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Inside: Cultural Sausage. ~ Ludic Lists. ~ Skullbucket. Outside: The Ludic Log is on vacation for five days. While I'm gone, please enjoy this delighful guest entry by the cryptic and cogitative Mr. Matt Rossi. "Kitty Pryde naked" "growing a mustache" "Lisa Raye and Benzino's club" "elders of the universe" "super crime girls in trouble press release" "She-Hulk naked" "Alexei Luthor" "Journal of MODOK Studies" |
08.07.2004
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Ten John Byrne comic book reboot projects of the future
10 - The Inferior Five. In a bold and daring move for John, he will opt not to restart their continuity from scratch. Instead, he will merely kill them all in as gruesome and undignified a manner as possible as part of a plan by Kobra to take over the world. Merryman will be beaten, tortured and hooked on drugs until he becomes Soma, the drug-weilding assassin, in a subtle bit of commentary on the 60's drug culture (subtle by Byrne standards, anyway) and Awkwardman and the Blimp will be sacrificed on the altar of Kali by a dominated Dumb Bunny, who will then be forced to star in a porn film by Soma/Merryman and Kobra. White Feather, incensed by the destruction of his team, will change his name to Black Feather and use his newfound rage to overcome his fear as he recruits a NEW team of Inferior Fivesmen consisting of the son of Awkwardman and Dumb Bunny, Brutal Bunny (with the strength of both his mother and father, and as dumb AND as clumsy as either), Zeppelin (son of The Blimp and Matchstick Lass, his ex-wife, with the ability to fly slowly and explode into flames once. Yes, once), Gorilla Head (he's not related to anyone else, he just has a gorilla head) and his own son Large Firearm, who has inherited the family aim but uses guns because 'arrows are for losers'. However, Large Firearm does use trick bullets like the Boxing Glove bullet or the Acetyline Torch bullet, only because they're being fired at high velocity from a firearm they tend to just kill people. Together, the new Inferior Five will set out to avenge the deaths of their parents and stop Soma's evil plans, which all involve taking drugs in yet more insightful social commentary from our boy John. 9 - Bat Lash. Starting over from the first issue of the new Bat Lash series, we learn that Bat Lash is actually living in a holo tank in the 30th century, and that none of the adventures of the Sergio Aragones/Nick Cardy book actually happened. Readers respond with a ferent "Bat who?" and are enraged to discover that this book has nothing to do with Batman, and are even more enraged to learn that Bat Lash is a robot hermaphrodite who fights crimes by means of an interesting biological adaption. 8 - The Elongated Man. Enraged that he didn't get to kill Ralph's wife himself, and worse, he won't be allowed to reboot Ralph's continuity so that the first issue of the John Byrne Elongated Man is the character's first appearance, John decides to have the Elongated Man kill himself by hanging (and he's his own rope... hah ha ha, oh John, your ironic wit) only to descend to hell where Lord Satanus reuinites Ralph with his wife (Sue's in hell for gambling) and sends them both back to earth to hunt down serial killers, child molesters, and other unsavory types so that Satanus may harvest their souls for an army of evil he intends to use to take over... let's say New Genesis, Byrne comes when he thinks about Jack Kirby... and thus the Elongated Man and his wife Sue continue their quipping, lighthearted detective romps over the still cooling bodies of the recently tortured and raped and kill, and help strengthen an evil demon's army for its inevitable assault upon the universe. That shouldn't suck, huh? 7 - Captain Mar-Vell. Turns out that ol' Marv never appeared in a Marvel comic before issue #1 of the new Byrne series, which stars Marv himself, his lover Una and Yon-Rogg, commander of the mission who is secretly in love with Una. John then will spend 70 issues essentially retelling the original 1969-1972 stories with about five times the dialogue. Also, readers will be left wondering how to explain who fought Thanos all those times if this is Mar-Vell's first appearance, because Byrne will only laugh, point at his crotch and say "You can start sucking now" when asked. 6 - The Metal Men. Byrne will respect their rich history and will tell stories dealing with their unique condition. Oh, and Platinum will be stacked and horny. 5 - The Ghost Rider. Not the flaming skull biker icon hero we all know and tolerate. No, Byrne's going back to the cowboy crimefighter infamous among all seven West Coast Avengers fans for drugging and assaulting Hawkeye's wife Mockingbird. Byrne extends that little bit of backstory into a loving entire issue dedicated to the rape and outrage of Mockinbird before having Mephisto raise them both from the dead and send Ghost Rider and Mockingbird forth to kill drug dealers, pimps and so on for an army Mephisto intends to use to conquer... let's say Asgard, that's a Kirbyesque place... and anyone who gets pissed because this is the exact same storyline as the one Byrne will use for his Elongated Man reboot can just shut up because John's a genius and the next Kirby. 