What Would Batman Do?

Remember a couple weeks ago when I was given a Kick Ass Blogger award from Pauly T. Kal ?  Don’t be coy, you remember it.  Well, I’ve made a decision on what other blogs to pass the award onto.  While they may not kick as much ass as What Would Batman Do?, it cannot be denied that these blogs do wallop some serious tushy.

What is Up With Politics?

I love any blog that uses a question mark in its title, but I also love a political blog that tries its absolute best to present an unbiased, nonpartisan take on the news.  The author, eclecticbird, takes on this seemingly impossible task while still inserting her own quirky personality.  Congratulations, eclecticbird.  Here’s your prize:

The Relevant Rhino

Now for the complete opposite of being unbiased.  Threedegrees makes no attempts to hide his baby-killing, gay-marrying, monkey-evolving, anti-oil, anti-gun agenda.  But that doesn’t stop him from being absolutely right.  Threedegrees, you’ve earned this:

Celebrity Today

Admit it.  You love to read about Lindsay Lohan’s girlfriends and which child Ryan O’Neal screwed up in the 70s.  We all do.  The one blog you want to check out for all your celebrity smut is Celebrity Today.  Sometimes they even talk about Batman .  Regina Avalos, come on down.

Autism Insights

Autism and, more specifically, Asperger’s Syndrome is something that touches me personally and I can think of no better site to get a close look of what the spectrum looks like than Autism Insights.  Congratulations on earning this unknown award:

Bird Brains

Though not a Today.com blog, Bird Brains presents intelligent arguments (and the occaisional comic) about how liberals have it right.  Liberal Eagle, Liberal Seagull, and Liberal Beagle, wear your badge of kick assness with pride.

Congratulations to all you Kick Ass Bloggers.  You will be recieving your complimentary WWBD adult diapers in the mail.

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I don’t know anything about stocks, and mortgages, and bailouts.  I’m not one who uses words like “Fed,” and “bankrupt,” and “700 billion dollars.” Luckily, YouTuber MBelinkie has found a way to explain this new Greater Depression it in a way we can all understand: Batman.

While those fat cats on the board of Wayne Enterprises are getting golden, bat-shaped parachutes, the real, hardworking criminals (the fundamentals of our economy) of underground Gotham are left to pick up the tab.  Where oh where is our Caped Economic Savior (insert poor emoticon)?

Okay, I still don’t get it.  But wasn’t The Dark Knight a great movie?

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I’ve been meaning to write a short review for a while now about Joss Whedon and John Cassaday’s Astonishing X-Men.  We do do reviews here , you know.

Volumes 1-4 of Astonishing X-Men include Gifted , Dangerous , Torn , and Unstoppable .  Although the series ran across a span of fourish years, the writing and — more impressively — the art remain consistent throughout each page.  I haven’t had any experience with Cassaday’s work before, but I can tell you now I’m hooked.  The art is crisp and detailed, delving into realistic protrayals of every character while still maintaining a balance with classic comic book presentation.  I love the cat-like appearance of Beast, and the mutated curves of Emma Frost will remain in my dreams for years to come (insert orgasming emoticon).  I’ll definitely be checking out the Planetary series after witnessing his work on this project.

Joss Whedon — as you may know from his work on Firefly and Buffy the Vampire Slayer — is a master of intriguing characterization and unique plots.  Astonishing X-Men only adds to his reputation as a gifted 21st century scribe of many media.  We begin with a new school year for the teachers of Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters (Cyclops, Emma Frost, Wolverine, Beast, and Kitty Pryde/Shadowcat/Ariel/Sprite/That Chick Who Can Walk Through Walls).  The massacre of mutants on Genosha is still a fresh image in everyone’s minds, Scott Summers is dealing with the loss of his dear Jean in an unusual way (i.e., porking Emma Frost), and a new “cure” for mutation has the entire mutant community divided.  These issues are all at the forefront of Whedon’s story, but his real skill is seen in how each X-Man has their own relatable issue that affect their many interactions with one another.

