October '23 Reading Round Up & The Streaming Solution

 

Living in La Land these days is challenging to say the least, with the entertainment industry taking a serious nose dive with the debilitating strikes, homeless zombies and tents everywhere, prices soaring, traffic congesting and a general feeling of blecch. Hey, at least I can walk outside and bask in the glory of a pristine blue sky and 80 degrees during November. The city may be turning into a cross between Walking Dead and Escape from New York but at least we're not freezing our asses off! Although, I would argue that when it dips below 60 most Angelenos are freezing their asses off.

I've been ranting on my social media about the Actors Strike and how I feel that SAG is a bloated out of touch mafia organization that should be completely dismantled and reduced to rubble. Having 90% of its membership either out of work or not making enough (25k a year) to qualify for health insurance is unconscionable. It's not like this is anything new or that streaming caused these numbers, it's always been this way. How on earth is a Union allowed to exist when 90% of its members make bubkes or don't even work? If this was a Tony Soprano led Union you know damn well he'd be making sure his Goombahs were all hooked up and provided with copious amounts of Gabagool.

 

So with all this time on my hands I've been able to contemplate the mechanics that make up the entertainment world and I had a moment of enlightenment the other day regarding streaming services the other day: We need them to operate like comic books do.

Right now everybody has got a plus, plus this plus that blah blah blah. So you sign up for all these services and next thing you know you're paying over $100 a month for all these streaming channels. Most of the time you don't even watch them! I can't remember the last time I watched anything on Apple TV+ or Peacock or Netflix. I just used Hulu for like the first time in forever and Prime? I mean, I get Prime for the Devil's convenience of Doggie Jerky treats delivered next day to my Princess, the TV stuff, not so much. Here's my thought, why can't we treat streaming services the way we purchase comic books? 

We don't subscribe to DC or Marvel every month do we? Yuck, can you imagine given the amount of pure drivel they're pooping out to the masses these days. We don't have an Image subscription. If we want to eliminate titles from our pull at any moment it's our prerogative. So why can't we do that with streamers? Obviously it behooves them to have paid subscriptions to justify their budgets and satisfy shareholders but it's not a sustainable model for consumers. At some point you're going to cut off the fat. So let's say that Max is $15 a month. You don't see anything you want to watch on Max but Succession. Why can't you just purchase the Succession series from them while it's airing? If it's 10 episodes charge $3-4 per episode just like a comic book does. Hey if it's top shelf shit like Succession charge $5 or $6. Now before you get upset, yo, that's $50 for one TV show, think about it. You'll pay about $50 for a 12 issue comic book series right? Why not do the same for a show?? 

So if I paid $60 for Succession but don't subscribe to Max and never see anything else that piques my interest then I just paid $60 for a Max show rather than $180 for the year to subscribe to it. See where I'm going with this? If a show comes out on a streamer you don't subscribe to you should be able to pay for the single episode to check it out just like you would a comic book and if it sucks, as comics have been lately, you can drop it; no harm no foul. I believe some networks and streamers do this but clearly at this point in the game all should. Let's say a show is about to be released that seems great. They could charge $6 for the first episode or be like 'Hey buy the whole 8 episode season for $32! Get 3 episodes free!' It's like buying Trade Paperbacks of comics rather than single issues. Trades are usually $5 or sometimes $10 less than if you bought every issue one by one. 

The great thing about this approach is it puts the onus on streamers to create quality wow content rather than creating oodles of content for their subscribers to justify the monthly price. Of course you could still subscribe to streamers if you feel like you watch their stuff all the time but I'd prefer to have the choice to decide what I want to spend my $$$ on. For example, 'The Bear' Season 3 just got ordered. I would pay for that upfront in a heartbeat, yum, yum, yum, gimme gimme, but I would happily forgo the Hulu subscription since I don't use it. If I pay $500 a year for Streamers I'd rather take that $500 and divvy it up how I see fit. Maybe one month I'm dropping $200, maybe I'm not paying anything for 4 months; it's my choice. 

At some point this model will have to change because people are not going to continue to pay and pay and pay for what a channel or service deems to be it's 'premium content'. Dude, everything should be considered Premium Content. If you're calling something that you put out Premium that means you consider the stuff that's not called Premium to be mediocre or garbage, so why even make it? This is what's slowly happening to the Comic Book Universe. If you've noticed, comics are getting pricier. Well, seems to me that the pricer $5 and up comics are better: no ads, better creative teams, prestige format etc. The industry is basically creating their plus without telling you. The result for me is that I'm realizing that most $4 books are cheap trash while the ones with the price tags are worth my comic book interest. I am willing to pay $10 for a prestige bad ass comic provided that it's amazing versus $4 for run of the mill mind numbing hero nonsense.

It makes too much sense, which is why the Streamers will probably never operate in this manner, but at some point they may have to. In the meantime...just canceled Hulu, eff you Disney. I'll re-up when Bear Season 3 is out, maybe by that point your offices will have been swallowed up by a sinkhole like the image below and it'll be on another streamer.

Okay, that's enough for TV stuff, this is a Comic Book blog so let's recap a bunch of what I got into this past month...

 

Not gonna lie but Something Epic is hitting me hard. I’m not sure if this is a comic but rather a treatise on the whole idea of what creativity is and what it means to actualize one’s imagination into the real world. In examining these ideas Szymon Kudranski invokes the notion of a place where the imaginings of the physical world, that were never followed through on, exist in a specific reality outside of the realm of our senses. As an Artist, Comic, Writer and Performer I can relate to dozens if not hundreds upon hundreds of ideas of mine that never made it into the real world or are just sitting somewhere on a computer waiting to be completed. It’s made me commit more to what’s in front of me and to honor my imagination more and for a comic book to do that, that’s saying something.

 

As for the story, it’s started to veer off into a Disneyish quest by the lead as he makes his way through various challenges and realms while being guided by some old dude who’s seen ‘Epics’ like him before. The whole ‘World of Imagination’ becomes too ethereal, too empty, too muddy. It definitely feels a bit corny and less grounded but the book itself is transcending story so I’ll give it a pass and hope we find our way back to the physical world some time soon. Maybe this was an essay that Kurdranski turned into a comic. Maybe it should have stayed an essay? Maybe we can stop with this ‘End of Story Arc’ crap in comic books and just write a series until they come to an organic conclusion??? 

 

 

 

Barnstormers came to a fitting and satisfying end under the dutiful and competent navigation of Scott Snyder. Tula Lotay’s work on this book was absolutely beautiful and I will happily take in any pages she decides to work on going forward. She’s got one of those pricy DSTLRY books coming out at the end of the year and I will be all over it regardless of the premise. I was a bit surprised that this thick issue was only half story and half back matter. I guess they had to justify the price tag. I’m all for sketches and ‘Artist Notebook’ stuff, it can be interesting but a lot of times it feels like it’s just a a tool to knock out pages for content’s sake rather than as an extra bonus. I’m also don’t need to see the creative process for how you developed the logo of your book, that’s really neither a here nor there. Overall, really enjoyed this but could’ve used a little more smooching at the end.

 

 

 

The great thing about Rick Remender is that it’s crystal clear that he absolutely loves what he does and loves the medium of comic books. Despite the fact that some of his books have made it to the screen it still takes nothing away from his original concepts and desire to keep pumping out great stories for comics and comics alone. The Sacrificers is another fully realized unique world of the likes that we’ve never seen before with a tale that is both intriguing and rich in potential. It’s important to support comic dudes like Rick for tis’ dudes like this who maketh the world of comicdom a wondrous place to be. That being said, wondering what's going to happen to a kid that looks like a pigeon is, well, kinda weird.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well well well here we are with another hiatus for the ever brilliant Saga book. Given the fact that their stated end issue is 108 we’re basically looking at perhaps another 7 years for this tale to come to an end. Since Saga started back in 2012 that would mean it might be a whopping 18 years in sum total for BKV and Staples to knock out this run. Not that I’m necessarily complaining, I’ll take 18 years of Saga over six months of DC dropping 30 Bat Family Books that reek of stale mediocrity. I will say it does feel like this story is running its wheels in the mud at this point. Basically every month its someone looking for Alana, Hazel and the Bot kid and those three figuring a way out to survive, stay low and escape. Hopefully when it comes back next year there’ll be a renewed vigor to ramp up the excitement. In the meantime, their annual costume contest was a hoot although I disagree with their choice of 1^st place. I thought the 3rd place winners (Robot Kingdom Royalty) was by far the best.

A rather miserable retelling of Dicky D’s tragic life as an abused orphan in an orphanage is the gist of this Miracleman issue. Dicky continues his search to find out who he is with the help of a purple haired babe in an X-Men outfit while Double M sits in his Double M throne wondering where Dicky D is and perhaps if he smooched him too early. Maybe  the guy who wrote the smooch into the story in the first place made a huge mistake. Seeing as how he’s Miracle Man and he can jump into comic books or whatever medium he so chooses perhaps Neil is going to write about him jumping into his living room and walloping him in the chops for slowly turning this highly anticipated climactic ending into a snooze fest. Next issue is the final one, c’mon Gaiman, make it a humdinger or you will have ruined two major creative properties in the span of a couple years, one being the unwatchable Sandman Netflix series and now this.

 

 

 

I’m not sure if What’s the Furthest Place from Here is a work of genius or pure caca poo poo; it’s a fine line. It might be both, who knows. Despite it only being 15 issues in I feel like this book has been droning on for several years. It started off wonderfully then veered off into wackadoodleville after numerous issues that had backstories in them. I appreciate the fact that the last two issues at least attempted to get back to the main narrative but there’s still a whole lotta WTF going on. Maybe that’s what they’re counting on to keep us hooked, well, fuck, it’s working. Boss & Rosenberg are either doing enormous amounts of hallucinogenics while working on this comic or soberly crafting a story that will be dissected by Liberal Universities for years to come. All the main characters in this book have had the shit kicked out of them, unfortunately so have the readers. Wrap this up already guys, I’m dying here!

 

 

 

That cat's paw reaching out from the abyss in the latest installment from Monstress is exactly how I feel about this series. This comic has turn me into a complete and utter pussy, an undeniable wussbag. I should have the balls to just dump this comic as I have so many others that have been penned by a certifiable lunatic author who must be having major issues come up in her therapy sessions; and yet I can't. I've been through it all with this comic, it's been 8 long years at staring at seaweed eyes, pirate cats and lesbian psychopaths born from wolves. It seems like Liu injected a couple of pitch black panels to indicate she's returning back to the main plot. Maybe she actually went on a shroom bender and blacked out for a couple of days and her hubby Junot Diaz looked deep in her eyes when she came to and said 'Baby, it's time to return to the main narrative and wrap this puppy up'. That's why there's another hiatus for this comic, it's going to take Liu several months to cry about the painful journey she's put her readers through before she starts writing. It's okay Marj, I get it, but no more prison colonies and flying cat statues in outer space mmkay?

That's all I got people! I've got some big ol' prestige issues to dive into including Christian Ward's Batman and 'Gone', DSTLRY's first comic by Jock. 

Happy reading...