BIZARRO BASEBALL!

Sorry that I stole the title from Tom Verducci, but it was a just title for his article in this week’s Sports Illustrated and given the cover of this week’s issue, it was too much of an easy transition from our normal topics of conversation to my first sports article. Tom uses Superman’s evil clone and the comic book style cover as a way of describing that the 2008 baseball season is something so ridiculous and out of this world that it could only be seen in a comic book and the opposite of what we are used to seeing. A fitting assessment, but one that has come far too early into the season in my opinion and for an article that promised all different kinds of weird baseball conundrums, he really only focuses on the last place Yankees and first place Tampa Bay Rays.

Now, I understand why he focuses on the Yankees and Rays because it is the most obvious of disparities this year and he does do a nice little inlet about Cliff Lee, the Indians’ ace with a sub 2.00 ERA, and a nice layout on hitters he feels are having exceptional years by their standards, but what about all the other stories? He barely gives Cliff Lee and those great hitters a page and rambles on for five about how great Tampa Bay has become in 50 games. One third of a season does not a dynasty come even close to making my dear Mr. Verducci. So like the real Superman to your Bizarro Superman, I have come to save the day and foil your nefarious plot of bashing the Yankees like so many like to do, and mention a few other bizarre stories in baseball that you so conveniently left out.

First off, around the rest of baseball. If you want to talk about the Yankees and Rays, why not mention the team on the other side of town in terms of both the Yankees and Rays. I am of course talking about the Florida Marlins and New York Mets. The Marlins are even more of a surprise because people had seen the Rays coming for a couple of years now with their All-Star outfield and Scott Kazmir and James Shields leading their young rotation; no one saw the Marlins coming. Everyone thought the Marlins would sink to the bottom of the NL East instead of storming out to a 30-20 record and first place, including 6.5 games over the 4th place Mets, who avoid the basement due to the Nationals being far worse than anyone expected this year as well. If you talk about the Rays and Yankees, you have to mention the Marlins and Mets in the same breath. Verducci mentions the Marlins once in the entire five page article and gives a special nod to 2B Dan Uggla, but aside from that it’s all Rays and Yankees. He does not even mention the Mets and their locker room struggles. How about I move away from my slight AL/NL East bias and look at the AL Central? How about the Tigers? After being in the World Series a couple of years ago and being a strong contender last year, they are now tied for last place with the Kansas City Royals, who are 6-0 against Detroit so far this year by the way. How about Justin Verlander who already has more losses this year than all of last year? He was 17-9 two years ago, 18-6 last year including a no hitter, and this year he is 2-7 with a 5.16 ERA, a full point and a half above his young career average. And if the Yankees offense is struggling, then Detroit’s is anemic. They may have had a 19 run outburst against Minnesota a few nights ago, but they proceeded to follow it up with a 6-1 loss to Minnesota and a 1-0 12 inning loss to the Angels the night after that. The times they are a-changin’, eh? Let us wrap this part up with the San Diego Padres in the NL West with a glamorous basement record of 19-33, the worst in the NL. This has always been a team to struggle to score runs, and they have had a bad case of the injury bug, but even when Chris Young and Jake Peavy were healthy, they were still the worst in the NL. A team built on pitching that has not received any. Greg Maddux did not get his first win of the season until his fifth decision, and although has bounced back nicely with three wins in a row, is now being asked at 42 to be the ace of this staff. ::puts on a Ron Burgundy/Mike D’Antoni mustache:: It is going to be a long season San Diego.

Now that we have helped to point out some of the other anomalies around the league, let us come back to the Yankees. The Yankees are going to be fine. It would be nice if we could play the Seattle Mariners every day, but we cannot. I think an important stretch of their schedule is coming up. They are going to be facing teams they have not seen this year and that will be including fellow wild card contenders Oakland and Minnesota. If the Yankees play strong against these teams leading into the next round of interleague play, then you will see the expected form of the Yankees. If the Yankees struggle and are still hovering around .500 when June ends, not May, then you can probably say that they will remain there for the rest of the year. I do not think it will happen though. Another test of their mettle will be that most of this upcoming schedule is on the road and in typical Yankees fashion, they are much better at home this year than on the road. Still I have faith though. Robinson Cano and Jason Giambi have finally climbed up off the interstate and are both batting over .220 now and showing signs they are snapping out of their early funk. Hideki Matsui has been on fire all year and shows no signs of cooling off after a big homestand and a 3-4 night to begin this most recent road trip. Johnny Damon and Melky Cabrera are struggling a little right now, but since they were okay to start the season, both hitting around .285, a slump is to be expected every now and again. Alex Rodriguez has come off the DL like a man possessed and is probably the catalyst right now behind the Yankees short term success. Derek Jeter and Bobby Abreu will continue to get their hits as well. Don’t forget that we are still two weeks away from getting Jorge Posada back too. Once he is back, you add 60-70 career points in terms of batting average, and a lot more HR power over Jose Molina and Chad Moeller, who have done fine jobs standing in for the true Yankees backstop. Bottom line, the Yankees will score runs. They might not score every night, but on enough nights to pull themselves out of the basement. A big weakness is their bench. Even with Wilson Betemit coming back to add a little pop, most of the Yankees bench is hitting below .200 and most cannot field for their life. Cashman needs to do something to fortify a glaring weakness for the Yankees, especially with interleague play coming up and pinch hitters becoming more important than in the AL.

