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I don't know why, but shippers drive me up the wall. I dislike them with every core of my body. I hate that audiences of a book, musical, tv show, movie, cartoon, comic book, etc try to force two characters together because they feel that they belong, even when the actual writers of said characters chooses not to put them together. The only thing I hate more than shippers are Mary Sues.



I first ran into shippers when I frequented the X-Files chat room of Yahoo. I have never been on board with Mulder and Scully being involved in a relationship, because I don't agree with the formula that a woman and man who work together/hang out with each other/do something together automatically will be involved together. Unfortunately this is how a lot of shows/movies/etc seem to run. The characters are not together at first, but their relationship evolves from friendship to lovers. This doesn't always work in real life and it drives me bonkers. The majority of shippers are women, and I don't know if it says something about the female gender or what. I get the notion that a lot of women are like Marge Simpson; they feel that everything and everyone should be paired together. I know that there are always going to be exceptions to the rule (myself for example). Do women just want romance? Happy Endings? Am I just alone, when I enjoy a movie where the main guy and the main gal go their separate ways, or one dies, or they love someone else?

Today I would like to bitch about shippers in a novel-turned-multiple-franchise that I hold dear to my heart: The Phantom of the Opera.

I have been a 'phan' for quite some time. My parents had gone to see Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical in the early 90s in Toronto, where it was a permanent fixture of Canadian Broadway for over 20 years. My mom brought back the soundtrack and played it constantly, inspiring me to find out more about the production.

Lucky for me, our library had a copy of the novel and I took it out in grade 4. It wasn't really the easiest novel for me to get through with my preconceived notions of what should happen based on my knowledge of the musical. My favourite thing about this book though, was the wonderful artwork of Greg Hildebrandt. I actually found the book at an online used book store and bought it for sheer nostalgia (and pretty pictures!).

I finally saw the stage production in 1997, during one of its final years. Shortly, the musical left Toronto, although occasionally it comes back for a month performance. When the 2004 movie came out, I was ecstatic because it meant I could watch it whenever I wanted, provided it was a word for word reproduction of the musical. For the most part, it is. I did have a little problem with some of the casting though.

Gerard Butler is too hot to be the Phantom.

Way too hot.

It was like casting had no concept of the story. The Phantom was hideously ugly. So ugly his mother never kissed him or looked upon his face. So ugly that it haunted Christine. Nobody loved the Phantom because he was a distorted gargoyle and that is why he had to live away from society's gaze.

Every actor who had played The Phantom in the musical had 4 hours worth of make done.



Look at Butler here. Loathsome gargoyle indeed... He looks like he had some minor burns, but nothing that couldn't be fixed with some of that Parisian stage make up they would have used in the operas!



The problem with making the Phantom hot is that it gives the character too much sympathy. There will always be sympathy for the Phantom. He had a shitty life and he just wanted to love and be loved. However, the Phantom also was a complete jerk. He took away Christine's freedom and held her prisoner, wanted to force her into marriage, murdered several people in both the novel and musical and used terror to control the staff at the Opera House. He was a selfish man up until the end. Only when Christine showed him pity and compassion, did he change his mind and give her back her freedom, his one unselfish act.

But, many female fans of the movie and the musical felt that Christine should have stayed with the Phantom. Oodles of speculation, fan fiction, fan art and even novels have tried to come to this conclusion. They felt that Christine truly loved the Phantom but clearly they were never paying attention to what was in front of them. It is absolutely illogical. Christine never once proclaimed her love for the Phantom. She appreciated his voice, his ability to write operas and to teach her, but never once did she feel torn in a love triangle. She always wanted to be with Raoul and it was the Phantom that forced her into choosing, only because he threatened to kill him in the musical (in the book, he was going to blow up the entire opera house).

Yet, Phantom of Manhattan, Susan Kay's Phantom and Andrew Lloyd Webber's Love Never Dies, a sequel to POTO go against this logical and insist that not only did Christine love the Phantom, but she had sex with him and had his love child.

Wait, what?

Damn you shippers! Clearly you have convinced enough people that there is a market for your insipid Christine-Phantom fantasy! You deny the logic presented before you!

In order to make C and P work, you have to make Raoul a jerk. So what do they do? They turn the brave hero who was willing to sacrifice his life so that Christine wouldn't be stuck marrying the Phantom and living in the bowels of the Opera House into a gambling drunk. A gambling drunk that Christine had to have cheated on to have her 10 year old son. In Kay's novel, Christine gives birth to a premature child who is actually full term, so Raoul realizes that the child is not his. In Love Never Dies, Christine goes and has sex with the Phantom the night before her wedding. Because this totally fits the character of Christine. Christine, who pledged her love to Raoul, who was willing to give up her freedom to save his life, who wanted him to steal her away so she wouldn't be captive of the Phantom any longer, who was frightened of the Phantom's soulless face, went out of her way to have sex with the Phantom before getting married to Raoul.

/brain explode.


Anyways.

My best friend is a shipper, and I tolerate it. But ugh, it drives me up the wall! I apologize to any other readers if you are shippers, but I have to ask: Why doesn't the audience just accept the writer's choices (I'm looking at you, Zutara shippers!)?

Ugh,


Have had about an hour's sleep, and my roomie's bro screaming bloody murder (whether pissed off or ecstatic--doesn't seem to make a difference) while he plays Call of Duty: Black Ops Online DOES NOT FUCKING HELP!!


