Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: We are back.
[00:00:09] Speaker B: Number three, we have some history.
[00:00:13] Speaker A: We do. It is now. We have some understanding of some things and stuff, and he's moving through the story and the paces a bit.
[00:00:23] Speaker B: So let me just say you've been reading, right?
[00:00:25] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:00:26] Speaker B: Okay. And you've read through issue twelve.
[00:00:29] Speaker A: I am almost there.
[00:00:31] Speaker B: Okay. So you liked it, obviously, because you kept reading.
[00:00:35] Speaker A: I kept reading.
[00:00:37] Speaker B: Or you had a morbid curiosity because it was so terrible that you just kept reading? I kept reading because I know you. Right.
You have this sort of morbid curiosity, right, of thinking, could it possibly be this bad?
[00:00:57] Speaker A: I find it funny that you even just started the podcast with this, because this was not even a conversation we had over dinner this week.
We didn't even broach the topic.
[00:01:13] Speaker B: Yeah. Of how bad it is or keep reading something in the hopes that we get better.
[00:01:19] Speaker A: Oh, my God, I almost called you out on this and was like, why did you subject me to such a book if you knew?
[00:01:31] Speaker B: Well, I knew, but the question is, did you know? I didn't. I know that you know, but now.
[00:01:40] Speaker A: I have to read the whole thing all the way through to just.
[00:01:45] Speaker B: Wait to get to the reveal. I don't know if you. Are you to the reveal already at issue twelve?
[00:01:50] Speaker A: No, I'm on issue nine right now.
[00:01:55] Speaker B: That's the best. Yeah. Well, speaking of things that were canceled, do you know multiplex's first appearance, by the way, we're jumping right in. We're at a beautiful cover. We've got AcO is back. So we've got the cool art again, Aco. We've got this weird sort of.
I don't know if this is the ACO on the COVID actually.
[00:02:16] Speaker A: I don't know.
[00:02:17] Speaker B: It just looks really cool. Yeah, I could be wrong. So I'm going to back off on that. Let me find out who the actual cover artist is. But, yeah, so we've got a pretty cool cover. It's got a lot of line art.
It's gritty. I kind of like it.
It's very 90s in the 20 teens here.
[00:02:40] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:41] Speaker B: For a 2015 cover. And then we flip the page. The Altcover is really interesting.
[00:02:48] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
It's like, whoa, that one is like.
[00:02:55] Speaker B: A shadow boxing all the multiplexes, right?
[00:02:57] Speaker A: Yeah. And that one is a very 2015 cover.
[00:03:01] Speaker B: Yeah. I actually really like that cover, though.
[00:03:04] Speaker A: Yeah. It's a very modern cover.
I appreciate both covers for what they are. I find them both unique, interesting, and I like them, and that's what just kept me jumping into this book.
[00:03:19] Speaker B: Well, let's jump right in. So I did want to say, know I'll talk through the history here while we talk through the fight with multiplex.
We're in Oakland.
Is that where we left off? I thought we left off in somewhere else.
[00:03:34] Speaker A: No, we left off in Oakland.
I thought it was the Boston subway, but it was going back and forth because we're like, it said Boston, but you asked the question, why would they extradite her from Oakland to Boston?
[00:04:03] Speaker B: Well, there is a lot of movement from Boston to Oakland. To Boston to Oakland and back. And yes, it does get a little bit.
[00:04:13] Speaker A: He can. He can move through doors and stuff like that.
[00:04:17] Speaker B: Like this week or this month. The West Coast Avengers appearing in Boston.
[00:04:21] Speaker A: Whoa, the band.
[00:04:24] Speaker B: I mean, Avengers West Coast.
Because that's the one you read. Yes, I read the West Coast Avengers. You read West Coast?
[00:04:33] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:04:34] Speaker B: There's a little name change in there, just to clarify. Yes, I think I was done reading before it became Avengers West Coast. But anyway, because you've got another character in know, you've got the best. Captain America.
Yeah. Anyway, so we are in Oakland. There are a lot of multiplexes, and he's totally like. Multiplex has a complex.
[00:05:00] Speaker A: Yeah. Oh, yeah.
[00:05:02] Speaker B: He's the man with a million clones. He doesn't even know who he is. He's all upset with that. You want to guess why he doesn't know who he is?
[00:05:11] Speaker A: Why?
[00:05:12] Speaker B: Well, because multiplex was part of the DC implosion. No, remember the DC implosion? Oh, 78, like, 20 podcasts ago.
[00:05:23] Speaker A: Yeah, when everything kind of, like, shifted and they lost all their stuff. Because of a snowstorm.
[00:05:31] Speaker B: Yes, because of a snowstorm. And they canceled all star comics, Aquaman, army at war battle classics, black Lightning, challenges of the Unknown Claw, the unconquered DC special, DC superstars, doorway to nightmares, dynamic classes, Firestorm, House of Secrets, isis Commandee, metalmen, Miracle men, new gods are fighting forces, secret Society of Supervillains Shade the Changing Man Showcase Star hunters steal the indestructible man, super Team family teen Titans welcome back, Cotter and the Witching Hour. In which of those comics was multiplex from? Go.
