DISCLAIMER (angry creators, please read)
[[WARNING! THIS COLUMN MIGHT CONTAIN SPOILERS!]]
"How does Batman keep his kid focused. Swear he drugs Robin's water." Christopher "Peacemaker" Smith, Blue Beetle V7 #19.
Well, here I am, struggling to finish this column and post it in time. Yes Dominik, I know I said I'd most likely have it up by Thor's Day, but work's been heavy.... So, straight into the Nitpicker's Picks Of The Week, alright? The best book of the week (this is 09/26) was Green Arrow Year One issue five, almost close to resolution, is a great story by Andy Diggle which makes Ollie's origin more believable, and Jock's art is suitably rugged. Yes, the mini could have lasted three or four issues instead of six, but it's still a good read.
The worst book of the week was Avengers: The Initiative #6, not because it was a bad story (it was OK), but because the art was horrible. Not technically bad, but an awful match for this kind of book, it looks like it belongs in some videogame comic book... Last column's Spot The Nit was indeed the fact that Bucky's hair should be brown, not blond. Two weeks in a row Miss Kitty Fantastico, and yet another HNSC badge for you! Nuff' said, cut the chatter, nits now!
<-------------------------------->
"THEY'RE BUILT ON METAPHYSICAL THINGYDIBOPS."
TITLE: 52 Aftermath: The Four Horsemen.
ISSUE: 02 of 06.
CULPRIT: Keith Giffen (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: The Horsemen are described as having "morphogenetic chassis, pathogens, ordnance"; and most of those things have nothing to with DC's definition of morphogenetic, the morphogenetic field being the "red" that characters like Animal Man and Vixen derive their powers from (or at least use their powers to tap into).
NIT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"I USE MY POWERS TO GROW AND IMPRESS GIRLS!"
TITLE: Avengers: The Initiative.
ISSUE: 06.
CULPRIT: Steve Uy (penciller/inker/colorist).
NIT-TO-PICK: On page 7 Hank Pym and Tigra are shown jogging around Camp Hammond's perimeter, and their heights (not to mention Tigra being a skinny modelette, instead of the buxom babe she's normally drawn as) are incorrect. Pym is, naturally, 6', while Tigra is only 2 inches shorter, and in this page she looks about a head shorter.
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELS!!!!"
TITLE: Countdown.
ISSUE: 31.
CULPRIT: Manuel Garcia (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: Yeah, exactly, Mary Marvel has no heels on her boots.
NIT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"FASHION CHANGES FROM WEEK TO WEEK."
TITLE: Countdown.
ISSUE: 31.
CULPRIT: Manuel Garcia (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: Una is now wearing different looking bracelets.
NIT-O-METER: 7, because they just can't keep it straight.
<-------------------------------->
"COLOR ME DIFFERENT."
TITLE: Countdown.
ISSUE: 31.
CULPRIT: Hi-Fi (colorist).
NIT-TO-PICK: Una's costume is colored a decidedly different shade of purple, almost blue.
NIT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"AH, YES, THERE'S MUCH BEAUTY IN WORLDWIDE CONCENTRATION CAMPS!"
TITLE: Countdown To Adventure.
ISSUE: 02 of 08.
CULPRIT: Justin Gray (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: Miss Kitty Fantastico found this nit, earning one more HNSC badge: "One more nit for you, from this week's Countdown to Adventure #2: on the first page of the Forerunner story, Monarch narrates that "...with fifty-two universes come variations of historical timelines so that one place of horror is potentially offset by a place of beauty. In this case the latter..." Granted I don't know a whole lot about Monarch's character, but seeing as he's referring to a worldwide Nazi empire, I kind of think he meant 'former' rather than 'latter'."
Yeah, I'm kind of thinking that however warped his mind might be, the former Captain Atom wouldn't consider a Nazi empire a place of beauty.
NIT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"EETS OUR GEERMAN ACZENT!"
TITLE: Countdown To Adventure.
ISSUE: 02 of 08.
CULPRIT: Justin Gray (writer) and/or Pat Brosseau (letterer).
NIT-TO-PICK: On page 26, first panel, one of the Nazi soldiers says "geet" instead of "get".
NIT-O-METER: 1 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"HERE COMES THE (RAYLESS) SUN."
TITLE: Green Arrow Year One.
ISSUE: 05 of 06.
CULPRIT: Jock (penciller/inker).