The other aspect of the Yankees is their pitching. Their pitching will be fine, especially their starters. Even though he is 4-5, Andy Pettitte will be a horse (no steroid references!) down the stretch just like he always is and his record is only so bad because of a few heartbreakers and that the bullpen could not keep it close. Mike Mussina is 7-4 and will continue to do fine for the Yankees this year. He has learned to pitch better with his 86 MPH fastball, probably in large part to Jose Molina calling a great game and Moose putting his faith into him. For those who say he will get rocked on the road this year, his ERA is 3.36 on the road compared to 5.17 at Yankees Stadium so I am not buying that argument. Also, he may have had a rough year last year going 11-10 with a 5.15 ERA, but I am saying that it was a fluke and that although I do not see him putting up his 2006 numbers of 15-7 with a 3.51 ERA, I can see his 2005 numbers of 13-8 with a 4.41 and I do not know any Yankees fans out there who would not take that. Chien-Ming Wang is 6-2 with a 3.81 ERA, no surprise there and that will continue as long as he stays healthy. ::knocks on wood:: Darrell Rasner has been a pleasant surprise and with this kid’s demeanor and stuff, I do not see how he cannot be considered our number four guy at 3-1 with a 1.80 ERA. You got to leave him up here to see how he handles a full season, but I do not see how this guy does not win close to 15 games this year as long as the Yankees give him run support. Then you get the question marks. Well I am going to answer them for you and give you the solution to straighten this all out. Ian Kennedy and Phil Hughes to the bullpen and Joba Chamberlain is the number five guy. This kills two birds with one stone. It shores up your struggling bullpen aside from Mariano Rivera and Edwar Ramirez so far and it puts Joba back into the role he was always expected to play. I expect Joba to have about 3.50 ERA as a starter once he gets into the groove of it. Kennedy is usually really good his first time through a lineup and struggles after that so he would make a great long man to go two or three innings when Moose or Andy might not have it one day. Although he made a strong case in his last start to stay a starter, only giving up one run in six innings, he still had four walks which you could say is possibly being effectively wild, but I say it is too wild to stay as a starter too long. Matsuzaka in Boston might be getting by on it, leading the AL in ERA, wins, and walks, the first man to do it in over 50 years, but Kennedy won’t.

So that is the wrap up. The Yankees will straighten themselves out, the Rays will be strong and continue to be a threat, and baseball is standing on its head with all the craziness abound that Tom Verducci failed to mention, but it has the makings for one of the best baseball seasons we’ve seen in a long time. See you in the stands everybody.

-Ray Carsillo

TEEN TITANS! GO! (Review of Titans #2)

Wait. They’re not teens anymore. So we are just calling them Titans? Weren’t the NY Jets called that before they were the Jets? Isn’t that already taken by a football team in Tennessee now? Is Vince Young in this too? Titles aside, the former Teen Titans, some former Outsiders, have been brought back together by some dark force that is trying to kill off anyone who once was a Teen Titan. After several current Titans are not so fortunate and attacks are coordinated elsewhere around the world on other former and current Titans, Nightwing (formerly the original Robin) of course realizes the pattern and the Titans are off to find Raven, who is suspected of being next on the hit list after Flash (formerly Kid Flash), Red Arrow (formerly Arsenal, even more formerly Speedy), Starfire, Beast Boy, Donna Troy (formerly Wonder Girl), and Cyborg all escape supernatural related, near death experiences. Upon encountering Raven, she reveals that the only being with enough power to pull off such an attack is her dear old dad, Trigon. Raven then confronts her giant red demon daddy on an astral plain where he reveals that she is not his only child and we are left on the cliffhanger that Raven has a brother who is orchestrating all these attacks in the name of Trigon.

Ok folks, now that I caught you up on the first two issues, what I thought would be an interesting series with lots of nostalgia thrown in considering the cast of characters is what I would call too much of a good thing. I look at these first two issues and the theme song from the Cartoon Network show screams in my head because that is how it seems to be playing out. Although the characters are drawn much better than the anime style from the show, everything else just screams that some people at DC got bored and decided to just take scripts from the cartoon and draw them the way they should have been drawn in the first place instead of the anime style they were done in which caused the cartoon to never be taken as seriously as it should have been.

