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The Drunken Odyssey

~ A Podcast About the Writing Life

The Drunken Odyssey

Monthly Archives: November 2013

The Curator of Schlock #17: The Night They Saved Christmas

29 Friday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Film, The Curator of Schlock

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The Curator of Schlock #17 by Jeffrey Shuster

The Night They Saved Christmas: No “Jingle Bells” Ever!

Let’s talk about heresy. I know it’s a term that’s fallen out of fashion in modern times, but it exists and pretending that it doesn’t, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. Santa Claus has been maligned, draped through the mud, raked over the coals, and twisted to meet the foul needs of whatever charlatan wants to make a quick buck over his bloated carcass. Case in point, 1984’s The Night They Saved Christmas.

Night3

A big oil company is drilling up in the North Pole (where is Steven Segal when you need him?). The man in charge of the drilling is Michael Baldwin who keeps dynamiting the ice up there with no luck. Eventually an elf named Ed shows up and asks him to stop drilling. Michael tells him to get lost so Ed the elf starts stalking Michael and his family. Ed eventually kidnaps Michael’s wife Claudia (Jaclyn Smith) and their three kids and drags them off in a World War II snowcat. They arrive at North Pole City just in time for a hot chocolate break. Everyone’s having a good time, the elves are singing “Jingle Bells”, and then Santa Claus (Art Carney) shows up and reams them out because he’s sick of “Jingle Bells.” Not a very jolly way to start the day now is it?

Santa wants Claudia to tell her husband to stop the drilling or North Pole City will be destroyed. You see North Pole City is protected by huge walls of ice and even has anti-radar equipment to keep it safe from prying eyes. Santa has employed the help of an elf scientist named Dr. Fernando to create all sorts of gadgets to aid him with the delivery of presents. There’s a teleportation platform attached to his sled and time slowing device that slows down time. Dr. Fernando has even created a robot that knows over a hundred riddles and can help a child with his or her homework, but it won’t give you the answers. It will not cheat. Dr. Fernando repeats this over and over again to the point where I can’t help, but think that the gentle elf doth protest too much.

I have to say this movie started to make me very uncomfortable at this point. We have a taciturn Santa Claus who forbids the singing of “Jingle Bells.” He has scientists creating teleportation and time slowing devices. That’s not the Santa Claus I grew up with. That’s trademark of monsters and supervillians like Brundlefly and The Clock King. North Pole City is shielded from radar and Santa is interrupting US oil concerns. I hate it to say it, but this Santa looks like a threat to national security. The kids in this movie should be more concerned with saving the homeland than with saving Christmas. What good is a fancy, toy robot when you’ve allowed Chris Cringle to ignite the flames of World War III?

Ten Things I Learned from The Night They Saved Christmas

  1. Elves are addicted hot chocolate.
  2. Kitschy made for TV Christmas movies from the 1980s really don’t hold up all that well.
  3. Santa’s sleigh is actually self-propelled these days, but don’t tell the reindeer that.
  4. Santa stores the presents for each country in huge hovering satellites.
  5. Mrs. Claus will go on long, rambling diatribes against toy tanks and toy guns.
  6. Teleportation effects in made-for-TV Christmas movies are still better than those used on Star Trek TNG.
  7. Santa Claus can actually suck the joy out of Christmas when he puts his mind to it.
  8. North Pole City is made out of plastic.
  9. Toy companies rip off Santa’s ideas all of the time. I suspect Hasbro is one of them.
  10. Jaclyn Smith is good in anything.

___________

Jeffrey Shuster 4

Jeffrey Shuster (episode 47) is an MFA candidate and instructor at the University of Central Florida.

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Episode 74: Nikki Giovanni!

28 Thursday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Episode, Poetry

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Carlton Melton, Chasing Utopia, cormac mccarthy, Miami Book Fair International, Nikki Giovanni, Peter Biello, Poetry, The Road

Episode 74 of The Drunken Odyssey, your favorite podcast about creative writing and literature is available on iTunes, or right click here to download.

On this week’s show, I interview the legend Nikki Giovanni,

Nikki Giovanni

plus Peter Biello writes about reading Cormac McCarthy’s The Road.

Peter Bielo by Oliver Parini

TEXTS DISCUSSED

The Road

 Carlton Melton Country Ways

NOTES

Peter Biello’s essay on The Road featured “Found Children” from Carlton Melton’s Pass it On.

Repeal Day Poster.jpg

The Heaven of Animals, the forthcoming collection from friend-of-the-show David James Poissant, is available for pre-order. Please support the launch of his book, which is wonderful reading.

The Heaven of Animals

Episode 74 of The Drunken Odyssey, your favorite podcast about creative writing and literature is available on iTunes, or right click here to download.

Gutter Space #17: Metacomic Case Study (Cyanide & Happiness)

27 Wednesday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Gutter Space

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cartooning, gutter space, insignificance, leslie salas, meta, models, pixels, Rob DenBleyker, scale, Sequential art, webcomic

Gutter Space #17 by Leslie Salas

Metacomic Case Study: Cyanide & Happiness, by Rob DenBleyker

It’s been much too long since I’ve written a review about a webcomic, so just in time for Thanksgiving let’s put our lives into perspective with Cyanide & Happiness’ “Depressing Comic Week” comic 3373. For those of you who may be unfamiliar with Cyanide & Happiness, these comics, by Rob DenBleker, have a reputation for their often surprisingly dark humor. DenBleker pushes boundaries for acceptability, often cartooning what many people may consider inappropriate or outrageous. Consider it part of his charm.

Similarly to xkcd (which I’ve talked about here and here), the art style employed in Cyanide & Happiness is that of slightly-detailed stick figures, and the comics often transcend the space of their panels and website, utilizing the tools of the Internet to enhance their storytelling.

In comic 3373 (I refer to it’s number because there are several “Depressing Comic Week” comics—in fact, there’s a whole book of them), an optimistic protagonist is interrupted from his excited, “I’m gonna go do something great with my life!” by the creator of the comic, who responds with, “Seems unlikely.”

The Creator then goes on to utilize panels of 500 x 500 pixels, zooming in to the center pixel of each to illustrate the scale of the Universe, the solar system, and the insignificance of a single human being, especially with respect to the billions who have already died. He showcases this on an impressive visual scale, even scaling one drawn person to represent 1,000,000, because, as he says, “[H]onestly this comic is getting kind of tall. Let’s not overdo it.”

This raises the audience’s awareness of the comic—that it is indeed pixels projected onto a scrolling screen in a web browser. And so we, the audience, are made more aware of our own existence. As we scroll, our understanding of our insignificance only deepens.

The ending—well, I’ll save that, for you to read yourself. But I’m left with an unsettling awareness of DenBleyker’s deliberate use of metafiction to drive home a point.

It’s this use of the Internet, the scrolling function, pixels, and the author’s intrusion on the comic that I find fascinating and wonderful. DenBleyker has turned a comic into a depressing infographic that is both thought-provoking and humorous. And he makes it look tongue-in-cheek and effortless. Impressive work.

___________

Leslie Salas (Photo by Ashley Inguanta)

Leslie Salas writes fiction, nonfiction, screenplays, and comics. She earned her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Central Florida and attended the University of Denver Publishing Institute. In addition to being an Associate Course Director at Full Sail University, Leslie also serves as an assistant editor for The Florida Review, a graphic nonfiction editorial assistant for Sweet: A Literary Confection, and a regular contributing artist for SmokeLong Quarterly.

 

Heroes Never Rust #17: Brains

27 Wednesday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Comic Books, Heroes Never Rust

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Zombies

Heroes Never Rust #17 by Sean Ironman

Brains

I like watching movies and reading books that make me think. I don’t like to waste my time with trivial things or works that seem to be too easy. Many people tell me how good a book or a movie is and that I should see it because “you can turn your brain off.” That doesn’t sound like a good time to me. It sounds horrifying. I know this might not be true—I hope it’s not—but all I hear when someone tells me they don’t want to think while watching a movie or reading is “My life is so sad and I am so miserable so I just need to shut down and escape for the little bit of peace I get in a week.” I don’t even want to discuss literature or movies with these people (and I’m not talking about the people who occasionally want to shut down—only those who always read or watch something to shut down). It just makes me want to talk to them about changing their career or their lifestyle.

But that doesn’t mean I only like serious work, or even intellectual work. I’ve gone on a few times about my love for the X-Men on this blog. I still enjoy fun stories and movies, but they don’t have to be stupid or require less thought in both the audience and the creators. Since this is a superhero comics blog, I’ll stick to superhero comics. One of the most fun superhero comics of recent memory has been the Marvel Zombies series (minus the second one—stay away from that one). I know the zombies fad has been played out (it wasn’t yet when the series started), but Marvel Zombies gets points because it never concerns itself for making you care about the characters. There’s no soap opera here—no comment on society. It’s just fucking craziness.

In Marvel Comics, there are a number of other universes with different versions of the superheroes. Marvel Zombies were introduced by Mark Millar in Ultimate Fantastic Four, possibly the only good thing to come from Ultimate Fantastic Four. Reed Richards is contacted by another version of himself, and after the Fantastic Four crosses over, they find out the world is filled with zombies. What I thought was clever about this is that it is a product of the endgame for zombies. If zombies conquered the world and ate everyone, what would happen to them? What would they eat? Because of all of the technology the Marvel superheroes have, the zombies have the ability to travel to other dimensions so they could continue their feeding. It’s not incredibly complex, but I found it clever.

marvel_zombies_Spider-Man wedding

The zombie Fantastic Four were beaten, but Marvel seemed to put two and two together to continue the concept.

