REVIEW Batman: Under The Red Hood

Mar's library got this DVD in and we watched it last night. I had been really wanting to see this ever since it was announced and bugging her all the time about when they were going to get it.

The highlight  of the story was The Joker but when written strong that character will dominate just about any story he's in. I've heard some complaints about Bruce Greenwood as Batman but I think those complaints are blind to the good job he actually does voicing a cities defender. I think it helped that his voice didn't stand out because the voices that needed that were The Joker and Red Hood.

I liked the comic story this is based on but I actually ended up enjoying this version even more. If you are a Batman fan I say pick this up. The action is great, The Joker is the highlight as stated earlier, and you even get an off hand mention of The Killing Joke. Though the last bit may not be a good thing considering most people either blindly love or hate The Killing Joke; which is sort of how most people feel about these DC direct to DVD animated stories.

As a bonus which is coming standard now on these DVD releases you get a DC Universe animated short film. On this DVD you get Jonah Hex. (though I think the shorts only come on the double disc sets?) After watching the movie recently I have to say this short is so much better and catches the rough hard edged nature of the character. If you haven't went through the torture but were thinking about watching the Jonah Hex live action movie, don't, just watch the short.

3 out of 5 stars: Batman: Under The Red Hood

4 out of 5 stars for the Jonah Hex short

And here are a few quick stars only reviews:

SUPERMAN: THE THIRD KRYPTONIAN!

2 out of 5 stars

HOUSE OF M: THE INCREDIBLE HULK

2 out of 5 stars

NEW AVENGERS: THE REUNION

3 out of 5 stars

REVIEW Batman: Under The Red Hood

CHOCOLATE DRAGON

Here's a few quick star reviews of some stuff I read or watched in 2010. I'm going to try and get all up to date on my reviews in Jan so I can start from new in the new year.You can also find these at my GoodReads and LibraryThing accounts. I'm going to start posting reviews here and both of those places until I'm all caught up.

THE CHOCOLATE WAR
audio
2 out of 5 stars

PIRATE RADIO
dvd
3 out of 5 stars

BATMAN: DARK VICTORY
graphic novel
4 out of 5 stars

BATMAN: FALSE FACES
graphic novel
2 out of 5 stars

HULK: RED HULK
graphic novel
2 out of 5 stars

JLA: SALVATION RUN
graphic novel
3 out of 5 stars

THE AVENGERS: POWERLOSS
graphic novel
3 out of 5 stars

HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON
dvd
3 out of 5 stars

CHOCOLATE DRAGON

ULTIMATE COMICS SPIDER-MAN: THE WORLD ACCORDING TO PETER PARKER

WRITER

brian michael bendis

ARTIST

david lafuente

COLORIST

justin ponsor

LETTERER

vc's cory petit

PUBLISHED BY

marvel comics

I  have missed a few volumes of Ultimate Spider-Man leading up to and including The Ultimatum Wave but this volume is my first introduction to the new look Ultimate Universe and as the only book I was following was Ultimate Spider-Man that's how it should be.

There are a lot of Bendis haters out there. People who will only judge his books just by his name being connected to the project. I'm not one of those. Some of his work I have enjoyed, some not so much, but I think when time has passed his run on Ultimate Spider-Man will be considered one of the top five takes on the character ever.

Even though there is a lot of back story to this series, don't let you lead you away from reading it, most of the back story is explained before the collection gets started or easy to understand as the story goes forward. I consider this a great jumping on point for those who may not want to start with the very first Ultimate Spider-Man volumes, though I think you should, you can start here.

I've always looked at Ultimate Spider-Man as one of the best YA books out there. Better writing and drama than most of the big prose books YA books AND YOU GET REALLY COOL ART WITH THE COMICS!

4 Out Of 5 Stars

AND HERE ARE SOME QUICK REVIEWS:



BATMAN: KING TUT'S TOMB

2 Out Of 5 Stars

HOUSE OF M: UNCANNY X-MEN

2 Out Of 5 Stars



ULTIMATE COMICS SPIDER-MAN: THE WORLD ACCORDING TO PETER PARKER

NIGHTWING: RENEGADE

WRITER

Devin Grayson

PENCILLERS

Phil Hester, Cliff Chiang, Brad Walker, Wellington Alves; Marcos Marz

INKERS

Ande Parks, Rodney Ramos; Edde Wagner

COLORIST

Gregory Wright

LETTERS

Phil Balsman, Pat Brosseau, Rob Leigh; Travis Lanham

ORIGINAL COVERS

Phil Hester, Ande Parks with Guy Major

PUBLISHED BY

DC Comics

I have to start the review by saying a few things about former Robin and in this collection Nightwing = Dick Grayson.  I'm a really big fan and always have been of the youngest of The Flying Graysons and his masked idenity of Nightwing is one of my all time favorite superheroes but I am not a fan of Dick becoming and I've read now staying as Batman while Bruce was lost in time and now that he is back. Talk about ripping away years of building Nightwing into his own strong character. Oh, and if you want my opinion, which is all this is and all my reviews ever are, I would have made Jason Todd take up the Batman costume with Damian as Red Robin and when Bruce came back they could have stayed a team with Jason gaining his own costumed indenity. I like Tim Drake staying as Robin because he has established Robin strong outside the shadow of the Batman and the modern costume doesn't look a kid superhero so age doesn't matter either. And no I don't think Batman always needs a "Robin", I just think he needs someone to mentor and show him a different view on his misson. For that role you could have Batgirl.

But none of that rant and ramble has anything to do with this trade outside Dick going through a lot of stuff because he doesn't match up with that self-righteous ass named Bruce Wayne. Batman is all cool but the dudes a dick also.

I love that this story is one big adrenaline rush, which the whole Nightwing series from the begining was for the most part, and here Devin Grayson hits the adrenaline button perfect with the right guest characters and story structure. I've always loved how Dick relates and reacts to Superman. I've always wanted to see more stories with Nightwing and Superman because I think they relate to each other better than Superman and Batman. Plus, I also think Superman has a certain amount of pride and faith in looking at the man Dick has become on his own. Never been a huge fan of Deathstroke but liked how he was used here from Ravager to what happen with Bludhaven.

By the way, Bludhaven was my favorite DC Universe city. The name alone was just cool in a kid, "That's cool," sort of way.

Oh, and the last page. Not a fan of it then or now. Too much of a jump the shark moment for my taste.

And you see in this review, though calling my reviews reviews are like saying the *baseball Hall Of Fame means something, the actually book I was reading was drowned out by my feelings of what is currently going on with the Dick Grayson character.

*I know, not adapt, but I have to finish this and put a cat in time out.

REVIEW WRITTEN BY brian c. williams

NIGHTWING: RENEGADE

THE TITLE IS: MEXICAN COFFEE AND SNOW

I really do not feel like writing today. I really do not have the fire from deep inside that forces me on even when all I wish to do is give up but I will not be giving up today because I have learned one of the biggest lessons you can learn as a writer and it has nothing to do with structure, grammar, spelling, or any other shit that happens to be a weakness of mine. The lesson is the one of when you have a notion to call yourself a writer then you must also see there will be many many days when all you want to be doing is nothing but what you have to do is write.

So to save a little bit of my soul I will write here and then go off to work on MEXICAN COFFEE which is a maddening story that is doing just what I want it to, but when you are as nuts as I am, sometimes that is not the best thing.

Here are a few Opinion Reviews of some materials I have checked out of the library recently. I'm sitting on half of a journal of these type of reviews that I have written but I will only start with a couple today though. I will write about reading Transformers: Generations Vol. 1 and Batman:Snow.

TRANSFORMERS: GENERATIONS VOLUME ONE
IDW
BY, Bob Budiansky
These are an IDW look back reprinting of classic Transformers comics. I have not checked out any of IDW's Transformer new line of stories but the thing I love about these older books is how much humanity plays into things through human politics, human greed, and human interactions with the robots in disguise.
I checked this collection out of the library. The only Transformers book I have in my personal collection is
Prime Targets: The Unauthorized Story Guide To Transformers. What can I say I'm a crack head for story guides. I still want the G.I. Joe guide.
To end before I start a ramble about my love for story guides I will further state that I enjoyed this collection and recommend it to Transformers fans. Maybe I should see if the library has any of IDW's new line of stories? Any Transformer fans out there wish to recommend any trades to me?

BATMAN:SNOW
DC COMICS
BY, Dan Curtis Johnson, J.H. Williams III; Seth Fisher
Mr. Freeze has always been one of my favorite of all of Batman's enemies since the first time I saw him on BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES. When I spotted Batman: Snow at the library I had to pick it up. The art by Seth Fisher was different and I quite enjoy different. I really took to the sharpness the art style gave to Gothem City especially.
The story by Johnson and Williams is of course a re-telling of the origin of Mr. Freeze but Snow also tackles angles I think Batman would have taken early in his vigilante carrer. I highly recommend this to true lovers of the Batman myths and stories about Bruce Wayne's early years as the Dark Knight.

Ok, now I'm off to tackle MEXICAN COFFEE. I wish I had some right now.
C.

THE TITLE IS: MEXICAN COFFEE AND SNOW