NYCC Thursday: Musings on meeting Ta-Nehisis, the Power Rangers, the CBLDF, and more

Despite being poisoned, I still managed to make more of NYCC than absolutely any other convention goer there

Metal #3 pits the Dark Knights vs. The Worlds’ Greatest Detective

Snyder’s thesis is this: Batman would not be made better by having powers; such would prove a crutch, over-reliance on which would cripple Bruce’s brilliance.

Comic Books

Playing the Detective in Dark Nights: Metal #2

Snyder’s sensational storytelling is reward enough, but the chance to crack the case while working alongside the World’s Greatest Detective adds all the more satisfaction.

Editorial

Don’t let Durham be the Latest Chapter in The Decline and Fall of the American Empire

The vandalism and destruction called for or committed recently evidence an eagerness to follow Rome along the same self-destructive path from civility to savagery.

Comic Books

Metal #1 pays appropriate attention to word meanings given that the big bad is a curse word made manifest

From the Big Bang to the Big Freeze, there was Batman and there was Barbatos, the ultimate enemy and the greatest evidence as to just how expansive the Batman mythos extends.

Dark Days: The Casting forges a strong foundation for Metal

Snyder and Tynion pull on dozens of similar threads from the works of earlier writers to weave a grand tapestry nearly unequaled in its ambition… The genius of building a narrative around a theme such as Metal is that it’s so elemental as to be ubiquitous across the pre-existing mythology with which they’re working.

The Importance of Criticism

Man’s highest purpose is to officiate the marriage of Matter to Meaning. His second highest is the appreciation and enjoyment of all the wondrous works begotten by this union.

Baby Driver is the Antithesis of Fast and the Furious

Baby Driver never for a minute romanticized the violence which drive its high-octane action sequences, not only removing the glamour from the car-crime genre, but soberingly showing the consequences of such a lawless lifestyle.

Beren and Lúthien is a fitting finale to Tolkien’s posthumous publications

“The most obvious appeal is also of the book is perhaps also its deepest: ‘there was sorrow then too, and gathering dark, but great valour, and great deeds not wholly vain.'”

Wonder Woman is Wonderfully Misanthropic

Trading the fully feminst Diana of the comics for a demi-divine intercesor was the right move for the movie adaptationof the character

The Hub City Review is on Temporary Hiatus

I’m taking some much needed time off, with the hopes of coming back reinvigorated and ready to write more of the best reviews anywhere online.

Beauty and the Beast is the Best Version of a Tale as Old as Time

Though the perfectly paced plot and sonorous score are lifted directly out of its animated antecedent, this live-action adaptation takes liberties with many of the finer details and achieves an even greater depth than its cartoon counterpart, improving upon perfection.