4 - Kamandi, the Last Boy on Earth. Being how John is the next Kirby, even the King himself would surely applaud John's decision to reboot Kamandi from the start. After a year of retelling Kamandi's origins in grovelling fealty to Kirby, the comic book equivalent of what Gus Van Sant did to Psycho only in twice as many issues as Kirby originally used, it is revealed that none of it actually happened and that Kamandi is in fact an experiment in virtual reality brainwashing. The boy escapes the lab and hides in the woods, where he is adopted by a family of raccoons. Eventually Kamandi leads the raccoons against their human oppressors, and the raccoons are all shot and killed. Kamandi is then subjected to a haircut so he looks less like a damn hippie and made to go to school, which then is revealed to be filled with monster teenagers out of the old Universal movies. Kamandi then hangs himself with a strange, almost alive rubbery rope he finds and is forced by Etrigan the demon to walk the earth collecting the souls of raccoon serial killers and other raccoon killers to complete an army of damned raccoons Etrigan is going to use to annoy the hell out of the Hairies or something. Then Byrne reboots the whole thing with a time machine and it turns out that Kamandi really is from a post apocalyptic future and is the last boy on earth after all. The rumors that Jack Kirby's enraged ghost showed up at Byrne's house will be unfounded, I'm sure. 3- M.O.D.O.K.. Naah, I'm just kidding. Even Byrne wouldn't screw around with a Mental Organism Designed Only for Killing. 2 - Captain Comet. What has Adam Blake been up to since his last appearances, you may wonder? Did he quit L.E.G.I.O.N. to explore the cosmos? Did the Secret Society of Super-Villains bear him a grudge for interfering with their criminal enterprises? Are his super-powers limited to the ones we've already seen, or does this, the first mutant superhero of the modern comics age (first appearing in 1951) have other, even stranger abilities? What does it mean, to be born 100,000 years ahead of your time, anyway? Is Adam Blake unable to bear the cupidity and primitive savagery of the humans surrounding him, who are to him as primitive and backwards as our distant ancestors would be to us? Does he have strange thoughts, concepts, inventions that appear in his mind, ideas that come from the thousand centuries in the future he himself should have been born in, similar to the idea of 'steam engine time' used to explain morphic resonance? Are you kidding? This isn't a Grant Morrison revamp. This is Byrne we're talking about. He's throwing the whole character aside for a lame series of 'comet' powers like 'comet vision' and 'comet blasts' and restarting the character over from issue #1, with Adam Blake being the son of a comet that came to earth and mated with a human. Half man, half comet, Adam Blake fights crime as Captain Comet. Oh, and sometimes he has to fight an army of serial killers being recruited by Lord Satanus or something like that, and in issue 20 we find out that the comet was in fact... Lightray. Yeah, Lightray, that's the ticket. 1 - Atlas Comics. They're back, and Byrne has them! Thrill to the adventures of the Destructor, who shoots stubborn locks eleven times from a revolver! (Don't try and slow Byrne down by telling him that was John Targitt, Manstalker, he hasn't got time for your puny concerns! BYRNE SMASH!) Beginning in his flagship series THE ATLAS EFFECT, Byrne will bring Destructor, The Scorpion (the later costumed one, which will be the only one in Byrne's revamped Atlas continuity), The Cougar, Phoenix the Protector and Morlock 2001 together to help halt the rampage of The Brute. However, the Brute was really being framed by The Grim Ghost and Vicki as part of their plan to assemble the greatest champions of the world, making it easier for them to use said group of titans to hunt down the greatest villains in order to help Satan create an army of criminals. (And the best part is, that's actually what the Grim Ghost was really up to in the old comics, so Byrne can silence his vociferous critics with a mighty blast of his genius!) However, it backfires, the Brute joins what becomes known as the American League of Titans, and millions of fans scream in anguish. Byrne then gathers their souls and deposits them in Hell, where his lord Satan uses them in an army of evil dedicated to storming... let's say Brooklyn. |
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| TODAY'S DRIFTWOOD: "Beauty is merciless. You do not look at it; it looks at you and does not forgive." (Nikos Kazantzakis) |