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Oops! It’s Winter Again!
That’s okay with me. It’s the perfect weather for me to take a walk or maybe even mow the grass.
Good Things Popping Up All Over
This weekend is chock full of goodness!
Mother’s Day
It’s that lovely time of year when we take some time to show appreciation for the mothers in our lives. Whether they be our own mothers, our mother-figures or the mothers of our children, it’s the day to give them a little extra love.
Connor’s Birthday
Just like the day of his birth, Connor’s birthday this year falls on Mother’s Day. He’s definitely the best Mother’s Day present I have ever gotten my wife.
Opening Pennsylvania…maybe
The legislature may have gotten vetoed once, but they’re still trying. Sooner or later, they will be able to pull the cord on Governor Wolf’s illegal power grab. He may tell himself that he’s doing it for our own good, but exceeding his legal authority isn’t doing anyone any good. There will be a price to be paid when all is said and done.
Despite what all the nanny-staters and assorted hand-wringers would have you believe, COVID19 is not substantially worse than any of the dreadful ailments that proceeded it during the previous administration. SARS, Bird Flu, H1N1 and all the rest did NOT result in societal house arrest and neither should this one. This has been a colossal waste of time and an economic calamity that need never have happened.
Second Winter
Just as Pippin wanted Second Breakfast, I’m enjoying this little trip into Second Winter. It’s almost noon and we’re only at 37°F!
It’s glorious!
Getting Back In Genre
I’ve been watching superhero media lately to get my head back into the genre. Here are some of my favorite fight scenes from superhero movies and TV.
| Wonder Woman is epic superhero combat, particularly when you add Superman and Batman to the mix. It goes without saying that Lynda Carter will forever be associated with the character but Gal Gadot brings a lot of power to the role that just wasn’t available in 70s TV special effects budgets and capabilities. | |
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| Daredevil is more gritty and realistic, but he’s still pretty epic as portrayed by Charlie Cox. | |
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| Chris Evans played an incredible Captain America. Some of us also remember him as the Human Torch. | |
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| If you want superhero fights, you want Batman | |
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As much as anyone enjoys a good super-powered donnybrook, there is a certain balance between super battles and character development. Even in Shaw Brothers Kung Fu movies, there’s still some dialog and plot to put the combat in context. I think I’ve achieved that balance in the story I’m working on. We’ll see what can be done during the big edit.
IT’S FOR THE CHILDREN!!!
An effort made for the happiness of others lifts above ourselves. ~Lydia M. Child
Superhero is generally considered to be a kids’ genre, but not all of it is. The comic books of old had some pretty grim themes and even a hint of torture porn. The comics code was set to ensure that these publications would avoid any taint of juvenile delinquency.
Comics started drifting from the campy nonsense of the Batman TV series to the saccharine mind pudding that was the Superfriends. All the while, big labels from DC and Marvel began dealing with serious issues like drug addiction, alcoholism, mental health disorders and racism.
A lot of these topics lead the characters (and consequently, the readers) down some fairly dark rabbit holes of society, morality and the human psyche. As this became ‘the new normal‘, themes have become progressively more grim.
The original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles comics were pretty gritty urban fantasy. It was made kid-friendly in the first live-action movie for marketing purposes, but the notion of chemically mutated rats and turtles hanging around in the sewers wielding swords, sai and other martial arts weapons against a clan of deadly ninja is still pretty grim when you think about it.
The Brothers Grim wandered around what eventually became Germany collecting old folk tales while they did a linguistic survey of the German language. The topics were fantastical. Magic shoes, cross-dressing wolves, child-eating witches and things of that sort seem like childish fantasies until you look at the underlying themes. It’s a wonder we’re even sane after reading some of that stuff to our kids.
As I said, my stories aren’t being written to be read by kids. My heroes are trying to hold themselves to a Superfriends standard but the bad guys are every bit as bad as the good guys are trying to be good. There is harsh language on both sides of the struggle. Fights break out and people get hurt.
One of the heroes in the Sentinels had Krav Maga training in her efforts to become a superhero. She was taught by an IDF veteran who is a friend of the family. As you can see from the video below, it’s not BIFF, WHAM, POW like an Adam West Batman fight. This is serious stuff designed by people who are constantly surrounded by some serious shit.
This is Krav Maga
She needed to be sure she could go toe to toe with the gangs of Empire City with some chance of coming out alive. That was before her powers became apparent.
If you think that’s rough, imagine what a guy who can bench press a dump truck or an elf who can lift a jumbo jet can do when they’re seriously ticked off. The Sentinels have the ability to do a LOT of damage but the heroic desire to prevent themselves from doing so.
The bad guys? Not so much.
Things get ugly in Empire City when the Sentinels throw down. It isn’t kids’ stuff.
Some day we’ll move to Code Yellow, but not if Governor Wolf has anything to say about it.