Futures End

"52" was great, you
should probably read it.

DC's “52” was a fantastic success, both financially and critically. It was a weekly series that went a full year, an endeavour never done before. After the events of "Infinite Crisis" Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman take a hiatus and we are treated to a collection of stories that showcase characters in the DC universe that usual do not get too much attention. Steel and his daughter had to deal with Lex Luthor trying to give a bunch of teenagers superpowers. The Question was dying of cancer and he recruited Rene Montoya to replace him. A new Batwoman was introduced and she had to fight some crazy crime cult. Will Magnus was recruited by some crazy bitch to help make a weapon of mass destruction. Animal Man, Starfire and Adam Strange were lost in space. The best story was Black Adam causing World War Three, which was Black Adam versus EVERYBODY. And all these stories tied together, more or less, with Booster Gold using time travel to fake his own death so he could go undercover and save the entire universe from Mister Mind. All in all I would give DC's 52 a solid ten out of ten, a must read for any die hard comic book or super hero fan.

The success and popularity of “52” encouraged DC to try to do it again. They repeated the strategy of telling multiple stories at once with a weekly title again with "Countdown to Final Crisis." This time the stories were about Jimmy Olsen suddenly acquiring super powers and Donna Troy, Jason Todd, and everyone's least favourite Green Lantern Kyle Rayner going on a search for Ray Palmer, for some reason. Karate kid was in there somewhere. It was awesome when Orion killed Darkseid. I do not remember it as well as I should, I read it a long time ago now and frankly it was pretty bad, other than Orion punching a hole in Darkseid's chest. Lightning did not strike twice.

DC tried again to work magic with a weekly title called "Trinity" which I did not read, "Countdown to Final Crisis" had sapped my confidence in DC's ability to write a good ongoing weekly title. I believe "Trinity" was about three characters from parallel universes attempting to usurp Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, somehow. I heard it was not very good.

The stuff of nightmares.

With the "New 52" DC universe doing just about everything wrong, DC has used up a lot of my goodwill towards them, but they still have Geoff Johns writing stories so I am still a customer of theirs. As a consumer of DC products I got sight of an ad for "Futures End." The ad was gruesome; many of our favourite heroes were mutilated cyborg zombies. Wonder Woman's face was most horrible; an uncomfortable level of detail had been made where flesh ended and cold steal had replaced it. It was well drawn, and that made it worse. It looked like tasteless garbage at first but it did capture my attention, I was curious. I Googled "Futures End" and the draft art was diabolic in its depiction of our heroes as cyborg zombies, and it all looked trashy, trashy like Marvel Zombies. One thing I thought was particularly interesting was the title "Futures End," note the lack of an apostrophe, this is not the end of the future, but the end of multiple futures. That is actually quite clever. I was ready to dismiss “Futures End” as shock jock garbage but they were offering up the first issue, number 0, for free on free comic book day.

Okay then DC, I’ll bite. I will accept your free comic book.

The first free issue was largely what you would expect, cringe worthy deformities of fallen heroes whose corpses had been perverted into machine zombies. However there was some glimmer of hope, not just in the story’s set up, which involved Batman Beyond Terry McGinnis going back in time to stop this nightmare, but there was a glimmer of hope that there was actually a story somewhere within all this degenerate murder of out favorite heroes. The primary problem with something like “Marvel Zombies” was that all it was, was uncomfortable visuals, there was literally no story, or a story so fucking terrible there was no point in telling it. How did zombies destroy the Avengers and the X-men? That could be an exciting story, but no, just everyone’s a zombie, end of story. Lame. “Futures End” had some heroes still alive and fighting even at the age of ruin where the story began.

The Flash died fighting. He destroyed cyborg zombie Wonder Woman and Hawk before being overwhelmed by Frankenstein who had grafted Black Canary’s head to his chest so he could use her sonic boom voice. That was... something.

We see the skeleton corpses of Death Stroke and Green Lantern on Themyscira, so it is implied that they too died fighting and managed to avoid the dark fate of having their corpses desecrated by Brother Eye.

Green Lantern John Stewart and Blue Beetle Jaime Reyes get taken out by cyborg zombie Superman and Amazo, not a lot of shame in that.

Two characters I did not recognize Grifter and Amethyst report to Batman before their untimely demise at the hands of newly ruined cyborg zombie John Stewart.

Firestorm was still alive, albeit a prisoner to Brother Eye who used him as a power source. So there is some hope there.

Lastly Batman did not just lie down and die either. He even managed to make a time travel device, because comic books.

The free issue left me with some sense of curiosity. Surely Batman Beyond would prevent this future from ever happening, but it looked like there would be a gradually build up to this cataclysm, and that... that could be interesting.

I thought “whatever I could drop the title at any time, so sure I’ll buy the first few issues, see what happens.” Now I’ve bought them all. “So I guess it was good right?” is probably what you are asking, hold on, we’ll get to that... but the answer is no.

There are effectively six stories that intertwine over the course of the series, but upon reflection, they actually bleed together more than I initially wanted to give the story credit for.

For example we follow Lois Lane at first as she is investigating the identity of a bar tender named Cal, who it just so happens to be Tim Drake, the former Robin. Lois’s story eventually departs from Tim’s altogether and she end up investigating events that eventually lead her into Grifter’s story line, while Tim’s relationship with a girl named Madison leads him into Firestorm’s story line, but ultimately he ends up part of Batman Beyond’s story line. So there is some good overlap there.

Lois’s story really just setups up other people’s stories, Tim’s, Captain Marvels, and she is witness to what should have been Grifter’s concluding arch.

SPOILERS! ALL OF THEM! You’ve been warned.

I really liked this cover, but it kind of
doesn't fit once you know the twist.

It would have to be considered a side story at most but Superman is wearing a mask at the beginning of this story and acting strangely. I would like to pat myself on the back for figuring this one out. It was clear to everyone reading “Futures End” that this Superman was not the real Superman, but who was it? It was Captain Marvel, the two hints that gave it away for me was how immature Superman was acting, and also how strangely absent Captain Marvel was from the whole series. Slam dunk for me, full points.

Meanwhile;

Grifter is apparently a character from a rival comic book universe DC has acquired. I am not new to this song and dance routine so yeah that’s cool, I can dig it. At first I thought Grifter’s story line was the best. Grifter can detect the presence of super natural powers or something, it was not very well explained; the important thing was that he could tell normal human beings from cyborg zombies. In the first issue he breaks into a house and kills everyone inside and watches their corpses erode into vapor, and it was cool. It had the whole Captain Harlock kicking in the doors and killing Mazones. What? Is that reference to obscure, okay, it had a whole “I am Legend” feel, like it was setting up Grifter to be one of the sole survivors for the reasons of his powers, his actions early on to stop all this cyborg zombie shit, and true grit. Too bad none of that happened to him.

Grifter’s storyline was easily the worst. First he quickly gets abducted and brought to Cadmus Island where he spends half of his time being Death Stroke’s bitch and the other half of the time being a new character Fifty Sue’s bitch. Not a great introduction to the character Grifter DC.

Fifty Sue is a Frankenstein (not to be confused with Frankenstein who is a character in this) monster made with the genetics of all the hero refugees from Earth 2, since that has now been destroyed. She appears to be able to manipulate... all reality I guess; she is pretty damn powerful. However despite, her actual age, whatever that may be, she takes the form of a little girl, and is obsessed with finding a family for herself.

The climax, if we dare call it that, is when Green Arrow, who faked his death in Firestorm’s story line, (more on that later), and Red Arrow and Big Barda from Earth 2 attack Cadmus, that story line basically ends for Grifter, at least it should. My main girl, Power Girl is killed in battle against Big Barda as Brother Eye had taken her body, her powerful, sexy body, as his primary cyborg zombie, for lack of a better description; which is sad because I miss Power Girl, and seeing die horribly is the only thing I have seen of her in years now.

“But Colin, Power Girl is in Earth 2 comics.” Shut up! I’m not reading some convoluted fan fiction that somehow got published also that series is over now.

Grifter spends the rest of the series slowly inching towards become the surrogate father to Fifty Sue with Lana Lang from Earth 2, god comics are weird, as the surrogate mother. It was stupid, but worst then that it was boring, a complete waste of time.

Meanwhile,

I was introduced to Amethyst through
"Futures End,"  Evidently I do not
know a lot about her.

Frankenstein, the green monster, who is a regular sword wielding adventure in the DC universe, ends up in space with Amethyst and the Atom. They go to investigate the pointless deaths of new characters Storm Watch, again, great introduction DC, solar powered gay Russian superman sounded like an interesting character, guess I’ll never know. I guess I could track down “Strom Watch” comics but still. Anyway they all got killed by Galactus/Brainiac, and the three of them need to go figure it out.

Atom cuts off Hawkman’s arm and uses it as a replacement for Frankenstein who lost his arm fighting Black Adam in the phantom zone. Also Hawkman is there. Also Hawkman is the only one to survive, at least at first. Hawkman walked off getting blown up, left a drift in outer space and getting his arm hacked off. He grows a new arm rather quickly and is good to go. I like Hawkman, but I do not remember him being indestructible, oh well, at least I have another character to root for.

