Category: Highlights

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Today, a group of comics bloggers have gotten together to recommend lesser-known gems of the comics world. Comics are more than Brightest Day and Heroic Age, and you just might want to…read this too!

The Unwritten, by Mike Carey and Peter Gross. Recommended for mature readers. Published by Vertigo Comics.

The Unwritten is a story about stories, and the impact fiction has on reality. It’s told as an adventure, filtered through today’s media-crazed society, modern fantasy (especially the Harry Potter phenomenon), occasional moments of horror, and centuries of popular literature.

It was also my favorite new comic book of 2009.

The Plot

Years ago, author Wilson Taylor vanished after writing 13 immensely popular children’s fantasy novels, leaving his son Tom — the real-life inspiration for “Tommy Taylor” — to grow up as a Z-list celebrity. A question at a fan convention sets the adult Tom onto a path of adventure and danger that has him doubting even his own past, as the world begins to wonder: Did Tom Taylor inspire Tommy Taylor? Or is he Tommy Taylor made real?

By the time of the third major arc, Tom has been proclaimed a messiah, framed for murder, and declared dead. He’s acquired a power trio much like the heroes in his father’s novels (naturally, in the Harry/Hermione/Ron mold), with one ally who may be a fictional character brought to life, and one who plays the sleazy reporter but has his own connections. They’re on the run from a secret cabal, its hit man who can transform objects (and people) into their component ideas…and the surprisingly real vampire nemesis from the Tommy Taylor books, Count Ambrosio.

Stories

Although Tom is just now figuring out his role in events, the villains have been pulling strings for centuries. They’ve shaped the world through stories: by controlling how history was recorded, and by ensuring that stories were written that promoted their goals. One early issue flashed back from the present to Rudyard Kipling, who was quite happy to write stories for them promoting the British Empire…until they asked him to change his tune, and he lost everything.

Of course, since this is a fantasy series, stories can also impact reality directly. Magical objects cross into reality, people travel into stories, and in one case, a particularly tormented story actively threatens the heroes.

Every few issues, the focus moves away from Tom Taylor to reveal another piece of the puzzle. One focuses on two children caught up in Tommy Taylor fandom to the point where they aren’t quite sure where playing ends and believing begins. Another focuses on a servant of the cabal trapped inside a Winnie the Pooh–like setting by a writer who was prepared to stop him.

The Unwritten frequently mixes in excerpts from media commenting on the events of the story: television news, magazine articles, blogs, even Twitter conversations. In one issue, Tom is kidnapped by a deranged fan and threatened on a live webcam feed, while viewers debate whether it’s real or just a publicity stunt. In another, a TV news network focuses on the launch of the latest Tommy Taylor novel, while the ticker at the bottom of the screen runs through a series of dire headlines which would normally be the top stories of the day

The latest issue reveals the past of Tom’s ally and guide, Lizzie Hexam…in a choose-your-own-adventure format. She always ends up in the same place, but the path she takes varies…along with the most important parts of her back story. They’re all equally canonical, and you as the reader get to choose which version is “real.” In a sense, we do that with everything we read or watch. We have our favorite versions of stories, TV episodes and comic book issues that “don’t count,” and our own ideas of what’s going on off-screen or between panels.

The Unwritten is up to 17 issues so far, collected in two trade paperbacks with a third on the way. Carey and Gross have a complete story in mind, one that they hope to tell over 60 or 70 issues. Update 2015: The series is complete now, collected in 11 volumes of the main story and a related graphic novel, Tommy Taylor and the Ship that Sank Twice.

Interested in reading more? Good! I’ve written about a more traditional super-hero comic, Astro City, at Speed Force. And there are more bloggers out there. Check out the lesser-known titles reviewed in these other blogs and read these, too!

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I’ve finally found something more crowded than Comic-Con International: The Orange Street Fair on a Saturday night.

I think we usually end up going on Sunday, because while it’s usually a solid crowd, I don’t remember feeling quite so…herded. We ended up not doing much more than getting dinner and dessert.

