I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: ANA TIJOUX-Tiny Desk Concert #77 (August 30, 2010).

Ana Tijoux was born in France.  Her parents moved there to escape the Chilean dictatorship.  She returned to Chile as a teenager and started rapping first in French and then in Spanish,

This Tiny Desk Concert is just her and a percussionist (Names Thompson) who is playing nothing but a modified tambourine (it’s an impressive variety of sounds he’s getting out of that).

Ana raps in Spanish.  I don’t really know anything that she’s saying.  And I have to admit that many times hearing someone speak quickly in Spanish sounds melodic anyway.  But she seems to be rapping with a great flow. It’s especially noticeable in the final song “Go!” when her speed increases exponentially.  And she is still very clear in her delivery.

I really enjoyed how in “La Rosa de los Vientos” she had sung a chorus at the end (her singing voice is lovely).

[READ: September 4, 2015] The League of Regrettable Superheroes

I received this book with my Loot Crate (this is the Loot Crate edition, which as far as I can tell just means it is smaller).  It is yet another wonderful book from Quirk Books.

This is a collection of superheroes who actually existed in comic book form–forgotten heroes, also-rans and all around second-tier superheroes.  The introduction is quick to point out that none of these superheroes is inherently bad.  Perhaps they had bad timing or got lost in the crowd.  He assures us that every character here has the potential to be great. In fact several have been revamped and revived

Each listed superhero has a brief synopsis which includes a Created By blurb, a Debuted in (giving the comic and the date of first publication) and an amusing commentary to accompany it.  There is a one page summary of the superhero and then a sample page from the comic (sometimes a cover, but more often a page of dialogue–which is always more fun).

Beginning in the Golden Age 1938-1949 (when every Super-Tom, Wonder-Dick, and Amazing-Harry could throw on a cape and a cowl and give Hitler the Business).  Superman debuted in 1938 and soon after everyone was making a superhero.

Some interesting also rans: The Black Dwarf (it implies a mash-up of two distinct schools of exploitation cinema).  But he never really got going. He was notable for his tough talking language “take a bit of knuckle pie:

I prefer The Bouncer (whose little blurb says “Headquarters: The Bouncy Castle (not really , but wouldn’t that be great?)”.  Among the oddities of this 1944 hero: his superpower was bouncing.  His secret identity was a statue.

Another favorite is Dr, Hormone.  That appears to be his real name, not a super identity.  His was rejuvenated on his death bed by a youth hormone.  Another great doctor?  Dr. Vampire.  “Whatever his medical specialty, the doctor’s pseudonym is a confusing choice.  He calls himself Doctor Vampire but he fights vampires?”.

Another interesting choices of the year:  Doll Man, whose superhero ability is shrinking!

One of the most confusing superheroes was The Eye “an actual living, speaking crime-fighting disembodied floating giant eyeball.”

Arguably the first female super hero (preceding Wonder Woman by a year) was Fantomah Mystery Woman of the Jungle   At rest she was a gorgeous blonde-haired, pale woman but when angered she became sky blue and her face turned into a skull.

More female superheros included Invisible Scarlet O’Neil who seemed to be going more for titillation with lines like “I’d better remove my clothes so I can swing freely in the rig.”   Or Lady Satan and Madam Fatal.  Madam Fatal was the alter ego of Richard Stanton.  When his wife was killed an his daughter kidnapped, he decided to become a crime fighting old lady (surely there is a compelling reason for this).  He rescues his daughter as Madam Fatal, but tells the crook: I’ve decided that as Madam FataI l’ll go on fighting crime and lawlessness as long as I can.” (He lasted for two years!).

And then there as Mother Hubbard.  She was a witch and inspired “the most flat-out terrifying superhero stories in the entire genre:  Mother Hubbard confronted a race of gnomes who pried the eyes of out of children’s heads with a crowbar.

In terms of super hero teams one of the first was Ghost Patrol.  These ghosts (who were killed while doing good) seem to be having a good old time.