This is a series that has potential, but if DC is not careful with these characters, it will end up the way of the cartoon series and in much less time. We want new adventures with these characters, not the same ones told in a different way. The only saving grace they have right now is that in my mind they are just using this first story arc to reintroduce and re-establish a lot of these characters in the minds of readers. If the second story arc doesn’t start mixing it up though, this title is coming off my list of monthlies. Simple as that. They spent a good amount of time building this up, it would be a shame to see it come crashing down faster than Paula Abdul after a night of binge drinking. Ooooh. Off-beat pop culture reference. Score one for the angry geek.

-Ray Carsillo

HEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRREEEEEEE’S NORMAN! (Review of Thunderbolts #120)

After coming back from the dead for the umpteenth time; after being brainwashed, beaten, belittled, and battered; after having his character basically being made a joke of; finally, the Green Goblin is back. That’s right, after many months of teasing you that he would return as more than just the political head of the Thunderbolts, Norman Osbourn has finally donned the infamous green scales and purple imp outfit that he made famous.

In Thunderbolts #120, Thunderbolts Mountain is a mess. Psychics are being held captive inside and wreaking havoc upon the Thunderbolts from their jail cells, having the Thunderbolts turn on one another to the point that the team is a bloody mess, literally. After seeing hallucinations of the his Goblin gear scattered about the office, Norman has been driven to taking it out of storage and donning it in hopes of bringing his team under control…by any means necessary. Swordsman was crucified to a wall with shards of his own sword after being beaten to a pulp. Before that, Swordsman had to subdue Venom after he went cannibal…again. Radioactive Man is trying to give everyone cancer. It is a joke. The comic is spiraling out of control in terms of randomness, much like the Marvel Universe as a whole, and although this is actually somewhat entertaining to read, if they do not rein it back in soon, I will no longer read it because it is just too outlandish, just like Spider-Man with Brand New Day. I understand that saying a comic is outlandish is a little bit of an oxymoron, but I mean even by comic book terms the book is getting out of control. Although I am thrilled to see Green Goblin back as a sadistic madman, the way he should be, it also reminds me how much of a joke he was to begin with and why he was billed as Spider-Man’s greatest enemy still baffles me.

If you have been following the series, it is finally reaching the boiling point that we have been waiting a year and a half for, but after this cools back down, I would reconsider this as an every issue comic. They have taken some of the Marvel Universe’s best villains and made them soft and nothing more than punch lines in the other comics. Bringing back the Green Goblin is a good move, but depending on how it plays out will be the deciding factor on if I continue to read the Thunderbolts. If you have been reading Thunderbolts, continue to do so for a little while longer. If you haven’t, now is not the time to get into it and there might not be a time to get into after this story arc. More as it develops.

-Ray Carsillo

P.S.: In other comics news, Marvel has announced a new solo Deadpool series starting in September. Personally, I can’t wait to see the Merc with a Mouth get his own series going again, especially if it is just half as good as his cameos in the past few Wolverine Origin comics or the Cable and Deadpool series. If it gets anywhere near there, I will have a new favorite comic again.

I’VE GOT A BAD FEELING ABOUT THIS… (My review of Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull)

To be honest, I really didn’t have a bad feeling. I was waiting for this movie with baited breath just like Iron Man and how I still am with Incredible Hulk and The Dark Knight (which is my most anticipated movie of the summer of course). I sat down with a couple of friends of mine with our popcorn and soda in hand and we kicked back and relaxed for two hours. When we left the movie theatre though, the consensus was the same; the movie was okay at best. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg basically just went wild trying to film “the good ol’ days”. Instead of making a movie that the fans wanted to see, they overdid everything about Indy to try and re-establish the character for a whole new audience and that was their first mistake. For Christ’s sake, they have Indy survive a nuclear explosion in the first 20 minutes of the movie. It all just seemed a little too easy for him and easy is definately not Indiana Jones. Next, they took elements from some of their best and most famous movies and tried to incorporate them into Indiana Jones. I am sorry, but Han Solo says “I’ve got a bad feeling about this…” not Indiana Jones.

