This Week in Buffy History: June 28-July 4

June 28

1979 - Felicia Day born (played Vi in Season 7 of Buffy)

June 30

1965 - Saverio Guerra born (played Willy the Snitch on Buffy)

July 1

1971 - Steven W. Bailey born (played Cave Demon in Season 6 of Buffy)

2009 - Season 8, Issue 26, "Retreat, Pt. 1", released by Dark Horse Comics

July 2

2008 - Season 8, Issue 16, "Time of Your Life, Pt. 1", released by Dark Horse Comics

Jersey Monday: Eddie George

A couple of years ago, I had a month on Facebook where I changed my profile picture to jersey numbers from my collection to match the day of the month. There were a couple numbers for which I didn't have a jersey -- 25 and 29 immediately come to mind -- and there were a few more between 1 and 31 for which I only had one jersey to represent that day.

Well, if I was still doing that, then today's jersey on Facebook would have been Eddie George, as he's the only No. 27 in my collection.

I got this George jersey when I was in college, and at the time the Titans were one of the last remaining teams for which I didn't have a jersey (pre-Houston Texans, that is). This particular model is a replica from Puma, the German sneaker company that became an official on-field supplier of NFL jerseys and equipment for about a 3-year period beginning in 1999. What was interesting about the Puma replicas is that they almost all used that same weird NOB font, despite it not matching any of the teams for which they supplied jerseys or anything "standard" to any other team.

As you can probably see in the picture, this jersey also has a really low nameplate, because, if I'm not mistaken, this was the first year they were actually the Titans, and thus it was the first year this jersey style was made. Puma hadn't quite figured out where to place the nameplate, with the color separation on the shoulder and back. From what I can tell, this is still something of a problem with Titans jerseys, though the two-tone color doesn't drop quite as low on the back anymore, and the nameplates on current jerseys are placed as close to the split as possible.

Also, now the Titans use the reverse of this color split as their primary home jersey, with this style being relegated to an alternate. I honestly prefer this one, and I'm not just saying that because I own it.

Jersey Monday will continue every Monday until I run out of jerseys to spotlight. And since I’ve got more than 150 of them, that could be awhile.

Charmed Comic Review, Issue #11: Last Witch Effort

RECAP

The issue opens in the attic with Phoebe still calling out for Paige. In the interim between issues 10 and 11, Sam (Paige's whitelighter father) has arrived, but hasn't been able to help call Paige. Coop reassures Phoebe that he'll be able to help, at least by calling the other whitelighters. Phoebe feels like she's alone, and Coop reminds her she's not. Henry and Sam look over Paige's body, while Kyle and Paige discuss how to get her spirit back into her body.

Kyle tells Paige the other Elders have moved on to someplace in between (like Paige) but they still have their physical bodies. If Paige were to go into the light without hers, Kyle isn't sure what would happen. Paige asks if Piper is there and Kyle says she's someplace else.

In that someplace else, Piper wakes up, with Cole holding the apple again. Apparently the magic that will return Piper home won't work until she trusts Cole, and she won't trust Cole until she's sure the magic will work, resulting in a paradox.

Back "Up There", Neena is still working her magic on the orbs, in an attempt to break the barriers between the upper regions and the underworld to unite them. Leo protests that it will devastate the Earth, but Neena doesn't care. Leo says Neena will be destroyed along with everything else, but she explains that the unification will open a portal that will allow her to reclaim her place with her mate in the Higher Realm. She adds that she's doing this because she's tired of "fate" dictating everything, and she doesn't want to play by the rules anymore. She compresses the two balls while reciting "Iungo Iunxi Iunctum" (Latin for "join unite mate") and her eyes go all glowy.

In a two-page spread, we see the immediate aftermath, in which the underworld begins to pierce the upper realm, the realm where Piper and Cole are begins to split and Paige says "this can't be good". A massive storm breaks out on Earth, just as Victor arrives at the manor.

Henry answers the door and shows Victor the living room, where they have all the kids sleeping. Victor asks about Piper and Paige, and when Henry says they're no update, Victor says everything will be alright. Henry expresses his doubt, and Victor recognizes that he's doubting more than just their current fates. Victor explains the challenges they face being mortals married to a witch and what their role is in the whole thing. His inspirational words cheer Henry up, and he returns to the attic, but before he does, Victor notices that there's one extra child in the room (the orbed child from Issue #8). He asks who it is, and Henry responds "Henry Junior".

Back in the attic, Phoebe notes that it's getting worse outside, and wherever Paige is, she can't hear Phoebe -- and "hearing" is something only whitelighters can do. Henry says that with the Power of Three, they should be able to communicate. Phoebe says it doesn't work that way, but it did giver her an idea. She calls upon the Power of One to telepathically communicate with Piper and Paige. It works -- Cole tells Piper to tell Phoebe "hi" (she doesn't) and Kyle tells Paige that it'll work better if she just thinks her words, rather than saying them. They fill each other in on what's going on and wonder what's happening "Up There", where Leo still is.

Back up there, things are breaking down, as the universe comes apart at its seams. Leo tries to appeal to Rennek logically, but Rennek doesn't care. Neena insists that this is the right thing to do, giving total control to free will with no more grand design. Leo says the new Elders were changing, doing things better, but Neena believes they would have made the same mistakes as the other ones, and now her children will have a chance to live freely. Leo thinks Neena is just imposing her will, her rules, and Neena says she's earned that right. She just has one more little thing to do.