So I did a little cleaning up and re-decorating here...let me know what you think (go ahead and offer suggestions, too)

Oh, and the new pics that don't quite fit in thsidebars? They'll be taken care of soon as Blogger gets off its lazy ass and fixes a glitch that's keeping me from resizing the pics.

Later!

(STOP FUCKING SCREAMING!!!)


Springtime For Scooter

Hello all

I'd like to let you know that I am not dead, and I've been trying to think about this review for a long time. I have not been able to think of a lengthy review for it, because it's hard to review a story without giving it away. My main idea was to focus on the three different mediums the story was presented, and how each one enhances or takes away from the story.

I do not wish to spoil the story because this is one of my favourites, and one I hope most people would pick up at one point in their lives.

So without further delay:



The Last Uncorn: Can a story be told in different mediums?

As some may recall, I did a review on the Watchmen movie exploring this same topic. I felt that despite the movie not capturing the entire aspect of the Watchmen comic, it did a pretty good job delaying with the set backs of certain limitations of a form.

A movie adaptation will never be perfect. Some have come close, but there is too much of a gap between a written story and a visual one. Written stories rely too much on provoking one's imagination through descriptive words and additional details to move the story along, while a movie can just show you what it is trying to portray. A book can be as many pages as the author wants. Movies are forced to stay in specific time restraints, or be pushed into a series of movies to tell the whole story. A book allows the reader to picture what they think certain things look like, while a movie keeps the image the same for everyone.

Despite these limitations, movie adaptations can be successful. I actually grew up watching The Last Unicorn movie before I read the book. I didn't even know it was a book until I was in high school. But when I read the book, I realized that the movie version did not stray from its original concept. Sure, there were some certain parts of the book that were cut out, but their omission did not seem to affect the overall story. I am certain that this was probably because the author of the book, Peter S Beagle was the one that wrote the screenplay for the movie. While he may have removed a chunk of backstory on certain characters, anyone who compares the book to the movie may be able to agree that some of it is just not that necessary to get the same messages and themes across.

There is one form of story telling however, that is a marriage of words and pictures. A comic.

IDW publishing announced that it would publish a series on The Last Unicorn. A 6 comic series throughout 2010 that was approved by Peter S Beagle once again. In fact, he himself adapted the story for a comic.

Much like movies, a comic can be limited as well. I suppose the publishing company has the last say on how many issues you may have and how many pages in each one. As an owner of a couple of trade series, it seems a little daft that IDW would force an author to telling a story in only a limited number of issues and pages. Beagle himself announced in the summer that in order for them to properly tell the story, they would need additional pages in the 5th and 6th issue in the series. IDW told them it was a cost issue, and Beagle himself (and I think some others) paid out of pocket to get these additional pages.

With the first 3 issues, I was quite excited. I did have a slight issue with the art because I was hoping that the artist would have used her own style for some of the characters. Most of them looked exactly like their cartoon movie counterparts. A comic is a great way to get anew persepctive, but I felt that by using the same image of the unicorn as the 1982 film just reinforces that the cartoony unicorn is the image the author himself finds to be the most accurate, which I have a hard time believing.

Another thing I did notice with the comic was it was very slow at story telling. When the comic series is only 6 issues long, and you haven't even reached the middle of your story yet by the end of issue #3, you risk cutting some poignant parts of the story. I was delighted that some of the book that was not able to make it into the movie worked its way into the comic though they might be slightly minor.

I felt that the last two issues were really lacking and I was not keen on their design. In issue #5, the artist decided to label a spread with a character's name. It just seemed so out of place, especially since the reader had already been acquainted with the characters. I also felt that this issue's layout was just so mumbled compared to the previous issues. Issue #5 is also the first time we meet the main antagonist. In both the book and movie, he speaks deeply about the reason why he has captured all the unicorns in the world for himself. The comic ignores this outright, which is a shame since it is with that speech he becomes a sympathetic character.

As if issue #5 wasn't bad enough, the last issue really dropped the ball. Much like the main antagonist, the Unicorn herself exits the story with a relfection of her quest that sets her apart from the rest of the unicorns because of the life changing situation she had encountered. Instead, in the comic, she leaves the story quite quickly. Her reflection is vague and hurried, like the entire quest wasn't a big deal. It just seemed so unfitting and I was quite disappointed.

The art was okay. As I mentioned, a lot of the characters were very much lifted from movie itself. I did like how the issues started very bright, then increasingly got darker and more grey until the end of the last issue., using the contrast to reflect the moods of the story.

Overall, I thought that a comic version of the story could have been utilized a better way than it was. There was a chance for the comic to bring in what the movie had missed, but also offer visual stimulation. It started off well, but petered out in the end. I am not sure if this was a decision made by the author, or there were too many restrictions placed upon him. I think if he was allowed to do an eight issue series instead of a 6th, it may have worked better in his favor. At the end of the day, I will likely buy the trade when it comes out because I have a collection of TLU items and I am a weird collector in that way. I do hope that the comic book version of the story has encouraged others to read the book (now in its 40th year). At the end of the day, I guess the book will always be better.

Now for some pictures from the comic!

'Sup Peoples!


The Rat-Bastard did it!


My roomie's brother, owner of the computer that had been my second home for the last six months(give or take), finally ended my access as I mentioned he might a few posts ago. Only the Rat-Bastard didn't take it to his room, he just put a password on it that only he knows. So it sits here, in the living room, dark and inactive--MOCKING ME!!


