Less Than a Week Until Nightwing Joins Arkham City
Batman: Arkham City only came out a week ago and already developer Rocksteady is ready to hit us with some downloadable content. They will be bringing Nightwing into the game as a fully playable character in the Challenge Maps, just like they already have Robin and Catwoman. Nightwing will also bring his own Challenge Maps called ‘Wayne Manor’ and ‘Main Hall’, so that should be neat.
Batman games can never have enough Robin, as far as I’m concerned.
The 6 Best Easter Eggs in Batman: Arkham City
I love video game Easter Eggs, and Batman: Arkham City is littered with them! For anyone who doesn’t know, an Easter Egg is an in-joke or a wink to the fans that game developers put into their game for the sheer fun of it. Like finding He-Man in World of Warcraft, the beating heart in the Statue of Liberty in Grand Theft Auto IV or being able to play as Bill Clinton in NBA Jam. They don’t have anything to do with the main game; but if you’re a fan of the series, and you get the ‘joke’, they can bring a smile to your face. They are a real treat.
Arkham City up close and personal
And when creating the ultimate set of Batman video games, the makers of Batman: Arkham Asylum and the new Batman: Arkham City went Easter Egg crazy!
The story of Arkham City (which I won’t spoil here), is an epic adventure that pits Batman against the Joker and Professor Hugo Strange. The game has Batman facing off against other classic rogues like Two-Face, Catwoman, Penguin, Mad Hatter and more as he tries to solve the mystery of Arkham City and save the day! The game takes place in a sprawling map of Gotham City, featuring such notable levels as Penguin’s Iceberg Lounge, the Gotham City Police Station and Ace Chemicals, where the Joker received his vicious grin.
But hidden in the nooks and crannies of the game, far off the beaten path, are tons of Easter Eggs and references to other characters, villains and stories from Batman lore.
It was like that in the first game too. I loved walking around Arkham Asylum and randomly stumbling across Two-Face’s or Mr. Freeze’s cells. They were just there as part of a normal cell block, the way any prisoner’s cell would be. Well Batman: Arkham City has much more room to work with and a lot more ways to hide Easter Eggs. I won’t be spoiling the main story in this list, just a few of the fun and funny Easter Eggs that you can find hidden in the game.
Here are the 6 Best in Batman: Arkham City:
Sinestro is a Jerk…but Green Lantern Sort of Deserved This
I’m a huge fan of Robot Chicken, the stop-motion animated variety show that celebrates all of geekery. Well they have a DC Comics special coming up soon, and this is a preview clip of the Green Lantern vs. Sinestro. Hilarious and filthy. So the rest of the special should be more of the same. Guess they ran out of jokes to make about Star Wars.
Why Can Nobody Get the Punisher Right?
The big superhero TV news this past weekend was that FOX has ordered a pilot for The Punisher, the grim and gritty vigilante from Marvel Comics. Normally, that would be very cool news because I love comic books, I love the Punisher, and it would just be cool to have a Punisher TV show. But according to Deadline, and every other news source I read about this deal, the people making the show are GOING TO FUCK IT ALL UP!!
What the hell is so hard about making a live action Punisher!?
Three movies have failed at it. And now a TV show is going to fail too?
Here’s the description of the show according to Deadline:
The Punisher is described as an hour-long procedural with a Marvel signature and a new take on one of the comic book giant’s iconic characters, Frank Castle, a rising star detective with the New York Police Department who moonlights as the vigilante Punisher, seeking justice for those the system has failed.
Are you kidding me!?
A cop who works on the side as the Punisher? What complete and utter bullshit is that? That’s not the Punisher! That’s TV hero #29473 with the name ‘Punisher’ slapped onto it for merchandising or some such bullshit studio reason. It’s mind-numbing to me that somebody along the way decided to so greatly alter the character and yet still have the gall to call it The Punisher. There have been three distinct live action Punisher movies, none of which have been sequels of each other, and yet every single one gets the Punisher wrong in some way.
Nobody can apparently just tell a straight forward, unaltered live action story of the Punisher.
