Yo!
Well kiddies, let's take another brief trip back in time to September, 1997. The WB network's then three-year-old "Kids' WB" Saturday morning program block kicked off another new season on-air, with as its most anticipated addition, aside from the "Men in Black" animated series (yes, for those who don't remember, there WAS a cartoon show based off the movie. Too bad it didn't last until season five, because the new season/second movie timing would've promoted each other beautifully, but that's another rant), was their new Superman animated series returning for its sophomore year, but this time being directly teamed up with a new Batman animated series being handled by most of Superman's creative and animation team, meaning the 30-minute Superman show was now an hour long "Batman/Superman Adventures" show.. This was hyped to be a sixty-minute DC Comics fanboy's orgasmic dream come true.... And it was for most of the first year... Until the Batman episodes started to lag in story quality and originality ("okay, we get it! The writers REALLY like writing Joker episodes!"), the Superman episodes were noticeably winding down in the last season (1999-2000), and they decided to cut the show down from an hour-long format Saturdays, to a half-hour hero-alternating weekday format, until "Batman/Superman"'s iminent doom in late August, 2000. God, I miss Fox's original Batman series (1992-1995)
September, 2004. After even MORE hype, WB launches Batman show number two, "The Batman." My first thought: "Okay, big deal. They added the word 'the' to the title of this show. The producers are billing this as the original 1992 animated series crossed with Batman Beyond. They better not screw this up." Then, "'The' Batman" "the" premieres, and "the" first thing that pops into "the" brain is "the" following: "Holy crap, I'm never going to get used to the word 'the' being used all the time like that. It's just too annoying and stupid." His name is Batman, not THE Batman, after all. Character designs from the old shows have been given a thorough redesign (read: brutally trashed and given a semi-Tim Burton makeover), and story content, while slightly better, just can't quite make up for the out-of-place visuals, the aforementioned awkward title, and the fact that the writers decided with this incarnation to wait until the third season (fourth, if you include the "real" second-season episodes they ran all through last summer to subtly push more publicity for Batman Begins), which just launched Saturday, to introduce Robin to the show. In the process of airing said episode, the first-half of Batman/Superman was officially reborn.
Also on Saturday, WB launched another new show that brought a teenage Superman back to the lineup, but this time with a little backup: the "Legion of Superheroes", a small group of teenage superheroes defending truth and justice and blah-blah-blah-blah, but in the distant future, with a bunch of enemies that certainly beats out the retardedly conceptualized abortions that are the villains from last year's it-sucks-and-everybody-knew-it "Loonatics Unleashed", which somehow survived to another season as well. Anyway, the pilot episode worked out well, I thought, with some promising hints at things to come. Not the best beginning for a Superman show, but far from the worst. I'll give it the benefit of the doubt this first season, but the story quality had better not start sinking steadily, or we'll have a problem. Good news is, as a fan, I'm willing to accept the change of setting, Mr. Kent's age-reduction, the fact that WB can't just use the name Superboy already (big lawsuit over that. Check Wikipedia.), and the all-too-convenient magical self-resizing of Clark's suit to fit his teenage self automatically, after he gets the suit out of a local Superman museum in said future, which shouldn't even exist since Clark was persuaded to come to the future, in the process rendering everything he would do as present-day Superman non-existent because that time-travel should have altered the timeline accordingly, but that's just the quantum physicist in me talking there. Anyway, thanks to the fact that WB paired this show's timeslot right before Bat--- sorry, "THE" Batman, the golden days (for me) of the Bruce Timm/Paul Dini-era Batman/Superman shows are back and almost tolerable!
Bottom Line: "The" Batman gets three of five stars. Story quality and character dynamic is slightly improved here, because the fans have had some time to adjust to this new format. For me, though, it's still not really the same. At least, any Batman cartoon without Kevin Conroy voicing the bat just isn't right. Although he did do a cameo as Robin's dad in this episode, which I enjoyed thoroughly. Yeah, I know that's kinda nitpicky of me, and all things considered, Romano does do a pretty good job of delivering an appropriate voice for a Batman in his mid-twenties, but for me, that glaring voice change was the last straw. Rumor has it, this is the final season of the show, so production staff, don't make "Batman Gotham Knights" (the Batman half of Batman/Superman's formal title)'s mistake and let the show suffer death slowly and antagonize the fans because you're winding down. A show with the buildup it got, better have the ending it deserves, if for no other reason than it now, I believe, ties the original Batman cartoon's lifespan, and a cartoon show with that kind of tenure (considering it's WB) deserves a good finale. "Legion of Superheroes" gets three and three-quarter out of five stars. Overall interesting premise, good character designs, voice acting kinda flat, but I expect that to grow and keep a high quality quickly. If I'm supposed to buy this as a replacement for Teen Titans, you better fill those shoes darn well, production crew. And when this show ends, please. FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, again, don't make the Titans' mistake and end the show with more loose ends than a shoelace put through a high-power blender for five minutes by letting the network air the piss-poor finale, unadvertised, on a Monday afternoon. .....But that's just me.
