Barnestorming #9990- Dragon Con Post Mortem, Mark of the Ninja, Doom Patrol, Station to Station Hot

Have you read A Superman For All Seasons by Loeb and Sale? I think a fan of All-Star Supes would enjoy it. It's got more of a "down on the farm" Clark Kent feel to it that I enjoyed.

The Painting That Ate Paris was great fun. It's awesome to see the Justice League standing around uselessly in the face of a threat so strange that they can't even comprehend it, let alone stop it. That was always the specialty of the Doom Patrol, dealing with really strange situations. Even their silver age adventures were mindblowing, at least by silver age standards.

Fables is outstanding for the first dozen trades. Then there is a really terrible crossover with Jack of Fables. It was like the opposite of synergy. Jack of Fables was mediocre comic that gradually turned meh, but the crossover briefly turned both Fables and Jack of Fables into lousy comics. Jack sputtered to a halt not long after that, but Fables mostly recovered. Still, it might have been better if Fables wrapped up sometime around issue #80. For what it's worth, the Cinderella spin-off is actually excellent.

If you ever get the chance, track down Bill Willingham's first comic series, Elementals. He was 15-20 years ahead of most of the industry when he did that comic, and it holds up pretty well, at least through the first series. However, avoid the stupid and gratuitous Elemental Sex Specials at all cost. You're better off reading Ironwood if you need to read kinky comics by Willingham.

Although I have a variety of geeky interests, the only convention that still interests me is GenCon, because I can go there and play games with a bunch of my old gaming buddies that I otherwise rarely see anymore due to the distance. Other conventions seem like relatively pointless occasions for costumes, shopping and unabashed nerdiness. Maybe my priorities are messed up, but apparently I enjoy this stuff with friends and not so much with total strangers.

Be warned, after "The Painting that Ate Paris" Doom Patrol has its worst storyline. Just dull and boring. Possibly worth racing through. Probably better skipping to issue #42.

Mark of the Ninja put me to sleep faster than this article did.

Barnes, I thought of you today (this never happens) when I saw that Bayonetta II is going to be a Wii U exclusive! I know that the first Bayonetta gave you stiffies all the time so is this enough to make you get a Wii U for sure? Weird that they're doin' that, eh? It's not exactly the Wii's target audience. Are they going after Xbox360 and Ps3 market share?

"Told you so"

I'm much more happy to say "told you so" about DOOM PATROL and ALL-STAR SUPERMAN, though. I love Doom Patrol so much that I'm actually just ridiculously excited to hear about someone else reading it, which is absurd, really. But each point you get to in your read brings back great memories.

The Alan Moore Superman stories are pretty great ("For the Man Who Has Everything"? That JLU episode made me bawl), but I agree with you on All-Star Superman being the best Superman story ever. The grand finale still felt very human to me (and certainly issue #9? #10? the one where Superman tries to wrap up all the loose threads, cures cancer etc.); each issue is completely obsessed with death, and the ending just finally consummates that.

Agreed on THE INVISIBLES, too. When I read it in college I struggled with it, and then reread it, read LOTS of footnotes, and loved it, and it genuinely changed how I think about things, but I have almost zero interest in revisiting it. When Morrison self-indulges, it can get reaaaaaaaaaally ugly, and Invisibles is pretty much maximally indulgent Morrison. I know you're kind of overloaded on Morrison, but check out THE FILTH at some point. I felt like it did everything the Invisibles did in just 13 issues, and much more HUMAN than the Invisibles. Along with Superman, it's my favorite Morrison comic from the last decade.

Morrison is primarily known/stereotyped as a "big ambitious weird idea" writer, but his best stuff by far is when he pared down and did something more emotional, human-based: Animal Man, Doom Patrol, All-Star Superman, and The Filth, all of which are emotionally devastating to me.

Also, in case it got lost in the comments for your last Barnestorming: check out PRISON PIT on Comixology. I think it'll be right up your alley, and was one of my absolute favorite comics discoveries from last year; I'd been hot/cold on Johnny Ryan before, but New Character Parade blasted all the other Johnny Ryan comics I'd read out of the water, and then I checked out Prison Pit and "The World's Funniest Joke", and those turned out to be stone-cold masterpieces as well. In other words: even if you've thought other Johnny Ryan stuff was dumb/lame, he's done some really great stuff.