Piper, Paige and Phoebe are still communicating telepathically and they've come up with a plan no one really likes, but it's their only shot. Piper finally agrees to take a leap of faith and takes the apple from Cole, bites it, and comes through a portal into the attic. Henry asks where Paige is, and Kyle leads Paige into the light, where she arrives in an alternate attic, and Kyle tells her she's moved on. Patty and Grams arrive to say it's not permanent. Paige asks if she'll finally get to meet Prue, but the answer is not yet. However, Patty and Grams do have plenty of firepower lined up, and they reveal it on the final splash page: pretty much the entire line of Warren Witches (again... aside from Prue).

REVIEW

Happy Birthday Joss Whedon: The 47 Best Characters from the "Joss-verse"

One of two items I own signed by Joss

Joss Whedon, our master, turns 47 years old today. In honor of that occasion, I wanted to do something special to celebrate the impact he's had on our lives, something that spanned all of his creations, and something that tied into the number 47 (because I'm secretly J.J. Abrams and obsessed with the number 47).

So, after much debate between myself and... myself, I guess... I decided to rank the top 47 characters from Joss Whedon's creations, based entirely on my opinion. No fancy formulas based on appearances, screentime, quotability, etc. Just throw some names on a list and put them in an order I like. I figured it'd be fun and kinda easy.

I was wrong.

First of all, there are a LOT of characters, between "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", "Angel", "Firefly", "Serenity", "Dollhouse" and "Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog". Some of them made dozens of appearances. Some made just one, but a memorable one. Some characters crossed over into multiple series (mostly between "Buffy" and "Angel") and some actors played multiple distinct characters. Every time I put a name of the list, I agonized over it. "That seems too low for that character... he/she was AWESOME" or "How can I rank X above Y? They're both amazing".

By the end of the entire exercise, I hated both myself and the list. I keep making changes to it, hoping I'll like it, but I realize that's impossible, because in a way it's like ranking a very large group of my children. Each of Joss's characters has meant so much to the fan base as a whole that it's impossible to say that any one is MORE important than any other one.

But, I can't let all this work go to waste, so here's the list anyway, with my best explanation for why I put the character in that spot.

HONORABLE MENTION: Kitty Pryde from "Astonishing X-Men". Technically not a "Joss" character, since she's existed in the comics since 1982, but Joss put his own spin on her, and really made her his own. Also, apologies to the MANY characters who missed the cut, including Warren Mears, Andrew Wells, The Master, Allen Doyle, Daniel Holtz, Marcus Hamilton, Mellie/November, Bennett Halverson and Penny. God, I really hate this list. But I'd hate it even more if I replaced any of the 47 characters with any of the ones I just mentioned.

47. Dawn Summers (from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer")
OK, maybe I could take ANY of those names in the honorable mention and put them here in place of Dawn, and it wouldn't have affected my feelings about the list. I've written about my feelings on Dawn before and how they differ from the overall fanbase's, and while most "Buffy" fans would have her WAY lower on this list, I personally think she should be higher. So this is a compromise.

46. Alpha (from "Dollhouse")
I can't decide if Alpha is this low because he wasn't in many episodes, or if that's the reason he's on the list at all. He almost seems like a character that was better in concept than in execution, though Alan Tudyk was brilliant playing the role.

45. Jenny Calendar (from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer")
I don't think Jenny made the cut for like my first three drafts of this list. But the role her death played in Season 2 of "Buffy" (then again, in a way, in Season 8) was too big to ignore.

44. Joyce Summers (from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer")
Considering she was the only parent of a major character on "Buffy" with anything more than a token role, you'd think she'd be higher. She probably should be, but again... SO MANY GOOD CHARACTERS.

43. Oz (from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer"
He never really had much to say, but he had a way of saying everything without saying a word.

42. Dr. Saunders (from "Dollhouse")
The reveal that Dr. Saunders was actually a doll, with a personality created by Topher, was played so well by Amy Acker that it elevates the character above many of the others who were also revealed to be dolls (like Mellie or Senator Perrin).

41. Amy Madison (from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer")
Weirdly, Amy wasn't in nearly as many episodes as you'd think. But she managed to be effective enough that they kept bringing her back, before making her a major player in Season 8.

40. The Operative (from "Serenity")
We never even learn this guy's real name, but damn if he doesn't make the movie. In many ways, he's a mirror image of Mal, except that his beliefs aren't really his own. They're just the beliefs he's employed to have, which is, in the end, what makes Mal stronger.

Desktop Girl of the Week: Lucy Punch

Later this week, the movie "Bad Teacher" opens in theaters, and most of the marketing for the movie has centered around the hotness of star Cameron Diaz (as well as one line in particular from Jason Segel), but I don't even think Diaz is the hottest female actress in the movie. No, that honor instead goes to English actress, and this week's DGOW selection, Lucy Punch.

Punch isn't a huge name in Hollywood, but she's made her mark in recent years, starring in the Woody Allen movie "You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger" and playing the scene-stealing Darla alongside Paul Rudd and Steve Carell in "Dinner for Schmucks". Going back a few years, she was in the short-lived CBS sitcom "The Class", which given the strength of its quirky cast (Lizzy Caplan, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Andrea Anders, Jason Ritter) probably should have lasted longer than 19 episodes.

