Parker!?

I got my first comic book when I was in second or third grade. It was a reprint of the issue where Spider-Man returns from the Secret Wars with his black suit. I think the series was called Marvel Tales or something like that... It was basically The Amazing Spider-Man issues from the 80's being reprinted in succession. It was sort of a spur of the moment gas station purchase while I was with my mom. I just remember seeing it on the rack and thinking "Hey, that looks cool".

I purchased it, and read it many times, but that did not really start my comic obsession yet. So when people ask me what the first comic I bought was, I usually don't count that one unless we're getting technical. Both because it was a reprint, and because it didn't really get me into comics.

The "first comic" I usually cite, is Amazing Spider-Man #374.

A while after that Marvel Tales purchase, maybe even a year or so, I was on my way to a Boy Scouts camping trip with my father, and Dad stopped at, again, a gas station for some drinks and such. Upon glancing on the comic rack, I see this calling my name:

This was my first introduction to the character of Venom, who came about from the suit Spider-Man brought back in the aforementioned reprint comic. This issue started me collecting. Suddenly I could not get enough of these things. I was saving every dime I could scrape up from grass cutting and whatever else just to afford as many of the (then $1.25) books I could manage. Many opinions were solidified in me by these first readings of Spider-Man... Some of them are as follows:

• Venom was a pretty good villain, but was at his best as a slightly deranged anti-hero.
• It is perfectly acceptable for Peter Parker to be a married adult with adult problems instead of teenage ones. It does not take away from his character, it actually makes it much stronger.
• Mark Bagley was the best Spider-Man artist I ever saw.
• The black suit is still much much cooler than the red and blue.

Anyway, around this time in my life I was starting to ride the bus to my grandparents after school. I'm not sure if my grandmother saw an opportunity for me to become a better reader, or if she just wanted me to have something to look forward to after school, but for some reason she started buying me comics while she was out during the day and I was at school. And she was remarkable at it. One of my first days returning home from school I found this waiting for me:

Red foil cover and all. Who's Grandmother randomly buys something like that?! Mine. That's who. She did this for several years, and between that, and my own buying, I amassed quite a collection.

I branched out a little... I delved into Batman, Spawn, some of the X-books... But in the end I always came back to Spider-Man... Always followed Spider-Man... and he became quite an inspiration for me. I can honestly say that if Spider-Man hadn't been written the way he was back then, I might not be quite the person that I am today.

The reason I felt so close to this character, was the reason that we all become close to characters I think... I related to him. Social problems, relationship problems, family problems, guilt, uncertainty, guilt, guilt. This is Peter Parker. This is also me. From the time of my childhood, to my current adulthood, and I'm sure into my later life, I resonated perfectly with all of these concepts, and watching Peter Parker triumph over them all really did affect me in ways that I still feel today.

There were lots of differences, sure. I mean I didn't get anybody killed (though you'd think it sometimes). Also, the school bullies aren't always just misunderstood 'not so bad' guys, and the girls pretty much never actually like the nerd it seems. Also, I cant lift a car, or dodge machine gun fire...Yet. And as far as I know there are no super villains hunting me. But all in all, I felt like I knew Peter Parker, and I knew how he would think.

For several years I followed comics closely until something went wrong... Spider-Man lost.

I don't remember the exact and ridiculous storyline... But it went something like... Chameleon had replaced Peter's 'back from the dead' parents with robots right? And they were secretly stringing him along in some weird ass revenge scheme over the death of Kraven the hunter waaaaaaay back in the FANTASTIC "Kraven's Last Hunt". So finally the parents strike, and the father goes all T-1000 on Peter and tried to kill him, but mother robot had grown to love him so she sacrifices herself to destroy them both and save Peter. So Peter goes all dark and stuff? And he wants to hunt down Chameleon and kill that bastard. So there are a few books where he nearly beats some super villains to death trying to find the chameleon and finally he tracks him down, beats him to a pulp, but decides not to kill him... THEN he discovers that the REAL mastermind behind it all was none other than the already dead Harry Osborn, aka The Green Goblin!

Got all that?

Anyway... Peter cracks under the pressure, and stopped being light hearted Spider-Man and started being grumbly, angry Bruce Wayne in a Spider-Man costume. It just didn't feel right anymore... but I kept reading... for a little while longer...

In marched the clone saga... And I kept reading... They brought out Ben Reilly, Peter's long lost clone, as a new Spider-Man... I kept reading. They decided to tell me that Ben was actually the original Peter, and the Peter I had been following for years was a clone... I kept reading. But finally, the last straw was when they said "Nevermind all that testing we did, Peter is real, and Ben is the clone." and then revealed Norman Osborn, the original Green Goblin who died in the 70's, to randomly be alive again, and behind the whole clone saga and everything. They basically took maybe one of the most significant deaths in comics history and erased it for the sake of tying up loose ends. I was, and still am, appalled.

