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Post by ritt on Apr 23, 2013 23:21:24 GMT -6
I just started looking at comics again after a long absence and... What do you think of the various Barsoom comics that have been published in recent years by Dynamite Comics? The covers are stunning but how do they measure up as adaptations or even just as goofball fun reads? I don't have a comics shop anywhere near so I would probably pick them up in TPB form if at all.
Thanks in advance for any advice!
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Post by kesher on Apr 24, 2013 9:05:01 GMT -6
Those I haven't seen, but I'm a big fan of the Marvel run from back in the '70s.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 24, 2013 21:46:39 GMT -6
I just started looking at comics again after a long absence and... What do you think of the various Barsoom comics that have been published in recent years by Dynamite Comics? The covers are stunning but how do they measure up as adaptations or even just as goofball fun reads? I don't have a comics shop anywhere near so I would probably pick them up in TPB form if at all. Thanks in advance for any advice! Who cares about the INSIDE of the comics!
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Post by Morandir on Apr 25, 2013 7:24:41 GMT -6
I've read the first five issues as well as the Fall of Barsoom mini-series and enjoyed them all. The regular issues do a good job IMO of following the original story. I'd recommend them.
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Post by thorswulf on Apr 25, 2013 10:39:44 GMT -6
Artwork is definitely first rate! Stories arre pretty good too!
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Post by Malcadon on May 4, 2013 7:47:40 GMT -6
This might be old news, but just a heads-up: Dynamite comics has been facing a legal battle with the ERB Estates over Warlords of Mars and Lord of the Jungle. ERB Estates clam copyright for the entirety of both setting, and have given Disney and Dark Horse Comics the rights to them. Dynamite comics clams the right of Public Domain in US law. When that argument failed, ERB tried trademark infringement - a whole other legal animal. ERB Estates also clams that the nudity and pit-up art, which they clam is "bordering on (and in some cases are) pornographic."), is hurting the brand. Although the covers in general are risque, they do have alternative covers with topless nudity (see all the covers here). Although, this is a weak argument, as nudity is a normal facet to both fiction, and cheesecake/beefcake art have been used to represent these works for decades! I hope Dynamite wins (or won - I have no idea on the outcome)!
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Post by ritt on May 4, 2013 14:25:56 GMT -6
I really shouldn't be spending any money right now (I teach high school and Summer- The Season Without Paychecks- is coming) but I bought two of the Dejah Thoris TPBs (Both because I like the character and to give a big middle finger to the Burroughs Estate). If I dig these I'll also eventually pick up the adaptation of PRINCESS (My favorite novel) and the Gulliver Jones team-up.
For the ERB estate to complain about nudity in anything is hypocritical beyond belief.
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Post by Achán hiNidráne on May 7, 2013 10:00:04 GMT -6
ERB Estates also clams that the nudity and pit-up art, which they clam is "bordering on (and in some cases are) pornographic."), is hurting the brand. Although the covers in general are risque, they do have alternative covers with topless nudity (see all the covers here). Although, this is a weak argument, as nudity is a normal facet to both fiction, and cheesecake/beefcake art have been used to represent these works for decades! I wonder where ERB's lawyers were when Frazetta and Whelan were attracting horny teenage boys to the Barsoom novels with their "pornographic" cover art? I suppose Disney's money was better than the pittance they were getting from peddling paperbacks. By the way, I wonder how the ERB estate now feels after the House of Mouse essentially screwed up the marketing of John Carter, dropped the franchise like a sack of angry king cobras, and picked up the Star Wars license.
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Post by Malcadon on May 7, 2013 12:48:04 GMT -6
I wonder where ERB's lawyers were when Frazetta and Whelan were attracting horny teenage boys to the Barsoom novels with their "pornographic" cover art? I suppose Disney's money was better than the pittance they were getting from peddling paperbacks. By the way, I wonder how the ERB estate now feels after the House of Mouse essentially screwed up the marketing of John Carter, dropped the franchise like a sack of angry king cobras, and picked up the Star Wars license. My mind still cannot grasp the fact that the great Dejah Thoris is now a godd@mn "Disney Princess"!!! Its like hearing that your most beloved girl have been sold-off into white-slavery and violated by creepy old perverts! As much as we enjoy the cheesecake aspect of Dejah Thoris (Thuvia and others), this is still a good thing, but Disney has a perversion that goes beyond simple lust - it is a worldview that would whitewash the world of what it sees as negative, and replace it with watered-down stories and shoehorned happy endings, like it was a cheap sunday school coloring book!
