Dissecting the Winter Soldier trailers

Well, yesterday was a little long-winded, wasn't it?



Today should be a little shorter.... yeah, no, probably not



Here’s my rundown of stuff you can draw from the assorted promotional materials.



Some of these are SPOILERS, you HAVE BEEN WARNED.



And some of these are ... well, they are MAYBE spoilers, bit and pieces collected from what we know of the Winter Soldier plot (covered yesterday) and the Marvelverse at large, and just plain old-fashioned speculation.



So, SPOILERS and SPOILERS...maybe.



In the words of Heath Ledger, here ... we .... go! [below the break]





Paranoia and conspiracies.



You may have noticed one or two things in the trailers posted yesterday that was a little paranoia-ish.If you didn’t pick up on this vibe, you weren’t paying attention. From shots of SHIELD’s arsenal to Cap beating up a bunch of agents in an elevator, it’s pretty obvious that the idealistic World War II hero is going to find himself pitted against the more modern intelligence community. Add to that a shadowy assassin (potentially the person Robert Redford is talking to when he says, “Your work has shaped the century”) and your story begins to take on the dimensions of major American myth.

 We've seen SHIELD on SHIELD violence. Fury being shot at, perhaps helicarriers firing on helicarriers, an airship crashing into the Triskelion, the Black Widow apparently on the run, out in the cold with Cap, a lot of images of SHIELD seemingly fighting itself and/or failing the people it’s supposed to be supporting. American-looking fighter planes chase the Falcon around the helicarrier. Cap argues with Nick Fury about SHIELD policy. Fury warns Cap not to trust anybody. Is that because the threat—whatever it is—is closer than Cap would like to admit?

And they have Robert Redford, ultra-leftist, in a Captain America movie ... how is he NOT the bad guy?  

The directors have insisted that this is a nod to 1970s paranoid thrillers like Three Days of the Condor, which was all about "the evil government wants oil!" So, Captain America will be running a lot.



Steve seems to spend a lot of time in these scenes walking around in civilian clothes—at least once, seemingly through a museum exhibit dedicated to his wartime exploits. The ensemble even includes the traditional hero-incognito baseball cap. But he’s still seen carrying the shield and getting shot at—and fighting the Winter Soldier—in that civilian garb.



Something else from the trailers....



Um....

Nyet, comrade. I suspect cameras are involved

Cap in love? 



Yes, that’s a set photo of Steve and Natasha making out.



No, I don’t believe it. Unless fanfiction writers have taken over this script. But the last Captain America movie was pretty darn romantic for a film with only one major female character. With Natasha giving Steve romantic advice in that early scene, it looks like she’s getting involved with his personal life. And while Natasha could have any of a billion reasons for that involvement, Steve is pretty straightforward with his emotions. If he falls for Natasha, he’s serious about it. And that can’t go anywhere good.



However, Sharon Carter, Cap's other love interest, is also in the film. So.... muahahahahaha.

The Falcon.

See that guy with the metal wings? That’s Sam Wilson, a.k.a. the Falcon, one of the first African American superheroes. In the comics, Sam was powered by the Red Skull with a fancy wing-suit and a telepathic link with birds, including a hawk named Redwing. and sent to kill Captain America. That worked as well as can be expected, and the two of them ended up best friends and partners. The relationship was notable at the time (the 1970s) for being something pretty close to a real partnership, too; while Steve was obviously giving Sam tips on superheroing, Sam held his own remarkably well in those stories, and wasn't nearly as stereotyped as typical portrayals of black characters from the same period (see: early Luke Cage). 

Also, Falcon started out wearing green and purple spandex, something that the actor actually said he wanted to try, instead of a flight suit, seen above. Obviously, this is a man who has never, ever been in spandex. Ever.

Anyway ...Steve and Sam routinely describe each other as brothers—a term Steve reserves for Sam, Bucky and a couple of war buddies, and that Sam uses only for Steve. While this Falcon is apparently a SHIELD agent rather than a creation of the Red Skull, he seems to have the same deep and instant loyalty to Steve Rogers. It’s good to see him up on the screen; this movie needs a rock like Sam Wilson.

Robert Redford.

As mentioned earlier, that’s Robert Redford. And he seems to be talking to Steve Rogers about the need to tear down an old world and build a new one … but is he talking to Steve? 

At one point, he’s heard saying, “Your work has shaped the century. And I need you to do it one more time.” Steve was pretty impressive in the war and everything, but shaping a century? That sounds more like a description of the Winter Soldier and his involvement in key assassinations throughout the Cold War. And with the role of spy-mentor already filled by Nick Fury, Redford’s character is looking more and more sinister... outside of being ROBERT REDFORD. Yeesh. He might has well have a neon sign over his head.



