Category Archives: Comic Books

On 1UP: Mega Man’s Comic Career: The Good, The Bad, The Bizarre

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Ah, right; I should have mentioned this last week. In addition to my other stories for 1UP for their Cover Story “Mega Man: 25 Years of Theme-Park Levels and Stolen Robot Powers,” my wife and I collaborated on one other piece.

“Mega Man’s Comic Career: The Good, The Bad, The Bizarre” looks at a sampling of noteworthy comics and manga from around the world, each of which treating the franchise in its own way. From the bizarre self-gratification of bad writers in Brazil to the current Archie Comics series (with comments from series writer Ian Flynn), and several stops in-between, there’s a lot of ground covered here.

Please check it out, and feel free to leave comments on what you think of any of my articles here or on 1UP!

That wraps up that theme. Hopefully I can soon get my foot in the door for another!

The Top Nine Other Things I Want Reinvented in the New TMNT

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Okay, so I’ve already talked about what I think of Nickelodeon’s new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, as well as at length about one big thing I’d like to see them reinvent. Now, in some lesser detail, are nine other things I’d like to see reinvented for the new series.

9) Power Armor: Granted, I don’t want them to get into this too soon… in fact, I’d rather it come much later. Perhaps even much, much later, but more on that in a moment.

I always dug the Cyber Samurai Turtles’ power armor, and with Iron Man being a pretty hot ticket as of late, it seems like a cool idea. The alternate implementation was the one-shot episode of the original cartoon where putting on generic suits saw them shift in size and shape until they were the size of Megazords… neat, but not an idea with lasting power, in all likelihood.

Of course, where this idea really works is if they were to bring back a shared element from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures comic…

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Nickelodeon Should Bring the Super Shredder Back to TMNT

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As I sit down to write this, it is late on the eve of the debut of Nickelodeon’s new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon, which– as I see it– officially kicks off a new era for the fab four. Certainly, IDW has been doing some rather intriguing things with their comic book, things which I like a lot from what I’ve read of them (I need to begin collecting the graphic novels), and which you can read about at TMNT Entity.

Ah, but the cartoon… though the Turtles’ life began in the Mirage comics (aka “Turtle Prime” in Turtles Forever), it’s the cartoons which have really driven the franchise for better or for worse. Some even refuse to acknowledge anything which came before the Fred Wolf cartoons of the 80′s and 90′s… or after, for that matter.

And so we come to this. So far, it seems to be taking a bit of the old, a bit of new, and is more or less ignoring what IDW is doing in the comics, to boot (to my chagrin, in some cases). Can you believe it’s been nearly three years since Mirage sold the whole thing off to Nickelodeon?

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Spider-man? No, It’s Spider-Stan!

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So, Spider-man has a new movie coming out, and… Zzz…

Okay, so admittedly, Spider-man has been on the outs with me ever since that whole “sold my marriage to the devil” thing Marvel did to nearly ruin him. And honestly? A reboot isn’t really what I want in a new movie– “untold story,” my foot. I’ve seen his origin told so many times and so many ways that the only way to surprise me would be if Uncle Ben lives… and no, I don’t want that, either.

So a game based on that movie? Zzz… but wait! A mode where you can instead play as Stan Lee, chasing after his windblown script papers through the city with Spider-powers and fighting crime on the side? That is so outrageous that all I can say is “sign me up!”

Now watch it be some unlockable or DLC or something.

Thanks to Topless Robot for bringing this to my attention, and curse Topless Robot for taking the good, obvious headline.

Check Out My Interview with Mega Man Writer Ian Flynn at The Mega Man Network

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Over at The Mega Man Network, we’ve just posted a recent interview I conducted with Ian Flynn, a writer of many hats at Archie Comics. His works include Sonic the Hedgehog, companion title Sonic Universe, and the Archie superhero revival known as The New Crusaders, but given the place this interview was published, it’s obvious that this interview focuses on his other title, Mega Man.

So give it a look to learn more about the upcoming story arc which delves into the origin of Proto Man, the appearance of upcoming Robot Masters (some sooner than you might expect), and what to expect regarding future game adaptations.

Revenge of the 90′s: The Fate of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

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The first two posts of my impromptu “Revenge of the 90′s” weekend (which is now admittedly running over into the week) were not particularly revenge-like. In one, we learned of First 4 Figures taking Sonic the Hedgehog back to his roots, while the other gave us a hopeful look into the future of the Power Rangers.

Hopeful. That’s a word that doesn’t seem especially fitting towards this look at the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Specifically, the Mirage version of the characters, which as Turtles Forever made quite clear, are essentially the root of all the other versions.

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Coming to San Diego Comic-Con: Everything You Want, But Cannot Have

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The 2010 San Diego Comic-Con is this week, and as always, it brings with it lots of exclusive toys for attendees to buy. This is often a painful endeavor for those who cannot go, as aftermarket prices can be simply insane, but this year seems worse than ever!

Topless Robot has put together a list of this year’s 20 greatest exclusives. But even with that many, there are still some great items left unmentioned, such as Capcom’s recently announced Mega Man Universe foam Mega Busters, or the Servbot Bobble Buds from Mega Man Legends.

Besides the Mega Man stuff (more of which is listed here, obviously, the items topping my “most wanted” list of SDCC exclusives this year include the reissue of Transformers Autobot Blaster with three of his cassettes (Steeljaw, woot), the Marvel Super Hero Squad “Sunday Morning” Dr. Doom figure, and the Masters of the Universe Classics homage to the Robot Chicken sketch featuring Skeletor and Mo-Larr: Eternian Dentist:

Other appealing items include Sgt. Slaughter from G.I. Joe and the MOTU Classics Orko with Prince Adam “accessory.” Plus, Nintendo is making its first appearance there since 2006; they’ve made no mentions of exclusives, short of a Dragon Quest IX downloadable map, but Metroid: Other M will be available to play there, over a month before its release.

Are any of you going to Comic-Con? And if so, which items are you hoping to grab?

–LBD “Nytetrayn”

Free Comic Book Day!

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Can’t believe I nearly forgot to post about this… today is FREE COMIC BOOK DAY! Go out and get some free comics while you still can!

Or check with your local participating comic book store (there’s a locator through the link); some will be celebrating tomorrow, too.

Me? I just got back from mine; managed to snag Sonic the Hedgehog (an original story), Toy Story, Iron Man & Thor, G.I. Joe, and the Bongo Comics (The Simpsons and Futurama, usually) FCBD special. And that’s just a fraction of what’s available.

In addition, Darkwing Duck tweets: “Now’s your chance to run into a comic book store, shout ‘give me all the comics!’ and not be a criminal!”

Why would he tweet that? Probably because he has a new comic of his own coming out in June, and figured that while you’re grabbing freebies, you can ask your shop to order his. You can catch a sneak peek of what’s to come from the Duck Knight here.

–LBD “Nytetrayn”