The Factual Opinion

Solo 12

Art by Brendan McCarthy
Published by DC Comics

After two quiet years, the bimonthly anthology series known as Solo came to a close yesterday.  It's too early to mourn it's unjust cancellation though--especially when it went out on such a high note.  Brendan McCarthy hasn't done art for comic books in 13 years, choosing to make his daily bread in the film and television industry.  (He's a cultish figure for his involvement in the co-creation of the unlikely-to-exist Mad Max 4: Fury Road.)  Getting an artist like McCarthy for Solo is representative of what's made the series so interesting--besides the collective artistic legacy it contains, Solo is almost totally unique in it's desire to form a sort of canon of comic art.  Unlike DC's Archive or Marvel's Masterworks series, which base the history of comic art around the weakest link possible, the characters, Solo has allowed each and every issue to be constructed totally under the aegis of the creator.  If the focused artist of the month wishes to use established characters, like Batman etc, they've been allowed to--but if they're interest have been completely non-comics related, they've been allowed to do so as well.  Comic Book Artist and the Marvel Visionaries publications are similar to Solo in that they focus on an individual creator, but they rarely examine the creator's current work, choosing to focus on previously published pieces or, as in the Will Eisner issue of Artist, pieces done by other artists in dedication to.  What's been so refreshing about Solo is that it totally ignores whatever work it was that's made the artist famous by commissioning new work entirely.  The work is then packaged into a 48 page comic book with no ads and the barest of graphic design.

McCarthy's work followed two lesser issues, focusing on Sergio Aragones and Damion Scott, but even if it had followed the best of Solo, it still would have out-shined them all.  While McCarthy may have dodged comic work for over a decade, it's clear that the imagination that has made him so successful has been in constant practice.  A masterful depiction of the sort of grotesque beauty normally found only in the farthest ends of the comic spectrum, this issue of Solo is probably one of the ugliest pieces of work that's been published in years.  It's intense, emotional and sarcastic work, covered over in the stink of creation.  Although it might be considered offensive in some circles, McCarthy is clearly operating on a much higher level than merely going for shock--even at it's strangest, the comic is more of cyberpunk fairy tale than anything else.  Whether it's telling the story of a bizarre hermaphrodite who goes shopping, or just printing the word jelly in place of all nouns against photo-realist images of Earth, McCarthy's work is so unlike anything else that it makes total sense why someone of this level of talent no longer works in comics regularly--what could comics possibly have to offer him?

With the cancellation of Solo, the sad answer is this: nothing at all.

I Pugni In Tasca (Fists In The Pocket)

1965
Written and Directed by Marco Bellocchio
Starring Lou Castel
With Paola Pitagora and Marino Mase

Watching Fists in the Pocket is like being thrown headlong into the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre as imagined by Italian neo-realists who are in love with the French New Wave.  The film takes such unexpected turns into savagery, but never without a delirious wink.  The movie is so simply shot, so lost in a world of pedestrian joy that when Lou Castel (the brutal protagonist) turns to matricide, it seems less because of the fact that he couldn't find a dance partner (as seen in a prior scene) but because he believes killing ones mother is about the same as sitting alone at a club--after all, both are simply put, things one does to pass the time. 

Living out on the edge of some unnamed beach town, Fists tells the story of a mildly unhappy family who have become so isolated that they've begun the process of defining global relationships in the terms of family strife--brother and sister will hatch a secret treaty to protect themselves from those they must go to war with, while passive mental-handicap sibling mills around on the edges, finally slaughtered because global conquest requires the least players possible. As the movie reaches it's darkly cynical close with Lou Castel showcasing why the film made him a star, we realize not only that no one will be punished, but that they do not even know that they should be.  Although it's not uncommon for films full of anti-heroes to dabble in cynical statements on the lack of clear justice, Fists refuses to even address it entirely, choosing to be as sociopathic and obsessed as it's surviving characters.  While the credits roll, one sits back and realizes that not only does the director care about retribution, but neither do we--at least, not without the proper music.

The Venture Brothers

Season One
2003
Created by Jackson Publick

Adult Swim has such a stealthy presence that it's capable of being both incredibly popular while seeming almost totally unknown at the same time.  Fans of the Swim line-up don't congregate in heaps like Monday night 24 clubs, nor do they gather around water coolers like Soprano's fans.  Even now, with Aqua Teen Hunger Force showing up both on C.S.I. and the "Danger Doom" album, Adult Swim cartoons still manage to feel like personal secrets when late night viewers happen to catch a 15 minute block of Sealab they've never seen.  Venture Brothers has had one of the tougher times of it as well-the recent DVD release of the first season comes almost three years after the episodes actually aired, ensuring that by this point the show has been re-run so many times that few people who have seen it have managed to catch the serial aspect of the show, and those that did are probably worn out by sheer lack of quantity.  Now that the show has returned with new episodes, it's finally discovered a fan base it never knew it had--the DVD set, when finally released, was Amazon's number one seller within weeks.

