Category Archives: Buffy/Angel

On Ebay: Angel DVDs, Tori Amos CDs, and a Star Trek T-Shirt

Posted on May 21, 2009 by Kelson

Star Trek T-ShirtI hope you won’t mind me using this blog for a little self-promotion. We’re selling off some duplicate CDs and DVDs, plus a Star Trek T-shirt from the Paramount panel at Comic-Con International 2007.

  • DVDs: Angel Seasons 1-5 (individual season boxed sets)
  • CDs: Tori Amos “A Piano” boxed set (massive 5-disc archive of hits, rarities, alternate mixes, etc.)
  • T-Shirt: Star Trek (XL) from the new J.J. Abrams movie. Handed out at San Diego Comic-Con in 2007, still has the original 12-25-08 release date on the back. It’s never been worn.

Here’s the link to all the auctions. Most of them run through Sunday, May 24.

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Frostbite Looks Familiar

Posted on September 22, 2008 by Kelson

Looking at the “all ages” shelf in Borders, which seems to be almost entirely made up of novels about vampires and dragons, I noticed that the cover to the Vampire Academy novel Frostbite looked awfully familiar. I walked over to the DVD section of the store and picked up a copy of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 2.

This may be the most recognized image from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and I just could not believe that the cover designer would copy the layout so closely.

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Dawn from BTVS: Irrational Character Hate

Posted on September 1, 2008 by Kelson

This post on 20 things I learned at Dragon*Con reminded me of something Katie and I noticed at Comic-Con. During the screening of the musical Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode, “Once More With Feeling,” it seemed like half the audience would boo Dawn, and would shout out things like, “Shut up, Dawn” when she spoke, or “No!” when she sings, “Does anybody even care?”

Okay, I get that you don’t like the Scrappy… but shouting “Shut up!” when she’s spilling the beans about Willow & Tara’s fight? That sorta implies that you don’t want Tara to find out that Willow has been altering her memories. That’s psychological abuse by any standard. Is it better for Tara to stay in an abusive relationship than for Dawn to be the one to open her eyes?

Or how about when she mentions to Sweet that her sister is the Slayer? That sets the rest of the story in motion — in fact, it sets the rest of the season in motion. Not only does it make it possible for them to “beat the bad guy,” but it sets up that Buffy/Spike relationship, and I’d bet 90% of the people booing Dawn just lurve “Spuffy” to death. (Excuse me while I gag.)

It’s hate for the sake of hating the character, even when she does things you like — or things that are necessary.

Personally? I couldn’t stand her through most of 5th season. I’m not sure what turned me around, but it was during the last episode, “The Gift,” that I decided, y’know, she’s okay. Katie, who has a younger sister, found Dawn to be the best characterization of a younger sister on television…and couldn’t hate her for that reason.

Perhaps it was the realism of that sister relationship, seen through Buffy’s eyes, that made so many viewers dislike her. Well, that and the Scrappy effect.

(20-Things post found via Blog@Newsarama)

Posted in Annoyances, Buffy/Angel, Comic Con 2008 | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Amazonia, Flash and Joss

Posted on November 20, 2005 by Kelson

[Buffy: The Chosen Collection]Yesterday our copy of Buffy The Vampire Slayer: The Chosen Collection—all seven seasons—arrived. (It’s supposedly a limited edition, but I don’t see anything to that effect on our box.) Since we’d been listening to the soundtrack of “Once More With Feeling” on the drive home last night, we immediately put on the episode.

Comic Cavalcade Archives v.1I’ve been slowly working my way through the Comic Cavalcade Archives. I’m determined to read the whole thing, but I have to take it in small doses. Partly the target audience is much younger than me, partly the storytelling (and art) I’m used to is much different, and of course partly it’s a very different time. It was the middle of World War II, and half the stories involved fighting Nazi spies or, in some cases, wreaking havoc in Germany itself. (The Ghost Patrol should have been able to take Hitler out on their own, but they seemed more interested in sabotage and practical jokes.) The original setup for Wonder Woman was that she left Paradise Island to help America defeat the Axis!

The Golden-Age Flash hunt continues. I’m now up to three issues of All-Flash with an issue of Flash Comics on its way. So far I’ve discovered that the Turtle didn’t have a costume the first time he appeared. He was just a guy in a green suit who used slowness against a guy who was used to moving fast. Next up: the original Thorn. I’ve bid on a lot of eBay auctions, expecting to win only a fraction of them. Everywhere else I look online, people are selling collector-grade books at much higher prices. I just want to read the original stories, write down who appears, and scan the occasional panel that I’m going to clean up anyway.

Golden Age Flash Archives vol. 2Amazon has finally put a discount on the Golden Age Flash Archives vol.2, so I’ve pre-ordered it. While there I looked around on my wish list and noticed that the Mirrormask DVD page (which still shows the wrong date) is recommending, “Buy this DVD with Serenity (Widescreen Edition) DVD ~ Joss Whedon today!” That seems like an appropriate pairing!

