Speed Force

Some items I’ve written about elsewhere that might be of interest to this site’s readers.

First up: I’ve finally found the time to finish my San Diego Comic Con write-ups! Here’s Saturday and Sunday at Comic-Con International!

Review: I liked Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. It was a fun movie/comic/video game mash-up, and it’s a shame that so few people have gone to see it.

Speaking of reviews and things that are insanely late: I found some interesting reviews on Amazon this week while looking for long-delayed fantasy books, including Tokoypop’s Labyrinth and Dark Crystal series. I found it most amusing that George R.R. Martin’s fans are already reviewing A Dance With Dragons…even though the book isn’t finished yet. More precisely: they’re reviewing the wait for the book!

Today, DC released some major Wonder Woman news: a new costume designed by Jim Lee and a new direction for the series as J. Michael Straczynski takes over.

To sum up: Persons unknown have altered Wonder Woman’s history so that Paradise Island was wiped out 20 years ago. Diana has no memory of the original timeline, doesn’t have her full powers yet, and needs survive, help other refugee Amazons, find out who destroyed Paradise Island and find out whether the timeline can be restored.

All-New, All-Different!

I’m always apprehensive when a new writer picks up an established character and the first thing he does is to remove some key element of the character. Like the Flash’s speed (Geoff Johns’ first Flash story, “Wonderland”). Or Superman’s flight (JMS’ first Superman arc, “Grounded”). I understand it might help the writer get inside the character’s head: what is he or she like without the powers? But it always feels like shoehorning some other idea onto the character. Why did you want to write the Flash if you didn’t want to write about a guy who runs fast?

That said, for all that DC is pushing this as a “new direction,” to me this description reads more like a major story arc. I mean, there’s an end point right there in the description: find out who did it and see if it’s possible to change things back. Given the timing of the comics themselves and the time-travel elements to the story, I suspect this is going to be linked to Flashpoint. [Update: Comics Alliance asked JMS about this and he said it's not related.]

Retcon Fever

It’s worth comparing to Flash: Rebirth, actually. In both cases, someone within the fictional universe has gone back in time and altered the main character’s history. With Diana, we know before the first issue is out. With Barry Allen, only long-term readers knew anything had been changed to begin with. It wasn’t clear that there was an in-story explanation for it until the miniseries was almost over. Even then, the prospect of undoing the changes was only floated long enough to be dismissed as impossible.

Most importantly: changing Diana’s history drastically alters who she is today. That’s a story. Once you get past the doom-and-gloom Barry of Flash: Rebirth #1-3, the changes to his history don’t seem to have made much difference in the present.

More linkblogging! Here are some (mostly) non-Flash-related posts on general comics, fandom, and online community issues.

Orbital Vector analyzes an aspect of super-speed that’s usually glossed over: Just How Old is the Flash, subjectively? (via dhusk’s comment on the Flashes’ experience post)

Techland has eight questions for comics creators to consider before putting a book on the market. (via @SpeedsterSite)

Multiversity Comics looks at some of the pros and cons of waiting for the trade.

Comic Vine has 5 Things to be Aware of When Buying Back Issues.

What do websites with open comments do when they realize that people are jerks? Reining in Nasty Comments. (via @ThisIsTrue) I’m reminded of Penny Arcade’s expression of the Greater Internet ****wad Theory (NSFW language): Normal Person + Anonymity + Audience = Total ****wad.

Poll: You find a typo in one of your old blog/LiveJournal/etc. posts. Do you fix it?

Technologizer tracks down the origin of the term Fanboy (via The Beat)

High Five Comics considers The Problem with Madame Lady Girl-Woman.

In the 1940s, Crash Comics introduced a super-hero named Blue Streak. He was a “skilled fighter.” With that name, how did they not make him a speedster?

There have been a lot of articles on the battle for the future of Comic-Con International, but one question jumped out at me in this one at Deadline Hollywood: Jeff Katz asks, “Are you a fan show with trade elements, or are you a trade show that lets in fans…or is there a happy medium?”

A few brief news items:

Top Cow’s delayed Velocity #1 is shipping June 16. I’ve been looking forward to this since reading the Pilot Season book, though of course this is an entirely new creative team. On the plus side, it’s a miniseries, so there’s not a huge commitment to picking it up.

Cartoon Network will be producing a Green Lantern animated series. Green Lantern: First Flight was pretty good, but of course there’s no guarantee that any of the same people will be working on this.

DC will be teaming up with TASCHEN Books to produce 75 Years of DC Comics: The Art of Modern Mythmaking. Basically it’s a history of DC Comics. How soon can I pre-order this?

