My stupidity is your reward!
I'm a stupid man. This is not open to debate. Recently I ran out of gas on the Pennsylvania Turnpike and, the next day, missed the wedding for which I flew back to Pennsylvania in the first place. So I'm stupid. This is not open to debate.
I recently did another stupid thing. Through a series of stupid events, I now have in my possession two (2) copies of the trade paperback of the mini-series The Coffin, written by Phil Hester and drawn by Mike Huddleston. I reviewed it quickly in this post, in case you're wondering what I thought of it. Do I really need two copies?
I do not. Therefore, I'm going to give one away. That's right, one of you lucky readers will get a very good trade paperback for absolutely no money. What will it cost you? I'm glad you asked.
In the comments section, leave a comment. Tell me who your favorite character in comics is. It does not have to be a main star - if Stevie Hunter is your favorite character in comics, go for it. Anyone in comics will do. Tell me where this person appeared (I don't have Cronin-like knowledge of the entire history of the medium, after all) and then (this is the important part) pitch a story starring that character. It should be a short thumbnail sketch of the story, but enough so we get the gist of what you want. It can be dramatic, funny, kitschy, satirical, blasphemous, pornographic, didactic - I don't care, but it better be good.
So. Are we clear? Your favorite comic book character (Cyclops, Iron Man, Robin, Cerebus, Dreadstar, The Spirit, Jimmy Corrigan, Silver St. Cloud, Donna Troy's husband what's-his-name, Element Lad, Jupiter Assante - I don't care!) in a story pitch of your twisted imagination. I'll give you guys until ... let's say Tuesday. Then I will read the comments and decide which one is the best. The winner will get the trade paperback, plus an added bonus that I won't reveal now (no, it's not a nude picture of me - don't fret!).
If no one wants it, I'll just mail it to a friend of mine. He always gets a kick out of it when I buy more than one copy of a comic (yes, it's not the first time I've done this). So get to pitching!
I recently did another stupid thing. Through a series of stupid events, I now have in my possession two (2) copies of the trade paperback of the mini-series The Coffin, written by Phil Hester and drawn by Mike Huddleston. I reviewed it quickly in this post, in case you're wondering what I thought of it. Do I really need two copies?
I do not. Therefore, I'm going to give one away. That's right, one of you lucky readers will get a very good trade paperback for absolutely no money. What will it cost you? I'm glad you asked.
In the comments section, leave a comment. Tell me who your favorite character in comics is. It does not have to be a main star - if Stevie Hunter is your favorite character in comics, go for it. Anyone in comics will do. Tell me where this person appeared (I don't have Cronin-like knowledge of the entire history of the medium, after all) and then (this is the important part) pitch a story starring that character. It should be a short thumbnail sketch of the story, but enough so we get the gist of what you want. It can be dramatic, funny, kitschy, satirical, blasphemous, pornographic, didactic - I don't care, but it better be good.
So. Are we clear? Your favorite comic book character (Cyclops, Iron Man, Robin, Cerebus, Dreadstar, The Spirit, Jimmy Corrigan, Silver St. Cloud, Donna Troy's husband what's-his-name, Element Lad, Jupiter Assante - I don't care!) in a story pitch of your twisted imagination. I'll give you guys until ... let's say Tuesday. Then I will read the comments and decide which one is the best. The winner will get the trade paperback, plus an added bonus that I won't reveal now (no, it's not a nude picture of me - don't fret!).
If no one wants it, I'll just mail it to a friend of mine. He always gets a kick out of it when I buy more than one copy of a comic (yes, it's not the first time I've done this). So get to pitching!
posted by Greg at 12/18/2005 05:52:00 PM
18 Comments:
I want it, and I'm excited about the challemge. I'll be back later with my pitch.
The PA turnpike is indeed a lousy place to run out of gas. Though I have not lived in the state for ten years I remember it vividly.
In the '80s and early '90s I was completely crazy over Flaming Carrot Comics. There was something so brilliantly hilarious about a guy with a ten-foot tall burning carrot for a mash (and flippers on his feet!) that cracked me up.
If you read the book, you might remember that the Carrot used to hang out with the original Mystery Men - not the ones from the mediocre movie, but a different set. One of those Mystery Men was Screwball. Screwball wore a mask with the two eyes off center from each other, and had a pet shoelace that he wore on his shoulder.
I always thought Screwball had a crazy amount of potential to have Carrot-style adventures. Just the idea of his going against a Galactus-style villain and winning due to his skewed view of reality would be hilarious.
