Reggie Blogged

I don't know who drew this, but it was a good excuse for me to post a blog entry about the character that is the butt joke of the Naruto series where I frequently discuss all things Naruto, Ten-Ten. Careful observers of Naruto will note that, despite being a weapons expert, Ten-Ten has managed to hit JACK throughout the Naruto series. Even when she becomes a Chunin after the time skip, she's still scrubtacular. Makes you wonder how she got anywhere in the ninja world. She's had fewer appearences than my favorite female character, Hinata. TenTen really is the character you love to hate because she more or less fails at everything.

I'm not really one for varriant covers, (you know, stupidly high prices and all) but I do like the one for Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane #1. The image of a teenage MJ holding a Spidey doll and staring out into space is cute. Now I want a Spidey plush toy.

Guess who's back, guess who's back? Yup, my (and Peter Parker's) favorite redhead makes a return for season two of Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane. Regrettably, I didn't buy a single issue of any of the previous three Mary Jane series. I feel like scum for not doing so because I've heard nothing but good things about them from the reviews on Spiderfan.org. Ah well, that's what trades are for and rest assured, I will be picking the digest trades of Mary Jane, Mary Jane: Homecoming, and the hardcover of SMLMJ. Terry Moore handles the writing duties for season two of SMLMJ. I haven't read any of his other works, but if the first issue of season two of SMLMJ is any indication, he's a very worthy successor to Sean McKeever. My comic shop was sold out of the first issue but I was told they would be getting more next week. I don't know if they didn't get a lot of copies in, or a lot of people had it put on their comic files. So in addition to getting SMLMJ #...

When I went to pick up my copy of Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane (which will get it's own blog entry), I decided I'd finally buy a few issues from Howard Mackie's run on Peter Parker: Spider-Man, the one before the '99 reboot. Mackie gets a bad rap, much of which comes from the aforementioned reboot, which is considered by many to be one of the worst periods in Spidey history, if not the worst. The stick of that particular Spidey era came from a writer who admitted to being burned out on the character, tons of editorial interference, and just plain horrid writing. Outside a few issues here and there, I understand it was pretty bad. Before the reboot, he put out some nice stories. I enjoyed the issues he did when Ben Reily was Spidey and though I didn't like John Romita Jr's art at the time, I've come to have a huge appreciation for his style now. The Mackie issues I picked up were before the reboot era. I bought two and both were in the dollar bin. The first tha...

It actually took me a few days to get around to reading some of the comics on The Amazing Spider-Man The Complete Collection DVD-ROM. After spending what seemed like an eternity to get it, you'd think I'd have read dozens of issues by now. Nope. All I've read are two issues. Before I get into the two part story that I've read, I'd like to say a few things about this DVD-ROM collection. The comics on here are not reprints with touched up coloring. These are the original comics. That all the letter's pages, the original coloring, everything from the original comic has been reproduced here. The shuddering "Snap" next to Gwen's neck in Amazing Spider-Man #121? It's there. The original comics being burned on this disc, to me, shows that a lot of care went into making it. As for the stories I read, when I first popped this disc in, I went straight to ASM #229, part one of Spidey's tussle with Juggernaut. Juggy is coming for Madam Web and even wit...

I haven't talked about Ultimate Spider-Man on here for some time now. Personally, I thought USM #123 sucked. All the issue did was have Eddie Brock ramble on and on about what he's been doing since we saw him last in USM #38. The symbiote has messed Eddie up, we get it. I don't think I'd felt that bored with an issue of USM for long while. Anyway, USM #124 was a better read, but I still think this Symbiote War arc could use more steam. Peter is suffering from nasty headaches, brought on by Venom. For those of you that don't know, in USM, not only does Venom trigger Peter's spider-sense, he overloads it so much that Peter gets headaches, which cause him a great deal of pain. In the USM video game, these headaches stopped when the symbiote reattached itself to Peter for a short time. The current story uses story elements from the game and in USM #124, Spidey met and named the Beetle, who didn't say anything the whole fight. Silver Sable and her Wild Pack captu...