Hypergeek notes that the UK graphic novel Whatever Happened to the World’s Fastest Man? has been nominated for the 2009 Eagle Awards. From his review, it looks like it’s not about a speester so much as it’s about a man who can stop time, and reluctantly becomes a hero. I’m going to have to look for this one as well. [Edit: I should note that I stopped reading the review once I decided the book looked interesting, just in case there were spoilers.]

Remember the Battlestar Galactica cake? For last night’s LOST finale, my wife made an authentic DHARMA Initiative chocolate cake, and pizzas with the Swan and Orchid logos.

The cake is chocolate, with homemade buttercream icing (vanilla for the background, chocolate for the design). The pizzas have an outer ring of sausage, with bell pepper strips for the I Ching. The Swan logo is cut from a bell pepper. The Orchid is cut from a tomato, and placed on the pizza after baking.

For more views, including in-progress pictures, close-ups, and making-of commentary, check out the LOST finale food photos on Flickr.

This Is True is a weekly newsletter rounding up weird news from around the world, summarized with witty comments by Randy Cassingham. It’s usually funny, sometimes sad, sometimes infuriating — but it always makes you think.

I’ve been a subscriber for years, and highly recommend it. One of the things I like about it is that he makes more effort to verify the stories than the typical “odd news” wire service that simply repeats something printed in a distant newspaper without realizing that it’s the local equivalent of the National Enquirer or Weekly World News.

Anyway, I could keep talking it up, or I could show you an example story using the True-a-Day service:

Cassingham also links to interesting news items on Twitter and on Facebook, though not the same articles as in the newsletter.

It’s a safe bet that your web browser uses at least one plugin, and probably several. Maybe it’s just Flash (the other one!) for viewing animations and video (think YouTube and Hulu). Maybe it’s Silverlight for watching Netflix, or Shockwave for playing games. You’ve probably got Java installed.

Just like your web browser, these plugins must be kept up to date or you’ll run into problems: missing features, instability, or (worst case) security vulnerabilities. Unfortunately, most plugins don’t update themselves.

Several months ago, Mozilla introduced a service called Plugin Check that will identify the plugins you have installed and tell you whether they need to be updated — and how to do it. At first it only worked on Firefox, but now it’s been expanded to all major browsers: Chrome, Safari, Opera, and even Internet Explorer.

It’s worth taking a few moments to check. Think of it as a pit stop for your computer’s web browser.

(Reposted from K-Squared Ramblings)

Here are a few recent comics-related items from my other blog, K-Squared Ramblings, that might be of interest to readers of Speed Force.

First up, I’ve written up a piece on today’s Comic-Con hotel deposit deadline and how it should be a second chance for hotel rooms. The short version: Today’s the last day to cancel without a penalty, so you can bet that rooms will be freeing up. We’ll see how Travel Planners handles the waiting list.

Last November, I wrote up a piece here on mini-series I was reading that had stalled with just one issue left. One of those miniseries, the adaptation of Robert Jordan’s New Spring (a prologue to The Wheel of Time), finished this week. Five years is a bit long for an eight-issue miniseries, but it’s done!

I spotted a movie marquee that had (as most of them seem to) censored the title Kick-Ass, but the placement created another movie title entirely:

This could actually make an interesting movie! Okay, it would be about as long as Bambi Meets Godzilla, but still…

So today I was checking my yahoo mail and on the front page an article immediately caught my eye. “Why the speeding ‘cushion’ is disappearing” – USATODAY.com. Naturally I clicked on the link and proceeded to read an article explaining that the ‘speeding cushion’ that enabled drivers a little leeway to go about 5 or 10 miles over the speed limit is rapidly disappearing due to increased police action. As a result of the recession, cities and states are trying their best to bring in any “new” revenue they can. Even to the point of apparently exaggerating details.

As for what this has to do with The Flash?

Not much really. It just reminded me of this hilarious fan film, “Speeding Ticket” by Chris .R. Notarile.

In it The Keystone Comet is “pulled over” by a police officer and humorously admonished for going 275 miles over the speed limit. Kelson did a little blurb on it about a year ago but I thought it was funny enough to warrant another mention. Especially in light of this recent story.

You can check out Speeding Ticket HERE and see more of Chris .R. Notarile’s Blinky Productions Fan Films (and there are a ton) HERE

-Devin “The Flash” Johnson

One scene in Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths really reminds me of a moment in an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

No, really.

Spoilers for Crisis on Two Earths (and Buffy season 2, if you’re really behind the times).

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