Sorry about the length again this week, guys. I just had a lot to say about this one. Form your own opinions by checking out both shows back to back, Batman/Superman-style, "Legion of Superheroes" at 10am, and "The Batman" at 10:30, EST, Saturdays, on whatever your local W--- ah, crap. Almost forgot. I mean, whatever your local CW network is. For a history lesson on what you probably missed, every Timm/Dini Superman and Batman animated series episode (including the "Batman/Superman" ones, of course, up to season two of Beyond) is currently available on full-season DVD sets. See ya next week.
-D.
Monday, September 25, 2006
Monday, September 18, 2006
Entry 27: "The Land of the Fallen Son"
Yo!
I'm really tired of hearing about Daniel Smith's mysterious death last week. In case you haven't been paying attention to the news AT ALL lately, Daniel is the 20-year-old son of former Playboy playmate Anna Nicole Smith. He died last Sunday, the 10th, in the Bahamas, in the very same hospital room where his mother was recuperating from giving birth to his baby sister just three days earlier. Anna is currently (understandably) extremely depressed and in mourning while simultaneously taking care of her new baby. On top of the fact that Anna has yet to publicly reveal who the father of child #2 is, the cause of Daniel's death has yet to be determined, or at least yet to be publicly released.
My gripe about this is, again, you couldn't turn to any news outlet at all last week without getting some serious recapping and perspectives and conjecture surrounding this death. My stance is, could the media possibly have made a bigger deal of this? I mean.... okay, I understand that it was an extreme tragedy that this death happened, and my condolences to Anna Nicole and her family, but seriously. The way the TV media and the internet over-covered this story, you'd almost swear it was a presidential assassination. I can't wait until the results of the second or third (I lost count) autopsy's results are made public, so then the spinning can REALLY begin. I can hear the various questions now:
"Where did he get all those drugs from?"
"How long has this been happening?"
"Did anyone in his family know about this?"
"What kind of evidence did the forensics guys recover?"
"Have the authorities found a suspect yet?"
"When's the trial??"
Bottom Line: Okay, I'll try very hard to avoid making this week's BL turn into an improvised eulogy-type...... Um... thing. Anyway, like I said, it's an extremely unexpected bomb to drop on a new (second-time-over) mother, and my condolences go out to Anna Nicole and family. But please, news media. Exercise restraint and show just a little tact and learn when to stop milking the living crap out of a story, just because of how big and high-profile you think it is. ...But that's just me. Okay, enough preaching to the choir. That's all. I'm outta here.
Later.
-D.
I'm really tired of hearing about Daniel Smith's mysterious death last week. In case you haven't been paying attention to the news AT ALL lately, Daniel is the 20-year-old son of former Playboy playmate Anna Nicole Smith. He died last Sunday, the 10th, in the Bahamas, in the very same hospital room where his mother was recuperating from giving birth to his baby sister just three days earlier. Anna is currently (understandably) extremely depressed and in mourning while simultaneously taking care of her new baby. On top of the fact that Anna has yet to publicly reveal who the father of child #2 is, the cause of Daniel's death has yet to be determined, or at least yet to be publicly released.
My gripe about this is, again, you couldn't turn to any news outlet at all last week without getting some serious recapping and perspectives and conjecture surrounding this death. My stance is, could the media possibly have made a bigger deal of this? I mean.... okay, I understand that it was an extreme tragedy that this death happened, and my condolences to Anna Nicole and her family, but seriously. The way the TV media and the internet over-covered this story, you'd almost swear it was a presidential assassination. I can't wait until the results of the second or third (I lost count) autopsy's results are made public, so then the spinning can REALLY begin. I can hear the various questions now:
"Where did he get all those drugs from?"
"How long has this been happening?"
"Did anyone in his family know about this?"
"What kind of evidence did the forensics guys recover?"
"Have the authorities found a suspect yet?"
"When's the trial??"
Bottom Line: Okay, I'll try very hard to avoid making this week's BL turn into an improvised eulogy-type...... Um... thing. Anyway, like I said, it's an extremely unexpected bomb to drop on a new (second-time-over) mother, and my condolences go out to Anna Nicole and family. But please, news media. Exercise restraint and show just a little tact and learn when to stop milking the living crap out of a story, just because of how big and high-profile you think it is. ...But that's just me. Okay, enough preaching to the choir. That's all. I'm outta here.
Later.
-D.
Monday, September 11, 2006
Entry 26: "This Is The Anime That Never Ends..."
Yo!
Okay, four things: Thing #1, I noticed last week that the BTJM Blog's 500th page view happened, and I want to quickly thank all my visitors and regular readers who've been putting up with me over the last six months. Thing #2, apparently, today marks the five-year anniversary of the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks. My thoughts and prayers are with those who lost family and/or loved ones as a result of the events of that morning. Thing #3, please excuse my lateness again with this Blog. My laptop's on the fritz again, and I completely forgot my timeframe while recovering my files. Hey, any of you ever heard of or seen a virus or something that causes your entire screen to do this northern lights-ish effect and slowly turn the screen white, top to bottom? Anyway, I'll be back in top form next week.
Moving on, starting two days ago, all brand-new season nine Pokemon episodes are airing only on Cartoon Network, which thoroughly screws over the loyal fans who kept the show going all this time, even when it was syndicated in those early season one episodes, early weekday mornings (memories..... light the corners of my mind.....). I'll say right off the bat that The Pokemon Company (henceforth known here as "PokeComp") already did a heck of a job improving the former 4Kids voices over the abysmal "preview" that was the Mirage special that aired this Spring. Max, Jessie and Wobbuffet are almost spot-on impersonations of the 4Kids cast we all know and love, but they're not bad enough to not be able to get past over time. Keep it up. Meowth and Ash are almost as hilariously off as the Mirage actors. Change the voice tone, please. Hey, new guys! When you're fixing your voices for those two, just ask yourselves: "What would Blaustein and Taylor do...?", rent a couple of their Poke-movies, and deliver the voices right. Period. Brock and May are vast improvements, considering how constipated and old (respectively) they sounded in Mirage. James and Pikachu are in pretty much the same boat Meowth and Ash are in. Except they're not really THAT bad. Just change the voices a little bit more, and we'll talk. But not too much. I hate watching history repeat itself.
Story content this go-round, I'd say is about season four- or seven-caliber, meaning us true regular viewers can easily tell these are just filler stories just before yet another major tournament Ash will no doubt lose-- Oops! Sorry, I almost slipped into an old rant for a second there! But seriously, PokeComp. tell your writing/translating staff to step it up. If you expect us to accept the new cast, new timeslot, new supporting Pokemon cast changes (James' Chimeco is gone?!?!? .........eh.), and even the new network, we expect a positive tradeoff. Make the switch worthwhile, and don't you dare try forcing another "Mystery Of The Mirage Pokemon" special on us. The U.S. market that helped build you up to where you are now deserves better than that. And please... Let Ash win one stinkin' championship. The Orange League victory cup from September 2000 is collecting some serious dust.
....And then there was Yu-Gi-Oh. It ended on Kids WB on June 1, and I was relatively fine with that... but then I saw the atrociously patched together resurrection effort that is "Capsule Monsters." (*stomach grumbles from sickness relating to mere mention of the spinoff show. Also, long and wordy explanations.) That's all I can stand writing about that without losing my lunch. .............Again. Read ToonZone's advance review HERE for more on that show. Bottom Line: Pokemon: 3/5 Stars. Good, but not great. Step up the quality, or the fans will stop watching. There'd better be a FullMetal Alchemist Movie-esque quality ending at some point, and if this winds up ending prematurely because you wouldn't get your stuff together, PokeComp, and we have to download out subbed (subtitled Japanese) episodes from torrents because you wouldn't step up enough so CN wouldn't cancel the show, we'll be really pissed off. ...Well, at least that's just me... Yu-Gi-Oh: 1/5 Stars. Nice try, 4Kids, but........ no. If you at home want to form your own opinion, "Pokemon: Battle Frontier" airs Saturdays, 9:30am on Cartoon Network, and "Yu-Gi-Oh: Capsule Monsters" is Saturdays at 10am on whatever your local Fox affiliate is.
See ya next Monday!
-D.
P.S. I almost forgot Thing #4: This week's title pun, in case you didn't catch it, parodies "The Song That Never Ends" from Shari Lewis' "Lamb Chop's Play Along" puppet show last seen on PBS in the early '90s.
Okay, four things: Thing #1, I noticed last week that the BTJM Blog's 500th page view happened, and I want to quickly thank all my visitors and regular readers who've been putting up with me over the last six months. Thing #2, apparently, today marks the five-year anniversary of the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks. My thoughts and prayers are with those who lost family and/or loved ones as a result of the events of that morning. Thing #3, please excuse my lateness again with this Blog. My laptop's on the fritz again, and I completely forgot my timeframe while recovering my files. Hey, any of you ever heard of or seen a virus or something that causes your entire screen to do this northern lights-ish effect and slowly turn the screen white, top to bottom? Anyway, I'll be back in top form next week.
Moving on, starting two days ago, all brand-new season nine Pokemon episodes are airing only on Cartoon Network, which thoroughly screws over the loyal fans who kept the show going all this time, even when it was syndicated in those early season one episodes, early weekday mornings (memories..... light the corners of my mind.....). I'll say right off the bat that The Pokemon Company (henceforth known here as "PokeComp") already did a heck of a job improving the former 4Kids voices over the abysmal "preview" that was the Mirage special that aired this Spring. Max, Jessie and Wobbuffet are almost spot-on impersonations of the 4Kids cast we all know and love, but they're not bad enough to not be able to get past over time. Keep it up. Meowth and Ash are almost as hilariously off as the Mirage actors. Change the voice tone, please. Hey, new guys! When you're fixing your voices for those two, just ask yourselves: "What would Blaustein and Taylor do...?", rent a couple of their Poke-movies, and deliver the voices right. Period. Brock and May are vast improvements, considering how constipated and old (respectively) they sounded in Mirage. James and Pikachu are in pretty much the same boat Meowth and Ash are in. Except they're not really THAT bad. Just change the voices a little bit more, and we'll talk. But not too much. I hate watching history repeat itself.
Story content this go-round, I'd say is about season four- or seven-caliber, meaning us true regular viewers can easily tell these are just filler stories just before yet another major tournament Ash will no doubt lose-- Oops! Sorry, I almost slipped into an old rant for a second there! But seriously, PokeComp. tell your writing/translating staff to step it up. If you expect us to accept the new cast, new timeslot, new supporting Pokemon cast changes (James' Chimeco is gone?!?!? .........eh.), and even the new network, we expect a positive tradeoff. Make the switch worthwhile, and don't you dare try forcing another "Mystery Of The Mirage Pokemon" special on us. The U.S. market that helped build you up to where you are now deserves better than that. And please... Let Ash win one stinkin' championship. The Orange League victory cup from September 2000 is collecting some serious dust.
....And then there was Yu-Gi-Oh. It ended on Kids WB on June 1, and I was relatively fine with that... but then I saw the atrociously patched together resurrection effort that is "Capsule Monsters." (*stomach grumbles from sickness relating to mere mention of the spinoff show. Also, long and wordy explanations.) That's all I can stand writing about that without losing my lunch. .............Again. Read ToonZone's advance review HERE for more on that show. Bottom Line: Pokemon: 3/5 Stars. Good, but not great. Step up the quality, or the fans will stop watching. There'd better be a FullMetal Alchemist Movie-esque quality ending at some point, and if this winds up ending prematurely because you wouldn't get your stuff together, PokeComp, and we have to download out subbed (subtitled Japanese) episodes from torrents because you wouldn't step up enough so CN wouldn't cancel the show, we'll be really pissed off. ...Well, at least that's just me... Yu-Gi-Oh: 1/5 Stars. Nice try, 4Kids, but........ no. If you at home want to form your own opinion, "Pokemon: Battle Frontier" airs Saturdays, 9:30am on Cartoon Network, and "Yu-Gi-Oh: Capsule Monsters" is Saturdays at 10am on whatever your local Fox affiliate is.
See ya next Monday!
-D.
P.S. I almost forgot Thing #4: This week's title pun, in case you didn't catch it, parodies "The Song That Never Ends" from Shari Lewis' "Lamb Chop's Play Along" puppet show last seen on PBS in the early '90s.
Monday, September 4, 2006
Entry 25: "U.S. Open for Business"
Yo!
1987. The Sul America Open tennis competition in All Saint's Bay's Itaparica island, near Salvador. A then-unknown Andre Agassi would win his first top-level singles title there, barely a year after turning professional. Age 17 at the time, he wasn't even old enough to get drafted into the Armed Forces. The beginning of a sports legend. 2006. September 3rd. Round three of the 2006 U.S. Open. Agassi loses to Benjamin Becker, a former (read: 2004) NCAA Men's Singles Tennis Champion. A very appropriate standing ovation roars out from the audience. Agassi's goodbye speech:
"The scoreboard says I lost today, but what scoreboard doesn't say is what it is I have found. Over the last 21 years I have found loyalty; you have pulled for me on the court and also in life. I have found inspiration. You have willed me to succeed, sometimes even in my lowest moments. And I have found generosity. You have given me your shoulders to stand on to reach for my dreams; dreams I could never have reached without you. Over the the last 21 years I have found you and I will take you and the memory of you with me for the rest of my life."
I'm not into tennis very much, but this is the first time I can say with all certainty that I tuned in to a match willingly, without looking in on a game my mom was watching at the time, paid attention to and Iwas genuinely excited and enjoyed witnessing it. Even though the only game I managed to see this year so far was Agassi's 1st round match against Andrei Pavel of Romania last Monday night. Yes, I missed Agassi's retirement match yesterday. But that 1st round match was sure one heck of a way to start a tournament!
Anyway, hands-down, this has to be one of the more eventful Opens in recent years. ...Or at least that's what my mom tells me. ...Mainly because of Agassi's retirement. Being a big fan of the Williams sisters, she's way more into tennis than me. She also tells me that one of the players to watch this year is James Blake, who currently ranks #7 on the official U.S. Open website's Top 20 Players page (men and women) seen HERE... Could be something big there......But that's just me.
Bottom Line: Mr. Agassi, professional tennis won't really be the same without you. Good luck in the future, and thanks for the memories. If you readers want to catch some of this action for yourselves, apparently USA is doing the bulk of the cable TV coverage (if not all of it). Also, the Open tournament ends on the 10th. Next week on the BTJM Blog... My final verdict on the Post-Kids' WB Pokemon..... and Yu-Gi-Oh episodes..............
SYNM! See Ya Next Monday!
-D.
1987. The Sul America Open tennis competition in All Saint's Bay's Itaparica island, near Salvador. A then-unknown Andre Agassi would win his first top-level singles title there, barely a year after turning professional. Age 17 at the time, he wasn't even old enough to get drafted into the Armed Forces. The beginning of a sports legend. 2006. September 3rd. Round three of the 2006 U.S. Open. Agassi loses to Benjamin Becker, a former (read: 2004) NCAA Men's Singles Tennis Champion. A very appropriate standing ovation roars out from the audience. Agassi's goodbye speech:
"The scoreboard says I lost today, but what scoreboard doesn't say is what it is I have found. Over the last 21 years I have found loyalty; you have pulled for me on the court and also in life. I have found inspiration. You have willed me to succeed, sometimes even in my lowest moments. And I have found generosity. You have given me your shoulders to stand on to reach for my dreams; dreams I could never have reached without you. Over the the last 21 years I have found you and I will take you and the memory of you with me for the rest of my life."
I'm not into tennis very much, but this is the first time I can say with all certainty that I tuned in to a match willingly, without looking in on a game my mom was watching at the time, paid attention to and Iwas genuinely excited and enjoyed witnessing it. Even though the only game I managed to see this year so far was Agassi's 1st round match against Andrei Pavel of Romania last Monday night. Yes, I missed Agassi's retirement match yesterday. But that 1st round match was sure one heck of a way to start a tournament!
Anyway, hands-down, this has to be one of the more eventful Opens in recent years. ...Or at least that's what my mom tells me. ...Mainly because of Agassi's retirement. Being a big fan of the Williams sisters, she's way more into tennis than me. She also tells me that one of the players to watch this year is James Blake, who currently ranks #7 on the official U.S. Open website's Top 20 Players page (men and women) seen HERE... Could be something big there......But that's just me.
Bottom Line: Mr. Agassi, professional tennis won't really be the same without you. Good luck in the future, and thanks for the memories. If you readers want to catch some of this action for yourselves, apparently USA is doing the bulk of the cable TV coverage (if not all of it). Also, the Open tournament ends on the 10th. Next week on the BTJM Blog... My final verdict on the Post-Kids' WB Pokemon..... and Yu-Gi-Oh episodes..............
SYNM! See Ya Next Monday!
-D.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
