Obscure Comics Character Pitch: The Spectre

Wherein the Serial Wordsmith takes an obscure comic book character, puts a new twist on it, and well, pitches it.

Today's Character: The Spectre

The Character: The Spectre is a Golden Age DC Superhero and founding member of the Justice Society of America, the WW2 predecessor to the Justice League. He's also an angel, sort of. This is where his powers come from. The Spectre is God's angel of vengeance and judgement, given almost unlimited holy power to exact justice on criminals. Often punishing them in ironic and creative ways. So how'd he end up palling around with superheroes in the 40s? I'll explain.

Review of the Jedi: A Necessary Bond

Join the Serial Wordsmith every Monday as he recaps and reviews the new season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars

This week's episode hits the ground running as we pick up right where we left last week. Ahsoka and the youngling escaping from Hondo Ohnaka's fortress in a stolen tank with pirates in hot pursuit. Nice, jumping right into the action. And it's a great starting action scene. Building excitement and suspense quickly. The Pirates are about to close in on our heroes so Jeff from American Dad! calls Ganodi back on the Jedi ship. They need to get picked-up but she isn't there. She and R2 were bust fixing David Tennant-bot. Yeah, the Doctor's back!

This leads to the Jedi ship hovering over them with their gangplank out so they can jump on. But the pirates are still following. Eventually, the younglings are hanging in a human chain off the gangplank and their stolen tank is headed for a cliff. The pirates blast the ship and shock R2, who's driving it. So the Jedi ship crashes and the Jedi are forced to surrender. But when they get back to base, they find the pirates have some unexpected company. General Grievous and his army.

More after the break,

Review of the Jedi: Bound for Rescue

Join the Serial Wordsmith every Monday as he recaps and reviews the new season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars

Another week, another fun episode in the Younglings arc. We rejoin our intrepid young Jedi aboard their damaged spaceship trying to contact some help. Ahsoka's been kidnapped by pirates and R2 is busy repairing David Tennant so he can't help. It also means that he doesn't appear this episode. Awwww. The younglings finally get somebody on the other end of the phone and it's Obi-Wan! He says he'll be by to pick them up after he rescues Ahsoka. They protest and want to help, but Obi-Wan is the by-the-book cop so he tells them to sit and wait. But then a bunch of Separatist ships come out of hyperspace and start attacking his fleet. So he's going to be a little pre-occupied.

Of course, being kids, the younglings weren't going to listen to him anyway. With David Tennant still being fixed by R2, they get to work putting their lighsabers together for the coming rescue. And they do it with the Force. This is actually a cool scene, these kids sitting in complete meditation with all these tiny lightsaber parts floating around them and slowly coming together. Kudos to the animators. Jeff from American Dad! naturally takes lead and proposes going down to Florum (Hondo's hideout planet) to rescue Ahsoka themselves while Katooni says they should wait for Obi-Wan. But things are decided for them when Ganodi the Rodian comes in and says the ship has a coolant leak. If they don't land, they'll be permanently stranded.

More after the break,

On Fake Geek Girls

There will be fewer silly pictures this time because it is serious time.

Okay, so there's been a lot of talk around the net recently about "fake" geek girls. The closest I can find for an inciting incident is this Facebook post from comics artist Tony Harris complaining about cosplayers. These rather disgusting comments have prompted much discussion here on the nerdy side of the internet ranging from the sarcastic to the academic. Now I consider myself an observer of our culture, so I'm going to offer my own thoughts on this whole idea of the "fake" geek girls.

Buckle in folks, this is going to be a long one...

Review of the Jedi: A Test of Strength

Join the Serial Wordsmith every Monday as he recaps and reviews the new season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars

And welcome back dear readers. This week we rejoin our young Jedi-in-training as they return from their successful trip to Ilum. With crystals for their lightsabers, Ahsoka's escorting them back to Coruscant. Yoda decided to finish his vacation, I guess, because he's not here. Instead the younglings are introduced to Prof. Huyang, the droid onboard who'll teach them to build their lightsabers. Wait, this droid's voice is familiar. Holy Shit! It's David Tennant!

And not only is David Tennant here, but that Harry Potter comparison I made last week was rather apt since he's basically playing a robot version of Mr. Ollivander. Seriously, they even do that "looking through lots f drawers for the right piece" bit from Sorcerer's Stone. But Tennant's a good actor and I'm glad he's here. So Prof. Tennant gets the younglings working on their lightsabers when we cut to outside their ship. Where a curiously familiar flying saucer approaches...

More after the break,

Classic Sci-Fi Reread: Ender's Game

I am conflicted, dear readers. Very conflicted. For, as I'll explain in a moment, I really enjoyed Ender's Game. But I didn't want to. And it's all Orson Scott Card's fault.

Before I get into my feelings on Mr. Card and his book, I need to explain a change in this series. Originally the Classic Sci-Fi Reread was meant for me to take another look at older science fiction books I read when I was younger. But while I was going over more lists of classic Sci-Fi novels I found there were plenty that I had never read at all. So while I'll still being looking at things I have read before, I'm expanding this series out to include looks at things I've just read for the first time.

Which brings me to Ender's Game. Yes, believe it or not, I somehow managed to avoid having to read this in my formative years. Which is a shame because I think my younger self would have liked more than I did.

Happy Birthday Carl Sagan!

The Serial Wordsmith wishes a happy birthday to the great popularizer of science and space exploration. He's starstuff once more.

Here's a video montage of one his best speeches.

Remember, remember the fifth of November

Happy Guy Fawkes Day!

Review of the Jedi: The Gathering

Join the Serial Wordsmith every Monday as he recaps and reviews the new season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars

Okay, so I was wrong last week. This week's episode isn't about Padme and banks. It's about young Jedi. Our helpful newsreel narrator informs that because of the war, the number of Jedi has dwindled. As such, they've been trying to get their younglings advanced faster. And taking more babies to become Jedi. Yeah, this is something I've always found weird about the Jedi. I know they're a pseudo-religious order but I've never heard of any other religious order than trains their monks from birth. It just feels very sketchy, like if a priest showed up to take your baby because God told him to.

Anyway, our episode this week focuses on a group of Jedi younglings who are ready to advance to the next level. Ahsoka is chaperoning them to the Jedi Temple on Ilum the ice planet, where Jedi get the crystals that make their lightsabers work. Star Wars fans will remember Ilum from Tartakovsky's Clone Wars series when it was attacked by Separatists. The Jedi have learned since than and protected their temple with a giant Force door.

More after the break,