Marvel Zombies 3rd

Robert Kirkman, who had created The Walking Dead, had done some Marvel work here and there and was assigned to write a mini-series, Marvel Zombies, dealing with the zombie universe. I’m a fan of some of Kirkman’s work, although some of it never really grabbed me. But what he does right with Marvel Zombies is give the people what they want. Zombie versions of the Marvel superheroes doing wild stuff. The end. That is basically the whole comic. This isn’t taken from the humans’ point of view. While there are some people still alive who aren’t zombies, the focus is on a group of zombies consisting of fan favorites like Spider-Man, Hulk, and Captain America, as they hunt for something new to eat.

While it’s not a serious story, it doesn’t require someone to turn their brain off. The story builds and builds, with a lot of humor, to the coming of Galactus, the devourer of worlds. And what happens to Galactus? Well, he gets eaten of course!

Marvel Zombies Tony Stark

I’ve always liked Galactus because I like to think of him as just a guy looking for lunch except he’s really damn big so he eats planets instead of tacos. Any story with the big guy is instantly made better by his appearance. Here in Marvel Zombies, it makes the story better because it seems like anything can happen. There’s no human element holding down the fantastical elements. It’s just crazy superhero zombies trying to scrounge up the last of the food on the planet. There’s not even much of a traditional plot. It’s there—the coming of Galactus’ herald, then Galactus, and then a big battle—but it’s so focused on the fun of seeing the Marvel Zombies hanging out. I also like that Giant-Man had been keeping the Black Panther in his lab as a food source he could come back to. It’s sick. I like that.

Marvel Zombies X Men

There have been five main Marvel Zombies’ mini-series with many more spinoffs, like Marvel Zombies vs. The Army of Darkness. Each version (other than the second one. Don’t read that one.) get crazy. The third series sees the Marvel Zombie universe cross over into the regular Marvel Universe, but it still manages to stay crazy. The fourth series brings back the Midnight Sons, a group of the supernatural superheroes, and they take on the zombies. The concept succeeded because it didn’t try to be anything it wasn’t. It didn’t dumb itself down because it was always dumb fun. It didn’t squeeze in romances or heroic beats. It had Bruce Banner’s stomach explode after he ate too much as the Hulk and then stopped being mad and reverted back to human form. But it still allowed the reader to imagine, and I think that’s the key. It didn’t close off the audience. The series didn’t make the reader think about the medium or the genre or lofty thoughts, but it allowed the reader to think about the possibilities of where the concept could go. Geez, at the end of the first series, the Marvel zombies are seen with Galactus’ powers and invading other planets. It’s fun and cool and it could only be done in comics. After reading each series, I’ve had multiple conversations with friends thinking of possibilities for future comics. The series allowed us to imagine what the Marvel superheroes could do as zombies.

And I can’t end the blog without saying how Arthur Suydam’s covers, many of which were takes on classic Marvel covers, really captured, not only the idea well, but the audience’s attention. I think his covers were talked about more than the series itself. Each cover managed to reflect the original work, the zombie concept, and the fun the series was about.

___________

Sean Ironman

Sean Ironman is an MFA candidate at the University of Central Florida, where he also serves as Managing Editor of The Florida Review and as President of the Graduate Writers’ Association. His art has appeared online at River Teeth. His writing can be read in Breakers: An Anthology of Comics and Redivider.

In Boozo Veritas #17: Please Read Responsibly

25 Monday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Drinking, In Boozo Veritas

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In Boozo Veritas, Teege Braune

In Boozo Veritas #17 by Teege Braune

Please Read Responsibly

It has come to my attention that some people believe that In Boozo Veritas promotes alcoholism. While I appreciate the community’s comments and concerns, I feel that these criticisms are the product of a gross misunderstanding. It is true that personally I have not always done my drinking in a responsible manner; nevertheless, I have never encouraged anyone else to get wasted. More often than not, I have urged friends to and acquaintances to drink less by way of suggesting they spend their booze money on me. Why imbibe in another adult beverage that is only likely to get you into trouble when you can promote a local blog that is quickly gaining praise and recognition by buying me that drink instead? The next day you will awake with a gratifying sense of personal accomplishment that you supported Orlando’s arts and literature instead of the hangover you’d be nursing if you had indulged in all that alcohol yourself.

Secondly, I would like to come out and publicly announce that I never drink and drive. Most nights of bar-hopping and heavy drinking I utilize the services of my personal valet Mr. Ives whose duties include transporting me from one watering hole to the next. If Ives, the old scamp, helps himself to a stiff night cap while he waits in the van, I am usually too inebriated by the time we make our way back home to notice or care. On nights when Ives is too drunk before we’ve even left the apartment to get me to my first stop, we have been known to hop on the old tandem bike we reserve specifically for these occasions. With Ives manning the handlebars, me carrying my own weight, peddling furiously behind him, we are sure to arrive at our destination safely.

I will also make it clear that In Boozo Veritas, because of its explicit content, is only intended for adult readers. In cinematic terms, a rating of R or NC-17 should be implied for every article. If my writing is finding its way into the hands of your child or teenager, I can only chalk that up to your negligent parenting and accept no fault of my own. If you know of any minors who insist on reading In Boozo Veritas, please take away their computers and encourage more age-appropriate diversions such as Grand Theft Auto. I will not be held responsible for any murders or suicides that result from young people reading this blog!

As for the rest of you, you are all adults capable of making your own decisions. As my proprietor John King is paying me copious amounts of money to produce this weekly blog, I must continue to drink heavily as a necessary aspect of my career. In fact, I even submit my bar tabs as a tax write-off. Remember that I am a professional. Just because tales of my own debauchery appear glamorized in these brief essays, it does not mean that your own intoxication won’t end in disaster. Who, after an intense molar cleanse and cavity filling, hasn’t returned home with a disparaging sense of ennui, longing to engage in the romantic mysteries of the dental profession? But we resist the urge, knowing the lives that may be lost when the uninitiated so much as attempt a flossing.

In conclusion, I will encourage you, my reader, to keep in mind that all my drinking is in the service of a greater good: namely, literacy, which has reached unfortunate lows in this great nation. Even once popular fantasy series Henry Porter is now in threat of going out of print. Today’s public would rather watch heart-throb Daniel Radcliffe than read about Porter’s adventures for themselves. This is precisely why I have turned down multiple offers from various Hollywood studios to adapt In Boozo Veritas into a multimillion dollar motion picture with premature hints at an Oscar nod. We are currently in the midst of a heated debate here at the In Boozo Veritas office over whether or not to meet with HBO executives who are eagerly pursuing our okay to green-light a new series based on the trials and tribulations that I have presented in these posts. We aren’t sure we would like to invite comparisons to other blog-inspired television programs like Sex and the City, and besides, who would be cast to portray yours truly, Sarah Jessica Parker? I, for one, am not convinced she could master my signature swagger. More importantly, though, is my concern that you, my faithful audience, would cease to read these articles if you could, with less effort than it require to login to your Facebook page, watch some gorgeous Hollywood celebrity live my life, so for now you will have to make your way to The Drunken Odyssey to see what kind of mischief I’ve cooked up this week, and if you see me out on the town, don’t hesitate to buy me a bourbon, scotch, or beer. I’m not picky, and your charity may prove a tax deductible feeling of goodwill.

___________

stylishbartender

Teege Braune (episode 72) is a writer of literary fiction, horror, essays, and poetry. Recently he has discovered the joys of drinking responsibly. He may or may not be a werewolf.

Like a Geek God #13: Geeking Out: Orphan Black

24 Sunday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Like a Geek God

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Like a Geek God #13 by Mark Pursell

Geeking Out: Orphan Black

I’m a sucker for well-done serialized storytelling, i.e. TV shows that have a continuous, over-arching story rather than successive stand-alone episodes. It’s the cinematic equivalent of reading a novel, with everything broken into chapters, and much more running time to delve into the complexities of plot and character than a traditional movie. (Indeed, we are in, or maybe nearing the end of, a new Golden Age of TV spurred by HBO and AMC where creative storytellers have been given the money and the free rein to craft some of the most profound serialized storytelling experiences in history: The Sopranos, Six Feet Under, The Wire, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, and so on). So I followed my traditional modus operandi when starting a new show that I know has a good chance of getting me addicted: I laid in a few bottles of wine, set aside an entire evening when I didn’t have to be up early the next morning, and pressed play on Orphan Black. The show originally aired this past spring but I only heard about ita few months ago, when there was an outcry from the fanbase because of lead actress Tatiana Maslany’s Emmy-nomination snub.

A few friends whose taste I trust urged me to watch the show, which they described to me as a science- fiction drama about cloning.

To say that Orphan Black’s concept is fresh and interesting is an understatement; to say that its approach is both unusual and highly effective is even more so. The revelation that main character Sarah Manning (Maslany), a young drifter and con artist, is one of several identical clones doesn’t come until the beginning of the third episode. In another show—an American network show, for example— we would have launched into the clone mystery almost immediately, with no breath or space allowed to develop the characters and foster investment in them. Instead, creators and writers Graeme Manson and John Fawcett spend the first two 43-minute episodes slowly introducing us to Sarah, the other characters around her, and the disturbing mystery of show’s initial scene: Sarah, waiting on a platform, observes a woman who looks identical to her step in front of a train and die.

Shaken, but opportunistic as always, Sarah makes off with the dead woman’s personal belongings before authorities arrive on the scene. Sheassumes the dead woman’s personality (her name: Elizabeth Childs), less concerned with their seeming identical appearance than the possibility that she may be able to access and make off with Beth’s money, thus enabling Sarah to achieve her primary goal: starting a new life somewhere for herself, her best friend and foster brother, Felix, and her young daughter, Kira. Of course, as Sarah impersonates Beth and becomes more entangled in her life, and as the uncomfortable implications about their identicality become impossible to ignore, darker forces gather around the edges of the conflict, waiting for the right moment to strike. Joining forces with two other clones— suburban wife Alison and graduate student Cosima, who reveal their true nature to Sarah and beseech her help in uncovering the truth behind their existence—Sarah is thrown into conflict with not only the police, a cultish scientist, and a fringe religious group, but also her family, as her foster mother Siobhan (an always excellent Maria Doyle Kennedy) seeks both to understand Sarah’s dilemma and shield Sarah’s daughter Kira from any danger. More often than not, the writers handle these competing elements deftly.

They occasionally leaven the tension with some “impersonation schtick” where theclones have to pretend to be one another, but this mostly (and fortunately) disappears after the midway point. The only time things seem to get out of hand is in the last few episodes, where some logical inconsistencies and confusing factual glosses kicked me out of the narrative a little. But by the last shot of the finale, a revelation you’ve been halfway expecting the entire time plays out, leaving Sarah bereft and more desperate than ever.

In a way, Orphan Black reminds me of Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse. It deals with many of the same issues regarding biotechnology and identity, as well as affording its lead actress the opportunity to show off her chameleonic abilities by slipping into multiple roles. But where Eliza Dushku’s Echo sufficed by being different facets of Eliza Dushku—each personality was her, essentially, but with an overlay—Tatiana Maslany faces the much stranger task of portraying multiple, very different people, with different tics and personalities. And perhaps one of the most compelling aspects of Orphan Black is watching this ingenious young actress tackle this (these) demanding role(s) with the confidence and panache of a seasoned veteran. Maslany vanishes inside the different clone personae: she is recognizable but also wholly distinct depending on which clone she is portraying, down to the physical way she holds herself, the way she draws breath.

In one crucial scene, where we are supposed to think we are seeing Sarah but it is really another clone in disguise, I knew immediately that it was not the Sarah character—despite the hair and clothes, despite the fact that the scene opens with Maslany sitting stationary—because of how she was sitting. It’s that subtle, and that striking.

The outcry about her lack of nomination for a lead acting Emmy is well-founded. What’s most notable about Orphan Black in the end, though, is the way it hops genres, changing its spots with the same ease as Tatiana Maslany changes her semblance. It’s a science fiction thriller, but it’s also a police procedural, a domestic drama, a commentary on medical ethics, etc., jumping from one to the other and, in an understated way, lampooning each without becoming overtly satirical or parodic. It’s that rare show that has its cake and eats it, too, succeeding at this kind of line-straddling where others that attempt it—Girls, American Horror Story—lose their footing and fall into the crevices between satire and SRS BZNS TV, never to recover. It’s not a perfect show, but—and this is how I define quality or greatness in anything artistic—it transcends the flaws that it does have. Season 2 starts this coming spring. Bring it on.

___________

Mark Pursell in Orange

 

Mark Pursell is a lifelong geek and lover of words.  His publishing credits include Nimrod International Journal, The New Orleans Review, and The Florida Review, where he also served as poetry editor.  His work can most recently be seen in the first volume of the 15 Views of Orlando anthology from Burrow Press.  He currently teaches storytelling and narrative design for video games at Full Sail University in Winter Park, Florida.

The Curator of Schlock #16: Cannibal Apocalypse

22 Friday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Film, Horror, The Curator of Schlock

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Cannibal Apocalypse, Invasion of the Flesh Hunters, Jeffrey Shuster, John Saxon, The Curator of Schlock

The Curator of Schlock #16 by Jeffrey Shuster

Cannibal Apocalypse, AKA Invasion of the Flesh Hunters

cannibal_01

I tried to think of a movie to review for Thanksgiving. I know many of you are looking forward to munching down on succulent turkey in a few days, but have ever been tempted to sink you teeth into something more forbidden? You know, like human flesh? 1980s Cannibal Apocalypse starring John Saxon will satisfy your curiosity. Yes, we finally have a John Saxon movie in The Museum of Schlock.

The movie opens with a Vietnam flashback/nightmare where Norman Hopper (John Saxon) is leading a platoon through to take care of the local Vietcong who kidnapped a couple of his buddies. There’s an exploding dog, the platoon sets a bunch of thatched huts on fire, and Harper finds two of his buddies, Charles and Tommy, held prisoner in an underground pit. Hopper is shocked to discover that the two of them are munching on the charred remains of a Vietnamese woman. Then Tommy bites Hopper.

Saxon in nam

Fast forward to modern times (1980). Hopper is domesticated and happily married. He likes to fly modern airplanes and has to fight off advances from the teenage neighbor girl. He gets a phone call from the very same Charles Bukowski, the same Charles who was munching on the corpse of that Vietnamese woman. Bukowski has just been released from a veteran’s mental hospital and wants to grab a beer with Hopper. Hopper declines because he has a problem with cannibals.

Bukowski decides to spend the afternoon catching a movie at the local cinema. He’s munching on popcorn, but we can tell from that crazed look in his eyes that he’d rather be munching on something else.

Cannibal Apocalypse

He sees a young couple going at it pretty hot n’ heavy a few seats down. When he sees the bare shoulders of the guy’s girlfriend, Bukowski pounces and rips a huge chunk out of her shoulder before punching her boyfriend in the face. Bukowski tears out of there with a mob of angry movie patrons following close behind. Some bikers join in on the chase too and manage to follow him into a closed flea market. Bukowski finds a display of shotguns and locks and loads. He manages to shoot and kill one of the bikers in addition to the store security guard.

The Atlanta Police Department don’t take too kindly to Bukowski’s cannibal and killing rampage and manage to hole him up in the flea market. Hopper hears the news from his wife and gets himself down there. He manages to talk Bukowski into surrendering. They send Bukowski back to the mental hospital, but not before he bites into one of the police officer’s hands. I sure hope this cannibalism thing isn’t contagious.

Later at the mental hospital, a doctor by the name of Helen (we’ll call her Dr. Helen) gets attacked by Charlie and Tommy. Tommy manages to get his chompers around her leg before the orderlies pull the two of them away and sedate them. Meanwhile, at the Hopper residence, Hopper tells his wife that he felt the urge to bite the neighbor girl. Concerned, she has him go down to the mental hospital to get checked out.

cannibal-apocalypse

The bitten start turning into cannibals. The police officer that got bit starts eating other police officers. Dr. Helen bites the tongue off of another doctor causing him to bleed out all over the floor. She then lets Buwkowski and Tommy loose. Hopper decides to join up with them realizing he’s cannibal after all. And what’s wrong with that? People should be who they are, that’s what I say. If someone wants to take a bite out of another person, who are we to say that’s wrong. If I want to take a bite out of let’s say a Christmas bulb, who are you to say that’s wrong? Not that I’ve ever done such a thing. I was just speaking hypothetically.

Ten Things I Learned From Cannibal Holocaust

  1. Cannibals are just like you and me except for the whole eating people part.
  2. If a woman bites your tongue off, it’s not a sign of affection.
  3. Cops won’t be amused if you sing “Yankee Doodle Dandy” while firing at them.
  4. Don’t give a cannibal a day pass if you don’t want him to bite the unsuspecting public.
  5. The Vietnam War was unpleasant.
  6. Don’t pet dogs with bombs attached to their necks.
  7. Cannibals don’t eat each other.
  8. You can kill a cannibal by blowing a hole in his stomach.
  9. You can kill a cannibal by setting him on fire.
  10. John Saxon is good in anything.

___________

Jeffrey Shuster 3

photo by Leslie Salas.

Jeffrey Shuster (episode 47) is an MFA candidate and instructor at the University of Central Florida.

Heroes Never Rust #16: A Different Side of Superhero Comics

20 Wednesday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Comic Books, Heroes Never Rust

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Heroes Never Rust, sean ironman, Sean McKeever, Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, Takeshi Miyazawa

Heroes Never Rust #16 by Sean Ironman

A Different Side of Superhero Comics

While most of what I read tends to be dark and filled with violence and sex, I also like to read lighter stories. I’ve never understood people who read the same type of stories, whether in comics or prose, over and over again. That’s boring. I don’t want to just read superheroes. I don’t want to just read mysteries. I want to read everything. When I walk into a comic shop, I usually check out the X-Men and some of the more mainstream superhero titles, but many times I also search for something a little different. What I’m looking for isn’t necessarily an indie comic—it’s just a comic that’s different from what I’ve been reading. I think it’s important to have diversity in most aspects of life—in food, in books, in movies, in everything.

I can’t explain it, but I also like teenage dramas. (Although for whatever reason, I don’t like YA books, even when I was young.) I like Dawson’s Creek. I like Everwood. I like Gilmore Girls. I like the first couple of seasons of Smallville. I think they’re fun and sometimes I just want fun. Also, I get tired of life and death conflicts and everything always the biggest it could be (especially in film). A story with interesting characters and fun interactions can be just as good or better than a story about the world ending. Sometimes I just want a story about who’s going to prom with whom. Or someone gets grounded when they have a big date. I love stories when one person has a crush on somebody and can’t tell him or her for whatever reason.  I think it’s because now I see how silly it is and I find it funny.

Spider-Man_Loves_Mary_Jane_Vol_1_9

Six years ago, I walked into a comic shop at the age of twenty-three and bought the volume one hardcover of Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, with the sky blue cover with pink text. It collects both Mary Jane miniseries (Mary Jane and Mary Jane: Homecoming) along with the first five issues of Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane. The comic was written by Sean McKeever (Sentinel, The Waiting Place) and drawn by Takeshi Miyazawa (Runaways, Robotech: Invasion). McKeever impressed me with Sentinel and I spent some time tracking down his other work. The Waiting Place is wonderful as well, although I think Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane is his best work. He tends to write young characters very well. The art is done in a manga-style, which usually I hate. I think I like it here because the women aren’t drawn like twelve-year-olds and as sex objects. The lines are clear, and the coloring is done really well, making the pages seem natural.

MJ006_COV__scaled_800

The comic takes place outside of regular continuity and puts the characters in high school. The main character is Mary Jane, not Spider-Man or Peter Parker. Spider-Man shows up, of course, in the first issue and saves Mary Jane, who then wants to go to Homecoming with him. That makes me smile. Peter Parker likes Mary Jane. Mary Jane likes Spider-man. Mary Jane gets a part-time job to pay for a Homecoming dress, and she deals with her friends Liz and Flash Thompson who are dating. It’s a teen soap opera, and I love it.

Every so often Spider-man shows up to fight some villain, but Mary Jane is rarely in trouble. It’s her story and she doesn’t play damsel in distress. It’s also great to know the characters’ futures and to see another side of these characters who have been around for a few decades. At the end of volume one, Mary Jane finally realizes she likes Peter Parker and goes to meet him the next day at school and finds him with the new girl, Gwen Stacy. Knowing the futures for these characters, that Peter and Gwen date, gives that scene greater impact.

SMLMJ 16

The comic doesn’t try to be anything other than what it is. I think that is what saves it. It’s not overwrought. It doesn’t think it’s smarter than it is. It’s not pushing the boundaries of comics or storytelling. Whatever happened to just telling a story? It’s a nice, simple story that makes me feel good. I want Mary Jane and Peter Parker to get together. When things get in the way, I get upset and say, “Why can’t it all just work out?” And I know it all works out. But I still get worried and I feel bad for Mary Jane. The comic is so simple and straightforward. I find it impossible not to like. How could someone not love it when Mary and Peter are doing homework alone and she tell him Spider-man turned her down and he says, “Well. Who needs him, right?” and then she smiles?

This comic makes me so happy.

___________

Sean Ironman

Sean Ironman is an MFA candidate at the University of Central Florida, where he also serves as Managing Editor of The Florida Review and as President of the Graduate Writers’ Association. His art has appeared online at River Teeth. His writing can be read in Breakers: An Anthology of Comics and Redivider.

Gutter Space #16: Cartooning through Delicate Subject Matters (Marbles, by Ellen Forney)

20 Wednesday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in Comic Books, Gutter Space

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bipolar, cartooning, Ellen Forney, Graphic Novel, gutter space, leslie salas, Marbles, Memoir, mental illness, Sequential art

Gutter Space #16 by Leslie Salas

Cartooning through Delicate Subject Matters: Marbles, by Ellen Forney

Part of what makes cartooning such a powerful medium of expression is the ability to tweak one’s words and pictures to express tonality and nuance in a way that words and pictures alone cannot. This is most clearly illustrated when writers+artists(=cartoonists) cover delicate subject matters—such as Ellen Forney’s discussion of her bipolar disorder diagnosis in her memoir, Marbles.

Forney does not beat around the bush about her diagnosis. After giving her audience a taste of her constant mania, we get the slap-in-the-face news and it’s weighty implications. Once we focus on the image in the magic eye stereogram of “let’s take a look at the symptoms”—she emboldens the image:

How does she deal with this news? What does it mean? What are it’s implications?

At first she handles it rather well—and attributes it to joining “Club Van Gogh.”

And soon she runs away with the idea.

Forney draws herself in a typical manic fashion—surrounded by stars and bright emanata, she is excited and vibrant and full of life, jostling around, knocking things over, starry-eyes and happy.

But note the sword precariously perched above her. It’s not literally there. Damocles’ sword is just a metaphor, as are the stars and the swipes and the dotted lines and the squiggles. But all of those extra marks add meaning—they enrich the reading experience and clue the audience in on the internal happenings in Forney’s brain.

This continues on when Forney “revvs”  from neutral to high gear and gets swept away into becoming manic.

She draws herself as literally being swept away, when in reality the distraction and excitement is all figurative. The illustration is compelling and insightful  for those who have never experienced the highs of losing control while being manic.

The lack of control is dizzying. Even Forney’s eyes and face are starry and unfocused. She is a blurry whiz of energy, and we see that by how she’s presented herself on the page.

Conversely, we get the stark stillness of her plummet to depression.

She is an amorphous shape, wrapped in a blanket, laying on a couch.

The simple act of getting out of bed is a tremendous victory.

And still, panel by panel, with the tiny changes between them, it’s clear that there is a heavy weight of depression. It’s oppression, and her immobility. The panels lack detail and shading. There is no richness or depth during depression, and we get that through her illustrations.

Forney also covers some of the unforeseen side-effects of bipolar disorder, such as the awkwardness of telling family members.

And the frustrations of finding a treatment plan that works for her.

She uses humor as a buffer for the sensitivity and intense personal nature of her diagnosis. But what is more telling are the additions to her illustrations. She includes sound cues and a director’s “cut” for her disappointment. She turns herself into a pill bottle, surrounded by mountains of pills and an excessively long list of failed treatment plans.

And there is her sheer frustration.

The small illustrations in the background are more telling than anything else I’ve discussed. She uses each of these images as themes throughout her memoir—moods like rainstorms, a merry-go-round as a tool for discussing the various types of bipolar disorder, the constant emotional rollercoaster—we’ve seen these symbols before, so when we get to this panel on this page, we sympathize with her even if we haven’t experienced any of these ourselves (let alone all of it at once).

Marbles is a powerful account of a woman learning to live with a diagnosis and telling her story through the best tools she has available: her voice and her art. By putting both of those tools together, she expresses more than either could alone, resulting in effective storytelling about a sensitive and personal subject matter.

___________

Leslie Salas (Photo by Ashley Inguanta)

Leslie Salas writes fiction, nonfiction, screenplays, and comics. She earned her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Central Florida and attended the University of Denver Publishing Institute. In addition to being an Associate Course Director at Full Sail University, Leslie also serves as an assistant editor for The Florida Review, a graphic nonfiction editorial assistant for Sweet: A Literary Confection, and a regular contributing artist for SmokeLong Quarterly.

In Boozo Veritas #16: Fun

18 Monday Nov 2013

Posted by thedrunkenodyssey in In Boozo Veritas

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In Boozo Veritas, Teege Braune, The Sun Also Rises

In Boozo Veritas #16 by Teege Braune

Fun

I used to see fun as a kind of commitment, a form of work that I did at night, no less important despite the fact that I had to spend money to do it. My dedication to fun meant staying out, drinking in bars, knowing that I had to be at my real job early the next morning. If eating cheeseburgers at Steak ‘n Shake at three o’clock in the morning meant that I only got two hours of sleep and added gastrointestinal pain to my list of discomforts, it was a sacrifice I was willing to make for fun. Headaches, hangovers, and fatigue may have been unfortunate side-effects, but red eyes, a wan, sallow countenance, and a hoarse, raspy throat were badges of honor, indicating just how much fun I had achieved. If abject exhaustion made a regular eight hour shift of work feel like an endurance test, it only proved that I was worth my grit in the labor of fun.

the sun also rises

When I read The Sun Also Rises, I wanted to be there with Jake Barnes, Lady Brett Ashley, and their friends in Pamplona, drinking fighting, and horrifying the locals. If an acquaintance confronted her ex-boyfriend’s date and then I had to comfort this person I barely knew while she wept hysterically, I understood that this was just the kind of thing that sometimes happens when people get together to have fun. If a friend got us kicked out of a bar for puking in a garbage can and continued to throw up in the street outside, we didn’t fret. He was only a casualty in the name of fun.

No matter how tired I might be, no matter how nice it would be to just climb into bed with a good book, no matter how tedious the routine of parking and waiting in line to get a drink, these were tasks that were well worth the frustration on the way to fun. Every night I stayed home was a night I wondered if the love of my life sat at the bar, lonely and forlorn, waiting for me to arrive. The fact, that I never successfully met women at bars did not indicate that I wouldn’t eventually. Whenever I settled myself in for an early evening, knowing people were having fun without me, I lived with the anxiety that the fun might reach such a pique of intensity that those involved would be transcended to another plain of existence. There was no feeling worse than opting out, only to hear the next day that I had missed out on all the fun.

If sometimes fun was boring, irritating, or even depressing, if sometimes I became so drowsy in midst of all the fun I was having that I fell asleep in a booth and my friends simply propped me up while the went about the business of having fun, it was okay. It wasn’t so bad to overdo it, vomit, and embarrass myself because it meant I had simply had too much fun. Making an honest effort was the important thing. It was unrealistic to expect every evening to be enjoyable just because I was out having fun.

I used to be a disciple in the church of fun. Now I am a deacon or priest. As a bartender, I collect tithes as I droll out pints of liquid fun. I try to keep my acolytes safe without diminishing their experience of fun. If sometimes I have to ask them to leave, I am merely urging them to seek another location in which to have fun. As they stumble out the door, I do not envy them, but I do not judge them either. After all, my livelihood is directly dependent on my ability to ensure that those around me have fun. In my free time, I still enjoy hanging out in bars, but I’ve learned that these are not the only places one can have fun. Furthermore, I’ve learned to have fun without the intensity that it once required, which is good because it’s becoming more and more difficult to recover, and I find I am seldom more miserable than the morning after a night of raucous fun.

___________

stylishbartender

Teege Braune (episode 72) is a writer of literary fiction, horror, essays, and poetry. Recently he has discovered the joys of drinking responsibly. He may or may not be a werewolf.

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