For those who have yet to experience the show, be assured, it's all that your wide-eyed overweight friends were sputtering about: inventive, funny, exciting and really good.  Watching it in rapid succession, isn't just recommended but necessary: if ever there was a good reason to hit "play all" on the menu, The Venture Brothers has it in spades.  Although the first two episodes are a little unwieldy, the show rockets in quality and intelligence by the third and is ceaselessly amusing until the brutal close of episode 13.  It's the show you never knew you were missing, and never thought you'd enjoy, and it's funnier than just about anything on television.  (Although The Simpsons remains the gold standard for 22 minute single-episode humor, there's nothing serialized that comes close to Venture for exploring character dynamics in comedy: imagine what Seinfeld would be like if Kramer and George incorporated actual growth from season to season and you'll start to comprehend what happens between episode to episode with the Venture crew.)  Whether or not Venture has maintained it's exploration of character development into it's second season remains unclear at this point--after all, the extensive downtime between seasons coupled with fears of cancellation are likely to have caused considerable difficulty in returning to the aggressive pace found in the closing third of the first season.  All the major and minor players involved have returned, and if they're able to match up to even half of their former glory the show is certain to be good.  We'll have our answer in a few months.

Bloodsport

1988
Directed by Newt Arnold
Starring Jean-Claude Van Damme

Time has done little to age the physicality of cult classic Bloodsport.  The mechanics of building movies around martial artist have never been the kind that require extravagant film knowledge--the recipe usually requires the most basic of idea: hero is placed in situation where he is confronted by those who assume themselves to be his better, he proves them wrong thereby teeing off some sort of high-level criminal who aptly considers himself to be the best fighter and then the movie goes through all the requisite scenes (including an uncomfortable love scene, bad attempts at dated comedy, more fight scenes and training regiments) until the final battle, often longer and more intense than previous, with the hero winning out over aforementioned criminal.  Then a bad joke, credits. 

If a filmmaker has concerns that his leading man may not live up to this most basic of film, one oft-used decision is to insert the above plot line into the setting of a martial-arts competition, which, by design, limits the amount of time any of his cast has to actually act.  Doing so also increases the number of fight scenes, which will lend the film pacing the director may be incapable of building through other means.  It will also help when his leading actor is portraying an American citizen who happens to have an incredibly unwieldy Belgian accent, as is the case with Jean-Claude Van Damme in Bloodsport.  Either way, limiting the amount of times that one allows Van Damme to speak is always sure to increase the credibility of narrative--see Road to Perdition for an example of the many films that profit from not allowing Van Damme any lines.  This example also qualifies itself even further by giving Mr. Damme no part at all to play, thus increasing its, ultimately failed, attempts at Oscar glory.

Bloodsport has, to be expected, aged considerably since it's 1988 release: the music seems to have been stolen outright from Red Dawn, the stunt-casting of Donald Gibb (Ogre from Revenge of the Nerds) now seems stupid and uncomfortable, and an appearance by a young Forest Whitaker makes it impossible not to feel a sense of shame at was surely a good decision for a young actor to make at the time.  What has not aged at all is the excellent display of fighting styles, all of which come from directly from various "legends" of martial arts films.  Physical prowess in the martial arts is so rarely depicted in this day and age of wire-fu and computer effects that it's impossible to watch certain scenes and not experience a sense of awe--just as seeing Van Damme drop into his trademark "split" a total of seven times, often only for the purpose of avoiding paying what must be a skyrocketing room service bill, tends to replace that awe with a sense of revulsion.  Still, Bloodsport is the very definition of a cult classic: appealing only to those who remember watching a PG version on TBS in their teenage years and of no interest to those who experience it afresh.  Simply put, if you haven't seen Bloodsport yet, you probably shouldn't--but if you have, it's probably time to watch it again.  It is, of course, as good as you remember.

Operation Shylock

By Philip Roth
1994
400 pgs.
Published by Vintage International
#16 on the NY Times "Best American Works of the Last 25 Years."

