Random Stuff

Originally published April 9, 1993, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1012

Back to bits and pieces—

More people who came in to audition for the two Trancers movies I wrote: Gerard Christopher, who played “Superboy” in the syndicated series (the part he was reading for was the son of the character that Sherman “Lex Luthor” Howard was reading for. Now that would be an interesting casting bit), and Scott Valentine, whose years as Nick on Family Ties did not begin to indicate just what a talented young actor this guy is.

* * *

I sometimes look at people and places and think that they look as if they were drawn, or at least designed, by comic book artists. For example, much of San Francisco (particularly the older buildings) looks like it was drawn by Gene Colan. Bruce Willis—particularly in Die Hard, when he’s running around with a sweated-through undershirt, receding hairline and outthrust jaw—looked to me like he was drawn by Mike Zeck.

So tell me—was it just me, or did anyone else think that Gareb Shamus, the publisher of Wizard who appeared the other day on QVC, looked like he was drawn by Steve Ditko? I kept waiting for Aunt May to try and shove some brownies at him while Uncle Ben stood in the background and scolded her for fussing over the boy.

I also thought it was interesting that—in a show crammed with material from “hot” artists and writers (including Hulk #400 signed by yours truly that was the low-ticket-item, thank you very much), only two things sold out: Spider-Man 2099 #1 signed by the editor, Joey Cavalieri (which I’m sure just thrilled everyone who ever said that readers have no interest in editors), and the signed Doomsday Trading Card. (The Doomsday Trading Card is a really cool item—stick it in your bicycle spokes and it blows your Schwinn to Kingdom Come when you try to ride it.)

* * *

First I get people telling me that I slam Image too much—which, to be honest, I don’t think I do. But then, when I write my convention-riot column and make no mention of Image at all—partly because I couldn’t see everything that was happening and didn’t want to risk false accusations and partly because I didn’t want to distract from what I was saying by having some readers think, “Oh, well, he’s just ragging on Image again”—I get Joe Monks complaining because I wasn’t hard enough on Image.

Talk about dámņëd if you do, dámņëd if you don’t.

I loved his thought that I was trying to suck up to Image, though, in hopes of working for them. Funny how Joe could tell what was happening 10 feet away during two minutes at the convention but is apparently unable to perceive, over the last year, what’s been going on in this column and Oh, So? a mere 10 inches from his face (or however far he holds CBG when he reads it). The suggestion kind of calls into question Joe’s assertions of how observant he is.

* * *

I don’t watch the X-Men animated series, so stop asking me what I think of it.

* * *

During a jaunt in North Carolina with George Perez and Tom Smith to promote Future Imperfect, we found ourselves trying to kill time during lengthy car trips between stores. With Shelton Drumm (our host and chauffeur) at the wheel, our favorite exercise was to react to, and make fun of, various signs.

Shelton bore up under this fairly well until we passed a sign that indicated the name of the next town was “Mocksville.”

We promptly declared that the reason the town was so-named was because it was the most sarcastic town in the Carolinas. The theory was that all the Mocksville residents went around making fun of, and exaggerating, each others’ southern accents. So a typical Mocksville conversation would be:

“Hi. Howse yoo-awwlll doin’?”

“Wee-awwwwlll is doooinn’ fiiiine. Howwrrreeee yoooo-aaaaawwwllll?”

“Waalll hussshhh maahhhh puppies, weeeaaawwwlll izzz juzzzzz fiiiiinneee, tooooo.”

And so on.

And then I declared that the biggest problem anyone can have in Mocksville is when they want to rent a U-Haul. Because the following exchange would invariably occur:

“Hi! Ah’d liiike a U-Haul.”

“Waalll, ain’t thaat nice? We-awwll liiike yoo-awwll, tooo. So what kin we doo fer yoo-awwlll?”

“No, ah’d liikkke a Uuuu-Haull.”

“An’ weee-awwwll juz said, we-aawwlll liiikeee yoooo-awwlll, too—”

Shelton, who’d borne up remarkably well under all the other silliness, was laughing so hard that we almost skidded onto the shoulder of the road.

Ahhh love th’ South. You do signings there and all the kids call you “sir” or “ma’am” (presumably depending on your gender). Complimented on her politeness, one young girl replied, “Southern hospitality, sir.” Asked if she was as polite to her parents, the girl said, “No, sir.” Which made us feel a little better.

* * *

When are toy manufacturers going to wise up and realize there’s an adult market for action figures? They’re coming out with all these animated Batman action figures; do we really need an umpteenth version of the Penguin? Where’s Poison Ivy? Where’s Harley Quinn? Where’s Talia? The Pirates of Dark Water line had every character except the female pirate, voiced by Jodi Benson. The Deanna Troi action figure is impossible to find in the Star Trek line. In the Aliens line, we got Hicks and Apone coming out our ears, but Ripley and the Alien Queen are in short supply.

Apparently the reasoning is that only kids buy action figures; that young boys have no interest in buying “girl” figures and that girls won’t want to bother with action figures at all.

Someone is going to have the brains someday to release a “major comic book babes” action figure line and clean up.

* * *

Does anyone know if Children’s Television Workshop has either released, or has plans to release, a collection of “Monsterpiece Theater” from Sesame Street?

Featuring Cookie Monster as host “Alistair Cookie,” Monsterpiece Theater has grown from its humble beginnings to the point where it now includes an entire opening pan shot (a la Masterpiece Theater) of all the great works this running feature has sent up. I, for one, would love to see collected all in one place such immortal performances as “Me Claudius” (various monsters running around loudly proclaiming “Me Claudius!” “No, Me Claudius!”); “Upstairs Downstairs” (featuring an increasingly exhausted Grover staggering up and down a flight of stairs for no discernable reason); and Mel Gibson starring in “Hamlet” (which wins praise from host Alistair since Hamlet’s status as Prince of Denmark means, “He’s Danish. And me love Danish! Especially prune Danish!”)

Hey—I never said nothing good came out of Sesame Street, now, did I?

* * *

For the first time in my life (and, quite possibly, the last) I was in New Orleans during Mardi Gras. I actually had the nerve (if not lack of sense) to show up at the climax of Mardi Gras, namely Fat Tuesday.

It was, quite literally, a sense of “anything goes,” stopping short of someone actually getting hurt. There was so spilled liquor on the streets (particularly on the aptly named Bourbon Street) that if someone had dropped a match, the entire French Quarter would probably have gone up like a Roman Candle.

The parades were colorful and raucous, with people going by on floats tossing beaded necklaces, cups, and other mementos into the crowd. People were practically killing themselves, and each other, to get their hands on the various items.

Even more remarkable was simply walking around in the French Quarter. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.

Anti-gays-in-the-military people would have had a stroke at the variety of men wearing leather throngs, or dressed in drag, walking around with their hands serenely on each other’s buttocks.

On balconies, women were doing stripteases. On other balconies, people would be waving long necklaces, promising to drop them down to folks in the crowd under condition that pedestrians would “show us what you got.” Some people eagerly complied—women baring their breasts, men dropping their pants. Pavlov would have had enough raw data for a thousand studies. And cops resolutely looked the other way.

At one point a group of senior citizens were laughing uproariously. They look fairly harmless, and I—complete idiot that I am—asked what was going on. A gray haired man said to me, “Well, have you met Millie?” I had not. I was introduced to a woman old enough to be my mother, and she said, “There’s a red dot patrol at the end of the street. You have to be wearing a red dot or they won’t let you past.”

And she slapped a red dot sticker on my crotch—and proceeded to rub it in counterclockwise fashion, assuring me that she wanted to make sure that “it wouldn’t fall off.” (I was unsure which “it” she was referring to). One isn’t expecting this sort of behavior from a woman who most likely drives a car with a bumper sticker reading “Ask Me About My Grandchildren.”

So I squeezed Millie’s breast and said, “Thank you for your concern.” What else could I do? I didn’t want to be rude.

Something tells me that I’m the wrong type for Mardi Gras. I think to fully appreciate it you have to be very young, very old, or very drunk—or some combination thereof.

So probably the next time I go, I’ll be using a walker.

(Peter David, writer of stuff, is going to try and come up with 100 things about Tony Isabella that we don’t want to know and hope he never tells us. Suggestions are welcome. As always (except for that one time that’s now going to cause untold confusion) the address is To Be Continued, Inc., PO Box 239, Bayport, NY 11705.)