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Dawn and the Key

Posted on October 17, 2005 by Kelson

The synopsis for JLA #124 (due in January) includes the phrase, “he loses focus on stopping The Key and saving Dawn, and turns his energies on an even deadlier foe.”

Now, I know these are separate DC characters, but my first thought was “But Dawn is the Key!”

Once you start down the Buffy path…

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Looking for Spike (in all the wrong places)

Posted on September 4, 2005 by Kelson

My regular comic store, Comic Quest, didn’t get any copies of Peter David’s Spike: Old Times. Yesterday I checked at Comics Toons and Toys. They were also sold out. Today I started looking around more of the Orange County area.

First step: Mile High Comics. I figured it was a long shot, since they’re the most well-known comic store on the internet, but I wasn’t in a hurry to read it, and it would save me the trouble of driving around the county. Naturally, they didn’t have it.

So I started calling stores I knew. As I was about to start, I noticed an email on SuperHeroNews saying, “Mile High Comics in LA, burned down last night, more information as we get it.” The first store on my list was Netherworld Comics, which used to be a Mile High store, but is in Garden Grove, not Los Angeles. Their phone isn’t picking up. And they’re still listed as an affiliate on Mile High’s website. And there aren’t any other Mile High stores in southern California. This doesn’t look good for Netherworld. Edit Sep. 7: Yes, it was them [archive.org]. Figures. I’d only been in there a couple of times, but it was a nice store.

Okaaay… Next step: Diamond’s Comic Shop Locator. Unfortunately it only lets you search by ZIP code, and only shows the nearest three. Since I’d already been to two of the stores, I only got one phone number out of it. No luck there.

Time to do it the old-fashioned way: the phone book. (Katie remarked, “There’s nothing wrong with being old-fashioned, especially about a book called Old Times.”) There are surprisingly few comic stores in central Orange County. I only got three more numbers out of it, and one of them specializes in vintage comics. Not surprisingly, none of them had any copies either. (One offered to order it for me, but I simply declined rather than pointing out that it was already sold out at both the publisher and distributor.)

Next stop: eBay…

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Wee Little Puppet Man

Posted on June 29, 2005 by Kelson

OK, I have officially changed my mind about the four covers for Angel: The Curse #1.

If they weren’t publishing alternate covers, there’s no way they would have used a fully-painted picture of the puppet Angel. Update: Scan added.

Cover for Angel: The Curse #1

The guy at the comic store said, “of all the people who had it on their pull list, I figured you’d appreciate this one the most.” Good call!

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Dark Angels

Posted on June 21, 2005 by Kelson

Two bits of news on some of the less conventional “Angels” of comics.

Fallen Angel artwork by J.K. WoodwardWriter Jeff Mariotte reports that Joss Whedon and Fox have approved a second Angel comic book miniseries to come out late this year, which may interest fans of the show who want to know what happened after the final episode:

While The Curse is strictly an Angel solo story with the other characters just showing up in flashback, this one will include most of the gang (those who survived NFA, anyway)—although some of them in unexpected ways. More than that I will not say. It’s the only approved, official continuation of the TV series, though

Meanwhile, Peter David has confirmed that the new artist on Fallen Angel is J.K. Woodward, and posted this sample of his art style. This isn’t just a cover—this is what the interior art will look like!

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Spike and (Fallen) Angel

Posted on June 19, 2005 by Kelson

You know, I should have made the connection when Fallen Angel moved to IDW that it’s the same publisher that picked up the Angel (as in the vampire with a soul™ from the Buffy-verse) license. And I should have remembered that Peter David is writing a Spike one-shot comic book that should be out soon (August, apparently).

So it really shouldn’t surprise me that Spike: Old Times will feature a full-page ad for the new Fallen Angel series.

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Excess Coverage

Posted on May 5, 2005 by Kelson

A new Angel comic book mini-series (from IDW, rather than Dark Horse), Angel: The Curse, picks up after the end of the TV series.

In this first issue of a new Angel tale, Angel has survived the conclusion of his TV show and finds himself in a mysterious Romanian forest. There, his search for the Gypsy tribe that cursed him years ago takes a turn for the worse.

I suspect we’ll get a “once out of the pit…” explanation (i.e. no explanation at all) and the cliffhanger’s resolution will remain open for Joss to deal with in a movie-of-the-week or something.

But what galls me is that the book is supposed to have four covers. OK, one variant every once in a while is nice, and I can even go for Dark Horse’s early efforts to have one drawn cover and one photo cover to get the newsstand audience (is there such a thing anymore?)… but the only reason to do four covers for one book is to get collectors to buy four copies. It was an insulting gimmick in the early 1990s, and it annoys me that the practice never quite went away. Worse, TV Guide took it mainstream. I guess we’ll know we’re in trouble when Time or National Geographic starts doing multiple collectors’ covers.

*grumble*

Posted in Annoyances, Buffy/Angel, Comics | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments