Hoopla! - Episode 43: October... why have you forsaken me?

Hello and welcome to Hoopla!

Well, I started out strong this month with a few pretty good columns, but these past few weeks have been mighty silent. I won't bore you with all the details, but here's the gist of what I've been up to and why this week's column is going to be brief as well...

1) The main agony of my life has come from the chair of my dissertation committee who, after disappearing off the face of the Earth for the past six weeks, has returned and decided that all the work I'd been doing in the meantime is completely wrong, wrong, wrong... and must be scrapped and started over.

But, hey, that's cool... I'm Mr. Groovy-Pants. I take it all in stride...

2) I'm supposed to present a paper at a conference. The paper was due last Friday. It still isn't finished.

3) I'm applying for jobs and fellowships, most of which are due in early November, and all of which require a whole list of things like an updated CV, which is taking forever to put together, letters of reference, which I have to nag people about, filling out online applications that if they'd just read my goddamn resume it already has all that information... etc.

Honestly, it's a pretty stressful time to be me... and if someone should ask you, "Hey, would you like to be Paul for a little while?" I would advise you to say no. It's not that fun, at the moment.

And, to be honest, the pay sucks...

Anyway, enough of my whining...

Let's talk about comic-books for a moment, shall we?

The above cover was released a couple of months back and I featured it in an earlier column and essentially said that I didn't know what it was, but whatever it was, I wanted it.

Well, now I know...

TEEN TITANS: YEAR ONE #1

Written by Amy Wolfram

Art by Karl Kerschl & Serge Lapointe

Cover by Kerschl

Writer Amy Wolfram (Teen Titans animated series) joins rising star artist Karl Kerschl (ALL-FLASH #1, ROBIN) for a colorful reimagining of how the Teen Titans came together! See how these teammates bonded, and overcame the sheer awkwardness of being teenagers in this explosive 6-issue miniseries that guest-stars the Justice League of America! You may think you know Robin, Wonder Girl, Kid Flash and Aqualad…but you don’t really know the original Teen Titans!On sale January 2 • 1 of 6 • 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

If the interior art looks anything like the cover art, and it surely ought to, then this is going to be sheer loveliness. Hurray!!!

This is one of those Marvel Adventures "all-ages" books. It looks quite nice, no?

MARVEL ADVENTURES SPIDER-MAN #35

Written by FRED VAN LENTE

Penciled by CORY HAMSCHER

Cover by PATRICK SCHERBERGER

Venom is back ...but says he wants to bury the hatchet with Spider-Man. No, not in his head. In fact, in order to show Spidey how much he's reformed, he wants to become the web-spinner's official sidekick. But one night "on patrol" with a homicidal maniac as a partner has Spidey wanting to hang up the web-shooters himself!32 PGS./All Ages …$2.99

That's a neat cover. Oh, Marvel Adventures, you do tempt me...

This next cover is nothing special, but I've gone ahead and included it anyway because it's the first issue of Chuck Dixon's return to Robin. There was a time when Dixon was writing Birds of Prey, Nightwing, and Robin, and they were all pretty darn enjoyable. This was followed by a time during which he was writing Birds of Prey, Nightwing, and Robin, and they were all kind of stale and dull.

I'll give him this, though... neither Nightwing nor Robin were ever as good again. His work defined those two series and the fact that he's now returning, years and years later, to write Robin has me pretty psyched...

And now, the ugliest cover of the month...

Aint that something?

It's got sort of a 90's vibe to it... back when really, really crappy artists were trying to mimic the Rob Liefeld/Todd McFarlane look.

This book is actually a sort of perfect package because every single element of it is unappealing to me. There is no negative that has been overlooked.

First, let's look at the soliciation...

COUNTDOWN PRESENTS: LORD HAVOK AND THE EXTREMISTS #4

Written by Frank Tieri

Art by Liam Sharp & Rob Hunter

Cover by Sharp

A COUNTDOWN tie-in! Monarch makes an unexpected alliance with the Americommando and the Meta Militia in an effort to strongarm Lord Havok and the Extremists into joining his Multiversal Army. Plus, Dr. Diehard sees all he cares about vanish in an instant, and we learn the secret origin of the Extremist known as Dreamslayer.On sale January 23 • 4 of 6 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

Okay, so first of all, it's a Countdown tie-in. Hurray!!! If there's one thing you can never have too many of...

Then, it's written by Frank Tieri, who I think is generally agreed to be one of the absolute worst writers in comics. So, that's pretty cool. He tends to wallow in gratuitous violence, sophomoric humor, and female characters that exist solely to be sexy victims or sexy perpertrators of evil-doings.

Then there's the art...

And the characters? LORD HAVOK AND THE EXTREMISTS!!!

Wa-hoo!!!

Finally, there's the fact that the solicitation text has been written in such a way as to defy comprehension. Without looking back, try to remember what this issue is about...

Don't peek...

You can't, can you? You can't remember a single thing you read.

Let's give it another whirl...

A COUNTDOWN tie-in! Monarch makes an unexpected alliance with the Americommando and the Meta Militia in an effort to strongarm Lord Havok and the Extremists into joining his Multiversal Army. Plus, Dr. Diehard sees all he cares about vanish in an instant, and we learn the secret origin of the Extremist known as Dreamslayer.

Wow. That oughtta really be... something.

I totally didn't see that plot twist about Monarch and Americommando making an alliance with the Meta Militia against Lord Havok and the Extremists and the.. the Multiversal Army... thing.. that is going to... uh, and then Dr. Diehard. Yeah, that's the ticket! Dr. Diehard!!!

Wait a minute.

Dr. Diehard?

Doctor... Diehard?

Hm.

Dr. Diehard.

Dr. Diehard!!!

"Oh, hey, look, it's Dr. Diehard!"

"Hey, Dr. Diehard, how's it going?"

"That Dr. Diehard... he sure can cook a jambalaya!"

"Dr. Diehard... I'd like to marry your daughter."

Hm.

I'd say that someone who calls himself Dr. Diehard... who asks that others refer to him as Dr. Diehard... I would say that such a person just might be over-compensating a wee little bit.

Although, I suppose he is one of Lord Havok's Extremists so... y'know... he needs to have a sort of extreme name and all. But still...

Dr. Diehard?

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Well, it's time for me to go work on my stuff... I hope you all are well, though, and I'll try to be a better blogger in November...

Though I promise nothing. NOTHING!!!

- Dr. Paul Diehard

[But you can just call me Hard.]