up and pull out my wallet. Which I've just done. Thanks, Ken!

Art Show: Strange Visitor from Another Planet

Superman



By Evan Shaner. I occasionally have a hard time remembering what I like about Superman, but this picture brings it all back. I love the determination on his face mixed with the little smile. He's about to save a life or lives, but he's having fun doing it. Not because he's careless about the responsibility, but because he truly enjoys his job. This is so much more meaningful to me than images that show him off in the distance, detached from humanity. [ComicTwart]

Northstar



By Ted Naifeh.

Alpha Flight's Night Out



By Ryan Alexander-Tanner. I love Sasquatch's expression as he's not sure what to do with a depressed Puck. Meanwhile, Mac earns his name. [Drawbridge]

Sasquatch



By Gavin Spence. I've been looking through some old files recently and found this by my pal Gav who's also one of the artists on Cownt Tales.

Joy-Rider Spider



By Caanan Grall.

Discover the Thrill of Space and Time



By Justin White. [Love in the Time of Chasmosaurs: Click the link to find out also what happens to T-Rexes who play with finger traps.]

Western Robot



Artist Unknown. [Brother Cal has found several great robot paintings.]

Quotes of the Week: My mother lives in Hackensack

Was the "gravitas" of Richard Donner's Superman best expressed by Otis walking along screwing things up to the "Oafish Idiot" theme music? Or was that gravitas at its height when Valerie Perrine begged Superman to save Hackensack, New Jersey? Perhaps that "weight that no other superhero film really has" came from Luthor murdering a Metropolis police detective in cold blood and then the film immediately ignoring that for his comedy real estate scheme (which was such a great idea they recycled it for Superman Returns).

Yeah, The Dark Knight had no gravitas or weight compared to that.
--Snell, responding to Green Lantern screenwriter Greg Berlanti's comment that no other superhero film has had gravitas or weight "except for all the way back to Donner's Superman."

...everyone needs to stop using the word EPIC in place of the word GOOD.
--MRTIM

Recommended Reading: Siskoid's Reign of the Supermen

I mentioned this on the Twitter, but it's cool enough that I'll point it out here too. Having caught up with his Star Trek reviews, Blogger Extraordinaire Siskoid has taken on a new project that I'll let him explain in his own words:

Every day for at least the next year, I'll be presenting a different Superman. Different eras, alternate costumes, Elseworlds, Red K transformations, Bizarros, pastiches, alternate futures, replacements, tv and film versions, you name it.

I'm not a huge Superman fan, but I'm fascinated by the project. Superman's such an iconic character that there's a lot of room to tweak the details and still have him be Superman, though I suspect there would be disagreement about what's crucial and what can be gotten rid of. Can he be Superman without Jimmy Olson and Perry White? What about Lois Lane? Does he always have to work for a newspaper and fight a bald villain? Which of his powers does he absolutely have to have? How important is it that he have a weakness? It's extremely interesting to see the choices that storytellers have made over the decades and I'm looking forward to the rest of the series.

Art Show: Anubis and the Amazon

Anubis Guard



By Francesco Francavilla.

Wonder Woman



By Michael Dooney. [Pink of the Ink]

Trinity



By Ben Caldwell.

DC Elementary



By Tom Bancroft. [Project: Rooftop]

Art Show: Destroy This Mad Brute

Octomaid



By Carla Wyzgala. [Girls Drawing Girls]

The Toronto Roller Derby



By Vince Chui. [Art Jumble]

Black Canary



By Joe Quinones. [Project: Rooftop]

After the break: bats, Snowbird, Frankenstein, Scud the Atomic Hellwretch, DC fliers, Saturn Girl, and a crocodalien.

Bats
 


By Michele Legendre. Lots more cool, handmade plushies at that link, including a wolf-man and Appa from The Last Airbender.

Snowbird



By Jason Copland.

Frankenstein



By Andy Kuhn. [Comic Twart]

Fantastic Four



By Ryan Cody.

Superman with the World's Greatest Flying Heroes



By Neal Adams. [Photon Torpedoes]

'70s Saturn Girl



By Jim Lee. [Photon Torpedoes]

Thule Alien



By Kyle Latino.

Quotes of the Week: Sentient Hotdog Motorcycles

A while back I noted that televised news in the Marvel Universe must be like having professional wrestling on the air all the time, but, you know, at least that’s safely predictable. I think I’d be more comfortable watching Marvel News and seeing “Sub-Mariner and Dr. Doom have teamed up to fight the Fantastic Four,” which is something I could deal with, versus never knowing what new horror awaited me whenever I’d turn on DC News: “Top story tonight: Superman’s giant ant head…the world’s leaders react!” “The Dow dropped 300 points after today’s appearance of the Zebra Batman.”
--Mike Sterling, describing the respective strengths of Marvel and DC in as clear a way as I've ever seen.


I don't know that I could come up with anything new to say about [Superman] -- I'd probably shrink him and have him race Mr. Mxyztplk across the world on sentient hotdog motorcycles, or have him go on a reality show run by Lex Luthor wearing a blonde wig...
--Tom Spurgeon, trying to explain why he'd be no better a Superman writer than J Michael Straczynski, while simultaneously demonstrating that he's SO the man for the job.


Part of why Hamlet delays the murder of his uncle is that (and we've often spoken of his puritanism) murder is a sin. Though he was quick to swear revenge, the whole of the play has Hamlet working out how he can commit such an act (and abase himself to the level of Claudius - smiling and being a villain) in spite of his conscience. Even if we do not subscribe to Hamlet actually being mad, there is a dramatic insanity at work where a character cannot reconcile who he is and what he must do.
--Siskoid, explaining Hamlet in a way so that I can finally understand and accept the main character's inaction. Seriously, this is a big deal for me.