Trade Tales! - Superman: Kryptonite Nevermore

Well, it’s another September… so that means I get to gush on the Man of Steel himself. This month, I’m pretty much going back to basics this time. There’s no certain theme this time around. I think I’ve played those out anyway. The plan is to look at a story from each decade and some non-comic material as well. So, I might as well start off with the first (?) time DC tried to revamp Superman in a modern age!

In early 1970’s, comics were changing and trying to be more modern. That era became what’s known as “The Bronze Age.” Marvel was doing more thing with their characters.  DC was also trying to revamp their heroes a bit. Batman got thrown back into his dark, pulpy roots. Green Arrow and Hal Jordan were doing their “Hard-Travelin’ Heroes” gig. I think Wonder Woman had something going on too, but I’m not sure. Then, we get to Superman, who at this point, is pretty much “God in a Cape.”

The Superman books got new editors and they decided to get rid of a lot of the Silver Age goofiness that was around in the 60’s. Julius Schwartz, the editor of Superman, got Dennis O’Neil to come in and write Superman for this new era. Basically, the idea was to bring those god-like powers down a bit and revamp him. He didn’t stay long on the book, though, and his issues of Superman (#233-238, #240-242) became known as “The Sandman Saga.” The issues were then put into a collection called Kryptonite Nevermore. Assisting O’Neil was Curt Swan and Murphy Anderson on the art. Artist Neal Adams did the covers to these issues.

Mini-Music Reptrospective - Jamiroquai Part 2

Here is are the rest of Jamiroquai's studio albums. I also got a ranking of all the albums from least favorite to favorite. 

A Funk Odyssey (2001)

This is probably my least favorite album from the group. Something about it just feels off. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who thought that. Even reviews from that era were mixed on this one. It really sways into the techno/disco side of things, and most of the songs don’t stick with me at all. Now, they do try to do some new things and use some different sounds. Only a couple of songs here really come  to mind. The rest are fine for the most part.

Favorite Songs:

• Little L – Of the fast songs on here, this one and another one are the only ones that really hit with me.
• You Give Me Something – This is another fast love song. It’s cool and funky, but that’s about it.
• Corner of the Earth – This is one of the songs where the group tries to use a different sound. iN this case, it’s Bossa Nova… not Chevy Nova for you 1990 TMNT movie fans out there. It’s slower, not funky, and just more spiritual. Heck, Jay Kay is wearing Native American regalia in the music video, something that would probably get him into trouble these days. Still, it’s a pretty cool song.

Mini-Music Retrospective - Jamiroquai Part 1

You know, it’s been a while since I’ve geeked  out on some music here. I don’t have a lot of favorite artists, but there are some I tend to go back to from time to time. You can find most of them here on the blog. One group I’ve been listening to a lot has been… (checks Google)… Jamiroquai. If you don’t know who they are, you can do two things: look up that music video with the white room and moving floor, or check out that Napoleon Dynamite dance scene. Yeah, it’s those dudes. That “Virtual Insanity” music video was my first intro to the group, and that was pretty much it for a long time.

For those not in the know, Jamiroquai is a British funk and acid jazz group. Acid Jazz basically mixes funk, disco, R&B, and soul into a blender. They also started to add a lot of house and techno music to their repertoire in the 2000’s. Their front-man, Jason “Jay” Kay, is pretty much known for the wacky hats he wears, his soulful voice, and some of the dancing he does. While the group has some success in the US, they do much better on the UK charts. They’ve released eight studio albums between 1992 and 2017.

“Virtual Insanity,” “Canned Heat,” and couple of other songs were the only ones I heard for a long time. I think it was a couple of years ago when I decided to check out the rest of their discography starting with their first album, Emergency on Planet Earth. Since then, I’ve been listening to more on my iPod. Since I’ve finally gotten to listen to their latest album, Automaton, I thought I’d quickly talk about their albums and list off some of my favorite tracks. I was going to originally do a favorites list, but I couldn’t do it.  Besides, I think I would’ve thrown most of their first two albums on there.

"It's a Video Game! - Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag

Well, it’s time to step back into the world of Assassin’s Creed for a bit. Right now, I just got off from playing the newest game Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey. Yes, I haven’t gone back to Unity and I haven’t even touched Syndicate yet. I think Ubisoft knew that I’m casual fan of Greek mythology or something. Something had to keep me playing for that long! Anyway, before I started on that 80+ hour venture (yeah, it took that long and I haven’t even touched DLCs yet), I finally finished today’s subject, Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag.

Black Flag was released on October 9^th, 2013. It was put on both current and next-gen consoles, but I got it for the PS3. While Assassin’s Creed 3 wasn’t the best game, it did introduce a new mechanic to the series: naval battles. Ubisoft took that mechanic and made it into its own thing for this game and another one I’ll get to next time. They also decided to throw pirates into the mix, and pirates are always cool… unless you’re Johnny Depp these days. So, what happens in “The Adventures of Kenway 0.5 and Nameless Game Tester?”

The present day story for Black Flag takes place a year after the events of Assassin’s Creed 3. If you don’t remember that crappy ending, let me remind you: Desmond Miles is “deaded.” The Templars find what’s left of him and essentially exploit his remains in order to find more Isu artifacts. You end up playing as a nameless game tester who’s been hired by Abstergo Entertainment in to surf through the memories of Edward Kenway, the father of Haytham Kenway. While you end up “testing” the newest pirate game out, other familiar parties end up contacting you throughout the game.

In the past, you end up in the early 18^th century during the Golden Age of Piracy. You’re Edward Kenway, an up-and-coming pirate with goals of getting gold. With an Assassin uniform he pilfered from a traitorous Assassin, he uses his ship (the Jackdaw) to sail the high seas and go on many adventures. You end up coming across historical pirates like Blackbeard, Ben Hornigold, and Mary Read. He has no stake in the Assassin/Templar fight and only gets involved because he hears about the Observatory, something that could bring him a lotta wealth. Edward does end up coming across a character who has weird ties to the Observatory called “The Sage."  He more or less ends up as Edward’s antagonist during the game along with Templars and other nefarious folk.

TV Talk - Battlestar Galactica Overview and 13 Favorite Characters

Well, as some weird song states, “it’s been a long road, getting from there to here.” I think this should do it for my long look at Battlestar Galactica. Hands down, this is one of my favorite shows ever. So much was done right with the themes, acting, action, and effects. Since I’ve talked about my favorite episodes, I need to end this run of the BSG-verse with my ranked list of favorite characters. Before I get there, I want to quickly go through the pros and cons of the show. Yeah, you can go to my other posts for that, but here’s a quick summation of them all.

PROS

BSG came at the right time for me. It took the basics from the original show and did its own thing with it. We weren’t running into weird aliens or planets that also housed human life here. Ron Moore and David Eick tried to create a world that felt like our own current one. The show touched on a lot of themes like politics, religion, faith, survival, morality, and technology. It helped that the acting was well done and that the characters were pretty interesting. While they were our protagonists, they weren’t perfect. They would stumble and fall from time to time, but they would do their best to help one another.

The action was also pretty well done. If there’s one thing that actually didn’t change much from the original show, it was the Galactica’s look and the Viper’s look. The space battles felt like current-day dog fights. While the CG wasn’t as great with things like the robotic Cylons, it was good for its time. It even got better as time went on. Finally, I think we can all say that composer Bear McCreary brought a certain style to the show with his music.