The biggest mistake they made though was the entire sci-fi element they tried to incorporate. The plot of the movie had Indy trying to find the lost city of gold, El Dorado, and that a crystal skull was the key to it. Suppossedly, whoever returns the skull to El Dorado will gain immense power. Sounds a bit like Raiders of the Lost Ark, except now you are fighting Communist Russia instead of Nazi Germany because of the time period, but I can live with that. You watch the movie, only to find out, it is an alien skull from when aliens visited the earth 5,000 years ago and they were worshipped like gods. This is where my problems begin. I might have been able to believe that aliens had visited the earth. I might have been able to believe that aliens made the crystal skull and it had fancy powers. But to go and do an entire CG alien at the end to fry the bad guy (or girl in this case) was too much. One of the things that made Raiders of the Lost Ark so good was you never really saw inside the Ark. You saw what happened to those who did though and that was good enough. I mean they had an entire UFO rise up from the ground and blast off with Indiana watching. I began wondering when the hell the TIE Fighters were going to appear. This is not Close Encounters of the Third Kind and this is most definitely not Star Wars.

I did like a lot about the movie though. The action kept you going enough that the two hours flew by. The bad girl, played by Cate Blanchett, was brilliant and she was a throwback to the original Nazi band leader from Raiders of the Lost Ark. Also, nice touch in the warehouse to show the Ark, tying up the loose end of where all the stuff Indy collected actually went. Even the storyline of Shia LeBeouf being Indy’s son worked out well. I hated the fact that they did not give him an animal phobia though. Indy hates snakes. His dad hated rats. Shia should have hated monkeys. Watch the scene where he is swinging like Tarzan (which was a horrible idea by the way for SO many reasons, I mean is Shia going to remake Tarzan next?!). How much better would that scene have been if he was afraid of monkeys? Although they did hint at a phobia of scorpions, ants, and other creepy crawlies, we’ll see if the rumors are true of him taking up the Indiana Jones mantle first before we assume his phobias. Also, did he have a steel cup on because I had never seen someone get hit in the balls so much and barely even flinch. What was up with that? Working a snake into the movie with the quicksand trap was a good idea though, even if it looked ridiculously fake. Also, if this does finish the series, it was a nice way to wrap it up with him marrying Marion Ravenwood in the end. Puts a nice little package on everything and trust me, this should be the last one because if they make another with Shia, it’s a mistake. Overall, if you are not a diehard Indy fan, wait for the DVD to rent it because it was not worth $11 at the theatre to see a Raiders of the Lost Ark throwback. I give it 3 stars out of 5.

-Ray Carsillo

WHICH IS YOUR FAVORITE COLOR? GREEN OR BLACK? (Review of Green Lantern Corps #24)

As you might be able to tell from the cover, this issue continues to follow the Green Lanterns as they attempt to eliminate all of the Sinestro Corps rings. Several had been traced to a deep, dark corner of the galaxy where two Lanterns went missing. Guy Gardner, Kyle Rainer, and a few others show up for the heroic rescue like the cowboys they pretend to be. Upon tracing the last of the energy signatures to an uncharted part of the galaxy, Kyle and Guy recognize an entire field of Black Mercy flowers, which tie in of course that Mongul has been collecting Sinestro rings himself for his own diabolical purposes.

So here it is, one of those things that never really needed to be explained, but is anyways, the origins of the Black Mercy flowers. The issue did a decent job of retelling the back story of the Black Mercy flowers and how Mongul had used them in the past and even referenced Warworld, but only so much can be done in a two page spread. So to catch you up more, here I am. Oh you lucky people you. The Black Mercy flowers were used by Mongul on Superman to keep him out of his plans. The Black Mercy attaches itself to the host where it makes the person hallucinate their greatest dreams come to fruition. The person feels they are living it, while remaining completely motionless. Only one of great willpower can break the Black Mercy’s hallucinations, like Superman, who saw through the façade of him ruling over an ever-present Krypton. Of course, the plant can also be killed by an outsider, but you risk hurting the person who it has attached itself to. Mongul is the only known person to know how and where to harvest the Black Mercy flower, until now.

Now back to our story, which ends on the cliffhanger than Mongul has left the planet with a large harvest of Black Mercies and that the Green Lanterns have pried their fellow Lanterns from the clutches of Mother Mercy, a sentient, gigantic, Black Mercy flower that protects the harvest from outsiders like the Green Lanterns. Next issue has the Green Lanterns against Mother Mercy in what should be an interesting battle, especially if any of the Mercies should attach themselves to the Lanterns, and to see exactly how Mother Mercy defends herself. I am guessing something along the lines of a Poison Ivy plant monster, but it should be an interesting battle and to see what the next step is in Mongul’s plans. After all, who exactly are these Black Mercies intended for? If you have not been following the Green Lanterns, get on now because something big is coming folks. I’m talking total spectrum war. If this is any indication, it should be good.

-Ray Carsillo

STEVEN SPIELBERG PRESENTS…BOOM BLOX?!