FABLES, I read the first two trades and thought they were embarrassingly bad (especially the first), but I was just reading someone saying that the third trade is much better, so I MIGHT read that third trade, if I can borrow it from the library or something.

SUPERMAN FOR ALL SEASONS? Gah, nice art but cloying as hell, which is a pretty typical direction to take "prestige" Superman stories.

PS: Re: Dragon*Con: sounds like you have similar feelings towards D*C that I have towards the San Diego Comic Con (which HAS changed, drastically, over the 20+ times I've attended); I'll keep going every year, but for a shorter and shorter time every year, just for very specific purposes (usually to see a cartoonist whos *never* goes to cons), and I'm totally grossed out by it. With SDCC's case, though, the thing that grosses me out is that it's basically nonstop advertising, and people are paying big sums of money and waiting in long lines to be advertised to, and it's consumerism at its absolute worst. In response to some of the people in your comments thread defending against your attacks against geek culture: for me, it's not that I really think the things geeks love are any worse than what the mainstream loves. The thing that makes me backlash against geek culture is the fact that geeks tend to act like they're *intellectually superior* for liking faerie Jean-Luc Picard wolf cock whatever the fuck over mainstream art, or for being able to memorize the byzantine history of Jean Grey, or that Firefly was just "too smart" for the mainstream audiences.

This is true. I wouldn't skip it, but it's definitely the low point of the run, AND simultaneously the LONGEST Doom Patrol storyline.

Huh, so that explains why the third Doom Patrol trade is out of print and the rest aren't, I suppose!

Man, the part with the Fifth Rider, the giant horse. Wow. That just blew me away, and for a strange personal reason that would take too long to divest here. What gets me about that story in particular is how fluently Morrison understands _art_ and in particular surrealism through the perspective of a nominative superhero comic book.

Invisibles strikes me as a book where Morrison is saying "here is all of the stuff I am interested in at once". And most of it was already apparent in Doom Patrol and other books he's done.

I did read the first eight or so Animal Man issues he did. Obviously, "The Coyote Gospel" is a masterpiece.

Very strange. Prison Pit isn't on IOS Comixology, but it's on the Web site.

Yes, yes, yes. Ne'er have truer words been spoken about "geek" culture. Being obsessed with Firefly is just as soul-rending and despicable as being obsessed with Jersey Shore or your local sports team. I was talking to my good friend Pierre at the convention and we were comisserating about how so much of what these people are practically worshipping is just corporate-controlled, consumer culture junk food.

It's the same thing with board games...that whole elitist attitude that blowing all of your money on board games and hiding the credit card slips from your wife is any better than spending it all on booze and hookers.

I just finished reading issue one of "Fatale" by Brubacker and Phillips and it's excellent. Terrific writing and pacing and some crazy shit going on.

Animal Man is maybe not quite up to the other comics I listed as among his best, but lays bare a lot of his key themes that he comes back to over and over in a more explicit way than his later comics, and is, as mentioned, a very human story. If you liked Coyote Gospel, keep reading (at some point), because it points towards the direction the entire series ends up going. Even if you've already had the ending "gimmick" spoiled, it doesn't matter, because it's not nearly as much a gimmick as it sounds like (and all the smarter-than-thous who claim "such-and-such author did it before Morrison, it's not new or innovative" are correct, it's not innovative: but they're dipshits because innovation was not the point, the point was to use the device for very specific story and thematic reasons).

Also, having read Animal Man all the way through makes a certain coloring change in the final issue of Doom Patrol hit like a motherfucking ton of bricks (though it's still clear, maybe just a few panels later, even if you haven't read Animal Man :-P).

Also, the first four issues of Animal Man are pretty not-good, so half of what you've read is the worst part of the series. It gets better.

Well the difference between spending your money on board games rather than booze and hookers is that a board game never made get on the interstate heading the wrong way and kill someone when we collided head on and I never got a case of syphilis from a board game, well not counting that used one I bought off of Barnes.

You are right about "sexy" costumes killing Halloween.

Halloween has always been a holiday for children, or a holiday for being a child again, so I really don't get *any* trend in what costumes adults wear can "kill Halloween".

I think what Repoman is sort of getting at is that when I was young, Halloween was pretty much all about the kids. Nowadays, it is marketed to adults as well, hence sexy costumes and giant beer displays with orange cans in the grocery stores. I don't remember seeing that 30 years ago.

I'll tell you what Repo means, because I agree.

Last year I was trying to find an appropriate "vampirey" or "undeady" costume for my 11 year old. EVERY ONE was a whore costume. I mean, fishnets, miniskirts, bustiers...for 11-14 year olds.

Every costume party I go to, which isn't many anymore, have been "who is the biggest slut" contests.

Yeah, Halloween went from scary to sexy in a matter of maybe 15 years and now it's just a great big whorefest from the age of maybe 12 and up for girls. Shit's ridiculous. Just google "teen halloween costumes" and see what I mean.

First is the "Pre-Teen" Heavenly Devil. Short dress, too-tall heels. For pre-teen. As in, 12 and under. WTF?
http://www.costumeexpress.com/Heavenly-Devil-Pre-Teen-Costume/38428/ ProductDetail.aspx

Second one is the mummy.
http://www.costumeexpress.com/Yo-Mummy-Teen-Costume/800032/ProductDetail.aspx

How the hell is this a "teen mummy" costume? It's a fucking club dress with stockings and a bandana. For a touch of extra class they made most of the material see-through.

The whor-i-fication of America continues unabated.

I can top any "sexy" costume you can name. When I ordered River and Scarlett's Batman and Robin costumes, they sent a catalog...in it were...I shit you not..."sexy" Winnie the Pooh and "sexy" Finding Nemo costumes. I really, really thought that "sexy" Sherlock Holmes was the bottom of the barrel.

It is disgusting to see these costumes made for 12 year old girls that literally look like pedophile fantasies. No pre-teen girl should, under any circumstance, think that dressing like a whore (even if it's a mummy whore or whatever) is fun, cool, or legitimately sexy in any way.

Then there's the "couple" costumes...the man gets the plug costume, the woman gets the socket. Who in the world that has any shred of dignity would wear that.

Halloween is ruined. I don't even really care about it anymore because of how tawdry, sleazy, and adult it's become. I miss when Halloween was about candy, old horror movies on TV, and kids trick or treating in Ben Cooper plastic masks. Now it's just an excuse for adults to get trashed while wearing slut outfits and vampire capes.

There were two converging trends that conspired to hijack Halloween from the kids:

1. Back in the '80s, American beer and liquor distributors were aggressively marketing to young adults, which effectively meant that their marketing also appealed to teenagers. This included making a really big deal out of Halloween as the autumn edition of Mardi Gras.

2. American parents became overly paranoid about their kids in the '90s, leading to the modern "helicopter parent" label. This is around the time when most American kids stopped playing outdoors and became pale, flabby introverts. Anyway, the idea of sending kids door-to-door to get candy from strangers became too scary a prospect for many parents. Over-reaction to a few isolated incidents involving razors in apples led to the near-end of a fun tradition.

Taken in combination, this effectively transformed Halloween from a kid's holiday to more of an adult holiday. Well that, plus all the naughty nurse costumes. As an adult who likes to party in a costume, it's great. But if I become a parent at some point, it will be disappointing that my kids won't be able to enjoy Halloween much until they grow up.

Wow, I guess I've been able to isolate myself in a bubble, because as far as I'm concerned Halloween is still *exactly* about

; for me as an adult it's also been about hosting horror marathons and throwing game parties where we play Fury of Dracula, Werewolf, Betrayal at House on the Hill, and pull out the VCR for a end-of-night play of Nightmare. Maybe things will change and I'll be exposed to the sad world shown in Pete's links when my kid gets old enough to trick-or-treat, but even then I don't see how he's going to be affected by this until he turns 12 or something.

In my neighborhood Halloween is still about the kids. There's parties going on for adults but there's generally about 100 kids in perfectly reasonable costumes working the doors.

S.

Halloween is still awesome. I think I enjoy it more now that I have little kids than when I was young.