I don't exactly have a pitch, more just a kind of funky idea of how I would approach an obscure character, but maybe you can use thus.
I always thought Hob Gadling was a cool character, he was in some of my favourite issues of Sandman, basically he was a man that vowed never to get old and to never die. Dream and Death made his wish come true and every hundred years he'd meet up with Dream for a drink.
My pitch would be that after being alive for hundreds of years, seeing his friends and loved ones die over and over again he'd start thinking that he's had enough of eternal life and now might be a good time to try and find that cute goth chick.
As anyone who is me already knows, BROTHER VOODOO is my favorite character of all time. (He's, y'know, the dude from New Orleans with voodoo powers and Rogue hair.)
Here are my reasons why Brother Voodoo is the best character ever:
- He is the best character ever.
Here is my storyline:
The X-Men are all hanging out in that Australian ghost town they used to live in, because creepy Sentinels came over their house a few weeks ago and totally won't leave, which is annoying. (Note: this story guest-stars the X-Men, because I hear the kids like them.) Suddenly they're attacked by a deadly consortium of their most implacable foes! Ha, I said consortium. See, the Reapers - who are cyborgs that the X-Men constantly do awful things to like rip them in half - and the Marauders, who get cloned and brought back to life by Mr. Sinister, who sounds like a wrestler from the 80s, whenever the X-Men kill them, have teamed up! Because they're deadly.
So they're fighting and stuff and Colossus goes up to Pretty Boy and snaps his neck, because Colossus has been cranky recently and also what kind of villain name is Pretty Boy? Jesus. But...nothing happens! Pretty Boy's like totally fine! And at the same time, Prism and Arclight break into the secret underground joint that the X-Men are stashing a bunch of stuff from the School in, and they break out the ethereal remains of Quentin Quire, the omega-level telepath who went crazy on MGH and then died but only sortof and now his mist is being kept in a huge test tube! And what does not-really-alive Quentin do? He friggin resurrects Jean Grey, because why the hell not?
So the X-Men are facing the Reapers and the Marauders and some wrestlers from the 80s - Andre the Giant is there - and Quentin Quire's telepathic mist and Dark Phoenix, and they're all, "This is gonna end with Claremont writing, 'The outcome is never in doubt', isn't it?" But suddenly Beast, who is the only X-Man who's not a raving idiot, is all, "Dude! Andre the Giant is dead!" And that's when the X-Men realize that all their foes are more or less THE WALKING DEAD! (Kirkman plug!) And Gambit goes "Hey dudes, when I was in that crappy solo series a while ago I teamed up with this Brother Voodoo guy who's totally good with the zombies." And then Colossus snaps Gambit's neck.
So they get Gateway, the mostly-naked mystical old guy, to spin his magic teleporting bullroarer and open a portal to New Orleans and they're all, "Help us Brother Voodoo! You're our only hope!" And Brother Voodoo's all, "Ha HA! Another guest appearance! Three more of these and I'll make it into the next Defenders lineup!"
So he comes along and everyone's totally fighting. Brother Voodoo goes "Hey guys, what's up with all your greatest foes being dead?" And the X-Men are all, "Don't even get us started on Magneto, man. That dude dies so often our editors can't even figure out when he's supposed to be dead." And Beak's all "Hey, I got Xorn's old helmet!" And then Colossus snaps his neck.
But anyway the appearance of Brother Voodoo definitely turns the tide of battle and it looks like the X-Men are gonna win! Until...Scrambler, the Marauder who Claremont insists is Korean even though he totally doesn't look Korean at all, touches Brother Voodoo and scrambles his powers! Which totally shouldn't work since technically Brother Voodoo doesn't have any powers, but it does anyway because...oh, let's just say the Count Nefaria evolved his powers. So Brother Voodoo starts shooting out death zombie rays all over the place as his powers go wild! And one of them hits Wolverine and turns him into THE WALKING DEAD! (Kirkman plug #2!) He's the best he is at what he does...and what he does best is shamble! So between Dark Phoenix swallowing the sun and all, and Wolverine shambling around, and also Emma Frost has mysteriously started wearing pants, when did that happen? WEAK... things are once again looking bad for our heroes.
But then Andre the Giant finds a shred of humanity left in him. His power and goodness is too great to zombify! And he comes up behind Dark Phoenix and claps his hands on either side of her head and makes her brain explode. The resulting energy obliterates all the zombies, except Wolverine - his healing power has beaten the zombie infection.
But then Colossus snaps his neck.
THE ESOTERIC ADVENTURES OF SOLOMON GRUNDY!!!
Grundy gets "killed", which of course forces another resurrection and change in personality. This time, Grundy is a hard-nosed, but marginally heroic type, who sets off on a voyage of adventure in the DCU, looking for his origins.
Lots of pulp-type action and adventure follows, including cameos by (and probably fights with) Swamp Thing, Superman, Lobo and the army of Grundies from Morrison's Klation. He'll also encounter a number of women who are inexplicably turned on by his undead/planty charms, and he'll be hopping in and out of bed almost as often as he's fighting monsters, Nazis and superheroes/villains. It's basically Indiana Jones with an undead plant guy as the lead.
There'll be a Christmas issue in which Grundy is trapped by an avalanche in a log cabin with the Joker over the Christmas season.
There will also be a Summer Special double-sized one shot in which Grundy gets accidentally sent to the Wildstorm universe and has to break into the Authority's Carrier to return home.
He'll probably mix it up with the Legion at some point too.
Oh, and a Hulk/Grundy one shot if Marvel are up for it. If Marvel and Dark Horse are up for it, it's Hulk/Grundy/Hellboy. Mignola draws this one, either way.
My favorite super-hero is Nightcrawler. He just plain looks cool.
The recent Nightcrawler series failed because it was not about Kurt, it was a bunch of magic stories with Kurt thrown in. Bah!
Let's get Kurt into a mileau in which he belongs: high adventure.
Nightcrawler is a teleporter who can blend in with the shadows. He should be traveling the world, seeking out MacGuffins, dueling with secret agents and ancient terrors, and scoring with the ladies (in the Marvel Universe, normalish women like Trish Tilby, Amanda Sefton, and Archangel's various girlfriends have a thing for blue guys. I don't ask).
To get around the world, he can start using an image inducer. Eventually, the inducer breaks (at an inoportune time, naturally), and Nightcrawler has to fend for himself as himself. Amanda Sefton can pop in occasionally, but Kurt's a free man. Supporting characters can include a pilot or ship's captain Kurt befriends, some expert on ancient-and-powerful-and-deadly-in-the-wrong-hands MacGuffins, and maybe some old circus partners. Let's have a devil-may-care, swashbuckling Nightcrawler again!
My favorite superhero is The Man Called Nova. He was the reason I got into comics back in the 70s, and he's still occupying that soft spot in my heart reserved for prog rock, Python films, Lenny Bruce, and Kurt Vonnegut.
Short history: Nova is a 70s kid, much like Eric Forman from That 70s Show, who gets zapped by a dying cosmic warrior, thus gaining that warrior's powers and ... um ... super suit. It was a high-bandwidth zap, OK? Chill!
My story: Nova was a great comic, but it was slightly hampered (at least in the early issues) by some craptacular villains -- The Condor, Diamondhead (who had a -- wait for it -- diamond head!), etc.
My idea? Novagate. That's right. While on a school tour of the White House, Nova uses his alien powers and suit technology to accidentally uncover Nixon's secret taping system. He goes through an existential crisis ("Should I tell anyone?" ... "How could the president be evil?") before finally deciding to do the right thing and out Nixon.
Little does Nova suspect that a secret recording system is not the only technological advance made by the Nixon administration. Splash panel: The front wall of the White House explodes outward due to a shattering blow from the robot-exoskeleton-clad NIXON 3000!
Nova and NIXON 3000 (or the NIXONATOR or D.I.C.K. -- I'm still working on the name) battle it out, finally ending up on top of the Washington Monument. As Air Force jets rain fire on the battling foes, Nova overcomes NIXON 3000, who plunges to his death on the finely manicured lawn below.
Nova is given the Congressional Medal of Freedom by the new president, and he aces his civics test and wins the heart of the girl. His fame and fortune are assured when he then stars in a comic book ad for Hostess Twinkies.
The End.
My favorite hero(es) – or at least they used to be – were the DC heroes. They appeared here, there, and everywhere for the last 60 years. In my wildly improbable story they all act like the heroes they are supposed to be. They don’t hurt, kill or maim anyone at all. They aren’t primadonna crybabies who whine endlessly or waste precious time in shallow introspection. They get along like the intelligent, civilized people they are even though they all have huge differences and come from vastly different backgrounds. They aren’t perfect, they accept that, and work hard to overcome their shortcomings. And lastly, but most importantly, they inspire hope, faith, belief in right over wrong, and optimism for the future in normal men and women, just like you and me.
Al Brown provides stiff competition.
Neat idea. I'll take a go.
My favorite character is longtime DC stalwart the Martian Manhunter, also known as J'onn J'onzz. He first appeared in Detective Comics but is most well-known for a long tenure with the Justice League in their title, as well as in his own (excellent) solo series by John Ostrander. Since his powers are central to this story, I'll briefly detail them: superstrength, flight, telepathy, and shape-shifting. He also has an innate weakness to fire.
The pitch:
As the story opens, the Manhunter is on a solo JLA assignment when he's ambushed by a cadre of flame-based supervillians, including Firefly, Heat Wave, and Scorch, who have been hired by Vandal Savage to eliminate J'onn. Overwhelmed by the enemy's forces, the Manhunter attempts to escape by shape-shifting into human form and seeking help.
Firefly spots him changing, though, and tails him to the upper atmosphere, where he delivers a major blow to J'onn. The Manhunter falls to the Earth, and wakes up the victim of severe head trauma, an amnesiac while still in shape-shifted, human form.
Homeless and destitute, the Martian who doesn't even know he's a Martian wanders alone through Africa, getting a front-row seat to poverty, genocide, starvation and the humanitarian atrocities which are all-too-prevalent in the region. The remainder of the story is a race against time as the JLA attempts to find the missing J'onn before Savage's assassins do, while the Manhunter himself, unaware he's an alien and therefore unable to use his powers, takes up residence in a small village in the Darfur region of Sudan.
He grows close to many of the people he meets. They are refugees fleeing the Janjaweed, a government supported militia which has already slaughtered thousands in the region. The story ends when the Janjaweed converge on J'onn and his tribe, leading to a pitched battle in which J'onn is able to survive the bullets of the aggressors, leading to his realization of his non-humanity and the resurgence of his powers and memory. Unfortunately, this awakening comes too late, after all of J'onn's friends have lost their lives. Enraged, J'onn nearly murders those who have killed his friends. In the nick of time, he's talked down by the JLA, who have located J'onn after encountering (and defeating) Savage's hired guns.
Later, after his rage has subsided, J'onn tells his fellow JLA members that in the course of his experiences he's realized how short the JLA has fallen when it comes to encouraging real-world justice. It has been several years since J'onn has used a human guise for a considerable length of time, and his recent tragedy has re-exposed him to the widespread injustice which takes a form other than a supervillain that can easily be defeated through sheer brawn.
Determined to a fight a different kind of battle, he decides to leave the League, to live among impoverished and oppressed peoples, using his powers and a series of human guises to aid those who are both oppressed and often forgotten. In the story's closing moments, the JLA watches silently as their friend and comrade shifts into the guise of a humanitarian worker and walks off into the sunset, disappearing under a hazy African sky.
It's a story that, as you can see, tries to mix good old-fashioned superhero smackdown with a commentary on social injustice. I chose to incorporate elements of the real-life Darfur conflict. It'd be hard to tell without being preachy, but I think the Manhunter, due to his outsider status and abilities, is an ideal character to tell stories about the human condition, such as this.
OK, mine is a team-up book.
I'll make this brief:
In the future, Earth is being overrun by hordes of Nazi monkeys and apes. An eccentric Christopher Lloyd-type scientist decides to save future Earth from the unstoppable monkey horde by selecting a team of heroes from the 1980's - but instead of plucking the JLA from the timestream, they end up with The Creeper, Blue Devil, Ambush Bug, Mad Harriet, and Bizarro. Hilarity ensues.
Who wouldn't want to read that?
Lizard and Son
Curt Connors is trying to be a good dad and raise his teenage son. Billy Connors is trying to survive life as a teenager. Too bad his dad has a tendancy to randomly transform into a superpowered talking bipedal lizard who wants to rule the world.
A miniseries about tolerance, family ties and knowing when to hit your dad in the head with a tire iron.
My personal fave was (and is) Jack Knight in Starman. Think of it - he was the ultimate meld of "fanboy" and collector, who actually got to play with the "big boys", and who came to terms with it. In addition, he worked through his daddy issues, and decided to quit rather than, say, die in a horrible crossover event, er, I mean, "world shattering cataclysm". Even though proposing a pitch on him seems irrelevant (especially given current DC events), what the hey - I'll give it a shot.