Behold Galacus Brainiac.

They run into Brainiac, but not the old Brainiac, this Brainiac is some kind of space god, like Galactus.

Anyway, Brainiac being some kind of super deadly space deity is actually a really good expansion of this character, so that’s cool. They escape and they get back to Earth with a little help from Black Adam. Whatever, this story arc is fine I guess.

Oh and Engineer, whoever the hell that is, also survived.

I should also mention that Hawkman’s blood, traced with the Nth metal, apparently, begins to “heal” Frankenstein, turning him human once more. Amethyst tries to save him, but fails. Frankenstein dies which raises a suspicious question as to when and how could he turn evil with Brother Eye and kill Black Canary and then eventually kill the Flash. Continuity error?

Meanwhile,

John Constantine is... fuck what was he even doing in this series? At some point he finds the real Superman talks to him disrespectfully for no reason and then Brainiac shows up and Superman goes to fight him with Captain Marvel and friends. The only thing Constantine was even here for was to tell Superman that Brainiac was coming, but we did not need him to do that. As readers we knew Brainiac was coming because Frankenstein and friends encountered him in space. Constantine’s presence in “Futures End” was pointless, stupid, and maybe even worse than Grifter’s storyline, but I guess his title was also canceled so they had to cram him in there somewhere.

Meanwhile,

Firestorm is a in a bad way. During the war, the war, that one, where Earth 2 was destroyed, Ronnie Raymond’s mother was killed. Struggling with his loss he fails to meet up with Jason Rusch to form Firestorm in time to help Green Arrow, resulting in Green Arrow’s death; only not really because he’s faking it as I mentioned earlier; which is kind of a dick thing to do, because it totally messes up both Jason and Ronnie and they really fight with each other over it. Way to go poorly written Green Arrow.

Jason and Ronnie agree to never become Firestorm again, but over time Ronnie gets over himself and attempts to reach out to Ronnie so they can become a powerful superhero again. This reveals to Professor Yamazake Jason’s true identity and he has a grudge against the Justice League, and blah and blah, long story short he becomes Dr. Polaris, which would be cool if they did anything with him thereafter. Also Ronnie dies and Madison becomes the new second half of Firestorm. Who is Madison? I’m glad you asked.

Meanwhile;

After being outed by Lois Lane as Tim Drake, also known as Robin, Cal the bartender, decides to reveal his true identity to his girlfriend Madison, who did not take it well.

If I were a comic book character,
I would look exactly like this.

I really liked Tim Drake in this series. I am not a huge fan of Robin, or even the incarnation of Robin which Tim Drake represents, but I do like seeing sidekick characters grow up and become their own person. This is why I like Dick Grayson so much more as Nightwing, and why I could never go back to seeing Wally West as Kid Flash. Seeing Tim Drake as a young man with a full beard, trying to live a normal life but deep down is a super ninja super hero is cool. I can dig it. But I should also admit one of the reasons I liked Tim so much is that he looks like me. Beat up, haggard, bearded version of Tim Drake, looks kind of like me, and that was neat, at least for me.

The whole relationship between Tim and Madison is handled well. She has trust issues because she has had to live her whole life as a lie because her father sold weapons and collaborated with Apocalypse during the war, and upon discovering her boy friend, Cal the bartender, is actually one of the most recognizable super heroes in DC continuity, this feels like a great betrayal. Then zap, she is Firestorm, which as you can imagine is a challenge to their already complicated relationship.

Meanwhile;

While everyone else is wasting our time with plots that abruptly end and nothing of consequence in DC continuity proper or even in relevance to this obvious parallel dimension; the storyline that actually matters is taking place involving Terry McGinnis, aka Batman Beyond.

After arriving in the past Terry is attacked by a lone cyborg zombie that travelled backward in time with him. He defeats this abomination and places the now two time dead corpse in a shopping cart whilst posing as a homeless person. However Terrific Tech video tapes the ordeal and Mr. Terrific, along with Brother Eye, are very interested in the new Batman.

During a confrontation with... someone, I do not exactly recall who, but I am confident Mr. Terrific was involved somehow, Batman Beyond loses the corpse of the future cyborg zombie and it just so happens to be the ruined remains of the super villain named Plastique, and it just so happens she is present to see what sad remains are her future self. I chose to ignore the un-likeliness that Plastique just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time to see her future cyborg zombie self, and chose instead to enjoy the self horror of this development.

The future ain't pretty.

Plastique, Key, and Coil were planning a heist of Terrific Tech, and they encounter Batman Beyond who convinces them to bring him along. Terry has the obvious objective of stopping Brother Eye. While Key and Coil attempt to rob the place, Plastique searches the premise to find her future self. This was a good moment, it was dark and Plastique did not know how to absorb what she was seeing. Terry takes some pity on her and gets her out of there before Terrific Tech security can capture them.

A rather believable romance spurs between Terry and Plastique, and all and all, I liked Plastique. I know she is an old villain and I doubt this version of her has anything to do with past incarnations, but I liked her look, it was distinct, I like how she dealt with the nightmare situation “Futures End” presented to her, and I liked her relationship with Terry.

Probably my favorite cover from the series.

I also liked Terry’s story arc as a whole. It was the only story that consistently made me give a shit about “Futures End.” There was a connection to a real tragedy that demanded resolution, and his story, had tension throughout. Throw in a love interest like Plastique and we get someone seeing Terry from outside and this helps the reader’s perspective insight into the man and the situation Terry is faced with. It was good, not great, but completely satisfying.

Realizing he needs help he comes to Tim Drake since he apparently stops existing soon according to future files. That’s interesting.

Ultimately;

Superman and others stop Brainaic, obviously, but this is the moment Brother Eye also takes over and finally, oh god finally, starts making cyborg zombies for our heroes to fight.

I forgot to mention future Brother Eye, knowing Terry/Batman Beyond went back in time to stop him decided to mutilate Batman (Bruce Wayne) into a time traveling cyborg assassin, but not a zombie. No, that would be too damn normal, he grafts Joker’s head to the back of his and I guess gives Mr. J control of their new cyborg body. It is pretty fucked up. Anyway after a few attempts Joker/Batman/cyborg/time traveler/assassin succeeds in killing Terry. It was sad.

But remember Tim Drake, should cease to exist soon, so this is enough of a hint to our heroes that Tim Drake, who I will remind looks like a comic book version of me, Colin Kelly, King of Braves, must take up the mantle of Batman Beyond and travel back in time and stop Brother Eye. Batman (Bruce Wayne) doesn’t like it, and he doesn’t get along with Tim/me anymore, but he can’t stop Tim from travelling back in time and trying to convince Brother Eye that he needs to destroy himself in the past before he destroys everything in the future. That is the second last issue.

Holy crap, I am Batman Beyond now.

In the last issue Tim/me is faced with a statue of heroes he fought alongside with and finds his cute redhead girl friend Madison tending to the plants around his statue. They embrace, but it is an illusion, Brother Eye being an asshole. Mr. Terrific, of the future, interrupts and explains to Tim/me that he failed, and you could not stop Brother Eye because he exists outside of time or something.

Then the cyborg zombies come pouring in and I’m all like “ah shit, I don’t know if I can stop all these super hero and super villain cyborg zombies by myself.” When suddenly a stranger with a huge blaster appears and takes out Flash cyborg zombie, which is a continuity error since he was killed by Black Canary’s sonic boom voice in issue zero, or maybe it is not, I don’t know.

We get some nice dialogue from the stranger,

Mr. Terrific: “Where did you come from?”

Stranger: “I’ve been here the whole time, waiting for you.”

Then he disappears, and once the cyborg zombies start creeping up on Mr. Terrific and me again the stranger reappears and destroys cyborg zombie Blue Beetle, and I am thinking, “alright! We are finally fighting the cyborg zombies. This story is finally worth it.”

The stranger is Ray Palmer, The Atom, alright someone survived the horrors of this future, I can’t wait to stop Brother Eye with his help!

A bunch of renegades come crashing in and rescue Mr. Terrific and me, and Brother Eye destroys the whole city trying to stop us but we escape on a subway train. Once we are safe the identity of one of the renegades is revealed to be Madison, which might be a continuity error because she was Firestorm and Firestorm in issue zero is a prisoner and power source for Brother Eye. So Tim/me makes out with his mature girl friend which is both weird and wonderful and then we get down to business.

Mr. Terrific states that Brother Eye cannot be stopped but I am like, no, “Brother Eye hasn’t won yet.”

Cool.

The end.

What the fuck do you mean “the end?”

Batman Beyond/Tim Drake/Colin Kelly, was finally beginning to go forth on the story I wanted to read in the first place. I wanted someone to stop Brother Eye and put an end to the cyborg zombie madness. However, “Futures End” is over, at first I just assumed there would be a few more issues, but alas, it’s done. The finally note is Tim/me, stating that Brother Eye was not victorious and I was looking forward to seeing how I was going to stop him.

Is this story continued in “Convergence?” I had leafed through the pages of the first few issues on the shelf at the comic book store and while I did see a few cyborg zombies in issue two, I did not see Batman Beyond or old man Ray Palmer anywhere.