So now I'm on my roomie's laptop--and while it functions 500% better than the old shitbox, I only get to use it when he's at work or watching tv or on the PS3. Plus, since it's a laptop, he takes it into his room with him every night, so no more chatting til the wee hours with my beloved Superfriends.

Well--ok, that's not entirely true...I can still use the PS3 to go online, which is a galactic pain in the ass since it means not only do I have to use a game controller to type on a virtual keyboard, I have to deal with the PS3's inefficient web browser--the thing just wasn't built to surf the net.

So, I won't be posting as much as I used to.

Sorry! :(

Anyhoo, gotta go--Scott Pilgrim is on Comcast OnDemand.

I'll try to have something of interest for you folks later in the week.


Peace out,

The Elusive Scoot

A hearty Hello to you and yours!


Our Colleen is on the mend!

Thanks to everyone who offered their support, but she's not totally out of the woods--so if you haven't yet, proceed forthwith to the post below and sign our virtual "Get Well Card"!




On to new business--This...Oh man! THIS!

There's honestly nothing I can add to the awesomeness displayed here--so I'll just shut up, and let the man speak:





Wow.




A Blown-Away Scoot

Hello! Hello, you sexy devils. I know I've been gone for a while, but I still love you all and if there's anybody I trust to run my empire, it's you guys. I thought I'd celebrate my comeback with another review, this time of a film significantly lower on the Badassometer than Scott Pilgrim. I speak of course, of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 3.


Now, I don't want to jump on the bandwagon and rip this movie to shreds - ahh, hell, of course I do. THIS MOVIE SUCKS MAJOR ASS. As both a movie fan, a comic book fan and a human being I can safely say that this is one movie that actually distresses me, keeps me awake at night, because there are bad movies and then there are movies that COULD have been awesome but, for whatever reasons, aren't. Spider-Man 3 fits into this category perfectly.

First of all I will outline its good points. The fight scenes and special effects are, quite simply, spellbinding and the best I've seen in any comic book movie. The effects on Sandman and the symbiote are brilliant. The acting is, for the most part, good, especially from the man I believe is J Jonah Jameson incarnate: JK Simmons. The Spidey movies have always had great music, and this installment is no exception. And finally, it is extremely funny when it wants to be. Those are the good points. Now.... *clicks fingers* for the bad.












This movie is rife with plot holes. The first is Harry Osborn's transformation. Throughout these movies, the main continuous story arc has been the relationship between Harry Osborn, Mary Jane Watson and Peter Parker. Harry starts as a troubled young man with a crush on MJ, an evil father and a superhero for a best friend. He then becomes a jackass alcoholic businessman, without a crush on Mary Jane, without an evil father and with a superhero for a best friend. By the beginning of the third, he is a supervillain without a crush on Mary Jane, without an evil father and with a superhero for an enemy. Seems plausible enough right? Well, barely ten minutes into the movie he hits his head and gets what I refer to as 'Conveniencenesia', losing all his memory. For the next hour or so he becomes 'old Harry', but instead of turning into the troubled young man with a crush on Mary Jane, he becomes this preposterously nice, goofy, happy character without a care in the world. Seriously, it's so weird. There's a scene when Mary Jane calls him up and he's in the middle of painting some kind of masterpiece. It's just a split second, but it confuses me to no end. Why did a bump on the head make him this way? I am reminded of the Futurama episode where Fry gets worms and becomes a charming, artistic hearthrob, except it makes far less sense than anything Matt Groening has ever dreamt up. Forgive me if I'm wrong about this, but I was under the impression that people who suffer from amnesia generally become depressed, scared and confused individuals, unable to remember key details from their lives, constantly forgetting and misunderstanding things that are common knowledge to their friends and family. But whatever, I'm sure Raimi and co did there homework.

It may well be down to the performance James Franco gives. He's a fine actor and a.... *sigh* a beautiful man, but somebody should have told him to tone it down a little. He's so damn happy, I don't think you seem him frown once during his 'Conveniencenesia' period. That's what's so wrong with this freaking movie, it's full of over the top performances. Ehhhh. Anyway, Harry touches a mirror or something and Willem Defoe's face ZOOOOOMS towards the screen, causing Harry to 'remember. Remember EVERYTHING!!!' He turns evil once again, but now of course he's a DIFFERENT kind of evil from earlier on, this time becoming a scheming, grinning, pie-eatin' pantomime villain rather than a brooding, revenge-seeking, neglected son. Then at the last minute he turns into a generic good guy again. Seriously, Harry Osborn goes through about one hundred different personalities in this trilogy. LET'S COUNT THEM SHALL WE

There's Troubled Harry from Spider-Man 1, then there's Angry Harry from Spider-Man 1, then there's Yuppie Harry from Spider-Man 2, then there's Alcoholic Harry from Spider-Man 2, then there's Vengeful Harry from Spider-Man 2, then there's Goblin Harry from Spider-Man 3, then there's Conveniencenesia Harry from Spider-Man 3, then there's Magnificent Bastard Harry from Spider-Man 3, and then finally 'Awwwwww' Harry from Spider-Man 3. What is that, 8 different Harrys over the course of three movies? Dayum. Look, I realise it's important for characters to develop over a trilogy's story arc, but by the end of it all Harry Osborn is several different people. Ughhh. Let's move on.

