Tag: star trek discovery

Brainiac On Banjo #085: Crossing The Stream

Brainiac On Banjo #085: Crossing The Stream

Star Wars! / Give me those Star Wars! / Nothing but… Star Wars / Don’t let them end — written by Nick Winters, 1977

With all the streaming at our fingertips, the entertainment business is making a lot of headlines promoting what they’re going to do once Earthlings return to mobility. But don’t get excited just yet: the only cameras operating right now are working Zoom and not Studio Binder. When Keith Richards self-quarantines, everyone should self-quarantine.

Next week’s launch of HBO Max has turned up the heat. Clearly, studios are concerned about competing for subscribers with promises of new content, which, at best, won’t appear until after the winter solstice. My take on HBO Max is simple: it’s goddamn expensive, and right now they’re running little but reruns. It’ll probably work out because they’re not promoting that fact. But reasonable bean-counters understand that few people are going to maintain subscriptions to HBO Max, Disney+, AppleTV, CBS All Access, Peacock Premium, and Amazon Prime – to name but a very few – all at once. That’s a lot of money, and it’s also more programming than one can handle. Continue reading “Brainiac On Banjo #085: Crossing The Stream”

With Further Ado #79: Doing Your Homework for Star Trek: Picard

With Further Ado #79: Doing Your Homework for Star Trek: Picard

I vividly remember watching the debut episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation in 1987. I was in Boston at that time, recently graduated, and living with my great pals Pete (Hoff) Hoffman and Hans (Hadji) Rempel. I was the guy deepest into comics, but they each had their favorites and Pete, especially, was a big Trek fan. In fact, we had grown up together in the same little town and watched the original Star Trek series reruns every Saturday night on WPIX. And then, we’d go out and get into the usual high school mischief. Both activities were baked into the core of who we are.

So it was perfectly fitting years later that we were watching Star Trek on another Saturday night before we went out to find more mischief in Boston. Star Trek: The Next Generation was a different Trek from what we were used to. I will be the first to admit that I thought of the original series as the adventures of three friends who wandered about, broke the rules, and sometimes met exotic beauties along the way. TNG, in contrast, was much more disciplined. It seemed to be all about working in teams and overcoming obstacles with creativity. I remember one episode in particular, where Commander Ryker was trying to motivate Lt. Commander Data to manage a planet-side situation, and it was exactly what we had been talking about in my MBA management class that week.

Fast forward to last Saturday night, and my wife and I watched the debut of Star Trek: Picard. How come we all got so much older since the last outings, but Patrick Stewart is ageless? The message is clear – we all really must drink more Earl Grey. Continue reading “With Further Ado #79: Doing Your Homework for Star Trek: Picard”

Brainiac On Banjo #071: To Baldly Go…

Brainiac On Banjo #071: To Baldly Go…

Star Trek Picard started up a couple days ago, so if you know any ViacomCBS executives, now it a good time to hit ‘em up for a loan.

I can’t say I’m a huge Trekker. I saw the first episode at broadcast and thought it was decent but not particularly compelling. The next day, a young lady who held my interest told me she thought it was the Citizen Kane of television (I paraphrase) so, in order to show her how hip I was, I became a regular viewer. Look, I was hardly the first 16-year-old whose hormones determined his television-viewing decisions.

Sadly, the show held my attention longer than my puppy lust. There were some extremely weak episodes, particularly in the third season, and often I was afraid Captain Kirk was going to leap out of the boob tube and run away with my dinner. But as television went back in those days, it was pretty good and, at times, excellent.

Two decades later, Paramount launched Next Generation. I thought it was a very interesting idea, but I saw the broadcast at a Brandeis University comics convention under less-than-perfect circumstances, in a room filled with college-age fans who were pre-ordained to perceive every fart as a rose – and vice versa. I liked the show, loved the tribute to the original series, and found much of the cast to be first-rate. The writing was a bit weak in the beginning, but it improved around season three.

But this Patrick Stewart guy who headed up the show was magnetizing. In a room filled with Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts graduates, Stewart could grab your attention and imprint himself onto your synapses. I’m not a sucker for the British accent – at least, not when deployed by the male gender – but this man fit the Del Close definition of subtext. And most things Star Trek have a lot of subtext. Continue reading “Brainiac On Banjo #071: To Baldly Go…”

Brainiac On Banjo #051: The Challenge of Ideas

Brainiac On Banjo #051: The Challenge of Ideas

I just checked and I’ve decided I’ve got too many friends. Let’s see who I can offend today. But, first, a couple of disclaimers.