The best use of Redford would be as a red herring -- he's not the bad guy, will be the good guy, maybe even the best man of all, but I can't bring myself to believe it Cap’s got a long history in the comics of going up against bad guys in suits who seemed innocuous at first. Is Redford’s character the next in a long line?



The current theory is that Robert Redford is the Red Skull, older and Back! From! Spaaaaccceeee! after he pissed off the cosmic Rubix cube in the first film. Skull really enjoys mind-controlling, impersonating, and body-snatching people in power..  And Red Skull will always be Captain America's enemy. Even if he isn't on screen, he'll probably be in the background.



Oh, and the alphabet block from Hell has also played as a home for Skull's brain more than a few times. if the Red Skull did happen to be in there, the entire Avengers film probably would have woken him up. And SHIELD owned it for a bit, so .... bad things will happen.  Period.



Though it might be a touch too obvious.  But, still, Redford, evil.

Nick Fury having a bad day.

His car gets blown up and ripped apart by the Winter Soldier, SHIELD is going bonkers all around him, and Steve quotes “Fury’s last words” (which might be his last words before he apparently died, or just the last thing he said before disappearing). And someone with Fury’s skin tone is seen as a patient in an operating room. When ol’ One-Eye goes from running an international law-enforcement organization to being dead or missing, it’s a bad day for the free world, and a worse day for Steve Rogers. There’s even a scene that appears to show Natasha walking out of a congressional hearing about intelligence operations.

Fury’s major weakness is bureaucrats who can go over his head to get things done. How high do the bad guys go? And how low will Fury have to sink to beat them? Answer: as low as he can get. 

Also see: "Coulson kept his Captain America cards in his locker, not his jacket."  Yes, Fury is a m-fing BASTARD.

For the record, a spoiler: if Nick Fury "dies" in this film, he's going to get better. As in "you didn't touch me, sucka." The comic book Fury is so manipulative, this is a guy who has messed with every major superhero at least once, and didn't get his guts torn out -- this list included calm, relaxed folks like Wolverine.

Okay, let's look at a storyline caled Secret War -- no, not the one from the 80s, from the last decade.  Fury recruits every superhero in New York (ie: most of them) and brings them to Latveria to stop the Prime Minister from selling off all of Doctor Doom's technology to the highest bidder (Doom is temporarily in Hell at the time. Long story). Fury gets the heroes in, and assassinates the PM, and then mindwipes everyone so they don't remember it happened.

Later, when blowback happens and no one remembers why it's happening, Fury explains what happened.  Wolverine, who doesn't react well to having his mind messed with yet again, pops his claws and shreds Nick Fury.

Fury's robotic decory calmly answers, "Logan did you really think I'd be dumb enough to tell you this in person? I'm going off grid for a while. Bye."

Someone talk to the artist.

I think they enhanced ScarJo too much.

I don't mind, it's just that I can see it.

Black Widow.



Don't hold your breath on a Romanov/Rogers romance. Seriously, just don't.



The Marvel movies have been hinting around at the Black Widow’s history for a while now. From the effortless way she infiltrated Tony Stark’s life in Iron Man 2 to her loaded conversations with Loki and Hawkeye in The Avengers, she’s always come across like a complicated character with a long backstory.



Now she’s been promoted to second billing, right after Cap himself, and she’s in a lot of scenes in those videos. Most importantly, she’s the one seen telling Steve—reluctantly—about the Winter Soldier and his legend.



Are we finally going to get to see where the Black Widow comes from? Is the movie Black Widow going to have her own history with the Winter Soldier?



Since ScarJo is getting her own Black Widow film, I'm going to say.... not yet.



Agent 13

This isn't in the trailers, but Emily van Camp is listed in the cast of this movie as “Agent 13”, but she hasn't been seen except for that extremely brief shot of her in the UK trailer. Considering the huge importance of Sharon Carter in the Winter Soldier comics storyline, her absence is conspicuous. They're obviously going to have Sharon as a a surprise. 

So, Agent 13 is the neighbor for Captain America ... I wouldn't put it past the boys from SHIELD (read: Fury) to assign Cap a new best friend / lover / babysitter / spy.  After all, Steve has no friends in the twenty-first century, and doesn’t seem interested in making any. He apparently spends his free time alone in the gym. That kind of isolation is not healthy, so I wouldn't be surprised if SHIELD tried to set a valuable operative up with some “starter friends” to ease him into his new situation. 