Of course, if it had, then we might not be getting Punch in "Powers", the upcoming pilot and hopefully series from FX. Given the show's strong source material (the original comic was written by Brian Michael Bendis), hopefully it won't fail like so many "next 'Heroes'" shows have, and it could even launch Punch to the next level of stardom.

• Lucy Punch on IMDB
• "Bad Teacher" Official Site
• "Powers" News

As always with DGOW, I’ll provide a widescreen (1680x1050) image for downloading. If you want to see past DGOW, then just check the archive album.

Ultimate Spider-Man #160 Review

As I've been reading the lead up to Ultimate Spider-Man #160, I've tried to avoid spoilers as much as possible. I've also tried -- and this has been much harder -- to ignore the cynical voice in my head. You know, the one that says "it doesn't matter how this issue ends, everything will be back to normal in a year anyway" or "even if they kill Spider-Man, they're gonna bring him back."

The cynical voice does have a point. Comic book deaths are rarely what they seem to be, particularly in a series in which we saw Gwen Stacy killed, then magically resurrected as a remainder of the Carnage symbiote (yes, this is a thing that happened.). And major events like this are usually created to drive sales, which works until the point it stops, at which point another major event (which in this case would be "RETURN OF SPIDER-MAN" in 2012) is created.

But like I said, I've been trying to ignore all that, and just enjoy these issues for what they are, which are incredibly well-written, well-drawn stories that bring the tale of "Ultimate Spider-Man" to a natural conclusion.

Despite the "Ultimate" tag, this version of Spider-Man has always seemed a little more down to earth than the one in Amazing. After 11 years of the book's existence, this Peter Parker is still a teenager, still has everyday teenage problems, and still frequently makes mistakes. He's not this avenging, fantastic world-changing superhero. He's just a kid who got some powers, and tries to do the right thing with them, frequently to the chagrin of the more professional superheros of the Ultimate universe. And, realistically (though that word doesn't often apply to the world of comics), a situation like that is going to end up in death more often than not. So on some level, a level that ignores the cynical business implications in the real world, it makes sense to kill Spider-Man.

Still, as I was reading USM #160, there was a part of me that couldn't believe they would do it. This is a testament to Brian Michael Bendis's writing, because each page of this book is incredibly engaging and powerful, despite a lack of dialogue and an increased focus on action. Every page in the book is an "edge of your seat" moment, as you wonder, "will this be it for Spider-Man."

And then, eventually, that moment comes. The word gets tossed around so much these days that it's really lost all meaning, but the battle between Parker and Osborn in this issue is in fact "epic" and Bagley's art brings it to life. Then, if the aftermath of Parker's final moments, he does an outstanding job bringing life to the emotion everyone's feeling. I particularly loved the panel of a teary-eyed MJ in the upper right of page 23, not to mention the Peter-MJ kiss before that on page 18.

I think the only thing that bothered me about the issue, aside from its existence at all, was the way they chose to end it with the final page. Rather than going with the powerful image of MJ holding Peter's lifeless body with tears running down her face as May collapsed into Gwen's arms in the background (the panel at the bottom of the SECOND-to-last page), the last page features the presumed dead body of the Green Goblin, with a final smirk appearing on his face. It's an extra kick in the ass on top of what's already been a real downer of an issue.

Putting aside all the hype (multiple polybagged variants) and cynicsm, this issue is flat-out good, and really this entire series has been. Only time will tell how this issue is ultimately judged (no pun intended), but my immediate reaction is that if it was Peter Parker's time, then this was an amazing way for him to go out (pun fully intended).

This Week in Buffy History: June 21-27

June 23
1964 - Joss Whedon born (creator of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”)

June 27
1974 - Christian Kane born (played Lindsey McDonald on Angel)

Jersey Monday: Ichiro

We've officially entered what I consider to be the dark times in sports. There's no football, no basketball, not even any hockey. It's just baseball. The endless daily grind of baseball, which doesn't even hit the pennant drive until September.

Compounding the situation is the fact that we don't know when the NFL or NBA will even return. The NFL is officially locked out and we've reached the point that the owners can't even negotiate with the players, because the can't agree among themselves. The NBA isn't locked out yet, but that's a mere formality, as they seem further apart than the NFL.

So until we get some news on either of those fronts, it's time to go through some of the baseball jerseys I haven't spotlighted yet on Jersey Monday. One of these is my Ichiro jersey, which my parents picked up for me on one of their many trips to Seattle. It's hard to believe that Ichiro's been in the league for 11 seasons now, considering I can remember the hype from when he first came over.

At this point, Ichiro is 37 years old and needs 674 hits to reach 3,000 as an MLB player (he's already well past 3,000 when you add in his work from Japan). I wouldn't put it past him to get there, though his batting average is showing signs of dipping this season. Does he have 3 more good years in him left after this one? Maybe.

Of course, whether he gets there or not, this jersey will probably stay in the retired box. I just so rarely wear baseball jerseys anymore, and a BP fashion jersey like this isn't high on my rotation.

Jersey Monday will continue every Monday until I run out of jerseys to spotlight. And since I’ve got more than 150 of them, that could be awhile.

Complete Comic Book Movie Rankings

During my weekly visit to my local comic book shop this past Wednesday, the conversation turned to "X-Men: First Class" and its place among the Marvel comics movies. I mentioned that I'd created a formula to rank all of them, and that according to the formula, it was 4th, though personally I might have it a little lower.

The question was then raised if I could use the same spreadsheet to rank the DC comics movies, and I didn't see why not. From there, I realized if I was going to go through all the work of ranking the comic book movies from Marvel and DC, then why not just do all of them.

So, using the lists of comic book movies from Box Office Mojo and Wikipedia as a starting point, I identified 91 movies that fit my criteria -- prior to this weekend's release of "Green Lantern". The two basic requirements were that the movie had to be based on a comic book or graphic novel, not a comic strip, and that it had to be released in theaters in the United States and have trackable box office data. If there's a movie you think should be included on the list but isn't, please let me know. (Just to cut off any questions on it in advance, I know the concept of "Alien vs Predator" was a comic book before it was a movie, but I'm counting that, and its sequel, as a movie based on two separate movie franchises. The idea didn't originate with the comic.)

Once the movies were identified, each one was ranked 1 through 91 and assigned an inverse number of points in each of five categories.

1. Domestic box office gross
As I mentioned when I first did the post ranking the Marvel movies, this isn't the most refined way of doing it, but it's a simple question: how much money did your movie make at the box office? These numbers are NOT adjusted for inflation, mostly because I don't have a Box Office Mojo account, nor do I want to keep adjusting these numbers annually.

2. Net profit/loss expressed as a percentage of budget
So lets say you have a comic book movie that makes about $240 million at the box office. Is that good? Well, if you're "X-Men: The Last Stand", and your movie cost $210 million to make, it's a profit, but a slim one. If you're "Batman", and your movie cost $35 million to make, it's a huge success. That's what this is measuring. Theoretically, there's no maximum to this (though the highest number among the 91 is 901%), and the lowest possible number would be -100%, for a movie that cost anything, and made nothing at the box office. The closest to that is actually -94.07%, from a movie that cost an estimated $20M to make, and barely cracked $1M at the box office.

Review: "Green Lantern" starring Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively

I've never been a reader of the Green Lantern comics, but whenever I've had someone try and explain them to me, they've always prefaced the tale with the phrase "it's really complicated." That has always made me doubt whether Green Lantern could be successfully translated to a single cohesive movie, and after seeing "Green Lantern" I feel like those doubts were well-founded. While the movie has moments where it is incredibly enjoyable, more often than not it leaves the viewer confused, thanks to a muddled plot that never quite seems to come together entirely.

The movie, as best it can be summarized, is the origin story of how Hal Jordan became a Green Lantern -- which is a "corps" of heros defending the 3,600 sectors of the galaxy using the green energy of willpower. Hal, a cocky test pilot who followed in his father's footsteps despite witnessing the accident that killed him, is chosen by the ring of a dying Green Lantern, who just happened to be the most powerful of all of them. That Lantern -- Abin Sur -- once defeated Parallax, the greatest enemy of the Lantern, a creature powered by the yellow energy of fear, and it's up to Hal to stop it.

That is drastically oversimplifying the overall plot of the movie, which is a huge contributing factor to why it doesn't work. More often than not, plot developments seem to happen because they're supposed to in the Green Lantern universe, rather than as a natural consequence of characters' actions. On top of the Parallax story, or parallel to it as it were, there's a complicated mess of story with Hector Hammond, apparently taken from the pages of "Secret Origin", that just falls short of making sense, before coming to an utterly unsatisfying conclusion.

Part of the problem is Ryan Reynolds, who plays the confident side of Hal Jordan fine, but never quite seems to capture that bit of doubt they're going for with the character. The scenes in which he's expressing self doubt or coming close to succumbing to fear are supposed to humanize the character, but more often than not they drag the movie down. Not helping the situation is Blake Lively, who jumps wildly from self-confident empowered woman to wide-eyed damsel to wet blanket to supportive with really no explanation. The fault for that lies as much with the writing as it does with Lively, but its really on the latter to turn Carol Ferris into a living, breathing character, rather than a plot device to serve whatever role is needed at the time.

However, as I said earlier, the movie isn't a total loss. When focusing on the Green Lantern mythology itself -- particularly in the scenes on Oa -- it really shines. The scenes between Hal and Sinestro are probably the strongest in the movie, and I wish they'd spent more time on that, since the friendship and eventual conflict between the two characters is central to the comic.

Visually, "Green Lantern" is one of the more engaging comic book movies I've seen in awhile, though it doesn't really take off from that perspective until Hal visits Oa for the first time. I saw the movie in 2D, and given that it's just a 3D conversion, I'd recommend saving yourself the money, particularly because the darkening effect of 3D would really put a damper on some of the movie's brighter moments.

I'm sure there will be some people who will thoroughly enjoy this movie from start to finish, just as I'm sure there will be some who'll detest it. I think the majority of viewers will come to the conclusion that while it could have been much worse, it probably could have been much better too.

"Green Lantern" is rated PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action. Runs 105 minutes. Starring Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively, Peter Sarsgaard and Mark Strong. "Green Lantern" opens nationwide on June 17.

Desktop Girl of the Week: Erika Christensen

Flash back to last Thursday. It was the night of Game 5 of the NBA Finals, and I had reached LeBron-hate overload. I couldn't stand to watch the game straight through -- out of frustration with LeBron's performance and the fact that I'd resigned myself to the Heat losing that game, if not the series outright (which they eventually did). I was looking for any distraction at all, so I just started flipping through my channels.

