Mockingbird is a fun, Easter-egg-filled, and action-packed breath of fresh air in the male-dominated world of comics. Marvel Local author Chelsea Cain loves dark humor. Her Heartsick series, starring Portland detective Archie Sheridan and serial killer Gretchen Lowell, is a dark, messy, cinematic parade of murder, lust, and addiction—with all those elements intertwined. But it’s […]
Comic Books
Posted inMovies & TV
Forget about Batman and Superman. Where’s Wonder Woman?
The biggest problem with Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is right there in the title. I’m not talking about its ungainliness or its pomposity (the movie shares these qualities), or even the awkward v stabbed through it like one of the Caped Crusader’s little bat-shaped throwy things. I’m talking about the two words it’s […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Spidey’s in the New Trailer for Captain America: Civil War Avengers 2.5
Take a look overhead. SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN SPIDER-MAN […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Deadpool: Cue the Guns, Swords, and, Oh, so Many Jokes about Ball-Related Trauma
DEADPOOL Trivia Time™! Did you know that’s actually Macaulay Culkin in that suit? Wild! Deadpool, Ryan Reynolds’ second crack at Marvel’s most in-your-face character (following a forgotten appearance in the misbegotten X-Men Origins: Wolverine) is a terrifically faithful adaptation of some awfully obnoxious source material. If you’re a pre-existing devotee, the film’s nonstop assortment of […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Fantastic Four Is Grim, Gritty, and Boring
FANTASTIC FOUR “Wait. I think we did the math wrong.” Even among the legions of characters in long underwear, the Fantastic Four have always stood apart, both for their squabbling family dynamics and an endearingly retro squareness. The latest attempt to move the team to the big screen captures, well, exactly neither of those aspects, […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Should Non-Geeks Care? #1: Deadpool
DEADPOOL This is Deadpool. Welcome to Should Non-Geeks Care?, a new Blogtown series in which you, a non-geek, can learn if you should care about a particular aspect of pop culture. This series began 20 minutes ago when Wm. Steven Humphrey, who is my boss, sent me this message: “You should start up a new […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Movie Review: Normally I Hate Ants… But I Like Ant-Man!
ANT-MAN Aren’t you a little short for a stormtrooper? Every year around this time, ants invade my kitchen. So while I’m generally in favor of a superhero who controls ants, I’d be happier if he just murdered them. But I don’t run the Marvel Universe—Marvel does. And if they think it’s a good idea to […]
Posted inTV
That Time the Avengers Hung Out with David Letterman
David Letterman’s final show airs tomorrow night, and the internet’s already smothered in think pieces, tributes, and clips. That’s because Letterman is the best, and always has been; even the few late-night hosts who’ve come close—Craig Ferguson, Conan O’Brien—somehow never managed to make the format click quite like Letterman. But one of Letterman’s greatest accomplishments […]
Posted inComic Books
Local Novelist Chelsea Cain Will Write a One-Shot Comic for Marvel
Simon & Schuster Portland’s queen of darkness, novelist Chelsea Cain, announced yesterday via Twitter that she’s signed on to write a standalone Mockingbird comic for Marvel: So let’s make this official: I’m going to be writing a #Mockingbird one-shot for @Marvel. There will be murder, & some ass-kicking.— Chelsea Cain (@ChelseaCain) April 27, 2015 Given […]
Posted inTheater & Performance
No, YOU’RE Crying at Your Desk About Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home Coda
Alison Bechdel Before she was the reluctant namesake of the ubiquitous Bechdel Test, Alison Bechdel wrote the great “family tragicomic,” Fun Home, about her father’s suicide and her family’s repression. In 2012, she published a follow-up graphic novel, Are You My Mother?, pairing her complicated relationship with her mother with D.W. Winnicott’s idea of “the […]
Posted inMovies & TV
Two Good Reads on Genre and Gender
EX MACHINA Not pictured: himbos. From Daredevil to Game of Thrones to Avengers, genre movies and TV shows are currently dominating culture—and they’ve brought some issues with them. Combined with Hollywood’s longstanding sexism, it’s kind of a perfect storm. For everything that makes you think, “Hey, things aren’t so bad!”—like DC Comics and Mattel’s pretty-great […]
Posted inArtsy
Going to Linework NW? Here’s Your Essential Guide to Small Press Comics Releases
Portland spring emerges from her dainty (organic, grass-fed) clamshell and unpacks her greens, her rains, some guys that want to yell at you, and a hot mess of new releases from small press comics publishers. So it’s appropriate that the small press comics festival Linework NW also happens in spring at the beautiful Norse Hall. […]