Mark Your Calendar!

Kathy & I will be away at the Philadelphia Folk Festival (watching great musicians like Baka Beyond, the Mammals, Doc Watson, Vance Gilbert and John Flynn, along with tons of acts we've never heard before, and if you want to join us, just say the word), but for an entirely different experience -- one which I will be jealous of, despite being at the happiest place on earth -- the Film Forum is having a double feature (for the price of one) on August 17 & 18: The Warriors and Superfly.

Come out to plaa-aay!

Rob

Sushi vs. Spinach

Baron Bizarre on the Captain Comics board pointed me toward this video. I hadn't posted one in a while, so enjoy this animated throwdown: Popeye versus Anime! (And thanks, Baron!)



Rob

Friday Night Fights: Late to the Ring

Captain Marvel Junior cleans house!

(Bahlactus is ringin' the bell.)

Rob

Hey, Taxi!

For the past month or so, I have this fantasy about my time in New York. I’m heading somewhere uptown and decide to hail a cab. I climb inside and tell the driver my destination. Suddenly I hear a sharp blast of sound and the roof of the cab lights up – I’m on Cash Cab!

I can’t tell you how much I’d like to appear on this show. Cash Cab is a game show on the Discovery Channel in which unsuspecting riders are asked general interest questions as they travel to their destination. The further they go, the more money they can win. But if they miss three questions. They’re back out on the street again.

And man, I love it. I love the ambush when they first get into the cab—some folks have great surprised faces. I love seeing the cab travel down streets and past shops I recognize. And there’s not the sort of filter that a show like Jeopardy! has -- all sorts of people hail cabs. Salesmen, stoners, professors, club-hoppers – anyone can play. Some do surprisingly well. (I was thrilled when a guy and his teen daughter took a ride, and she was the one who knew Alexander Hamilton wrote The Federalist Papers. Put that in yer pipe and smoke it, “kids today are stupid” crowd!) Others, not so much. Some people tank three questions in a row, which is its own kind of fun.

We watch a lot of serial TV at our house. Plenty of dramas have ongoing stories, and sitcoms like The Office and 30 Rock do it as well. So it’s a treat to have this show in our rotation, ready to play we need some lightweight fun.

Rob

Not on the Deck, Nutsy!

So, as I was leaving the house yesterday evening, I noticed a squirrel was taking a leak on our deck.

I shooed him away, and he ran out into the street, and I continued to shoo him until he was out of sight.

And then I thought -- what if it's my dad?

I'm pretty much joking about that. Of course it's not my dad, and even if it were, I wouldn't let him pee on our patio. (Maybe especially if it were.) But every now and then since Dad died, Mom feels his presence when there's a squirrel around. (I don't know why the squirrels stand out to her; I'm sure she feels connected with him at different times every day, squirrel or no squirrel.) Anyway, the end result is that when I see squirrels, I think of Dad too. Which is nice.

Unless they're taking a leak.

Rob

Packin' Heat

Almost certainly exacerbated by this, I weighed in up 4.4 pounds today. (That is approximately the weight of the gun at right, a Magnum Research BFR .22 Hornet.) Next week will be better.

Rob

Regarding Question #2, Below

There are other times, like today, when I'd just perfer to elbow everyone in Penn Station in the face on my way to the train.

Rob

Get Ta Know Me! Part V

Greg has asked me a bunch of questions -- mostly comics-related -- and I'm finally getting around to answering them. Hopefully I'll be able to add some images to this big block o' text once I get home...

1. If you could erase from history the events in any one comic (or involving any one character) where things "went the wrong direction," (a la my opinion of pretty much everything with Swamp Thing since Alan Moore's departure) who/what would it be?

You want obscure? I’ll give you obscure!

I choose Legion of Superheroes #6, from 1988 or so. It was the issue that reality warped back to “normal” from a universe that Mordru the Merciless ruled, but the change was slightly imperfect. History had changed, so that Supergirl was no longer a member of the Legion – he place was taken by a similarly powered lookalike named Laurel Gand (Mon-El’s cousin – and yes, skip down to question 2, all you non-comics geeks).

Her introduction wasn’t bad – there’s nothing wrong with the story per se, and it’s part of one of my favorite runs in Legion history. But – BUT! – it was the first time the LSH’s history was presented as malleable, and paved the way for the various reboots to follow. I’ve liked each of those reboots, but every time history changes it takes me farther and farther from the Legion that I loved as a kid and teen. So as much as I liked that particular issue, it started a slippery slope that I’d veer away from, given the chance.

Okay, non-geeks? It’s safe again.

