Podcast Cohost: Paul, I don’t know about you but i don’t love the process of buying new jeans.

Paul Giamatti: No, it’s absolute Hell on Earth— forget it, i’d rather get hit by a FREIGHT TRAIN.

Paul Giamatti has his own podcast— hearing him try to do standard podcast ads but it’s still Paul Giamatti made me laugh really hard this morning. (Johnny Knoxville just started one too — im going to lose my mind if he says “hi im johnny knoxville and this is a mattress commercial”).

Imagining going to a Shaolin Temple and Bokeem Woodbine pops out. Hell yeah.

(X)

Joe Biden 2024: he's come out now as being against cannibals, but he also supports forced starvation and the violent and intentional murder of Jose Andres's World Central Kitchen staff.

Joe Biden: basically just against eating of any kind. No wonder eggs cost so much... Either way: the future of Cannibalism is now up for grabs in November. It's the most important election... of our lives!!!!

"Rock the vote"-- Sean Combs.

Inio Asano’s Mujina into the Deep is curious— I don’t think of him as an “action comic” creator, but i’m not as well read in his work as probably most other people. Other people have definitely read him more than i have— i like him but he’s not “one of my guys” (more my sloth than dislike, though). So for me it’s curious in that way— though i think he runs into the problem that, like, an Alex Maleev does, that the photo-ref (or i think he uses the Unreal Engine a lot, supposedly) deadens things a little, which is more of an issue for action than drama. (It’s not as stiff as Maleev since he’s less ref-y on the figures obviously so not a great comparison but it’s very much a palpable presence in his work).

I think it hurts the pages above— pages i like— that the sword gets lost in the texture of the ceiling in that first panel, say.

I don’t think he’s oblivious to the issue— it’s curious seeing how he tried to mitigate that. (Mostly, a lot of “camerawork”, really close framing on figures, and obviously those big splashes on the faces).

I’ve missed a lot of his big works (they’re available on the Viz App but through the more inconvenient web app) but i think he’s a very emotional creator— so seeing him try to bring that to action where the emotions get told through motion— I can see that being a challenge for how he approaches things, the verisimilitude he aims for in his background, at least for what i dig. I saw a couple chapters of Dead Dead Demon Something Something where it looked like he was doing big sci-fi spectacle so i like that he doesn’t stay in a box.

A couple short chapters in, there’s not a lot of meat on the bone besides his visual approach though, which might be the bigger issue. I haven’t found anything to hook into.

The Youtube channel that cuts together old Charlie Rose clips (I think) to create conversations between celebrities-- I liked their new one with Chris Rock and Will Smith.

I just feel like if you drew a venn diagram of people who (a) get angry/dismissive at Tarantino for only wanting to make 10 movies and (b) people who’ve seen Adieu au Langage or Tetro or Twixt or 2019’s Domino starring Nikolaj Coster-Waldau or The Assignment… the Venn Diagram wouldn’t touch as much as people are suggesting.

Curious about this story but not enough to really deep dive-- but did this Cody Ziglar not want to work in comics anymore? I'm struggling to see how this isn't a career ender-- sort of a bold choice and/or curious humiliation fetish going on over there. I don't know about Hollywood generally, if that makes life messy over in Hollyweird. But popping off loud enough on a podcast of all things that The Money has to issue statements and shit? I don't know if that's the move, professionally, in comics to make! You can be a horrible person, but mess with The Money??? Geez, Louise. Geez, Miss Louise. I'm sorry Miss Louise, Geez is for real.

I'm not a guidance counselor, but I still wouldn't recommend it. That just must not be a fun place to be-- that must be a rough morning to wake up to. I'm kind of sympathetic because I have said, continue to say, and will in the future say stupid shit basically all the time. I have made an ass of myself spectacularly before haha. But on the other hand, I don't go on podcasts (because I'm afraid of Big Mattress). That might be a know thyself type situation, but who knows? Again, haven't done a deep dive, but it's a damn curious thing to happen.

Zigler was relaying a story they supposedly heard from Zeb Wells, supposedly, but I don't know if this sticks to Wells, why it should. But if I were some Marvel editor having to deal with this mess, I sure wouldn't be happy about any of it. That might be where I'm most sympathetic here-- I always relate most to The Suits-- Paul Reiser in Alien$ and other misunderstood heroes. If I were a Marvel editor having to hear about this from two ends, like Jennifer Connelly in Requiem for a Dream, I'd be pretty honked off. And I wouldn't be happy about other ongoing developments both domestically or internationally. But I would try to order more charcuterie at restaurants. My life would be completely different. But would I be any more free? No.

Anyways, I'm done with my lunch break.

This must've been really scary for the game store employees, but that being said, I did (guiltily) laugh when the security cam footage cut to this angle, of Charmander watching American gun violence with a big grin on his face.

Especially because it's a Fox 11 video, so for some reason, they add a soundtrack, which is like the music that Tom Cruise hears in his head during Risky Business when he's doing pimp activities. Is that similar to what's going through Charmander's head? I don't know enough about Pokemon to say (but OTOH, yes). (X)

Oh! See, I think the big question (besides "are they bringing back Common or what" that is on the tip of everyone's tongue) was would they bring back Isla Fisher's character Henley Reeves (the inventor of the shirt) or Lizzy Caplan's Lula (no last name). I generally like Caplan more and I thought she had "more to do" in Now You See Me 2. But Fisher was there first, and her getting sidelined in the second was disappointing!

Of course there was the third possibility, of imagining a group of male stage magicians who have two distinct women that they are friends with. But the Now You See Me movies are serious Christopher Nolan-style action-dramas, not science fiction fantasies.

My big fear is they'd just hire a third actress, and try to shove Anya Taylor Joy in there, for some reason, so I'm relieved that's not what they're doing. My second biggest fear is that they might not do an elaborate chase through an "Enter the Dragon"-style hall of mirrors that swiftly becomes a slapstick cavalcade of illusion and delight (or with motorbikes), but we'll just have to wait and see. My third biggest fear is slowly suffocating while my loved ones try to help but are helpless and have to watch me die.

Anyways and in summation: major cultural progress being made again, finally, by the United States, after our long national dry-spell. But now, once again, not for the first time, a nation's eyes turn towards Common. But is he there? Or has he ... disappeared right before our very eyes??? Magic!!!!

Ranking C'mon C'mon ahead of 20th Century Women? More like a Variety of Bad Opinions! C'mon C'mon was a perfectly nice movie, but some of the people reading these listicles are adults and people of laws! 20th Century Women robbed again. (X)

Mark Bright/ MD Bright RIP

The platform will focus on content that has been cancelled, is at risk of cancellation or is being suppressed on other platforms and services.

Becoming QAnon but for Donald Trump bringing back NBC's one-season classic The Misfits of Science. Leave the swamp alone; do the Storm but the Storm is re-casting Courtney Cox as "Gloria Dinallo, a troubled telekinetic teenager with a history of juvenile delinquency and a mother in a mental institution who claims Gloria's father is from outer space." QAnon now!!!

"Cyrano's Army, Page 1 of the complete script, written by Len Wein in 1972, edited by Joe Orlando and published by DC Comics. The finished job appeared in Weird War 10. It was the first story I drew at the beginning of my career in comics and this was the first page. And I can see that I lettered the story as well."

-- Walt Simonson (X, XX)

Namor McKenzie & Sue Storm having underwater sex in front of a freakin' giant octopus (while Reed Richards is probably busy in his lab) by the very talented Daniel Warren Johnson (what he said about this commission on Twitter/X : "it was asked that I “highlight the romantic aspect of the two” and I just kind of went for it").