Roth is one of the few critically successful writers who has seen it neccessary to acknowledge his own celebrity in his writing.  Considering the style of his contemporaries (Pynchon, Updike, McCarthy and Delillo), that should not be taken as a criticism: Roth, after all, is the only of that club to write vaguely metafictional works.  Updike may include autobiographical touches, but Roth likes to go whole hog; often making his own narrators successful writers with old sexual perks; it's not going to require Eames and Goren to make the leap.  In Shylock he takes it even further, giving the reader two Philip Roth's to deal with, and although it's clear who the fictional imposter is, we read knowing that in reality, both Roths are false creations of the actual Roth.  (The temptation to resort to the old "But are they?" is nearly inescapable.)  Whether Shylock is to any reader's taste as fiction is more of a personal question--the book, while readable and mildly entertaining, is more like an extended anaylsis of both how good of a writer he is (which most people who haven't read him already assume) and how much of a jerk he probably is (which most people who have read his books already assume).  Shylock actually spends so much time dodging an actual plot that by the close, when Roth resorts to the always obnoxious trick of using an epilogue to tell the reader about a "secret, unpublished" chapter, we've spent so much time in his head that it's almost a relief not to have to experience his main character actually do something.

It's not to say that the book is bad--if anything, it plays to Roth's strengths as a writer: decisive satire and anaylsis of American Judaism (with a bit of Zionism thrown in) and an almost sociopathic ability to explicate his own mind.  While the political aspects of the book might lead some readers to an interest in Israel, the book is more striking as a portrayal of an intelligent man who, without fully understanding himself, is intent upon explaining his own mind as much as possible.  Whether one finds that fascinating is a question most readers can already answer, and, as is often the case with Roth; most probably already have.

Ultimate Spiderman 99

Written by Brian Bendis
Art by Mark Bagley
Published by Marvel

[Note: Cover Image not available at press time]

With only one month before their 100th consecutive issue, Bendis and Bagley continued to showcase the best work of their careers.  With some of the most dynamic plotting seen in any comic of the last year, Bendis focused nearly every page on a five minute conversation in a dark kitchen.  With only the beginning as exception, where the reader is shown the awful and terrifying situation Mary Jane is stuck in, one which we can no longer pretend she is "sure to escape from," the comic, like a filmed version of a play, focuses it's attention solely on three terrified players: Aunt May, arriving home to find a frightened Peter trying to explain to Gwen Stacy why they all think she's dead (because she has been).  As the hurried conversation unfolds, Peter, lost and confused, blurts out what he's been hiding from her for 99 issues: that he is, in fact, Spiderman--the cause of a vast majority of his Aunt's pain and emotional turmoil of the last few years.  After an embarrassing and demoralizing attempt by Aunt May to deny what she, most likely, has suspected she orders him out, screaming the classic words that no adopted son wants to hear, that Peter is not "her child."  Bendis then ups the stakes even more, revealing what no reader of Spiderman reader could expect by having Peter's long-lost, and assumed dead, father walk in the door.

While the storyline leads one to believe more nefarious circumstances are at work is unimportant.  Whether Bendis and Bagley knew they were headed here or not, they've spent 98 issues preparing the reader for this moment; the moment when a 16 year old boy with no father is finally given one.  Throughout the years portrayed in Ultimate Spiderman, Peter has tried to form relationships with every adult man he can find to fill the gaping loss that has informed the majority of his life.  Either openly rebuffed, cruelly used or outright manipulated, his very lonely and desolate existence has gone from bittersweet to downright heartbreaking.  Without any hope for happiness, his struggles to look after and protect his tiny family continue to wear him down; meanwhile, the gallery of sociopaths who wish to hurt him grow stronger and stronger.  Unlike other comics (or movies, for that matter) which depict youth as wise versions of mini-adults, Bendis chooses to portray Peter exactly as what he is--a lonely, melodramatic child out of costume, and a goofy, excited-to-be-free boy while in.  What's even more exciting is that Bendis has scored all of this realism against a very honest backdrop of loss--the absence of a family that understands or supports what he's going through.  Unlike most comic books that use the trials of being a superhero as metaphors, Bendis has openly left those standard realms often--having once spent an entire issue devoted to Aunt May's therapy session, or using multiple months to deal with Mary Jane's heartbreak over Peter ending their relationship. 

Ultimate Spiderman has, with the last few issues, cemented a legacy of quality that is sorely needed in comics today.  It remains one of the best comic books ever published, and this latest issue contained some of it's finest hours.

Sealab 2021

2000-2005
Produced by 70-30 Productions
On Warner Brothers DVD

Although it did not recieve as much coverage as the original DVD releases, Adult Swim's Sealab 2021 released the fourth, and final, collection of episodes of the much-beloved show just a few weeks ago.  Although decent autopsies (or any well-done surgical procedure) are not ever going to be The Factual Opinion's modus-grand, we would be remiss in out duties if not to ring in the trumpets and lower the flags in respect towards one of the finest pieces of absurdist comedy to see wide release, since, well, Aqua Teen Hunger Force. 

Sealab 2021 hit the ground running in it's first few episodes: we got our first taste of how incredibly funny Harry Goz could be as Captain Murphy when he started a pirate radio station, our first glimpse into how much danger he would put his subordinates in to find a Happy Cake Oven, and we watched an entire episode where nothing happened, excepting a long meandering conversation on what type of robot bodies each crew member would like to be placed in--and we saw the lab blow up each time, killing everyone inside. 