But why? What’s so difficult to make with the Punisher story? He’s got to be one of the easiest characters to create in live action because he doesn’t have any super powers or fancy costume. He’s just a guy with a skull on his shirt and some guns! Killing gangsters and criminals! It’s super easy!
This look, this is the look. What is so hard about this look?
Let me explain. The Punisher’s origin is very easy. He was a soldier in Vietnam (or it could easily be transferred to Iraq or Afghanistan) who learned combat and firearms training in the heat of battle. Upon his return stateside, Frank Castle tries to settle down with his wife and kids. But then one innocent day in the park, he and his family are caught in the crossfire from two rival gangs or mobsters. They have nothing to do with the criminals, they are just innocently caught in the crossfire.
With his family dead, Castle falls back on his military training to wage a one-man war on ALL crime. Yes, he gets revenge against those specific mobsters. But then he just keeps going after all other criminals. No one is safe.
So the basics: soldier, family innocently gunned down, Punisher goes after all criminals.
He’s not a rising star police detective who moonlights on the side as the Punisher. It defeats the very purpose of the Punisher. He’s a man obsessed or possessed or however you want to say it. The Punisher doesn’t do anything on the side. He is only the Punisher and he world has to deal with it. There have been decades of comic book stories written around this idea. Garth Ennis wrote a 10-volume comic book opus about Punisher which was very creative, very inventive and really got to the heart of the character – all while sticking to the actual character.
What about the movies?
The first one in 1989 starring Dolph Lundgren also had him as a cop, an ex-police officer who had become the Punisher. That movie also didn’t feature the skull emblem on the shirt for some reason.
The second one in 2004 starring Thomas Jane is the worst of them all. They get the name right, and the skull shirt, but everything else just gets thrown out the window. This time he’s an FBI Agent who gets caught in a sting operation gone bad. A mobster’s son gets killed, so as revenge, the mobster specifically targets Castle and Castle’s entire extended family. Not just his wife and two sons. Frank Castle’s family is the target of a specific hit. So when he becomes the Punisher afterwards, he specifically goes out for revenge against that one mobster (played by John Travolta). That’s not ‘punishment’, that’s revenge, just like a million other movie anti-heroes!
The third one in 2008 starring Ray Stevenson was a little bit better. They get the skull and they get the badassery. I don’t recall if they had the soldier origin or cop origin. But he’s the Punisher…then they go and muck it up by having the Punisher kill an undercover cop, filling him with guilt and remorse. Then the bad guys, Jigsaw and Loony Bin Jim, are ridiculous! They are comic relief pushed too far, taking a serious movie down with them. This film got close to the Punisher…then still found ways on the side to mess it up.
What is so hard about making a straight Punisher movie? Somebody tell me!
Review: Punisher #4
The new Punisher series by Greg Rucka continues to be a good read, but we’re four issues in and we don’t know anything about the bad guy, the bride has yet to leave the hospital and the Punisher has barely interacted with the rest of the cast. Heck, this issue doesn’t even feature the bad guys. It’s essentially a recap issue, giving us the origin of the Punisher and sort of catching everyone up to the story so far. We’re only four issues in and we need a breather? I don’t think so.
Punisher #4
Four issues in, I want some Grade A badassery.
Comic rating: 3/5: Alright.
That’s not to say Punisher #4 is a bad comic. It’s still a good read, with the mood, atmosphere and art still top notch for this kind of story. Rucka is still telling a grim and gritty Punisher tale, which is how it should be. It’s just that not enough is happening. He’s created a nice cast of supporting characters, all of whom seem more fleshed out than the Punisher, but he’s not doing enough with them. None of them seem to matter more than their particular role in the story, which is essentially just their job. Norah is a reporter. Clemons and Bolt are police detectives. That’s all these people seem to do, and it has yet to go any deeper.
I think Rucka’s trying to make the Punisher into something of a supernatural force of nature…but it’s not working. One problem is the art. The Punisher looks like a freakin’ cover model!
