That cover gives me the willies.

I wince whenever I see the April Catwoman cover. (No, I'm not reposting it on my blog. Go look at the link.) It's not normal Adam Hughes eyerolling at the exploitation here. It actually unnerves me to the point I can't really make a judgment on whether it's sexist or not. There's something disturbing there I think would bug me if it were two men. That picture is in the middle of the point where she pulls the lip away with her teeth. Gross. And the color scheme. Blues and blacks versus yellows and browns with red in the middle. I immediately focus on the red when I see it. And it looks like she's eating part of Cheetah's face.

It's a horror cover. It has a worse effect than a Zombie cover on me. 'd examine it in depth but I'd have to stare at the damned thing and I don't like looking at it.

I find it so weird that it's the violence that bothers me with this one. I mean, I'm a Geoff Johns fan. People ripped in half? No problem. Impaled heroes? I'll keep reading. Catwoman biting Cheetah's lower lip? I have to avert my eyes and find another website. Maybe it reminds me of cannibalism or something like that.

Either way, this cover getting reposted around the community is not going to be fun for me.

Raise a glass to Heath Ledger

Patrick Verona was based on one of the biggest jerks Shakespeare wrote, but Heath Ledger played him and I liked him. I'm still willing to watch 10 Things I Hate About You (a movie in which nothing supernatural happened) multiple times.



I'm still looking forward to The Dark Knight, but it's going to be sad.

I'll believe it when I see it.

Aaron Lopresti to replace the Dodsons on Wonder Woman.

NRAMA: What are your views on Wonder Woman - what is she to you? She seems to have this continuum of meaning and everyone has one or two places upon it that resonate with them...

AL: For me she is the perfect embodiment of what it means to be a super hero, male or female. In some ways she is like Superman or Captain America (when he was alive). She is a character that has character and it makes her stand head and shoulders above the rest of female
super hero community.

Most importantly, I don't feel I am drawing sexually exploitive material when I am working on Wonder Woman. Somehow she seems to be above all of that. At least in my mind.

I'd make a joke about him having his work cut out for him, but honestly so long the costume manages to cover her butt and her breasts most fans'll be impressed with his restraint.

And guess what, it does.



And there's muscle definition.

I'm grumpy to see the Dodsons leave, though. I grumbled when they announced them because Harley Quinn was so cheesecakey, but I was really surprised and pleased with the actual work.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day

I've gotten to enjoy historical holidays like Martin Luther King Day a lot more since I started blogging. There's really not much on TV or elsewhere that we haven't already seen before, but when you hit the blogfeeds on a day like today you can come up with some substance relevant to the occasion. Even blogs like this one, that don't get political beyond four-color commentary (though Kleefeld's managed to dig up two biographical comic books on Dr. King.) will have a few personal thoughts, or a link or a quote. Among the quoting and posting of "I Have a Dream" there's usually some stuff that you don't see in HS history class or that you don't remember. Last year was the first year I'd ever read "Letter from a Birmingham Jail", for example.

This year I found (through this blog) this 1996 article by Ronald Turner about the way the "I Have a Dream" speech gets misused to spread the idea that Dr. King was and claim that attempts to address racially-based injustice are acting against his legacy because they call attention to race.

Black Canary

Pictures of Alaina Huffman in costume as Black Canary in an upcoming Smallville episode. (Via)



I really like how her costume came out. Not only does the actress look the part (I always figured on Black Canary as a petite woman with a tough expression), they kept the fishnets and the basic design, so she's recognizable as the comic book character. They went with short hair rather than a long wig that would get torn off during a fight, or long hair that an enemy could grab at in a street-level fight.

The makeup mask is interesting idea. If she has some quick way to smear it on like a spray or something like a solid rouge applicator (one of those big old-fashioned round bars that you could just smear circles on your cheeks with), it makes for a good quick change and won't fall off. But makeup like that doesn't seem to obscure the face very well. I suppose you could say it's a distraction. Between it and the fishnets and the dark alley no one is going to be able to properly describe her.

She must have to carry wipes to clean it off.