Deadpool review #2 & #3

This edition of Deadpool review is for Thunderbolts 131 and for X-Force/Cable: Messiah War Prologue.



What you need to know: Deadpool, on a mission for Nick Fury, stole intelligence about the Skrulls, which Norman Osborn intercepted. Then, he used the intel to kill the Skrull queen, making him immensely popular and now is head of HAMMER, the replacement SHIELD. Deadpool learned about this and wants to be paid and recognized for his part in making Osborn so powerful. Osborn sent his new Black-Ops Thunderbolts after him. Now, Deadpool, working with Taskmaster, is trying to take out the Thunderbolts while trying to score with Yelena Belova, their leader, the second Black Widow (the blonde one).

The plot: The Thunderbolts captured Deadpool, but as Headsman is about to chop his head off, the actual Deadpool shows up, armed to the teeth. He frees Taskmaster, who was masquerading as Deadpool before, then they fight the Thudnerbolts, causing Norman Osborn to flee. Deadpool is able to get onto the ship, but Norman goes crazy and attacks Deadpool, causing the ship to crash. Black Widow shoots Deadpool in the heart, and then Headsman finally does something, chopping Deadpool's head off. Norman tells Yelena to burn the head, and walks away. Taskmaster then is embarrassed to be at an ATM, getting his money, considering he is "world-class." Deadpool, it seems, stole Norman Osborn's credit card while they fought, and had his head sown back on, he assumed by Taskmaster, but actually was Black Widow.

Deadpool's part: Well, the entire thing, pretty much. Read the plot, since this was specifically a Deadpool story.

Humor involved: As he shows up to rescue Taskmaster, he talks about how he couldn't decide which weapons to bring, deciding upon all of them. As he tries to get rid of Ant Man, who climbs into his outfit, he shoots himself a bunch of times. When he gets shot through the heart, he starts singing, then asks for last words from Yelena, who is threatening to cut off his head. As he realizes who sowed his head back onto his body, he is incredibly happy, and believes Yelena really does love him.

Worth getting?: If you've read the other parts, then yes. Otherwise, still yes, but I recommend that your read the other parts first. It is a fun storyline, and I enjoyed it. The current Thunderbolts, like the team from directly after Civil War, are horrible at teamwork, and don't work together well at all. It leads to some interesting dynamics. Plus, Deadpool is good in this. He isn't all silly all the time, but he does make things fun. The art isn't for everyone, but I enjoyed it.

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What you need to know: The one mutant born after M-Day has been flung into the future to live with Cable. Cyclops knows Bishop is after them, so he decides to send X-Force to help.

The plot: Cyclops recalls what happened while Bishop talks to a mysterious man in a bar who killed everybody else there. As X-Force gets sent into the future to help Cable out to protect the child, they come under attack by Deadpool, who unlike everybody else who had to time travel to get there, he just survived. Deadpool joins up with X-Force, who find Cable, and then learn that Stryfe is ruling the world at this point, with him being the person Bishop talked to.

Deadpool's part: He shoots at X-Force, then as they wonder what he's doing there, cracks some jokes, and joins up with them, as he is also looking for Cable.

Humor involved: Sees Domino and semi-remembers her, mentioning how he knew someone who looked exactly like her 1000 years ago. He then claims he's the emperor of North America, and can be called "your majesty." After Logan pops his claws through Wade's head, he says he feels Logan inside his head and wonders if Wolverine is a telepath now. Then, he comments on how he likes having his brain scratched. Then, he looks around and, seeing everybody, says, "Wolverine! Thunderbird II! Domino! Other people I don't know! I missed you! Where did you go? I was waiting for you! For a reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaly long time." After they get to where Cable is, he, Domino, Elixir and Vanisher are told to wait outside, at which point he asks if they want to play Travel Connect Four, which he brought with him. Oh, and Stryfe's file for him is great. You can see that here.

Worth getting?: It's a crazy storyline involving the future, Cable, Stryfe, Bishop and a time traveling X-Force. It's silly as hell, but made all the sillier with Deadpool. Seeing as it is a storyline which had a lot of Deadpool in it (surprisingly so), I reccomend it to Deadpool fans. To non-Deadpool fans, well, if you like all that time travel stuff or seeing stupid amounts of violence (reading X-Force), then sure, otherwise, I'd say to avoid it.

Look this Friday or Saturday (again, hopefully Friday) for my review of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, with a Deadpool review coming also.

Deadpool review #1

Welcome to my new series, Deadpool review, where I review whatever there may be that I pick up related to Deadpool. For this first article, I'll be going over the issue last week that had Deadpool in it, X-Force 14.



What you need to know: Cable has been trying to protect the first mutant born after M-Day, and he entered the timestream. Cyclops sent X-Force after Cable to help him out. Bishop has been trying to kill the mutant, who he believes will be responsible for the extinction of mutantkind. Currently, they are in the future, where Stryfe, Cable's clone is ruler, and wants Cable dead.

The Plot: X-Force, Cable and Deadpool have to fight off Stryfe's soldiers, as Bishop lands in the future, allying himself with Stryfe to take out a weakened Apocalypse. X-Force is able to take out the soldiers. Then, Stryfe attacks, taking lots of them down. Archangel discovers the beaten Apocalypse, who greets his former horseman.

Deadpool's part: In the future, Deadpool never died, instead living long enough to reach whenever they are. He helps Cable and X-Force out along the way. During the fight against Stryfe's men, he takes almost all of them out by shooting them and is the first to notice Stryfe coming to attack them.

Humor involved: While describing his group, when he gets to Wade, he remarks that their fates seem intertwined. "God help me." Deadpool also just yells while shooting wildly in the air. Deadpool shoots a guy in the head repeatedly, yelling out, "Bang! You're dead." each time, telling Domino after she asks him to help them out more, "But what if he's a zombie?!" Then, he yells, "Buuulleeeetttssss!!" as he mows all the remaining enemies down, before going back to shooting the one guy in the head, yelling, "Die, zombie! Diiiie!" Later on, talking to Domino, he remarks how his "...pants are an open book." Then, as she asks what he isn't telling them, "[What I didn't tell you was] that Stryfe just launched from his citadel, and is flying through the sky right now and coming this way I think to probably kill you all. But to be fair, I was only keeping that from you for a few seconds."

Worth getting?: I'm going to say yes. I only read X-Force's first volume in issue format, and while I thought it was kind of silly (and it still is), the story wasn't too hard for me to follow. The characters and plot are introduced right on the front page and everything is explained fairly well. Clayton Crain is still an amazing artist, whose art, while very dark, especially with black on black on dark grey is hard to see, is still really good. Craig Kyle and Chris Yost are great writers and the issue is good. I'm not reading Messiah War (well, aside from the issues with Deadpool. Still need Cable 13), and while the story is somewhat cheesy, it still is worth it, at least I think so. Plus, Deadpool is written well in this. He has a good amount of page time considering he isn't the main character, and is a back-up character to the back-up character. Still, he proves his skills in combat, and he still is funny.

Look this Wednesday or Thursday (hopefully Wednesday) for my Deadpool review of Thunderbolts 131, the final issue in Magnum Opus, the Deadpool/Thunderbolts crossover.

Giving thanks

No, I know it isn't the 4th Thursday of November, but I still feel thankful. I don't know why, but today, I just want to be thankful. This is specifically about VS.

As you may know, as VS was coming to an end, they had more interactions with the fan community than ever before. Part of that consisted of them having longer preview periods before sets with more cards revealed, plus they gave preview cards to some of the people in the blogosphere, me included. Late March of last year, Ben Seck PM'd me on VS Realms, letting me know that he wanted me to preview cards for Marvel Universe on my blog. As you can imagine, that was a big surprise and I was ecstatic. I know my blog hasn't been the biggest or most popular for VS. I mostly started it to rant about my comics that I picked up as otherwise, I had nowhere to direct complaints or appreciations. Since there were other VS blogs going up, though, I made mine have VS also. Anyway, I got picked to preview Annihilus's 5-drop incarnation and the Negative Zone location based off of the prison from Civil War. I did so, using my specific writing and personal skills, going over the comics and Annihilus's history, which amuses me. If you can't remember, the article is here. I loved the Annihilation storyline a lot. It was spectacular, sensational and amazing. Getting to preview Annihilus was awesome. Sure, I would have preferred a Skrull card (like the Kl'rt from that set), but Annihilus was a great character, and my MUN deck was based off of him. When the time came around for MEV, well, I knew Deadpool was in it, and I desperately wanted Deadpool. When TBS game me Blink to preview, I was incredibly disappointed, as while the Exiles are cool, and has been a good series from time to time, I mean, come on! I love Deadpool more than I like certain friends of mine. Not just people, but actually friends. Heck, even some family members I like less than Deadpool. Sure, writing about Blink was fun, and it is a cool card. You can see my preview for Blink here. I started to get my hopes up, though, when I saw other people were getting to preview two cards. So, yes, when Weapon X was previewed, I got to preview a Deadpool card. Extended Monologue is an awesome card and I am so happy that I got to preview it. The card itself is a perfect tribute to Deadpool and perfectly encapsulates a Deadpool fight. He may not be the biggest threat ever, but he'll be the person you go after first, even if there are more powerful people to deal with, just because he is so darn annoying. Plus, with his healing factor, that makes him even more deadly. So, being able to only target Deadpool makes perfect sense. Oh, and you can find that article here. So, to sum up this long paragraph, I want to thank UDE and VS for allowing me to preview cards (probably one of my favorite aspects of the TCG world) and especially for allowing me to preview a Deadpool card.

What else? Well, there have been great community forums for VS. When I started paying attention to VS online, I got accounts at VS Realms, VS Universe (TCGPlayer) and VS Paradise, probably the largest of sites (well, maybe not as much Paradise). Paradise was where I spent most of my time originally, because, well, the people there were less often mean, and they also had less annoyances. I got my first experience with fan cards there, which was fun (and something I took over to TCGPlayer) and had a great time talking with the people there (who were almost all from Australia). Even at TCGPlayer, in the fantasy card section, I made a little name for myself, mostly being one of the people who was more critical than most, trying to make everything make more sense and fit into the game. So, I'd criticize 3/3 Army 1-drops with no drawbacks, whereas other people might get really excited about them. Still, it was fun and I hung out there some too. Eventually, for reasons I forget, I left TCGPlayer (still have the account, just didn't do anything), and Paradise kind of fell apart after they got no support in Australia, so I hung out on Realms, and there were lots of cool people there as well, once you got past some of the more annoying people. I still haven't migrated to Dot Org, and might, but I'm not sure. Either way, the point I'm trying to make is that VS allowed me to meet lots of interesting people, some of whom I met in person, others not so much, but still, the community, for all its faults, was a great place, and I am thankful that I was part of it, while it was still bigger.

In general, VS was a really fun game. It still is, although it is sad that there aren't any more cards being made. I have always loved being able to control characters I love. It is part of why I play TCGs and video games. After enjoying OverPower and HeroClix, VS was, well, better. It is a more balanced, better game that allows for lots of craziness, silliness and lots of characters to do lots of things. OverPower was weak in that you had 4 characters max, and lots were just outright better than others, both in terms of stats and abilities. Also, the Strength, Fighting and Energy cards as attacks were kind of lame. Yay, I get to attack you from Spider-Man using Sauron. Wait, what? HeroClix worked better to an extent. First off, it was cool to have figures of characters although some of them were kind of awkward (paint-wise or sculpt-wise). Still, you could have lots of people, and your amount depended upon how powerful the people you chose were. So, Superman or the Hulk would take more points than Black Cat or Catwoman. Also, while there were teams involved, very few teams were so good that the best strategy was to pick that team, so you get horrible team-ups. Plus, power levels made things tricky. Sure, if my opponent has Superman, it would be hard to fight him. But, well, I want to actually be able to fight him. Sure, I might get a Critical hit on a 12 (two 6-sided dice for attacks), but with his invulnerability, I am doing jack squat. It got awkward and frustrating. VS isn't perfect, but it is the best collectable game out there with superheroes. You can include anybody, but teams make things better, by getting more powerful team-specific cards and being able to team attack with and reinforce teammates. Plus, there get to be so many more characters. Also, while Superman might do well, you can also do well with an army of characters, which makes lots of different strategies viable and fun. VS was a fun game with a lot of different ways to play and, well, had good Deadpool and Kl'rt stuff. So, I give thanks to VS for being a good superhero game that let me use Deadpool and others effectively.

Deadpool Cubeecraft

I have made no effort to hide the fact that I love Deadpool. Some time ago, I discovered Cubeecraft and since they didn't have a Deadpool, decided to make my own.

Click for template

To use the template, cut out along the edge of the shapes, and along the white lines. Then, just connect each letter to its counterpart (A to A, B to B) and you should have yourself a Cubeecraft Deadpool.

As featured on The Deadpool Bugle.

Suspense

I am the wrong type of person for suspense/slasher movies. At least, I think I am. I don't know what the intended audience is, but I am fairly certain I am not in that audience. I came to realize this when I watched Disturbia. Or maybe it was when I watched The Wicker Man. Well, let me tell you the stories, anyway. My "friends" and I theater-hopped a fair amount. I wasn't too fond of it, but whatever. They were my own age and I played VS with them and my parents wanted me to hang out with people my own age. So, we'd get a bunch of us and using two tickets, get into a movie theater, then go from movie to movie. I was somewhat opposed, but whatever. We had seen some movie, Eragon maybe, and we decided to see some more. So we went to The Wicker Man. Let me tell you, that was a horrible movie. Just absolutely horrible. While it is bad from the beginning, the end is where it really stands out in my mind. See, Nic Cage plays this cop who has a daughter on this island populated only by women, and he goes to find her there or something. Eventually it is revealed that this is all a trap for Nic, as they actually want to sacrifice him. See, they had a bad harvest and when they have a bad harvest, their religion/cult demands they sacrifice a man to their god or whatever. So, it's some trap to get Nic to the island where eventually they surround him as he realizes this was a trap. He takes out his gun (he's a cop), which they took the bullets out, then as it doesn't fire, starts punching and kicking the women. Yes, Nic Cage starts beating up ladies. Through sheer numbers they overpower him and put him in a sack. As they carry him away, he rants at them as he says they are murderers and that "killing [him] won't bring back their goddamn honey." Then, as they break his legs, he yells about how they just broke his legs. My thoughts are that as they neared the end of production, they realize how bad it was and decided that it didn't matter anymore so any effort they had put into it vanished. Ah, but it is supposed to be scary or something, and instead I was laughing like crazy.

Later that night, we saw Saw II and Silent Hill at one of the kid's houses. I wasn't fully paying attention as I was also playing VS, but, well, it just seemed silly. Both just seemed silly. Again, I was just laughing at the movies rather than being scared.

I watched Disturbia with a group of friends (that are actually friends), and well... Basically, it is Rear Window with Shia LeBeouf. He sees murders through his window and then tries to warn people kind of. It tries to make it seem like he isn't a murderer, but eventually, the movie reveals he is in fact a guy who is just killing people. When Shia finally goes in his house, bodies literally just start falling everywhere, and while my friends were slighty freaked out by it, it was so ridiculously over the top that I couldn't take it seriously at all. As we walked out, I was laughing at how silly it was and they just looked at me as if I were crazy.

Recently, I watched two movies on Hulu, My Little Eye and Bad Reputation. Both are suspense/horror movies and both were horrible. I watched both and was just amazed. Still, keeping on track with who I am, I laughed a lot at both. My Little Eye is about this "reality show" where 5 people live in a house for 6 months and if they succeed, they get a million dollars at the end. Eventually, they realize it is a snuff site, and not a reality show, and everybody dies. Oh, wait. I spoiled it. Well, you could guess that easily anyway, just from the description given. It was trying to be serious, I think, but it was just stupid. Bad Reputation was just as bad, but a lot funnier. I don't know how serious the creators of Bad Reputation were trying to be, but they ended up making what is pretty much a parody of hte genre. There are so many cliches everywhere. Basically, it is Carrie, except that she was raped instead of having blood dropped on her, and she doesn't develop telekinetic abilities, instead relying on other methods. The main antagonist is some football star and he has his friends and they all have girlfriends and are the "cool people" where the protagonist is nerdy, but obviously hot. Without giving too much away (why would you care anyway), the death scenes are hilarious. One aspect that is great is the sounds. It sounds like 20 tomatoes are being squished when she stabs someone. Yes, apparently, stabbing makes a squishy noise. A really corny one. Speaking of corn, red corn syrup looked horrendously fake in the second murder. Really bad. Oh, and don't get me started on obliviousness. A word of advice: When you are at a party, and somebody is dropping little while pills in everybody's drink, don't drink. I still don't know, though, whether or not it was supposed to be a parody of the genre or just ended up being one.

Anyway, my point is that I think that horror/suspense movies are meant for people who want to be scared or shocked, not people who laugh out loud (LOL) every time somebody dies. Am I wrong, though? I honestly don't know many people who like the suspense genre, so I can't say what the target audience is. Is it for people who genuinely like the movies or is it actually for people like me who think the movies are silly and laugh at them?