The last thing SHIELD needs is a self-destructive superhero. Besides, why would Captain America have normal neighbors? Wouldn't they at least need to be vetted by SHIELD just to live in the same building?

For the record: I love the idea of Emily van Camp as Agent 13. Words can't express how much I like the idea. On Revenge, she's basically playing someone in a long-term, deep cover operation, maipulating people to self-destruction.  I've also seen her fight, and I've seen her wearing black versions of Agent 13's white body suit.

Who the BLEEP is the Winter Soldier?

So, this week comes writing a series on Captain America: The Winter Soldier.



First things first, here, from beginning to end, are the videos we’ve seen so far.



First is the initial trailer, from back in October:

Then the Superbowl trailer, with a cameo by the creator of The Winter Soldier, Ed Brubaker.

And TV Spot #1.

And another spot with the phrase "Fury's last words." Sam Jackson still has several contracted Marvel films... and Nick Fury has more life model decoys up his sleeve than an army of Phil Coulsons, so....

Then a clip that apparently spoils the end of the film.

Followed by a ton of Black Widow. I approve.  I heart Redheads.

Marvel UK's "Three Days of Captain America"

Then... even MORE Black Widow.  I want a movie, and I want it called "Black Widow: Budapest."

So, if you want to know what exactly all this is about, and why a lot of people kicking around the internet are interested in this film, well, let's take a look.

Step 1, day 1: Who the BLEEP is the Winter Soldier?

WARNING: HERE BE SPOILERS

This paragraph pretty much only exists to tell you to STOP READING NOW IF YOU DON’T WANT SPOILERS. Seriously. This is your last chance. 


Abandon all hope of surprise, ye who enter this blog. There is no meaningful way to discuss the Winter Soldier storyline, or the movie that’s arisen from it, without spoiling at least a few really big plot points. So if you've somehow avoided all the chatter about this movie so far that’s spilled the Winter Soldier’s identity and backstory, and you don’t want to know walking into that theater who he is and why he’s fighting Steve Rogers, then

 STOP READING RIGHT NOW.

And if you didn't see that coming, I'd be surprised.  


Now, then, where were we?

THE WINTER SOLDIER STORYLINE

To explain who the Winter Soldier is and why he matters, come with me now to those glorydays of yesteryear -- 2004 -- when Marvel Comics relaunched the monthly Captain America comic book with a brand-new #1 issue.

With crime-comic writer Ed Brubaker, the comic quickly established itself as a combination of superhero adventure and spy thriller. The story begins with a mysterious ex-Soviet general, Aleksander Lukin, killing a Russian agent sent to disrupt his plans.


Lukin then orders his men to give the body full funeral honors -- he's not a supervillain, he's actually something of a patriot and a soldier.

After that, Lukin meets with the Red Skull, who wants to buy some decommissioned Soviet super-weapons generally found in Cold War comics.


There’s only one thing Lukin won’t sell—a tank containing the shadowy figure of a man with a metal arm. Lukin says he won’t part with that unless the Skull is willing to trade the Cosmic Cube (the Tesseract, if you watch the movies), which can reshape reality. 


The Skull says that a) he doesn't have the Cube and b) he wouldn't give it up if he did, and c) soon he will have it again, blah blah blah world domination—it’s your standard Red Skull rant.

What are we going to do tonight, Skull? 

Fast-forward to five years later. At the end of the comic, after some scenes establishing that Captain America is having some personal problems and that the Skull has some big plan in the works--reassembling a broken Cosmic Cube and powering it up. 

We’re all very focused on the Skull as he takes a call on his cell phone while he’s fondling the Cube.... yes, sounds dirty, doesn't it? It's the Red Skull, he's a freak.  Anyway.

The phone call is from General Lukin from five years ago, making one last offer. The Skull turns him down flat, goes into his usual rant—

—and then suddenly has a fist-sized hole through his chest from a sniper’s bullet.

The Skull falls to the floor, dead. Lukin had made him an offer Skull shouldn't have refused.

A shadowy figure enters the apartment and takes the Cube from the corpse’s hand … at which point we see that the hand picking up that Cube is made of metal. Whoever was in the tank, he’s out in the world now. And he’s working for Aleksander Lukin.


From here on out, what looked like a story about the Red Skull trying to take over the world AGAIN becomes a story about Captain America trying to figure out who killed the Red Skull, and why, and why do we care, it's the Red Skull? Let him rot.



And then it becomes a story about the Winter Soldier.

SO WHO IS THE WINTER SOLDIER?

CSI: Marvel

Still a better concept

than Agents of SHIELD

It’s up to one of Marvel's other super-spies to who figures that out.