In addition to our regular mutants, Astonishing X-Men also introduces a number of characters that will undoubtedly grace the pages of future chronicles in the Marvel universe.  Expect to see the names of Danger, Blindfold, Hisako Ichiki, and Special Agent Brand in upcoming X-stories.

Of course, Whedon is not faultless in this endeavor.  Just as in Firefly, events jump too rapidly from being laugh-out-loud funny to I-just-want-to-sit-in-a-corner-and-cry sad.  Some plot points remain unresolved by the fourth volume’s end, and that particular issue also suffers from pacing itself far too fast.

But even with these X-anomalies, Astonishing X-Men remains a solid piece of work and definitely deserves to be remembered for the X-future.  Whedon and Cassaday prove that stories revolving around superpowered people provide just as much commentary on the human condition as Kafka’s Metamorphosis or that episode of the Twilight Zone where everyone who was ugly was considered beautiful and everyone who was beautiful was considered ugly.  Remember that one?  I forgot where I’m going with this.  Review over.

Four adamantium claws out of five.

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It was just announced that Johnny Depp is set to play the Mad Hatter in Tim Burton’s next sure-to-an-unprecedentedly-successful film based on Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland.  First off, I think we can all agree that Burton can be trusted to do an amazing job in bringing a true adaptation of the story to life.  The actual Alice in Wonderland is an incredibly fucked up satire of innocence lost and ethereal mechanisms beyond our control.  Or so my friends tell me.

Second, we’ve already heard rumors of Depp set to play the Riddler in the next Batman film following the Titanic-sinking blockbuster known as The Dark Knight.  And What Would Batman Do? readers already overwhelmingly voted Captian Scissorhands best suited to play the Joker in the event that the character is featured in the next cinematic homage to the Savior of Gotham City.

Finally, using our advanced methods of constructing completely unfounded claims, we can understand that Depp is set to play the Mad Hatter, but not in Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland (insert smug emoticon).  No, for you see, Johnny Depp will take on the role of Jervis Tetch — also known as the “Mad Hatter” in Gotham’s underworld — in Christopher Nolan’s upcoming Batman: Criminally Insane.

What?!

What do you mean you’ve never heard of a Mad Hatter character in the DC Universe?  What do you mean you just came to this site for the prospect of free porn?  Look, he’s a real Batman villain.  I swear, look:

Isn’t that scary?  Isn’t that someone you can see Nolanified ?

Anyways, do a little reading , and then tell everyone you know that Johnny Depp is going to play the Mad Hatter in the next movie (Batman: Wearer of Many Hats), and that there’s a conspiracy to try to keep this information from the rest of the public.  Blame it on the Freemasons (insert censored emoticon).

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I’m still on a Green Lantern kick from Justice League: The New Frontier , so I hit up deviantART again to see what the fanboys and fangirls over there could offer.  In brightest day, in darkest night, no bored readers shall escape my literary might; let those who worship more visual arts behold these sights. . . Green Lanterns’ flights!  (Right click and click “View Image” to see them full-sized).

A fantastic Hal Jordan by one “RobHough” :

This one by hawk5 makes me green with envy:

Some sort of snake-chick Green Lantern by ROCINATE :

A Kyle Rayner homage to Alex Ross’ homage to Hal Jordan by greenlanternsgirl1 :

cheeks-74 shows us it’s not easy being green and hosting The Daily Show every night.  John Stewart:

And theFranchize reminds us that we can’t have a post without Batman:

Now go save the world.

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My girlfriend of the week, Megan Fox , is making headlines for fulfilling every thirteen year old boys’ dream: she had an affair with a female stripper named “Nikita.”

Fuck.  Yes.

My beloved readers, if you can think of any better reason to vote for Megan Fox as the next Catwoman in the current Batman film franchise, please tell me now.   She’s a goddess, a tease, a vigilante, a. . . dare I say “maverick”?  This is a woman with so much confidence in herself, she told the press directly the most scandalous period of her life.  This is Selina Kyle incarnate.