2. You can perform one illegal action without any (legal) consequences. What is it?

Legal consequences aren’t the only consequences I’d face for most crimes – so stealing and killing are out. (Sadly.) This leaves me with streaking. Not a victimless crime, by any means – I can only imagine the nightmares will continue for generations after the last person to see me race through the Vatican butt-naked is dead and gone – but one that my conscience wouldn’t trouble me too much about.

3a. Let's set aside our ideals of comic movie adaptations for a moment. Given the films that do exist, what's the best comic book movie?

Hmm. Spider-Man 2 is the best superhero movie. American Splendor may be the best comic book movie.

3b. Okay. Now, what's your favorite?

Tough one. For suspense and action, I’d say V For Vendetta. But I love Hellboy too, for sheer comic-book fun. And there’s nothing – nothing! – like the Modesty Blaise movie – a case where “favorite” and “best” aren’t even in the same universe.


4. Of all the cool books no longer being published, if you could resurrect one, with any of its previous creative teams, who would produce all new stories, which would it be?

5. On your word, Andy Helfer and Kyle Baker will pick up where they left off and continue their work on The Shadow to some kind of conclusion. Do you give the word? Well? Do you?

Why’d you ask the same question twice?

Okay, in reverse order:

5) Of course I do. And that word is “Lenore.”

4) What would I choose? More Preacher stories? More Sandman? More Transmetropolitan, more Chase, more Suicide Squad? (Actually, we’re getting more Suicide Squad, and a little more Hitman, too. So that’s nice.) More Flash by Cary Bates and Irv Noivick (my personal favorite team)? More Legion by Levitz and Giffin? More Question by O’Neill and Cowan?

So many of these are tempting. But I can’t help thinking that they were all somewhat a product of their time.

I think the revival that would make me happiest would be this:

More Calvin & Hobbes. Or, frankly, anything else Bill Watterson wants to write and draw. I can’t think of any comics rebirth that would make me so happy, and so confident of the results.


Rob

(As usual, if you’d like to be interviewed, just ask. I’ll ask you five questions in these comments, and you can answer them on your blog, or here, if you don’t have a blog. They won’t necessarily be about comics, so there’s no need to be left out!)

Four Margarita Lunch

So pleaes forgiv any tpyos.

Rob

Get Ta Know Me! Part IV

My pal Travis over at Tilting at Pinwheels answered my questions, then asked me five of his own. As usual, I had a ball answering them.

1. Which comic book character would you most like to have a beer with?

Reverend Jesse Custer. The man can drink, argue, and fight, and knows the proper time for each.

2. Name one character that you wish had stayed dead.

I feel like I oughta say Jason Todd. So far, there hasn’t been a decent story told with him since his reintroduction (which was pretty good). I think Batman’s guilt over Jason’s death is undermined by his coming back to life (obviously), and his tactics and moral code are so blurry right now I don’t know whether he’s really a bloodthirsty vigilante or merely just a “talk tough” vigilante. He’s the obvious choice to me. More than anything else, the focus on him is why I’m dropping Countdown. (Well, that and the glacial pacing.)

But instead, I’m going to choose Professor X. he’s died a few times, I think, only to be revealed as “not really dead” every time. But frankly, I think the X-Men are much more interesting when they don’t have a clear leader. Cyclops can never shine when Professor X is around – he can only be the good, dutiful son. I haven’t read the X-Men regularly for a long while, and I doubt much would bring me on board, simply because of the sheer expense and weight of the series and its spin-offs. But for my money, intra-mutant power struggles is where it’s at – and they can’t happen while Professor X is still on his feet. So to speak.

3. Assuming it was done right, what would be your dream comic-to-movie project?

I’d love to see a film of Ostrander’s Suicide Squad. Deadshot, Boomerang, Nemesis, Duchess, Rick Flag, Bronze Tiger, Nightshade and the Wall. With some other assorted scoundrels thrown in. It could be the Magnificent Seven of superhero movies.

4. Which childhood to do you wish you still had?

Tough one. I’m not sure where my Dapper Dan doll is, although I’m guessing my Mom has it. But ol’ Dan is certainly still around. So I’llsay my Evel Knievel motorcycle toy. I’d take a cerrated lastic strip and pull it out the back of the launcher, and E.K. would shoot over toward a ramp, where he’d almost always wipe out in some neck-breaking fashion. But he was always ready to go again. No teaching that guy. He had more guts than sense, but that’s why we loved him.

5. What is you favorite documentary?

That’s a tough one. I’ve really just started paying attention to documentaries; I guess we have Michael Moore to thank for making them popular again. There are some classics I’ve never seen, like Hoop Dreams or the 7-Up series. I’ve seen a few political docs – although I liked Bowling for Columbine, my favorite of these was Outfoxed which made a really compelling (if somewhat repetitive) case for how Fox News slants the events it presents as news. I’m only one part into Spike Lee’s When the Levees Broke, about Katrina and its aftermath, and I’m planning to see the big Bob Dylan retrospective that Martin Scorcese was involved with last year. I really liked what I saw of Ken Burns’s Baseball, and hope to see his Jazz one day.

But at the moment, my favorite may be the one I saw only a few weeks ago: Eroll Morris’s Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control. It really is amazing, and I’d recommend it to anybody.

As always, if you want to be asked five interview questions (comic or otherwise), put a note in the comments. It’s a lot of fun.

Rob

On the Road with Baker, Weber and an Armful of Juice

The other day I had the afternoon off, so I slid on down to the Film Forum to see Let’s Get Lost, a film by Bruce Weber about jazz trumpeter Chet Baker. I knew very little about Baker, mostly because I had taped David Wilcox singing “Chet Baker’s Unsung Swan Song” on the World Café years ago, and played that tape quite a bit in those pre-mp3 days. One look at the lyrics will tell you he was addicted to drugs of some sort; Wilcox’s explanation that preceded the song told me he’d been found dead outside the window of his Amsterdam hotel, an apparent suicide.

What the reviews of Let’s Get Lost told me was that Baker was the embodiment of 1950s pre-rock-n-roll cool.

The film opens itself up slowly. Shot entirely in black and white, it’s a mix of head-on interviews, archival footage, and sequences shot in present-day (1987) Los Angeles, as Baker moves through the city like a spectre with an entourage of young, beautiful people surrounding him. (I later learned they were hired for the film, and include Chris Isaak and Lisa Marie.) These scenes are dreamlike, with the group running on the beach, goofing around in bumper cars, and listening to Baker play in a studio session. (Out of the group, Isaak seems to be the only one who knows jazz; he and Baker sing a brief melody in a barroom booth todgether at one point.) One shot, which the film returns to again and again, is of Baker in the back of a convertible, hurtling through the Los Angeles night with a beauty on each side of him. As the women cuddle closer to him, it’s impossible to read his craggy face. Is he enjoying the drive, and the company, or is he just stoned? I was left with the impression that the man was plunging headlong into death in the most comfortable way he could find.

The archival footage shows Baker in his early days—a hunky dreamboat with a trumpet, playing gorgeous, languid jazz. The point is made that he and his Los Angeles contemporaries rejected the bebop of the east coast, playing simpler, prettier music. Miles Davis went one way, Baker went another. For the most part, jazz followed Davis. That’s the impression I get, anyway, although there’s few things I know less about than jazz.

And the interviews. Baker is interviewed extensively, and his talks about his past elliptically with the velvet-smooth voice that serves him so well when he sings. He’s sometimes evasive, and sometimes just prefers to play his trumpet. You get lost in the lines of his face, so smooth in the old footage, yet grooved with years of addiction and hard living. You can see the beginnings of the effect while he’s still young, in an old Steve Allen Show appearance from 1958. That can’t be age alone changing his face like that. He’s 57 in the movie. He looks 85.

Other people – a photographer who “discovered” him, fellow musicians, a few girlfriends, his third wife, some of his kids – all bring something new to the picture. From almost every perspective but his own, Baker was shifty and undependable. Abuse is mentioned. But Baker somehow keeps them all charmed. Some of the women cat about each other, each seeming to feel that only her claim to Baker is legitimate. The stories they tell about Baker reveal more about themselves than they might like. (A Baker biography mentioned in a recent New York Times article about the film’s revival—one I can’t find online, sorry—says that the film’s strength is this: It’s all jive. Everyone is lying. Could be.)

There’s a moment, late in the film, in which his daughter talks about going into one of his girlfriend’s places, looking for Baker, who’d already lit out. She found the things that mattered most to the girlfriend – jewelry and such, that she’d spoken of to the girl – and steals them, hocking them at a pawn shop for spite. Watching it, all I could think was This man is poison, and poison spreads. But I wonder: Did Bruce Weber recognize this? He clearly loves the man. The film seems flush with hero-worship, but the heel still seeps in around the edges.

It’s almost inevitable that there’ll be a biopic musical, a la Ray or Walk the Line, on Baker someday. His life had so many ups and downs (his teeth were punched out so he couldn’t play for years; he wound up living on welfare and pumping gas) that it’ll fit the formula with few alterations. But where those movies travel the same ground, Let’s Get Lost delves into more troubling places.