The Pitch:
Jack Knight's living in semi-bliss in San Francisco with his wife and two kids. However, things are tight - San Francisco is one of the more expensive places to live. (Plus, you can throw in a gratuitous crossover with Jack's kids playing with Sugar and Spike) So, how does he decide to earn a little pocket money?
One word: JLEbay
That's right - all the leftover superhero momentos are sold online. Batarangs, deflated boxing glove arrows, you name it, he sells it. Doesn't matter if it's a used Joker acid squirting flower, or Superman's old "electric" suit, if you want it, he has it. (Except for the Inferior 5 in trade paperback, but that's another issue entirely). However, he begins to get greedy - let's face it, his kids are going to need to go to college, and Metropolis University isn't cheap, so...
He begins selling more "sordid" items - Luthor's bank account and pin numbers. A formula from Tyler Chemicals for "Miraclo". Receipts from Waynetech that show purchases of military- and crime-oriented equipment that seems to have vanished. Mother Boxes that show porn from Apokalyps. Even bootleg cosmic rods.
As our story progresses, we find that Jack's attracting attention from both the hero and villain community - he won't cross the line at selling identities (and we're going to retcon the whole Identity Crisis mind-wiping as Dr. Light eating some bad Taco Bell), and, well, the heroes don't like him profiting on account of the whole "good-for-goodness'-sake" deal. Jack is losing popularity, and begins to resent it. OK, he wasn't a "heavy hitter", but come on - Booster Gold questioning Jack's integrity? Now that's "Hello pot, this is kettle" time.
So what does he do? He begins a blog where he "defends" himself (think half Drudge Report, half typical comics blog), and asserts his rights. For every legitimate criticism, he responds with something like, "Hey, my dad worked with Einstein and had at it with Black Canary - what has your your loser dad done?"
In short, he alienates himself, and there's a lot of superheroes fighting each other.
Ok, DC, please send me a contract. I'm ready to get cracking.
Moon Knight
Actually, I thought his costume ruled but all I know about him is what was on the back of his old Marvel Universe trading card. Apparently he was a military man killed and brought back by the god Konshu. Or somesuch. Weird predecessor to Spawn, for the record, but that's not where I'm going with this.
I want to explore that gods angle, but Marvel's not a company laced with Egyptian mythology. What've they got? Greek and Nordic suff in spades. I have no idea of anything about Moon Knight or what's going on in Thor right now, but I thought this sounded good.
I imagine Moon Knight as sort of a hard-luck hero in the vein of Spider-man, a villain in his own book who can't catch a break. The story kicks off as Loki, through trickery and gambling, wins the cosmic "rights" to Moon Knight from Konshu. Loki then decides to have himself a whole lot of fun by making Moon Knight believe Thor is an evil, crazy ex-hero turned villain who must be stopped, while simultaneously convincing the world that Moon Knight's lost his marbles. This results in, essentially, a Moon Knight story where he's your basic Thor villain, being pranked endlessly by Loki. The ol' God of Mischief laughs as Moon Knight gets his ass kicked by Thor, and uses sophisticated illusions to make it look like, say, Moon Knight was attempting to take a girl hostage when in fact he was leading her to safety during the fight. And then Loki does what he used to do to the Absorbing Man, which is to pump up his henchman's powers and send him after Thor again, but Loki knows Thor will beat Moon Knight just as hard next time.
Moon Knight, at his core, is a victim. He's a second-string hero at best who thinks this is his shot at the big time, by bringing in this mad god who his intelligence (Loki) tells him is now a villain. But the intelligence is faulty, and he's doomed to fail, and look bad in the process. And just as with Spider-man, even though he's got a good heart he always fails, everyone thinks he's a villain, and his life sucks. But instead of "Parker luck", here we can blame Loki, and root even more for Moon Knight and hope he escapes Loki's influence.
We throw that possibility out there. Perhaps Captain America or some of the other Avengers could start to wonder how Moon Knight has changed like this, teasing the reader that Moon Knight's about to be released somehow from Loki's influence. But there's not even a happy ending in store for our hero. Instead Loki lets Thor beat Moon Knight again, soiling his reputation, and then Moon Knight walks into the sunset as a total failure, as villain and a hero.
Not very upbeat for Moon Knight, but maybe the reader could laugh with Loki a little bit...
" He'll also encounter a number of women who are inexplicably turned on by his undead/planty charms, and he'll be hopping in and out of bed almost as often as he's fighting monsters, Nazis and superheroes/villains"
Well, "root" *is* used in various slang terms.
When this epic is filmed, the theme song can be "Root Down" by the Beastie Boys.
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