NIT-TO-PICK: On the spread formed by pages 9 and 10, Ollie discover that the island houses an abandoned WWII Japanese sub pen (or submarine base); which has a dam of sorts. The dam has a Japanese flag painted on it, problem is, it's the Nisshōki or Hinomaru; that is, the official flag of Japan, the one which is a red sun disc on a white background. The Imperial Japanese Navy (and almost all military divisions Japan has had since 1889) have used the flag commonly referred to as the Imperial Flag, the one with a number of rays coming out of the sun disk; with the most common variant being Hachijō-Kyokujitsuki (still in use today by the Japan Self-Defense Forces, except for their air division).
So, you see, particularly in WWII, a Japanese sub pen would have the Hachijō-Kyokujitsuki or a variant as their ensign, and not the "civilian" flag. Little known fact: although the Hinomaru, in one shape or another, was widely adopted as Japan's flag in 1854 (and has been in use by since the 12th century), the flag wasn't officially adopted until 1999. In that year, several teachers at a Hiroshima Prefecture high school graduation ceremony refused to participate in the raising of the flag and singing of Kimi ga Yo (the Japanese anthem). The school principal, caught between the demands of the Ministry of Education and the teachers, eventually committed suicide. The incident renewed interest in the official status of the national anthem and the national flag, which culminated in the proposal and passage of this Proclamation No. 127, which officially instituted the flag and anthem as official..
NIT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"TELEPATHIC SWITCHEROO?"
TITLE: JLA: Classified.
ISSUE: 43.
CULPRIT: Jared K. Fletcher (letterer).
NIT-TO-PICK: Oliver Queen (the playboy-turned-vigilante from the previous nit) chats in a bar with a human-morphed J'onn Jonzz, but their speech balloons in the last panel of page five are switched around, and then on the first panel of the following page, the balloon that says "Good eye." doesn't make sense coming out of Ollie.
NIT-O-METER: 3 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"ARTHUR CURRY, WARLORD OF MARS!"
TITLE: JLA: Classified.
ISSUE: 43.
CULPRIT: Jared K. Fletcher (letterer).
NIT-TO-PICK: On page 13, panel 4, there's supposed to be two sets of speech balloons, but what Martian Manhunter says is not pointed at him, and joined to Aquaman's balloons. It makes Aquaman say "the kind of piece my people saw on Mars."
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"YOUR HANDS SMELL LIKE FISH!"
TITLE: JLA: Classified.
ISSUE: 43.
CULPRIT: Rick Leonardi (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: Same page, Aquaman's gloves are missing.
NIT-O-METER: 4 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"FASTER THAN LIGHTNING!"
TITLE: JLA: Classified.
ISSUE: 43.
CULPRIT: Rick Leonardi (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: Same page still, Flash's belt and glove lightings are uncolored on panel 4.
NIT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars, just because he keeps screwing up on the same page.
<-------------------------------->
"I'M JUST WINGING IT."
TITLE: JLA: Classified.
ISSUE: 43.
CULPRIT: Rick Leonardi (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: One more time, same page, Flash's boots are missing the wings.
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars, keep on going Rick!
<-------------------------------->
"I'M SO FAST, I CHANGE COLORS!"
TITLE: JLA: Classified.
ISSUE: 43.
CULPRIT: I.L.L. (colorist).
NIT-TO-PICK: Yet again the same page, Flash's boots are colored red instead of yellow.
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"GREEN, NOT WHITE, LANTERN."
TITLE: JLA: Classified.
ISSUE: 43.
CULPRIT: I.L.L. (colorist).
NIT-TO-PICK: Yes, the same goddamn page! And I.L.L. didn't want to contribute just one of the six, yes, six, nits on this single page, so he put in the sixth one. On panel four, Green Lantern's boots are colored white instead of green. I think six nits on a single page is some kind of record...
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars. I bet if I keep staring at this page, I'm gonna find even more nits...
<-------------------------------->
"STILL DYING IT."
TITLE: JSA: Classified.
ISSUE: 30.
CULPRIT: Alex Sanchez (penciller/inker) and/or Pete Pantazis (colorist).
NIT-TO-PICK: Ted Grant's hair is black, when it should be brown with white/grey temples.
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"MUSICAL CHAIRS."
TITLE: JSA: Classified.
ISSUE: 30.
CULPRIT: Alex Sanchez (penciller/inker).
NIT-TO-PICK: Page three, seating arrangement shifts from panel to panel.