Is this story continued in “Batman Beyond?” Possibly but I have not heard about it yet.

What the hell DC?

I would claim the open ending to be daring, however, this is obviously a parallel universe. I highly doubt DC plans to stick with the ultimate end for Superman and Wonder Woman to die terrible deaths at the hand, figuratively, of Brother Eye and then desecrate their corpses into hideous abominations of a twisted design. That would literally be spitting in the faces of everyone who has ever given a shit about any super hero in the DC universe. So why not conclude you’re elaborate what if?

I do not know. I do not get it.

“Futures End” was barely good enough to keep me interested from issue to issue. Each issue did barely enough to keep me going and the only storyline I truly cared about did not conclude.

I got some tongue and cheek pleasure out of comparing myself to Tim Drake, so much so, it is the punch line of this review, but that is hyper specific to me. If you remove that jag of fun that I managed to wrangle out of this series I do not see much too really enjoy.

This is a breaking point for me.

The “New 52” is bad. I miss Power Girl. I miss Wally West. I miss Amanda Waller. I miss Superman being married to Lois Lane. I don’t agree with literally anything DC has done in the last few years.

I am very picky about which comic book titles I purchase, because I am not made of money, but also because I am a firm believer in voting with your wallet.  I distrust most titles available to me, especially when a cheap trick is employed to capture my attention.  Someone is dying, or dead.  Someone is now gay.  Someone is now black somehow.  Someone is now a woman somehow.  Everyone is a zombie.  This last one was clearly the trick employed for "Futures End," and for once I fell for it.

That is not to say that a good, or possibly even a great story line cannot emerge from what appears at first to be a cheap ploy, but let us be honest here, if comic book writers are reduced to employing such cheap tactics, they probably do not have a quality product to back it up.  In the case of "Futures End" they did not.  The most exciting thing by far was the nightmare future where everyone was a cyborg zombie.  Visiting that nightmare world could result in a fun story if there was in fact a story ready to be acted out, but they pulled the trigger and ended the series before that happened.

"Futures End" broke me.  One of the things I liked about DC was that, in my opinion, they were less guilty of using cheap tactics to sell comics then Marvel.  It felt like DC treated their heroes with more respect then Marvel, but "Futures End" kind of fell into the same trashy territory I have unfortunately come to expect from Marvel, and it shook my trust in DC.  To be fair "Futures End" is more or less a decent read, and it is far from the worst thing out there right now, but I, like I said, I am picky, and apparently I need to be a little pickier when it comes to DC.  The reality is they really are no more innocent then Marvel, they just had a better last decade, at least if you ask me they did.

Geoff Jones is still my homeboy, I'll buy anything with his name on it, but for the rest of the staff at DC you got your work cut out for you, because the purchasing power of one just got a lot less willing to part with his money.

Better luck next time, I guess that goes for all of us.  If anyone knows if Tim Drake as Batman Beyond makes any more appearances let me know.  I am curious if I make it out of this okay.

- King of Braves

Sonic Boom

I dream of Sonic Booms.

Also double leg sweeps and Flash Kicks, with a healthy mix of swinging back fists and upside down kicks.

I love Street Fighter. There is probably no game I have poured more hours into than Super Street Fighter Two for the Super Nintendo. This is also a game that I spent a lot of time playing with others, primarily my big brother who was always just that much better than me, but I was only one who was good enough to really give me a real challenge out of everybody else when we were kids, so we would play over a hundred matches routinely, like three to four times a week there for a few years. I would often get frustrated with how good my brother was and how difficult it was for me to beat him, but the game kept a score and I usually managed to win approximate twenty five percent of the time, which in retrospect is reasonably competitive.

One of the things that make my brother and me particularly good at Street Fighter is our encyclopedia like knowledge of every character’s move set and the priority of which moves have over others. One of the reasons we are probably not the best Street Fighter players in the world, though my brother is probably pretty close, is that we never got accustomed to, or happy with, the inclusion of super-super moves. Whenever we compete against other people who are really good we typical beat them in the strong majority of exchanges but we struggle to overcome the damage they can dish out with some overly convoluted super-super move. I guess we are just too old school.

My favorite character is Guile. I liked the whole military strong man thing. His very unique hair gave him extra personality. His story line of wanting to avenge the death of his best friend Charlie was cool, and it gave him personal reason to hate M. Bison, which in turn gave the player extra motivation to defeat the end boss. I also really like his skill set. I do my best with characters with powerful counter attacks and the nature of having to hold backwards or down for two seconds is a game mechanic that is best used for counter attacks like Sonic Boom and Flash Kick, so I am pretty good with Guile. Even though the Sonic Boom is a projectile and should be used as such it is also a very effective counter attack at close range. I am also very good with M. Bison, Balrog, E. Honda, and Blanka. Ironically if I had to pick a Street Fighter team of two that I would perform with best with it would probably be Guile and M. Bison.

One of my favorite tactics is to block a melee attack and counter with a Sonic Boom, since I am already holding back, and then immediately follow up with fierce punch or upside down kick, aggressive players have a tendency to walk into these sorts of attacks, and defensive players turtle up and Guile has a lot of quick lunging forward attacks that are perfect for just picking at someone. I also really like using Guile’s double leg sweep to bait people into using a jumping attack on me which I of course counter with a flash kick because I am already holding down, this works exceptional well when you mix in the low medium kick which is a single attack and you can throw a Sonic Boom at them if they do not jump at you. In Street Fighter Four they gave Guile this downward hooking punch when you are pressing forward and use the medium punch which can hit opponents who are blocking low, which I have gotten really good with getting into people’s heads and mixing up low leg kicks and that punch. God just thinking about reminds me how awesome Guile is.

Anyway you can understand that I have an almost intimate understanding and knowledge of the Street Fighter characters and their moves, most notably Guile and M. Bison, so sometimes when I dream and I find myself in a confrontation my mind naturally slips back to Street Fighter and I start throwing out Sonic Booms and plenty of double leg sweep/Flash Kick combos. This happens a lot, like almost once a week, and it has been happening for years. The craziest thing is I have not played Street Fighter Four in at least six months. The game just stuck with me forever.

It is almost comedic the sort of connection I have with the Street Fighter Two roster. I do not play much of any video games anymore at all, but when Street Fighter Four did come out while I really liked it because we saw the return of the majority of my favorite characters I struggled to appreciate characters like C. Viper, Abel, and Juri, they are weird, especially Juri, but mostly I have no idea what their moves are and the disparity of my knowledge of characters like Ryu, Chun Li, and Sagat, when compared to my ignorance of these new characters almost feels like are from a different game. I imagine they are good characters that I just never got used to them since I barely play any video games anymore. I was uncomfortable with many of the characters from Street Fighter Three at first but grew to really like Alex, Dudley, Hugo and all three of the new girls. That may be the funniest thing, I am very detatched from the entire genre of video games but Street Fight and Guile remain at least somewhat on the forefront of my mind and imagination.

I worry one day I am going to get in a drunken fight where I am very drunk and I think it is natural to go for a double leg sweep/Flash Kick combo, or worse believe I can actual throw a Sonic Boom.

I dream of Sonic Booms.

- King of Braves

20th Century Boys - The Greatest Manga Ever

For the span of my lifetime anime has been very popular. The novelty of violence and nudity being present in a children’s cartoon rocked many people’s world and from that anime’s popularity outside of Japan grew. It was only a matter of time before the source material for many anime became popular in North America and the rest of the world, and the well spring for many Japanese cartoons is manga, their equivalent of comic books.

For whatever reason I never really got into manga, and as a consequence I have not read very much of it, however I am one hundred present confident that Naoki Urasawa is the greatest manga writer of all time. Furthermore Urasawa’s magnum opus “20th Century Boys” named after the famous T-Rex song, is the greatest manga of all time.

It is instantly obvious the title of Urasawa’s twenty-two volume manga series is named after the 1973 glam rock hit “20th Century Boy.” Read more about it here: http://colinkellymusicinreview.blogspot.ca/2014/04/trex-20th-century-boy.html

The influence of Marc Bolan on Japan’s music scene, and apparently creative storytelling, may not be astronomical but still substantial enough to surprise us casual westerns. In fact glam rock, along with the rest of classic rock, was very popular in Japan. While the central themes and story of Urasawa’s “20th Century Boys” has little to do with any possible literal interpretation of Bolan’s music the series is still named after it. The symbolic meaning of Bolan’s music however, along with the music of Bob Dylan and John Lennon, carries a cultural significance capturing the spirit of the 1960 and 1970’s that lingers in the hearts and minds of all our central characters in Urasawa’s “20th Century Boys.” The theme of being a “20th century boy” is something of a central symbolic conflict between the heroes and the villain “Friend.” There is also something of an internal conflict with the antagonist “Friend” as he feels he himself is the “true” “20th century boy.”

