5 Simple Rules for Filming My Superman

They did it. They finally did it. Damn them all to hell, they did it.
They cast the role of Superman in the Zack Snyder take on the Man of Steel that will be filming in Vancouver this summer. I dunno, some British guy. But I guess that means that they're actually going to go ahead and make a Superman movie for the 2010s.
Okay, look, I thought Snyder's Watchmen was a joylessly pedantic adaptation that mostly missed the point of the Alan Moore/Dave Gibbons series. Patrick Wilson was pretty good as sadsack superhero Dan Dreiberg, but then I'm a sucker for sadsack superheroes. I do respect Snyder's high regard for art direction, but come on, dude, even Tim Burton always ties his eye-candy to his movies' themes.

Snyder will be at a disadvantage here, compared to his previous comic book adaptations. Both The 300 and Watchmen were based on graphic novels (in Watchmen's case, it was a 12-issue series that was subsequently collected in the graphic novel format) that Snyder clearly used as storyboards for his film. But there is no Superman graphic novel. Oh sure, there are graphic novels that tell stories about Superman, but what's the greatest Superman story? What's Superman's Dark Knight Returns or Year One (both of which have been pilfered by Chris Nolan for his Batman movies). Where's Superman's "Death of Gwen Stacy"? Which story, in Superman's nearly 75-year history stands out as the perfect distillation of Superman's essence? There are certainly some popular favourites, "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?" and the unimaginatively-titled "All Star Superman" come to mind. But it's unlikely either will be directly adapted for Snyder's talkie.

For one, so soon after Superman Returns, I don't think anyone is eager to have the word whatever in close proximity to the character. Second, "Whatever/Tomorrow" is a Supermanic Götterdämmerung, a Last Days of Chez Supes, that imagines an ending to Superman's story. That's no good for a big budget sequel machine. Third, who wants another round of Alan Moore whinging about what's been done with stories he wrote a generation ago?

All Star Superman, in its full glory, could be adapted as a trilogy of films. There's certainly enough story there. But that's not going to happen, since an animated adaptation will be coming straight-to-DVD (or whatever format things go straight to these days) sometime this year.

Interestingly, All Star Superman also concerns the final adventure of the Man of Steel. Most superhero mythos find their most iconic stories in characters' Secret Origins. But a great part of Superman's appeal is his endurance, his reliability, the longevity of his exploits. Superman was not only around for my childhood, and my parents' childhood, but also my grandparents' childhood--or at least their early adolescence. Of course, my daughter is already a Superman nut. And so it goes. We take Superman for granted, and it's generally good that we do. That's the kind of character he is. When writers seek to affect poignancy within a Superman story, it's more often than not his demise that drives home his significance. Ever since 1961--in a story written by Superman's creator, Jerry Siegel, no less--DC Comics has been wringing pathos and bathos out of sending off to arm-wrestle Great Caesar's Ghost. Like Lex Luthor says, "cry your hearts out, folks!"

But Zack Snyder probably won't kill Superman. Not in the first movie, at least. I get it, and mostly, I support it. Here are five things I would like Snyder to keep in mind as he constructs a new Superman film:

1. Do Not Stare Directly Into the Superman - One of the best developments in the Superman mythos is that his incredible powers are derived from our yellow sun. This isn't just pseudo-science mumbo-jumbo, this is poetry. Like the sun, Superman, as a concept is huge and nearly all-powerful. It's from his light that all other superheroes get their resonance. It's too much! You hear things like, "Superman's too powerful, it makes him unrelatable," a lot. That's a load, but, hey, no one says your audience has to relate to or identify with Superman. That's what his supporting cast is for. Filtering Superman's light through the lenses of Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen allows for all kinds of depth and resonance and all that stuff that changes readers (or viewers) into fans.
2. Lois Lane, Spell It Right - When was the last time there was a great Superman movie? Well, that would be the last time there was a great Lois Lane. Margot Kidder gave us a Lois Lane that was as potent a character as Superman. Why would a man with powers and abilities beyond those of mortal men fall so hard for a mere Earth woman? Because she's everything he hopes he would be without those powers: fearless, devoted to ideals like justice and truth and driven to make a change. This is your most important casting decision. Off the top of my head? Rashida Jones? Who else? Parker Posey? Why not?
3. Superman is an Archetype - You know what kind of story you should try to tell with Superman? A big one. Lay on the metaphors, bring on the allegories. Get operatic! Superman doesn't just have ideals, he is an ideal. Let Batman, Spider-Man, Wolverine, or even Kick-Ass play to our insecurities, they're great at it. Let them explore the darkness within, let them be complicated heroes on a journey to discover and define their own morality. But Superman will not work as an antihero. Yes, he may brood over the loss of his entire planet, a culture and family he'll never know. He may, in private, question whether he's up to the task of saving the world. But Superman must be super. He must use his powers and abilities for good, for that is his greatest power, goodness.
4. The Best Superman Story is All of Them - Remember what I said in the last rule about telling a big story? Forget it. Don't tell a big story. Tell a million little stories. One of many reasons there are few great superhero movies is that comic books are a serial medium. Comic books have traditionally translated better to episodic media like radio and television where characters aren't expected to develop at the same rate (if any) as they would in film or a novel. Of course, movies have become more episodic over the last dozen or so years. Nonetheless, Superman is impervious to character development like his skin is impervious to bursting shells. Again, this is why he has such a great supporting cast (especially Steve Lombard!); they grow and change and suffer because Superman can't. They are the workhorses of the serial melodramas that Superlore is built on.
5. That's Why They Call Him Superman - You can't put Superman into a grim, cynical world and force him to navigate the shifting ethics of uncertain times--outside of an origin story, that is. Whatever world Superman inhabits has got to be a greater, more optimistic place than this one right here that we live in for one simple reason: Superman lives there. He's the best at what he does, and what he does is very nice. A genuinely super Superman must change the course of humanity's destiny merely through his power of super-influence.

mp3: "Laughing With You" by Marcellus Hall

And then Lois says, "You've got me. Who's got you?"

Look, I need to say upfront that Lex Luthor is a genius. An evil genius, sure, but nobody's perfect.
So when some guy on the Internet says that Christopher Nolan is the wrong guy to revitalize the Superman movie franchise, I say to myself, well, that guy's no Lex Luthor.
When news broke that Nolan had been hired to shepherd the Man of Steel back to glory, I wasn't thrilled, but not because I didn't think he was up to the task. My worry is that the silver screen version of superheroes could become as homogenized as their comic book counterparts.

TANGENT: This condition was institutionalized at DC Comics last week with executive shuffling that names Geoff Johns Chief Creative Officer. As recently as 2004, you could find a wide array of storytelling in the DC Universe. You had the moody police procedural of Gotham Central, the anything-goes super-soap opera of the early run of Superman/Batman, and the fearless cartooning of Kyle Baker's Plastic Man. If you bought an issue of Detective Comics starring Batman and an issue of The Flash, you could count on each comic having its own tones and rhythms. Then, beginning with Identity Crisis and continuing on from Johns's well-intentioned disaster Infinite Crisis to his current thuddingly-dull Blackest Night, the whole line became this dour, depressing series of catchphrasing and limb-rending. END TANGENT

C. Robert Cargill, however, thinks that, much like Lori Lemaris, Nolan is "wrong, wrong, wrong" for Superman. And he was kind enough to break it down to five reasons, all of which are based on the pretty insulting assumption that Nolan only knows how to make one kind of film. As if a Nolan-driven Superman movie will feature Jor-El and Lara taking Kal-El home from the opera when all of a sudden a man comes out of the shadows and blows up Krypton, unwittingly giving birth to Superman's neverending war on opera.

1. According to Cargill, "Superman ISN'T a dark hero." Really? He's the last survivor of his entire species. If the deaths of millions, probably billions, of people and the destruction of an entire planet isn't a dark subject, what is? Batman lost his parents and became a pouty creature of the night. Superman lost his whole freaking planet. Brood on that, Bats.
2. "Superman isn't a detective," says Cargill. No, he's just a reporter for a major metropolitan newspaper. Nothing sleuthy going on there, no sir. Especially not from that very un-detective-like Lois Lane, who, as a nervy dame with a nose for news, never finds herself in over her head in situations that might as well be lifted right out of the noir textbook. Nope, nothing like that to see here. And since when is Nolan a detective filmmaker? Batman Begins and The Dark Knight succeed largely as science fiction films dressed up as crime thrillers. Certainly The Prestige is full on sci-fi, and at its heart, so is Memento. The Prestige and Memento are both exactly the kind of stories that used to feature in Superman comics back when Superman was the most popular fictional character on the whole planet. Thanks to his frequent contact with futuristic sorceresses and Red Kryptonite, Superman was always losing his memory or discovering imperfect duplicates of himself.
3. "They're throwing out the current continuity," Cargill mentions. I actually can't find any reference to Nolan in this "reason why Nolan shouldn't oversee the new Superman film", so I'm tempted to overlook it. Also, because it's a stupid reason. Also, because hopefully filmmakers will recognize that they've been telling Superman's origin for the last 10 years or so on Smallville and just tell a good Superman story.
4. "Nolan is great on story, but terrible on staying true to its history," Cargill claims. By now, I'm not sure if Cargill has ever seen a Christopher Nolan film, or any film at all for that matter. Nolan, like Tim Burton before him, excels at creating style and atmosphere, setting an appealing and intriguing tone for his films. The storylines and plots of his films tend to take a backseat to tone and theme. That's not the worst flaw for a filmmaker to have, and it's consistent in his films.
5. "Superman is science fiction," Cargill says. "Nolan is real world." This seems to be the same reason as #2, but what the heck. Cargill's got Nolan here, since Memento, Insomnia, Batman Begins, The Prestige and The Dark Knight were all faithful adaptations of true stories. Cargill notes that Nolan's upcoming film Inception is science fiction, but dismisses it because nobody knows if it will be good or not. Unlike his Superman movie, which Cargill knows will be bad. Cargill also proves that he hasn't seen Superman III in this paragraph, which is too bad, because I think he'd like it.
Stayed tuned for an upcoming post where I'll outline ways that a new Superman movie could be awesome (regardless of who's involved), including my top secret idea for a 30th Century Bromantic Comedy co-starring Lar Gand and Jo Nah.

mp3: "All This Trouble" by the Fugitives

The real reason newspapers are failing

You call this a scoop? Back in my day, you had to jump out a window to secure an exclusive rescue/interview or turn the Earth backward on its own axis to qualify as a scoop. I guess times really are hard.



mp3: "Hard Times" by Baby Huey

Print's charming

If you needed any proof that newspapers as we know and love 'em have entered their End of Days, it might be from a question posed a last week's WonderCon comic book convention in San Francisco. "Will The Daily Planet face a collapse like every other American newspaper?" a fan asked of writer James Robinson at a panel.
Robinson, who writes a rather lacklustre Superman comic, replied with non-committal reference to Morgan Edge, a toady of the extra-dimensional despot Darkseid. In the Superman comics of the 1970s, Edge's Galaxy Broadcasting System bought out the Daily Planet and summarily gutted it to enhance their broadcast media division. Most notoriously, Edge poached mild-mannered Clark Kent from the Planet newsroom and set him up as the anchor of WGBS's nightly newscast.
It might be interesting to see how the collapse of print media is portrayed in the Superman universe, but can we trust a print media outlet like DC Comics to have any perspective on it? At this point, I'm more likely to watch the Fables of Print's End Times on Ugly Betty.

Reliable sources tell me, howev, that the finest pre-mortem on the cadaver-in-waiting is Season Five of The Wire, but damnit, we found another glimmer of hope for the old broad(sheet). Anyway, I'm nowhere near Season Five, just getting settled into Season Two, thanks. Yes, I watch TV at a slower-than-normal pace, but that's the beauty of the 21st Century. You can do things faster, but you can also do things more slowly.

It wasn't blogs that killed print, though, bunk. There's not as much useful and meaningful knowledge in ten thousand blogs, be they Huffington Post or the Longmont Urban Hens Coalition, as there is in the front section of any daily broadsheet. Don't point your finger at the blogs. It was Craigslist, yo. Slam dunk. Y'see, there used to be these dense, fine-print pages in the back of the paper. Places where people used cute and clever language to sell Adult Services in such a way that everyone knew what was for sale, yet neither the newspaper nor the local morality squad seemed to care. Places where people looked when they lost their glasses at the Northwest Leisure Centre. Places where the people told each other stories: Wedding dress, only worn twice. $50 obo. Or, Will pay cash for lawnmower and someone to push it by end of weekend. That kind of thing. People used to pay for the privelige of selling their own and buying someone else's junk. It used to mean something. If you wanted to get rid of your ski boots in July, you had to think about. You had to write a letter, or at least make a phone call. You had to get someone else involved. You had to be a committed seller. These days, jeez. There's a million pieces of crap for sale on the Internet, and if you actually want to do someone the solid of buying their three-drawer Creamsicle orange dresser for $45, you've gotta spend a week emailing and calling them before they agree to sell it to you. And it's lucky for you that your parents raised you to be a halfway decent person who calls ahead before showing up on someone's door to pick up the piece of furniture, because in the three hours between agreeing to sell you the item and the agreed-upon-by-both-parties-time of pick-up, the lousy zeke has up and sold it to someone else. Without so much of a solid as calling to let you know.

Speaking of solids, Gentleman Reg's new album is called Jet Black. Reg's first couple of albums came out on the lovely and missed Three Gut label. Three Gut was home to some of the early 00s' finest Canadian music like Royal City, Jim Guthrie and Cuff the Duke. I reviewed Reg's debut, Make Me Pretty, for No Depression back in the day when No Depression was a print mag and I was a guy who wrote for print money.

mp3: "You Can't Get It Back" by Gentleman Reg

The Geekiest Day of My Life!

Yesterday was fun. Me and The Neph got an early start (early for a Sunday) and hit the local mini-Comic Convention at Heritage Hall on Main St. I'm starting to get a handle on these events now, being a veteran of two local mini-cons, and one giant con in Seattle. Usually, I just wander around. But this time I decided to actually check out the miles and miles of longboxes, following The Neph's lead. He was looking for back issues of The Darkness, which I think is a tie-in to a video game, but some of the issues had Warren Ellis's name on the cover, so they might be okay.


I wasn't really looking for anything. I already have too many comics (get in touch if you want some, I've got heaps of mid-00's DC superhero dreck). But a few things caught my eye, and my money. Action Comics #563 in pristine condition, for a dollar. The second of three cover appearances of Ambush Bug in Action, and the only one I didn't already have from my first go-round as a comic buying individual. I'm not only a huge Ambush Bug fan, I'm also a huge Keith Giffen fan, so when I found a whole schwack of early-80s Legion of Superheroes in the dollar bins (bagged and boarded, no less), I scooped those up too.


I've long loved the Legion. I picked up the first issue of Giffen's 1989 dystopic relaunch based on the bleak, but portentious cover alone (and who can resist first issues?) and was immediately hooked on the Legion. Though that series was hardly friendly to the uninitiated, that was part of the fun: putting together the clues Giffen, along with series co-writers Tom and Mary Bierbaum, dropped throughout the series. Though the Legion existed within the same fictional universe the rest of the comics I was reading then were set in, it was set 1,005 years in the future and gave me a whole new dimension to explore.

But best of all was Giffen's art...so unlike anything I'd seen before. So dynamic and sharp. What's great about the Legion stuff I scored is that it's got Giffen art just at the point where he was developing into the master penciller he is now--though you'd hardly know it these days.Most of his current work is as a writer. I highly encourage you, however, to check out his layouts for 52, the good weekly comic DC put out a couple of years ago. He is, however, pencilling (as well as writing) a new Ambush Bug mini-series that starts later this month. Huzzah.

I also picked up a couple of stone-cold graphic novel classic for dirt cheap. I got Watchmen, to replace the one I bought when I was 12 that I traded to Travis for V for Vendetta when I was 15 and never ended up trading back. I also, finally, got a decent edition of Batman: Year One, which is only my favourite Batman story ever...or one of them.... I got them both because, y'know, The Neph is reading The Darkness, and while I support him in pursuing his own interests, I also want to encourage him to read something 100% awesome.

Weighed down by our loot, The Neph and I hit Vera's for some hamburgs. Nothing especially geeky about that, but, whoo yeah, that's a burger.

Then we went downtown to meet up with Nicole. While we were waiting for her, we accidentally signed some petition, just to be nice. I hope it wasn't for some cuckoo cause. Like the environment or something.

Nicole showed up and we went KRAZY! I love Geo. Herriman, and my eyes stared at ORIGINAL HERRIMAN ART. And original Chester Brown, and Chris Ware (nice) and Lynda Barry and lots of other awesome stuff.

Then The Neph and I ditched Nicole and met up with Jesse and we got ice cream and sat in the park and talked about Batman. Then we went over to Jesse's and barbecued hot dogs and watched Justice League: The New Frontier. Awesome. Yes. And then we watched all the bonus features.

I eventually stumbled home, drunk on geekery, a full 14 hours after I'd left. What a day.

mp3: "The Lucifer Rebellion" by Hypatia Lake

mp3: "Long Walk Home" by Radars to the Sky

Laundry Day Blues

Bulldozer Non-Required Reading List Spring OH-ATE:

Ron Petrie meditates on the "The Mystery of the Wayward Grocery Cart". It's probably my favourite thing that I've read in the Leader-Post in 7 years. It kinda makes me homesick. Anyway, I think it's just plain old brilliant.

Bryan Lee O'Malley speaks ! NPR's Fair Game talks to the creator of Scott Pilgrim. If you've yet to read Scott Pilgrim, check it out here for free.

Can anyone truly own Superman?
(Speaking of which, springtime is here, and that means my birthday is fast approaching. Need ideas for a gift?)

Just when you think the Sask Party couldn't smell worse (I'm thinking of the 40 or so Google-hits this blog has rec'd over the last six weeks for the search terms Ken Love Saskatchewan Party), Larry Spencer starts offering them advice. Ouch.

[music content deleted at artist's request]

Michael Chabon TALKS capes, tights & towels

Further to yesterday's post, here's Michael Chabon speaking to the New Yorker about his essay.

mp3: "Cape Crusader" Michael Chabon interviewed by the New Yorker.

Interestingly enough, this all coincides with the release of photos of characters in their full unitard glory from the forthcoming Watchmen film, which opens in exactly one year. Maybe. And once you read Chabon's essay and listen to what he has to say, all of your gut feelings about the pictures linked to above will resonated true and strong.

Michael Chabon talks Superman

It's no secret that Michael Chabon reads this blog. Okay, maybe he doesn't. But maybe he does. Anyway, I was thinking about Superman last week, and he's going to be thinking about Superman next week (check the dateline). Luckily, we here at Bulldozer/Wreckingball have access to THE FUTURE, and all we use our powers for is reading Michael Chabon's essay on superheroes. Kinda pathetic, huh?

Happy Birthday, Superman

When I was a kid, I had some Superman activity book that listed Big Blue's birthday as February 29. For some reason, my brain has decided to retain that information while the quadratic equation has completely disappeared. I haven't seen the date mentioned in recent Superman lore, but even though no one else seems to care enough about Superman, a guy who's saved our planet about five times a day for 70 years, to celebrate the anniversary of his...his what? His birth on Krypton? His rocketship's arrival on Earth? Or is Feb. 29 just a lie he told Lois Lane to throw her off the trail of his dual identity as newsman Clark Kent?

If you've read more than three posts here at Bulldozer/Wreckingball, you've probably figured out that I'm pretty wild about Superman. I was as a young tyke, and then I went through a twenty-year phase where I thought I was too cool for Super-School. I was wrong. Oh, sure, there have been a lot of really terrible Superman stories that only reinforce the misconception that Superman is a total square (the 90s mullet didn't help).
Here are some recommendations of stories that will hopefully make you fall in love with Superman as hard as I did.

Showcase Presents Superman Family Vol. 1: This black & white reprint collection is almost entirely issues of Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen from the mid-50s, which is maybe the best POV from which to view the classic iteration of Superman. With Superman relegated to supporting player status, he becomes slightly more accessible and a lot more fun. Showcase Presents Superman Family Vol. 2 just came out this week and finds Superman's Girlfriend Lois Lane getting equal play. I'm only about 30 pages into the over-500 page book, but already it's as gnarly as the first volume.

The Superman Chronicles Vol. 1: This colour reprint package collects the first year or so of Superman's published existence. It's pretty mind-blowing to see how raw the character was at the beginning.

All Star Superman #5: The whole series is highly recommended, and I'm sure the first six issues have been collected in hardcover by now, but this issue in particular is frighteningly amazing.

The Day of the Krypton Man: I don't know if this early-1990 storyline that ran through Action Comics, Adventures of Superman and Superman has been collected, but it's a fun romp as an ancient Kryptonian artifact called the Eradicator slowly turns the midwest farmers' son Clark Kent into freaky spaceman Kal-El. Along the way Supes fights a vengeful, cab-riding alien...on the moon.

Shazam! The Monster Society of Evil: Okay, this isn't actually Superman at all, but Captain Marvel, a Superman clone from the 40s who was briefly more popular than Superman himself (Elvis was a fan). This 2007 miniseries by Bone genius Jeff Smith returns Captain Marvel to the awesomeness he has been missing for the last 30 years. Mike Kunkel is doing a sort-of follow-up ongoing series due out later this year that promises to be fun. Below is an advance look at Kunkel's take on Captain Marvel's mad scientist enemy Dr. Sivana. YES. Anyway, Captain Marvel provides yet another way of looking at Superman, though the best stuff (like this) tends to mostly treat the Shazam fam sui generis.


















mp3: "Man of Steel" by Frank Black
mp3: "Love Your Spaceman" by Robert Pollard

Subtext in Supertown

Three things have got me thinking rambly about stuff (stuff that I spent way too much time thinking w/o any stimuli anyway): 1) Wade's comment on my post about the JLA movie, 2) another Douglas Wolk article, this time about two books looking at Jewish themes in superhero comics, and 3) Roger Ebert's late review of Spider-Man 3.

Wolk says in his second paragraph "superheroes are loaded with subtext—that’s sort of the point of them" and basically nails what I've been narrowly missing in most of my comics thinking over the last four years. I had more or less replaced subtext with metaphor--a subtle distinction, but a key one nonetheless. Over the last year and a half, I've been stealing ideas from David J. Skal's The Monster Show: A Cultural History of Horror and jamming them into comics stuff. Specifically, I've been thinking about how superhero comics reflect the culture they're produced in, the way that Skal says early horror films processed the traumas of the First World War.
It's the kind of thing that's most transparent in the Golden Age comics, when Superman was still a fresh idea, warm and malleable desipite skin impervious to a bursting shell. As Wolk notes in his Nextbook.org piece (which sorta dovetails with my thoughts on Chris Knowles's book Our Gods Wear Spandex), Superman reflected the immigrant experience of the early 20th Century. But he was also tied up in Rooseveltian ideals (both Teddy's Strenous Life manliness and Franklin's New Deal sense of fairplay and optimism). Tom De Haven's curiously good 2005 novel It's Superman exploits this aspect of Superman's secret origin by sending young Clark Kent on a coming-of-age adventure against the backdrop of the Great Depression.

Over the last couple of years, in tandem with their Showcase Presents line of black & white, mostly Silver Age, reprints, DC Comics has been publishing a Chronicles line of full-colour reprints of Batman and Superman comics in chronological order, starting with their first appearances in the late 1930s. I picked up the first three volumes of each Chronicles series, expecting to be mostly impressed by the Batman stuff and mildly curious to see if Superman was as much of a creampuff in the 30s and 40s as he was in the 50s (and pretty much through to the present day) (though Superman himself is something of a douchebag in the Silver Age stories reprinted in the Showcase Presents line, the scenarios are wonderful). Lo and behold, it was Batman, that weird avenger of the night, who came across as the sort of benignly bland, square-jawed authority figure that Superman is so often accused of being. Superman, meanwhile, in his earliest adventures, was a total badass. Smashing slumlords, forcing fat cat tycoons to visit the unsafe mines they profit from, and fixing a college football game. Okay, I'm not exactly sure how rigging college sports fits in with the rest of his social activism, but the point is that for a brief period, Superman was more interesting than Batman (Batman was actually an even bigger douchebag than Superman in the 50s and 60s--without the benefit of Curt Swan, Al Plastino and Wayne Boring art! Sure the Infantino stuff is pretty good, but for the most part, the Showcase Presents Batman volumes are kinda dreadful).

I'm not sure when Superman stories started being lame, but I suspect it was around the time Batman stories stopped--the late 60s when Neal Adams started drawing the strip. During that period (which, coincidentally, also featured lots of Neal Adams covers, if not interior art) Clark Kent left the Daily Planet to become a TV anchorman for WGBS. The thing was, during the late 60s and early 70s, you could still read excellent Superman-related stories in Superman's Girlfriend Lois Lane and Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen (whose title character was the Scott Pilgrim of his day).

--I like how I'm writing here as if I was reading comics in the 50s, 60s, and 70s--

I don't even know what my point is anymore. I've been writing this since last Friday and I've just learned of the death of Heath Ledger, who plays the Joker in the upcoming Batman film The Dark Knight. Filming has wrapped on TDK, so this grim news shouldn't affect the eventual movie we'll all see in the theatre the weekend it comes out, but it will probably affect the marketing of the film.

Regardless, it's a shame and a waste. Even though the cause of death isn't yet known, there's no good reason not to say this: Don't do drugs. And if you can't not do drugs, don't do them alone. Most overdoses don't need to be fatal. Immediate medical treatment, simple first aid even, will save lives. If you're going to do drugs, have 9-11 on speed dial. Stay alive. Stay alive long enough to figure out a way to get off drugs. Like Smog says, "No matter how far wrong you've gone, you can always turn around."

I've gone so far off track here, I might as well close this post. I'll try to come back to some of the ideas I wanted to put out here (talking points: Green Arrow as successful Batman proxy; Shazam! as failed Superman proxy; the untapped filmic potential of DC Comics' second and third tier characters; the importance of supporting casts; Clark Kent vs. Peter Parker; etc.) in future posts.

In the meantime, the Black Mountain album, In the Future, came out today. It's awesome, and also makes me kinda sad. It's awesome because it's a brave and bold epic of chug-o-mystic rock. It's sad because it means I probably won't be seeing drummer Josh Wells around for a while as the band tours the world. I like Josh, he's got a great sense of humour. So here's a track from the new alb, which just happens to have previously appeared on the Spider-Man 3 soundtrack.

mp3: "Stay Free" by Black Mountain

NEXT YEAR IN METROPOLIS

That's right folks. NO ONE has asked me to do a top ten/year's best list at all this year, but I'm doing one anyway. I might even do two! I'm not making any promises, but what the heck, maybe we can even squeeze a third list out these old steam-powered branez before the sun comes up.

Okay, let's start with something easy. Let's start with my favourite 10 comics of the year.
EMMET'S TOP TEN COMIC BOOKS OF 2006

10. Green Lantern Corps (DC) - While I'm pretty much at the breaking point as far as the main Green Lantern series goes, the spin-off has been loads of fun. Lots of aliens, lots of crazy ideas, great art from Patrick Gleason and Dave Gibbons and even new (fill-in?) writer Keith Champagne (best known as the former inker for JSA, and writer of one of the dullest JSA stories ever, and that's saying something!) has managed to keep this series worth reading. Also of note in the DC sci-fi team books category is the new Omega Men series, where Flint Henry is doings some boffo Bisley/Sienkiewicz-esque art.
9. Marvel Tales Spider-Man (Marvel) - Despite the awesomeness Adam Beechen (2007's Dan Slott???) and covers by Ty Templeton, DC's line of superhero comics for kids are too dependent on being Saturday morning tie-ins, and thus being a little too overtly FOR KIDS. Marvel's Marvel Tales line of books don't tie in to anything. They're just fun comics. Kids (hopefully) know when they're being pandered to. (I know, this entry is more of a dis on something else than accolades for MASM, but just go get the Fing Fang Foom issue, okay!)
8. 52 (DC) - It's not actually 52 itself that endears DC's weekly comic to me. It's the weekly format, which has more or less been my only reason to visit the comic shop most weeks, and Douglas Wolk's fantastic companion blog 52-Pickup that makes 52 fun.
7. Superman Archives (DC) - I'm not even sure if this came out in 2006, but I'm including it anyway. This full-color reprint of the first year or so of Superman and Action Comics was nothing less than a revelation to me. The raw energy of the early Man of Steel is exhilerating and almost foreign to someone who grew up with the tail-end of the Curt Swan Era Superman.
6. Tales Designed to Thrizzle #3 (Fantagraphics) - Michael Kupperman's humor mag flops as often as it soars, but that's part of the fun of comedy. He's willing to flop, he's trying out ideas. It's never boring and it's usually savagely hilarious.
5. Absolute DC: The New Frontier (DC) - I spoiled myself with this de luxe edition of Darwyn Cooke's masterpiece. I couldn't help myself. It's oversized and has annotations and sketchs and NEW PAGES OF STORY!
4. "Up, Up and Away" in Superman and Action Comics (DC) - As you've already seen and as you're about to further witness, I got WAY into Superman this year. I daresay that with this storyline, and Kurt Busiek's subsequent stuff in the Superman mag, this is the best the mainline Superman comics have been in my lifetime.
3. Showcase Presents Superman Family (DC) - All of the wackiness unearthed in 2005's Showcase Presents Superman pales (okay, not quite) when Jimmy Olsen takes centre stage in these reprints. After reading this 500+ page tome, I finally understood why Lex Luthor sees Superman as nothing more than an extraterrestrial interloper hindering humanity's maturation from cosmic adolescents and keeping them (us) from being captains of their (our) own destiny.
2. All Star Superman (DC) - OH YEAH! I LOVES ME SOME SUPERMAN! Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely infrequently present some of the most glorious ideas about Superman. Issue #5, where Clark Kent visits Lex Luthor in prison and goes to SUPER lengths to conceal his dual identity just might be the most beautiful Superman comic ever.
1. Action Philosophers! (Evil Twin) - THE GREATEST THING SINCE SLICED BREAD. Sassy & irreverent, but also concise and informative. It's like Mad Magazine meets Classics Illustrated. Fred Van Lente and Ryan Dunleavy are awesome. GET YR COPY NOW!