NIT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"I ROLLED IT UP SO EVERYONE CAN SEE I'VE BEEN WORKING OUT."
TITLE: JSA: Classified.
ISSUE: 30.
CULPRIT: Alex Sanchez (penciller/inker).
NIT-TO-PICK: Same page, Stargirl's tank top covers her belly, but by the next page it's a top that bares her midriff, plus the neckline is different, the star on the top is not the same size, and she's ripped, with more abdominal muscles she's ever been portrayed with.
NIT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"WERNHER VON BRAUN, SS ÜBERKOMMANDO!"
TITLE: JSA: Classified.
ISSUE: 30.
CULPRIT: Arvid Nelson (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: So, according to Nelson, Wernher von Braun was a member of the SS, and thus, a hardcore Nazi and friends with the SS's commander, Heimrich Himmler. Actually, he just held an honorary rank, and Himmler had him under surveillance since 1943, and had him arrested in 1944 because von Braun was making difficult for Himmler to take control of the V-2 program. He probably wasn't a good guy, since some accounts said he didn't care about the slave labor used in the V-2 production plants, but still, there's a long way from there to being SS hardcore.
NIT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"WHAT'S YOUR NAME AGAIN?"
TITLE: JSA: Classified.
ISSUE: 30.
CULPRIT: Arvid Nelson (writer) and/or Ken Lopez.
NIT-TO-PICK: Page six, Mr. Terrific (Michael Holt) calls Dr. Mid-Nite (Pieter Cross) "Michael". That, or the speech balloons are not clear or just plain switched around... still creating confusion.
NIT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"MILDLY COLD WAR."
TITLE: JSA: Classified.
ISSUE: 30.
CULPRIT: Arvid Nelson (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: Mr. Terrific (or Dr. Mid-Nite, depending on those crazy word balloons) says that von Braun's defection to the US happened during the Cold War. It was in 1945, which I wouldn't call the height of the Cold War, which most historians agree began after WWII, in 1947.
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"BEFORE YOUR TIME, PUP."
TITLE: JSA: Classified.
ISSUE: 30.
CULPRIT: Arvid Nelson (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: Whoever mentions the Cold War, says "it's hard to explain how scary it was." Cold War or not (since it was 1945), whether it was Mr. Terrific or Dr. Mid-Nite, neither of them was alive at the time, not if they're supposed to be in their thirties or even their forties.
NIT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"UUUUH.... MULTIPLE EARTHS CONFUSE ME!!!"
TITLE: JSA: Classified.
ISSUE: 30.
CULPRIT: Arvid Nelson (writer) and Alex Sanchez (penciller/inker).
NIT-TO-PICK: Talking about a possible air attack on the U.S.A. by Nazi Germany, it's mentioned that even if the Germans could mass produce bombers capable of reaching America, U.S. superhero teams would destroy them before they were able to bomb the country... and they show Superman destroying the planes!!! It's World War II people, Superman wasn't around, it's not Earth-2!
NIT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars. God, what the fuck are these people on?
<-------------------------------->
"GROUP SHOT."
TITLE: Justice League Of America.V2.
ISSUE: 13.
CULPRIT: Ian Churchill (cover penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: Ok, I get that covers can be symbolic and all that... but there are some villains who just can't be here. I grant you that, say, Major Force may have escaped from that Phantom Zone like disk thingy Kyle put him in, or that Granny Goodness is pulling double duty, what with her faux Amazons and all that jazz.. But Black Adam doesn't have powers anymore, wherever he is; Validus is a Legion of Superheroes enemy who won't be born for another 1000 years, if ever; and Felix Faust is trapped inside Dr. Fate's tower. There's probably more villains I don't keep track off there that shouldn't be on that cover.
NIT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars, they're putting characters in the cover that not only shouldn't be there, aren't in the book at all.
<-------------------------------->
"NO MCDUFFIE, THIS IS NOT JLU, BATMAN IS NOT GOING TO FALL IN LOVE WITH WONDER WOMAN."
TITLE: Justice League Of America.V2.
ISSUE: 13.
CULPRIT: Dwayne McDuffie (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: On page 3, Batman claims that Wonder Woman is "the best melee fighter in the world"; which is doubtful, because there's several characters who can kick her ass, even with less strength.
NIT-O-METER: 5 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"OK, WHO THE FUCK'S BEEN PLAYING WITH THE STOLEN PYM PARTICLES?"
TITLE: Justice League Of America.V2.
ISSUE: 13.