[00:06:00] Speaker A: All of them.
[00:06:02] Speaker B: I guess technically he could have been from all of them since he can clone himself a billion times. But which comic? Come on, give it a guess. All those ones I just read.
[00:06:11] Speaker A: All of the ones that you just read.
[00:06:13] Speaker B: Yeah. Welcome back, Cotter. Of course. He was definitely from. He was the villain. And welcome back, Cotter. Yes. You're 100% right.
[00:06:27] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:06:29] Speaker B: I'm guessing it was probably a superhero book.
[00:06:32] Speaker A: I'm thinking, boy, oh, boy.
One of the ones you named off. There you go.
Could it have come out of the new gods?
[00:06:43] Speaker B: No, but he does have a new Gods esque costume now. Yeah, I'm going to give you bonus points on that. But that was actually a redo of the costume later. He actually was a Firestorm villain first in Firestorm number two.
[00:06:58] Speaker A: Interesting.
[00:06:59] Speaker B: Which makes sense because the multiple person could pull the two fire.
[00:07:05] Speaker A: I was like, there's no way. Part of Commandee. There's no way House of mean you.
[00:07:13] Speaker B: Could have gone for showcase since showcase always was like a. Oh, yeah. Possibly could have been secret society of supervillains.
[00:07:20] Speaker A: That's true, too.
[00:07:23] Speaker B: But that's all wrong. Well, we turn the page and we're at a dance party.
[00:07:27] Speaker A: Dance party. Oh, yeah. Birthday.
[00:07:31] Speaker B: And everybody's there. Jason's on the dance floor having it up in a fantabulous pink shirt and weird off color plaid shorts.
[00:07:42] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:07:43] Speaker B: Loafers. Yeah. And midnighters enjoying the scenery.
[00:07:48] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:07:49] Speaker B: Really all we need for that page, right? We flipped the page and his friend Tony is there.
[00:07:56] Speaker A: Right?
Tony.
[00:07:58] Speaker B: Tony the Wingman, Tony Boston.
[00:08:00] Speaker A: Yeah, Tony from Boston.
[00:08:01] Speaker B: Because we are back in Boston. So Towers earlier in.
[00:08:04] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:08:05] Speaker B: Back in gay nightclub in. Awesome. Okay.
And.
Oh, it's Matt, his name. What? I'm so excited.
[00:08:16] Speaker A: He's wearing a fire shirt. Look at that shirt. That's, like, so 90s.
[00:08:21] Speaker B: Well, anyway, midnighters current significant other is on the floor, and we've got a fire shirt. It's outstanding. Yeah, I mean, Tony kind of looks like every terrible skater superhero that they tried to create in the 90s. Except he looks like he's aged since the 90s.
[00:08:42] Speaker A: He looks like Fred Durst.
[00:08:44] Speaker B: He does kind of look like Fred Durst. I was thinking of, like, maybe the infamous bloodlines hero jam.
Or any of the bloodlines heroes.
[00:08:57] Speaker A: There you go.
[00:08:58] Speaker B: Honestly, because remember, all of them.
[00:09:01] Speaker A: No.
[00:09:02] Speaker B: Name one bloodlines hero that made it.
[00:09:05] Speaker A: I can't.
[00:09:06] Speaker B: Hitman.
[00:09:09] Speaker A: There you go.
[00:09:11] Speaker B: And that's it.
[00:09:16] Speaker A: I got nothing.
[00:09:18] Speaker B: Okay, well, we're on. So we are now back in Oakland, and he's ringing a doorbell and he's talking to Mrs. Riley and finds out wanted to talk about her daughter, and he wants to beat up the people that took her. And she offers him breakfast.
And that breakfast looks delicious.
[00:09:44] Speaker A: It does. He's master detective, too, because he's picking up on all the clues.
[00:09:50] Speaker B: Yeah, well, he's gay Batman, so what would you expect with a fight?
Yeah. He is at a gay nightclub, and then he's being a detective. That's what gay Batman would do.
[00:10:04] Speaker A: That's exactly what gay Batman would.
He's. When he's not picking up. When he's not picking up.
[00:10:11] Speaker B: I mean, it's pretty clear real Batman doesn't with women. So.
[00:10:25] Speaker A: Maybe midnighter does.
[00:10:29] Speaker B: I'm not sure Batman don't maybe. I don't mean comic said that Batman clearly doesn't do.
I mean, that's why we started this whole journey, right? Besides Pride month.
[00:10:42] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:10:44] Speaker B: Well, anyway, so we're learning about Amanda. The fight computer is going on. He's investigating, we're finding out, and we're flipping the page, and now he says he's going to work, and.
[00:11:03] Speaker A: This is some crazy stuff.
[00:11:05] Speaker B: Thrown somebody through a ceiling.
[00:11:07] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:08] Speaker B: Convenient. Yeah.
[00:11:11] Speaker A: I don't know. This whole page, there's so much going on, but I really like it.
[00:11:17] Speaker B: It's like, aren't we glad AcO is back? Assuming that's how we pronounce the name art is. I'm sorry, to whoever the artist was last issue that I've already forgotten who is the fill in artist, but this is a lot better.
[00:11:31] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:11:33] Speaker B: But obviously a series is in trouble when maybe there's a fill in artist in the second issue.
I got to give some credit to the inker here, too.
[00:11:43] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, for sure. A lot of cool stuff going on.
[00:11:48] Speaker B: Yeah. And the colors mean.
[00:11:50] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. That whole top panel is just like, boom, color, color. Then that middle, like color. Boom, boom, boom.
[00:11:57] Speaker B: And, yeah, we've got whoever, somebody got thrown through a roof. He's looking like Morty in an early episode of Rick and Morty when he fell off a cliff.
It's not looking good.
[00:12:09] Speaker A: No.
[00:12:10] Speaker B: And he asked if he's going to kill him. Of course he is.
Anyway, he grabs him, and they're talking about somebody's taking kids, and. Yeah, he's just kind of on a rampage.
He springs the guy up and. Okay.
[00:12:30] Speaker A: It's very cinematic.
[00:12:32] Speaker B: It is very cinematic. It's very disturbing.
[00:12:35] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. I mean, if somebody's messing with kids and you want answers, I'm pretty sure this is a way to get them, for sure.
[00:12:44] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, it's more like a Watchmen character than Batman.
[00:12:49] Speaker A: What?
[00:12:50] Speaker B: I don't want to get sued, so let's not talk about the Watchmen.
[00:12:53] Speaker A: That's right. Okay, moving on.
[00:12:54] Speaker B: Watches them. No one. Okay.
[00:12:57] Speaker A: Not even midnight.
[00:12:59] Speaker B: Now we are back. And, yeah.
Experimental gerontology. It's exactly where I thought this book was going to go.
[00:13:11] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:13:14] Speaker B: Well, they need raw materials.
Talk about dealers. And we've got a shot of multiplex and they're in the God Garden or.
[00:13:30] Speaker A: The wannabe God garden.
[00:13:32] Speaker B: Sure.
This is all making sense, right? This is a crystal clear story that requires no past knowledge or explanation beyond what's on the page.
[00:13:43] Speaker A: Looks like a cut rate Willy Wonka in his.
[00:13:52] Speaker B: Well, anyway, okay, we are. Well, we are moving on. Cut rate Willy Wonka is like, hey, raw materials want the girl. I control the market price. He seems like a jerk.
[00:14:03] Speaker A: Oh, totally.
[00:14:04] Speaker B: And they're experimenting on somebody, which is always good. And Midnighter is about to come in and take some people out.
[00:14:10] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:14:13] Speaker B: And now we get another really cool page. But I like the art, but. Okay.
[00:14:20] Speaker A: Yeah. It's a very nice, the way it's laid out, but it's not as colorful as the last one.
[00:14:30] Speaker B: Also, I have no idea what's happening, honestly. Okay.
[00:14:36] Speaker A: I don't think anybody does.
[00:14:37] Speaker B: Yeah, Midnight or bus in. Well, I guess maybe we're not supposed to know because he's got the fight computer, which means the fight computer predicts all the fights. So he's just got it all figured out.
[00:14:48] Speaker A: Yeah, because he says caskets for everyone.
[00:14:50] Speaker B: Yeah. All right.
And then he sees some guys running away and he says, hey, I'll be right with you.
So better than a short order chef.
[00:15:02] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:15:05] Speaker B: Okay. Now he finds. Oh, okay, this must be Amanda. This must be what's going on there. And there's a little girl, looks a lot like her.
[00:15:14] Speaker A: Yeah, right.
Stuck in the machine. She just wants out of this thing. Get me out of this crazy thing.
[00:15:21] Speaker B: He's not really trusting the guy that just murdered everybody in front of her.
[00:15:24] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't think I would either, honestly.
You say you're here to help me?
[00:15:31] Speaker B: And he says, yeah, I did that. And they can't hurt you. Stand back. And she says, oh, but what about the old man in his costume? Guy.
Holy exposition. Batman.
[00:15:42] Speaker A: What?
Boom.
[00:15:46] Speaker B: And then we get a back to now. Oh, my gosh.
[00:15:48] Speaker A: Okay, this is a crazy page of stuff.
[00:15:54] Speaker B: It's looking very spirally.
[00:15:57] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:15:58] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:15:58] Speaker A: There's a lot of stuff going on.
[00:16:01] Speaker B: Like a spiral.
[00:16:03] Speaker A: Yes. And Midnighter is just wrecking shop on whoever he's wrecking shop on. Which would probably be the multiplex.
[00:16:14] Speaker B: Yeah, it looks like there's a lot of multiplex getting dead.
[00:16:17] Speaker A: Yes.
Midnighter is multiplexing the multiplex.
[00:16:24] Speaker B: Well, we get to the next page, and he says, I feel refreshed in you. And now I think, is that Willy Wonka there? Yep. It looks like in a different.
[00:16:32] Speaker A: Yep, I think so. Cut rate Willy Wonka got his ass handed to him.
[00:16:36] Speaker B: He says, I can't die in a monument to public transit. I'm just not ready for it to be over. Is that wrong?
He apparently stole something from the God Garden.
[00:16:54] Speaker A: Here's a weird question for you, and maybe you can explain this to me. Where the multiplex was. Multiplex were all those clones. All him?
[00:17:05] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:17:05] Speaker A: And so he had hundreds of clones that were him.
It's like evil Jamie Madrox and Midnighter just killed all of his clones, apparently.
That's amazing.
[00:17:21] Speaker B: I don't know if he killed him. I mean, for a guy that just made it, this is like Count Goku territory. Right?
Like appear at the end and then die at the beginning. Right, right. Granted, I understand Count Doku was like in the cartoon clone wars and all that, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But if you just watch the movies, it's like he's a major villain and then all of a sudden he gets dispatched. Right. Yeah, it's the same kind of deal.
[00:17:47] Speaker A: I totally understand.
[00:17:49] Speaker B: Yeah. So, well, there we go.
Well, he murders this guy, straight up kills him after he begs. And, yeah, he's dead.
We even get a body, I think.
[00:18:02] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:18:03] Speaker B: Yeah. And we've got a squished head and a big crotch.
This is so old school. 80s, by the way. I love it when you write the noise of the thing happening right there. Yeah, I love that. Okay, I'm not going to lie.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: I personally enjoy it, too.
It looks cool.
[00:18:25] Speaker B: All right, well, now he's home for a midnight snack, and he's taking the little girl back home.
Amanda's going through her house, and he shares that he was kidnapped and experimented, man. Yeah. And that's. So they're having a touching moment there outside the house. And then he goes back through the door and leaves Amanda there at home.
[00:18:47] Speaker A: Bye, deuces.
[00:18:50] Speaker B: Okay, later. I saved your life. I'm not going back for more breakfast. Yeah, it's all good.
[00:18:56] Speaker A: Yeah, I got things to do.
[00:18:58] Speaker B: Oh, he does have things to do. Look at that. All right.
He's washing all of his bloody stuff in a sink, which is a good excuse to get mostly naked. Yeah, of course we're not going to get all the way naked because it's a comic book.
[00:19:15] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:19:16] Speaker B: And he's being hugged and long day at the office. And he says, sure, let's say that brains punch, not cards.
And he says, like he's got brains all over himself. Matt, not Jason.
[00:19:30] Speaker A: I keep getting, oh, it's Matt's. The other guy.
[00:19:32] Speaker B: Yeah. Jason's.
[00:19:33] Speaker A: Jason's out.
[00:19:34] Speaker B: Jason's, yeah. Matt was on the dance.
[00:19:37] Speaker A: Jason. Jason just wanted to be friend. He got friend zone real fast.
[00:19:41] Speaker B: But real friend be. This seems to be more than friend zone, though.
[00:19:47] Speaker A: Well, like, midnighter friend zone. Like, Midnighter tagged him with the GPS, and Jason's like, no, sorry, too much, too quick.
[00:19:56] Speaker B: Well, they're alluding to a lot of things, like about playing doctor and outpatient care, things like that. We flip the page we get to later. So we're way past whatever was going on there. We wouldn't want to show that in a comic book. Guys got too close, got to flash forward.
[00:20:13] Speaker A: Now they're on top of this giant building.
[00:20:17] Speaker B: Yeah, it's kind of cool looking building.
And Matt's like, I never come up here, he says, and there's midnighter. So my greatest adventures have been on roofs for whatever that means.
And then they lie down on the roof. They're hanging out.
[00:20:36] Speaker A: Yes, of course.
It's a cool roof.
[00:20:41] Speaker B: Okay, well, we are moving the story right along, and now we get to city. Okay. Uh oh.
[00:20:48] Speaker A: Oh. Months earlier.
[00:20:49] Speaker B: This is who lives in city.
Forgotten already.
[00:20:54] Speaker A: Would it be Apollo?
[00:20:57] Speaker B: Yes, Apollo lives there.
[00:20:58] Speaker A: And Midnighter.
[00:21:01] Speaker B: Jack Knight.
[00:21:03] Speaker A: Oh, Jack Knight.
Who is Midnighter?
[00:21:12] Speaker B: Making my soul hurt right now.
[00:21:14] Speaker A: I know, that's why I like.
[00:21:16] Speaker B: Well, anyway, who is it?
[00:21:18] Speaker A: Dan Starman. Star. Oh, man, that movie was not so great.
[00:21:31] Speaker B: Stop. You're right. It sucked.
[00:21:34] Speaker A: And then the comic book that they made after, it didn't even tie into the movie.
[00:21:40] Speaker B: Well, now we're back. It's hard to tell who he is. It's Midnighter, but he doesn't have the cool haircut, so he's different.
[00:21:47] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. It's more like not midnighter.
[00:21:51] Speaker B: By the way, I saw the haircut in real life, and so did you.
[00:21:55] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:21:57] Speaker B: On Saturday night, we saw the haircut in real life.
I was like, who would ever have a haircut like that? And lo and behold, here we are walking, and we see the haircut in real life.
[00:22:07] Speaker A: There it was.
[00:22:08] Speaker B: Not this haircut, mind you, the actual midnighter haircut. The I'm clubbing haircut. This haircut is like the I think I might be Bruce Wayne haircut.
[00:22:18] Speaker A: Yeah, I got a day job in accounting.
I need to look good for that meeting.
[00:22:24] Speaker B: Hi, I'm Midnighter.
I got to put this icon in cornflower blue for you today. And it's all good.
[00:22:33] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly.
[00:22:34] Speaker B: We're good. So, Andrew, my entire life as an outman, it's all been defined by us. That's so nice.
And that sounds like it's going to have a breakup soon.
[00:22:48] Speaker A: Yeah. And you are correct.
[00:22:51] Speaker B: He says, I don't know how to be me without you.
He just doesn't know how to lose because he'll get destroyed by gay Superman. So, yeah, it's. No, it's. Well, that's rough.
I feel like they keep bringing Apollo back for a reason. It feels like, like why would you keep focus? This comic is supposed to be about midnighter, not Midnighter and Apollo. Right.
[00:23:21] Speaker A: That's what I thought. But hey, sometimes you often bring back the past to get to the future.
[00:23:29] Speaker B: I see. Just like you overdo that when you're writing.
[00:23:33] Speaker A: I actually don't.
I don't in some books. I shouldn't say that.
I don't in my kids books because it's confusing to the reader in my more adult books because it sometimes lends to the story and an adult audience can understand these things, but I don't do it as much as this team does. Boy, oh, boy. Orlando loves to just keep jumping.
It's like Double Dutch.
[00:24:08] Speaker B: Well, the interesting thing is that, the interesting thing here is that there's an assumption here, and I get this right because it's a tough balance. Right. You're also not usually writing books that.
I don't want to say this. You're not writing books that have a long history before them that you have to adhere to.
[00:24:42] Speaker A: True.
[00:24:43] Speaker B: Right.
So with that in mind, I think you don't have to build in as much of this backstory that I'm whining about.
Right.
[00:24:55] Speaker A: Yeah.
And that's the difficult part, too, for someone who's read a lot of this stuff.
I would say anytime you're writing something that has a giant amount of backstory, you're running a really tough game, either for fan service or the folks who know and they're hoping you're going to get it right and they're going to be very judgmental on how crucial you are with the details. Right. And if you've got multiple things that fit into these stories that you're putting out there and every single issue and bringing all these characters in, it's going to be very difficult to service all the fans in that way. If you got people like myself who have just jumped into the story and they don't know everything that's going on or all the players, then there's a lot of sauce to get lost in. And if you don't have people to guide you along or you're not willing to do the research or you start to do the research, then you could fall down the inevitable rabbit hole that there is and start asking questions as to wait, I'm lost here. What's going on? How come this is happening? This doesn't make any sense or why, but hey, I'm trying to enjoy it.
[00:26:24] Speaker B: And I'm a legion of superheroes fans, so I probably know this better than anybody after reading all these years, right? Like, how do you make us happy? It's literally impossible. I mean, you've got a superhero team with over 30. Well, way more than 30, but usually, like 25 to 30 characters on a team at one time that spanned since 1958. How in the world do you keep that fan base happy? As a writer?
[00:26:47] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:26:49] Speaker B: There's literally nothing you could do to please everyone.
[00:26:52] Speaker A: It's really going to be a difficult thing to do.
[00:26:54] Speaker B: Well, in this case, we have Paulo floating in the.
[00:26:58] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:26:59] Speaker B: Which is always a good Superman look.
[00:27:01] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:27:04] Speaker B: And he's like, breaking up with him right there.
[00:27:07] Speaker A: Breaking it off.
[00:27:08] Speaker B: Great. Okay.
Apollo is very attractive. I just want to add that.
So now we're back to hanging out with.
[00:27:24] Speaker A: And back on the rooftop.
[00:27:26] Speaker B: I think Matt and I have a lot in common. Matt said when I was a kid, I used to play the radio to distract me until I could sleep. Bad reception, funny white noise. Spent a lot of nights stuttering Chase Lawler tunes. Except I wasn't listening to music. I was listening to either Mariners games or, like, Art Bell.
[00:27:44] Speaker A: Art Bell. And all the wild stories that would get spun.
[00:27:50] Speaker B: Oh, yes. Or talk net if you go way back in the day. Well, I had an AM transistor radio.
[00:27:55] Speaker A: That I used to hide under my.
[00:27:56] Speaker B: Pillow so I could fall asleep. But, yeah, there we.
Anyway, yeah. He's like, we're back to this gardener hid my life storyline.
That's so forgiving. He's like, I don't care where you.
[00:28:16] Speaker A: Who you are.
You're fine.
[00:28:21] Speaker B: Okay. And midnighter is like, oh, we should rest. I'm sure that was the plan.
[00:28:26] Speaker A: We should rest.
[00:28:29] Speaker B: Define resting.
[00:28:31] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:28:31] Speaker B: Well, tomorrow. Okay, so this story has been in the future.
[00:28:37] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:28:38] Speaker B: And the past.
[00:28:39] Speaker A: In the past.
In the Tomorrow.
It's all over the place.
It's a continuity string Nightmare.
[00:28:51] Speaker B: It's fun.
[00:28:53] Speaker A: Yes.
Oh, my gosh. Where are we at? The Tomorrow in the Northwest Territory is.
[00:29:00] Speaker B: So let me just say Tim Seeley.
Tim Seeley.
And Tim Seeley did something terrible.
And he also did this with one of my favorite writers, Tom King.
They made a character called Agent 37, Dick Grayson, in a comic called Grayson, because DC Comics got the great idea that they should unmask Dick Grayson as Nightwing. See, Nightwing just wasn't popular enough. He only had his own comic book, was only in the Titans all the time. And so not popular enough that they had to unmask him and then make him an agent infiltrating spiral.
[00:29:52] Speaker A: There's great.
[00:29:53] Speaker B: So after we're done with this, I would like you to read the 20 issues of Spiral.
Sorry. Of Grayson in 2015. I'm sure you'll love it.
[00:30:07] Speaker A: Okay. I could try.
[00:30:11] Speaker B: You did make it nine issues into this book.
[00:30:14] Speaker A: It's just reading James Bond in a DC book, right?
God, that's what they've done, right? I mean, that's what I got.
[00:30:24] Speaker B: Well, you know, the funny thing is, I go back and forth between buying Batman books right now. I've pretty much stopped. I am actually buying Tom King's.
The thing is, Tom King got it back, right? He won two Eisner Awards back to back years writing Batman, and now he's writing the Batman and Catwoman book. And Tom King's great. You can't. But you can't just go to show, like, Tom King's one of my favorite writers, but you can't please everybody all the time, right?
But I just felt this was a poor editorial choice, right? Like Nightwing. I don't know, it's like when they killed Wolverine and Professor X, you know, in the movies, right? And then let's just get rid of Nightwing. It's like you take things from my childhood and then you murder them on purpose, right? Like, you destroy them on purpose. And guess what? I've never bought a nightwing book.
Like, they ruined the character for me.
To the extent that I just look at the Nightwing books and I'm like.
[00:31:23] Speaker A: Yeah, no, can't do.
Mean after reading the books, a couple of these issues, I shouldn't say James Bond. It's more like because he doesn't have all the cool gadgets and stuff. He's more like an actualized.
[00:31:45] Speaker B: He's more ambition impossible than James Bond. And then we have to compare him to Tom Cruise, which irritates me.
[00:31:51] Speaker A: Even. No, I wasn't even go. Even. He's not even that.
He kind of is more, oh, man, why can't I think of the character's name in my head? It's, damn.
[00:32:07] Speaker B: Jason Bourne.
[00:32:08] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, Jason Bourne.
[00:32:10] Speaker B: I figured you'd go there. I felt like it was more of Mission Impossible. Just the way the story sets are set up.
[00:32:18] Speaker A: But not in the, in the movie, in the movies and stuff like that, but more like the Jason Bourne from the book series where he's an actualized person. He comes back stateside, he takes jobs based off of people's needs and things like that.
And it's like, oh, hey, this person needs, if you've ever read them or if anybody else has. It's kind of like you take the concept of the A Team and you have the Jason Bourne character and somebody out there needs help and is in trouble, but they don't know who to turn to because everyone is operating under some sort know whatever, and they reach out and he finds them. Right.
Or kind of like the Equalizer.
Yeah, Jason, born of the Equalizer.
[00:33:09] Speaker B: Okay, well, Queen Latifah, equalizer, it all sucks. What?
[00:33:14] Speaker A: Either way.
[00:33:16] Speaker B: Well, the Grayson.
[00:33:19] Speaker A: I thought you're knocking Jason Bourne in the Equalizer.
[00:33:23] Speaker B: Yeah. What?
Well, anyway, moving on. Moving on.
[00:33:31] Speaker A: I know.
[00:33:32] Speaker B: You know how I love the spy stuff.
[00:33:34] Speaker A: I know there's a joke.
[00:33:36] Speaker B: So is that where Dexter comes in and kills all of them?
[00:33:41] Speaker A: Not yet.
[00:33:42] Speaker B: Okay.
Anyway, he's Agent 37 and he's got such a great identity going on. She's yelling, Grayson, behind you. So they all know who he is anyway.
[00:33:51] Speaker A: Yeah, everybody knows.
[00:33:54] Speaker B: Good.
And then on the next page, midnighter is holding his neck and we get our first crossover in issue four. So way to establish that character. We're going to have a.
[00:34:14] Speaker A: I mean, when you think about he's, this is normal for him having crossovers, no?
Well, maybe, but, yeah, I mean, I.
[00:34:26] Speaker B: Think that's pretty normal.
[00:34:27] Speaker A: Yeah, that's pretty slash.
[00:34:30] Speaker B: Nightwing might be the king of Crossovers.
[00:34:32] Speaker A: Yeah. I was going to say, like working with a Batman man.
Yeah, he looks very Batman in this page with the stubble and everything like that. Usually he's got a clean shaven chin line, but right now he's very rugged.
[00:34:53] Speaker B: Are we going to discuss gay Batman working with Robin?
[00:34:58] Speaker A: What about. It's totally normal, totally healthy.
There's nothing wrong with.
[00:35:06] Speaker B: Do, I didn't say there was anything wrong with it. I just said, are we going to discuss that?
[00:35:11] Speaker A: You want to write some fan fiction or something like that?
[00:35:14] Speaker B: I don't think I'm the one to write that.
[00:35:17] Speaker A: You're not the one to write.
[00:35:19] Speaker B: Be really boring.
Be the most boring fan fiction ever.
Batman and Robin stare at each other from across the room. Things happen. The end, it would be, it's very exciting. Yeah.
[00:35:36] Speaker A: There you.
[00:35:39] Speaker B: Anyway.
[00:35:40] Speaker A: Yeah, well, we're honestly, like, I feel like we ended book two with a character that was lost in book three and we had no clue what cut rate Willy Wonka really was. Doing with everything or how he was doing everything and why he was doing everything except for the fact he was multiplex. But I didn't even pick up on that until the reveal when he gets his head smashed. So, I mean, I was cool. Cool story, bro.
[00:36:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
And now we get Dick Grayson, which.
[00:36:34] Speaker A: Could be good. So I'm excited. Let's find out what happens next when we return for issue number four. Yeah, number four.
[00:36:45] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:36:46] Speaker A: I had to learn counting with another guest artist.
Another one. Same guest artist or a different guest artist?
[00:36:55] Speaker B: Different guest artist. Wow.
[00:36:58] Speaker A: It's going to be this way through the whole entire.
[00:37:00] Speaker B: You can tell this was a high priority for DC Comics when we have three artists and four issues.
[00:37:07] Speaker A: Wow. Well, it happens. People are busy, folks.
[00:37:12] Speaker B: People are busy. Just can't wait for that to come in.
[00:37:15] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:37:16] Speaker B: Or we weren't ahead enough on the storylines to get the art up and running, which can happen, because.
Yeah, there we go. It's exciting. At least we have the same writer.
[00:37:32] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:37:34] Speaker B: I'll let you decide whether that's a benefit or not as you keep reading.
[00:37:38] Speaker A: I will tell you next time when we talk more. Midnighter from Russia with Grayson number four.
[00:37:49] Speaker B: So, grief.
Yeah.
[00:37:55] Speaker A: I don't know the COVID I'm just looking at the COVID We'll discuss the COVID later. But it definitely does look fanfic.
Yeah.
[00:38:08] Speaker B: Let's just say that cover, not my favorite art.
The interiors, I thought in the next book were a little bit better.
[00:38:16] Speaker A: Interiors looked really cool. But we'll get there when we get there.
[00:38:19] Speaker B: Yeah.
There's a lot of topless guys on the interior of the next mean. Could be worse.
[00:38:30] Speaker A: I guess that's true. Could be worse.
[00:38:32] Speaker B: Well, anyway, I think we're, know, the sad part is there's some Steve Orlando stuff I really like. Yeah, just not this.
[00:38:46] Speaker A: Just not this.
I'm enjoying this.
I keep coming back to it.
[00:39:02] Speaker B: I also kept buying mean.
[00:39:06] Speaker A: There you it.
I guess it's like when you want steak and you go to Sizzler and they have the salad bar, and you're like, I could do a salad. And you just keep going back plate after plate.
[00:39:22] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:24] Speaker A: And now there's no more sizzlers, but you still want that salad bar.
[00:39:30] Speaker B: I guess that's one way to look at it.
[00:39:32] Speaker A: It's a very bad analogy, but it's very true.
God rest in peace, Sizzler.
[00:39:39] Speaker B: Well, that's where we're at. So it's a story. We reviewed a story today.
[00:39:45] Speaker A: Yeah, that was a story. It wasn't my favorite issue. Number three, not my favorite issue.
[00:39:51] Speaker B: No. I mean, fortunately, this episode even is going to know it's weird because this is not our favorite issue, but this is much more coherent than our Ares issue I just posted, where we were completely incoherent for like an hour at least.
[00:40:07] Speaker A: Yeah, but we're having a good time.
[00:40:09] Speaker B: Talking, Dan and Greg talking about a comic and just mentioning we didn't like it. So nice of think, you know, when I'm saying I don't like a comic, too. This is probably a good time to introduce the creative. Yeah, yeah. So we, of course, had Steve Orlando as the writer, and then we had ACO as the penciler. We did like the art, though. Hugo Petrus as the inker, colorist Farardo, and letters by Fletcher. So, you know, cool.
However, we're going to introduce the editors, Mark Doyle, Chris Conroy, and Dave Wildgauss. And editors. Editors, step it up here.
[00:40:56] Speaker A: Step it up.
[00:40:57] Speaker B: I honestly think I'm not horrified by the arc here of the story, but editors, step it up. Help our friend Steve be a little bit more focused.
[00:41:08] Speaker A: Make some editor choices.
[00:41:10] Speaker B: We're having flashbacks. Like, let us give us some freaking context to know what's going on. So you can't assume I've read every midnighter book in history.
[00:41:19] Speaker A: Yeah, from a writer's perspective, honestly, like I said, I enjoyed the story for everything that it was. There was definitely some stuff in there that I was lost in that I wish it was more for all the things that I didn't like. Those are things that I will put into my little toolbox of things that I don't particularly want to do in stories that I write or work on with other people. And if I see it, then I'll make notes so that we don't make those same decisions. That made me feel like this was frustrating.
And that's the thing that other creators out there that are listening to this sometimes.
The best way to get an education is to read books. The best way to find out what you like and what you don't like is to pick up these books, read them, and see how the stories are told. There's going to be a lot of good stuff, and there's going to be a lot of bad things.
And hopefully more good than bad. And those little things, those things that you enjoy, take those with you. And even those bad things, don't toss them aside. Put them in your little toolkit so you know how to make them better.
Like, flashbacks are not my favorite thing, and it was definitely something an editor told me a long time ago. Don't do too many of those types of things because you're just going to confuse the reader and make it very difficult for the artist, for the reader, and even for yourself to keep that continuity. And that was something that I took to heart and I just don't do it. And even in books like Starlight, where we do do flashbacks, we really limit it and really make it a point to make the art look different 100% and make the time shift look very, you know, when there's a time shift.
And I feel like in this issue three of this book, there's a lot of things that I don't feel like we got in that sense. So that's what made it very.
[00:43:35] Speaker B: You know, the thing is, like, I sound like I'm hating on Steve Orlando, but I don't hate Steve Orlando. Like, I bought all sorts of Steve Orlando books. I just don't like this.
And for the reasons you said. Right. It's just very confusing and the back and forth and just the fact that we can't, even when we're in the middle of doing it, identify where or when things are.
[00:43:57] Speaker A: Yeah, it's just hard because he's got such a pool to pull from. He is going into that well of information and just trying to cram it into these twelve issues, I'm sure, and trying to give everybody their little nuggets and their cherries.
[00:44:17] Speaker B: Being forced by editorial to have a crossover with Dick Grayson.
[00:44:21] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, that could be true, too.
[00:44:24] Speaker B: And so I've got to truncate my storytelling because now all of a sudden, I have to have an artificial crossover, which seems like it's what's going to happen. But, hey, I say we leave that for next week.
[00:44:34] Speaker A: Next week it is.
[00:44:35] Speaker B: So we got a DC implosion villain.
[00:44:39] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:44:40] Speaker B: And he died. Yeah, dead lots of times.
[00:44:44] Speaker A: Many.
[00:44:46] Speaker B: And Willy Wonka died. And everybody dies. And so maybe Dick Grayson will die in the next issue.
[00:44:54] Speaker A: I don't think so.
[00:44:55] Speaker B: What?
[00:44:56] Speaker A: He's Dick Grayson.
[00:44:57] Speaker B: He can't die?
[00:44:58] Speaker A: No, I'm just saying he's Dick Grayson.
[00:45:00] Speaker B: He can't die.
[00:45:00] Speaker A: He's the cash cow right now.
[00:45:03] Speaker B: He is not the cow in 2015.
[00:45:05] Speaker A: He's the cash cow.
Can't die.
[00:45:08] Speaker B: He was such the cash cow that they took anyway. Okay, hey, well, no spoilers on that note. Well, we had almost naked guys. We had dead multiplex guys, and we had dead baddies and a rescued little girl. So by the end of the day, I just don't know what we're complaining about here.
[00:45:34] Speaker A: Agent 37. That's what you're complaining about?
[00:45:37] Speaker B: Agent 37?
And on that note, I think that's a wrap for this episode of Funny book Forensics.
[00:45:49] Speaker A: You it say something.
I'm trying to turn it off. I'm trying.