One: For decades I have been uttering I am a first amendment absolutist. There should be no roadblocks in the world of free expression. Yes, people need to stand behind what they say and I’m not at all opposed to laws that hold people responsible for malicious defamation. But there should be no roadblocks between the thought and its delivery. That’s free expression.

Two: I am a fan of Walter Mosley’s. I would have read every novel he’s ever written but for a couple decades he’s been in a Smith-Corona destruction derby with Stephen King. Had I been editing Fantastic Four, I would have found a way to get Mosley to write it. Continue reading “Brainiac On Banjo #051: The Challenge of Ideas”

With Further Ado #058: Discoveries beyond Discovery

With Further Ado #058: Discoveries beyond Discovery

Back in the day, when we had no idea that the Star Trek mythology would become so expansive, there was always a hint of untold stories about the folks on the Enterprise before Uhura, Scotty and the gang.   We were briefly introduced to Captain Kirk’s predecessor, Captain Pike, and shown the tragic ending to his career.  Little fanboys watching the show via 70s reruns (like me) couldn’t help but wonder what adventures that guy had in the earlier part of his career.

Over the years, I read a few paperback books focusing on Captain Pike. Marvel published a series called Early Voyages (that didn’t really do it for me) and more recently John Byrne took a crack at it again at IDW.

With all that in mind, I was pleasantly surprised by IDW’s new series Star Trek: Discovery – Aftermath. This series spins out of the recent Star Trek Discovery mythology.  As is the case for many longtime fans, this new reboot seemed to have so many troublesome issues for me that I’ve kind of drifted away from it.  Oh, I’m not shaking my fists with fan rage. Like a party that isn’t that great, or meant for me, I found myself slinking out the back door when no one was looking.  Continue reading “With Further Ado #058: Discoveries beyond Discovery”

Michelle Yeoh Officially Gets Her Own Star Trek TV Spinoff [i09]

Michelle Yeoh Officially Gets Her Own Star Trek TV Spinoff [i09]

We’d heard the rumors, but now it’s official: Michelle Yeoh will helm her very own Star Trek series. But she won’t be taking to the Captain’s chair—CBS has altogether more secretive plans for her.

 

Source [i09]: Michelle Yeoh Officially Boards Her Own Star Trek TV Spinoff

CBS All Access is adding yet another show to their Star Trek stable. This time they’re not giving us the Michelle Yeoh show we wanted since they launched Star Trek: Discovery but one taking place in the Mirror Universe.

It’s Michelle Yeoh, so I’ll take it.

With Further Ado #: 2018 Holiday Gift Guide

It’s that time again!  Looking for that last minute gift? Or looking for a last minute gift to put on Santa’s list for you? Here’s some suggestions, some you’d expect from me and a few surprises.

THE LOST ART OF KREIGH COLLINS
Volume 1: The Complete Mitzi McCoy

Edited and restored by the artist’s grandson, Brian E. Collins, with an introduction by Eisner Award-winning author Frank M. Young.

If you listen to John Siuntres excellent Word Balloon Podcast, you may have just learned about this book. Siuntres interviewed the man behind it all, the artist’s grandson, Brian E. Collins.  You can give it a listen here, and I’d recommend every episode of this long-running podcast. 

I first stumbled across Kreigh Collins while researching at the Syracuse University Archives and I immediately became a fan.  Lost Art Books just launched the initial volume in a new series devoted to this underappreciated illustrator and comic artist collecting (for the first time) his syndicated Sunday strip Mitzi McCoy in its entirety.

Kreigh Collins (1908-74) had a wanderlust that led to a lifetime of adventures, whether it was leaving his humble midwestern roots to study the masters in the Louvre and hone his craft painting on the banks of the Seine or getting knifed in Morocco while boating and painting his way through North Africa. But equally strong was the draw of his adopted home in Michigan, which is where he launched and set his first syndicated newspaper strip, Mitzi McCoy, in 1948. It didn’t take long, though, for wanderlust to strike again, rendering Mitzi but a precursor to Collins’ eventual 20-year run on the picaresque adventure comic, Kevin the BoldLost Art Books celebrates these beautiful beginnings with this first-ever complete collection of Collins’ Mitzi McCoy.

Drawn as well as scripted by Collins, Mitzi McCoy showcased the artist’s skill as an illustrator and storyteller. His picturesque landscapes, lovely character designs, and thrilling action sequences brimmed with detail and charm, and the strip’s ensemble cast rotated in and out of the spotlight taking turns as protagonists in the dozen story arcs collected in this volume.

Available  for $34.95 at comic shops and directly from the publisher here.

