Harry Potter Retrospective Part 5

You know what I just watched?

A preview clip for the final Harry Potter movie. It's just a few months away people. But before I'll experience that grand nerd event I'll have moved, seen my latest second cousin get baptized, taken a trip to and from USA (Logan and Las Vegas to be specific) and hopefully I'll have read through the last two books in the series. But that's in the future, a concept which some say doesn't actually exist but that's an entirely different discussion.

At this point in time I'll be talking about Harry Potter & The Order of the Phoenix. Possibly my favourite book in the series, at least as far as I can recall.

Top ten awesomest Batman: The Brave and the Bold episodes

Deciding that I don't put up enough stuff on this thing I've decided to throw out my usual pre-planning thinking and just do a new top ten list of the top of my head. And the first thing that came to mind was Batman: The Brave and the Bold episodes, mostly because I'd just watched the episode where Superman guest stars.

For those that don't know BTBATB is a fairly new cartoon series, around two years old, that focuses on Batman, of course. But unlike the grim, gritty, adult and "mature" Batman: The Animated Series and The Batman the subject of this indulges itself in the silliers aspects of the Batman mythos, and indeed the superhero genre itself, while presenting it all with a perfectly straight and serious face. The results is one of the most hilarious and awesome cartoon shows I've seen in a long time. Think Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on crack and steroids and you've got the mood down... that's probably a horrible analogy but it sounded weird enough.

In each episode Batman is joined by another character from the DC comics universe and they go on adventures where they do stuff like battle talking gorillas riding pteodactyls, particiapate in Wacky Races style races to determine the fate of the earth and, naturally, sing innuendo filled songs!

The series has its fair share of detractors claiming that it isn't an accurate representation of Batman and his world. The series has answered these concerns with a statemate made by the fourth-wall breaking 5D imp Bat-Mite.

"Batman's rich history allows him to be interpreted in a multitude of ways. To be sure, this is a lighter incarnation, but it's certainly no less valid and true to the character's roots than the tortured avenger crying out for mommy and daddy."

As should be obvous by now I agree with this statement and wish to celebrate the series with this top ten list. It should be noted though that this list is ordered merely by my whim of the evening and that I have not managed to see all the episodes. Also I'm probably forgetting one or two that I have seen. So take this with a massive grain of salt. Now let's get to it.

10. Inside the Outsiders

Summary: The Psycho-Pirate has kidnapped the teen team the Outsiders and plans to turn their weaknesses into his strength. Batman's only hope of saving them is to enter their dreams.

Thoughts: I always like when we get to go into a character's head through some weirdass sciencey thing so this episode was a natural fit here. What makes it stand out to me is how the mood switches between each of the Outsiders. Katana's flaws is pretty predictable but provides a fun yet totally serious scene. Black Lightning's problems however turn out to be quite eyebrow raising and sort hilarious. Then it's all topped off with Metamorpho's very realistic and almost heart-breaking insecurities and rage. The interaction between Batman and th Outsiders is always golden for me. Put it all together and you've got a fun episode all around.

9. Journey to the center of the Bat

Summary: As Batman has been stricken by a dangerous disease it is up to the Atom and Aquaman to shrink down and enter Batman's body to cure him of his illness so that he can stop Brain's diabolical schemes.

Thoughts: I just had to have an Aquaman centered episode here. He's easily one of the most entertaining supporting characters on the show and this is probably my favourite of his episodes. His adventurous attitude and positive bravado plays off hilarious against the Atom's no-nonsense science hero. The bond they build after a tragic sacrifice makes me look forward to more episodes with these two. And Batman gets major props for going into battle while almost unable to stand up and with spikey things growing on him. His battle against the immobile Brain just makes me smile.

8. Requiem for a Scarlet Speedster

Summary: Two years after the apparent death of Barry Allen, the second Flash, his ghost appears screaming for help. To solve the mystery Batman, along with Jay Garrick, the original Flash, and Kid Flash travel 25th century where they must do battle with Professor Zoom.

Thoughts: What's not to like about this story? It has three of the four incarnations of one of DC's most notable heroes guest starring. The plot is about the convoluted mess that is time travel. There's some honestly serious and emotional moments between Kid Flash and Jay. And the rogues at the beginning and end of the episode just steal the show. Good old fashioned superhero buisness. I love it.

7. Fall of the Blue Beetle

Summary: Jaimie Reyes, the current Blue Beetle, is trying to figure out who he is as a hero. But when Batman won't tell him anything about his predecessor Jaimie takes things into his own hands which leads to him putting a destructive army in the hands of a supervillain.

Thoughts: This is one of those episodes I'd point to if anybody ever says that this show only deals with silly and childish matters. The flashbacks that show Batman's friendship with the original Blue Beetle are really touching and greatly build the sadness to his demise. And you really feel for Jaimie as his searching for his roots as a hero. The end of this episode brought about a tiny sniffle of happiness when I saw it the first time. Of course I had to put it on the list.