Mark your calenders for September 9th, Spidey fans. That's the day when vol. 1 of The Spectacular Spider-Man hits DVD. The first volume contains the first three episodes of season one. That's "Survival of the Fittest," "Interactions," and "Natural Selection." However, instead of keeping each episode by itself as they were when they aired on TV, these episodes will be fused into one full-length feature, as the DVD cover says. We'll also get some addition footage that didn't make it into the TV shows due to time and S&P reasons (Standards & Practices). Consider me stoked. spideran_rj did his very own DVD cover releases. Personally, I think they look pretty epic. Check 'em out below.

So no one can say I don't recognize the pro side of BND, I've decided to post the counter argument to the anti-BND editorial. Like the anti side, it isn't anything you haven't already read and anyone that reads my blog knows that I hate BND with a passion and at this point, I've just agreed to disagree with those that like BND. I'd also like to say that as of now, I'm going to try my best to keep BND stuff out of my blog. I'm sick of it and I'm sure many other anti-BND fans are sick of it, so if I talk about anything Spidey related, you can better your Spidey underoos that it won't be about the editorial mandated Spidey. See ya next blog entry!

I was browsing the Crawl Space Message boards when I came across a thread that linked to an interesting editorial . It's pretty much more of the same from a fan who doesn't like the new direction, but I I enjoyed reading it. While I don't think it really matters how long you've been reading Spidey as to whether your opinion is valid or not, I do think it's worth stating that this guy has been reading Spidey for a long time, Amazing Spidey more than anything. Yeah, he's up there in age, but he's also a huge fan, one of the many Marvel has turned away. The longtime fans is where a good chunk of the green comes from when it comes to comics. How long will it take Marvel to realize that it isn't a good idea to bite the hand that feeds them?

Yes. Yes, he will be. How do I know this? He's remained popular for over 40 years. He started out as a comic book character and while he's still a character in comics, many people recognize Spidey in other forms of media, like the movies and cartoons. The wall-crawler is a cash cow for selling merchandise. Pencils, coffee mugs, bed sheets, shoes; I honestly can't think of anything Spidey hasn't appeared on. To think he'd suddenly fall off the face of the Earth is ludicrous. But something Joe Q said has me thinking that Marvel is concerned about the long term status of Spider-Man. Joe said this months ago and I'm not gonna post a direct link for a number of reasons: A. I'm too lazy. B. I really can't stomach digging for exact quotes from the man because after reading a five part interview with him about One More Day, I've had all the Joe Q I can stand. C. Enough people know how Joe Q works so you shouldn't have any reason to believe I'm putti...

I was in Circuit City yesterday, killing time before my bus arrived so I could go home. Browsing the computer software section, I noticed they had a few copies of the Fantastic Four & Silver Surfer: The Complete Collection. I figured, if they had some of those, they may have the Amazing Spider-Man: The Complete Collection. Sure enough, they had one copy left and I'm proud to say I am the now the owner of said last copy. The box isn't nearly as big as I thought it would be. In fact the thing is roughly the size of a DVD case. On top of that, it's pretty light. But really, the thing could be the weight of a toothpick and I wouldn't care. One of my most coveted Spidey collections is finally mine!! Now I can read "Where Cometh the Commuter," "Nothing Can Stop the Juggernaut" and I can see for myself how bad the '98 reboot really was. So yeah, I'll be talking about the issues I read that I've never read before as I go along.

I've never seen the movie Animal House, but since I've become a member of the Crawl Space Message Boards Anti-OMD/BND club , Delta House, I think I'll do myself a favor and pick the movie up. From what I hear, the film is really good. The club was founded on the fellow Spidey fan George Berryman getting this image in hi his head every time Quesada or some other tool says that BND is selling like gangbusters. Anyway, I joined the club a few days ago. My Delta House club name is Cash. Check out my member card to the left. George made that up for me. Pretty flippin' sweet.

