Battleship copyright Hasbro and Universal

So, last night I attended a midnight screening of Battleship.

I’ll be honest, I hadn’t intended to see this one, but the opportunity to hang out with a friend who’ll be leaving town soon came up, and off to the cinema we were.

Honestly?  It was better than I expected…and I’ll get spoilery after the break!

My first impression of this Peter Berg movie, upon finishing it, is that – aside from FX, it felt like an above par entry for a summer film from the late 90s.  This is not meant to be a criticism, it’s just the feeling that this had; something that would fit in with the Independence Days and the Armageddons. In fact, I’d put Battleship as better than either of those.

Yes, it has a romantic subplot – but this doesn’t overshadow the film.  Yes, it has a semi-cloying message subplot (involving an amputee soldier) but neither of these things detract from the movie.  Somewhat cliched, yes, but that’s not a problem because neither is a “look! look!” bit, and that is a credit to Berg as a director.

He made a movie about a board game, with Transformers-like SFX, and could easily have gone the Bay model of cardboard characters.  This cast – Taylor Kitsch, Brooklyn Decker, Rihanna, etc – weren’t playing the most three dimensional of characters, but it didn’t matter.  The characters fit into the film, and these actors made them likeable and accessible so that you cared enough about what happened when things started to go boom.

And things did go boom.

Battleship was a smaller-scale invasion movie; unlike Independence Day, with its massive fleet of alien ships and insane amounts of collateral damage, Battleship kept things… I hesitate to say “realistic,” but certainly relatable.  The aliens have a forcefield generator, and crazy weapon-seeking drones, but that’s the extent of their advanced technology.  Their artillery is very human, and they take damage as any other ship would.  Forcefields are limited to blocking off a region, not a ship so the fights are fair-ish.

I liked that.  I like seeing the soldiers as underdogs, but not hopelessly outmatched.

Four ships land on earth successfully, and these four need to be taken down – with three modern naval vessels and, eventually, the titular Battleship… the Missouri, manned by the remnants of our young cast and a plethora of pissed-off, Popeye looking old sailors.

These old men got a damn big cheer, and I admit, brought a smile to my face.  I liked the idea of these guys coming to the rescue.

Like Chekov said, everything that was set up, paid off.  Mention that the legless soldier that was feeling sorry for himself was a hero and a Golden Gloves champion, and that his physical therapist wouldn’t let him give up?  Well, you can be sure that he’ll again show heroism and punch the hell out of some aliens.  Mention that a Battleship was built to “take a punch”?  You can be sure that you’ll see it do just that.

And it all made me smile.

The chicken burrito opening bought a lot of good will as well.

The only thing that I expected to see – and didn’t get to – was Liam Neeson personally kicking alien ass.  It was a minor disappointment; that wasn’t the part he was to play here, and I can live with that.  His primary function was to be intimidating to the man who wanted to marry his daughter… and that, he played to perfection.  (The daughter was the physical therapist who met aliens with the legless soldier, the intimidated man was the LT who attacked the alien ships with the Missouri.  Yes, these connections would strain credibility in real life, but dammit, it still felt relatable to me.  I mean hell, if you’ve ever been the guy meeting the overprotective father, you know how it may feel like you have to save the world to gain any ground!  Heh.)

Bottom line, Peter Berg made a Michael Bay film better than Michael Bay does.

Patriotic and fun, with cheers and laughs in the right place.  Any criticism I would normally have with the story was totally defused by the entertainment it provided… I walked in with no expectations, or worse – expecting to hate it, and walked out with a smile on my face.

I really couldn’t ask for more.

Battleship image copyright Universal

(And just tell me there aren’t ample jokes coming to mind with this pic — as in: run, Chris Brown!  She can see you!)  Seriously, though?  I gotta give Rihanna some credit.  I’ve seen actors botch lines with one word, and she had a fairly sizeable part for her first go, and she wasn’t bad.  So, kudos.

Bottom line – is it a GOOD movie?

You can make the argument either way, folks.  It was entertaining, it had some good humor, and a nice save-the-day feeling.  You’ll have seen all that elsewhere, of course, these beats are well-worn, but unless you’re determined to hate it (or are raped by big-city theater prices, which would certainly skew my perception – I paid a princely $7 for this viewing) I think it’s a solid distraction… a good little popcorn film.

Also, for the first time in a dog’s age, I’ll be on a PANEL! The info:

Saturday May 19
12PM to 1PM: BUY LOCAL – Meet local up and coming comic book superstars Mitch Gerads (The Activity, Dr. Who, Planet of the Apes), Erik Burnham (Ghostbusters), Jim Clark & CJ Renner (Colliders). A candid discussion about getting started and building success in the zany world of comic books one panel at a time! INSPIRING!

So yes, stop on by and say hello!

I’ll be there signing and sketching and talking Ghostbusters — and unlike C2E2, I wouldn’t miss SpringCon for the WORLD!  You can put money on me being there (barring a catastrophe, knock wood.)

If anyone wants to make sure I have time to do them a good sketch, they can give me a yell at darvey AT rocketmail DOT COM or by messaging me via my Facebook Fan Page (be a fan!  It earns you brownie points!)

Info on sketches can be found at my commissions link — http://burnhamania.com/blog/commissions — and of course, if you don’t see something you like there or want to haggle (or work out some kind of merch trade) I may be open to that.  I’m an amiable cat.  Hope to see you all at the show!

For more info on SpringCon, CLICK THIS LINK!

http://burnhamania.com/blog/wp-admin/post.php?post=39&action=edit

This is not a comic book that will mean a lot to you — it’s just another comic book from the 70s with a sweet Jack Kirby cover… but it represents a lot to me.  There are memories tied to it…

When I was four or five years old, I had a LOT of comics and comic-related things.  A Spidey doll!  Shirts!  Blankets!  Toys!  Some of those comics had belonged to my dad and grandpa (and would’ve been worth a nice amount if they’d survived… but I digress.)  There was a lot of stuff there.

And it went up in a fire.  Gone.  History.  We moved in with my grandparents, who lived just a short hop away, across a field, as my dad, uncle, and grandpa remodeled the garage into a small house.  I found scraps of my possessions  – a piece of a sheet, a corner of a book – for months afterward, littered around the hill behind the place we lived.  It was depressing.

But there were still comics.  My grandpa had a stash, see, comics I would go over and read… there was Spidey and The Defenders and Batman and Cap… plenty of stuff to look at when I was visiting.  Now that we were living there, the books helped me cope.

And Avengers Annual #6 was, somehow, my favorite.  Maybe it was the cover.  Or the chaptered format… I knew Captain America, but Iron Man? The Beast?  The Vision? No.  It was fascinating to read.  And it was the first comic book given to me to keep.

As such, it always evokes strong memories – the loss of everything, the building/remodeling of a new home, and staying with my grandparents (I miss grampa terribly).  There was a lot to process for a little mind, and I was grateful that the Avengers were there to distract me.  I’ve kept that comic for thirty or so odd years.  Through moves upon moves — it’s tattered and beaten and no longer in one piece.  Most of the backup feature with the Vision is long gone.  This book, my first new possession, before I even got clothes to replace the ones that had gone up in flames, was a floppy little piece of hope.

It’s in a box somewhere, hiding.  But I still have it.  It’s still mine.

A few years ago, Marvel put out some nice reprints for sale at Target.  I flipped through one and found the Nuklo story that made up the feature of Avengers Annual #6.

I kinda choked up right there, in the store.  All of those long-gone memories came rushing back — and I was a small kid again and the story was in my hands.  Of course I bought it.  It may not be the original, but I still have an attachment to it.

Again, all of this pretty much came flooding to mind as the end credits rolled on Avengers, and hey, I can always use a new blog post, even if it’s sappy.

Thanks for dropping by!

I drove down to Cedar Falls, IA on a sunny Tuesday – nice change of pace – and dropped by the store just in time to hang out and interrupt the prep for Wednesday.  (oops.)  But it was nice to talk comics and other assorted thises and thats — something I rarely get to do in person these days!

Later, there was pizza, cheese curds, beer (Ranger) and more comics talk.

I hit the sack at 1am, waking up six hours later despite being dead tired… that’s the magic of me out of town — I can’t sleep for more than just a few hours!

I made it to the store at 8:30 and started about my business of chatting and signing!