Rob

Bat 21, Bat 21! Can you read me, Bat 21?

If you want to contact Kathy or me, your best chance is to call our cell phones. For some reason we have not yet determined, our phones are having trouble picking up incoming calls. So if you've tried to reach us and didn't even get our machine, that could be why. (You might also have a wrong number, or be talking into a banana.)

UPDATE: It seems to be fixed now, without any effort on our part. Don't know if I trust it, but feel free to call. Except not now; it's 1:30 AM. Wait until morning.

Rob

Remember What the Doormouse Said

Old schoolyard joke: Want to lose 10 pounds of ugly fat? Cut off your head.

I went to a meeting yesterday, and found hat, after a week where I was relatively good, but not paying strict attention to points and such, I had lost another 2.4 pounds. I kid myself that I’ve internalized some of the rules to keep the weight off, but then I went and completely blew it yesterday, so clearly that’s not the case. (A cannoli was involved. I am so weak in the face of cannoli.)

Whatever. It’s a new day, and my total weigh loss is 25.6 pounds. And that’s without cutting off 2.5 heads. So there’s considerably less of me than when I started sixteen weeks ago, but what there is of me is pretty happy.

Rob

My Fanboy Moment

I went to the WizardWorld: Philadelphia comics convention last weekend, and the highlight of it for me was getting to meet Carmine Infantino, co-creator of my favorite super hero, the Flash (Barry Allen*), and that I told him how much his work and the character mean to me.

I bought a copy of his retrospective art book, The Amazing World of Carmine Infantino, and asked him to do a sketch in the front pages. This was Sunday the 17^th – it might be the most recent drawing of Flash he’s done. It was great to see him work, laying down the pencil lines before finishing it up in ink. I had a chance to tell him how much I enjoyed his Elongated Man stories as well – I’m just finishing a collected edition of them now.

Anyway, without further ado… the Flash, by Carmine Infantino.

Rob

*(Remember when you could say who your favorite super hero was without having to give his secret identity? I hope Gorilla Grodd doesn’t read this blog.)

A Wizard, a True Fiend

Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Along with Steve Ditko, these two men built the Marvel Universe. They’re names to conjure with in comics circles, because they created some of the most original, exciting comics the world had ever seen.

One of their creations, the Marvel Comics version of Thor, brought together high-energy superheroics with a mix of science fiction and mythology. It was truly awe-inspiring stuff – the comics version of opera. But never let it be said they didn't take time to smell the roases. They knew that sometimes, the little things mean the most.

With that in mind, I’d like to present this single page from The Mighty Thor #179, the final issue Kirby drew. It features the diabolical Loki, lord of lies…

…versus hotel room service.

(click to enlarge)

I really can’t get over this page. Not only does Loki totally screw over the hotel staff, but he does it in the most dickish way possible. He could have just signed for it, and then skipped out on his hotel bill when he was done. But no, he has to conjure a fat wad of cash for these guys, only for it to disappear once he’s long gone. Loki Odinson is all about the dine and dash.

That’s just how he rolls.

I haven’t read the end of the story yet, but I hope there’s a panel of Thor swinging his mighty Uru hammer, shouting “For the wronged staff of the Waldorf Astoria, I stand against thee! Compensate them truly, including a tip commensurate with service, or know the Son of Odin will smite thee with the mighty Mjonlir!”

Loki is a bad, bad man.

Rob

Humility

After a thousand posts, it's good to remember that a Google search still turns up the Amazon page for the Doctor & the Medics album this blog was named for before linking to this blog itself. (I'm #2! Woot!)

Taking the quotes away from laughing at the pieces yields similar results -- but this item pushes me down to #3:

Amazon.com: Laughing Cow Spreadable Cheese Wedges Light, 8 pieces ...

I don't mind at all -- it's my cheese of choice when I'm beings strict with my point counting. One point per wedge. Spread on lowfat Triscuits, it's just the thing.

Rob

M

First of all, apologies for the navel-gazing. It's pretty much inherent in posts like this.

On September 7, 2003, an unassuming little blog called “Laughing at the Pieces” was conceived, with these auspicious words:

I've got no idea what I want to accomplish with this blog, so I'm starting out on the wrong foot already.

Approximately nine months later, I did the unimaginable – created a second post!

Well, THAT was a roaring success.

And with that, what was once a little embryo blog had emerged, slimy and squealing, into the blogosphere. (Or maybe that was the week or two when all the hip kids were calling it the “blogohedron.” Who knows…)

And now, here we are. One thousand posts of nonsense. About politics, about comics, about movies and TV and New York and New Orleans, and all of them, inextricably, about me. (I can only imagine that is for the worse.)

I don’t have a large crowd coming to read my posts every day, and with the way my interests and focus shift, that’s pretty much inevitable. But I do have a steady bunch of readers, and that’s incredibly fulfilling. I like writing to people. I like knowing that if I get a notion in my head, there’s a place I can go to spread it around.

And I like knowing that I’ve been doing it for years.

Soon, I intend to wrap up some unfinished blog business. I haven’t forgotten my plans for the earworm list, for instance. And somewhere deep in the archives, I was listing the top 50 DC characters … and stopped just as I reached the top 10. I’ve still got that list, so that needs to get done, too.

Beyond that, there’s nowhere to go but forward.

Rob

Eyes Right

Just wanted to direct you over to Greg's blog, where he recently answered my interview questions. His answer to "Which supervillain would you like to date?" is so pitch-perfect, I'm half-convinced the question should be asked on job interviews.

Rob

Get Ta Know Me! Part III

Thom has interviewed me. Here’s what he asked, and my responses.

1.If you could hang out with any character from Barney Miller, who would it be and why?

Dietrich, I think. He was my favorite character as a kid, just seemed a bit brainer and funnier than the rest. But it’s been too long since I’ve seen an ep with him in it that I couldn’t tell you specifics. C’mon, Sony! Put out Seasons Two through Eight already!

2.You are hired by the military to come up with a secret weapon to use against Evil Doers…what’s the weapon?

Hmmm... I need some sort of bomb to, I dunno… make people gay?

Nah, that’ll never work. (And I’d hate to start a flame war…)

It goes without saying that gamma bombs are a bad idea.

I think I’d go with the patented Green Zombie Mist. Spray it over an area and have their dead come back from the grave and feast on the brains of the living.

Confining it might be a problem, but let’s leave that to the U.N., shall we?

3. Countdown or World War Hulk?

Ooh, tough call. I’m holding out on World War Hulk, planning to read it when it’s collected (I don’t really feel like playing the crossover chase with it). On the other hand, Countdown hasn’t impressed me so far. So, sight unseen: World War Hulk.

4. Take the solicit for a Marvel or DC comic that just irritated you, making you ask “Really, Marvel/DC?” Rewrite it in a fashion that would convince you to buy it.

I don’t really get worked up about previews (that Daredevil bit was crass, but didn’t really ruffle me), but let’s see what I can find in today’s solicits.

Let’s see… Countdown Special: The Search for Ray Palmer says

The Search for Ray Palmer truly kicks into high gear, as Kyle Rayner, Donna Troy and Jason Todd scour the Multiverse… The trio's first stop: the Wildstorm Universe…

Hmm… It would take replacing pretty much every proper noun except Ray Palmer in this solicit to get me excited about this issue. Which I guess is changing the story, rather than the solicit.

On the other hand, here’s one where the nouns all tickle me right where I think:

SUICIDE SQUAD: RAISE THE FLAG #1
When original Suicide Squad member Rick Flag Jr. returned from the dead in the pages of CHECKMATE, it blew open a brand-new espionage mystery for the DC Universe! In this eagerly awaited miniseries by legendary Squad writer John Ostrander (WORLD WAR III), it’s revealed how Flag survived a nuclear blast while battling terrorism in Qurac — as his hard path home takes him from Skartaris to Dubai and into the hands of dueling commanders Amanda Waller and General Wade Eiling. Their power struggle reveals surprising secrets from their pasts — even as a new Suicide Squad is created to play a key role in the DCU’s ever-evolving future!

The only thing wrong with that is that it reminds me that Ostrander wrote part of World War III. (Brrr….) But “takes him from Skartaris to Dubai” is EXACTLY what I’m looking for in a Suicide Squad comic.

I don’t need better solicitations – I need better stories.

5.What one comics legend (living or dead) would you like to see return to comics?
I thought about Will Eisner, I thought about Jack Kirby, and I thought about Curt Swan and Jack Cole. But they all had long careers (even Cole, who killed himself after success as the creator of Plastic Man and as a Playboy cartoonist). The one person who I wish had lived long enough to have a much broader and deeper body of work is Mike Parobeck. I wouldn’t call him a legend – but had he not had such an untimely death, he might have one day become one.

More comics from Alan Brennert would be great, too. Every story he wrote was gold.

Thanks a lot, Thom. Those were fun questions!

Anyone who wants to be interviewed, leave a comment for me.

Rob

Happiness Is...

Mark Waid returning to write Flash. There's none better.

Rob