Our neighborhood/section of town throws road blocks up at the ends of the main streets in and out of the neighbourhood so there is almost no traffic and tons of kids and families just cruise up and down the streets trick or treating. Lots of people in the area do up their houses with graveyards, scary music/sound effects, smoke, etc.

Plus my oldest (5) wants to be Doctor Octopus this year, so he and I are already figuring out how to do the tentacles (we may go with old vacuum cleaner hoses).

Fables is my favorite comic series. The first trade isn't a good representation of the series, but it does not follow the gumshoe procedural format at all. Can't remember at all what happens in the second volume. And yeah the Jack of Fables crossover sucked. But it picked up again after that.

I played Netrunner: Android last night. The rule book really should have been split into two rule books, one for Runner and one for Corp so each could have something to reference. Our first game I didn't find all the neutral cards that were supposed to be in my Corp deck so there wasn't enough Agendas. I won because I flatlined my brother playing as Runner, but the whole game I kept thinking "holy crap is this deck nothing but Ice?" We got it figured out for game two and I still one.

The rules are 99.99% Netrunner. The only difference I noticed is how Trace bids work. In the original game I think it was a blind bid, now it's open. That's the only change I saw. So it really comes down to the cards, and as I only have 2 starters from the original game, I'm not informed enough to give an opinion. I don't see the problem with the LCG format. We only played with the two factions it recommends for starters, but I felt my deck at least had some good synergy. Just browsing at the other decks looks like they are based around certain strategies (tagging runners, getting credits, etc).

Glad to hear someone else say that the first volume wasn't representative, I really will have to give it another shot. Second volume was the Animal Farm story, and while it didn't *stink* like I thought the first story did, I wasn't enticed into reading further.

I guess it depends on where you go what you do on Halloween. I still love the Holiday and I always will. It's been a few years since I've gone to a costume party, but the people I hang out with have some self respect. Back in college the costume parties were ridiculous. The girls had zero shame. It was all sexy Dorothy, Sexy Cops, big ol' titties in yo face and skank-o-licious bitches. If you go to a bar or club on Halloween it is probably the most revealing, slutfest of the year. Since I'm no longer in college and I wouldn't go to a bar on Halloween weekend, I'm pretty much in the clear these days.

But I digress...Halloween still rules because I have young family members that still like it. There are still pockets of the American suburbs where trick or treating is a fun night filled with neat decorations, candy galore and playful scares.

The other joy of the Halloween season is people are open to my invitations of horror movie nights! I can throw on the Horror of Dracula, Monster Squad, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Basketcase, Suspira, Phantasm, The Abominable Dr. Phibes...it doesn't matter because people are in the mood to be scared/entertained. My movie collection is filled with horror gems that people scoff at for 11 months out of the year. Late September and October is their time to shine!

Same goes for horror themed boardgames. I'm determined to break out Fury of Dracula this year. I might make it a Dracula themed night with Universal's Dracula (1931) being the prelude to the game. Of course Halloween makes it easy to break out any zombie themed game...Mall of Horror is one that I've had for a while that I need to play.

Halloween also rules because it is the height of autumn. We go to cider mills, haunted hay rides/houses/corn mazes, indulge in pumpking pancakes/coffee. Oh and the beer! Sam Adam's Octoberfest, Imperial's Pumking, Dogfish Head's Punkin Ale...

I love this time of year!

Don't get me wrong- I LOVE Halloween and all of that stuff (Punkin Ale in particular)...and we did trick or treat last year and it was awesome. But it's always a bummer to see how low it's gotten. That "Fall mardi gras" comment is dead on. And sexy Winnie the Pooh. Just remember that.

On the Netrunner rules...they've always been kind of problematic like that since both sides are playing very different games, complete with different nomenclature, procedure, and card types. The FFG rules are pretty decent, actually, but being familiar with the old rules helped.

I forgot about the bids, that is different. And you don't have an "Identity" card in the old game. Don't know how essential that element is, it feels kind of superfluous.

Yeah getting used to all of the game terms (Ice, Grip, Rig, HQ, R&D, rezzing, clicks, etc) does take some time. And the first couple of games are bumpy, but damn if it's still not a great game.

The identities are a bit superfluous, but don't really detract either.

I think the identities add a lot to the game in terms of deckbuilding. Without the identities they wouldn't be able to implement the influence system. And the influence systems aids the identities by reinforcing the specific themes of each corporation. I find that this will help maintain a thematic balance when building decks which really enhances the game for me.

As for the rules - they pretty much are already split into two rule books. Check the colour coding. Blue borders for corp rules, purple for runner and grey for neutral/shared rules. The index in the back is reasonably decent too. I have to say, I thought the rule book for Netrunner was actually quite good for both teaching and usability. I did have some trouble with the terms at first but I got over that pretty quickly.

Great points. I'm warming to them. All in all, it's just about a perfect update. It's probably the best- and most unlikely- release this year. It's Netrunner, folks. Games don't get any better.

I can't seem to find any enthusiasm for the new Netrunner. I checked, and I still have all my old Netrunner cards, including a half dozen of those excellent double starter decks. It doesn't sound like enough has changed for me to buy into this version. Maybe FFG will eventually be cranking out new cards that interest me, and then I will buy in.

Yeah, I think the identities are a great idea for constructed play; I think some kind of factioning is generally necessary in CCGs to ensure more cards get played. But like Shellhead, I'm still not remotely sold on the idea that this new Core Set is going to be more fun for pickup play than the sealed decks I have (btw, I'd love to get one more of those, if anyone is looking to get out of old Netrunner and into new Netrunner). If other people in town were into Android Netrunner and I had the time to get into playing constructed tournaments against strangers or whatever, then I'd be all into it, and I'd certainly recommend it more than old Netrunner for that purpose. I might even recommend it over Magic for that purpose, considering that *for the time being* the buy-in is extremely low and there's no netdecking possible.

Oh yeah, I still don't understand why they changed tracing, though. Not annoyed by it, just wonder why the change, I always thought the blind bid both-pay bluffing part was fun.

BTW, the "bad Doom Patrol" story that we were warning you was coming up: that's still 7 issues away from the end of the Brotherhood of Dada story, there are some GREAT issues in between. Next storyline is *great* (LOVE the fingerprint guys) and then there's the freaking BRAIN issue, followed by Danny the Street!!! The "bad" story we're referring to is issues 37-41, so it's actually only 5 issues, too!

Just read the Brain issue today as a matter of fact! Completely blown away. Probably the funniest dissertation on the mind and body I've ever read. To hell with Superman kissing Wonder Woman...the real stunner is that smooch between Brain and Monsieur Mallah. Cliff Steele in the jar- "will somebody please tel me what's a going on?" I was laughing so hard.

Just fucking great comic books. I regret passing this stuff by for so long. I would, in all earnestness, rank Morrison's DP just behind Watchmen. I feel like I'm being constantly bombarded by crazy, strange, brilliant, intellectual, and plain absurd ideas.

The fingerprint guys rule. And the fucking planet head guys.

Oh, is the "bad" story the Crazy Jane thing? I didn't think it was awful.

No it is a weird space thing with spiders. Can't remember much but I have blocked it out.

My rankings exactly!

Naw, the Crazy Jane issue is fine, I assume that what Ancient of Mumu is talking about is the whole space war saga. I was surprised when I looked it up and it's only 5 issues, I remember it seeming a lot longer. I was also surprised to find that just about all the other Doom Patrol storylines are 3-4 issues long; amazing what an epic feel he managed to pack into those short storylines, especially considering that *every* superhero story nowadays is 6 issues long, to make it long enough for the trade (which I don't particularly mind, honestly, since I read them via trade).

Edit: I was right about the space war.

The space war is a bit tedious, but the ending made me laugh. And at least it was a coherent story, unlike any Morrison issues after the opening scene in issue #50.

Wow. I need to note this day in my diary - the second time F:ATies discuss a comic I have read (first time was Captain Harlock, and that was really only a mention rather than a discussion. Loved Doom Patrol, but never knew anyone else who read it. I need pull out my old copies and re-read it. I think I am missing a few issues, but I can't remember.

? Not sure which Doom Patrol storyline past #50 was incoherent; despite the weirdness of the premises, his Doom Patrols are shockingly among his more coherent stories, I always thought. We'll have to talk about it once Barnes gets there, I guess :-)