6. A Bat divided

Summary: During a battle with Doctor Double X, Batman is split into three versions of himself that posses seperate aspects of his personality. Helping the caped crusader pulling himself back together is Firestorm, a hero created from the mix of a brilliant student and his dimwitted coach harnassing the power of atomic energy!

Thoughts: One of the funniest episodes in the series. The three Batmen are just hilarious to listen to, especially the one that is what remains of Batman once you've stripped away his logical side and his crime-punishing side. What you get is a easy going slacker that likes to eat nachos with melted cheese. Yeah. The episode also works very well as an origin-story for Firestorm as it gives us the basics for the character and this series version of him/they... whatever.

5. Hail the Tornado Tyrant

Summary: Android hero Red Tornado builds a son to ease his loneliness, he even manages to give the boy human emotions. Saddly this leads to the son developing a hatred for humanity and it is up to Batman and Red Tornado to put him down.

Thoughts: Another one of the serious episodes of the series. This time dealing with themes of fatherhood, justice vs vengence and emotions. The tale of Tornado Champion, what the boy is named, is a sad one indeed and I just can't help but be moved by it. And even in the sorrow of his defeat the show somehow still manages to make things seem bright at the end without making it lame. Just a great episode.

4. Battle of the Superheroes

Summary: When Superman suddenly starts acting like a jerk it's up to Batman to stop his old chum before the man of steel starts using his incredible powers to take over the world

Thoughts: Freaking awesome and hilarious. Those are the words I would use to describe this episode. It's basically a love letter to Superman adventures as they were in the 60s, incredibly silly and weird. There's references to stuff like the old Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen comics, Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns and even an old Doctor Doom cliché pops up. Not to mention that the battle between Superman and Batman is pretty damn impressive. For those that know their comic book history this episode is a treat.

3. The Eyes of Despero

Summary: With most of the Green Lantern corps MIA it is up to Batman and the three remaining Green Lanterns, the arrogant blowhard Guy Gardner, the why-the-hell-is-he-even-here-guy G'nort and the so very obviously a bad guy Sinestro, to stop the mighty Despero from conquering the universe.

Thoughts: Batman... IN SPACE! That alone is awesome. Throw in the most ragtag GL team I've seen a reference to one of the most hilarious "fights" in comics and mix all together with above par epic space battles, good humor and some nice character moments and you got an all around great episode. And Batman does look cool in his GL space armor.

2. Mayhem of the Music Meister

Summary: Through his litterally enchanting singing voice the Music Meister plans to take over the world and make Black Canary his bride. Can Batman defeat this melodious miscreant?

Thoughts: From a story structural standpoint this a very basic plot. A new villain appears with a diabolical plan that threatens everything. Batman shows up, they fight and Batman saves the day and drives off into the sunset. Only difference. It's a musical episode. And the songs are honestly really good. Just listen to these Drives us Bats and Death Trap. I especially tend to sing the former one silently during work. Oh and you know... Neil Patrick Harris plays the Music Meister. That is just too awesome really.

1. Darkseid Descending

Summary: Batman assembles a new Justice League to combat an approaching invasion from Apokolips. But can even the combine might of seven superheroes stand up to the might of the master of Apokolips, Darkseid?

Thoughts: EPIC! Here we have classic superhero action at its best. A ragtag team (with a membership that harkens back to the JLI days) facing off against a dark god and his personal army. I love the episodes when multiple heroes appear at once and in this one we get many of my favourites in one go. At the same time we're introduced to a version of Martian Manhunter that is more bothered by the AC malfunctioning at the team's satellite HQ than by the impending invasion. That's funny. Other funny parts include the heroes hideout being discovered because one of them was tweeting about it. And the final battle against Darkseid is indeed EPIC. This is basically an ur-type of superhero stories and I love every second of it.

And there you have it. Ten of my favourite episodes of Batman: The Brave and the Bold. The order I put them in no longer corresponds to my opinion and there are several that should probably be there instead. But I don't care about that. The show has entered its third and final season, because the world is stupid, and I just wanted to talk about it.

Until next time GO WATCH THE SHOW!

What nerds can look forward to in 2011

A new year is upon us, has been for about half a month, and with it comes a plethora of new movies, games, comics and other wonderful nerd stuff that we can all look forward to... or dread depending on once preferences. So I figured that I'd just list a few of the things that I'm excited about this year, besides my totally awesome summer trip to Las Vegas, and a few things that I will avoid like the plague.

Let's start off with movies. This year will be an interesting year for comic book movies as I believe the genre, is it really a genre, will face its greatest challenge yet. The three big movies of this type that are coming out this summer are Marvel's Thor and Captain America and DC comics' Green Lantern.

      

Ok, so besides not exactly being household names to the common non-comic reading audience there are a few reasons these might be hard to sell. But I'm just gonna mention the big thing. Thor and Green Lantern might just be a bit too out there for people who haven't had their minds blown open by years and years of isolated comic book reading. Just listen to the both these characters' deals.

Thor is a norse viking god who is sent to modern day earth by his father to learn a lesson in humility and in doing so he becomes a bonafide superhero.