About three months ago, I upgraded my service package with U-Verse, ironically enough because they finally added NBA TV but only made it available on the U-300 or higher packages (oh, and I swear this is all coming to a point). When I upgraded to U-300, I was given access to Showtime, Starz and all the various families of channels that come with those networks. I hadn't used them much, if at all, but last Thursday I found myself in the 1800 range on my U-Verse receiver, and stumbled upon a little-known movie from 2007 called "How to Rob a Bank."

I landed on the movie about halfway through, so the narrative was a bit confusing, but what wasn't confusing was just how smoking hot Erika Christensen was (I told you I was getting to it). Seriously, I've seen her in a lot of things, and I always thought she was good looking, but I don't remember her ever looking quite as hot as she did in that movie. So I kept watching, despite the confusion and Nick Stahl's bad acting, and it she successfully took my mind off the Heat for about an hour or so.

Christensen popped on and off my radar for the first few years of her career, but the first thing of hers that really sticks in my mind is "Swimfan", which wasn't a particularly good movie, but damn if she didn't look amazing in it. She currently stars in the TV series "Parenthood", which I've never seen, but it's among my top five series for consideration for a summer catch-up, and given that it's also got Peter Krause, Lauren Graham and Craig T. Nelson, it probably should make my schedule next year. Because really, more Erika Christensen in my life cannot be a bad thing.

• Erika Christensen on IMDB
• Follow Erika Christensen on Twitter
• "Parenthood" Official Site

As always with DGOW, I’ll provide a widescreen (1680x1050) image for downloading. If you want to see past DGOW, then just check the archive album.

This Week in Buffy History: June 14-20

June 16
1976 - Tom Lenk born (played Andrew Wells on Buffy)

Jersey Monday: Hartford Whalers

The NBA Finals are over but the Stanley Cup Final is still going on, which means I might as well shift from showing off NBA jerseys to NHL ones.

This is a Hartford Whalers jersey that I picked up after the team had already moved to Carolina, but it's easily my favorite of my hockey jerseys. And because of the Whalers-Bruins rivalry that was huge in this area when I was growing up, I cannot in good conscience root for Boston in tonight's game, or in a potential Game 7 should it come to that.

I also still hold out hope that the Whalers will one day return to Hartford, a prospect that actually seems more likely now that Winnipeg has its team back (though not the same one, obviously). So maybe one day I'll get to wear this jersey at a real Whalers home game again.

Jersey Monday will continue every Monday until I run out of jerseys to spotlight. And since I’ve got more than 150 of them, that could be awhile.

Review: "X-Men: First Class" (with updated Marvel movie rankings)

Going into "X-Men: First Class", my expectations could not have been lower. It wasn't as if I was expecting a disappointing movie, or a movie that was bad by X-Men standards. No, I was expecting a flat-out BAD movie, and when the initial reviews came in positive, I actually lowered my expectations further, thinking I wouldn't like what the critics had liked.

So color me surprised that "X-Men: First Class" was a good movie. Not just "better than expected" or "not disappointing", but legitimately good.

The title -- and the teaser poster shown to the left -- is somewhat misleading, because this movie doesn't head to Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters until the very last moments. Its instead something of an origin story for "X-Men", if not for the individual characters. The two characters who are most hashed out from an "origin" perspective are Xavier and Magneto, who carry the movie.

Things start off a little slow, with Xavier and Mystique's early years coinciding with Magneto's training at the hands of the Nazis followed by his one-man revenge tour. Things start to pick up once Xavier and Mystique join forces with the CIA to stop the Hellfire Club, a group of mutants helmed by the same man -- Sebastian Shaw -- who'd killed Magneto's mother in front of him earlier in the movie. That bit of coincidence leads to Xavier and Magneto teaming up, complete with a fun "putting the team together" montage, and from that point forward, the movie really shines, balancing big action setpieces with more subtle character development.

There are plenty of times where the comic book fan in you (or in me) is going to see something happen in the movie and say "that's not how it's supposed to happen" or "that doesn't match up with the first X-Men movies", but those moments are relatively minor in comparison with the moments that make you say "wow, that was awesome."

Most of the awesomeness comes from James McAvoy (Xavier) and Michael Fassbender (Magneto), who really bring their characters to life. McAvoy's Xavier is different from any we've seen before on screen, but over the course of the movie you can see how he grows into the Professor X we now know. Fassbender does a much better job channeling his predecessor in his role, though to be fair, his character motivations are much more well defined from the beginning. There are moments where you can see the character trying to embrace what little good is left in him, but he always acknowledges what his real mission -- first killing Shaw, then establishing mutant superiority -- really is.

Charmed Comic Review, Issue #10: Three Little Wiccans

RECAP


The issue opens "Up There", where Paige and Leo -- disguised as demons -- have infiltrated Neena's horde and are discussing their next move. Neena stands by the gate and tells the group there  are two options: she can either have them all waste a lot of energy trying to open the door or they can have Paige and Leo do it for them. Neena tells the two that she can see through the glamour and that she likes to change things up herself once in awhile. She reveals their true forms to the rest of the demons.

Cutting back to the attic, Phoebe admits to Coop that she hated this plan from the beginning, and that she should have gone with Paige and Leo. Coop reassures her that she had to stay behind in case anything went wrong, but Phoebe just wants to know where Piper is.

