Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Panel to Panel

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Panel to Panel

Dark Horse (2007)

RATING: 2/5 Stakes

BACK-OF-THE-BOOK SUMMARY: "Buffy Summers--at once invincible and vulnerable, beautiful and brave--has grown into a mythic figure. After a shaky start inthe cult film, her icon status arose with the 1997 launch of Joss Whedon's critically acclaimed television series, where her valley-girl charm won audiences young and old. It seemed only natural that this Slayer of vampires and demons would find herself the start of her own comic. Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Panel to Panel collects the artwork that first brought the comic book to life, including work by acclaimed artists J. Scott Campbell, Tim Sale, Jeff Matsuda, and Eric Powell. This book captures the action, adventure, and drama of the television show through comic-book storytelling. Each image reveals the creative and collaborative efforts that have made Buffy a success in both TV and comics. Panel to Panel chronicles Buffy's life, death, and resurrection, and catapults fans into Whedon's comic-book continuation of the show in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight."

REVIEW

Panel to Panel is basically a collection of covers, interior artwork, and concept designs taken from Dark Horse Comics original run of Buffy comics (that is, the comics before Joss Whedon took a direct hand with the launch of Season Eight). There's a few paragraphs here and there written by Scott Allie, the comics' editor, about why certain artists were chosen. But by and large this is very much an art book--and if you have the actual comics, you can see pretty much everything that's in this book. In other words, as far as I can tell, unless you're crazy about comic art there's not really a lot of point to buying Panel to Panel.

Intersectionality and Posthumanist Visions of Equality

I wanted to flag this interesting article in the Wisconsin Journal of Law, Gender, and Society, Intersectionality and Posthumanist Visions of Equality by Maneesha Deckha. The article lays out the case that speciesism should be included along with racism, sexism, homopohobia, ageism, and more when analyzing the implications of laws and legal theory. Here are a couple of points I find especially interesting:

* The degree to which the legal system (and mainstream society) is concerned with animal abuse is heavily contingent on purely cultural constructions of the "worth" of those animals. That is, (using Western society as a background) animals that have reputations as being "dirty" or "savage" (rats or coyotes, for example) are rarely going to be the subject of concern; animals culturally constructed as "loyal" or "noble" (dogs & horses, for example) will receive greater protection. Different cultures value different animals differently (cows in India are sacred; horsemeat or dogmeat is common in others).

* Along these lines (my own observation here), there's a strange dichotomy with the phenomenon that inflicting pain on a single animal is likely to be considered morally culpable, while inflicting pain on thousands or millions of animals as part of a larger project is considered blameless: slitting the throat of a chicken for animal sacrifice by members of Santeria can incur legal difficulties, but industrial food production involving chicken will escape scrutiny.

* There's also an interesting discussion of Cary Wolfe's arrangement of species on a sort of grid that reflects cultural conceptions of their worth. At the highest are "humanized humans"--that his, human beings whose worth is fully embraced. A step below are "animalized humans", human beings whose worth is considered lesser by racist theories labelling them as "savage" or "bestial" (ethnic cleansing campaigns often reflect this sort of thinking). A step lower are "humanized animals", animals to which we assign traits (intelligence, affection, loyalty, etc.) that we considered valuable: dolphins, chimpanzees, dogs, etc. And then lowest are "animalized animals", those animals who receive little or no value and are seen merely as sources of food, clothing, sport, or experimentation.

Torchwood: Countrycide: (S1, E6)

"I hate the countryside."

Countrycide, Season One, Episode Six

("Torchwood investigates a series of gruesome deaths in the Brecon Beacons, only to confront a terrifying enemy.")

What I Liked

* A great opening sequence--very scary, but with a victim who isn't stupid or cliched (she brings the baseball bat with her, for example).

* Getting Torchwood out of the Hub, and even out of Cardiff. I know filming on location is expensive, but a show that stays in one setting too long can start to feel claustrophobic or repetitive. According to the commentary, the beautiful, haunting darkened-cloud skies were naturally there.

* Owen's hatred of the country. "What's that awful smell?" he asks. "Grass," Gwen replies.

* A story that has nothing at all to do with aliens--again, a surprising and original twist in the Whoniverse.

* Seeing Gwen & Owen hook up at the end--another big twist, taking the show down a darker path and giving an "episode of the week" larger implications.

What I'm Not Sure About

* Owen is just plain mean to Tosh (talking about making out with Gwen in front of her, for example). Why's a nice girl like her crushing on a jerk like him?

* Jack's saying that he was once a professional torturer--this has never been referenced again and seems out of place with his being a con man and time cop. Was he making it up?

What I Didn't Like

* Gwen giving up her gun while in a stand-off: listen lady, they're cannibalistic serial killers. Wouldn't you rather take your chances in a gun battle than be slowly tortured and eaten alive?

* The ending, with Jack crashing through the wall guns-a-blazing and shooting down all the bad guys. It was a little too Hollywood action movie for an episode that had been all about gruesome horror. Not that it wasn't cool--just, out of place and the wrong tone.

COMMENTARY

By: Andy Goddard (Director), Gareth David-Lloyd (Ianto), and Chris Chibnall (Writer)

Tone: Director-focussed, somewhat technical, but balanced discussion of pros and cons

Interesting bits:

* Gareth David-Lloyd regretted eating several of the roadside stand burgers.

* The scenes prior to the SUV being stolen were supposed to take place around a campfire, but apparently getting permits and ensuring the safety of the actors was too expensive and difficult. It's a bad sign for t.v. when simple campfires become logistical nightmares.

* A reference to "The Harkinator" debate: what I talked about above, with Jack turning into super killing machine.

Torchwood Declassified: "The Country Club"

* Discussion of the episode as being intended to drive Gwen & Owen together

* A feature on making the gory special effects--and how there are tone limits, even for late-night T.V.

* Discussion among the crew over the ending: some thought Jack should have been very stealthy and emotionless, while other's like the big finish with his face full of rage.

Deleted Scenes

* A different edit of Jack crashing into the barn and going gun crazy.

* A brief aftermath shot of a wounded Gwen walking towards emergency vehicles. Jack says the place will probably become a shrine to monsters.

* Gwen and Rhys sitting at home after everything that happened--it's awkward and uncomfortable, and Gwen pretends she's been called in to Torchwood so that she can leave.

Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque

Continuing with my collection of Worth Literary Classics: Edgar Allan Poe's Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque. This is kind of the "other" collection of Poe's short stories: most of his famous works (The Fall of the House of Usher, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Masque of the Red Death, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Cask of Amontillado and The Tell-Tale Heart) are in another collection ("Tales of Mystery and Imagination"). Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque really shows Poe's diversity: a lot of the pieces are humorous, a few show his trademark interest in the Gothic, and a couple are more in the nature of science-fiction. There were a handful I thought were really good: King Pest (set during plague-infested London, when grotesque mockeries of normal life are enacted by people who have given up hope); William Wilson (an early example of psychological horror); The Unparalled Adventure of One Hans Pfaal (a science-filled hoax about a trip to the moon in a hot-air balloon); and The System of Dr. Tarr and Professor Fether (inmates running the asylum: a bit of a hoary plot today, but still effectively creepy). The Worth edition comes with an introduction and an essay on "Poe and the Gothic", which probably would have belonged better in the other collection. Surprisingly, there's no table of contents--something really necessary for a short story collection. I really liked the Publishing History section, which included full-color reproductions of gothic art inspired by Poe's work.

Reflections of a Rock Super-Hero

Man, I wish I had an 8-track of Reflections of a Rock Super-Hero, "the beginning of a musical revolution!" Mainly, because "it's not just for the younger set" and is indeed "an honest-to-Aunt May Rock-and-Roll album that's the answer to any disc jockey's prayer." One of the "Super Songs" on the album is "No One Has a Crush on Peter", which I'm sure was an instant classic.

Proof that ads are often as much fun as old comics themselves.

Fantasy Football: Week 9

Week 9 resulted in another loss (71-89), dropping me to 3-6 on the season. This was a game I could have won if a couple of breaks had gone my way (like Peyton Manning or Ochcinco getting a TD). I picked up Jonathan Stewart on waivers to replace the benched Steve Slaton, but although Stewart got plenty of carries he didn't get plenty of yards.

SUN RUNNERS: 71 Points

Peyton Manning, Ind QB 14
Ricky Williams, Mia RB 9
Jonathan Stewart, Car RB 1
Pierre Garcon, Ind WR 6
Chad Ochocinco, Cin WR 4
Jeremy Maclin, Phi WR 4
Fred Davis, Was TE 2
Steelers D/ST, Pit D/ST 18
John Carney, NO K 13

SANDERBECK: 89 Points

Drew Brees, NO QB 13
Ryan Grant, GB RB 15
Ray Rice, Bal RB 18
Rashard Mendenhall, Pit RB 15
Andre Johnson, Hou WR 10
Dwayne Bowe, KC WR 7
Brent Celek, Phi TE 9
49ers D/ST, SF D/ST -3
Josh Scobee, Jac K 5

Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader

Set immediately after Revenge of the Sith, Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader gives some interesting insight into how Anakin makes the physical and psychological transformation into Vader. Psychologically, he scorns the Jedi for their weakness and inability to see what Palpatine was doing, while at the same time biding his time until Palpatine has taught him everything there is to know about Sith lore before betraying him. Physically, there's a good explanation of how difficult it is to adjust to having a largely cybernetic body, and how it forces the formerly agile and somersaulting Anakin into the ponderous, but implacable, Darth Vader (or, in other words, why the fight between Anakin & Obi-Wan at the end of Revenge of the Sith is such a dramatic departure from the fight between Vader & Obi-Wan in A New Hope). We also see some early glimpses of (future) Grand Moff Tarkin, the enslavement of the Wookies (including the apparent death of Chewbacca's family, forcing him off-world), the construction of the first Death Star, and Obi-Wan's first realization, while on Tatooine, that his former Padawan is still alive.

Apart from Vader, there's a plot concerning Roan Shryne and other Jedi who managed to survive Order 66--although some of them survive the events of the book, they haven't yet made appearances in any other canon fiction (at least according to Wookiepedia).