For those of you who don’t know, at last year’s E3, Steven Spielberg went around playing all the new game systems and started working on a separate project for each system. The games for the other systems have been kept tightly under wraps and then he revealed this monstrosity of cuteness for the Wii. I looked at this game and said to myself that this would be a kiddie game, a total waste of time for someone my age and that even its multiplayer would become boring after a time. Then I saw all the great reviews this game was given.

My fellow trusted reviewers had convinced me to give this game a chance and since I still had two weeks before Wii Fit was coming out, I gave it a shot. When will I learn not to go against my gut instinct? Let me just say that this game will probably be wonderful for anyone under the age of 10. The basic concept is to take the classic game Jenga to a whole new level by adding different kinds of blocks and powers that you can do, all the while trying to beat challenges and a lackluster story mode. The characters are cute beyond belief and the challenges would probably rack the brains of a 10 year old. For a 23 year old professional though, this game was a breeze and I beat the adventure mode in about 2 hours. Even the multiplayer could not save it. Playing with friends my own age added a slight bit of excitement, but we soon bored of it for games more at our level. The create a level mode was also a nice feature thrown in a la Super Smash Bros. Brawl, but still not enough to save this title. Again though, if I was half my current age, I would probably enjoy this game a bit more because it would probably (hopefully) add a little more challenge. I respect Steven Spielberg for wanting to create a game for his family, but unless one of the greatest directors in movie making history is not adapt at problem solving, I do not know how any adult could sit down with anyone and play this for a long period of time. A valiant effort, let us hope Mr. Spielberg sticks to a more mature audience for his other two upcoming titles.

Rankings based on a score of 1 to 10 with 10 being the best.

Graphics: 9.0: The graphics are solid for the title. The characters are purposely made to look like blocks (or Blox) and the backgrounds are painted beautifully in that classic cartoony look. All the colors are strong and bright and would be perfect for any 10 year old child and even pleases my older eye.

SFX/Music: 9.5: The SFX are great in this game. The explosions, the blox characters you have to save crying for help, the sound of whole “buildings” collapsing, all well done. The music is very fitting as well. A more haunting melody for the graveyard level, a more western theme for the frontier level, etc., etc.; even the option select screen has a fitting upbeat tune behind it that pleases the ears.

Replay Value: 5.0: Here is where the game begins to suffer. Even with all the challenges and levels it throws at you; even with the multiplayer and build a level options; I will probably never play this game again. The only reason this gets even the ranking it does, is that for a younger audience, it would probably stick better than for someone my age.

Plot/Plot Development: 3.0: What plot is there? The levels are broken into three parts with a short cut scene in between each one. The game is primarily driven on the fact that you are playing a version of Jenga on steroids. Other than that, there is nothing else to it.

Gameplay: 7.5: The physics of this game is one of the aspects that it shines in. Depending on where you throw a ball at the tower and with the force at which you throw it, really varies on what happens to the respective tower. Even the blocks that are taken out, how they bounce around before shattering or disappearing, really do so with a great deal of realism. The game lacks though in how sometimes the sensors fail to properly detect your throw or when you try to remove a block from a tower with your pincer fingers and you cannot get quite the right angle to see what would be the best way to pull it out. Very sensitive controls take their toll as well as the slightest shake can be felt by your pincer fingers in the game. I don’t know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. You try holding a Wiimote perfectly still and see how well you do with it.

Overall: 4.5 (not an average): Unlike many of my counterparts, I really disliked this game. I thought it was just too simple. I appreciate that for 10 year olds and younger this would excel, but the game was advertised as fun for everyone and that is why it gets a low score. The music and graphics were solid and the physics, although glitchy at times, were mostly spot on so I can appreciate how tight that part of the game was. This game is not worth anything more than a rental though because you can beat the whole thing in a day or two. Unless you have an elementary school child, leave this game in the stores.

-Ray Carsillo

WHY SO MANY PERFECT SCORES FOR A “LEGEND OF ZELDA” RIP-OFF? (My Review of Okami)

With the recent port of the award-winning PS2 game Okami to the Nintendo Wii, I was afforded a chance to play one of the most critically acclaimed games to hit consoles in a long time. Much to my dismay though, the game was a rip-off of one of the greatest franchises ever, The Legend of Zelda. For those of you who may not see the parallels, let’s take a look.