It is very common for aspects of art to mean something to the audience that has little to do with its actual expressed meaning. Many songs become timepieces for many people; the song will remind them more about the time in life when they discovered the song than the song itself. A song that was a hit when we were young will remind us of when we were young and this is exactly the case for Urasawa and his protagonists in “20th Century Boys.” Our main cast all grew up in the 60’s and 70’s and as such the music of that time meant a lot to them, as did giant robots like Tetsujin 28, the moon landing, and manga; which is kind of meta. This all plays into Urasawa’s strength as a writer, he is not only writing about things he knows a lot about, but he is also able to express his own youthful admiration for these things and how they influence his adult life and creativity, which is projected onto his characters, which again is kind of meta. Also, if Urasawa has only one strength as a writer, and he has several, but if I had to pick one that really stands out, it is how he fleshes out all of his characters and makes all of them very relatable, and for me, personally, I feel like Kenji Endou the main character of “20th Century Boys” and his friends are basically me and my friends.

Kenji Endou is invincible.

Kenji Endou is our main-main character. He is the leader of the group both when they are kids and when they are adults and must face off against a threat to mankind that only they are uniquely equipped to deal with. Kenji loves rock and roll, and as a youth he tried being the front man of a band but he never got anywhere. As an adult he ended up the owner of a convenience store taking care of his niece and mother. It is all too easy to relate to Kenji. I myself personally feel like we have almost everything in common except circumstance.  We share common interest, youthful hijinx, and unrealized dreams of high adventure, and the way all these things affected us both in our youths and adulthoods is comparable.

In their youth our main characters go to a grassy field where they tie together a series of the long strands to form a small makeshift hut, that is very well hidden, what being made of grass, and being in a large grassy field. This grass hideaway becomes the young boy’s base of operations where they can read comic books, listen to a radio that plays rock and roll, and also share scraps of pornography with each other. This base is a hugely successively idea because the twin bullies they are constantly at ends with, Mabo and Yanbo, are unable to find it... at first. Once the base is destroyed by the twins Kenji goes to stand up to them and under his leadership the kids unite and defeat the bullies. In the three part movie adaptation the second movie rolls its credits with black and white footage of the kids successfully fighting off Mabo and Yanbo to the score of T.Rex – “20th Century Boy.” It’s perfect, I can’t find a clip but believe me it’s perfect.

The main cast of “20th Century Boys” grew up in the outskirts of Toyko, or maybe rural Japan, and their friendships are all built around common interests and shared adventures, they create a fictional story about how they will save the world from a group of evil terrorists that involves a new virus that makes people bleed through their skin, the destruction of an airport in Tokyo and an attack from a giant robot. Many years later, when they have all grown up, events around the world start to unfold strikingly similar to the ideas they invented for their fantasy adventure. Eventually Kenji notices this symbol at one of the recent crime scenes:

This symbol is very familiar to Kenji and at his high school reunion he asks his friends about it and they all confirm that it had something to do with their little group when they were kids. Someone in the group recalls they buried a box of their stuff near the tree in the grassy field where they used to play, so they decide to go dig it up and this is what they find:

And it turns out some asshole named “Friend” has adopted the image for himself.

Now the real mystery becomes who could Friend possibly be? This person obviously knows Kenji and his friends, and he had to have known them when they were young because he is somehow re-enacting the events of their storybook fantasy. The virus that makes people bleed through their skin has hit Africa, and there are two more places that will be hit next and Kenji should know, only he would never think to apply his childhood imagination to the unfolding events of real life, at least not until he is prompted to by a turncoat from Friend’s organization.

"It's too stupid."

This is my single favorite moment in the entire series, Kenji realizing he knows exactly what’s happening and just how stupid it is that he knows. From this point the quest begins to stop Friend from destroying the world and it is the greatest manga ever.

When I finished watching the movies I told a friend of mine he had to watch it. I told him he would be able to relate to it on all points, because my friend and I lived very similar childhoods to Kenji and his friends. Now someone might find it strange that I can relate to a Japanese fictional character who for the most part is a self insertion of an older Japanese man, but I think we often focus far too much on the trivial difference between borders and generations, we tend to forget how much we have in common and just how often that occurs.

For example;

I am rather fond of Chris Rock’s “Everybody Hates Chris” and not just because it is a funny show, but also because I feel like it strongly reflects my own childhood. Some people might scoff at the idea that a white Canadian growing up in rural Alberta could relate to an African American growing up in urban Brooklyn, but I think they are missing a commonalty among human beings. We all have childhoods filled with struggles and moments of growth, most of us have families and siblings, and most of us fight with them sometimes, most of us make weird friends, deal with bullies, form awkward crushes, and make a lot of humorous mistakes along the way. We all deal with growing up when we are kids. Most of us have a lot in common.

Additionally there are specific moments in “Everybody Hates Chris” that remind me of my youth perfectly. Like the time their dad buys a very large amount of sausages when a good deal comes his way and they end up eating sausage for dinner every night for multiple weeks straight, that happened to my family, exactly the same way.

So yes, Chris Rock’s childhood seems a lot like mine. It’s almost like we are both human beings.

Now I know that apparently kids growing up in Japan were just like my friends and me.

My childhood was insanely similar to Kenji Endou’s. It might seem a touch strange that another country, a generation before my own, could share effectively ever single aspect in common, but we do. Kenji and Shogun might as well be me and my friend watching the movie adaptations. Every point of the plot every character development of every character felt like someone real, someone I knew, and something I was a part of, and this is why “20th Century Boys” is the greatest manga ever, or at least why I feel so strongly about it. It feels like the sort of story I would wish I could have written.

“20th Century Boys” has several highly effective hooks aside from being so easily perfectly relatable. We all want to believe we are special, and more often than not most want that to be the default position. In “20th Century Boys” we have highly relatable characters, who for all intents and purposes might well be us, made uniquely special by the crazy circumstance of Friend’s terrorism on the world. Imagine someone took something unique about you and used it as a weapon against civilization, and since the inspiration and strategy for all this is coming directly from your mind, you alone are uniquely equipped to deal with it? When this necessary heroism is thrust upon our protagonist we the viewers have to pause and wonder how we would react, because while the plot is outlandish, it is also impossible not to self insert ourselves into Kenji’s shoes and wonder what if? It is a very personal narrative, perhaps specific to the writer’s personal interests and characteristics, yet wholly universal. A self insertion so perfect anyone and everyone can relate and partake in the fantastic adventure.

Friend is such a great villain, because I hate him. Hating Friend is completely unavoidable; he is stealing the innocent ideas of a bunch of great kids and perverted them into a weapon to destroy the world. He is mocking our heroes by taking what was theirs and making it unmitigated evil. And for him it’s just a god damn game.

Then, just to pander to me specifically even more, our hero Kenji, after much struggle, manages to save the world with rock and roll... sort of. He unites the world with a song called “Bob Lennon” named so because his niece Kanna keeps getting the two legends names’ mixed up. Everything about those last two sentences sounds like the perfect series of events to my life, if I could choose it.

Bob Lennon

Best manga ever.

- King of Braves

Hell - A Self Damning Empty Threat

Hell as in visioned by Hieronymus Bosch

We have all been engaged in a political or philosophical conversion that turned ugly at one point or another. Casual debates can turn personal and when emotions boil over personal attacks often begin. It seems whenever religion is involved in these sorts of dialogues sooner or later, someone religious will say “you’re going to hell” or something suggesting the person who disagrees with them will, and should, suffer in the afterlife.

The first and perhaps most obvious problem with shouting “you’re going to hell” is that this is in no way an argument for or against whatever is being discussed regardless of the topic. The events of the afterlife are irrelevant to our on goings here in waking life, and who gets to go to heaven or hell hardly matter while we are alive. We are all brothers and sisters on earth and all our lives are equal in every moral, political, and lawful sense. Surely cooperation and reason should be the only criteria for us to consider when working through our current living condition, as that is the only way to be just. If we are being judged this is also our safest bet, we greatly increase our chances of being judged positively, you know, by doing our best. The afterlife is, at best, anyone’s guess, or more realistically, imaginary.

If we pause for a moment we can quickly identify “you’re going to hell” for what it really is; a threat of violence. Not a threat of ordinary violence either but rather a threat of infinite and endless violence. If someone were to utter a death threat legal action could be taken. Globally human civilization frowns upon murder as the single worst thing someone can do to another, so much so, that verbally expressing intent to kill is typically enough to be considered a criminal offensive. But if we are to compare the threat of death to the threat of hell we see there is no comparison, hell is literally infinitely worse. Hell is not just murder, it is endless murder. Hell is not just torture it is torment unimaginable by humans. Hell is the worst torture we can think of, multiplied by infinite, and multiplied by infinite again when we consider that it is meant to last forever. Hell is the worst thing ever times by infinity squared.

We people have a word to describe someone who uses violence and threats to pressure someone else into going along with them, we call it bullying. The only reason this kind of bullying often flies under the radar is that no sane person takes it seriously. It is asking a lot from any of us to accept the threat of hell as palpable since regardless of the argument we are obviously already in disagreement about the characteristics of god and the afterlife. They might as well threaten someone with an imaginary gun. But they think this nonsense is deadly real, so they are sincere in their threat and they are intentionally using fear tactics to bully us into agreeing with them, and they are stupid enough to think it will work. This kind of bullying only has a high level of success towards children and the mentally meek, both of which still require great ignorance in order to be duped. So being threatened with hell is not only monstrously offensive but also somewhat indirectly insulting to our intelligence.

The threat of hell is empty, but perhaps more so than we may have fully realized. The existence of the afterlife demands three very huge and dubious premises:

First, there is a nonphysical celestial realm of existence, even though there is absolutely no evidence to suggest such a thing exists and no reason to justify such a thing as tangible let alone probable.

Second, human existence contains some kind of energy that is connected to this above mentioned celestial realm and returns to it in death. Again there is no evidence for such energy’s existence and no reason to think such a thing as believable or that it would behave this way.

Lastly, and most damning, is an identity crisis. We know enough about neuroscience to understand how memories and emotions are created and how they can be manipulated. The specifics are unclear and it would be inhumane to have test subjects assist in investigating the matter further since the odds of them surviving the test is questionable. Nonetheless look no further than cases of brain trauma for evidence at just how easy it is to lose memories and personality traits when our physical minds are damaged. It may be a terrifying thought to some, but all we are, all our thoughts and feelings, all our dreams and memories are solely contained within the biochemistry of our physical brains, and that is a fact. When we die, the fauna and flora that comprise our bodies breaks down and is consumed by other fauna and flora, resulting in the cellular disassociation of our brains, and thus bringing an end to all that we are. The third premise demanded for an afterlife to exist is that our physical minds transform into nonphysical energies which is logically impossible.

If the first two premises were true it would be meaningless without the third because without it the experience would be a non-event. Without our minds the energy leaving our bodies would lack our identities and not really be us. But since the first two premises required actual magic in order to be rationalized we should not expect everyone to fully appreciate the convoluted absurdity that is this final premise and instead someone might just continue to ignore all reason in favor of magic. People are free to believe whatever they like but please understand the incredibly strong rationale argument against such a concept as the afterlife, and furthermore if such a concept should prove true there is no way anyone could accurately guess what an afterlife could possibly be like.

It is not unfair to conclude that the threat of hell is as empty as the head of the one uttering it.

But it gets worse.

When the threat of hell is made it is made because the person damning someone else believes this hell they are damning people too is real. This means they actually believe people who do not agree with them deserve to suffer infinitely forever. We have a word for this kind of intense hatred, we call it bigotry. The sort of hate that was necessary for elitist monsters to justify the slavedom and genocides within our dark histories is disgusting and embarrassing for all modern living humans. However, slavedom and genocide are nothing compared to hell, which is both inconceivably horrible and everlasting, which raises the question, how mind blowing hateful does someone half to be to genuinely wish hell upon someone? I believe we have now determined the most bigoted people ever. They hate others so much it cannot be put into words the horrors they wish upon them, and they are so brutal in their convictions they want this unfathomable torture to go on forever.

But it gets even worse somehow.

Kooks who have inadvertently showcased their extreme bigotry will often backtrack and claim they do not feel that way but god does. The crazy thing (though the list is very long at this point) is that people like this actually think they have avoided exposing themselves for the hatemonger that they are by blaming god. First of all, how are they unaware that people who disagree with them do not believe god is anything like what they claim or maybe they do not think god is even real. God is not speaking through someone in a heated debate nor do they get to speak for god. All this hate being spewed belongs to the one who said it not their imaginary friend.

But here is yet another thing, if we are to believe that god is this radical hate mongering tyrant, makes no difference. If god is such a diabolic sadistic bigot and actually believes anyone who holds a variant opinion on how humans should govern their own lives on earth should experience the worst kind of suffering forever, how is someone any less of piece of shit when agreeing with him? If we can understand why this sort of punishment is unjust and hugely prejudice then why worship the monster responsible? We have a word for people like this, coward.

It takes sickening cowardice to hide behind the skirt of god to express feelings of perverted bigotry. It takes even greater cowardice to worship such brutal tyrant in place of standing up for what is right. It takes a moment of great weakness to hide quivering in a shadowy corner when such an obvious matrix of falsehoods is being exposed and yet still cling to an imaginary friend as a shield of protection from thinking for one’s self. The price is high for such cowardice; the price is your mind, identity and dignity.

Only the worst among us would even consider the idea of hell as justified punishment for anything, and it is very revealing about how horrible someone has to be, if even for just a moment, to genuinely wish such a thing upon anyone. Next time someone threatens you with hell call them out on it, yes I know, the threat is empty, but the lunatic you are dealing with does not know that. They are serious and they want you beyond dead. Tell them you will not suffer their threats and expose them as the illogical, bullying, bigoted coward they are.

There are many people whose opinions I hate, (perhaps most notably people who think I should burn in hell) but I do not hate them. I appreciate most people believe the things they do primarily out of apathy, they like the idea of something being a certain way and never thought about it much beyond that, and if their curiosity should end there I am content to leave them be, these are not the sort of people who get violent about their beliefs. I also appreciate that most people believe things not for logical reasons but for emotional ones, which is exactly why they are equally irrational as they are potentially dangerous, they are willing to fight for their dreams and kill for their delusions, and it is these sorts of people that walk a slippery slope and I fear they do not know it. I would never wish such an abominable thing as hell, or torture, or death, on anyone. The only thing I would wish upon someone so lost is empathy because they are clearly in need of it.

Fortunately the inspiration for this essay does not come from personal tribulation but observation, though I have been told I would burn in hell multiple times in my life. After witnessing the invocation of hell in various dialogues I was given pause and I realized what was really being said, something far uglier than I would have initially suspected from such an empty threat. For the sake of argument, if a hell should be real where we are damned for simply not knowing or disagreeing, then the only righteous thing to do would be to fight like hell against it. Fortunately for all of us, this sickening view of the afterlife is part of a mythology belonging to barbarians from a time of great ignorance long ago and nothing more. If we are to explore new frontiers of philosophy and science we must do so with open minds and open hearts, but first, at the very least, we must learn from the mistakes of our barbarian ancestors; there is no reason for us to share in their archaic hatred.

- King of Braves

The Age Of The Universe - In Case You Didn't Know

Image lifted from
http://nothingnerdy.wikispaces.com/E6+GALAXIES+AND+THE+EXPANDING+UNIVERSE
Check them out, they're cool.

For the most part I hated my experience in post secondary education. I have a degree in accounting and in order to get that degree I needed to take a lot of courses about administration and management and I struggled to tolerate the arbitrary rules and lists of ethereal imaginings of subjects that were entirely subjective since they depended upon a countless number of variables determined by unnamed or described situations. Basically I had a hard time regurgitating the nonsense they tried to teach me since I could see right through it all and I have never suffered stupidity well.

Before I settled on accounting (since I wanted a job when I graduated) I took a variety of courses in mathematics and a few courses in physics and astronomy. While challenging I did love the subject matter of these courses, making them difficult for the exact opposite reason that made administration and management courses difficult.

On one particular project in Astronomy 101 I was asked to use the program “Starry Night” to calculate the momentum of stars in the night’s sky. Based on their movements in the night’s sky from the perspective of earth and using trigonometry we could calculate the direction and relative velocity to earth for any object in the sky, from there we could calculate the momentum of the object. I was then asked to compare multiple objects in the sky to one another and see how their relative momentum was related. I was instructed to work backward to find when two objects in the sky would have been together, based on their outward momentum. When I calculated the time that must have elapsed for any two objects for them to get where they were before experiencing the same force of momentum that sent them in their different directions I found it to be approximately thirteen billion years. I was then asked to repeat this calculation using two different stars and then three at a time, and then four at a time. It became very clear immediately that every object in the entire universe was moving with the same momentum away from a common point, and every object had been traveling away from each other for the same amount of time, then it clicked, around star number four I realized this is how we know, this is how we know the big bang happened and how old the universe is.

I kept up with the calculation up until about seventeen stars or so and my calculation for the universes age kept getting closer and closer to the scientifically agreed on estimated age of the universe of 13.798 billion years old. It was so very clear to me then, the big bang must have happened literally every single object in the universe was moving away from the same central point with the exact same momentum, also because we could do hundreds of billions of calculations to determine the time required to move from the central point it was inarguably thirteen billion seven hundred-ninety-eight billions years old.

I often think back to that moment, it really stuck with me holding the numbers in my hands understanding the mathematics required to make sense of it all and discovering the same fact that so many astrophysicists before me have been telling the world. It gave me new appreciate for the term “universe” for I know now the universe is nothing more than the cosmological distribution of all matter and I am always very careful now to distinguish between the universe and all existence when talking about the origins of things. We know how the stars and planets got to where they are, we know where they once were, we know what kind of event must have occurred to have sent every object set in motion and we know how long ago it began. I often think if others could invest the time necessary to calculate the movement of the stars as I did they would dismiss forever any archaic notion about the earth being the center of anything or the universe being young. Seeing the correlation between all objects and knowing how connected everything in the universe is one of the most beautiful things I have ever experienced, I recommend it to everyone.

Interestingly, cosmology is not the only way we have been able to determine the age of the universe, radiometric dating of the elements and determining the age of the oldest stars also assist in narrowing the age of the universe. If you are curious to learn more about this, or if my lawman’s explanation of extrapolating back to the big bang was too simplified for your liking I recommend reading more at NASA’s web page:

http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/universe/uni_age.html

We all should probably spend more time hanging out at NASA's web page.