In the course of all the running around and spycraft in this story, SHIELD agent, and Steve's girlfriend, Sharon Carter gets captured by the Winter Soldier and used as bait. 

Cap’s already rattled by this point because Lukin has been using the Cube to mess with him from a distance. Cap’s beginning to doubt his own recollection of important battles and major events in his life, especially the day that his partner, James Buchanan “Bucky” Barnes, died and Cap himself was frozen in ice.

He’s just remembered a long-forgotten detail—that Bucky didn't get blown up because he insisted on defusing a flying missile, but rather because he got his clothing snagged while trying to jump free, as Steve ordered him to do.



Bucky died because Steve wasn't there to save him.

Hmm, wait, doesn't Retcon sound an awful lot like how Bucky bought it in the movie?  Hmm. Yes it does.



Did I see Brubaker's name in the credits for The First Avenger? Yes, I did.



Funny that.

So, Steve becomes Catholic, and incredibly guilty.

And then Sharon tells him that she got a good look at the Winter Soldier’s face … and she’s dead certain that he’s Bucky.



Hilarity, chaos, and complete and utter anarchy ensues.

Steve doesn’t believe it at first, but when he encounters the Winter Soldier in the aftermath of a terrorist bombing (which the Soldier set off), even he’s struck by the resemblance—even if the Winter Soldier is not:

Who the hell is Bucky? It becomes a theme.



THE PERMANENT CORPSES

Remember how long

this lasted?

Yeah, bringing Bucky back from the dead was a bit of a big deal.  True, people who die in comics don’t usually stay dead. It's standard comic-book death: Superman didn't stay dead. Two dead Robins have failed to stay dead. Jean Grey of the X-Men has died so many times that we've all lost count, and all stopped caring.

But there are a few exceptions. Characters who not only stay dead, they must stay dead, so the theory goes. 

Spider-Man’s Uncle Ben is THE classic example of this. If Uncle Ben isn't dead, Spider-Man isn't motivated to be Spider-Man.



Bruce Wayne's family?  They are going to stay dead, dead, dead. If they could become more dead, they would.

Bucky was one of those permanent corpses. His death, ret-conned into Captain America’s backstory when the character was revived in the 1960s, turned a World War II patriotic hero into a tragic figure in keeping with Marvel's five hundred other tragic figures.  Because, you know, you can't simply have a hero be a hero because he's a good man. Heaven forbid.



And, this being marvel, Captain America just had to have a tragic backstory.  After all, isn't the “man out of time” schtick good for just so long—eventually, he’d have to adjust to life in the “future” and he’d be just another superhero, right? But a superhero who’s constantly reminded of his greatest failure—that his partner, best friend, and surrogate little brother died because of the very screwup that made him immortal—that’s a story that fits in with everyone else's tragic backstory. Because this is the freaking comic book industry; even Superman has been ret-conned so he was given some similar trauma.



So, according to this accepted comic book wisdom, Bucky has to remain dead.

Right?

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE


It turns out there’s a way to make a warm breathing Bucky even harder on Steve Rogers than ice cold Bucky. It turns out that Bucky also got the Captain America on ice treatment; even though the missile took his left arm, the freezing water preserved his body.

Remember when Bucky fell from the train in the Captain America movie, and fell into freezing water? Yeah, there's a reason for that.

I'll take you all with one arm

Anyway, a Russian submarine picked up his body, thinking he might be Captain America. But they got the wrong hero on ice. A Soviet general named Karpov had the frozen corpse studied, during which time, the Soviets revived Bucky. Like Jason Bourne, he was missing most of his memories, but he could thrash anyone who got too close, even with only one arm.



Basically, Bucky makes Jason Bourne look like a pussy, especially when he's played by Matt Damon.



By this time, the Cold War was raging. Bucky had basically been a teenage commando, trained in wet work that Captain America wasn't let near with a two-foot tactical baton. So Karpov fitted Bucky with a metal arm and some basic Cold War 101 Ipcress brainwashing, and used him against American targets.

"They will never see me coming."

No, wait, they used that line.

But Bucky was too stubborn—the longer he was out of the deep freeze, the more his real personality tried to reassert itself. So, Karpov put his assassin into stasis between missions and reprogramming him on each awakening. They called him the Winter Soldier in part because of these regular deep freezes, and because Russia has always relied on "General Winter" to win a lot of their battles. When Karpov died, Bucky was put back on ice for a couple of decades—until he was found by Karpov’s protégé, Alexander Lukin.

And for Steve, this is actually worse than thinking Bucky was dead... because having your friend come back as a cyborg zombie assassin is pretty much nightmare fuel.



