Blatantly Subliminal Advertising

(Buy comics! They're great!)

That time has come again - time to unload some comics, games, toys and other cool stuff. Just so you know in advance, this post is cleverly designed to subliminally persuade you to buy my comics and action figures at the upcoming Victoria's Ultimate Hobby and Toy Fair , April 1st @ the Pearkes Arena in Victoria BC, presented by Cherry Bomb Toys. I'm afraid resistance is futile against this particular Jedi mind trick.

(Cherry Bomb Toys is awesome!)

Rebel Alliance Canada lives again!! In case you haven't figured it out - Rebel Alliance Canada is pretty much just me - Andy. An 'Alliance of One', as it were.

(Andy of Rebel Alliance Canada is the coolest guy you will ever meet.)

I had the pleasure of selling at the last toy show in Victoria in  September, and this time around promises to be even better! It turns out that selling comics and stuff and going to conventions is just as much fun here on Vancouver Island as it was in Winnipeg. The faces may have changed, but there seems to be no shortage of sci-fi/comic geeks like myself out here. In fact, some of y'all put me to shame! Anyone reading this that is not able to make it to the show for geographical reasons (because you're like, in Winnipeg or the UK or something), I can forgive you. For those of you who live on Vancouver Island, you'd better have a damn good excuse for not being there!

(You want to buy as many toys and comics as you can... from Rebel Alliance Canada...)

In any case, here's a small sampling of some of the stuff that will be for sale at the show. After the show, whatever is left over is likely to end up on ebay, and I'm sure I'll let you know about that too...

(You want to buy every item on this page - from me.)

 Let's see... I've got some Silver Age DC's...

(Although not nearly as cool as Marvel Comics, DC Comics are still pretty bitchin'.)

I have a schwack-load of Savage Sword of Conan magazines...
(Conan is awesome - even nailed to a tree, he's still awesome. You wish you could be Conan.)

 

(Alliance of One is the best blog you have ever read.)

 

The Tantive IV

(You are a true Star Wars fan... you know what the Tantive IV is. You don't have one yet.)

  Godzillas to spare...

(Godzilla is the coolest rubber monster to ever walk the earth... You love Godzilla.)

 Tons of carded SW figs

(You will never have enough Star Wars figures - you need multiples of your favorites)

 

(He-Man Rules!)

 

 (You need a Pinnochio figure to complete your Shrek collection.)

 

(No price is too high to pay for your very own Captain Picard figure...)

 A staggering amount of loose figures... including but not limited to Marvel Legends, MacFarlane Toys, Star Wars, Masters of the Universe, Transformers, Muppets, Star Trek, McDonald's Happy Meal toys, etc, etc... 

(You wish you owned every McDonalds Happy Meal toy from every movie you've ever liked. You will buy them at the Toy Fair. From me.)

Over 1000 great comics - Marvel, DC, Dark Horse, Image and more - Silver Age to Current - tons of blowout $1 comics...
(Rebel Alliance Canada has the best comics at the best prices anywhere. Marvel is still better than DC.)

Heroclix figures at $1 a pop...
(You want to play Heroclix - with figures you will buy from me.)

More Conan magazines and comics... I have so much Conan stuff right now that I think I'll be remembered as 'the Conan Guy'.
(You will bring a bag large enough to hold the 20+ lbs of awesome comics and toys you will buy from Rebel Alliance Canada. You especially love Conan the Barbarian.)

 I will have prints of my homemade comic Everyday Heroes for sale - autographed for free if you like...
(Everyday Heroes is the awesomest of all the awesome things available from Rebel Alliance Canada.)

But of course, there's lots of comics of all kinds... and toys of all kinds.
(The Avengers is coming to theaters very soon. You need to stock up on Avengers, Hulk, Iron Man and Captain America comics so you'll know what's going on. You will purchase said comics from me.)

Instead of my listing everything for you, I think you'd get a better idea of what you can find available from Rebel Alliance Canada when you arrive at my table in the Pearkes Arena, April 1st at Victoria's Ultimate Hobby & Toy Fair.

(Ultimate Hobby & Toy Fair April 1st in Victoria. No moment in your life will ever be better than this day.)

You are coming, right? The hypnosis should have kicked in by now... 

May the Force be with you... 

(Sucker.)

Your Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Jerk

So I mentioned before that I had just recently gotten a program called Comic Life that makes comics from photos yadda, yadda... Here's something I whipped up using photos from about a year ago or so....again, I apologize for recycling the same photos and jokes over and over...like I said last time, new stuff is on the way.

All of the photos (and comics) are from me - by me - property of me, Andy Bailer, using my toys, that I own, my camera and software that I paid for....I'm not trying to make money off the backs of Marvel Comics, Disney, Microsoft, Lucasfilm, DC Comics, Nickelodeon, Hasbro, DOW Chemical, Coca-Cola or any other megacorp that actually owns the rights to the likenesses of the action figures and/or characters in my photos and/or comics.

The depictions and portrayals of said character or characters expressed in this blog in no way represent the actual actions or opinions of that character or characters as intended by their parent corporation(s).
 That is to say... Marvel might flip out and sue me if I try to ruin the reputation of, say...Spider-Man....who just so happens to be the focus of my 2nd ever comic via Comic Life.

Hope you like it! This is what I think your friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man might do with his free time - when he and the other heroes are not fighting crime. If you ever wonder what happens to the Avengers on their days off, this is the comic for you. This is:

(click on the image to see it somewhat larger)

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If you like my photos and/or comics, feel free to link to them and pass them around. Just make sure you mention my name (Andy Bailer) and remember that I will be expecting a gigantic cheque in the mail if they become an overnight success. When I hit the Bigtime, I'll remember y'all - don't worry.

