Episode 1603 Talkback - Comic Talk

Adam_Murdough

We've got a full house of five Geeks for this one, and special guest Julie Benson makes six! We talk to Julie about her upcoming gig as co-writer of Batgirl and the Birds of Prey for DC, and then the conversation goes a-wandering, from TV talk to this year's Eisner Awards nominees to a brief history of CGS promotional buttons! How many hoots can you handle?! (1:57:58)

Listen here.

Shawn138

Excellent episode as always, Geeks! I loved the Julie Benson interview and can't wait for Batgirl and the Birds of Prey! Can you please have Julie on as a guest in a semi-regular fashion? She adds a lot to your panel conversation! Anyway, I always love the Comic Talk episodes and (as Shane and Pants would say) the "loosey-goosey" nature of the conversations. Keep up the great work, guys and gals, and thanks for making my mundane Monday at work entertaining!

Rod28

Poor @Pants. He's a fine roommate. My only criteria was that he not be a snorer. His gas didn't bother me but I only spent a few minutes in the room anyways. That's what a con room is for. Passing out after drinking and losing your debit card.

Rod28

You can actually say two of the First Doctor's companions died. Katarina and Sarah Kindgom. Sadly Adrienne Hill is no longer with us but Jean Marsh is. I met her at Gally and she was a complete delight.

TheOriginalGMan

Only about 40 minutes into this one, but loving it!

@Julienae ... my wife and I are big fans of The 100. Awesome show. I was a little concerned about where they were going with that whole "City of Light" angle, but then when they had that whole flashback reveal this season about the 1st "Commander" and the AI implant? Whoa! Game changer!

I'm curious, did they have that mapped out from the get go, or was that something they dreamed up after the show started? If they had that in mind from day #1, well, salud, The 100 writers. Well played. Well played, indeed. It was a great twist.

Also, hated to see Lexa go. (insert sad emoticon here). Neither my wife nor I even realized it was the same actress from Fear The Walking Dead until after she was gone.

I've never read "Birds of Prey" but will definitely be putting on my list going forward.

TheOriginalGMan

PS - This one definitely goes on the short list of best CGS cold openings.

jaydee74

So, I'm going to take @wildpigcomics to task on calling Fan-4-Stick the worst comic book adaption ever made. Have you seen Halle Berry's Catwoman? Shaquille O'Neal in Steel? Those were so much worse than Fan-4-Stick. Now, I'm not saying that Fan-4-Stick wasn't terrible. It was but mostly because they made this a Fantastic Four movie. If this had just been a generic sci-fi movie about people getting powers that had nothing to do with the Fantastic Four, it might have been average. The very fact that they made this movie into a Fantastic Four movie is what makes this movie so terrible. It's not the worst adaptation I've ever seen but it's by far not the best.

bralinator

With the pedigree of the director, the actors, and the budget, Fan4stic should have been LOADS better than it was. It was a failure on almost every level. Worst interpretation of Doom ever put to celluloid.

jaydee74

Well, look at Catwoman. I would say that Halle Berry at that time had more pedigree and clout than all of the main characters of Fan-4-Stick put together. Add Sharon Stone and Benjamin Bratt who was hot due to his role on Law and Order and you had a very good cast. Not to mention decent actors who had smaller roles in this movie, you would have thought Catwoman would have been better as well. I would say Halle Berry's Catwoman was the worst version of any comic character on celluloid. Well, maybe Shaq as Steel.

matchkitJOHN

Great episode. I didn't know (or didn't remember) that Julie was a writer on the Uncle Sal episode that's so cool. If that was Skpe it sounded great. Looking forward to Wild Pig/FCBD recap show and Cap review. How about periscoping during the sale? @wildpigcomics @Pants

playdohsrepublic

For Dani, I've been a Marvel Unlimited subscriber for 2 years. I love it. I don't care about being current (a good story will keep) so being 6 months behind doesn't bother me. Plus the back catalogue is extensive and always growing. It took years for them to make a decent reader but now every Monday is like Wednesday.

bralinator

jaydee74 said:

Well, look at Catwoman. I would say that Halle Berry at that time had more pedigree and clout than all of the main characters of Fan-4-Stick put together. Add Sharon Stone and Benjamin Bratt who was hot due to his role on Law and Order and you had a very good cast. Not to mention decent actors who had smaller roles in this movie, you would have thought Catwoman would have been better as well. I would say Halle Berry's Catwoman was the worst version of any comic character on celluloid. Well, maybe Shaq as Steel.

Pedigree is only one aspect, the Catwoman director had never done a US film before so most expectations were low. I'd be much more upset over a crappy Spider-Man film (we've had a few) than a crappy Elektra film (we had 1.5) simply because of the character legacy. Another aspect is hope and anticipation. I had zero interest in a Catwoman film. Perhaps a reboot by Quentin Tarantino starring Michelle Pfeiffer would've interested me, but I have no fondness for the character to begin with so when it was announced, I was 'meh'. Fantastic Four on the other hand is a whole other property. I'd really love to see an improvement over the 2005 and 2007 films, but Fan4stic Four was a bitter disappointment. I guess with a bigger legacy, it had further to fall/fail.

Your mileage may vary, but they both hold a 9% rating on RT. However, since Catwoman has an 18% audience score and FF has a 19% audience score, I am willing to concede the point.

i_am_scifi

Marvel Unlimited is totally worth it, @Dani. Especially since they improved the app. Now it feels closer to Comixology. Still the occasional glitch, especially in panel mode, but it's nothing too difficult to get past.

Meanwhile, LOVED Julie! She's got so much passion for the genre that it was literally exuding from my headphones. Definitely looking forward to Batgirl & The Birds of Prey now, that's for sure.

Bryan

@Dani I'm not currently a MU subscriber, but I've signed up in the past when the service was on-sale. Totally worth joining for a month or 3 to catch up on the stuff you missed.

I haven't loved the app (iOS). Glitchy, and the download for offline reading function is really painful to use, even when it works correctly. It was just updated though, so who knows, maybe it's a little better now. Even with that, still worth a couple bucks to catch up on classic stories.

Mr_Cosmic

MU is great if you don't mind the wait. I subscribed for about a year and found myself forgetting about the books I wanted to read by the time they were on the app.

Julienae

Hey, fellow CGS'ers! Just wanted to say thank you for the nice comments on the CAHHMIcCK TAAWWLKk ep. ;) I adore this show and the whole CGS gang and getting to join them was a dream come true. Check out B&BOP, or don't, but either way, yay for CGS! xo

RickM

I kinda love MU. I bought one year for $99 and I just started reading the full run of FF, although work derailed me. But my son is reading everything in sight, particularly good mini-series from the last 5 or 10 years.

alienal

LOL! Loved the opening! Good job, Julie. And Pant's laughing reaction during the music was funny, too. I'm now so looking forward to reading Batgirl/Birds of Prey, now that I know that the ladies who Sal swooned over are writing it. (Heheh! Just kidding!) I enjoyed hearing the backround on how the sisters got their work at DC. I also like how the Julie and Dani seemed to bond a bit. Just a reflection of more diversity on the new CGS! (somewhat joking...) Julie also has some geek cred! Green Lantern #23? Wow...
Anyway, the "loosey-goosiness" of the podcast makes it hard to comment on everything, but I enjoyed it all!

AxelBrass

Great episode. Julie was great. Hopefully she can come back and give us updates as her comic writing career progresses.

@Dani, get the Marvel Unlimited for a year. If you don't mind the wait, it's great. I still buy some Marvel trades, but my spending has been reduced by 80 - 90%.

mwhitt80

Finally got done with 1603. Good episode guys. It was great having so many people on the show.

@Julienae you did a good job on the show and congratulations to you and your sister on the Birds of Prey.

TheOriginalGMan

Finally got around to watching last week's episode of "The 100." Congrats, Julie (and sister) ... it was excellent! The flashbacks to Pike's "Earth Survival Skills" class on the Ark were awesome as was the callback to Imagine Dragons' "Radioactive" from S01E01 as well. Luna's clan living on an old oil derrick in the ocean was a nice twist, as was the absolute brutality inflicted by the followers of the City of Light vs the non-conformists. Pants ... you need to get on board with the show. One of the top sci-fi shows on TV today.

A couple of other things on the Comic Tawwwwwk episode ...

I've only read Faith #1 so far. Loved it. Looking forward to the rest of the series. Great take on the super heroine genre.

Re: the SyFy Krypton series, I thought I heard you guys said it takes place 200 years in the past and will center around Superman's grandfather, is that correct? If so, I was unaware that Kryptonians lived that long. Is that an actual thing in the comics?

ChrisMurrin

WonderCon is a great show from an attendee standpoint. Great panels, lots of celebrity appearances, and a huge artists alley.

From an exhibitor standpoint, though, yikes! Unless you were by the big publisher booths near the entrance or over in artists alley (also near the entrance), it was a ghost town. I helped staff a booth and spoke to a lot of exhibitors, and not one of them said that they had a good show. Most said the show was so-so, but in that way that lets you know they're sugarcoating the truth.

The last time I worked a booth was in Anaheim a few years ago, and it was a tremendous show by all accounts. I'm hoping that next year it will improve.