First off you are a god in the form of a wolf. The most recent of Zelda games, Twilight Princess, had Link transforming into and out of wolf form for most of the game. Second, you travel back in time at one point, specifically 100 years into the past and have characters from the time period, travel forward to help you out later. How many Zelda games have incorporated time travel into the main theme? Ocarina of TIME maybe? Just to get you started. Third, you collect “brushstrokes” in this game, usually finding one in every temple, which ironically helps you greatly defeat the boss of the temple who has cursed the land. Where have I heard of finding weapons in a dungeon that are then used to help kill the boss? EVERY ZELDA GAME EVER MADE! How about in the ice dungeon where there is a puzzle where you have to make trees blossom on a giant weight. If you make the trees blossom prematurely, you’re S.O.L. and have to go back to your last save because exiting the room or even the temple will not make the trees wither back to their former selves. I immediately thought back to Link to the Past where in the ice dungeon in the dark world, you are only given enough keys to open all the doors except one. If you open the wrong door, guess what? You have to start over at your last save and re-do the entire dungeon. Let’s stay with the ice dungeon in Okami where the boss is a set of evil twin owls, one silver, the other gold. They use completely opposite powers. Anyone remember the fire and ice twin witches from the desert temple in Ocarina of Time? How about the whole thing of having to banish the darkness from the world and shed light back onto the land of Nippon and that Yami, the end boss, is the embodiment of all the world’s evil? I thought I was walking through Hyrule and fighting Ganondorf for a second there. How about before getting to the final boss, you have to re-defeat all the bosses from the game and clear the ship of evil before opening the path to Yami? Reminded me of two games there! Ocarina of Time when you storm Hyrule Castle with the six medallions, and every Mega Man game ever. Real original. How about that you have a sprite named Issun bouncing around with you the whole time who leaps and changes colors when there is something nearby that could be of interest. Anyone remember Navi the fairy from Ocarina of Time and every Zelda game since then? How about collecting sundial fragments to increase your “solar energy bar”? Heart containers folks. Heart containers.

Look, the game was innovational in many different ways, I’m not saying it wasn’t. All I am saying was that this game was hyped for being so special, but it wasn’t. I appreciate that it reaches into Japanese mythology and I love how it kept track of all the enemies you fought along the way, giving stories to their creation and what not, even if it admits to not knowing all the details since Japanese legends get mistranslated all the time due to the slight differences in their characters can say two completely different things. The brushstroke idea was great and having to draw your powers was an ideal concept for the Wii, even if the game did not always understand what you were doing so you had to re-draw a circle 6 times to make a tree bloom. The brushstrokes were more accurate but slower for PS2, but you probably saved more time because you only had to draw them once. The characters were vibrant and kept you well-entertained, but unoriginal. The one thing they did not take from Legend of Zelda was that the characters are always silent. Even though these characters did not speak, the mumbling underneath them was nearly enough to drive me insane right till the very end. I loved the story, even if it did make me think the religious right wing had something to with it because in the end it’s all about your prayers making god stronger and that you have to believe. The game gave you your money worth too because it took me 34 hours, 29 minutes, and 34 seconds to beat over the course of 42 days (nice touch really keeping track there with the calender) . Typical of any awesome epic game. That is one thing that I like was just like The Legend of Zelda.

Rankings based on a score of 1 to 10 with 10 being the best.

Graphics: 9.0: It was a very nice cell-shaded style that reminded you of an old Japanese painting having come to life. Although the landscape and temples were a little too simplistic for my taste, they set the mood well enough.

SFX/Music: 9.0: The music was great and really complemented the experience, just like The Legend of Zelda. SFX were spot on, especially like the cutting sound that was made when you sliced with the celestial brush. If I heard one more mumbling sound during dialogue though, I would have started using the game as my new coaster.

Replay Value: 5.0: Not a lot of replay value for this one. Like any great epic quest, once it’s done, you breathe a sigh of relief and take pride in the fact you beat it. Not many epic games warrant a replay and this is no exception. It is nice that you can get special items if you find all the hidden stray beads and a couple of extra demo movies, but that’s about it and that is not nearly enough to warrant starting all over again, even though they do let you keep most of your health and ink.

Plot/Plot Development: 8.5: They keep you guessing as to the whole back story for most of the game, which is a great way to drive the story and keeps you playing it. It is basically another Legend of Zelda game though. Good guy must save world from forces of darkness as he powers himself up by collecting special items in temples and ridding the world of the minions of darkness and bring light back to the world. This took that a little more literally and I appreciate the green message of being rewarded for bringing plants back to life, but there were a lot of characters needlessly slain to get the point across, even though that is probably more accurate to Japanese mythology, and the whole religious right theme of everyone needing to pray crept me out a little.

Gameplay: 8.0: There were no glitches that I can think of except the major one of with the Wii, your brushstrokes were not always correctly felt and this made some puzzles and bosses very difficult. Also, the roaming camera worked well most of the time, but I think a stationary one that was behind your main character most of the time would have worked better, especially when it was difficult trying to position said camera the right way so that you could draw a line from one point of interest to another.