Green Lantern is a young man who's been chosen by a dying alien to inherit a ring that gives him the power to use green energy to create anything his mind can imagine. He also becomes part of an intergalactic police force with over 3000 other aliens weilding the same type of ring.

I fear that these might be considered unrelateable and silly by non-comic book readers. But hopefully the movies will be good enough to overcome any such obstacles. When it comes to Captain America there's a whole other problem. Namely that european audiences might brush it off as a sort of "America is AWESOME" type film because of the main character's name, I've met people who feel this way about the character. Which would be a shame because Captain America is about more than just USA being great.

Either way I'm looking forward to all three of these movies, mainly Thor, and I hope that they'll all do well. It would nice for Marvel to continue building up good steam for their Avengers movie and if DC could gives us a successfull movie based around a character who isn't Batman.

On the other side of the spectrum I strongly recommend that you avoid the following three, in-all-likelihood, cinematic abomanations. They share in common that their visible actors will be starring alongside lesser computer animated versions of classic tv characters. There's Yogi Bear with Dan Aykroyd in the lead and, get this, Justin Timberlake as Boo-boo. Then there's The Smurfs with a rather eclectic cast of actors voicing the blue little buggers as they appear in modern day New York. Because that's exactly what I think off when I think of the smurfs. Adventures in modern day New York. Last on this little list is the third live-action Transformers movie.

That's all I'm gonna say about that one. I'm firmly holding on to my opinion that the first Transformers movie is one of the worst movies that I've ever seen. The second one sounds even worse. I hold no hope for the third installment.

If you want to see a movie with computer animation primarily featured that'll probably actually be good I recommend Kung Fu Panda 2. It'll probably be awesome.

Next up is comic book related stuff. Since most comics are kept secretive to keep storylines and plot twists a surprise to the readers I'm a bit limited here. However I do know what I'm looking forward to. Namely the double-filled cosmic adventures of Annihilators and Rocket Raccon & Groot. The first is a team of five of the most powerful heroes in the space-ways taking on whoever the hell is strong enough to actually take them on and not die in epic superhero fashion. The latter is the misadventures of an antropomorphic raccon and tree. And both of these stories will be published in the same comic for a higher price.  If that is the way to save Marvel's cosmic line I don't know but I do know that it'll be a helluva lot of fun.

And I'm not aware of any comic storyline that I will actively avoid due to thinking that it'll sucks. But I am wary about Marvel's coming huge summer event storyline Fear Itself. The problem with most comic book event storylines is that they seldom live up to the idea behind them, which are often interesting and have great potential. Marvel seems to try to avoid that this time by being actively being very vague about what'll happen.

What we do know is that it'll be a battle between the heroes of Marvel against the god of fear and that the story will reflect the world of today in that everybody is afraid of something or someone or just about everything due to the climate we live in. Also, it'll involve the Marvel version of Dracula which I interesting in that it's very unusual. Accordingly it'll be as big as Civil War which is worrying because that story was ridiculous in how gigantic and all-encompassing it was. It's written by Matt Fraction who I find as hit or miss most of the time. So we'll how this turns out. Can't be any worse than Siege.

Lastly let's look at some video games. First up I'll say that I'm not at all looking forward to any kind of shooter game. They're just not my cup of tea unless I'm playing them for short periods at Ruy Hobble's place. So I don't really care about stuff like Gears of War 3 and Dead Space 2 (that the latter is a horror game doesn't help it in my book). And Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception looks like an adventure I'd rather see on movie screen than play. That said they all admittedly look like good games. I just don't think that they'll excite me.

Games that I think will probably suck are the inevitable tie-ins to the above mention comic book movies. There's always a game for those and 90% of the time that game sucks.

Then there are the games that I'm interested in but I'm not certain that I'll be getting. Portal 2 looks mind-trippingly brilliant and The Last Guardian has an interesting premise. But since I'm such a caveman in these things it's no guranteed that I'll get them, at least not until later.

There are three games however that I've already decided that I'll buy. First up is Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of 2 Worlds. A fighting game with some of my favourite comic characters duking it out with some of my favourite video game characters. You bet your ass that I'm getting that. Now if they could just announce whether Thanos will be playable or not... or if the rumours about Galactus being playable are true. That'd be insane.

Next up is Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. The next big Zelda game and the first to truly be made for the Wii's unique controls. The developers are really hyping up how different this will make the gameplay experience and since the big Zelda games are often pretty freaking excellent I'm willing to believe them. The only sad thing is that apparently it'll take place before Ocarina of Time so Midna will not appear to funny and awesome a second time around.

And lastly there's the game that I'm probably looking forward to the most this year. It's Batman: Arkham City, the sequel to the absolutely brilliant hit game of 2009. We've only seen trailers without actual game footage and some screen shots but that alone, along with the info released, is enough to make me drool with anticipation. Parts of Gotham have been closed off and given over to the colorful criminals of the city. One of them knows about Batman's secret identity. And the Catwoman in the picture below is REALLY hot.

That this will apprently be Mark Hamill's last performance as the Joker makes it all the more interesting. I can't wait.

And that's some of the stuff I'm looking forward to in 2011.