Sandman's entire character is completely fucking ridiculous. So we have an escaped burglar with 'bad luck' who has some kind of dying adorable child and a wife who lives in Elwood Blues' apartment 'in the presence of great truth' whatever the fuck that means. He falls into a giant sandpit (you know, the kind that are just lying around in fields with no safety rail or anything all over America) in which some scientists are testing the effects of sand when spun around real fast. They assume he's a bird (you know, one of the many man-shaped birds that occupy America) and start up the experiment. He turns into some.... some kind of.... SAND....MAAAANN!!!!!! but his little necklace thing manages to stay intact, despite being with him the entire time. I guess because it was in his pocket it stayed alright, but then there are scenes when he's floating around as a cloud guy and the necklace thing stays with him.... maybe it was floating with him, I don't know.

He wants to kill Spider-Man, because apparently he won't let Sandman take care of his sick daughter. Rather than, you know, explaining his situation to Spider-Man, a fellow superhuman, and asking for his help, he clumsily destroys a street in an attempted robbery. Smooth.

Now, I like Thomas Haden Church, I do. He seems like a nice guy, but the only movie I've ever liked him in was George of the Jungle, and this is no exception. His entire performance is so weird. He always looks kind of pained and frustrated, like his face is being stretched over his skull. There's a scene in which Spider-Man rips a water pipe apart, the camera zooming sharply in on Sandman's face with each screw that pops out of the pipe. The last time this happens Church sort of does a little face quirk, like he's thinking 'Daww, nuthin ever goes right for me! Guess I'm just a born loser. Here we go again!'. I know I'm shamelessly nitpicking, but I don't care, I'm fresh from watching the DVD and I have been living on Fruitella for the past five days and I feel my brain may be dissolving or something and I needed to get these thoughts off my chest. At the end of the movie, Sandman asks Spider-Man for forgiveness after pounding him into the ground seconds earlier, then floats away to a life of.... uhhh.... floating. His character sucks, and he was never a fantastic villain in the first place. Give me Vulture or Mysterio or Lizard next time, characters you can actually give depth and interest to. Some say without Venom this film would be great, but that's just not true. Sandman is only slightly better a character. Not to mention the fact that he is preposterously shoehorned into the franchise as Uncle Ben's 'real killer' in a pathetic attempt to give him a reason for even being in the fucking movie. EDIT: After watching the end, I find myself wildly cackling at the flashback of Uncle Ben's murder. Sandman just sort of raps on the window and helps the old man out of the car, politely asking if he can borrow the vehicle. He ponders whether or not he should proceed with the robbery and then accidently shoots Ben to death and gives a 'what have I DONE???!!!!' face. I lol'd.
Blleerrrghh, let's move on.

Venom, played by Topher Grace, is perhaps the worst and weirdest fictional antagonist I've ever come across in all my life. A meteorite falls from the sky with no explanation or reason and splurges out a black liquid (the symbiote), which attaches itself to Peter Parker's scooter and lives with him unnoticed for a while. When he's at his lowest, it crawls all over his costume and turns him into Black Suit Spider-Man. Even though later, he's got the black suit and the regular suit seperately in a cupboard, even though the black suit IS the regular suit, just covered with the symbiote, because we see it envelop the regular suit earlier on, except then the symbiote comes off and Spider-Man is completely naked underneath.... um. Anyway. Spider-Man gets rid of the symbiote (after some bizarre dancing, which is not so much funny or rage-inducing as it is baffling) and it plops down onto Eddie Brock's face. Yes, that's right, Spider-Man's parasitic liquid drips onto Eddie Brock's gazing face as Spidey writhes naked above. In a church. Abraxas, feel free to make of this what you will.

Eddie Brock is not evil or crazy, he's just an annoying douche who, for reasons unknown, wants Peter Parker's job. Or IS he meant to be crazy? There are certainly signs of this. He frequently makes weird comments about Gwen, first saying they are dating and later claiming he plans to propose despite them only ever having coffee. He has a complete breakdown after being fired from a job he didn't even have yet and asks GOD to kill someone he screwed over in the first place. However, these don't strike me as the actions of an insane supervillain, more the actions of a complete fuckwit. AAAAAAnyway, Spider-Man's black suit/symbiote/sperm envelops Brock and he turns into Venom, who somehow knows everything about Sandman and Peter and gets Sandman to team up with him in a grand plan to..... humiliate Spider-Man. Not murder or destroy, just humiliate.




Yeah.





Anyway, he is only ever Venom for about five seconds at a time, because every time we get a glimpse of him his spookyface peels back to reveal the oddly fanged Topher Grace (who, once again, is naked under the suit despite being fully clothed when he transformed. Weird) in all his not-at-all-threatening glory. He is incredibly easily defeated by Spider-Man banging poles together around him and making him bug out. He then explodes or something, I don't know (I stopped watching because Hot Fuzz had started on ITV 1 and is the far superior flick). So, that's Venom.