Overall: 8.5 (not an average): Blasphemy! Someone did not give this game a 9.5 or better! Well deal with it. There were too many parallels to The Legend of Zelda to make me feel this was a special game. With the handful of glitches, lack of replay value, and lack of an original plotline, this game did not deserve everything it got in terms of praise. All those Sony, Microsoft, and Sega people are just finally getting a taste of what they have lacked over the past two decades by not having The Legend of Zelda series. Nintendo die-hards should pick it up, but do not expect your socks to be blown off as advertised. You will still get that good feeling of accomplishment though if you beat it.

WHY IRON MAN IS THE BEST COMIC BOOK MOVIE EVER!

Ok, first off I apologize for not writing about this sooner, but I’ve been very busy and I wanted to see it several times with several different groups of people before I made my official analysis of it and it is the same as after the first time. It is easily the best comic book movie of all time.

The reason for this stems of course from Marvel financing the entire thing after making their own movie production company, Marvel Studios, and not allowing any outside interference from other studios they previously sold their licenses to. This movie followed the stories perfectly, from Iron Man’s origin story, to the Armor Wars tone, all the way to Iron Monger. They connected everything in a way that made sense and did not sell out the comics, something that had not been done this well since the first Spider-Man movie. They even hint at War Machine and Mandarin (Clan of the 10 Rings was the terrorist group, come on folks!). The only noticeable difference that I could think of off the top of my head was that the terrorists were from Afghanistan and not Vietnam, but of course that is only because they updated it with current world events to make it a little more believable so it is a very forgivable move and that they went from Mark I Iron Man Armor to about Mark VIII in 3 suits, but this is due to it only being a two hour movie and not several years of comic book issues so again, a very forgivable move on their part.

This movie had everything perfect though. The tension between the strict, tow the line Jim Rhodes, played amazingly by Terrance Howard, and the flamboyant, care-free Tony Stark, played by Robert Downey Jr. who gave an Oscar worthy performance; the other kind of tension between Tony and Pepper Potts, actually played surprisingly well by Gwyneth Paltrow; and the sinister, back-stabbing Obadiah Stane played perfectly by Jeff Bridges. Jon Favreau even played Happy Hogan and gave it his all, losing 70 pounds for the bit part, while directing the whole thing! The only thing a friend of mine mentioned was how cheesy the fake chest looked when Pepper had to replace his chest battery, but if he did not mention it, I would never have noticed it so to me it worked. Maybe I did not notice it though because the movie had me fully engrossed the entire time and at only 2 hours and 6 minutes long, not a single second dragged. It had comedy, it had drama, it had sex appeal, it was PERFECT. The performances were spectacular from all involved and the plot was well executed and it was believable. I cannot praise this movie enough. Of course the special effects were up to par, but we would not expect anything less nowadays. The sticklers were would these actors be able to pull off these characters and make you believe it and they did it. You could see a comic book movie win its first major Oscar for this; it was that good.

Only two things could go wrong now. They either let the actors go, which I don’t think they will because they all have been given three movie deals, or they do not do Mandarin and War Machine in the next movie after blatantly hinting at them throughout the movie. I will be gravely disappointed if Iron Man 2 fails to incorporate those two CRUCIAL characters and it will probably erase the success of this movie in the eyes of many comic book fans.

Also, I hope you all stayed through the end credits because I am sure you have all heard by now, it is official, THE AVENGERS will be a movie as showcased by Nick Fury (played by the king of all bad-asses and the hardest working man in Hollywood, Samuel L. Jackson) confronting Tony Stark after his blockbuster end press conference. More on that as it develops. For now, let Iron Man have his moment to shine.

-Ray Carsillo

El Escarabajo Azul Numero Veintiséis (BLUE BEETLE #26)

I know this is a comic that came out last week, but it had special significance to me and I felt it needed to be talked about. The plot is fine and the standard for the new Blue Beetle. Jamie Reyes attempts to introduce his new girlfriend to his family at a reunion when he gets word that the Parasite is attacking. Our young hero flies off to battle where he promptly kicks the crap out of the bad guy. A little too neat for my liking, especially since the Parasite has brought Superman to his knees and Jamie Reyes thumps him in a matter of four or five pages. The reason why it was wrapped all nice and neat though was it would have been very difficult to have a real epic battle drawn out over several comics in Spanish.