CULPRIT: Joe Benitez (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: The spread of pages 4 and 5 looks awful, not only the anatomies are all screwed up, but the sizes are too. Gorilla Grodd has never been a gigantic ape as wide as five people, plus he's only four inches taller than Lex Luthor, who wearing a suit of Gigantic-Manga-Feet(TM) armor, stand two (human) heads shorter than Grodd, Also, Dr. Light's height is 5'11", yet he stands half a head taller than Joker's 6'5", and a head taller than Cheetah's 5'9". Then, on page 17, Grodd is again gigantic when compared to Dr. Light and Cheetah, and the wrong height difference between the latter two is still there.
NIT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars, for the clusterfuck, and I'm counting it as two nits.
<-------------------------------->
"HE'S THE BLACK LANTERN."
TITLE: Justice League Of America.V2.
ISSUE: 13.
CULPRIT: Pete Pantazis (colorist).
NIT-TO-PICK: Alright, I'm willing to accept some of Dwayne McDuffie's JLUization of this book, because the show was cool... even if he's replacing Hal Jordan with John Stewart. But Pete Pantazis, it's only in the cartoon that John Stewart has green eyes, got it? His eyes are black.
NIT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"MIGHTY MORPHING KILLER FROST!"
TITLE: Justice League Of America.V2.
ISSUE: 13.
CULPRIT: Joe Benitez (penciller) and Pete Pantazis (colorist).
NIT-TO-PICK: Killer Frost looks very different from the last time she was shown, only two weeks ago, different hair length, different length of the fur like parts of her costume, different cut and color of costume,.
NIT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"SCIENCE IS HARD!"
TITLE: Justice League Of America.V2.
ISSUE: 13.
CULPRIT: Dwayne McDuffie (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: On page fourteen, Poison Ivy attacks Green Lantern (John Stewart) by multiplying part of his intestinal flora (mycobacterium paratuberculosis, to be precise)... but intestinal flora, despite its name, it's made of plants, it's made of bacteria.
NIT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars, dammit, if you wanna do science fiction, read up on science. Anyone who's finished high school and paid some attention should know that intestinal flora is made of bacteria.
<-------------------------------->
"SIPHON THIS, YOU VIXEN!"
TITLE: Justice League Of America.V2.
ISSUE: 13.
CULPRIT: Dwayne McDuffie (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: Superman says on page sixteen that Vixen siphons powers from other superhumans; but her powers don't siphon (which would imply the other characters losing part of their powers), they mimic.
NIT-O-METER: 7 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"WELL, TECHNICALLY..."
TITLE: (Supergirl And The) Legion of Super-Heroes V5.
ISSUE: 34.
CULPRIT: Tony Bedard (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: On page one, Atom Girl's power is indicated as "size-changing ability", when she can only shrink.
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"NITPICKER OR NIT-PICKER?"
TITLE: The Nitpicker.
ISSUE: Various.
CULPRIT: MaGnUs (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: I've occasionally written "superheroes" instead of "super-heroes"; now, as a term, I didn't think it would be a problem, and it's not, since "superhero" is a valid word. Yes, "Super Hero" and its plural are a joint trademark owned by DC and Marvel (and they've also trademarked the hyphened version, or tried to); but "superhero" is the actual dictionary word. Still, the Legion is called "Legion Of Super-Heroes", including the hyphen, and I've been writing it wrongly occasionally.
NIT-O-METER: 10 Bazzars, I should know how to write the name of one of my favorite comics...
<-------------------------------->
"SPOT THIS ONE, AGAIN WITH 100% FEMALE CONTENT."
TITLE: Wonder Woman V3.
ISSUE: Annual 01.
CULPRIT: Terry Dodson (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: Check out this panel, and tell me what's wrong:
NIT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.<-------------------------------->
"ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE NOT NAMOR'S SISTER?"
TITLE: Wonder Woman V3.
ISSUE: Annual 01.
CULPRIT: Allan Heinberg (writer) and/or Terry Dodson (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: How is Queen Clea flying?
NIT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"YOU'VE ALREADY SPOTTED IT."
TITLE: Wonder Woman V3.
ISSUE: Annual 01.
CULPRIT: Terry Dodson (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: Cheetah is missing her spots on her face, arms, and visible parts of her torso, only to have some of them on page seven.
NIT-O-METER: 9 Bazzars, for lack intra-issue consistency.
<-------------------------------->
"OLD TIMES' SAKE."
TITLE: Wonder Woman V3.
ISSUE: Annual 01.
CULPRIT: Terry Dodson (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: The cavalry arrives on pages 8-9, and Green Arrow (Ollie) is wearing his Robin Hood cap, when he's been wearing a hood for a long time now.
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"WHO GAVE POWERS TO THE STRIPPER?"
TITLE: Wonder Woman V3.
ISSUE: Annual 01.
CULPRIT: Allan Heinberg (writer) and/or Terry Dodson (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: Same spread, Starfire is there, she shouldn't have her powers. And this time I'm right without a doubt, because this happens shortly after 52.
NIT-O-METER: 10 doubts.
<-------------------------------->
"STILL RUNNING SO FAST I CHANGE BOOT COLORS."
TITLE: Wonder Woman V3.
ISSUE: Annual 01.
CULPRIT: Terry Dodson (penciller).
NIT-TO-PICK: Ending spread of the main story, pages 24-25, Flash's boots are colored red instead of yellow.
NIT-O-METER: 6 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
"WHAT'S NEXT, SARGE STEEL'S JLA?"
TITLE: Wonder Woman V3.
ISSUE: Annual 01.
CULPRIT: Allan Heinberg (writer).
NIT-TO-PICK: The backup story says that Nemesis served with "Sarge Steel's Suicide Squad"; but Steel never actually lead the Squad, he just oversaw it. Furthermore, Steel oversaw the Squad (along with Checkmate and other agencies) after the Janus Directive storyline, and Nemesis left the team well before that. He did rejoin it during the Phoenix Gambit arc; and for one mission, the Squad was still technically under Steel's jurisdiction, but that doesn't make Nemesis part of "Sarge Steels's Suicide Squad".
NIT-O-METER: 8 Bazzars.
<-------------------------------->
Wow, the average Bazzars this week is 6.9... I toned down a few costume errors from 7 to 6, if not we'd reached the 7.0 easily. I know I had a few 10s this week, but I swear, I'm still walking the line (to quote the great Johnny Cash) between overbazzaring and underscoring. Look at that, this column was all DC except for the one Marvel... odd, isn't it?
This week we have another Dayamn! moment that is sure to cause the same reaction on my readers than it did on me. If Black Adam can punch through some guy's head, and bungee jump with the innards of the Yeti he just gutted, why can't the original anti-hero pissed off monarch do something like that? Of course he can, Venom rips off some of Namor's ankle wings, so Namor retaliates by "catching" Venom’s tongue.... and ripping it off!
That's it for now, until next week, I'll be on the outlook for more nits, because (almost) nothing escapes...THE NITPICKER!
16 comments:
For Spot The Nit, it's got to be the explanation of how Giganta's powers work - I thought that was odd at the time. I think they meant 'inverse proportion', meaning she gets dumber the larger she is - but even that's wrong, I thought part of Heinberg's WW arc was that the villains were all enhanced by Circe, in Giganta's case that she no longer loses smarts as she gains height. It's been a while since #1-4, so I may be misremembering that... I'll check later.
Agreed about the Avengers: the Initiative art. Luckily it wasn't all as bad as the first few pages (which were previewed online) suggested, but it was still below par in a lot of panels. Gauntlet's mecha-fingers were just plain wrong.
As for Yellowjacket though, perhaps he's making himself taller to compensate for his insecurities? Thing #8 claimed that Goliath's tell in poker is that he grows a bit when he's holding a good hand, so it's not as if these Pym people have only 'tiny', 'normal' and 'immense' as their options.
I'm not sure Four Horsemen's use of morphogenetics is wrong - it seems consistent with Animal Man et al, just a different flavour of the basic concept. Those heroes, as I understand it, tap into the morphogenetic field, the 'red', which allows them to connect to Earth's animals and gain powers from them - it doesn't seem unreasonable that mad science like the Horsemen could tap into the equivalent field for all of Earth's diseases, weapons, and so on. They're basically doing the same thing as Animal Man and Vixen, just for different fields, different parts of the 'spectrum' perhaps, if red is the animal field.
I disagree with the "WW-melee-fighting ability", i think you could make a case that is a good call by Batman.
But McDuffie really dropped the ball with the Poison Ivy use of intestinal flora. I couldn't believe it when I was reading it...
Ha, ha, ha. Six nits on the one page, you must have felt like you won the lottery MaGnUs. Plenty of high Bazzars this week, can you imagine what the average would have been before you started restraining yourself.
I'll hazard a guess for Spot The Nit, even though I know nothing about the characters. Is it that Giganta is presumably giant sized, yet Wonder Woman and the other doll seem normal height so it looks like they are standing on really huge platforms. So Terry Dodson screwed up the height proportions then.
Miss Kitty Fantastico said "For Spot The Nit, it's got to be the explanation of how Giganta's powers work - I thought that was odd at the time. I think they meant 'inverse proportion', meaning she gets dumber the larger she is"
I think Diana just meant Giganta is a bright scientist. I'm not overly familiar with Giganta's powers, but I didn't think she ever lost intelligence when growing, or at least not normally. But no, it's not that, since it's a penciller's nit... I give you that much clues. Somebody over at the ICS forums said it was that Diana seems to have too lassoes, but even if it seems weird, I don't see why she couldn't have one extra, fake one... the fight started in an Amazonian exhibit in a museum, didn't it?
Miss Kitty Fantastico said "As for Yellowjacket though, perhaps he's making himself taller to compensate for his insecurities? Thing #8 claimed that Goliath's tell in poker is that he grows a bit when he's holding a good hand, so it's not as if these Pym people have only 'tiny', 'normal' and 'immense' as their options."
Of course, they seem to have a wide range, and Pym himself more than anyone would have greater control. But I don't buy it, the artist probably never checked to see the real heights of the characters, as most don't do these days. Oh, and about Goliath, you mean he "grew" when he had a good hand, right? Cuz he's six feet under these days... remember? :P
Miss Kitty Fantastico said "I'm not sure Four Horsemen's use of morphogenetics is wrong - it seems consistent with Animal Man et al, just a different flavour of the basic concept. Those heroes, as I understand it, tap into the morphogenetic field, the 'red', which allows them to connect to Earth's animals and gain powers from them - it doesn't seem unreasonable that mad science like the Horsemen could tap into the equivalent field for all of Earth's diseases, weapons, and so on. They're basically doing the same thing as Animal Man and Vixen, just for different fields, different parts of the 'spectrum' perhaps, if red is the animal field."
Well, the "red" is just for animals, and diseases are not animals, death and hunger are not animals (though these two I'll let slide, as they're stuff thatthat happens to animals), and weapons are most definitely not animals. And my biggest problem is stuff like "morphogenetic chassis" and that
Teukro said "I disagree with the "WW-melee-fighting ability", i think you could make a case that is a good call by Batman.
But McDuffie really dropped the ball with the Poison Ivy use of intestinal flora. I couldn't believe it when I was reading it..."
I think calling Wonder Woman the best melee fighter is a bit of an exaggeration. Powers aside, I'm pretty sure people like Hawkman, Lady Shiva, Deathstroke, Big Barda, just to name a few, are much better melee fighters than Diana is.
But yeah, the intestinal flora thing is one of the worst nits I've ever found... if I was doing my column back then, only Paul Levitz having Mon-El carry a white dwarf star to LSH headquarters back in the mid-80s would top this.
The Guvnor Paul C "Ha, ha, ha. Six nits on the one page, you must have felt like you won the lottery MaGnUs."
Hehe, it's actually one of those times I see two or three nits, and then I find more when writing up the ones I found initially. Ah, brownie points to you Guvnor for writing my name properly... not even my RL friends write it as they should.
The Guvnor Paul C "Plenty of high Bazzars this week, can you imagine what the average would have been before you started restraining yourself."
Through the fricking roof...
The Guvnor Paul C "I'll hazard a guess for Spot The Nit, even though I know nothing about the characters. Is it that Giganta is presumably giant sized, yet Wonder Woman and the other doll seem normal height so it looks like they are standing on really huge platforms. So Terry Dodson screwed up the height proportions then."
Ah, no... I should have published the panel under that one, but I thought it would distract from what I was going for. Giganta's body continues down through the next panels, Wonder Woman and Queen Clea are flying (hence the following nit, of how the hell Clea flies, if she just has normal Atlantean abilities). I thought the cloud would clue you in... Nah, Dodson is not that sloppy... all in all, he's a great artist, I think, as in he can do cheesecake and at the same time pretty cool action, and an almost George Perez level of 40 characters in a fight.
Thank you all for the comments (on this column and all the ones before and to come), both long time readers like the Guvnor and MKF, and newcomer Teukro (who's left comments for the second time, I think)... where did you find the column Teukro? You guys, and the ones who comment over at ICS.net really make it worth writing it, as well as those who read it but are silent (say something, please!)
Hi Magnus..
Looks like this week you had too much work.. :)
You should add a record section like pointing which are the pages and the books you found more nits on.. :)
And i want to congratulate you on pointing out that you made some nits yourselve, some people does not accept their own mistakes and you did. I relaly respect that. :)
See you later Magnus..
P.D.: By the way.. that doesn't look like a trident. It's more likely to be an axe.
magnus said: "I think Diana just meant Giganta is a bright scientist. I'm not overly familiar with Giganta's powers, but I didn't think she ever lost intelligence when growing, or at least not normally."
I see what you mean - that could be the case, but if so, it's a rather ill-considered parallel to draw between her physical size and her intellect, seeing as she's most known for changing size.
She did used to get dumber as she got bigger, it's mentioned in issue #2, and Nemesis points out that she and the other villains are now enhanced: Giganta's not dumb, Cheetah can be human, Dr. Psycho is more powerful than usual - all Circe's doing, it turns out. I'm fairly sure that Giganta had lost the size-to-dumbness thing much earlier, but perhaps in New Earth she was still losing brainpower until Circe supercharged her in this arc.
magnus said: "But no, it's not that, since it's a penciller's nit... I give you that much clues."
Ah, right - I tend not to look at the culprit unless I can't find a nit on my own. I can't see a pencilling nit worth an 8 at first glance: Clea's trident is an odd design, but despite looking a lot more like an axe it's got three points, so technically it could be a trident - if it's different to earlier appearances, chalk it up to New Earth unless Clea shows up again with a more trident-y trident. Giganta's collar looks ribbed, whereas it's flat elsewhere, but I think that's just that her chin's pressing down on it making it bend, not a design feature. Her eyebrow is drawn 'over' the hair across her face, but that's a very common trick of animation art (which this is, more or less, albeit at the realist end of the spectrum), and it could technically be the end of the strand of hair touching the edge of her eyebrow. If it ain't one of those, I'm stumped.
magnus said: "Somebody over at the ICS forums said it was that Diana seems to have too lassoes, but even if it seems weird, I don't see why she couldn't have one extra, fake one... the fight started in an Amazonian exhibit in a museum, didn't it?"
It's intentional - Circe got Wonder Girl's Lasso of Lightning earlier in the arc, and in issue #4 Wonder Woman grabbed it back, so she's got two lassos at this point.
magnus said: "Oh, and about Goliath, you mean he "grew" when he had a good hand, right?"
I find it easier to use present tense for superheroes - you never know when they'll come back.
magnus said: "Well, the "red" is just for animals, and diseases are not animals, death and hunger are not animals (though these two I'll let slide, as they're stuff thatthat happens to animals), and weapons are most definitely not animals. And my biggest problem is stuff like "morphogenetic chassis" and that"
I'm not saying they're tapping into the Red, or even that there are necessarily factual equivalents to the Red in other areas - a 'sickly green' for disease, a 'gunmetal grey' for weaponry, and so on. They may not really exist the way the Red does, but I think it could be argued that they conceptually exist, as intellectual constructs based on the real-world example of the Red. So in the same way that the real Animal Man taps into the morphogenetic field of fauna to gain the abilities of animals, you could conjecture a theoretical 'Weaponry Man' who taps into the morphogenetic field of ordnance, and can produce the 'abilities' of any weaponry.
It's not real, but if you ignore the fact that it doesn't exist, it makes sense the same way Animal Man does - it's a sort of 'could-be' reality. If you ask me, that's more than enough justification for mad scientists to build it for real - that's why it's called mad science, after all. Given that, 'morphogenetic chassis' makes perfect sense - Animal Man's body is basically a 'morphogenetic fauna chassis'.
Too much work, yes, you know it Jordan.
Records section? Too much work, but I might do it sometimes...
Somebody else pointed out that the trident looks funky at ICS.net... but now that I look at this image Queen Clea's more recent appearances, Dodson drew it a little funky, but still within what this particular trident should look.
Oh, about Giganta's intelligence, Wikipedia (yes, I know) says "It was noted in Wonder Woman #2 (volume 3) that Giganta's intellect reduces as she grows in size, compelling her to become less rational and more prone to violence. Subsequent appearances seem to suggest that Giganta has overcome that limitation and retains her full intelligence at any size."
As far as I can tell, it was Heinberg's idea that she loses rationality and intellect when she grows.