Steve knows that Bucky would want Steve to kill him rather than let him remain a zombie assassin. And as everyone in the story points out to Steve at some point, there's no Bucky under all that programming. He came face-to-face with Captain America, in full costume, and didn't recognize him. He didn't even know his own name:

It’s appropriate, then, that there’s one dissenting voice in the chorus of “just kill him already”. That voice belongs to a character who’s been controlled by the bad guys before, and who might be Captain America’s best friend in the present day—Sam Wilson, a.k.a. the Falcon.

So, let's save Bucky.

NEVER TRUST THE GENIE


Cap, the Falcon, and SHIELD track the Winter Soldier, and the superheroes go in before backup can arrive.

Because you don't want to see this

from the business end.

What follows is a running fight between Cap and the Winter Soldier. It comes to a head after Bucky expresses surprise that hitting Captain America in the head with a cyborg arm doesn't actually kill him, and Steve realizes that the ex-Soviet killer is still trying to kill people. This comes as a shock, somehow, and Steve challenges Bucky to shoot him in the head if he really doesn't remember their past relationship.

Luckily, Captain America can dodge bullets pretty well, and grabs the Cube.



And then, well …

There's an important lesson comic books can teach writers. It's that there is no easy answer to a problem. Ever.

Two things about the Cosmic Cube.



One, in the comic universe, you can touch it without being blown away.



Two, it's your standard untrustworthy wish-granting device, an old-fashioned jinn, or one of the fae. It will misinterpret pretty much anything you say, if it can. So, with only a second or two to make his wish before the Winter Soldier tackles him again, he goes with:

Sounds good, right? Impossible to screw up? Well...

Yup. This will end well.

PTSD level flashbacks.

NOTHING can go wrong here.

Turns out that suddenly regaining your real personality after being a cyborg zombie for 7 decades is not terribly good for your mental health.

Yeah. NO ONE saw that coming, right?



Oh, wait, everyone’s been saying this all along.



The Bucky grabs the demonic cube and then poof, all that’s left is a little pile of ash. To Sharon and the Falcon, it looks pretty simple: Bucky couldn't live with what had been done to him, so he killed himself. Steve is unconvinced.



And he’s right. For the next year’s worth of comics, Steve is alternately battling the Red Skull and trying to find Bucky. Yes, the Skull got better. Are we surprised?



THE REST OF THE STORY


Once Bucky has his memories back, he ends up doing some cloak-and-dagger work for Nick "I am a bastard" Fury and avoiding Steve, apparently because there’s no good way to have a conversation about how you murdered a bunch of innocent people, tried to shoot your best friend in the face, and then faked your own suicide.



And then Steve gets himself assassinated in Civil War.  If you don't know it, I've got a rant for that.



Along the way, Bucky runs into an old girlfriend... And Hawkeye is going to be pissed.  Apparently, Bucky and Natalia had a thing back when the Winter Soldier was a combat instructor for the Black Widow program. So there’s that.



And Bucky becomes Captain America, because someone has to be.

Alex Ross is a badass.

He's the artist.

The “Bucky Cap” stories focused on Bucky’s ongoing quest for redemption, his struggle to live up to Steve’s example, and his complicated relationship with Natasha. She acted as his liason with SHIELD, pointing him at trouble spots



The Bucky-Widow relationship was actually a lot of fun. The fact that Bucky and Natalia were both strong, complex characters with their own clashing agendas, but that they still clung to each other emotionally kept the story from ever degenerating into something that made one or the other secondary.



Then they killed Bucky AGAIN so Steve could resume being Captain America, just in time for the movie to come out.



Bucky, of course, gets better; he's too popular to kill now.



And, post-Avengers film, Black Widow has had Bucky mind-wiped from her brain, because fans liked her and Hawkeye in the film.



As much as I love the Marvel films, I hate it when it messes up the comic books.

Top ten Pius Blog posts, March 2014: Politics, sex, comic books, music.

At one point, it felt like that my blog's top ten posts changes.  Which is most popular and which aren't.



These are the top ten all time best blogs, as of now.

Sex and Comics?

1.  Who would Captain America Vote For? An election special. (October 29, 2012) Politics has been a major selling point for the blog, it seems.  When I did this blog post in time for the 2012 U.S. Presidential election, I had no idea that it would become so insanely popular. But then again, given the next one on the list, I guess it shouldn't have been too much of a surprise.



2. Sex, DC Comics, and ... wtf? (October 3, 2011) You remember this, right? It seems everyone has read it, probably twice. It was a study of DC Comics and their mistreatment of two of their better female characters. It includes, sex, sex, and more sex. And writing.  This is post is over two and a half years old now, and still going strong. I wonder why ....



For that answer, meet me over at #3...

3  Disasters to Marvel At: A Comic Discussion.  One of the longest-running posts on this list (Nov 8, 2010), and constantly in the top ten, this was a brief look at the past five to six years of Marvel Comics' history of absolute garbage. Looking at the top three, I need to find a way to make my blog about comic books, sex, and politics.



4. Snarky Theology 4: "Things that go boink in the night." See? Sex sells. I just need to find out how I can sell a book over how it's not sexualized. That should be fun.  Anyway, I can credit my friend Jason for this title. I mentioned I wanted the Catholic position on sex. The title was the first thing that leapt to his mind. I guess it worked.  This has been constantly popular since March of 2011. Maybe people are stopping by  JUST for the well thought-out theological discussion on the sexual nature of the human person.



Or sex.

Meet Mandy.
MY "SCF."

5. SFCS -- Strong Female Character Syndrome (August 19, 2013). This is the most recent post on the list, and it surprised me. It amounted to a simple rant of mine in which I ripped someone a new one over her idiotic interpretation of women in films. It had some valid points, but used the worst examples EVER.



I got your strong female characters right here for ya.



6. Self defense review: Zombies, Women's self defense, Barbara Sheehan (10/26/11).  I'm not sure why this one is so popular. All of the links are broken, and can't be fixed.



7. Someone has jumped the shark: women and military scifi (January 23, 2012). Tor, who seems to have become my favorite punching bag, decided to take an open-handed slap to their competition, mostly through libel.



Libel? How so? As in: "Oh, all of THOSE people are sexist, but WE are as pure as the driven snow".... give me a break.



Again, a blog about politics and sex ... sort of.



Maybe I really should find a way to make this blog about sex, politics and comic books.

8. Black Friday blog: Book shopping. On November 15, 2013, I tried to cash in for friends of mine, mostly because I really liked their books, and because people really needed to buy gifts. Books are always useful ... okay, and because I wanted to easily hock my books on twitter. Is that so wrong?  Apparently not, because a LOT of folks have shown up to take a look at this one.



9. Music: the Eye of the Storm: Fenton  This is a bit of a surprise. One part Cruxshadows, and one part killer sheep, this has been up since June 23, 2011 -- when I was going a little nutty on posting everything at once.

10. Writing A Pius Man, Part 5: A Love Story?  Okay, this one I can't explain. At all. I have no idea why people flock to this one. Is it because it's romance? Is it because it's about writing?  Is it because I used to have an amazingly stunning woman on the post? Maybe. 

In Memory of Fred Phelps of the WBC: RIP or RIH

Ah, Fred Phelps is dead. Whatever could we say about a man who insisted hat God really hated everybody? Except for him and his incestuous cult of a family?



Well, we can briefly discuss what has been said about him.



When I first learned about Phelps and his merry band of vile creatures, my response was "Mr. Phelps, you are disavowed." I discussed his history, his attitudes, and how he's basically a pure, unadulterated schmuck.



I later discussed how the Supreme Court went through a lobotomy over these morons.



And then there was the day where I got into a fight with some of the little retards ... and if you insist that I'm picking on the autistic, you know what I mean, stop being a douchebag.



Then my last shot was NOT God Hates .... Superman? a short story.  Completely not about Phelps at all. Honest. Would I lie?



We could all hope that he rests in peace. However, if he's as unrepentant in death as he was in life, then we can replace RIP with RIH -- rot in Hell.

Dear Forbes, you need some nerds.

The following blog post is rated R, mostly for language.



Last week, Forbes decided to weigh in on the whole Agents of SHIELD writing with this article, that claimed that "Had it been this show [that fans wanted] out of the gate, it would have failed catastrophically."



Really? Well, what does Forbes think that fans wanted in the first place?

Had the series come out of the gate with nothing but major universe tie-ins, the series would have tanked before episode two because it would have said to the viewing public “we’re only going for hardcore fans of the MCU right now.”

Major universe tie-ins? What?



Um, how do I break this to Forbes?  Oh, yeah. WE DIDN'T WANT MOVIE TIE-INS! We wanted the Marvel Universe writ small. There was not been one, single, teeny-tiny hint that there's an actual Marvel universe out there independent of the films until seven episodes in. Instead, now, at this late date, we're getting movie tie-ins? If I wanted a movie tie-in, I'd petition for Peter David to write novelizations of the films again.



I try not to swear, but I call BULLSHIT.



BULLSHIT. BULLSHIT. BULLSHIT.