The worst part of this movie is the character of Harry's loyal butler, 'Bernard', who has had about three off screen lines throughout the trilogy until now. He pops up persuading Two-Face - I mean, Harry to turn good again by telling him his father died by his own hand. Gee, Bernard is a great guy. Not only was he fully aware that BOTH the Osborns were murderers and madmen, but he could have saved Harry countless times by telling him how his father died at ANY point in the last few years. Is he fucking CRAZY?! What the HELL were they thinking?! Why didn't they just have GOD appear from the heavens before Harry and tell him what happened? That would have angered me less. This is the worst fucking deus ex machina I have ever seen, and I am shaking with rage as I type this. Good God. Fuckadoodle doo. CuntburgerfucktwatterlycumquatfuckbraintrollsuckingarsewipeANAL JIZZ CLOWNS! WHY THE FUCK DO I BOTHER???!!! THEY COULD HAVE ENDED THIS FUCKING STORY TWO MOVIES AGO! WHY WOULD BERNARD WAIT TILL NOW TO TELL HARRY?!! WHY WOULDN'T HE TELL EVERYBODY STRAIGHT AFTER HE FOUND OUT! WHAT POSSIBLY REASON COULD HE HAVE HAD FOR KEEPING SHTUM? IS HE A FUCKING ASS?!?!?! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Somebody, please tell me! Tell me how I fix this! How do I calm down! HOW?! HOOOOOOWWWW

This is THE DOCTOR, signing out, deeply sorry for the nonsensical bullshit posing as a movie review, incredibly glad to be back and FUCKING angry about the shitfest that is Spider-Man 3. I am truly apologetic for the above article's shittiness. Goodnight. Now WHERE THE FUCK IS MY FRUITELLA?!

I missed boobs?! Seriously, I missed EVERYBODY'S boobs?!! Because my LAPTOP WAS OUT OF POWER?!?!?!?!
Since Scooter will never let me forget this, I will be publicly executing him at dusk. And not the nice kind of execution where everybody's kinda sad that it's come to this and stuff. The BAD kind where people are throwing fruit and punching pinata versions of the prisoner.





I missed boobs....

Jolan Tru,



99.9% percent of this article I previously wrote in two consecutive emails to my friend, fellow nerd, original TR Superfriend and soon to be SOHB contibutor: Senhorita Roberta Leopoldino(in other words, you can skip this one, Robbie ;) )

At the time, I thought it was decent work and deserved to be up on the blog some day, but that was back when next to no one read this thing and I only bothered to post about once or twice a month.

Now that I have a confirmed audience, I thought the time was right to share these words with my little community, it also seems an appropriate way to welcome Robbie to the unhinged ranks of SOHB's authors.

Lest I forget, Zortt1 will also be adding his voice to the blog--I'd love to tell you all about him, but I know literally nothing about the man save that he's a TR reader and seems like a nice guy.


Right, let's be on our way!



PART ONE: The Dark Ages



How did I become a nerd? Well, that's assuming I was ever anything else, isn't it? Here's a useful analogy: Some gay people can't remember ever being attracted to the opposite sex--since they were old enough to experience physical attraction its always been for the same gender. Others, however, may spend years--decades even--convinced they're straight, often to the point of getting married. This may be because the beliefs they were raised in were so intolerant that they subconsciously repress their real feelings. Or, it could simply be that they've been so sheltered that they don't understand their own impulses--they're often incredibly relieved once they learn that there's a name for what they are, and others out there like them.



So basically, what I'm saying in so roundabout and long-winded a manner is I've always been a nerd, I can't recall ever being anything else.


Whoa, I've just remembered the first time I was directly called a "nerd". I hadn't thought about this in years--it literally just came back to me. This may not be the literal first time I was called such, but it was definitely the first time it really struck home, the first time I knew I was different.

I was either 10 or 11, and hanging out with the kids across the street. Details are vague, but the oldest kid there, the elder sister of this family, was teaching the rest of us how to be "Punk". I realize now that she had no idea what she was talking about, or even what the word means--somehow, being "Punk" consisted of drawing peace signs on all your clothing. Who knows where she acquired this bizarre notion--but hey, she was a teenager, and therefore knew everything and was way cooler than a little kid like me.

Anyway, following the time-honored principle of "monkey see, monkey do"--I went home and proceeded to decorate my gym shoes in the prescribed manner(drawing the peace signs upside-down as I recall), and returned forthwith to my neighbor's house, bursting with pride from my newly discovered coolness. My neighbor's reaction still rings in my ears over two decades later:


"You're not Punk, Jamie--you're a Nerd!"


I don't recall ever being as humiliated before or since. I ran home, mortified beyond belief. My shame was such that I cut the insufficiently "Punk" emblems out of my shoes with scissors, preffering to wear them mutilated than decorated with failure.


It's funny, I declare myself a Nerd with almost indecent pride nowadays, and when I use it to refer to others, it's always as a term of affection and respect. It's strange to realize that not so long ago, in my own childhood, the very concept of calling someone a Nerd for any reason other than to cause pain or express hatred was utterly unheard of.


Remember a few months back on TR when the inclusion of Olivia Munn on a list of Nerdiest Celebrities ignited a firestorm of rage and indignation from "Real Nerds" who were convinced that Ms. Munn's avowed nerdhood is a complete sham?

Do you have the slightest notion of how absurd the very idea of being a "Poseur Nerd" would have been in, say, 1987? In those days, you either desperately hid your nerdish leanings, or accepted life as a social pariah(as you probably guessed, I chose the latter).



We've come a long way!(I'm starting to sound like I lived through the Civil Rights Movement).



PART TWO: What's In A Name?


I generally only use the word "nerd" as a matter of convenience. Technically, I've always considered myself a geek.


As I see it, there are three terms for the kind of people we're talking about: Geek, Nerd, and Dork.


GEEKS

Geeks are defined by their almost obsessive enthusiasms, usually for things like sci-fi, comics, movies, anime and other things Japanese, video and role playing games, and other similar subjects(NOTE: Interest in such things per se by no means automatically makes one a Geek). Geeks themselves can be subdivided into three basic classes:

Collectors, who focus all their time, effort, and energy into the acquisition of any item remotely associated with their particular enthusiasm.

Adventurers, who are most interested in experiences such as conventions, concerts, book signings, celebrity appearances, cosplaying, and the like.

And Brains--walking data receptacles obsessed with learning the most esoteric facts imaginable concerning their favorite subjects(these are my people).

Granted, most Geeks probably have a bit of all three of these tendencies, but generally one is dominant. For instance, I'd love to go to a con, but I'm not gonna live on peanut butter and work double shifts for six months so I can afford tickets, transportation, and lodgings.

Geeks are usually, though not necessarily, of above-average intelligence, and though often shy and socially awkward, they're generally able to function amongst non-Geeks reasonably well.


NERDS

Nearly everything I've said about Geeks could be applied to Nerds, and the two groups are often almost indistinguishable. The most important difference is while Geeks are usually highly intelligent, Nerds are always so.

Furthermore, ambition, discipline, and a strong work ethic are all typical Nerd traits, while many(though not all)Geeks are slackers. Many Nerds also add some more intellectual pursuits to the list of common Geek enthusiasms--Chess(or for Japanophile Nerds, Go), stamp or coin collecting, classic literature, theater and opera, art appreciation, butterfly collecting, and so forth.

Lastly, though Nerds certainly face the same social pitfalls as Geeks, a signifigant number of them are also prone to superiority complexes, further alienating them from the general population.


DORKS

Last--and by all means least, we have Dorks. Take everything I said about Geeks--and remove the ability to communicate meaningfully with the rest of humanity.

Geeks understand that the vast majority has no interest whatsoever in their pursuits and enthusiasms, thus they do not force them upon those who are ignorant and/or apathetic--they save such conversations for their fellow Geeks.

Dorks, unfortunately, seem to believe that the world would be a better place if every man, woman, and child knew the intimate details of their World Of Warcraft guild. Remember the TR contest where we discussed times when we were embarrased to be Nerds? Nine out of ten of those stories were inspired by the actions of a Dork.

Also, Dorks have the largest number of individuals of below-average intelligence among these three groups. Not that this is always the case, a Dork may well be a genius, just an obnoxious and socially inept genius.

And worst of all, because Dorks often travel in the same circles as Geeks and Nerds, and seem to have a predilection for making public spectacles of themselves, the rest of us are stigmatized and assumed to be of a kind with such human embarrassments.(Kinda like the way typical Christians feel about Fred Phelps)



Well, I hoped you all found this educational as well as entertaining. And remember, I'm no expert or authority--the definitions offered here are based solely on my own experience and are completely subjective and unscientific.

I'd like to dedicate this article to Gmail--without their policy of saving every email sent from one of their accounts, this work would not have been possible.

And to the Copy/Paste function, without which this mess would have taken hours to manually type out with my shitty keyboard.



TV's Scoot

'Sup



Man, the fact that I remember that Pee-Wee line(pre-Big Adventure, even)is the second thing today that make me feel absurdly old.

Hi Folks! Been enjoying the work of my new contributors?

That reminds me: I didn't give Abraxas a proper shout-out when he joined the gang. Yes, the Prince of Preversion himself has deigned to share his talents with SOHB's readers. Usually, I'd use the word "talents" somewhat ironically when describing a fanfic writer--not in Abraxas' case. The twisted bastard really can write, and he's sharing with us the other side of fanfic, where talented authors and fascinating story concepts dwell. Best of luck, and many thanks to him.

Spent most of last night designing the Meditation Chamber, an arduous and demanding task--I hope everyone appreciates my selfless and painstaking efforts here in bringing them this bastion of peaceful serenity.

I also fine-tuned the Divas Page--all the names are now properly placed. Yay.

About my contributors--man, you guys are making me look pitiful!

I'm gonna have to work twice as hard now to post interesting and entertaining articles, or the inmates will take over the asylum!(this isn't one of those interesting an entertaining articles--it's a space-filling, state-of-the-blog type article)

My first SOHB Poll ended yesterday. If you'll remember, I asked you guys if the blog featured too many nerd-babe pics: 76% of you believe I either have the right amount, or not enough of such pics. So I don't think I need to worry that I've overdone it.

The new Poll asks which Sci-Fi/Fantasy series has the most attractive cast--Firefly currently has 100% of the vote. Make of that what you will.

(btw, Battlestar Galactica refers to the most recent incarnation, I'd put in a note, but you can't edit a Poll once someone has voted, you can only delete it)

Tomorrow I'll have something big and momentous for ya. Tonight, I leave you with a video inspired by a question Colleen asked me earlier, enjoy!



P.S. Colleen and Joltess successfully won their TR shirts for their tireless work on the Haiku Contest. The Halls of SOHB will be graced with their sublime forms clad in said shirts within a few weeks.

Fortunate Halls, they!





