When DC Comics launched their V series in 1984, the first and only season of the TV series was still airing. This put the writers of the comic between a rock and a hard place. On one hand, they were free to use whatever was already covered in the 2 mini-series and the current series, which is a great sandbox to play in, but on the other, they were constrained by the TV series still being on the air. They did not know where the TV writers were going with the plot, but since the TV producers had certain plans in mind, DC had to get permission for just about everything.
You can’t radically change or kill off any characters, or take any chances when the producers have their own agenda.
Sadly for the V comic, this often means that the missions of the resistance and the villainy of the Visitors are a bit subdued. That doesn’t mean it isn’t fun, but it is often little more than short story arcs that are wrapped up quickly. Ham Tyler, Mike Donovan, Julie, Willie, Kyle, the Starchild, they’re all here. And this 18 issue series is a fun read.
But for the reasons described above, it is far from perfect. I would say about half of the issues really capture the feel of the original two mini-series, while the other half is just kind of blah. Being that I am a hardcore V fan, I loved it all despite these flaws.
The art is at times great, at times not so great. It’s not that the art is bad in itself, it’s mostly that the characters do not look like the ones we love.
Interestingly the comic gets canceled right after the TV series does, so it never got the chance to stand on its own and spread its wings. Which is sad, because I feel like the team here could have made a very special book. One that might have lasted at least 100 issues. It just wasn’t meant to be.
Gonna keep this review short, but the bottom line is that it’s a great comic series if you have a special place in your heart for V. It’s fascinating to read through and see how the writers and editor chose to handle the constraints that they faced and it was fun reading the letters pages to see what folks thought of it back when these issues were new.
It’s been ages since I have read a comic book and I thought I would dive back into things with Doctor Who Classics Omnibus Volume 1 and share my thoughts with you guys. This book features a collection of comics that were originally published in Doctor Who Magazine in the 80s, featuring mostly the Fourth Doctor. They were originally just black and white, and not colored until IDW had them colored by Charlie Kirchoff. The coloring is superb by the way.
This book features work from Dave Gibbons and Grant Morrison. The stories collected here include “City of the Damned,” “Dreamers of Death,” “Iron Legion,” “Spider-God,” “Changes,” and more.
Apparently the magazine was not allowed to license the companions, so some of these adventures feature the Doctor by himself or with new companions created specifically for these comics. When I bought this omnibus, I figured it would be a fun jaunt into the past, a novelty, a fun read that is likely dated. Something to be enjoyed and then left on the shelf. It turns out, I really really love this book.
The thing about reading these comics all collected in one book is that it feels like authentic classic Doctor Who. One of the problems with the vintage DW show is that they suffer from a lot of slowness. I love them, but you could probably cut those episodes in half so that the plot moves along at a good pace. That is solved with this series of comic stories.
The pacing is just right and due to the nature of Doctor Who magazine publishing these weekly, you have the same cool cliffhangers between each installment. That makes this omnibus a joy to read in either large chunks or small. So you get that old DW experience, with some added benefits. Like I said, the pacing a much nicer, the cliffhangers are all there and the art is just amazing and appropriate to DW.
Sure, there are a few missteps here and there. The odd plot point that has you scratching your head, a weirdly drawn panel here or there, but almost all of it is fantastic. This book will really re-awaken your love for classic Doctor Who. It’s pretty darn charming.
This is Doctor Who with no budget constraints, so unlike the TV show, you can expect more alien aliens, plots that are a bit more out there etc. That’s a good thing. Think of it as Doctor Who unchained. And they really nailed Tom Bakers gravitas and personality in much of this book.
For some unknown reason they inserted a few stories from later Doctors, but this is mostly Tom Baker. Give this omnibus a go and I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised. It’s a great read and a lot of fun. Doctor Who Classics Omnibus Volume 1 is 356 pages of just plain fun.
Foundmi App Enabled Bluetooth Tracking Tags are pretty cool. Not only do they come in a variety of cool pop culture characters, but they also perform useful functions, like allowing you to track down your keys, your phone or anything else. And these tags are small enough to fit on your keychain. There’s no need to lose anything ever again. Foundmi recently sent us a sample so we could check it out and let you know if it is worth getting some.
So what did we think? Well, after testing out a Stormtrooper version, here are our thoughts:
Setup-
The accompanying app that you need to use on your phone is 128MB, which is a bit large for an app that provides such a basic function. Then when attempting to sign up (via both email and Facebook), the app would just say that an error has occurred and give no indication as to what the actual problem is. To solve this issue, I simply waited a day to see if something had changed, and it did! Perhaps just bad luck… but wait there’s more!
While trying to pair your foundmi keychain, if your location services is not available, the app will send you in a loop of testing the Bluetooth connection, again just saying that an error had occurred. So we were off to an annoying start, but hey this stuff happens, so I’m not holding it against the company.
First Impressions once it started working-
It looks like the app can support being connected to multiple keychains at a time,which is handy.
The app was a little confusing to get working, but once I got it to work, the functions of the app were obvious and streamlined.
Interestingly, you can use it as a selfie taking button as long as it is paired to your device. Again, a cool feature.
It can show you the status of the battery in the foundmi keychain as well and Alexa can ring the foundmi keychain.
The ringing is loud enough that it can be heard from an adjacent room, while muffled under clothing and behind a closed door. Big noise for such a small device! Good news, because you will find your belongings.
The device’s bluetooth connection range is standard at about 100 meters.
The device can also make your phone to ring.
The location identifier did a good job approximating the location of the keychain, but the address was not exact (as expected!)
The bottom line is that they need to streamline things on the app end and setup, but the device really is as capable as they claim. It will help you to find your lost items. Plus, these tracking tags are all adorable to boot. They come in all kinds of cute characters, whether you are into Star Wars, Batman, Wonder Woman, Superman, Deadpool or just about any other geek character, they have it and you can buy it. Heck, I would like to collect more, just because I love the style. So we have to give this device a hearty thumbs up.
So I wanted to wait a few days and let Star Trek Discovery sink in, before I wrote anything about it. Now I’m ready. You may agree with my opinion of the show or disagree. Either way, you can sound off in the comments if you like.
I really wanted to like this new Star Trek show. I wanted to like it despite how terrible it looked. I wanted to like it despite the fact that Alex Kurtzman is involved. And despite that it looked like Jar Jar Abrams Star Trek, I entered into this world with an open mind. I have been a fan since TOS, all my life. It would be so great to have a new Star Trek show. Gotta keep an open mind. But not so open that you cling to garbage just because it has the name Star Trek on the tin. So here we go. It is beginning.
Holy crap! This show looks amazing. Such sweeping visuals. Maybe I’ll like this after all……
Two hours later…
Wait- WTF! That was entertaining, but it wasn’t Star Trek. The fact that it is wrapped in a Star Trek label is just plain sad. A few points in no particular order:
Spoilers ahead people! Pew pew pew!
I actually found Captain Georgiou to be a pretty cool character in some respects. She has a certain gravitas and comes off quite capable. Until you realize that she is an idiot. It is one thing to be friends with your Number One and have fun banter, but this woman lets her first officer browbeat her regularly, tell her what to do and step all over her. It’s called boundaries people. If you don’t know what that is in this situation look up Picard and Riker as well as Kirk and Spock. Friends AND professionals. So right off the bat, this woman who I would really love otherwise just outs herself as a terrible Captain, but we can see behind the veil, so we know it is mostly just terrible writing. Learn how the military structure operates.
First Officer Michael Burnham. A woman named Michael. Aren’t we progressive? Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge. The character of Michael Burnham is hardly a character at all. Mentored by Sarek, (Spock’s Father. Sigh. Be original please.) her world was attacked by Klingons, even though no one has seen the Klingons in over 100 years. Burnham is appropriately named, because she has all the personality of a burned ham on the Thanksgiving table. It’s there, you can’t help but notice it, but it’s not enticing and just something to reach around to get at the mashed potatoes and turkey. She spends all of her screen time walking around wide-eyed and more than slightly tweaky like a crack addict. Seriously, go rewatch it. She bosses the Captain around, is pushy, arrogant and has an “I’m always right” attitude. At one point she pushes the science officer away from his station, butting in, because she can do it better. Why is such an instantly unlikable character the center of attention? Why should we care? Doesn’t matter because I don’t. She’s a jerk. And not the kind that people want to watch evolve. There’s not enough here to warrant interest.
The Klingons are all mush-mouthed and bizarre, although their part of the story is mildly interesting. The problem is that they sound terrible they way they talk slow and enunciate. So far I see no reason for their change in appearance and those prosthetics look God-awful. Even so, the Klingon side of the story flows way more natural than the the Federation side, which is just bizarre much of the time.
At one point Sarek’s hologram sits on Burnhams desk. WTF? Just a bizarre moment. And the fact that the Vulcan’s solution to the Klingon aggression was to always attack first… I can kind of see that. It’s even a cool idea. But bizarre and so not how Vulcans would choose to respond.
Also holograms are everywhere. I get that the tech has to be better than TOS in some respects, but things are WAY more advanced. That is honestly the least of my gripes. The Daft Punk headed crewman seems way over the top for instance.
So at one point Burnham betrays her Captain and everyone seems shocked. Uh, you created this monster with your lack of boundaries and let her walk all over you. Now you are surprised? God, the writing is just so so bad. And yet, this could be a great show. I love the visuals.
The ships. Oh the ships. Trek is known for it’s lovely ship designs. Almost every ship on screen so far has been ugly as a Ferengi butt after it was whipped with one of those lightsaber whips they used to carry. The Klingon ships especially are eyesores. Just ugly with no thought for design whatsoever. Fighting these ships is like firing phasers at a glob of poo. I’m not exaggerating. They’re ugly!
I could go on and on, but here’s the point. How did we get such crap Star Trek? Why do they not care? Well, partly because they know that a large amount of the fan population will just eat it up because it bears the name. These people never demand better and will accept anything. It’s the reason so many bad movies get made every year. They don’t think very deeply. I’ll leave it at that. The other factor is no doubt that corporate idiots have too much leeway here. But I think the real answer is staring us right in the face. The key is Michael Burnham.
You might remember the internet chatter a few weeks back about how they were going to make this Star Trek more politically relevant to our time. Especially when it comes to the recent election. Nothing wrong with that in general. It’s what Trek does best, but hear me out here. The problem is never that a show focuses on the politics of the time, the problem comes when the show is designed from the ground up with it’s own agenda. That is a recipe for disaster every time. I believe that is what is going on here. In other words, instead of promoting thought in a television show by examining issues in thought provoking ways, the intent is to socially engineer the audience from the start. No, I’m not a conspiracy theorist. It happens. Entertainments shapes us.
I won’t go into all of the ways, but it is very clear that this show does have it’s own political agendas. They clearly want to appeal to a younger audience. That’s cool and not unexpected. They see the audience as Michael Burnham.
The name alone implies gender identity issues that the kids are always going on about. Let’s make them identify with Michael then. What else can we do? Well, these Millennials always get the trophy, ya know? They are coddled. I know, let’s make her brash, kinda pushy, everything her way. She’s the Captain’s pet. Can get away with almost anything. Okay, okay. What would a millennial do in this situation? I got it. Make her run to Sarek for a pep talk instead of thinking things out. Then when she comes back out, she will have all the answers. And since decisions are hard, and lets face it there are no real consequences for her in this charmed life, let’s just make her commit mutiny. Sure, she’ll go to jail for like 10 hours and get back on a starship. Kids today can so identify. They’ll be brooding right along with her bitching about how it’s other people’s fault. Oh man, we got this! High five! Can one of them be gay? I don’t see why not.
Now, I’m not saying all millennials are like that obviously. There are some great strong kids out there. Smart as hell too. But this is the sector of youth they are appealing to. Maybe. If nothing else, it is food for thought. Because otherwise I can’t explain why they think this kind of writing is okay.
Look, I’ll probably watch more because I am genuinely fascinated in this social experiment and I’m having more fun wondering how dumbed down it will all get before it’s all over. The coming this season scenes were kind of hilarious.
For the record, I love what Star Trek stands for. I love the message of loving each other and being peaceful and accepting. I’ve based my life on it’s teachings in many ways. I could care less how many gay people, black people, or anyone else is on the show. Just create a show naturally and from the heart and your cast will be perfect. The show itself will be gold. Again, it’s the difference between something naturally unfolding in an organic way and someone trying to force values down your throat. I think that’s the issue many people are having with this show. It will be interesting to see what happens here.
I can’t emphasize just how ugly those Klingon ships are!
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