Concrete Volume 1: Depths: written and illustrated by Paul Chadwick (1986-1999; collected 2005): Concrete became a critical and commercial success in the 1980's in part because of the comic-book world's 'Black-and-White boom,' in which a rising tide of speculation floated all boats and then a declining tide nearly grounded all boats, forever. It also got the always understated Harlan Ellison to declare it the best comic book of its time.
It wasn't.
What it was, though, was a refreshing change for the superhero-dominated time: a low-key story about a guy stuck in a super-powered body and what he tries to do with that body. That the body looks like a Golem made of concrete and has an extremely limited sense of touch makes things tougher. Concrete has super-strength, but it's bear-level super-strength, not Superman-level super-strength. He can be hurt by explosive shells, long falls, or oxygen deprivation lasting more than an hour. Oh, and he has terrific eyesight, which allows Chadwick the artist to depict some pretty interesting undersea vistas during Concrete's periodic forays underwater.
Re-reading (most) of these stories 24 years later, I'm struck by how soothing the world of Concrete is. The adventures are low-key in tone even when they verge on the epic (Concrete saves miners from a collapsed mine; Concrete tries to swim the Atlantic Ocean); Chadwick's skills as both an artist and a writer lie in the depiction and accumulation of small, telling details.
Schmaltz and over-sentimentality always lurk at the threshold, but for the most part they're kept at bay with lovely little details (the look on Concrete's face when he accidentally steps on someone's foot, for example). And one of the early central conceits of the series -- that the best way to get people to stop talking about something is to over-expose it in the media -- remains fresh. Recommended.
Next Men: Aftermath: written and illustrated by John Byrne (2012): John Byrne's time-twisting superhero book finally comes to what may or may not be an end, 17 years after he started the project. It's been a mostly enjoyable ride.
Here, the reality-bending shenanigans come thick and fast, reminding me of one of Byrne's better efforts, the OMAC miniseries. Byrne's one of only a handful of creators of his era who seems truly comfortable with science fiction as a thought process and not as a series of symbolic markers deployed in the service of allegory.
This volume is probably a necessity if you've followed Next Men and completely pointless if you haven't. Byrne's art is very sharp, and his inking of himself has finally reached the status of some of the great inkers -- Terry Austin, Karl Kesel -- he had in the past. Recommended.
Top Ten: Beyond the Farthest Precinct: written by Paul DiFillipo; illustrated by Jerry Ordway (2005): Science-fiction writer DiFillipo and long-time DC artist Ordway do nice work picking up the story of the super-powered precinct five years after the events chronicled by creators Alan Moore, Gene Ha and Zander Cannon in the original Top Ten series from 1999-2000.
Ordway luxuriates in the chance to do hyper-detailed panels in the backgrounds of which lurk pulp and comic-book and comic-strip characters highly reminiscent of every such character ever created. The city of Neopolis houses virtually all the super-powered, supernatural, and just plain weird people of America. And Precinct Ten ('Top Ten') tries to keep the peace.
This time around, we catch up with old friends, especially Toybox, Smax, King Peacock, Peregrine, Shock-headed Peter, and Sergeant Kemlo, as they deal with an irritating new mayor, an even-more irritating new precinct Captain, and a bizarre apparition which swiftly goes from scary nuisance to potentially universe-destroying threat. The geography of Neopolis remains an odd delight and a commentary -- we again see the robot ghetto, but we're also introduced to Bugtown, in which reside insect-based characters, and insects, of all types. Don't ask me what it all means. Recommended.
The Five-Year Engagement: written by Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller; directed by Nicholas Stoller; starring Jason Segel (Tom Solomon), Emily Blunt (Violet Barnes), Chris Pratt (Alex Eilhauer), Alison Brie (Suzie Barnes-Eilhauer), David Paymer (Pete Solomon), Mimi Kennedy (Carol Solomon), Jacki Weaver (Sylvia Dickerson-Bauer), Rhys Ifans (Professor Winston Childs), and Mindy Kaling (Vaneetha) (2012): Advertised as another Judd-Apatow-produced romp, this movie is indeed that -- but also a surprisingly nuanced and accurate portrayal of life in academia. Now wonder it wasn't a hit!
The trials and tribulations of Emily Blunt's post-doctoral-fellowship-holding psychology Ph.D. and her hapless fiance Jason Segel, transplanted from his dream job as a sous-chef in San Francisco to life as the lightly regarded non-academic partner in Michigan, ring amazingly true.
Segel gradually goes crazy while Blunt putters along in her mostly laughable academic career, the romantic target of a lecherous supervisor played to unctuous, faux-sensitive perfection by Rhys Ifans. The stellar supporting cast has lots to do, with Community's Alison Brie doing a decent British accent and the Sarah Silverman Show's Brian Posein making good use of his giant beard and drunken Sasquatch charm as one of Segel's Michigan drinking buddies. And the leads are funny and charming.
This isn't a great movie -- like almost every Apatow-associated project, it's a bit too shaggy and a bit too long. But it certainly provides more laughs than almost anything else you're going to see this week. Recommended.
They Live, written by John Carpenter, based on the short story "Eight O'Clock in the Morning" by Ray Nelson; directed by John Carpenter; starring Roddy Piper (Nada), Keith David (Frank) and Meg Foster (Holly) (1988): John Carpenter's snarly dystopic satire looks as fresh and relevant now as it did in 1988. Maybe moreso, given the increasing ascendancy of corporations Uber Alles in the interim, the Occupy movements, and all the other stuff that's happened since then.
Wrestler Roddy Piper makes an engaging hero as Nada, an umemployed manual labourer who arrives in Los Angeles looking for work and instead discovers a conspiracy aimed at destroying the middle-class and working-class. Nada's a man of action (he is played by a professional wrestler, after all), and soon he and his initially reluctant compadre Frank (the always marvelous Keith David) are going toe-to-toe with the Secret Rulers of the World.
Is this a perfect movie? No. Some of Piper's witticisms fall pretty flat, though others ("I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass. And I'm all out of bubblegum.") have justifiably become classics. The cinematography looks amazingly crummy, which fits the film without necessarily being intentional (Carpenter's films often look crummy, as if they were shot on videotape and then transferred to film).
Nonetheless, this is one of the two or three best science-fiction films in the sub-genre of Paranoid Conspiracy That's Actually True. It may not look as good as The Matrix, another film in that sub-genre, but the eight-minute fight between Nada and Frank, as Nada tries to get Frank to on the sunglasses that allow a person to see what's really going on in the world, beats almost any fight sequence I can think of for sheer stubbornness on the part of both the characters and the filmmakers. Highly recommended.
The Muppets, written by Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller, based on characters created by Jim Henson; directed by James Bobin; starring Jason Segel (Gary), Amy Adams (Mary), Chris Cooper (Tex Richman), and the Muppets (2011): The Muppets return to the big screen after more than a decade away thanks to the slightly unlikely Muppet-love of Jason Segel. It's great to see all of them again, and the gossamer-thin plot doesn't get in the way of an assortment of great Muppet moments and the occasional song. Segel, Adams, and Cooper strike just the right note of earnestness mixed with gently self-mocking metafictionality. Recommended.
Waiting for Guffman, written by Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy; directed by Christopher Guest; starring Christopher Guest (Corky St. Clair), Fred Willard (Ron Albertson), Catherine O'Hara (Sheila Albertson), Parker Posey (Libby Mae Brown), Eugene Levy (Dr. Allan Pearl) and Bob Balaban (Lloyd Miller) (1996): It's Blaine, Missouri's 150th anniversary, and resident little-theatre guru Corky St. Clair will write and direct a musical tribute to the history of the small town. Oh, boy, will he ever.
Writers Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy hit pretty much all the right notes in this affectionate but clear-eyed tribute to the delusions that theatre can bring on in people who long to be something other than what they are, even if they dream of being something they're not actually good at. It now looks like a satire of the American Idol generation, though of course it isn't -- in tone and execution, it hews closer to Stephen Leacock's scathing, sympathetic Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town. Highly recommended.
Top Ten: Beyond the Farthest Precinct: written by Paul DiFillipo; illustrated by Jerry Ordway (2005): Science-fiction writer DiFillipo and long-time DC artist Ordway do nice work picking up the story of the super-powered precinct five years after the events chronicled by creators Alan Moore, Gene Ha and Zander Cannon in the original Top Ten series from 1999-2000. 