By the time one reached the close of the first season and spent 15 minutes watching the main character trapped underneath a soda machine, you'd already become a fan: otherwise, you would've stopped watching a long time ago.  For those who stuck around, Sealab 2021 became one of those happy secrets, a show that was (and remains) impossible to explain to someone without annihilating the humour.  Unlike South Park or The Simpsons, where the joke is often in the telling, Sealab thrived on the rhythm of it's delivery system: a poorly animated cartoon for the 70's, free-jacked into the 2000's.  The cast, a slip-shod mixture of actors and video-game nerds, only served to accent what was already apparant from the opening of the show: this cartoon was interested in amusing itself, and while it hoped you stuck around, your enjoyment was far down on the Lab's list of priorities.  Sealab 2021 dabbled in straight-forward humour, blisteringly uncomfortable satire; but its pride and joy always remained in an unwavering committment to absurdity: either with a flying feng-shui-conman or with an Interpol employee who offers callers to take advantage of "Two-fer-Tuesdays." 

Although Sealab 2021 experienced a noticable decrease in quality after the unfortunate demise of Harry Goz, the voice behind Sealab's funniest character Captain Murphy in the midst of Season 3, Season 4 found them able to pull together an ecletic mix of some of the shows more extreme efforts.  It's a nice epilogue to a show that not only holds up under repeat viewings, but seems to grow funnier and funnier all the time. 

Miami Vice

2006
Written and Directed By Michael Mann
Starring Colin Ferrell and Jamie Foxx
With Li Gong and Justin Theroux

Oh Michael, where did you go?  Miami Vice has nearly played itself out of the top ten, and unless DV filming accounts for a much smaller gross, it looks like Mr. Mann will be posting his least profitable film since The Keep.  The difference now is that when The Keep came and went no one knew who Mann was, or what he could accomplish.  One dose of Heat and a slice of The Insider later, there's no chance that something as disappointing as Miami Vice can go unremarked upon.  Of course, the failure that is Vice is not totally his fault-after all, it's incredibly gorgeous, the violence is fascinating and Jamie Foxx's abs are above reproach--in fact, a good portion of the blame for the sheer mundane stupidity has to rest in and on the hands and muttonchops of Colin Ferrell.  Mr. Ferrell so completely sleepwalks and shambles through his performance that merely watching him for five minutes creates an entirely new genre of fun: come on, theater-goer, join us: "When was Colin actually good, in anything?" and if you mention New World again, than i'm gonna...

But as horrible as Colin is, eventually, as Descartes proposed, we circle back to Mr. Mann.  After all, he did write the script--and one doubts it took him very long.  Even if it did, what he ended up with is so completely full of cliched garbage that it comes across like Dick Tracy on angel dust and by the time one finally reaches the film's requisite attempt at re-creating the magic of the bank heist in Heat, one is desperately trying to focus memory solely on bloodshed if only to get the horror the English language has just endured out of one's mind; the script (if it could be said to have one) seems like something that Mann might have come up with while junked out on blow and watching old episodes of Vice itself, but with the sound turned off--did Tubbs just say "Skillset?"  It's an easy claim, and it's been made multiple times in the last few weeks, that "a bad movie by Michael Mann is still better than a good movie by Todd Haynes," and while that may be true, especially if you compared Vice to Velvet Goldmine, this time there's really no honest arguement for why looking at jpg files from Miami Vice in an air-conditioned office wouldn't be far preferable than sitting through such a meandering piece of tripe.  Just saying how great it looks isn't going to be enough this time. 

Although we here at The Factual are loath to attempt to answer the question "why" in most circumstances, we will do so--after all, the editors have all agreed on one consensus: there's just no plausible reason why this movie was made in the first place.  If Mr. Mann would've just liked to return to the cops and crooks genre after vacationing in the sunny lands of bio-pics (Ali, The Insider) and character studies (Collateral), than he should have done so with a more sure footing.  Incorporating in the moronic ideals of a long-cancelled television show that barely survives in re-runs probably crippled him from the outset.  Poor choices in casting are to blame, sure, but if Joel Shumacher has taught us anything, it's that you can make Colin seem intelligent. (Tigerland)  Michael Mann is one of the few directors who is able to capitalize on an actors weakness (Al Pacino for one) and tame a lunatic actors wild choices (Russell Crowe and Val Kilmer for another.)  Mann surely could have done it again, despite Li Gong's incomprehensible speech pattern, if he'd gone into making a film with the same level of courage he took to dismantling Last of the Mohicans or Manhunter.  Instead, he sold off his courage, intelligence and integrity and made the second worst film of his career.  (Look, The Keep is really, really bad.)