Comic Book Television: Too much of a good thing?

It wasn’t that long ago when the only comic book-like characters on TV could be found in shows like ‘Heroes’ and ‘The Cape’. Now we have a smorgasbord of comic book TV shows and for most people there is so much content it is impossible to view it all (unless your unemployed I guess). There is so much that I have had to pick and choose what to watch and what not to watch. Here’s a quick breakdown:

 

Netflix/Marvel Shows:

 

Season 2 for both Luke Cage and Iron Fist was an improvement from their first seasons but sadly the improvements were not enough and both shows were cancelled. Mike Colter as ‘Luke Cage’ is brilliant in the role; I would even go so far as to say he was born to play the character. I really hope they use him in future Marvel TV or film projects. Iron Fist on the other hand just never really hit for me. Their portrayal of Danny Rand just fell flat. He is supposed to be a kung fu master yet season one there were very few fights. And the fights that did occur were really laughable. Season 2 was a slight improvement but not much. It is my hope they will combine both these characters in a ‘Heroes for Hire’ TV series, which is what they should have done to begin with.

Season 3 of Daredevil was great in my opinion. The story, the fights, the cast, everything was just right for this season. Season one was great too, season two was not as good but they did introduce the Punisher and Elektra into the mix.

Season 2 of Jessica Jones was definitely not as good as season one. Season 2 lacked a compelling villain. David Tenant as ‘Killgrave’ hit it out of the park, and he is in my opinion THE BEST villain in all the MCU (movies included).

 

CW/Arrowverse Shows:

 

 

I stopped watching these shows a few years ago despite having good actors and good stories. The formula they all follow is what ruined them for me: Arrow, Flash, Legends, Supergirl all have the same format: title character surrounded by a ‘team’ which help them solve problems and save the day. As time goes on the ‘team’ members themselves gain powers, abilities and take center stage from time to time. This is easily forgiven in ‘Legends’ since they are in fact a team show, the rest it just gets too be too much following all these less interesting characters around. Plus the 22+ episode seasons do not help!! Sorry Stephen Amell, you are a great guy and it was a thrill to meet you but I can’t commit to a 22+ television season with so many other shows trying for my attention.

 

Others:

I watched ‘Legion’ season one and was intrigued, especially with Aubrey Plaza. She is fantastic in this show. But season 2 lost me right away and I haven’t gone back to watch.

 

I have not checked out any of the other shows I’ve heard of: Titans, The Gifted, Cloak & Dagger, Gotham, etc. I am looking forward to a ‘Doom Patrol’ show because I have been a fan of the comic since I was a kid. I think that launches early next year.

 

And finally DC: Make a Batman TV series already! Not a young Alfred show or young Gordon show or Batwoman show, I want a honest to goodness serious (not Adam West) Batman series! Call up HBO, they do awesome TV like ‘Game of Thrones’ and ‘Westworld’, I’m sure they’d love to tackle a Batman series!

 

Nuff Said.  

 

Crash Test Dummies: 19 years later

My Enemy

I've been debating whether to blog about this and I have finally decided to set the record straight. This post will go a few places so bear with me. 

Recently I have been watching a lot of YouTube videos about author Harlan Ellison, who passed away this year. He was a controversial guy who had a lot of enemies out there which made me conclude I really don't have any enemies. There were a few guys in high school and after that I got in conflict with but nothing too serious and nothing lasting. Then I received a call from my Mom Wednesday morning to tell me that an acquaintance  made a very ignorant comment on my Facebook post from August 28th where I mentioned it was Crystal and I's anniversary. It was a confusing and rude comment and I have since deleted it and blocked this person from my Facebook, all FOUR different Facebook accounts he has. This "acquaintance" is the ex-common law husband of a friend of Crystals. This guy is a real piece of garbage and I will not name him here as to avoid any legal trouble, but here are some facts about he who shall not be named: He began dating Crystal's friend when she was 14 years old and he was 29-30 years old. He's always been a pot head for as long as we have known him but the last few years he has moved on to meth and probably some other "hard" drugs I suspect. A few years ago he dumped his common-law wife (Crystal's friend) to be with another woman. When that relationship only lasted a week he expected to take up with his ex as if nothing happened. She told him no and over the course of several years she has been the victim of stalking, threats and death threats of which he was actually jailed for. 

Anyway a couple years back he was on one of his Facebook accounts and making false claims that his ex wife's current boyfriend was a pedophile, ironic considering he was at one time a 30 year old man dating a 14 year old but I digress. My son went on FB and defended the man he was speaking against as we know these accusations to be untrue, which he later removed from his FB when questioned by the police about making false accusations. Anyway my son then became a target of this asshole: he got into a public war of words with my son on FB. He even went so far as to leave a message on my wife's phone where he told her to "shut up your fucking kid if you know what's good for you", unfortunately this message was deleted otherwise I would have shared it with the cops. He even began to follow my son, who had just turned 16 and had a car of his own, around town in his truck. Did I mention this guy got fired from his job due to not passing a drug test; yep he sure did. Anyway one of these times he actually pursued my sons car at higher that normal town speeds. This scared my son and all of us so I took my son down to the cop shop to give a statement. Sadly all the cops could do was talk to the asshole as their FB exchange had been deleted by him and my son had no proof he had been in a car chase with him. Ironically the cop told him to next time if he was chasing him and/or stalking him in his truck for my son to record it with his cell phone. 

So here we were: this piece of shit had threatened and scared my son and the cops could do nothing about it. The next evening I went to the pub with some friends and had a few too many to drink. Now as I walked home in my drunkin stupor I decided I was going to have a talk with this asshole as he lived at the time only a few blocks from my house. I asked him to come out and face me and I told him if he was man enough to terrorize a 16 year old boy he could be man enough to face me, he refused. But I seemed to have scared him as he left my boy alone after that and he has not left any messages on my wife's phone. Now over 2 years later he left an ignorant comment on my FB post. As I said I have since blocked all FOUR Facebook accounts he has. 

This man is 53 years old, he has done jail time for making death threats, he is a drug addict and he lives in my community. He is my enemy and if he threatens my family again I will do everything in my power to see he goes back to jail.