Piper is still in the created world with Cole, who offers her an apple to leave and return to her plane. Piper is doubtful of Cole's intentions, but Cole reminds her of the time he reunited her with Leo and saved her life after the Thorn Demon attack (in "The Seven Year Witch"), but Piper remains suspicious. Cole explains that they can't just pop back into the manor like they did last time, because they aren't in limbo, and that the apple is the escape route -- though technically the apple is just an illusion. Piper thinks this is just another play by Cole to get back with Phoebe, but he says he's just here to help. Piper asks if Cole is working with Neena, and he responds "We don't really travel in the same circles." Piper points out the vagueness of Cole's answer, but he insists he's still her only shot of getting out of there.

Back Up There, Neena tries to force Paige to help her by having Rennek hold Leo at crossbow-point. Leo tells Paige just not to let Neena into the vault. Paige isn't even sure the door will open for her, since she's only part-Whitelighter, but Neena ups her threat, saying she'd go after Paige's family. Leo thinks Neena wouldn't hurt any of her descendants, but she says she's already killed a warlock, and witches aren't all that different. Leo says that's not true, and Neena concedes the point, but says that's why she has Rennek. Paige agrees to help.

In the attic, Phoebe's continued to have no luck using magic to find Piper or Neena, when she suddenly realizes she should be looking for Neena's mate. Because Neena's magic cancels out her mate's magic, she wouldn't have been able to contact him in the Higher Realm, but Phoebe thinks she might.

Up There, Paige opens the door, and Neena immediately spots what she's looking for, two glowing balls floating above a pedestal. However, while she's distracted, Leo got the drop on Rennek, taking his crossbow and using it to take out the demons, while Paige uses her orb shield to take out some other ones. Neena blasts the crossbow from Leo's hand and Rennek grabs him again. He tells Paige to orb out. Neena attempts to stop her, but another demon blasts Paige at the same time.

When that happens, a portal opens up in the realm where Piper and Cole are, but it closes before Piper can get to it. That causes her to ask for the apple from Cole.

In the attic, Phoebe is casting her spell, which doesn't seem to work -- but certainly causes a mess in the attic. Paige's body orbs in and though she's breathing and has a heartbeat, Phoebe can't pick up anything from Paige with her empathy power. Henry comes in and sees Paige. Phoebe tries to reassure him that everything will be OK, but he's unconvinced, and takes Paige's seemingly lifeless body from the attic.

Back in the created realm, Cole assures Piper that everything will be fine with the apple. She bites into it and passes out. Cole stands over her body and says "Huh. THAT wasn't supposed to happen."

A suddenly conscious Paige appears in some other realm, where she encounters Kyle. He tells her that she hasn't moved on yet, and tries to tell her something else, but Paige needs a moment to compose herself.

On the final page, Neena manipulates the two glowing balls, which will giver her the magic she needs to "bring together the heavens and the underworld."

REVIEW

Desktop Girl of the Week: Rose Byrne

It's been awhile since I've done a Desktop Girl of the Week post, and that time off allowed me to go on something of an accidental Rose Byrne run. It started a few weeks ago when I finally watched "Get Him to The Greek", a movie I'd ignored when it first came out because I couldn't get past the fact that Jonah Hill was playing a completely different character than the one he'd played in "Forgetting Sarah Marshall", despite the movie being something of a sequel (though obviously focused on different characters).

Then, two weeks ago I went to see "Bridesmaids", which has been something of the sleeper hit of the summer. The movie wasn't quite what I'd expected going in, but it was still very good, and Byrne -- playing Helen, the rival to the main character -- was gorgeous.

The run wrapped up last week when I saw "X-Men: First Class" (and yes, a review is still coming on that, at some point) in which Byrne plays Moira MacTaggert.

Obviously I didn't set out to see a whole bunch of Rose Byrne movies, but I'm not complaining either. Weirdly, I've never really seen her in much, but it's not for trying. I'm pretty sure I've got a handful of her past movies -- "Knowing", "28 Weeks Later", "Sunshine", "Marie Antoinette" and "Wicker Park" just to name a few -- sitting in my Netflix queue, but they just never manage to make it to the top. That will obviously have to change shortly. I'm not sure I'm going to start watching her TV series "Damages", but then again, it could be a good summertime filler.

• Rose Byrne on IMDB
• "X-Men: First Class" Official Site
• "Damages" Official Site

As always with DGOW, I’ll provide a widescreen (1680x1050) image for downloading. If you want to see past DGOW, then just check the archive album.

This Week in Buffy History: June 7-13

June 8
1963 - Anthony Cistaro born (played Scourge Commander in Angel Episode 1.09 “Hero”)

June 10
1975 - Nicole Bilderback born (played Cordette #1 in Episode 3.09 “The Wish”)

Jersey Monday: Troy Aikman

Since my Jersey Monday jinxing of the Mavs in Game 1 worked so well, and I don't have any other Mavericks jerseys to show off, I'll stick with the Dallas theme and share this quintessentially '90s Troy Aikman Cowboys Starter Jersey.

There's actually a pretty cool story behind this incredibly ugly jersey.

I was working at Marshalls at the time, my first real job as a teenager in the mid-'90s and I had just really started getting into the jersey collection thing. At that time, Marshalls would get a lot of "last year's" jerseys, from players who'd changed teams, teams who'd changed jerseys, or, in rare cases, jerseys that the company realized were a bad idea.