- Colin Kelly, The King of Braves

Orson Scott Card - A Betrayal of Intellect

Orson Scott Card, the otherwise brilliant, compassionate, wonderful man. 

As of this time I have read four novels by Orson Scott Card; “Ender’s Game,” “Speaker for the Dead,” “Xenocide,” and “Ender’s Shadow,” and I thoroughly enjoyed each one. Like most people I really like the character Andrew Wiggen’s (Ender), he was an outsider because of his intellect, it separated him from his family (literally) and his peers (socially), and he had to use his mind to solve all of his problems. The very thing that found him in so many trying circumstances was also the tool of his salvation, and it was always convincing how he would use his ingenuity to resolve his issues. The world Orson Scott Card created was realistic not only because he used a healthy amount of scientific knowledge to explain many aspects of his fictional world’s workings but also because his characters were, including, and most notably Ender, as believably intelligent people. Card showed us how brilliant Ender was by having him solve complex, relatable, puzzles, and as a result we, the reader, were convinced of his brilliance, we like Ender, and we want to know more about him.

Most everyone feels like an outsider at one point or another, especially in our youths, but also many people with sharp minds often feel segregated by their peers, and as a result books like “Ender’s Game” strongly appeals to people who were able to outperform their peers in school and other tests of understanding and knowledge. I should have read “Ender’s Game” when I was still in high school or maybe grade school but I did not get around to reading the book until I was in my early twenties, and maybe that is why a book like “Speaker for the Dead” speaks more to me.

Even though “Ender’s Game” is by far Card’s most successful book, the reality is “Ender’s Game” is meant as an introduction to the character Ender before he goes on amazing space adventures, and “Speaker for the Dead” is the intended masterpiece by Card. I agree with the author and some critics that “Speaker for the Dead” feels like a more mature story as a whole when compared to “Ender’s Game” and a major reason for that is that the primary protagonist is now an adult and he is able to grapple with the challenges facing him with the resources of a mature and free mind.

While everyone, including myself, loves the problems solving skills of Ender in “Ender’s Game” and the wonderful game of cat and mouse he plays with his peers and the adults testing him, what I love most about Card’s works is the empathy exhibited by the character Ender and the overall narrative of compassion. There is a scene in “Speaker for the Dead” where Ender speaks on the behalf of the deceased at his funeral. This man was hated by his family and wife and Ender gives this big explanation why he was actually a pretty good guy and it is like Card just punches us in the heart, showing as us a new perspective on a character we were convinced to loath earlier in the book. Later in that same book Ender uses his amazing powers of empathy to bridge the communication gap between humans and the pequeninos.

The overarching narratives of Card’s stories are all about open mindedness and understanding. In “Ender’s Game” Ender has to reach out to his peers and teach them how to work together despite their differences, and we get an additional leap of compassion when Ender successfully reaches out to the buggers an alien race, that is fact so alien, we fail to communicate with them, or relate too, on every front until Ender finds a way, and of course what we learn is profound. In “Speaker for the Dead” Ender teaches the people of the planet Lusitania to better understand, respect and love one another, all the while extending an olive branch of communication and respect to the pequeninos, another alien race, so alien, that we completely misunderstand each other even when communicating in a common verbal language. In “Xenocide” the people of planet Path learn to understand each other, themselves and their role in life all the better while trying to solve the puzzle of the seemingly vanished Lusitania.

If I could sum up the character Ender in one word, it would be empathy.

I was surprised to learn Orson Scott Card was a Mormon. Most authors have a tendency to write themselves and their beliefs into their fiction, but to the best of my knowledge there are literally no Mormon characters in any of Card’s stories and at no point does Card preach his religion, or the existence of god, in any of his books. The fictional world he has created operates on different premises then reality, though the science fiction Card proposes is tangible insofar if certain aspects of physics could be manipulated the way he describes then everything he proposes could therefore be tangibly possible in reality, regardless Card explores this fictional world without any self serving symbolism. Ender himself is depicted primarily as a casual deist (or maybe even an agonistic) with a very open mind, the primarily Roman Catholic population of Lusitania is represented respectfully and so are the primarily Chinese population of Path who hold many old Taoist (I think) believes. In fact the variety of characters and perspectives Card is able to write is so well done I am strongly led to the believe that he is a man himself who is incredibly open minded to different cultures and spiritual world views.

Which is why I feel so betrayed.

I first heard Orson Scott Card was a homophobe when someone told me that Card thought homosexuality was a choice and he thought homosexuals should engage in heterosexual relationships because their talents/skills and therefore genetics were valuable and needed to be passed down to the next generation. When I heard this, it did not sound too bad, clearly he was wrong about homosexuality being a choice, but the idea that they need to reproduce because their genetics were valuable is actually a strange roundabout compliment. If we ignore the examples of same sex couples raising children who are the parental child of one of the couple and a sibling of the other, as well as formerly divorced mothers or fathers from a previous heterosexual relationships raising their children with their now same partner, both of which are examples of homosexual carrying on their genetics to the next generation, then the unusual idea that homosexuals should reproduce via heterosexual sex makes sense if we really value their reproduction so highly. Again I think this might be the strangest indirect compliment I have ever heard.

I wanted to defend Card, because it sounded like he had a fundamental flaw in understanding what homosexuality actually was and is, but he did not seem to hate anyone, but then I continued to hear reports about how he would declare war on his own country if it were to be corrupted by same sex marriage.

What the fuck?

Orson Scott Card openly said he would go to war to fight against equal rights. I am so disappointed.

Then I started to read some of Card essays on the topic and his problem clearly stems from the fact that he is completely convinced homosexuality is a sin and should be discouraged/outlawed, and he made careful mention that he did not hate anyone and really wanted to help homosexuals by convincing them to “choose” not to be gay. Again we see Card is hugely misinformed on the reality of homosexuality and not necessarily a hateful asshole, however ignorance is not bliss, and we, the sane people of world, don’t typically care why you’re a bigot we are generally displeased just because you are one. Also thinking we can “fix” somebody when they are not broken is about as about as bad as the normal direct hatemongering from more atypical homophobic jerks.

Now I am a strange man, I am offended as a good person by Card’s ignorant bigotry, but I am much more offended as an intelligent person by his abandonment of logical empathy. Because I, for whatever reason get a lot more pissed off about stupidity than I do evil, and I am well aware this is warped sense of priority.

Card while being of Mormon faith showed nothing of arrogance regarding this in all his writings but instead showed profound respect for other peoples’ cultures and spiritual dispositions. He wrote characters unlike himself with such skill and understanding it was clear, at least to me, that Card deeply respected, and maybe even admired, those different from himself. All this must stem from a healthy amount of empathy, the very characteristic I believe best described his most famous protagonist. Empathy is nothing more than an extrapolation of basic binary thought. It comes so naturally to so many of us some of us have mistaken our ability to distinguish right from wrong as something mystical, but the truth is your mind is able to calculate empathy so quickly you do not even realize you are doing it. As soon as you can understand someone has the same capacity for pain and pleasure as yourself you immediately intelligently identify the error in mistreating others, because you can now relate to them. But being able to understand people very different than yourself can require active thought, all it requires is more of the same kind of logical thinking, just applied more deeply. Empathy, and with it morality, is literally a form of intelligence. Orson Scott Card is clearly a very intelligent man to have developed such a fine craft of empathy.

And it blows my mind that he has failed to apply the same exact same logic towards homosexuals!

In reality homosexuality is a attribute of such irrelevance that members of this social demographic can and do exist in every nation, ethnic group and culture, so arguably it takes even less empathy to relate to them then someone from a different cultural, political or spiritual disposition. A homosexual could literally have everything in common with you culturally, politically, socially, and spiritually, so what is it about the details of their private sex life that is such a bearer? While Card has already shown such powers of understand towards real and fictional peoples in this novels why is he unable or unwilling to apply the same curtsy towards individuals he at times with have everything in common with? Of all people he is someone who knows better.

After many years of waiting, they are finally going to make “Ender’s Game” into a movie. It has the potential of being one of the best science fiction films of all time. There is a lot of talk about boycotting “Ender’s Game” because of Card’s ridiculous homophobia, because why would you want to financially reward someone who hates people? Personally I do not want to boycott “Ender’s Game,” because I love the book and with any luck I will love the movie, so like many people I am torn.

Trailer for Ender's Game, it looks great.

I like to believe in people.

I know that anyone can learn anything, and I have hope that Card’s mind will change. I hope he learns that homosexuality is not a sin, at least not in the eyes of most people.  Even if the Mormon church preaches homosexuality is a sin, I hope he learns that that does not make it true, I hope at the very least he learns to respect this difference of opinion. I hope he agrees to the idea of equality for all people regardless if we like what they do behind closed doors or not. And I do not think my hopes unfounded; we have every reason to think Card is capable of learning this minimal amount of respect for homosexuals as he has shown such great compassion for other people, both real and imagined already.

There are lot of people writing off Orson Scott Card as a lunatic, but I believe this is just more example of this:

“Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.” – Steven Weinberg

Orson Scott Card is a good man, and a smart one. The moment he realizes his religion is fatally wrong in its attitude towards homosexuals he returns to being the wonderfully compassionate person I believe he probably, actually, is. I want to believe he is too smart a man not to make this realization eventually, at least I hope so.

It is easy to be mad at someone expressing such intolerance, and understandably a lot of people are talking about it. It is easy to dismiss the ignorant words of Card as “crazy” or “stupid” but it is possible this is just a glaring example of misinformation albeit a very surprising one. No one seems to be talking about how this view is in complete contradiction to everything else Card has ever said and wrote, and I, being the odd man who gets more upset over irrationality than amorality wanted to say something. What is most baffling about this whole discord is Card’s willingness to abandon his otherwise brilliant mind for loyalty to misguided ideal, and I felt the need to say something myself since no one I have heard has narrowed in on this detail.

If I could speak to Card, I might say, “Orson, it does not matter if the saints say homosexuality is a sin; if they did say such a thing, then they were wrong. The power of their words should be held up for their logic and truth not because of their supposed authority. An argument from authority is a logical fallacy, you know this. If we are to analyze the differences between individuals based on their sexuality all we will find is insignificance. Like so many things sexuality is a matter of taste, and there is no accounting for taste, there is also no harm in poor taste, and while everyone has the right to an opinion on everything no one has the right to condemn or persecute anyone ever, definitely not over a triviality such as this.”

It’s so fucking stupid Card of all people knows better. As an intellectual, I feel so betrayed.

Space Runaway Ideon

It has always been humoured that after writing “Mobile Suit Gundam” Yoshiyuki (kill them all) Tomino was suffering from a serious depression. I cannot validate the claim one way or the other, but I can speculate. Depression is a terrible thing. It is like someone has taken all the sound out of music, all the flavour out of food, all the joy out of life, and many other equally metaphorical examples. Depression affects your work, and knowing this I think we can understand a lot when examining “Space Runaway Ideon.”

Space Runaway Ideon - Opening Theme

“Space Runaway Ideon,” is the first anime Kill Them All Tomino worked on after “Mobile Suit Gundam.” He was given complete creative control and with that freedom he was able to explore his wild imagination in all direction. The premise of “Space Runaway Ideon” is as follows, in the distant future, earthlings have begun colonizing other planets. Our story begins on the planet Solo where the military are investigating the construction of unauthorized military equipment only to be informed that the machinery was not produced by the scientist present but rather they dug it out of the ground. At the same time another civilization of space travelers, known as “The Buff Clan” come to the planet Solo with the goal of discovering the “Giant God.” Karala the daughter of the Buff Clan’s military commander comes to investigate the discovery of the earthlings but her overzealous protector, Gije, believes her to be in danger and attacks. The Buff Clan have a technological, and therefore militaristic, advantage over the earthlings however the three pieces of military equipment come alive and combine to form a giant robot who forces the Buff Clan to retreat.

Both sides learn very early on that both the earthlings and the Buff Clan are human; literally, they are the exact same species only from different home worlds somehow. In spite of this, the Buff Clan are relentless in pursuing the “Solo Ship” the space ship that houses the “Giant God” and an elaborate game of cat and mouse across the stars begins. The crew of the Solo ship use the Ideon (The Giant God) to defend themselves and the more they use the giant robot the more they learn how insanely powerful it’s abilities are.

The Ideon firing tens of thousands of missiles all at once.

“Space Runaway Ideon” is a series that is built on tension. There is a constant feeling of unease surrounding the Ideon and what it is capable of. Everything about the war between the earthlings and the Buff Clan is in a state of escalating terror. Every element of the plot moves towards a grimmer and darker setting. This is the only anime that might qualify as both a “real” robot anime and a “super” robot anime. Everything surrounding the science fiction in “Space Runaway Ideon” seems reasonable enough, except for the Ideon itself which is way too powerful to be considered realistic, until you realize what the Ideon really is.

Of course it is much easier to feel the growing tension of war and feelings of terror when we have characters to relate to and Tomino deliveries with great characters in “Space Runaway Ideaon.”

Yuki Cosmo

Our primary protagonist is Yuki Cosmo, a young man whose father is killed in the initial attack by the Buff Clan on the planet Solo. Cosmo is one of several people who seek shelter inside one of three piece of military equipment during the attack and is one of three people end up piloting the Ideon. If the introduction of young man hijacking a mysterious piece of military equipment and using it to ward off an unforeseen enemy attack after a permanent separation from their father sounds familiar, it should, it is exactly how Amuro Ray was introduced in Mobile Suit Gundam.

In fact Cosmo has a lot in common with Amuro. They are both approximately the same age, both are hot headed and need to grow up, and both do this with the backdrop of grandiose epic war in space where they are responsible for piloting the most powerful weapon on the battlefield. Both are naturally talent for commanding machinery, both are mechanically inclined, both are brave and strong young men.

However Cosmo is a fun main character because he surprises us in various was. First of all that hair, even during the eighties when this show came out giving anyone a orange afro would diminish our ability to take them seriously, it takes daring to give your main character hair like that, but Tomino did. Cosmo’s hair is one of the those things that is funny the first few times you see it, then you just get used to it, and Cosmo would not be the same with a different hair do. Also Tomino lets Cosmo be a little more bold and capable than other young male protagonists at the start. At the start of “Space Runaway Ideon” Cosmo is standing up to adults, holding his ground against them both intellectually and physically. He wins arguments against scientist and military officers and quickly establishes himself not only as the logical choice for piloting the Ideon but also as useful warrior outside the giant robot.

Kasha Imhof

Our second pilot in the Ideon is Kasha Imhof. At first it seems like Kasha is the obvious choice to be the love interest to Cosmo, they are same age, both are thrown into the same crazy situation as Ideon pilots when a war with another clan of humans begins. Both are headstrong. Both are capable. Neither trust the adults. Neither is afraid of the tough situations and choices thrust upon them. However they do not get along, Kasha is more brazen and rude than Cosmo, their young egos clash and they do not get along. In fact it is not until the very end of the series that we see them starting to like each other, and at that point it feels very real since they have been through so much together. Also most everyone they know is dead at this point and affections is a coping mechanism for humans at times like those so it feels realistic.

Jorden Bes

Our third pilot (initially) is the young dashing military Commander Jorden Bes. Following Tomino’s nature of surprising us with characters Bes is introduced as a condescending jerk and maybe a bit of an idiot, but then the Buff Clan attack and Bes shows us his true colours as a brave and cool headed leader. Bes is established early on as being dashing and handsome and him being a naturally leader makes him a primary plot point as well as a major character throughout the series. He is still short with the scientist on board, he still shows a lack of patience at times, we know he is not the smartest man on board the Solo ship, but we, the viewers, never question his qualifications as leader because his flaws while real do not cripple him and his strengths are paramount. In fact Bes being the brave daring man he is might be the single thing that saves humanity in the end.

Moera Fatima

It should be noted that even though Bes pilots the third part of the Ideon initially during the Buff Clan attack he rarely pilots it again after that. As commander his responsibilities force him to commander the Solo ship during future battles. The third pilot of the Ideon for the majority of the series Moera Fatima. While Fatima does get a solid amount of character development over the course of the series he is just not as interesting as other characters we need to talk about.

Sheryl Formosa

During Bes’s introduction he in highly confrontational towards the scientist Sheryl Formosa. Sheryl in many ways is the opposite of Bes. She is knowledgeable and highly intelligent; however she lacks charisma and daring. Sheryl is brave though, in fact she is reckless at times in her pursuit of knowledge and she never backs down to anyone. When Bes and her first meet this wonderful bit of dialogue occurs:

“You bitch!”

“My name is Sheryl Formosa, not ‘you bitch.’”

And here is a fun fact, Sheryl kind of is a bitch, but that is what I like about her. She makes some poor choices at times, other times she is right on the money and knows exactly what she is talking about. It makes for a great dynamic between her and Bes, Bes is bold and brave but ignorant towards the mysterious of the Ideon and Sheryl is smart and logical but untrusting and both are belligerent. Both also see the value of the other. They never really get along Bes and Sheryl but they show each other respect casually and passively multiple times throughout the series. Bes knows Sheryl is valuable because they need to unravel the mysteries of the Ideaon and Sheryl knows it is Bes’s military leadership getting them out victorious and alive from the many Buff Clan attacks.

Karala Ajiba

One last character I want to mention is Karala. As mentioned earlier she is the daughter of the Buff Clan’s military leader and she comes to Solo to investigate the Giant God. Karala is important for two reasons. First she is a major plot device as she is the bridge of peace between our two people. She volunteers herself as a hostage to the Solo ship and makes every effort to show the earthlings that the Buff Clan can be reached for peace and also extends this message to her own people over and over again. She is a wonderful caring person who puts herself at insane risk for the betterment of all people. Also she is beautiful.

Karala is a cartoon character, as such her beauty ends up being even more subjective than a flesh and blood woman’s attractive qualities. In live action TV shows and movies you can convey to the audience rather easily is someone is attractive by simply casting an attractive actor, but even then people don’t always agree on what is sexy. I never understood why so many people thought Megan Fox was so hot, and I don’t expect everyone to understand my attraction to say, Sara Quin, but at least a visual effort can be made fairly easily in live action productions. The same is not as easy to accomplish in an animated feature. Yes, they can draw a woman or man is a certain way to appeal to our sexual sensibilities like Jessica Rabbit (Who Framed Roger Rabbit) or Holi Would (Cool World) but both of those examples are deliberate exaggerations almost to the point of comedy, or perhaps literally to the point of comedy. When creating a serious effort in animation some sense of consistency needs to be kept, meaning you cannot have one character have exaggerated features to showcase femininity or masculinity while others look reasonably realistic. You can see how this might be difficult, in fact the most difficult aspect of illustrated art most artist struggle with is variety of physical characteristics between characters. This is why all women look alike is so many comic books and cartoons, but you will notice that this is also why so many men look alike in so many comic books and cartoons.

“Space Runaway Ideon” has a very good art direction that allows for variety. Perhaps this is way Cosmo as an eccentric hair cut. This artistic talent is best on display in regards to the character Karala. She doesn’t look that much different than other female characters at a glance but you immediately identify her as a good looking woman. She is drawn with a glow about her. Her hair dark, light complexion and bright blues eyes create contrast that emphasises her other subtle features, the slenderness of her face, the large size of her eyes and the brightness of her color. Most people probably did not pick up on this, only you did pick up on it, you just did not realize it. This effect only works because Karala is the only person in the entire show to have these exact features which allows her image to stand out to us, also her appearance slowly becomes one of the more memorable ones.

But artistic ingenuity is not the only giveaway to the viewer that Karala is beautiful, there is also the way other characters act around her. Gije is initially obsessed with Karala, and while his overzealous loyalty does stem from a sense of duty it is also quite obvious that is he infatuated with her. In one of the earlier episodes Karala poses as a Solo refugee and gets a ride from two men. There is a brief moment when they are driving and both men are staring at her with smiles on their faces, no attention is drawn to this, but it is suggestive. When Karala first meets Bes there is some appropriate flirting. Men take notice of Karala in realistic ways over the course of the story, the writing does not beat into us that Karala is beautiful but passively suggests to us at irregular intervals that this is the case, and as viewers our brains pick up on this without even realising it.

Combine all this with the fact that Karala is a space princess and a wonderful human being and you have a very attractive and alluring character. Even if you do not find Karala particularly attractive yourself (I don’t she is a cartoon character) it is easy to understand why characters in “Space Runaway Ideaon” do. I just spent four paragraphs talking about Karala, I guess I really liked the character, everything about her. I like the way she was presented to us. I liked her goals in the story, and was rooting for her the whole time. I like what she represented to the story and how important of a plot device she was both literally and metaphorically. Basically Karala was a perfect character.

Still my favorite character was Cosmo, that kid had huge balls.

So to summarize “Space Runaway Ideon” is a fantastically well written story, with awesome characters, and deep symbolism throughout. Stop reading now if you don’t want spoilers, and I mean right now!

In “Space Runaway Ideon” everyone dies.

And I fucking mean everyone! Everyone dies! Everything dies! All of creation is destroyed in the end! This is the series that earned Yoshiyuki Tomino the moniker of “Kill Them All.”

When I told you earlier that there is a powerful sense of escalating tension in this series, and as the story unfolds the greater the discomfort the crew of Solo ship have towards the Ideon becomes, and the danger levels in your brain rise and rise until you are freaking out while watching this anime. It is not like the end comes out of nowhere either we slowly crawl towards a Armageddon ending so when it does finally arrive you feel like “oh man we messed up. But I don’t blame us. We tried.”

In a way it is almost better to know this going into the series. Knowing that the end to this series is so impossibly tragic really lets you embrace this escalation of the plot. The war constantly worsens, the grudges between people constantly grow, and the horror of wars and the Ideon endlessly escalate. Not to over use the word but escalation is the perfect description for this series. Just when you think things cannot possibly get any worse, everyone dies. Not all at once, the battles rages and people are slowly shot down, blown up, or crushed. Then in one final blaze of rage and glory the Ideon unleashes it’s most powerful weapon and all of creation is destroyed. You might think that a robot destroying all of reality seems like a silly exaggeration of its power, but you would be wrong, wrong for two reasons. First there is the escalation factor, we see new powers of the Ideon all the time and the power of Ideon is being realized gradually and eventually the only logical step remaining is a universe ending doomsday attack. Second the plot twist.

There is something else that helps make the Ideon’s power believable, the unspoken and unexplained plot twist at the very end. The end is a flash of light and everything in existence ending, and the souls of our dead characters flying away in space to a new world to start again. It is a “what the fuck ending,” and many people are rightfully confused by it. This ending makes very little sense unless of course you understand the plot twist; the Ideon is god.

The Ideon is god and we used god’s power to fight a war. We messed up.

We kept using god’s power to protect ourselves and the more we used this power the more was revealed to us how unbelievable and terrifying god’s power is. In the end, in our darkest moments when our hero Cosmos is one of the only characters still alive and still fighting when the Ideon is struck at point blank range with a cannon that unleashes the full power of the sun (oh by the way they destroy the sun in the final battle) the Ideon finally wakes up and makes a judgement; human kind has failed. We have failed in the eyes of god and he destroys everything. Literally fucking everything!

Knowing this, the tension through the series, the escalating discomfort, the growing feuds between earthlings and Buff Clan, everything about “Space Runaway Ideon” makes perfect sense. It is brilliant really. Every crazy aspect of the show, every seemingly impossible abuse of science fiction, every convenient plot devise, every unlikely occurrence is explained in one unspoken plot development, the Ideon is god.

My mind is blown.

It is not that difficult to compare characters and plot structure between “Mobile Suit Gundam” and “Space Runaway Ideon” they have a lot in common, but then again Tomino has a lot of reoccurring themes and plot devices he likes to use throughout all his work. In the example of “Space Runaway Ideon” we see something bold from Tomino, we see an uncompromised ending of total finality. We see a disregard towards explaining the far out conclusion. We see a sadness that would not be repeated in Tomino until some of his later work in the Gundam series. It is safe to say that Tomino was very depressed when creating “Space Runaway Ideon.” The man hated writing sequels and it is often joked that by killing off the main characters he could get out of writing one, and I suspect there is some truth to that, but I feel there is something more to “Space Runaway Ideon’s” bleak ending. When dealing with the philosophical issues of cosmic war, something Tomino wrote at length about, there remained only one possible exaggeration, the destruction of the universe whole sale. If I had any recommendation on how to improve “Space Runaway Ideon” it would be only two things, two subtle things that when included would have invoked the viewers. Before destroy everything the Ideon should have spoke, it should have pronounced one word loudly “judgement.” And then after everything, maybe even after the credits we should have seen the Ideon completely restored and acting on its own it would venture to a far away planet and rebury itself, waiting for human kind to find it again.

It is highly suggestive by the ending that this is not the first time human kind has failed in the eyes of god, the Ideon that is, and there is every reason to think that when human kind rebuilds itself that is will find the Ideon again and maybe this time we will use the power of the Ideon for peace instead of war, or perhaps we will be wary of such power and respect the Ideon and leave it be.

A lot of people will not watch “Space Runaway Ideon” because of the very dark themes and very bleak ending but there is a very bright silver lining, because there is hope. Human kind will try again and again and eventually we will find cosmic peace with ourselves; it is an unavoidable eventuality. As I stated before when the terrible end finally arrives there are feelings of failure, utter failure on the part of our species, but as viewers we understand. We did not fail because humans are stupid and evil, there was a solid effort made by many characters to end this war peacefully. There were many acts of violence motivated by extreme fear that it was impossible not to empathize with. By the end when Cosmo swears uncompromised vengeance on the Buff Clan and abuses the power of the Ideon to destroy them, I was rooting for him. These mother fuckers couldn’t just leave the Solo ship alone, and by this point not only have we lost the vast majority of characters plus countless soldiers and civilians (like billions) but Earth is destroyed and so is the Buff Clan’s home world and other inhabited worlds, also the sun is destroyed. At that point the only thing left for Cosmo to do was fight for revenge.

So yeah, the human race failed, we made one too many mistakes and it ESCALATED to a dark conclusion.

But we might make it work next time.

There is hope, and not some small hope, but grand brilliant hope. We very nearly prevented our destruction multiple times during the events of “Space Runaway Ideon” and everyone dies with some knowledge of the choices they made were not perfect. I would love, just love for Tomino to write a short sequel where human kind succeeds where we failed before with Ideon, and I do not want it to be easy. I want the same tension, the same escalation but in the last moments something clicks in the minds of our heroes and they realize human kind has been here before and in a very courageous moment we reach out to each other and find a way to live in love and peace, our true nature.

There is so much to take in from “Space Runaway Ideon” it is one of the deepest pieces of fictional philosophy ever produced in cartoon format. I loved this anime, it was dark yet hopeful, and everything about it is very powerful.

Be invoked.