Super Cousins

Now that the Supergirl TV series has moved from CBS to The CW where it belongs, the producers announced they've decided to include Kara's cousin Superman in Season 2!

Finally! At long last, we'll no longer be treated to endless scenes of Superman almost showing up. No more teases featuring blurry images of him obscured by sunlight. No more shots of just his hand, or even worse, his boots.

Superman/Clark Kent will be played by actor Tyler Hoechlin, whoever that is. So far it's not known if he'll be in every episode, or appear as the occasional guest star. If I was a bettin' man, I'd guess the latter.

Hoechlin is definitely a more… slender Superman, especially when compared to his cinematic counterpart. Actually I'm OK with that. Christopher Reeve, the best cinematic Superman to date, wasn't a hulking behemoth either. 

Based on that photo, Hoechlin seems to have a startlingly small noggin as well. I'm hoping that's just the result of some bad Photoshop retouching or the low angle of the photo.

I see they're going with the horrible, horrible Henry Cavill version of the Superman costume. The one that's way too dark and features a slimy, off-putting lizard-like texture. Worst of all, he's still missing his goddamned trunks. This has been a sticking point for me ever since Man Of Steel, and I'm never going to get used to it.

It's just so bizarre to me that DC has actively issued an edict banishing trunks from all their superhero characters, in an effort to be more "realistic." Because a man who can fly, shoot heat rays from his eyes and bounce bullets off his chest makes perfect sense, but one who wears trunks on the outside of his suit— well, that's just absurd.

Seeing this version of Superman next to Supergirl only highlights the fact that the costume desperately needs something to break up the design and add some much needed color to it. Like a pair of red trunks. His costume just plain looks wrong without them.

And what's up with those lens flares at the side? Are we sure this isn't a JJ Abrams project?

Be Careful What You Wish For

Last week a new Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer premiered at Comic-Con. 

Unlike most trailers, this one gave us three minutes or so of behind the scenes footage. They spent a good amount of time loudly trumpeting the fact that the new film is shunning the overuse of CGI and green screen, and is using real sets, real props and real prosthetic makeup and creature costumes wherever possible.

Here's one of those practical creature costumes they're crowing about.

Um... are we sure we don't want maybe a little CGI? Just a smidge?

On the other hand, it's always nice to see a member of the Banana Splits getting work again.

Everybody Out Of The (Dead) Pool!

Last week actor Ryan Reynolds released this photo of him in costume as Deadpool in the upcoming comic book movie of the same name.

The costume looks to be extremely faithful to the source material, and is a prime example of what I call The Comic Book Movie Costume Inverse Accuracy Law. It's a little fundamental rule of the universe I made up that states:

The odds of a comic book movie or TV series staying true to the source material is inversely proportional to how much I care about the property in question.

In other words, if I'm a huge and devoted fan of a character or property, the movie version will inevitably be virtually unrecognizable. If I have no particular interest in a character, then the film version will be a slavishly recreated copy of the source material.

Which is exactly what's happening here. I have no feelings one way or the other towards Deadpool, so of course he's wearing the most meticulously recreated and detailed costume in the history of comic book cinema. And because I honestly don't care, Ryan Reynolds is doing everything in his power to make sure Deadpool will act precisely in character at all times. 

Meanwhile, after botching them twice before, Fox is rebooting The Fantastic 4 — my all-time favorite comic book— yet again. Everything about this project seems deliberately designed to be as off-model as possible, from the ages of the characters to the race-swapped Human Torch and even the Thing, who looks like nothing more than a walking, corn-studded turd. Thanks a lot, Fox.

The Deadpool film would seem to contradict the usual movie studio mantra that comic costumes are impossible to recreate in the real world, or that they'd look ridiculous in real life (which Fox actually said prior to the first X-Men film back in 2000). Obviously this Deadpool costume proves that was all nothing but a bald-faced lie.

Now that Deadpool has shown us that comic-accurate costumes are indeed possible, I look forward to seeing more exact recreations in the comic months.

It's A Wonder

Last week DC Comics revealed their new costume design for long-running character Wonder Woman. 

Gone is the highly offensive and sexist "swimsuit" the character's been saddled with for decades, by the male-dominated comic industry. It's now been replaced with an empowering and practical semi-armored full bodysuit.

I'm not sure why Wonder Woman needs Wolverine-esque knives that pop out of her gauntlets, but whatever.

So Bob, I hear you all asking with baited breath, what do you think of the new Wonder Woman costume? Is it a hit or a miss?

Well... I don't much care for it. For one thing, I can still see a slight bit of skin, particularly in the areas of her hands and face. And the high priest collar, with the daring notch cut into the front, exposes far too much of her supple and provacative neck. And her hair!  Just look at those blatantly exposed tresses flowing freely in the wind! Worst of all, you can still faintly discern a slight indication of the female form through the material and armor. No, this new costume just won't do at all.

I hope DC won't mind, but I took the liberty of making a few tweaks to the new costume. Ah, that's much better. Now every square inch of her flesh, even her eyes, is chastely covered. No longer will Dianna be viewed as nothing more than a sexual fantasy by emotionally stunted man-children. This is the bold new empowered, politically correct Wonder Woman for our time!

Super Suit

This week CBS began filming the pilot for their Supergirl series. It stars Melissa Benoist as Supergirl. Benoist previously starred in Glee. Oddly enough, The Flash's Grant Gustin is also a Glee alum. What is it with that show and superheroes?

I'm honestly surprised they're calling the series SuperGIRL. Given our politically correct, all-inclusive, hypersensitive society, it's a wonder they didn't call it Super Empowered Young Woman, Unequaled Woman Of Strength or Exceptional Woman Who Don't Need No Man To Tell Her She's Super.

Also this week, CBS released an image of the Supergirl costume:

Eh, it's actually not bad. I like it. It looks quite a bit like the one Supergirl wore in her comics debut way back in 1959. It's also very similar to the one Helen Slater wore in the 1984 Supergirl movie.

Of course DC couldn't help themselves and constructed the costume out of the same scaly, reptilian substance they used for Superman's outfit a couple of years ago in Man Of Steel. Because God forbid they make a costume out of some kind of cloth. It's even festooned with superfluous piping and details just like his.

And just like the Man Of Steel get-up, it's dull, drab and dingy-looking. Would it have killed them to have added a bit of color to it? This is DC we're talking about though, and they firmly believe superhero movies should be dark and joyless affairs, hence the funereal colors.

I took the liberty of lightening the costume in Photoshop. There, now doesn't that look better? Doesn't that look like the costume of someone who's happy to have her powers and actually enjoys being a hero?

I guess it could have been worse. They could have gone with this recent comic version of the costume, complete with useless boot holes that leave the knees unprotected, along with a giant red crotch arrow. Note to DC's comic artists: "Red" and "Crotch" are two words that should never appear next to one another.

The Comic Book Movie Costume Inverse Accuracy Law

Last week NBC (yeah, that NBC) released this publicity photo from their upcoming Constantine pilot.

Actor Matt Ryan will play John Constantine, the supernatural detective who's the star of DC Comics long-running Hellblazer comic book.

As you can see here he looks very true to the source material. Same hair, same shirt, loose tie and rumpled trench coat. The only thing missing is Constantine's trademark ever-present cigarette, and I would not be surprised if the network griped that out of existence.

Anyhoo, this is a prime example of what I like to call The Comic Book Movie Costume Inverse Accuracy Law. It's a little fundamental rule of the universe I made up that states:

The odds of a comic book movie or TV series staying true to the source material is inversely proportional to how much I care about the property in question.

In other words-- I'm not a fan of Hellblazer, so of course the TV version of John Constantine will look and act exactly like he does in the comic book. It's just a given.

The same thing happened with The Green Hornet movie a couple of years ago. I've never much cared for the Green Hornet one way or another, so of course the film version looked exactly like the comic. And even though the movie inexplicably starred Seth Rogen, they still got pretty much all the details right. The names, the origin, the supporting cast-- even the Hornet's Black Beauty was perfectly recreated.

Meanwhile, The Fantastic Four is my all time favorite comic. So naturally we got two awful movies in which most of the team was horribly miscast, looked nothing like the comic versions and acted completely out of character. And soon we're getting yet another botched version in which the actors look like high school kids and one isn't even the same race as his comic counterpart.

It stinks, but it's just something I've grown used to.

News Flash Update

A couple of weeks ago the CW network teased a headshot of the Flash's costume from their upcoming Flash TV series.

This week they're finally giving us a look at the full costume. Well, sort of. It's kind of hard to see the whole thing with him crouched at the starting block like that.

Overall it's better than I expected. I was sure he'd be wearing a kewl red leather jacket (like Clark wore on the later season of Smallville) in lieu of an actual costume, but happily he's not.

This suit's still way too dark for my tastes though. And again with the fiddly, complicated textures. Why do all modern TV and movie superhero costumes have to be formed out of some kind of weird textured polymer? It would not surprise me a bit if the texture here was made up of thousands of tiny lightning bolts, like the one on his chest.

I still like this Flash costume from the 1990s TV series. I get that they probably don't want to (or legally can't) copy it exactly. But why go so overboard with the textures? So everyone will get their money's worth out of their high-def TV screens?

I know, I know. Things were better in the old days, get off my lawn.

The Amazing Spider-Meh 2

This week director Mark Webb (is that supposed to be a pun?) unveiled the new costume for The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Even Amazinger.

It would appear that after I savagely mocked the previous suit on my highly influential blog (which reportedly made Webb sob during the Golden Globe awards), it's been completely redesigned. I'm glad to see Hollywood's finally come to its senses and is listening to me.

Gone are the odd gold colored eye-pieces and the odder basketball-like texture that plagued the previous costume.

This "new" suit looks suspiciously like the old one from the Sam Raimi Spider-Man trilogy. In fact it looks pretty much identical to my eyes. So tell me again: What was the point of rebooting this series already? Didn't the filmmakers say they were trying to distance themselves from the first trilogy and give us a "fresh, new take" on the character? And they do that by digging the first suit out of mothballs? 

You know, I'm beginning to think that people in Hollywood will say just about anything to sell a movie ticket.

Halloween Mystery

Ah, Autumn! When the leaves begin to fall, the air has a little nip to it, and the Temporary Halloween Stores start cropping up like the black mold on the floorboards of my house, that my insurance company conveniently no longer covers.

There are at least three of this things here in my moderately sized city (two within half a mile of one another). They're vast too; each the size of the average supermarket. All this is in addition to the seasonal Halloween sections in stores like Target, Walmart and CVS. That's a lot of Sexy Plumber costumes.

So who's buying all this stuff? Is there really such a high demand for Halloween costumes these days? 

Are people buying costumes to wear to Halloween parties? I fully admit that I am out of the loop when it comes to this subject. My partying days ended a long time ago, after I was involved in what my family has delightfully dubbed "The Incident." Do Halloween parties still exist? Do people still do that?

Maybe people are buying costumes to wear to the office? Hoo boy, what am I saying? Nobody has a job these days, especially in an office. The few people who are employed are already wearing costumes on a daily basis as they hand out burgers and fries. So no, they can't be wearing them to work. I don't know what I was thinking there.

Are people buying them to wear as they hand out treats at their door? Doubtful. If the public is anything like me they turn off the porch light on Halloween and hide in the bedroom all evening, reading by match light.

Are these stores really that profitable? Do they make that much money from their combined 100,000 square feet of prime retail space, filled to the brim with Sexy Bus Driver and Sexy Journeyman Electrician costumes? I suppose somehow they must or they wouldn't keep popping up year after year. 

It's a modern mystery, on par with how the hell Radio Shacks can possibly manage to stay open in this day and age.

The Amazing Spider-Meh

Last weekend I saw The Amazing Spider-Man, Sony's incredibly unnecessary remake or reboot or remoot or rebake or the Spider-Man franchise.

I'll write up a review of it another day. In the meantime I want to call attention to the new spider suit, or costume if you will.

Just look at the texture on the red sections of the suit, or costume if you will! Tell me that it's not made of basketballs. Go ahead, tell me! Look at it! Convince me if you can that Peter Parker didn't steal a bunch of scuffed-up basketballs from his high school, slice them up and sew them together into a suit, or costume if you will.

Once again the filmmakers apparently believe that a simple colorful suit made of ordinary spandex is too plain and pedestrian for today's sophisticated and discerning audience. Therefore they have to festoon the suit, or costume if you will, with a dizzying array of intricate and near-microscopic textures in a desperate attempt at production value.

I couldn't enjoy the movie as much as I could have because of the damn suit, or costume if you will. Every time they showed a closeup of it, all I could think about was "basketballs" and then I'd think about the time my dad forced me to play Biddy Ball at the Boy's Club in order to get me "out of the house," and how he disagreed with everything the coach said so he ended up pulling me off the team and forming a team of his own, with him as the coach of course, and then suddenly I was the coach's son and all the other kids on the team resented me, and... well, before I knew it the end credits were rolling and I don't even know if Spider-Man beat Lizard-Man or not.

I tell you this, this Peter Parker kid in the movie is wasting his talents fighting crime. Sure he's got the proportional strength of a spider and can swing through the streets on an artificial web of his own invention, but that's nothing compared to his sewing skills! Somehow, with no prior experience and without the assistance of a sewing mannequin, he managed to construct a perfectly form-fitting suit, or costume if you will, for himself, complete with multiple panels of different colors and textures that all fit together seamlessly. He even added sleek form-enhancing piping trim to the suit. And all out of old basketballs. This kid is quite the seamster (masculine form of seamstress, of course).

Radioactive blood? Try radioactive clothing design abilities!

Flame Retarded

OK, I know it's not politically correct, but I don't care. I thought it was kind of funny. So sue me.*

Taken at a Flea Market in Louisville a couple of months ago. Can anyone out there I.D. what character this is supposed to be? At first I thought it was teenage Pebbles from the "Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm" show, but the more I look at it I don't think it's her.




*please don't sue me.