This Troy Aikman jersey obviously falls into that latter category. For some reason in the '90s, everyone collectively lost their minds and decided that black jerseys were awesome, even for teams that didn't have black jerseys. That's where this monstrosity came from. It did only cost me $18 (after my employee discount), so I'm not complaining too much.

But that's not the cool story. The day this jersey arrived at the store, it came as part of a shipment of multiple jerseys from this line. We got Aikman and Emmitt from the Cowboys, Steve Young from the 49ers and Brett Favre from the... Cowboys?

Now, this was in the days before the ubiquity of camera phones, so I don't have any visual evidence of this, but included in that shipment was a batch of black Cowboys jerseys -- complete with the blue and gray neck trim and stars on the sleeves -- with green and gold "4"s and the name "Favre" on the back. We had actually received a memo from corporate that morning to pull those jerseys from the shipment and keep them in the back. The next day, we got instructions to send them back. I begged my manager to let me buy one -- or just "have" one, if he didn't want it to go through the sales system -- because it was such a unique item, but he wouldn't allow it. I ended up buying the Aikman jersey instead, which is lame, because it was pretty widely available. Still, $18.

Jersey Monday will continue every Monday until I run out of jerseys to spotlight. And since I’ve got more than 150 of them, that could be awhile.

Heat-Mavs Game 2: My Silver Lining

As sports fans, we have a tendency to put an extreme emphasis on wins and losses. It's understandable, since that's how the teams and players we follow measure their own success, but when you get right down to it, we're not PART of the team. To them, sports is their job, and they need those wins to serve as a reflection of all their hard work. But to the fan, sports are intended to be entertainment, and in theory it should be possible to be successfully entertained whether your team wins or loses.

I may not have been thinking about that as I was walking out of the arean follow the Miami Heat's stunning Game 2 collapse against the Dallas Mavericks -- and though I put the Heat collapse first there, the Mavs really do deserve the bulk of the credit for an amazing comeback -- but the thought hit me as my friend and I were driving back to his house. A lot of how I end up defining my Game 2 experience in the long run will come down to whether or not the Heat rebound to win the series, but the reality of the situation is that I got to see an incredibly entertaining basketball game, and a pretty historic one too, even though in the end the outcome was not what I'd been hoping for.

Now, I'll be honest, when the Heat were up 15, I pretty much mentally booked the win. But I also took note of the clock, realizing there was plenty of time left in the fourth quarter for Dallas to at least make things interesting. When the score got to 88-81, I said to my friend, "if Miami can just get one basket, they can stop this thing." But they never did. The Heat's next field goal came after they'd already given up the lead to Dallas. 24 seconds of game time later, we all shuffled out of the arena, mostly angry, but even at that point in the game, there was part of my brain that said "ya know, that was a pretty awesome game to have seen in person."


It helps that at my core, I'm just a basketball fan, not specifically a Heat fan. When I was a child, I latched on to the Atlanta Hawks, mostly because their colors were cool (kids who don't live in pro sports cities choose their favorite teams for some of the dumbest reasons, and I was no exception). However, when they traded Dominique Wilkins, they were dead to me, and I became an NBA nomad. I loved Jordan during his prime, but I never really felt like a Bulls fan. I latched on to the Knicks in '94, mostly in support of a friend who was a die-hard Knicks fan, I loved Shaq in both his Magic and Laker incarnations, and when LeBron James entered the league, I hitched my fandom to his star.

There were times in his first seven years that I felt like a Cavs fan, but really in my heart, I knew I was a LeBron fan, and the same goes for my connection to the Heat. Do I want Miami to win when I watch them play? Absolutely. But that's simply a byproduct of wanting LeBron to win. However, because of my detachment from team success, I also find myself often just wanting to see good basketball. And, given what had happened to me in the 2007 Finals, I was pretty happy just to see basketball period on Thursday night.

Even with the loss in the game, the trip itself wasn't a total loss. First of all, I got to see great NBA basketball, which is something I can't easily do here in Connecticut, and with the lockout pending, something I may not be able to do anywhere for awhile after this series ends. Secondly, on Friday, David and I went to the Hard Rock Casino and played some blackjack at what turned out to be a really good table. David won his first 8 hands and I won 11 of my first 13. At one point, I was up $375 on my original $100, playing at a $10 table. I ended up walking away up $250, which more than covers my game ticket. So in the ledger of life, I paid $400 to fly to Miami to see an amazing NBA Finals game at no cost to me.

No matter what the scoreboard in American Airlines Arena said, I think that's a win.

A Finals Trip Four Years in the Making

It's interesting that today is the anniversary of the Cavaliers beating the Pistons in Game 6 of the 2007 Eastern Conference Finals, because that's when this quest really began. What quest, you ask. My quest to see LeBron James play in the NBA Finals.

Flash back to 2007. Once the buzzer sounded on Game 6, I started to look into the possibility of flying to Cleveland for a game during the NBA Finals. It just so happened that I had requested the weekend of  June 15-17 off from work, with the original plan being to attend Philadelphia Comic-Con. However, by June, that plan had fallen through, so I had that weekend free, and an opening to attend a scheduled Game 5 in Cleveland. I booked my flight and hotel, ordered a ticket off StubHub and I was all set. There was just one problem:

The 2007 NBA Finals never got to a Game 5.

I ended up going to Cleveland anyway, because my flight was non-refundable and I'd pre-paid for the hotel through a travel site. It wasn't a total waste, as I saw two Indians games, got to see Quicken Loans Arena in person for the first time, and visited the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. But it wasn't the NBA Finals. And I did eventually see LeBron play in Cleveland, but a regular season game in March isn't exactly the NBA Finals.

In a cruel twist of fate, I did get to attend the NBA Finals in both 2008 and 2009. But LeBron did not -- at least not as a participant in the series -- with the Cavaliers losing in heartbreaking fashion to the Celtics in a Game 7 in 2008, then getting upset in 6 games by Orlando in 2009. The Magic series really hurt, because I spent the majority of that postseason being convinced that I was not only going to see LeBron in the Finals, but see him win a title, and in the span of a week, that dream all came crashing down, but I still had to go to the Finals for work purposes.



This season, I wasn't planning on going to the Finals, even if the Heat made it. I spent a week in Miami in March, and that was intended to be my basketball fix for the season. As recently as two weeks ago, I ruled myself out from another trip to the Finals. Too expensive, too inconvenient, I enjoy watching on TV. I told myself all of that.

Really, I think it was all just a way of protecting myself from another 2009-like disappointment. So when the Heat actually clinched a berth in the Finals, my line of thinking changed. LeBron James is in the NBA Finals, presenting another opportunity for me to see him, and if I go down for Games 1 or 2, there's no chance of the series ending before I can see the game.

So, I looked in to it. The flight to Miami was affordable -- more so than the flight to Cleveland was in 2007 -- and I was able to get a ticket through Ticketmaster at face value. I came around to the thinking that I couldn't pass up this opportunity. Which is why in just a few minutes, I'll be getting on a plane and flying to Fort Lauderdale, landing just before 6, then driving to Miami to get in my seat before tipoff at 9pm. Are my seats close? No. Does that matter? Not at all.

Assuming all goes well, I'll have a full report for you on Friday.

Remembering the Shaquille O'Neal Rookie Card Phenomenon

Shaquille O'Neal announced his retirement today after 19 years in the NBA, making me feel really old in the process. Shaq was really the first athlete I can remember following from his college career all the way through the pros, and to see him calling it quits is... well, honestly, it's kind of overdue, but it's still a day I never really thought would come.

There are going to be countless odes to Shaq's basketball career, his larger than life personality, even his music and movies, written today, but I want to take it in a different direction. Shaq turned pro in 1992, when I was in 7th grade, which happened to coincide with the height of my sports card collecting fever. So I, like pretty much every basketball fan like me, was all about snapping up every Shaq rookie card I could get my hands on.

One problem: right after he turned pro, Shaq announced an exclusive trading card contract with Classic, which meant that until 1993, no other company would be allowed to produce a Shaquille O'Neal card.

Now, I got the Shaq Classic card from both the basketball set and the four-sport set (and I think I even have both full sets somewhere in my basement), but the card that quickly became the one that everyone wanted to track down was this one from Upper Deck:

As a way of getting around the Shaq restriction, Upper Deck created this redemption card, which stated on the back that it could be traded in for the card of the #1 NBA Draft Pick after January 1st, 1993. Obviously the card came out AFTER the draft, so everyone knew it was a Shaq trade-in, and it was Upper Deck's creative way of getting Shaq into their set. The card you got in return was the triple-exposure one pictured above. Of course, back then, most card collectors wouldn't consider a set of '92-93 Upper Deck to be "complete" unless you had the Shaq card, the trade-in card AND the redeemed trade-in card with the hole punched in it. And yes, at one point I had all three.

Three more quirky Shaq rookie card stories I remember from 1992-93:

- For a brief while, there was a controversy over whether the 1992-93 Terry Catledge Upper Deck card was actually Shaq. People tricked themselves into believing that because of the exclusivity deal, Upper Deck might have slipped it in as an intentional "error". Adding to the speculation was the fact that by 1992-93, Catledge had hair, and the picture on the card was of a bald player. A bald player who didn't really look like Shaq either, but whatever. I think there was an issue of Beckett that finally put the rumor to rest in the letters section, explaining that the picture of Catledge had probably come from the '90-91 season.

- Fleer Ultra made it to market with rookie cards featuring action shots of the players before a lot of the other sets, but also before the Shaq restriction was lifted. However, Shaq was included in the set, via Clarence Weatherspoon's rookie card. The card's value shot up beyond what it otherwise would have been, at least until the real Shaq rookie cards started to come out.

- My last Shaq rookie card story comes from the NBA Hoops set, which released Shaq's rookie card as part of their second series to come out in the '92-93 season (which also included their first rookie cards with action shots for a lot of other players from the 1992 draft). NBA Hoops packs had a weird quirk where they were sequential. That means that when you opened a pack, the same players would follow each other every time, and that order would almost always carry over between packs in the same stack. Well, Shaq's rookie card ALWAYS came right after Marty Conlon's in 1993, and I remember always being infuriated when I opened a pack and Marty Conlon was the last card (somehow I was smart enough to have figured out the pattern of "Conlon then Shaq", but I could never remember who would be FIRST in those packs, which probably would have lessened the blow).

Lastly, this has nothing to do with cards, but I'd be remiss if I did a whole Shaq reminiscing post without dropping in this video, which will always be his all-time greatest highlight to me.