This entire article is a collection lame excuses, and even if I believed a single one of them, there is no reason on God's green Earth for Agents of SHIELD to have taken so damn long.  As of last week, March 4th, we were 14 episodes in; by this time in a single season of Buffy, or Arrow, or practically any other series with "a plan," we have some idea of who the bad guy is, what their motivations are, and a hint of their sinister plot.



Instead, we have had a creepy sex subplot with Ming-Na and someone young enough to be her son, we still have no idea about Coulson's death (not really), they spent a lot of time with awkward scenes of bad guys talking to each other, yet still lacking any character, and this garbage could have been compressed into half the time.



Don't believe me? Do you really think that "This couldn't have happened immediately"?



So we needed a "second pilot"? We needed the Island of Dr. Quinn ("The Asset")? We needed two-dimensional characters, writing as witless as 24, season 6, and a boatload of writing and episodes that went NOWHERE?

[more below the break]







Tell me right now why the viewing order couldn't have been:



Pilot (different ending: blowup Mike Peterson)

The pyrokinetic (The return of not-A.I.M. in "The Girl in the Flower Dress")

Either The Hub or The SHIELD academy (a solid murder mystery with some character development)

The painfully obvious ratings grab with the Thor 2 tie-in and the not-Wrecking Crew, starring Peter MacNicole ("The Well")

The Magical Place (We get a new timeline on Coulson's death)

The killer train (T.R.A.C.K.S. Surprise! Deathlok!), as a mid-season cliff-hangar

T.A.H.I.T.I. (last week's episode) where we actually introduce comic book SHIELD agents



Seven episodes, all of the good stuff, none of the boring crap, their vaunted "slow buildup," and we'd even have the blatant Thor tie-in AT THE APPROPRIATE PLACE AND TIME (November, when the Thor sequel came out).  This is half of the freaking show.  I could make the argument to keep the academy episode or the Island of Ian Quinn, if they actually follow through on anything laid down in those episodes, but I won't hold my breath.  That's still five brain-numbing hours that I want back, closer to seven.



Should we even discuss the upcoming episode that's a blatant dove tail to the Thor: The Dark World DVD release?



And there's still no reason for coming up with a team of "original characters," who are all about as original as the stereotype cookie-cutters they were produced from.



Forbes need some actual nerds on the staff who know what the fuck they're talking about, and I don't mean statisticians and stock analysts, I mean people who read comic books.  Is that so hard?



How could this have been done better?



Let's look at another comic book tv show: Arrow, centered around DC comics' Green Arrow. The first SCENE in Arrow has DC comic references. For anyone who has ever looked at the comic books for an hour (I may have spent four minutes), it's clear that someone has paid attention.  No, it's not fan service, fan service, fan service faithfulness to the comics – but there was enough to show that, yes, the writers are respecting the original material without being chained to it.



And then there's Marvel's Agents of SHIELD, with the forced references to the Marvel movie universe. Which is sort of strange, don't you think? Marvel has seemingly endless B- and C-list characters to draw on, and they used … no one.



But we needed time!



Again, tell it to Arrow; with a half-dozen nods to the comics in the first episode, AoS can not make any such excuses. However, since Jeph Loeb (last seen destroying Heroes) is running the series into the ground, I'm quite willing to blame him for everything. There's an entire universe to play with, and he's barely using any of it.



Like I said before, why bother making "original characters?" Marvel has a pilot named Wyatt Wingfoot... we needed someone new to fly the plane? Can't you see a modified Frank Castle (the Punisher) as being a slightly older field agent who “had a little breakdown a while back, he's better now”?  If they needed female agents, why not use Spider-Woman? Silver Sable? Jessica Jones? All of whom were deep, complex, yet badass females who do not have powers, (Spider-Woman has been de-powered so often, no one would blink if she didn't have them on the show).



With the occasions people have asked for lawyers, is there one reason they couldn't have name-dropped Jennifer Walters (She-Hulk)? Or Matt Murdock (Daredevil)? Marvel even has their own reporter for superheroes … so why didn't we just have her be the Skye character, only with social media instead of dead-tree media?



You see, Forbes, we don't want much, and we don't need much. There are plenty of little things that could have been done from day one.  Heck, even though the first appearance of Nick Fury, at the end of Iron Man, said "You've just taken your first step into a larger universe," the series has made it perfectly clear that there isn't a larger universe to be had.



Forbes apparently don't have any staff nerds, and they've never seen Arrow. While the occasional cameos were amusing, what we all wanted was melding the *general* world of weird that is the MCU (Marvel Comic Universe) in with the show.



In short, we wanted a Joss Whedon show, not a Jeph Loeb show. We wanted the Whedon wit and vibrant characters.  Even Xander of Buffy the Vampire Slayer had more character in the pilot than most of these folks do, half a season in.  They're sort of white bread ... and by that, I mean bland and generic.

The saving grace of the series since day one has been Agent Coulson, and he's what has me coming back week after week. Ming-Na's Melinda "The Cavalry" May had been interesting, then she and the "young hot thing" Grant Ward started having sex (she's 22 years older than he is. Just... eeh).



After the awesomeness that is Arrow, AoS is pissing me off with
it's cliche` characters, its weak overall story arc, the cheap and obvious
attempt to insert romantic tension, and its inability to incorporate the
Marvelverse. Joss Whedon's name has been slapped on this as a selling point, but
it's obvious he's not involved in any of the writing, the characters, or
anything about AoS, really.



Someone send the message to Forbes. We don't want a movie tie-in series, we want a Marvelverse, characters we care about, the wit and wisdom we got from Buffy, and the basic Whedon magic. Not a Heroes retread.

Who wants a free book?

So, how do you get a free copy of A Pius Legacy?

Well, you remember how free Kindle copies work?  I set a specific promo day
for everyone to download a free copy.  Those copies downloaded count on Amazon
in the "members who have bought X item have also bought Y."  Well, while that's
all well and good, Amazon does not allow that to happen until you get 40 reviews
on you novel. Yes, you heard me, 40 reviews.  And I'm going to take a wild shot
in the dark that all the reviews had better be good ones.

Right now, I'm halfway there.  Last year, over a thousand (okay, 1400)
people picked up a copy of A Pius Man via the free Kindle day, and I've gotten
20 reviews.  Count 'em, 20.  And some of these I've had to ask for, some of them
have been really recent.

So, if you want a free copy of A Pius Legacy .... just review A Pius Man.  The point of free Kindle copies is to drum up PR. Let's start, shall we?

I start the free promo days on A Pius Legacy right after I hit 40 reviews on A Pius Man.
 Preferably positive. :)

This doesn't necessarily mean you have to wait.  Go write a review, post it
at Amazon, and come back here and comment, or email me at DeclanFinnInc@aol.com and I will personally
send you a Kindle copy of A Pius Legacy.  Those 20 people who have already read
it have gotten (or will be getting) their own copies, one way or another.

Writing "A Pius Legacy"

So, as I mentioned yesterday, A Pius Legacy was book two of the 800-page monstrosity that was the original A Pius Man.



You want to know the real interesting part? A Pius Legacy was actually only 60 pages of the original book.



At which point, you have to wonder, "Um... did you just admit you padded 60 pages of plot with 200 pages of nothing?" Not really.



Keep in mind, a book becomes a very fluid thing after a while.  Especially when you're breaking up one book into three. You can't just pull a Lord of the Rings, write a one-page summary of book one, and then keep going with book two. For those of you who didn't read the novels, the movie Fellowship of the Ring ended where the novel The Two Towers began.



So if I can't do that, what can I do without making the first half of book two a retread of book one? Legacy follows hot on the heels of A Pius Man, so it's not like I can say that it's "a few months later."



However, I can tell the story from someone else's point of view.  Remember, a lot happened in APM, and a lot of people were shot at.  Not everyone knows everything. So, if I take the same events from a different point of view, I get a fresh perspective.



Second? There's the United Nations aspect. Remember who the ultimate villains of A Pius Man were. If you didn't read it, well, let's just say that these aren't people you just arrest. You have to have a heavy hitter take them down. You need an international authority to go after international villains. Could the United States do it? Nope. Why? For five different reasons. Some involve the villains themselves, some involve the individual politicians in this universe. We have to make the case for action.



So, the recap is done. Check.



Now what? Here's where the politics comes in. When you're essentially dealing with national enemies, public relations will be key. However, I have to use the right person as the public campaign for what happened in A Pius Man, or we're going to have a lot of problems. Let's face it, some of these people are as subtle as a sledgehammer. Some of them are spies who can't afford to go on MSNBC, CNN or Fox.



Oh, yeah, and remember, the other side uses mercenaries who have no problem killing civilians who get in their way.



When I write, I try to give new meaning to the phrase "killer interview."



How else to expand the novel? Simple -- A Pius Man had enough characters for Fellowship of the Ring, surely I can give them their own subplots. I killed family members in the last book. I killed friends. I shot one of my main characters half to pieces. There's a double agent that hasn't really been dealt with. I have tons of people to play with, areas to explore, and really mean things to do to my characters.



What do I do to these poor, unfortunate souls that have the misfortune to land in my novel? You'll see.  But it's going to hurt.