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Post by scottenkainen on May 7, 2013 14:31:48 GMT -6
Malcadon, have you even seen John Carter? You don't seem to be describing the Disney movie at all...
~Scott "-enkainen" Casper
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Post by Deleted on May 7, 2013 16:16:58 GMT -6
I'm sorry, but in ERB's original books THE MARTIANS ARE NAKED.
I see no problem here.
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Post by Malcadon on May 7, 2013 22:36:19 GMT -6
Malcadon, have you even seen John Carter? You don't seem to be describing the Disney movie at all... Yeah I seen it. They made changes that I liked, and a lot I did not like. It was an OK Hollywood movie, but it could have been way better. The biggest issue I had with the movie was how the books are the embodiment of "escapist fiction," but it felt like the movie tries to brush that under the rug for the sake of shorehorned drama. They also put so much effort on world-building, that the story was a jumbled mess. I could not identify Carter as the hero will all this angst, and I found Thoris to be really lacking on all levels. Its never good when the CGI supporting characters are more interesting then the live-action stars. So my issue is less about it being a Disney movie -- after all, there are a number of great live-action Disney films that do not suffer the same annoyances as their animated films -- but it being another big-budget, watered-down Hollywood spectacle that are becoming a dime-a-dozen these days. Hollywood hates taking risks, and despite the ability of creative producers to make great movies on a shoestring budget, they manage to throw fortunes at mediocre producers, to make a mediocre film, then call it a success or wonder what happened when a film bombs, then ignore the real reason why it failed for some retarded conclusion! As for the Dynamite comic, I have never read it beyond some sample pages. I hear good things about it, but not enough to draw a solid conclusion. I have been interested in it, but I lack the money to invest in a series that I don't know if I would like or not.
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Post by ritt on May 13, 2013 16:56:32 GMT -6
My main issue with the movie was that in _every other sentence_ in the books horny John Carter love-sickly jabbers on and on about Dejah Thoris' "Beautiful copper skin", her "luscious bronze skin", etc, etc... and then the movie casts the most white-bread, pale, Midwestern actress imaginable. Anyway, the film was such a colossal financial and critical bomb that The House of the Rat is extremely unlikely to even touch Barsoom with a bargepole ever again (And also, as pointed out above, they have Star Wars now). Dejah's bondage in Walt's princess harem was short-lived.
Anyway the two trade paperbacks I ordered were DEJAH THORIS AND THE WHITE APES OF MARS and WARLORD OF MARS: DEJAH THORIS VOL 1.
APES was dumb fun. The art could have been better, but story was fast and violent and portrayed Dejah as both a smart and cultured mother/princess and a bad-*ss killer . It also verged into splatter-horror territory (The wild white apes are almost portrayed like the ALIENS xenomorphs) which was kinda cool as it showed that Barsoom is a big setting that can host other genres besides swashbucklery.
WoM:DJ was better, with nice Adam-Hughes-wanna-be cheesecake art (Some great facial expressions) and a fun story that recalled the feel of the old 70's Marvel John Carter comics. It was a prequel set 400 years before PRINCESS, which is also cool.
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Post by scottenkainen on May 14, 2013 8:22:45 GMT -6
Many people were able to understand the John Carter movie. I saw no jumbled mess. Many people identifed better with John Carter once he had issues and wasn't a perfect superhero. Feeling angst did not eliminate the escapist quality of the story. He literally, after all, goes to *another planet.*
The movie was not that large a financial loss for Disney when you factor in DVD sales and the foreign market. The critics might have uniformly jumped on the movie, but millions of people love it and clambor for a sequel. But then, anyone who calls Disney the "House of the Rat" isn't going to be fair and unbiased.
But back to Dynamite Comics...
~Scott "-enkainen" Casper
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Post by Old Guard Villian on Jul 18, 2015 13:34:22 GMT -6
I have to agree with Malcadon...
I have a problem with little 7 year old girls dressing like "slave Lea" in Star wars and Princess Dejah Thoris. But then again we do have people that like " toddlers & tiaras " on TLC.
But I do like it and think that its funny when movies imitate life ( Bad Grandpa with johnny knox ). They showed what it was like when people dress up their kids like little adults.
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