Lindsay Lohan, you’re old news.

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Some of you die hard What Would Batman Do? fans out there (the both of you) might have noticed a slight decrease in posts here.  I recently found a job, or what might be called a “gig,” and thus, the majority of my time will be devoted to that rather than talking about Batman’s eyebrows .  That’s not to say I won’t be posting on here at all; it’s been working out okay for me so far posting on here one day and on The Godless, Baby-Killing Sodomite the next day.

In other news, our latest poll only has thirteen votes right now and I won’t be completely satisfied until we break our last poll’s record of twenty-two votes.  So, tell your friends.

In other other news, the Yahoo! Buzz buttons are acting stupid.  It’s probably not my fault.

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Let’s talk about Batman’s eyebrows.  Everyone else seems to be avoiding it, but I for one will not stand idly by while my Holy Savior is periodically defiled above the ears.  Maybe not “defiled”. . .

I’m not really sure what to think of My Main Man’s look in Justice League: The New Frontier and the upcoming Batman: The Brave and the Bold .  I think we can all agree how ridiculous Adam West looked with the chalk eyebrows drawn on his cowl.  And while I’m all for reinventing stuff from the Golden Age and the TV series (especially for King Tut ), I’m not too crazy about the eyebrows.  Batman’s face is His icon, a physical representation of His personality, and by putting those bold, fatherly eyebrows on him, it implies that He thinks he’s better than us, wiser than us.  But He doesn’t.

The Dark Knight stops us when we make poor decisions, but even He knows that He isn’t without fault.  We’ve seen Him blame Himself for the tragic death of Jason Todd, for pushing Dick Grayson away, and for putting Barbara Gordon in a wheelchair.  We recently saw Him take down the OMAC computer He created to keep tabs on the rest of the world’s heroes; this, after He realized that we all must make mistakes and recover from them on our own.  In The Dark Knight, He came to a similar epiphany–that in order for His fellow citizens to trust Him, He must first trust them.

What the hell was I talking about?  Right, eyebrows.  We made a decision.

Keep the pompous-looking eyebrows off Batman.

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Among the other treasures bestowed upon me on the anniversary of my birth was Batman: Gotham Knight .  So, with Superman: Doomsday and Justice League: The New Frontier in my collection, I’m all caught up on DC and Warner Brothers’ straight-to-DVD saga.  In case you were keeping count.

Unlike The New Frontier, this film, which collects six different stories about the Bat from acclaimed writers and anime directors, seems to be explicitly targeted towards a more mature audience.  The dark tone of the Holy One, Blessed Be He is faithfully preserved throughout each story featuring (among others) Killer Croc, Scarecrow, and Deadshot.  And while every chapter is connected to every other one, we are also treated to seeing six different directors’ visions of who the Dark Knight is–what makes Him question Himself, what other citizens consider Him to be, what He looks like.  All good stuff.

The animation is, not-surprisingly, very well done and clearly on par with Japanese anime, and the voice acting, featuring none other than Kevin Conroy, doesn’t disappoint.  But the biggest selling point for Gotham Knight (at least for the “special edition” version) lies in how Warner Bros. decided to include four complete episodes of Batman: The Animated Series .  Plus, the cover is shiny.

So, to answer your question–yes, Virginia, you should buy Batman: Gotham Knight .

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Or at least Pauly T. Kal at Political Rants from the Right thinks so.  And though my pal Pauly may be absolutely wrong on every political topic currently being discussed at the water cooler , I can’t agree with him more on his latest decision to award What Would Batman Do? a Kick Ass Blogger award.  Here she is:

I’m assuming that the gold plaque with my name on it is still in the mail.

The scam–I mean, catch is I have to give the same award to five other bloggers I feel kick ass (though of course, not more than I do), and then provide links to both the creator of said award and the blogger who realized my genius .  So, who’s going to get an award?  You can all start kissing my kick ass now.

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