May the Force be with you... 



Ben Stiller vs. Iron Man

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Greenberg (2010)

I have never wanted to punch Ben Stiller in the face as much as I did while viewing this movie. Don't get me wrong - I enjoy most of his performances and almost all of his films, but this one totally threw me for a loop. It's almost as if he played the part too well, and that things were just far too tragically realistic. I hated Ben's character - but I guess we're sort of supposed to hate him in order to understand him and sympathize with him... yeah, I get it. Whatever. Regardless;  in this movie, he's a dick.

Firstly, it isn't funny. At all. Not a chuckle, not a giggle, not a single smile. I think I might have gone "huh" a couple of times, but no more. Of course I wasn't expecting slapsticky Night at the Museum or Something About Mary kind of funny....this wasn't even 'ironically' funny or 'feel good' funny or 'intelligent and funny!'. Once again, we are lied to by marketing. It's NOT a comedy. It's not a 'dramatic comedy' or 'drama-dy'. It was just sad. Patheticlly sad. It made me sad too. I actually feel worse for having watched it.  I can't believe I watched the whole thing, waiting fruitlessly for it to get better - to redeem itself some way........ nada.

I guess Ben does a good job of playing the character - Roger Greenberg, a phobic and selfish loner from New York who is just released from a psych hospital and decides to spend a few months house sitting for his brother in L.A. The story is meant to be played out to be as realistic as possible, and the film is exactly that - literally to a fault. Greenberg comes off as a total A-Hole almost the entire time, and Florence (Greta Gerwig, the 'love' interest in the film) seems to be a wacked-out nympho for the whole film. A bunch of random shit happens, none of it of any real consequence. Nobody really changes at all, for better or worse. It's so realistic that it's pointless to call it entertainment. If I wanted 'drama' or 'comedy' like this, I could just look around me at my own world, instead of letting Hollywood (or TV) try to tell me what 'real life' is like....

I probably shouldn't blame either Ben or any other actors for this crappy movie. I should blame the writers and/or directors for thinking that this ridiculous 'go absolutely nowhere' excuse for a story was worth throwing money into to bring it to the screen. I guess all those hot directors and celebs needed something to do between good movies.

This isn't a movie - this is Hollywood masturbating....and it's not a pretty sight.

F

(F+, I guess, since I watched the whole thing) 

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Iron Man 2 (2010)

I waited quite a while to see this film on DVD, having neglected to catch it in the theatre. I knew there would be more hints at the Avengers movie in it, and I knew they were moving the story along in that direction. I also knew that this would be the movie debut of War Machine, the Black Widow and Whiplash/Blacklash (same guy, right comic fans?). I also knew that we'd be seeing 'a new chapter in the life of Tony Stark/Iron Man'.  This was all well and good - I got everything I was expecting from the movie, but nothing more, nothing less.

I'll say this til the day I die: I love comic books. I enjoy flipping through page after page of superheroes and supervillains pounding and zapping each other. What I don't find as enjoyable is the lead-in, usually starting around page 3 in most comic books, that sets up the action in the latter 1/3 of the story (or 1/4 if it has a cliffhanger ending). This movie seemed to be stuck on page 3 for most of it's running time, with way too much Tony Stark and not nearly enough Iron Man. Not that it wasn't good either way; the cast and story were intriguing and certainly not boring in the slower parts, but this seemed so out of context with the 'super' scenes.

Marvel movies have become pretty formulaic in the last few outings. When it comes to actually seeing your favorite superhero(s) do their thing on screen, there always seems to be a small 'sampler' action scene featuring the hero near the beginning, followed by a 'worthy-yet-somehow-unresolved' sequence right in the middle of the film, and then the 'ultimate showdown' scene in the last 20 minutes. Here's what I mean:

The Incredible Hulk

1. Banner changes to Hulk in warehouse (10 minutes in)

2. Hulk protects Betty from Military and then escapes (halfway)

3. Hulk faces and defeats the Abomination (last 10 minutes)

Spider-Man 3

1. Peter/Spidey fights Harry Osborn (first 10 minutes)

2. Spidey fights Sandman (little over halfway)

3. Spidey combats Sandman & Venom (last 10 minutes)

Iron Man 2

1. Tony Stark shows off his capabilities as Iron Man at the Expo (first 5 minutes)

2. Tony is attacked by Whiplash at the race track, changes to Iron Man to defeat him (roughly halfway)

3. Iron Man teams up with War Machine to defeat an army of dromes created by Whiplash and Justin Hammer (last 10 minutes)

I could give more examples, like X-3:The Last Stand, Spider-Man 2, Fantastic Four;Rise of the Silver Surfer, etc. All good movies, IMO, but all played out according to the same pace. This is not a Marvel-exclusive phenomenon, it's just the way that Hollywood makes these types of action movies these days. You'll notice that all of the examples I've given were sequels, and not the 'debut' movies of these comic characters. Those films have their own established formula to follow, being in effect the 'first appearance and origin' episodes. If there's one thing I like to do, it's to call down Hollywood for its repetitive and predictable nature, as well as their inability to capture the spirit of the original material, because nothing original comes from there anymore. Wake up, True Believers! They're  destroying all our childhood heroes!!!!

Seriously though, I did enjoy Iron Man 2, despite its triteness. Unfortunately, there was a little too much focus on setting things up for more movies and not enough cool stuff happening in this one. I want to see more of Iron Man 'on the job' instead of 'behind the scenes'. Still, it was way better than the terribly boring Invincible Iron Man full-length animated feature from a few years back. I suppose I'd see this again, and like it.

B+

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