 

EAGLEMOSS AND GIMCRACKS

I love reading about the origins of the modern Yuletide Season, and every year I trot out my copy of The Battle for Christmas by Stephen Nissenbaum. It’s a great read and seems to have spawned a mini-trend in holiday publishing. In this book, Nissenbaum talked a bit about about Gimcracks.  I’m still not sure what a Gimcrack is, but I think it’s meant to mean some sort of novelty or treasure.  And for modern equivalent, I kind of think of the amazing collectibles from Eaglemoss.  They really are miniature treasures.

Eaglemoss, an entrepreneurial UK company with a top-notch US team, has been on the leading edge of producing licensed merchandise for quite some time.  Here’s a few of their most impressive recent releases:

Star Trek

Maybe it’s because my desk is always so uncluttered (a-hem!), but I just love the model Star Trek starships that Eaglemoss has been producing for several years now.


From the new show, Star Trek: Discovery, comes the USS Buran. It’s the ship that the enigmatic Captain Lorca was on and like that character, it looks downright mean.   It  is $54.95 if you order directly from Eaglemoss and at fine comic shops nationwide

Eaglemoss’ new XL editions are 8 ½”  to 10 ½” inches long, which is oversized compared to the rest of their line.  My favorites are the USS Reliant (which also was essentially a “bad guy ship”) and a quintessential Star Trek vessel, the Enterprise 1701 A.   The XL editions list for $74.95 and are available from Eaglemoss here and here.

 

 

The Star Trek Shipyards book is a place to get lost for a few hours.  It’s a virtual encyclopedia of Star Trek vehicles.   It’s the type of book that’s tough to but down but easy to pick up, and you can do it out here. The book comes with a slipcase and a small starship model, all for $49.95.

ONE OF THOSE OTHER SPACE SHOWS

 

But in space, or the TV version of space, it’s not only about Star Trek!  Eaglemoss just launched their new Battlestar Galactica ships. The Viper, which always seemed liked the space versions of a WWII Corsair to me, was always a favorite. It’s usually $25, but for this holiday season Eaglemoss has it on sale here for just $21.21.

 

 

 

 

 

DC COMIC HEROES

Speaking of WWII, the Bombshell Wonder Woman figure channels the classic “We Can Do It’ pose from J. Howard Miller’s classic patriotic poster. This one has been reduced to $17.95 so get it while you can now!

 

Eaglemoss also offers gorgeous busts. Their DC line is professional, spot-on and bring a a sense of fun to it all. The standouts are for me are their busts for Nightwing and Harley Quinn.  Each are usually about $25 bucks, but they are on sale for $21.21 here and here.

 

 


PULP REPRINTS for the BATMAN FAN IN YOUR LIFE

Do you need something for a Batman fan who has everything already? You know the type.  Maybe you are the type.  You never know what to get them because they already have it.

Here’s a suggestion that I bet will be new to them: The Black Bat reprints from Anthony Tollin’s Sanctum Books.  I just started reading one (“The Black Bat’s Crusade” in #4) and it is way too much fun.  This adventure is a little bit Batman, a little bit Daredevil and a little bit of The Shadow. Each issue reprints two vintage adventures and they are all available at Adventure House.

MODERN PULP from AIRSHIP 27 –

THE ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN GRAVES  by Thomas McNulty

Airship27 publishes many modern pulp thrillers each year. This one features Captain Elliot Graves and his ship, The Reaper’s Scythe sailing the exotic waters of the South Pacific.  But the mystery starts in 1944, as Captain Graves has disappeared without a trace, his ship supposedly sinking off the coast of Australia with all hands lost. Eight years later, reporter Bill Harrison finds Graves living in Honolulu and manages to persuade him to recount the events of his last and greatest adventure. The legendary sea captain then reveals for the first time what actually happened on a remote South Sea island that changed his life forever.

Writer Thomas McNulty spins a fast-paced tale of two-fisted men, beautiful women and lush island paradises where both heaven and hell await. My Uncle Mike just read it too and even he said he liked it!  Available for just $16.99 here

 

 

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And remember, it’s not all about stuff either.  I always like to suggest OXFAM as a choice to consider for pulp culture geeks – they do great work and their origin story seems like it’s right out a comic. Learn more here.  And in the meantime, I hope you and yours have a blessed Yuletide Season.

SDCC 2018 Trailer Central -Updated

SDCC 2018 Trailer Central -Updated

Hey Folks!!

We are hoping those of you who are at Comic-Con International: San Diego are having a great time. Say “Hi!” to our publisher if you see her in the aisles.

We are going to collect the trailers that are debuted at the Con here. There will certainly be some interesting entertainment coming down the pike for everyone out there in multiple areas of fandom.

Keep checking this post throughout the weekend. We will update as we get access to more trailer content:

The updates are down the list

Continue reading “SDCC 2018 Trailer Central -Updated”