In the more obviously named superheroes category, there is Just N’ Wright (the pseudonym of lumberjack Justin Wright–“this shouldn’t leave crooks scratching their heads about his real name.”  He only lasted one issue.

Amidst the seemingly normally named superheroes like, um, Rainbow Boy there was also Speed Centaur “I’m a talking horse-the only one there is.”

The Silver Age was from 1950-1969.  The market had been saturated and superheroes fell from favor. But in the 1950s a new wave of optimism came about which lead to more superhero comics.

Like Brain Boy, a baby with a super intelligent and telepathic abilities.

More interesting is surely Brother Power the Geek “Man, I tell it like it is now!  The sound is groovey!  It blows my mind!”  The comic promised the real-life scene of the dangers in hippie-land.  It only lasted 2 issues suffering from a meandering and genuinely confusing plot.

Then there’s Captain Marvel.  Well, not THAT one, this one is a copy of the original and was made in from 1966.  This Captain Marvel could split apart at the arms and legs and head by hollering the unique word “Xam!”

The Silver Age’s best group of Super Heroes has to be The Fab 4.  They were sightseeing teens who happened to visit the Dell House of Heroes (published by Dell Comics, of course). While at the hall there was an explosion in the super hero robot area and the kids are imbued with super powers.  Morris asks some important question: “Where the heck is this Hall of fame anyway? Who invented the super robots in it and why aren’t these kids in school?”

As far as the most unusual superhero award, it must be given to Fatman the Human Flaying saucer.  He is indeed a fat man but he can turn into a flying saucer somehow.

Jigsaw is a stretchy super hero with “the ability to elasticize his body in a genuinely unsettling manner.  Rather than smoothly expanding like a rubber band, the interlocking plates on Jigsaw’s body separate, allowing his ropy alien tendons to swing free.”

By 1966, we had superheroes like the peacemaker who would “end conflicts with nonviolent solutions (although he apparently didn’t count “tremendous explosions as violence.”  Despite his lofty ambitions, the Peacemaker is remembered primarily for wearing a helmet that resembled a toilet seat.

The Modern Age 1970-Present is not exempt from regrettable superheroes.

There is Holo-Man: Laser physicist Dr James Robson plays host to the President but during his demonstration, bad guys attack and the laser explodes.  “At this point the soon-to-be Holo-Man’s origin comes fast and furious (and ridiculous).  The good doctor is somehow encased in a life-sized holographic plate, which is then shunted into another “dimensional plateau” somewhere within something called a “mind-aura” where a bearded and cloaked figure named Laserman grants Robson tremendous powers that are controlled by a “holodisc” from “future time dimensions.”

Then there’s 1975s Morlock 2001 who started life as…an eggplant

The DC Comics team The Outsiders was made up of a four armed, green-skinned Cyclops, a squinting bespectacled frog man, a gorgeous sloe-eyed blonde who had fish scaled limbs, and a man bonded to a truck.

There’s even Prez First Teen President of the USA.

1983 brought us Skateman “Hands off jerkhole, we’re forming a union!  My foot and your face.”   This comic was created by Neal Adams  “allegedly developed as a tie in for a potential licensing project the book’s ultraviolent story line and objectionable language made it an unlikely candidate to sell whatever it was intended to market: roller skates, men’s roller derby, headscarves, the mafia, whatever.   Skateman also “has the honor of being one of the few street-level vigilantes in the history of comics to have taken justice into his own hands while wearing pristine white booty shorts .  It only lasted one issue.

1983 also brought is Thunderbunny.  “I have great power but I become a rabbit to use it.  I don’t know if being a superhero is worth it!”  All Bobby must do is concentrate–clap his hands–and he is transformed into a giant pink rabbit clad in Spandex.”    He gains impressive strength, is invulnerable and can fly, but the longer he stays in this form, the harder it is form him to become human again.  Ah, the 80s.

As you can tell this book is silly and fun.  There’s a lot of head scratching when looking at these ideas.   And yet how many of them are more absurd than successful superheroes?  Well, Thunderbunny, maybe.