Scooty B. Goode

I like to think I am a well rounded nerd. When I was younger, I enjoyed reading anytime I could (and still do), and I would pick up sci-fi, fantasy, horror and the Classics, I would avoid the 'fluff' books. I'm interested in history, science, archaeology, literature, and mythology. I love cartoons, and still watch them to this day like most of us. I absolutely love Batman. I have started subscribing to comic issues and picking up trades. I enjoy collecting things way too much. My DVD collection boasts classic Sci-Fi and Fantasy with a sprinkling of cult classics. I dress up for Hallowe'en every year despite that I am 25 years old. I go to RHPS screenings. I love musicals. I love Star Wars for its science fantasy. I love Star Trek because of its science fiction. I watch a lot of television shows that appeal to the nerdy population. I own a lot of geeky t-shirts. I am proud of my nerdy and geeky lifestyle and embrace all that it is.

However.

There is one thing I just cannot get into.

Anime.

I've tried, really I have. I've dated several guys who loved it and would show me what they considered the cream of the crop of the genre. I've watched a few episodes of animes on Canada's Cartoon Network, Teletoon. I loved Flight of Dragons, The Last Unicorn and Lord of the Rings (the cartoon version) and they were all early styled animes.

There a few animes that I liked. Hellsing for one. I can't really remember anymore than that. I love Avatar: The Last Airbender but I'm not even sure if it would be considered anime since it is American. I watched Pokemon before school because it was the only thing on and I didn't actually mind it at all. I also watched Yu-Gi-Oh for awhile (I like monsters). My cousin would make me watch Sailor Moon and while I didn't exactly hate it, it wasn't something I went out and watched on my own, or bought the DVDs for.

I wouldn't go as far to say I hate anime. I don't. It just doesn't appeal to me. It's just one of those things in the nerdy world that I just haven't been able to get myself into. Anime seems like one of those things a lot of people like myself are into, and I almost feel like I should like it. Like it is just one classic nerd genre. And I do appreciate the form. I know quite a few people who draw in that style, and usually people who can draw in that style are very good at it as well (with some exceptions I am sure). I have found myself liking a lot of anime inspired art.

Anyways, that's something I don't like. How about the rest of you? Is there something that people tout as a nerd staple that you just couldn't find yourself liking?

- The Joltess

This is my first post, and after Colleen and Braxy's quite excellent attempts, I am feeling intensely nervous. You can tell, can't you?! The topic I have chosen to discuss (or rather, yell at you all about) is the first in a series I call Why Everything Is Bullshit (I have no plans to continue this series. I just liked the idea), and will be about the surge of what I call Buzzword Comics - namely, any comics, TV shows or films that include the words 'Dark', 'Gritty', 'Realistic' or any variations of those Big Three in their premise.
The main subject is Batman. The general opinion is that Batman is a lot 'darker' (at this point you may like to begin the Buzzword Drinking Game, in which you must drink a Smashy Spritzer every time any of the Big Three are mentioned in this article) than other heroes in the world of superhero comics. I mean, he wears black, all his villains have plausible motivations and gimmicks, and he basically lives in a city that's so dark it's like a Tim Burton wet dream, where the sun almost never shines and the streets are composed entirely of shadowy alleyways. So, he's pretty 'dark' and 'realistic' and 'gritty', right?
Well, ha, no. At its prime (referred to as the Silver Age of comic books), the DC universe was as campy, outlandish and fucking spectacular as Marvel is (or was, but we'll get to that). I mean, this was a time when KITE MAN was a tougher than the Joker.
Batman was awesome back then. Who needs a growly Christian Bale voice or a perpetually angry old Frank Miller jerk when you've got a Batman that bitch slaps his own apprentice when he talks back and dresses like a FUCKING mirror just to outsmart an enemy. Goddamn he was cool. Who needs a deadpan, eye-stabbing Heath Ledger or a 'super-sane' transvestite Grant Morrisson.... thing when you have a gleeful Joker who threatens to turn all of Gotham's water to jelly. Jelly. Just think how many problems that would cause. More than raping some henchman's wife to spite him (all these things I mention have happened, btw). The Silver Age was like, WOAH.
Frank Miller (a writer I'm sure you've all heard of, who, like M Night Shymalan and Tim Burton since, has got worse with each piece of work) once wrote a book called The Dark Knight Returns. People loved its gritty, dark and pissed-off take on what could be the future of the Batman world. It was shocking and wonderful because it demonstrated a world in which Batman had retired, and quite simply, everything had gone tits-up. Weird monster gangs ruled the streets, all the supervillains and heroes have retired or been killed, and the worlds' finest (a certain Mr Kent) was now a mere pawn of the US Government. Times were hard. That GN worked so well because when The Dark Knight actually did return, you felt it. Miller took time to introduce the future Gotham and shock us with it - the scenes of rape and violence (comitted mostly by teenage gangs) aren't as gratuitous as they seem. They just add to the feeling of 'FUCK YEAH!' when Batman comes to fix his city.
But a lot of writers didn't see this when they read it. All they saw was 'OOH RAPE! KIDS AS CRIMNALS, BELOVED SUPERHEROES DECONSTRUCTED, BELOVED SUPERVILLAINS KILLING THEMSELVES - THIS IS MY KINDA SHIT!' For the next few years, almost all comic books followed this tradition (Batman: A Serious House on Serious Earth is perhaps the best example of this), and pretty soon people began to try so hard to be like Alan Moore and Frank Miller that comics became campy once again. Rob Liefeld and many of Miller's more recent works are a good example. However, recent years have shown that the time of dark, gritty, realistic comics are far from over.
The much-praised Christopher Nolan Batmovies are a perfect example of people not quite understanding it.
Now please, don't get me wrong - one of the great things about comics is that anyone can interpret them however they want, but it's the writers and artists that take this idea and completely screw up by making comics that aren't fun, orginal or even interesting for the readers.
Anyway, the 'Nolanverse', as fans have dubbed it. Many, many people view it as the greatest ever incarnation of Batman and his world, but that is simply not true. The Nolan films are less 'brillaint Batman films' than they are 'brilliant films that include Batman'. The Dark Knight is not a great Batman story, it is a great story featuring Batman. Heath Ledger's performance is not a fantastic portrayal of the Joker, it is just fantastic. But no, pretentious assholes who have never read a single Batman comic ignorantly label themselves as Batman fans simply because they like to dress up as the Joker on Halloween or write 'Nolanised' fan fiction, then post their crappy DeviantArt illustrations online. They don't understand and love these characters the same way Paul Dini and the Nolan brothers (to an EXTENT) do. They call the classic Penguin character 'lame' and 'not special', and prefer the current 'realistic' interpretation of him simply being an ugly and cowardly club owner who provides Batman with information, rather than the colourful, rich jerkass who had the class of Joker, the gadgets of Batman and the complete obnoxiousness of the Riddler. It's insulting, and an example of writers too lazy to stay true to the character. It's like if they made a Star Trek movie in which Spock was a young, blonde action hero with no Vulcan ears, no fringe and no crazy eyebrows because the original depiction was 'too boring' or 'too unrealistic'. Fuck that, I want my Penguin back.
The Brian Azzarello GN Joker was released fairly recently, to rave reviews. It has been called the best depiction of the Joker since Killing Joke, and when I heard Lee Bermejo was pencilling I was ecstatic (check his stuff out, it's amazing). Then I saw the first image, of an extremely Ledger-like (the book was finished before TDK was released, but their similarities back up my point that the 'realism' dominating modern comics is unoriginal and is producing the same results every time) Joker striding out of Arkham Asylum and giving it the finger with the look of a teenager sent to his room, I knew this was going to suck ultimate.
The Joker in this comic book is NOTHING. He's a bullying gangster who speaks in slang, kills for no reason, rapes women, robs banks and pops pills. You may as well have called him Evil McDoesNoGood and it would have made him only slightly more cliche. The entire book is full of terrible interpretations of Batcharacters such as Two-Face, Riddler, Penguin, Killer Croc and the beloved Harley Quinn. Two-Face is a sort of expressionless, brooding, upper-class criminal who sits in a chair half the time. Riddler is a hustler with tattoos and a pimped-out car. Penguin is the bumbling coward I have already mentioned. Killer Croc is a token black guy with bumpy skin. Harley Quinn is a mute stripper. What the fuck is this? Reading this GN, I get the impression that Brian wrote an incredibly generic gangster story and thought 'Well, this sucks. How can I make money out of this....' He stared around his office and noticed a kid playing outside the window with some Batman figurines. 'THAT'S IT!' he cried. 'I'll tweak the characters a little, rename the city to Gotham and mass produce this shit!' He then laughed evilly and preceded to beat up the kid and rape a few kittens.
Anyway, the entire graphic novel is just terrible. The Joker is a swaggering bully who commits petty crimes and Batman is a kind of presence watching him the whole time (now this idea I did like, but it was not used particularly well), who lets him murder a bunch of people because they're criminals.... or something? Because apparently the Gotham Police Force is completely nonexistent in the world Azzarello has created.
The problem with a realistic Batman world is that it isn't quite possible. Saying all of Batman's villains are realistic and 'could happen' is like saying that it's a good idea to burn Qur'ans.



Oh.








Anyway, CONTROVERSY aside, there are tons of Batvillains who are completely comic-booky and would be BORING if you made them realistic. Poison Ivy. Clayface. Bane. Killer Croc. Loads of the greats. If you create a Batman world in which some of Batman's best characters won't work, you have created a pretty shitty Batman world.
If you want to do something new with Batman, create a comic that is the OPPOSITE of Joker. Less rapes, more pie-throwing. Less club-owning mobster 'Abner', more umbrella-gun wielding, top hat wearing, cummerbund sporting supervillain.
For all his faults, Grant Morrisson recently came up with a phrase that perfectly describes comic books: 'Popcrime'. Murder, burglary and all-out crime comitted not because someone's daddy once cut a smile in his face, but because it's part of the game. Criminals do it for fun, and most of them (particularly the Joker) are gleefully aware that they are ridiculous. Arguably, the 1960s Batman show is the most 'realistic' Batman of all time. Every character is completely insane. The Bruce Wayne of the Nolan films is an extremely realistic character, which is why it's so dumb that he is secretly Batman. If Batman existed, he would most definitely be as batshit insane (pun most definitely intended) as the Adam West version is. ARGHHHHHHHHH EVERYTHING IS BULLSHIT




It is pretty late, and if any of you stopped reading half an hour ago, I don't blame you. All of the above is most likely incorrect, nonsensical crap, so I apologise. This was mostly a test article, as I felt like I should take advantage of my position as contributor before all of you have written a bunch of masterpieces and I'm still trying to find a decent Mad Men torrent.
Also, does anyone know how to put more than one picture in these things? The Kite Man one worked fine, but none of the others are appearing.

Thanks for reading and so on! Hope it was worth it.
KTHNXBAI