Still, the baklava on Greek Street was good, as were the “Australian” potatoes (that probably weren’t any more Australian than the ice cream), and one of the lemonade stands was offering diet lemonade sweetened with Stevia, which meant Katie could actually drink it.

Overheard

“Do you want a Viking helmet?” “F%@# yeah, I do!”

“Is your name Don?” “Uh, no.” “I wonder what it would have meant if your name was Don.”

“These cupcakes are insufficiently sized.”

“Do you even know where you’re going?” “Yeah, that way.”

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I’m listening to The Bird and the Bee right now. Every single track on the album is labeled as [Explicit] because of the song called “F——ing Boyfriend,” even though that’s the only song that actually has any explicit lyrics.

Both iTunes and Amazon have two versions of the album. One is marked explicit on every single track. The other has edited the one song, and isn’t marked.

I suppose that might have made sense in the old days when an album was only ever sold as a complete unit (with maybe a single or two)…but in today’s digital market, the base unit isn’t the album. It’s the song. If the song itself isn’t explicit, it shouldn’t be labeled as such. That would be like giving Spider-Man an R rating because Sam Raimi also directed Evil Dead.

Some consequences:

  • On my playlist, 9 out of 10 songs from this album are labeled [Explicit], but aren’t. They’re perfectly suitable to play around children and people with sensitive ears, but are labeled as if they’re offensive.
  • Anyone searching iTunes or Apple for an individual song will see at least two versions, one of which says it’s explicit (but isn’t) and one of which doesn’t — even though they’re the exact same recording. Confusing your customer is bad for business.

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I am so tired of “critiques” that boil down to one of the following:

  1. I have no use for or interest in this, therefore no-one does or should.
  2. Pop culture was so much better during my formative years than the crap they put out today.

These are, to put it mildly, a load of bull.

1. So you don’t have a use for it. Other people have different interests than you do. They also have different needs than you do. You might not need a roto-rooter, but a plumber is going to find it very useful.

This one really infuriates me when it comes from supposed techies. So you don’t have a use for a touchscreen with your giant desktop setup with a wall of six monitors. That doesn’t mean touchscreens can’t be useful on, say, handheld devices, or a small wall unit in the kitchen. There’s a reason this xkcd strip rings true.

2. There was plenty of crap back in the day, too. You’ve just had time to forget the mediocre, while the good stuff has stood the test of time. Not everyone who wrote plays during Shakespeare’s time was a great playwright, and not every movie produced before Star Wars was a great work of art.

Plus, y’know, they were your formative years. Of course you’re going to like stuff from that era better, because that’s what shaped your tastes.

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Last night I noticed @BadAstronomer posting ideas for a Twitter meme, #fishpopstars. It’s pretty much what you’d expect: take a singer or band name and make a pun with the name of a fish.

Katie and I came up with these:

  • Death Crab for Cutie
  • Chum-bawamba
  • Flounders of Wayne
  • Vienna Tang
  • Betta than Ezra
  • Dace of Base (or Ace of Bass)

Some favorites from the event:

  • beano76: Sushi and the Banshees
  • shinkaide: Squid Vicious
  • MisterElGuapo: No Trout
  • ebrown2112: Fleetwood Mackerel
  • Caissie: Sharkira
  • dominichamon: Kylie Minnow
  • ethanwc: Crash Test Guppies
  • ThisModernDeath: Ling Cod Park
  • earlkabong: Herman’s Hermit Crabs
  • znmeb: Pike and Tuna Turner
  • AndyJukes: Smelton John
  • KenPlume: Mackerel Jackson
  • notgiamatti: Jefferson Starfish

It looks like it’s still going on if you’re in the mood for fish puns.

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Mental Telepathy

I’ve always been annoyed by the phrase “mental telepathy.” It’s just redundant, like “big giant” or “fast speedster.” Is there any such thing as non-mental telepathy?

So it was nice to see someone taken to task in this panel from a Flash story in Adventure Comics #459…all the way back in 1978!

The characters pictured are two of Barry Allen’s high school classmates at their fifteen-year reunion. The woman, Rachel has just picked up that one of their classmates is the Flash.

Hijinks ensue.

Cross-posted at Speed Force.