It was insane.  And there were homemade cupcakes (delicious.)  Ton of fun!

At around noon, the other half of the signing bill — Mr. Gordon Purcell — got into town and settled in for a long day of sketching.  This picture, where Gordon looks like he found a centerfold in the middle of an issue of X-Men:

After the day ended, there was more fun chatting and comics talk, and me zonking out at the hotel around 1am.  (Of course I was up before 8!)

This is all I’m prepared to remember at this point.

But it was a lot of fun at a great store – what more can ya ask for?

What made it to the page was a three issue arc featuring the Ghostbusters in a haunted amusement park in Schenectady…. but when I’d initially pitched it, it was going to be an issue longer and a LOT more dense.

I was going to have double the characters as the guys were joined by a very familiar group of supernatural debunkers who had their own reality TV show.

Two men, two women, and a large dog. The gag was that at one point, the ghost would possess the dog, enabling it to talk for a bit. I think the joke I was going for has become clear.

I decided against this for a few reasons… first, that is a LOT of characters to keep track of and serve. I didn’t want to give short shrift to the Ghostbusters, and if I was going to introduce these other characters and make them more than a one note joke, I’d need space for that…

It just didn’t work. Maybe I’ll revisit the idea one day.

In any case, it worked out — taking them out let me cut the arc by one issue and give the pages over to Egon for this month’s Ghostbusters #8.

…Which I hope you are all enjoying!

I’m cursed.

No, really.  Every year, within a week or two of my birthday, for as far back as I can remember, I get hit with some sort of calamity, major or minor.  It’s practically a given.

This year, unfortunately, the curse contributed to me having to cancel out of attending C2E2.  This was gonna be my big show for the year; I had bought a table and I was set to go.  I was looking forward to seeing old friends, and meeting new ones, especially all of the fans of the Ghostbusters ongoing!  I’m truly sad to be missing it.

The last time I made it to C2E2 was its inaugural year, in 2010.  That was an interesting time; a weekend of truly bizarre circumstances.

How bizarre?  I was pulled over on the way to Chicago for NOT speeding.  You read that right.  Wisconsin is a strange place.

I also had one of the worst allergy attacks I’ve ever had.  The OTC meds available to me had me so loopy I’m sure I gave quite an impression to all the folks I met.

I thought this year I’d be able to experience the show without a lingering haze and with (joy) a place to sit!  But such was not to be.

I do want to give a shout out to all the folks who tried to help me find a way to attend after all — Michael Moreci, Ethan Colchamiro, Paul Storrie and the artist on my upcoming Splinter one-shot, CP Wilson III.  I appreciate the effort gentlemen.

…Maybe next year!

Working like a madman over here on Ghostbusters: Haunted America, but I wanted to share a few things with you…

First, still planning on making C2E2, but there’s a chance yet I’ll have to cancel out.  I’m working to make sure that doesn’t happen, but I have had a couple of circumstances pop up to meddle with my weekend.  I took care of one, but the other… we’ll see how it plays out next week!  I really hope to make it.

Second, Team Ghostbusters has been nominated for the 30th annual CBG Fan Awards!  Here’s what we’re up for:

Best Writer (me), Best Penciller (Dan), Best Colorist (Luis), Best Cover Artist (Tristan), Best Editor (Tom), Best Series and Best Story Arc.  We would all of us appreciate your vote!

Here’s where you go to vote: CBG Fan Awards.

Finally, I wanted to share on my blog the David Peterson cover for the TMNT Micro Series issue I’m writing — Splinter!

And that’s a wrap!

But the individual Doctor portraits WILL be for sale.  They’ll look slightly different from the versions you see here because I’ll be hand-coloring the line art.  That’s right!  Even MORE unique!

I know the Tenth Doctor will sell easily, but I want all of the other boys out the door, too… so watch this space for that. (;

I am still making plans to hit C2E2 in a few weeks, and still have time to pre-draw a sketch, see a post below for all that jazz. May be making a few store trips here in the future as well, which I enjoy, again, news as it develops!

Over on my Facebook Fan Page, I’ve been posting quick sketches of the incarnations of the Doctor (y’know, Doctor Who.) I’m up to the Fifth Doctor as we speak — these are fun! Go check ‘em out! (: