One last update before I head out

While my vacation officially started Tuesday morning at 8:30 a.m., the main reason for it won’t start until Friday afternoon when my wife and I set out on our way for Key West. Her good friend Jen is to be married on Saturday, which also happens to be my birthday, so we are celebrating it as kind of a combination event. Don't know exactly all we have planned for the trip other than fighting to stay cool, but all in all I think it will be an enjoyable three and a half days. I will be coming back very early Tuesday, so you can expect to see the next Metahuman Press stories (at least mostly) on time on Wednesday.

The last few site updates are also done before I leave: you can check out a new chapter of Century as well as the beginning of Book II of Comic Book Hero at the main site. In addition, my final profile for Mean Streets is now up. When I return I plan on getting the free-form blog story going, and FYI, the five posted profiles so far are the characters featured most prominently in our first chapter. More on that later.

And hey, after just looking at this weekend’s forecast it looks like I may be spending most of my Florida vacation inside: highs in the mid to upper 90's, lows in the 80's, and storms all weekend. Maybe I will be going to see The Simpsons Movie while I’m there.

Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows

I finished this one up last night at work. I will try not to give anything away, but I will say it’s a great read. J.K. does a great job of making up for missteps she took in the overly dull last volume. Although it drags a little bit around pages 100-250 or so, Deathly Hallows really works as a near perfect denouement to the franchise. Lots of character deaths, good and bad, many tragic, fill the pages, and pretty much every question about character motivations are answered. Ms. Rowling also does a beatiful job of tying the sub-titled subject matter of every other book in to this one.

That being said, DO NOT read this book if you have not read the other 6 books, as I would think much of it may prove heavily confusing. This book was written solely for the fans who have read volumes 1 through 6 (which is pretty much 75% of the world's regular readers at least) and it shows from the very beginning, as wizards shout out spells without J.K. ever stopping to explain them. It’s a minor nitpick at best, as really, I hope not too many individuals are silly enough to start a book franchise with Volume 7.

Anyway now I’m all Pottered up, I will have to go out and see Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix, a film which my wife really liked even though the critics did not. That being said, movie critics actually liked the Prisoner of Azkaban, which I cannot believe any self-respecting Potter reader could actually like. Such a butchery, but I digress.

If you are one of the people who haven’t read it yet, go pick up your copy of today. (And hey, look! I even provided you a link to it at Amazon, in case you want to support MetahumanPress.com while you are picking up your copy.)

Weekend to Myself

I am enjoying a weekend to myself as my wife and daughter are in Indianapolis for a family get together. I had to work so I got to stay home. I am not really going to complain though, as I think it’s good to spend some time away from the family once in a while.

I have been playing EWR (Extreme Warfare Revenge) for the last few days. Great old school wrestling simulator. Now that I have a computer that can handle it, I am also thinking about picking up a copy of the professional version Total Extreme Wrestling at some point in the near future. In case anyone cares, I am playing as the new NWA and I am over a year in, with Matt Hardy as World Champion, Sonny Siaki as Mid-Atlantic champ, Sabu & Steve Corino as Tag Champions, Arik Cannon as NWA Anarchy champ, and Ms. Chif as Women's World champion. Good stuff. Anyone interested in a download of EWR (it’s free) should go to EW Battleground.

Finally saw Live Free or Die Hard today. It amuses me that the over the top action film we all hated 10 or 12 years back is now on its way back with what is just a really fun film. And John McClain may be one of the best super-heroes in the market today. Check this film out if you like actioners.

And I’m about half way through Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows thanks to the owners of my job. URrelay has its own copy of the book and working nights I don’t have much competition getting it done. More later.

11 Days and Counting

Exactly 11 days remain to my next birthday and my wife and I going to Florida on vacation. Looking forward to it, but its means an unfortunately busy week between now and then.

Mean Streets has updated again with another pre-character back story. I am having tons of fun concocting full back stories for these characters, but with Jack Flash I had to do the first editing history, as I didn’t want to give away all his secrets right away.

I will have at least one or 2 more character profiles before Mean Streets, the story, starts up at the end of the month, post-vacation.

Still haven’t gotten to Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix but my wife gave it a startlingly good review considering her dislike for the previous films. Lord knows it can’t suck as bad as Prisoner of Azkaban did. I still can’t believe that people still like that pile of stank, diarrhetic donkey poo.

After Potter only two must sees remain for me in this busy summer: the I have watched the show for 19 years and should really know what happens already Simpsons Movie and the movie I have waited for years to see come to fruition (and with one of my favorite actresses Claire Danes in it!): Neil Gaiman’s Stardust.

New Grendel is coming to comics very soon and to make things even better, Matt Wagner has just been announced as Dynamite’s new Zorro book. I am a HUGE Zorro fan, and Wagner is the perfect choice to help resuscitate the character for modern readers (especially since he can use Isabel Allende’s excellent novel from a year or two back as its basis).

Enough rambling for today. More late I’m sure.

Ho Hum

It’s been a slow couple days off here in Cedar Rapidia, which has give me some time to catch up on all the novels and graphic novels I have had sitting around the house. Unfortunately, not many of them have been very good. With the exception of Bill Willingham’s always excellent Fables most have been rather dull.

So anyway out there have a good sci-fi/fantasy/graphic novel that an avid reader like myself might not have read. Hit me up with a few suggestions, won’t you?

Site update and whatnots

Uneventful weekend. Worked, spent a little time with family, played some evil, evil Sims 2. That’s about it. I am working on wrapping up the first story arc on Freedom Patton after over two years of working on it. My plan is to do a shorter 4 or 5 parter after that and then move on to the next big storyline.

The Mean Streets page is up and running. I will be throwing some profiles up for the next month or so with my plan being to start publishing the first few bits of story beginning in August. This will be a way more free form experiment than the rest of MP, but I am excited to see how it turns out.

I am in the beginning stages of putting together a print anthology of the first 18 or so months of Metahuman Press. More on that as I get closer to bringing it to fruition.

That’s about it. Any questions?

100 times better than Armageddon

I saw Transformers on Tuesday. Proved to be a really solid flick. Not exactly the classic characters, but close enough to make a really engaging story. I honestly don’t understand the people unwilling to give it a chance at all based on its differences from the 80’s show, as Hasbro has never been shy about restructuring their characters over and over and over again.

It has flaws: a few two many one-lines, a little too much product placement, John Turturro just going too over the top. Oh, and Optimus Prime, voiced by the great Peter Cullen, should never, ever say “My bad”. But the action was great, the Transformers were well voiced, the effects were spot on, and Shia LeBeuof makes a great Whitwicky.

And I was happy to see that a lot of parents were apparently able to figure out from the previews this ain’t a flick for the really young ones. I didn’t see anyone under maybe 9 in the theatre.

Oh, and everyone should worry less about Bumblebee being a Camaro and try to figure out why he’s kind of a dick. Anyway, I recommend it. Probably the best actioner I have seen this summer (so far, still have to get to Live Free or Die Hard), so get out and check it out (oh, and you can see where this blog’s title originated).