What? That’s right, Spanish. This is the first comic, based on Jamie’s Hispanic descent and location in El Paso, New Mexico, that had every printing done almost entirely in Spanish. Doing a comic in a foreign language like that is a strain on resources and that is why this was a one-shot. I have a problem though with the Spanish comic and not just because it forces them to waste a great villain like the Parasite. I appreciate the translations in the back, but it made reading this comic damn near impossible for someone who is not fluent in the language. Comics revolve around their drawings, but the script and dialogue is vital as well and for the first time maybe, I realized how much so. I breezed through this comic and did not give it my usual time and care because I couldn’t read it. Now the reason for this is a political issue, that with the ever growing number of Spanish speakers in this country, more and more things have to be translated or have dual writings on them. I understand and do not mind, but when English, the first language of this country, gets trumped, I have a problem. I have no problem with equality. You can print the comic in every language if you like, but when you provide Spanish as the only language for a comic in this nation, I have a problem. We are a diverse nation made up of all different people and this comic is a testament to this, but when you ostracize most of your population to cater to a small demographic, you are going to piss off a lot more people than make happy. I appreciate what DC tried to do with this comic, but please do not do it again. If you want to print comics in Spanish and English, all the better, because again, the more people reading comics the better, but when you only provide one option, you are making a statement that I do not think everyone in this country is ready for and since most of us grew up only having to know English in my generation, you alienate your foundation. Not a smart move and I had a problem with this comic DC.

The other political issue I had with this comic was that I noticed for the first time the difference on the barcode. Now, unless you are a computer, every barcode looks the same, right? True, but below the barcode is the price of the comic and always you see both the American and Canadian price. It usually looks something like this: $2.99 US $3.99 CAN. With this comic though, I noticed this. The price was the same in Canada and the US. The American dollar has plummeted so much in the world community that the American and Canadian dollar are equal in value. Now, I do not have a problem with our neighbors to the north, especially considering how much of a hockey fan I am, but my whole life I knew that we had a strong enough economy that our currency was stronger than theirs. If this is not a recession ladies and gentleman, then I do not know what it is. You hear the talk of this stuff all the time on CNN and MSNBC and all those other news channels, but until you see it in something you can relate to, it does not really hit you. Even with gas prices skyrocketing and the job market going to hell, it was comics that this really hit me on. All I know is that come November, someone better get elected that is going to fix this.

-Ray Carsillo

NY COMIC CON REVIEW

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WHO MADE WHO

If you understood the AC/DC reference, then kudos to you. On that note, this week we look at New Avengers #40. The Secret Invasion story arc continues as we look for the first time at the Skrull point of view. It explains how important Earth is to the Skrulls as well as explains that this massive invasion was foretold with a minuscule glimpse into the Skrull Civil War. We also see how the Skrulls were able to develop the technology to mask themselves from the superheroes in every way possible.

These are crucial points to the story arc, questions and loose ends that had been unresolved to this point, and NEEDED to be explained in my opinion. Also, finally Marvel had done it. They promised you that you would not be able to choose sides in Civil War. They failed. They promised you a surprise blockbuster ending for World War Hulk. They failed. They promised you to return Spider-Man to his great roots in Brand New Day. They failed. Are you noticing the pattern here? Finally, for me what would be their last chance would be Secret Invasion with the promise of reveals that would turn the Marvel Universe upside down. Well folks, this issue put Marvel on the right track. Marvel finally might have delivered the goods. The one person you felt you could trust, maybe, was Spider-Woman because she went to Tony Stark with the body of the Elektra-Skrull. She had been in communiqué with Nick Fury, who is maybe the only other person you could trust in the Marvel Universe and who was pretty much cemented as trustable in previous Secret Invasion issues as he found out a Skrull imposter and killed her outright in his hotel. The issue ends with the queen of the Skrulls asking whose identity on Earth she could assume to help lead the invasion and the last page shows a Skrull scientist showing a hologram of Spider-Woman to the queen.

Now we don’t know if the queen took her identity, but it sure does throw a lot of questions out there and finally, Marvel’s promises are coming true. There really is not anyone you can trust in this thing. Hawkeye mysteriously came back from the dead, Iron Man turned on his friends, Luke Cage abandoned his wife. WHO IS A SKRULL? And no, Captain America was not a Skrull because when he died he did not revert like Elektra and Spider-Man is not a Skrull because the devil a.k.a. Mephisto should be able to tell if he was a Skrull before selling his marriage. Maybe though “Captain America” was in his form for so long though that maybe he wouldn’t revert on death and since the Skrulls can fool Dr. Strange, why not fool the devil himself? All these questions and more keep popping in my head, so finally, Marvel has done it. You just don’t know what is going to happen. This could make DC’s entire Crisis series look like child’s play in terms of a possible Universe re-launch. Stay tuned true believers!

Also, for more in-depth coverage of my time at ComicCon, you can go to the following website, towards the bottom of the page, courtesy of Gordon Damer of 1050 ESPN Radio, NY, on from 2AM-6AM Monday-Friday;

http://stations.espn.go.com/stations/1050espnradio/show?showId=gordon_show1

Also, be sure to check out 1050espnradio.com and look up the Gordon Damer show for other entertaining tidbits about sports, video games, movies, and all that other stuff we love.

-Ray Carsillo