Miss Kitty Fantastico said "If it ain't one of those, I'm stumped."
Nothing of that, so you're still stumped. Clue: the nit is by the penciller, but read the captions.
Miss Kitty Fantastico said "It's intentional - Circe got Wonder Girl's Lasso of Lightning earlier in the arc, and in issue #4 Wonder Woman grabbed it back, so she's got two lassos at this point."
Yeah, I thought so, that's why Cassie doesn't have her lasso when she arrives with the rest of the heroes.
Miss Kitty Fantastico said "I find it easier to use present tense for superheroes - you never know when they'll come back."
Point.
Miss Kitty Fantastico said "So in the same way that the real Animal Man taps into the morphogenetic field of fauna to gain the abilities of animals, you could conjecture a theoretical 'Weaponry Man' who taps into the morphogenetic field of ordnance, and can produce the 'abilities' of any weaponry."
I understand your reasoning, but the thing is that, the morphonetic field IS the red. So a gunmetal grey or sickly green would be another kind of field.
What I'm getting at is that I don't see that the Red has to be the only morphogenetic field - that it's fundamentally impossible that the Oolong R&D team, the maddest and most brilliant of mad brilliant scientists, couldn't have found a way to tap into new ones, besides the one Buddy uses. Perhaps the Red is the only one that existed until now, and it's the Horsemen themselves that are generating these new fields - or maybe their mad science is mad enough that it doesn't matter that these other fields don't exist - it's enough that they theoretically could. Either way, it's plain they're doing it, and they're doing it exactly like Animal Man does it - therefore I think it's quite logical to use the same terminology.
I don't want to eat up your comments section with a long debate - email me if you want to discuss this further. Either way, I think the pseudoscience is quite solid.
Re: Spot The Nit. Is it that the girl on the right says, "You're alive because Circe's still hoping you'll join us." But the fact that Giganta is in the panel, one would assume that she has already joined in the fight or whatever is going on? I'm pretty stumped by this nit, but if however I am now correct then would the writer not also take some of the blame for the captions as he is misdirecting the reader.
With regards to Terry Dodson, yeah I like him as well and I wasn't really having a go at him. He does a fantastic Spider-Man in my opinion.
Miss Kitty Fantastico said "What I'm getting at is that I don't see that the Red has to be the only morphogenetic field"
Again, I follow your reasoning, but again, the point is that the morphogenetic field IS the Red, not that the Red is ONE of the morphogenetic fields. I get that the mechanics might be similar, but they should have chosen another term for this.
Miss Kitty Fantastico said "I don't want to eat up your comments section with a long debate"
That's exactly why we have a comments section, not just for singing my praises. :>
The Guvnor Paul C said "Is it that the girl on the right says, "You're alive because Circe's still hoping you'll join us." But the fact that Giganta is in the panel, one would assume that she has already joined in the fight or whatever is going on? I'm pretty stumped by this nit, but if however I am now correct then would the writer not also take some of the blame for the captions as he is misdirecting the reader."
No, Queen Clea is talking to Diana, saying that Circe hopes Diana joins them, sees things Circe's ways. But no, everything the writer has put in in that panel is correct. It's a pencilling nit.
"Whoever mentions the Cold War, says 'it's hard to explain how scary it was.' Cold War or not (since it was 1945), whether it was Mr. Terrific or Dr. Mid-Nite, neither of them was alive at the time, not if they're supposed to be in their thirties or even their forties."
The Cold War lasted until the USSR dissolved in 1991. I'm 41, and I remember the Cold War well...
(Unless 'it' doesn't refer to the Cold War. In that case, never mind.)
Yeah, I'm not 28 yet, and I remember the Cold War too (even if I wasn't too sure what was going on :P). The point here is that they're talking about 1945, when von Braun defects to the USA, and saying it was a scary time, talking about 1945 as if it was the height of the Cold War.
Not only most historians don't believe the Cold War started afterwards, but if you're 30 or 40, you can't remember the height of the Cold War, or even the Cold War at all as "a scary time".
At best, these characters (Terrific and Mid-Nite) were born in 1965, and probably after 1970.
Thanks for the clarification. With more context on Terrific and Mid-Nite's conversation, your nit stands...
Spoooot the nit!!
mmm I think is the the finger in Diana's left hand. Diana drinks gingold?? That finger can't be right...
Roy
costumegallerydc.blogspot.com
Shad: thanks for the validation. :P
Roy: nope, not that.
Post a Comment