But you may be surprised to hear what I think is the most disappointing thing about the clone saga. The most disappointing thing is that they could have given Peter Parker a happy ending, and they didn't. At the time, Mary Jane was pregnant with clone Peter's child, he had retired from being Spider-Man, and was letting Ben take over. They should have left it that way. At least for a while. Why not give the Marvel universe's favorite punching bag a few years of happiness? Maybe I was speaking for myself more than Peter at the time, but in any case I just couldn't keep reading this crap anymore.

I stopped buying comics, and have only in the last few years started picking up a few here and there. Mostly I just buy the trade paperbacks. I'm more interested in the stories than the collecting these days. But I've noticed a disturbing trend in comic books these days. Too much 'Major Event!!!!!!!'.

I don't know if it started with clone saga and Onslaught, and whatever else was happening around that time, because as I said, I stopped reading for about ten years... But somewhere along the line, comic companies decided the only way to sell their products was to have a major event every other week, and kill kill kill all the major characters in the most horrible ways possible, then inexplicably bring them back to life a few months to a year later.

In the last six years or so of comic reading, I have witnessed:

• Spider-Man dies 3 times (counting ultimate comics) all in STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID WAYS. BADBADBADBADBADBAD.
• Peter Parker's marriage to Mary Jane is magically and stupidly erased by Mephisto because some mouth breather thought it made the character seem "too old".
• Captain America is assassinated with BULLETS that cause him to BLEED EVERYWHERE and then later we're told that they are magical bullets that just transported his soul back in time.
• Batman is killed by Darkseid and left as a fleshless corpse in a tattered costume but later we're told, again, his soul was just sent back in time, no biggie.
• The Aunt May who so memorably and poignantly passed on in Amazing Spider-Man #400 is revealed to have just been... you know... another clone, and god damn Norman Osborn had the real Aunt May locked in his fucking basement or something.
• DC comics killed and rebooted their whole universe like 14 times.

Also, a few other notables, there was also that whole thing where almost all of the mutants were depowered, Tony Stark became a government lackey, Norman Osborn (still fucking alive) runs a government organization, Thor is dead, Charles Xavier is dead, Cyclops is a villain, Gambit is/was a villain, Spider-Man had big blade thingys coming out of his arms there for a while, and suddenly Deadpool is everybody's favorite character ever, probably because he's the only one who can see how ridiculous this all is.

Showing my age here... But in the old days you didn't need all this. You could have one issue, and two issue stories... leading into one thing or another. Maybe a big event every few years. If you had a dark comic, you wrote a dark comic, with the occasional light moments. If you had a light comic, you wrote a light comic with occasional dark moments. And you killed or seriously injured characters WITH CARE, not seemingly every month. Kraven's Last Hunt was special. Knightfall was special. Killing Joke was special. You FELT those books.

But anyway, I guess somebody must be buying this crap because they keep making it for years and years. So what do I know... Just what I like I guess.

But even if I never pick up another Spider-Man book again, I will always carry the memories of coming home from school to find new books, and learning all I can from them. Much literacy and life lessons can be attributed to them and for that I will be forever thankful.

So, even though you're dead right now (again), thank you Peter Parker. Until next time.

Tell Me When It's Over...

I'm not a particularly squeamish person... I am a grown adult (physically anyway), but even as a child I wasn't too badly hounded by terrors. Actually I would almost venture to say that I had less phobias as a child than I do today. I was never really afraid of the dark. Snakes do not haunt my nightmares. Nor do spiders or the like. I do have a problem with parasitic insects which I'll discuss in the next post... But for the most part I don't have an excessive amount of your "normal" phobias.

So I'm pretty tough right? Manly.

No... Not really. You see the whole purpose of that paragraph above, was to prepare you to be swept up in whatever hilarity / life lesson / touching story I'm about to hit you with next (oh the suspense... which will it be!?). It's sort of my 'thing' I suppose.

So this evening we're going to discuss some scenes in movies and such, that this previously mentioned grown adult, still cannot watch with both eyes open.

When I was very young, I spent the night at a friend's house in Charleston... He had HBO and a gigantic sectional couch. We fell asleep in his living room one evening watching some movie or another. This would have been the early 90's I suppose.

At some point during the night, I woke up and my eyes focused upon the TV. My mind immediately locked upon the actor and said "Hey, that's Arnold Schwarzenegger" (really proud of myself for spelling that without looking it up... henceforth in this post he shall be referred to as 'Arnold').

So there was Arnold on the screen... Looking like he was having a rough time. He's standing in a dingy bathroom looking at himself in the mirror. "What's he doing I wonder... and why does he look so fucked up?" (Okay, I probably didn't say 'Fucked up' even in my mind at this point... but you get the idea).

So then Arnold proceeds to take a razor blade and cut out his eye.

This is of course the scene in the original Terminator where the battle damaged T-800 removes his eye to reveal the red glowing dot, and dons the big black sunglasses.

I had no idea what I was looking at at the time as I was recovering from my sleep. I had not seen the original Terminator yet... I actually saw the second one before the first.... And I'm pretty sure I hadn't even viewed the second one yet at this point. But I knew that whatever it was, it was very very bothersome to my sensibilities. I knew that I did not want this fellow to cut out his eye, and that if he just absolutely HAD to cut out his eye, I did not want to witness it. CUT. OUT. HIS. EYE.

Now, as I've grown older this scene has settled with me, and I'm no longer particularly bothered by it. I only include it here because it was sort of the first movie I ever saw that I had to say "Yep... I'm not going to be looking directly at that. Call me when it's over."

With that said, lets move on to some newer fare shall we?

Anybody see Prometheus last Summer? No? Just me and Weapon Mods huh? He didn't review that one did he? Hmm...

Well if you did manage to see it, you may remember (how could you forget?) a little scene where a poor "impregnated by the alien spawn in her husbands body" lady is forced to give herself a C-Section in order to avoid being exploded from the inside by a rapidly growing alien creature. She manages to get the thing removed, and then staples (yes, staples.) her stomach back together.

Wow folks. Just wow. I watched this movie again last night, and let me state for the record that I LOVED this movie, but that scene did not get any easier to view.

Next up, another Arnold offering.

Remember that remake of the Colin Farrell movie that Arnold made back in the early 90's? Total Recall? (That was a joke guys, please don't letter-bomb my office, we just got this place cleaned up.)

Toward the end of that film, there is a scene where, through various circumstances, Arnold and the female lead end up lying unprotected upon the surface of Mars. What happens next will be sort of difficult for me to explain. There is a lot of face expanding, and eye bulging, and Arnold makes "AUGHUAHGHAUHGUHAHGUHGUAHUGHUAUGHH" noises. Their faces turn red and swell up... and it's just awful alright?

Well a big machine generates a magical atmosphere for Mars just in time to save them. And somehow, their faces return to normal... I'd think they would be fucked up for life after that? Hmm... Hollywood eh?

How about Cast Away? This is one of my favorite movies, and Tom Hanks is one of my favorite actors.

There are a lot of really emotionally rough scenes in this movie. But none of these are the focus of my writings. That's right... You know where I'm going, don't you? Removing his own infected tooth with the edge of an ice skate by pounding on the end of the skate with a big rock? Holy fuck. That would hurt. I want no part of that scene. I will watch it... sort of... but ow. Just ow.

Now we get to the mother of all "I don't want to look..." movie scenes... It has to be Robocop. The original, unedited scene in Robocop, where he is 'killed' by the thugs at the beginning.

I cannot watch this scene. The others on this list, I see them, and it's like "Hmm... bothersome." But this one... When I see it I think "I'm going to go get a drink... No no... No need to pause it. I'll be back when the screaming stops."

It's not so much what happens in the scene, as it is Peter Weller's facial expressions during it. Particularly when his hand is removed. It's just awful guys.

80's... you were fucked up, okay? Stay away from me.

There were a few runners up in this... I considered Kill Bill: Volume 2, where Uma Thurman crushes that girl's eye between her toes? Seems like there was something in Event Horizon too but it's not coming to me right now. So uh... The end.

Curious Behavior

I talk to myself a lot.

Sometimes it is sensible, person to person conversation (minus one person), and sometimes it is nonsense... gibberish... I'll speak to myself in imaginary languages that have no meaning. Just random sounds. Sometimes I'll yell nonsense words. "MALARKEY!!", "CHEEZ-IT ASSAULT!!!", "EXPLODED BOLOGNA SANDWICH!!", none of these things would be uncommon to hear around my house.

Lately I've taken to saying one thing to myself, and then I will repeat it loudly in a British accent, as if I am surprised and enraged by what I've just said. For instance this evening I was making rice, which called for two cups of water. I said aloud to myself "Two cups of water." and then my angry British counterpart said "TWO WHOLE CUPS!? ARE YOU DAFT!?".

Sometimes I grab the sides of my dog's face and I yell "FACE!!!". She doesn't seem to mind much, but it's odd that a creature who could simply maul me to death would put up with that. Sometimes I'll wrap her entire head in a towel, and she'll just sit there... towel covered face... staring at the inside of the towel... Weighing options. "Do I really need this human to keep providing me with food?"

When I get home in the evenings, if one of my neighbors is outside, I will sit in my car until they go away in order to avoid any awkward 'neighborly' greetings. I will pretend to go through my mail (there is always loose mail somewhere in my car), or I will act like I'm looking for something over my shoulder in the back seat. Sometimes I'll aimlessly dig through my glove box, or clean out the console. Just any old activity so it looks like I'm engaged in something other than "waiting for you to go away."

If it appears that they are doing yard work or something that is likely to keep them outside I will forgo this ritual, and leave my vehicle, hoping that they will not notice me. But I will not enjoy it. Not one bit.

It also works in the reverse... If I walk out my door to go to my car, and I hear or see one of my neighbors coming out to their car at the same time, I will act as if I forgot something in the house and go back inside until they've left. Doesn't matter if I'm late for work or whatever.

I just really hate that fake waving and head nodding 'how ya doin?" nonsense. I don't know these people... couldn't tell you any of their first or last names... and I'm fairly certain they don't really give half a shit about how I am doing.

I hold doors for people. Sometimes. There are rules that must be followed. My calculation for door holding is as follows: distance from door / rate of speed x obvious handicap. Obviously I don't bother to come up with an actual number (though perhaps I should create a true rating system of some sort), but it's more of a fictional number that I gather from what is before me. You take the distance and the rate of speed, and that pretty well tells you whether you're going to be standing there a long time, looking awkward. However, if there is an obvious handicap to this individual, then courtesy generally dictates that you wait a little longer than normal. Occasionally this system will fail. You'll hold a door for someone, and they'll walk on by, or they'll stop to smoke a cigarette or something and pay you no mind. But usually it's fairly foolproof.

I've noticed that women typically are better about saying 'thank you' for such things. Men will nod, or completely ignore you. Perhaps door holding is an assault upon masculinity.

Recently when leaving a restaurant, and running the door holding calculation for some people (the numbers were not in their favor) I devised an amusing game in which you make eye contact with someone way way far out on the lot, completely ignore the calculations, and hold the door for them, while maintaining steady eye contact all the way. I wonder if they would speed up? Or maybe act like they forgot something in the car, and come back later.

I burn things on purpose when cooking. It is delicious.

I hope my neighbors aren't reading this.

Esteemed Friends...

I feel like I probably owe a post since I haven't touched this thing yet in the year of 2013. I even skipped my obligatory "I didn't accomplish anything in 2012. Life is still exactly the same as always." post (Don't worry, I wont try to sneak it into this one).

So I've decided that, to fill my quota, I will take this time to thank all of you other publications out there for keeping me entertained during the long days in my office. I'll probably be fired for this... Advertising the competition and all... But the bosses did tell me to post "Something".

Slacker Conservative: Your humor laced tirades on the sad realities of politics, and life always manage to crack me up (in the saddest, most depressing way). Thank you for making the sometimes unpopular statements. I don't always agree, and I don't always disagree, but this guy knows how to make an argument. Just don't ask him to open any doors in Hyrule (or me either for that matter).

A Little Unfocused: Your random life musings sometimes remind me of my own mental question and answer sessions. It is a nice contrast to read about someone who is both searching for the best possible life, yet appreciative of all they have at the same time.

The Only Girl Playing: I am glad to see some new posts lately after an absence. This blog follows two stories and reads like a sci-fi, or fantasy story. It's nice to get a look at the world you folks have created, and I look forward to reading more.

Whispering Yak: I still think you should be banned from the Internet. But sometimes the things you find are hilarious (when they're not giving me nightmares).

Point of Aim: You only posted once... and the gods, along with myself, laughed heartily. Please return.

Forbidden Thoughts From Merghast the Unbindable: Another slightly infrequent, but high quality offering. The most recent "Release" conjured memories of all the special moments I shared with the early Nintendo systems. I welcome your writings whenever they arrive.


Well I guess that wraps things up... Seems like I'm forgetting somebody... but oh well. Guess not.








Just kidding.


Weapon Mods: Ohhhh Weapon Mods... Where to start. Your editor is a god damn Excessively-Sized-Venom loving freak, and the nice lady at the front desk is waaaay underpaid. But if it weren't for your prodding, I wouldn't be sitting here typing this nonsense. I laugh loudly, and often at your stories, and I too share a hatred of people making chewing noises. Thank you for the years of amusement, and let us never discuss "Segmented" again.

Well that wraps it up for this little post. I know that I may possibly be the most socially inept, and usually absent, of the group, but I feel fortunate to know you all. Thanks for reading, have a belated happy 2013, and keep fighting the good fight of keeping me entertained while I'm supposed to be working. Goodnight.