This is from the King Size Spider-Man Summer Special one-shot. The opening page has Spidey sum up his origin in three short word balloons. Its one of the funniest things I've seen in a Spider-Man comic book. The first issue of All-Star Superman summed up the man of steel's origin in eight words. "Doomed planet." "Desperate scientists." "Last hope." "Kindly couple." Spidey does it with just six words. "Got bit." "Uncle died." "Fight crime." 'Nuff said indeed.

Looks like a few Disney artists drew this one. Goku reminds me of Disney's Aladdin. Did someone take Goku's food? Jokes aside, I've always loved the Super Saiyan 2 form. It's my favorite, topping even Super Saiyan 3. The only thing missing from this picture is Trunks saying "OWNED!" Vegeta got his butt handed to him more than anyone else in the series. Kinda sad.

Now I don't know if this would actually be enough to make the Joker kill Harley but I found this comic from SNAFU to be pretty hilarious.

I could not wait for August 6th to get here because Amazing Spider-Man Family #1 was released. So I walk into my comic shop on Wednesday and there it is... with the frickin' Brand New Day logo splashed across the top. Ugh. I already know ASMF has BND content in there, the last thing I need to see is the blasted BND logo. Enough, Marvel, we get the dumb point. You're proud of your botched attempt to fix Spidey. Annnnyway, the ASMF's first story kicks off with a trip to the past where we see Peter dealing with the death of uncle Ben and learning the ropes as hero. Yes, the beginning of Spidey's career has been milked to death over the last few years, but this is still a good story, done by Spidey veteran JM DeMatties. The art has a retro feel to it and from the way everyone's dressed, it evokes the look and tone of the Lee/Ditko era. Being new to the hero gig, Peter naturally makes a few mistakes his first two nights out as Spidey. These screw ups don't feel force...

I finally post a sweet Dragon Ball pick AND know the name oft he author who drew it. It took me a few seconds to figure it out but after looking at Trunks and Piccolo, it became evident that this piece was done by Bleach creator Tite Kubo. Heh, I'm getting better at picking out people's art styles.

I'm not a reader of Daredevil but this particular panel was pointed out to me on the Comic Book Resource Forums, and I felt it was worth mentioning. The panel to the right is taken from Daredevil #60 volume 2. This was back when Brian Bendis was writing Horn Head and during his run on the book, he outed DD's secret identity to the public. Matt's life was in utter turmoil as a result. Seeing what DD went through convinced Spidey never to reveal his ID. At least until Civil War. If I had the kind of enemies Spider-Man does, there's no way I'd take off the mask in public. That just opens up the floodgates for trouble. However, if Peter were written in character, he never would have unmasked in the first place. But then, Marvel had to have Peter act out of character so they could have his life so messed up so they could rest everything with One More Day. Man, the things a company will do to "fix" what isn't broke.

Remember back in the day when Master Roshi would make countless passes at Bulma? When Demon King Piccolo terrorized the Earth? Ah, those were good times. Of course when things got even more hectic in Z, those were good times too. The epic first fight Between Goku and Vegeta, Trunks taking out Freeza with no problem whatsoever. Gohan as the Great Saiyaman. OK, so Gohan as a costumed super hero was Gohan at his worst but that part of Gohan's life was meat to be cheesy. Looking at the above picture reminds me of so many moments in Dragon Ball history. But what's with the dreamy look on Gohan's face?

In the dubbed version of Dragon Ball Z, Vegeta once said to Bulma "Every time you open your mouth, you prove you're an idiot." The more Marvel talks about Spider-Man, the more the words ring ever so true. George Berryman of the Crawl Space forums caught Joe Quesada and Dan Buckley making fools of themselves and I'd like to represent it here in my blog. From CBR's SDCC : Buckley addressed a "Brand New Day" criticism, saying "That story's not over. We'll deal with that stuff as we go along. He didn't do a deal with the Devil, it's a supervillain in the Marvel universe. There's no religious connotations at all in this series. " Oh really? Did Buckely actually get those words out with a straight face? Did he even read the crappy story? Ugh, NEXT! Quesada said, "Go back and read 'One More Day,' and tell me who made the deal? Peter didn't make the deal. It's Mary Jane who makes the deal. This is a...