AudioComics and Titanium Rain in Times Square!.
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AudioComics and Titanium Rain in Times Square!
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New Walking Dead: Less Than a Week Away!
Season Three of AMC’s The Walking Dead Premiers This Sunday Oct. 14th at 9pm
*Warning: May contain some spoilers.*
We’ve all been waiting patiently (since we had no other choice) for this day to come; 
watching the blogs, checking Facebook pages and Twitters of cast members, discussing/arguing/conjecturing amongst ourselves- and now the day is almost upon us. Yes Zombies and Zombettes- Season Three of The Walking Dead is here at last in all of it’s flesh-eating, corpse-rotting, skull-stabbing glory! Yet things are a bit different this time, as the season’s poster clearly states, proclaiming “Fight the dead. Fear the living.” (Something I’ve been saying since the very beginning) and from the looks of the images I’ve collected everyone is in for a bumpy ride right off the bat.
So enjoy a few galleries of teaser images: promotional pics, episode stills, character portraits, etc. to wet your appetite for blood and guts- because everyone has said that this season is so insane it’s going to make the finale of season two look like an episode of Sesame Street!
It all looks good to me! The only thing I’m seriously worried about is Daryl hooking up with Carol…
Twice Norman Reedus has mentioned love/romance/sex in interviews about season 3 and I’m praying he means someone else- ANYONE ELSE- besides him and Carol, otherwise I may vomit to death. Like, literally puke over and over until it kills me. Ugh. Talk about Mommy issues…
Until Next Time Fellow Dead-Heads,
-Dianthrax
Image Sources: The AMC Press Resource Center, The official Facebook page of Andrew Lincoln, Entertainment Weekly online
The Dark Knight Trailer Rises
…And So Do Some Posters & Pictures & Shit, Too!
I can usually tell how a movie is going to go based on the quality of the previews that show before it.
For example “Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows Parts 1 & 2” both had excellent previews and were both kickass movies. I missed the ones for “Black Swan” but I’m sure they would’ve been good, and while I have no way to be certain because I would rather pay NOT to watch one than ever go to the theater to support a “Twilight” film, but my guess is that the previews for those were all UN-Godly horrible.
Today I took my Dad to see Marvel’s “The Avengers” in Imax 3D which was totally f%#king awesome (he loved it too, by the way); and even if I hadn’t known for myself that it would be, or knew it would be before I’d heard from a million people that it was, or before I heard from the comic people on my Twitter when they saw it at the special premier forever ago, or just knew that it would be because it’s Joss Freaking Whedon and Marvel and The Avengers so how could it not be- I would have known from watching the previews.
One preview in particular stood out and compelled me to find it and post it for you to see as well. While doing that, I came across some movie posters that were just released and decided to share those too. After that I just figured “what the Hell” and found the previously released posters, teaser trailers, and some movie stills. Just some fun stuff to check out before the movie come out later this summer!
The videos go in order of their release- just click the little red “chat bubble” looking thing to “Hide Annotations”- which means “to get the crap off the screen.” I’m truly sorry about that- I had a hard time finding videos without something obnoxious along those lines (an ad you had to sit through, a giant logo in one corner, etc.) & I’m still learning about video embedding x-D I hope you can still enjoy them!
Looks pretty good to me; but then I’ve liked all of the Batman movies so far- particularly the Tim Burton ones. (Though I should be clear that I don’t count the one with Clooney at Batman and my Ex-Governator as Mr. Freeze- even though I love both Uma Thurman and Poison Ivy.) So until we meet 
again; Same Bat-time, same Bat-channel!
I Am Vengeance; I Am The Night!
I Am…Dianthrax!!
Info & Image Sources: *Please Note- All but one of the poster images were part of a blog posting on the fan site PlanetFury.com by blogger Tristan Sinns- the link to it is the first one listed-who shows them along with commentary on theatrical posters/the marketing of films & such in the article “Seven New Posters for ‘The Dark Knight Rises.’” http://www.planetfury.com/content/dark-knight-rises-posters?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email utm_campaign=Feed%3A+PlanetFury+%28Planet+Fury+Headlines%29 http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/tag/the-dark-knight-rises http://movies.zap2it.com/movies/the-dark-knight-rises/8757074 http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-rAp3Kp1FhSc/T6k_JpqIAEI/AAAAAAAAPWY/ze70Q4DQ2gw/s860/The_Dark_Knight_Rises_posters+%252812%2529.jpg http://www.Batman-News.com
What Made “Crazy Mary” Crazy?
Probably Something YOU Did
I’m kidding; I’m sure you had nothing to do with it…or did you??
Actually it was the combined efforts of many people, primarily this group of jokers; maybe you’ve heard of some of them?
First up we have the author Michael Colbert, followed by artists J.K. Woodward, William Blankenship, and Ryan Sargent, then some guys named Tony Lee and Lou Anders, this Josh Finney character, and something called 01 Publishing.
And of course by “crazy” I mean “completely crazy-freaking-awesome.”
She might be the other type of crazy too, but that’s really something you should decide for yourselves.
Miss Maybe Mentally Mutilated Mary is a cyberneticly-enhanced bad-ass mercenary doing 
her thing in the New York City of the future. She’s burdened with hallucinations of a world on top of this reality which no one but her can see. She also has spirit guides who give her advice and what appears to be help along the way. Obviously the chick is nuttier than Charlie Sheen on PCP but if it helps get the job done does it really matter? Is she really just hallucinating or are the rest of us born blind and don’t know what’s really happening all around us every day?
Crazy Mary was originally seen in the pages of Digitally 
Webbing Presents in 2006 as a series of short stories and was never completed. One short story in particular called “Trail of Tears” was a project that artist J.K. Woodward helped create nearly a decade ago. (That would be before he was snatched by Peter David to do Fallen Angel and became all distracted working for the likes of IDW, Boom!, Top Cow, and Marvel.) That story is now going to become part of a full graphic novel entitled Factory Smoke and Acetylene Light, which will contain all of Mary’s collective adventures along with an additional 52 pages of new stuff- thanks to the efforts of Mr. 
Michael Colbert. Mr. Woodward, having always wanted to return to the mentally-unstable red-head from his past, signed on as an artist
Additional artwork will be provided by Blankenship and Sargent- two names you should probably familiarize yourself with since my guess is, given the quality of their work, you’ll be seeing them more and more often. In fact I’d say that original art by any of these guys is probably a good investment…there’s also new blood in the Crazy Mary storytelling in the form of Josh Finney. If you’re familiar with his 
art and writing via Utopiates or Titanium Rain then you know he will deliver something that is, shall we say, off the proverbial chain.
If you aren’t familiar with his work, um, well….sucks to be you. Sorry.
Well known among sci-fi/fantasy fans as well as a Hugo Award winner and both a close friend & mentor to the author, Lou Anders is adding an afterword to the graphic novel, which will also contain a forward by acclaimed Doctor Who writer Tony Lee.
“Tony has been a huge supporter of Crazy Mary since the early DWP days and a good friend to boot.” says Colbert. “I’m thrilled that he’s writing the forward.”
These both only add to what is already an incredible project, and should go well with was just added as an incentive to Kickstarter campaign.
That’s right; I said “Kickstarter;” which means this project and all of the hard work associated with it will come to naught if it doesn’t reach it’s modest monetary goal.
The Crazy Mary Kickstarter was created by Colbert to raise the funds necessary- $8,000- to finish the remaining stories and compile/publish/print the complete arch into one graphic novel. The campaign will run till May 14th and assuming everything goes according to plan, the completed book will be available in August. So far they have almost 20% of the funds needed with less than 2 weeks to go.
This is the part where you come in. *(See first line of article.)
You dedicated and supportive comic book fans are the people who make things like this happen by becoming project backers and by spreading the word through RTs on Twitter, Likes and Shares on Facebook, sending links to friends, and so on.
Join the ranks of people like Steve Niles, Rick Remender, ComicAttack.net, Bill Corbett, & Dave Dwonch and show Crazy Mary some love. Why? Because of the other word that goes along with “Kickstarter”: the one after “donation” and “backer” and “amount.”
I’m talking about “incentives” baby, and there are some great ones.
On top of things like having your name listed on the inside as a thank-you and receiving a 
signed copy, there are things like limited edition art prints and posters, shot glasses, cover gallery art books, commissions by the book’s artists, and most recently the mother of bad-ass one-of-a-kind collectibles for the right fan: an original page from the IDW miniseries Doctor Who/Star Trek due to hit shelves later this May will go to one lucky backer who supports the Crazy Mary Kickstarter effort!
Ah, incentives; because donating for the sake of supporting art and talented artists is a lot easier in these tough economic times when you get something awesome in return.
I want to see this Crazy Mary graphic novel happen and I want to see more of Mary 
herself. Maybe it’s because she reminds me a little of Typhoid Mary, who was also a step or two away from the Sane area of the playground and looked so cool with the whole 
half-painted-face thing going on. What’s with red-heads being cast as all looney? Is that a stereotype that I just wasn’t aware of; red-heads are supposedly batshit crazy-pants?
Hmmm…Well Poison Ivy is pretty wacky. Jean Grey has lost it a few times, too. 
The angel that Dean Winchester banged in the backseat of the Impala went all Glenn Close genocidal, and Detective Linden is at least a strawberry-blonde and everyone knows she’s spent some time walking around in elastic shoes.
Plus I was a red-head for a little over three years.
But then I’ve also had blonde, brunette, auburn, purple, blue-black with pink tips, black with a blue stripe and brown-black hair for various amounts of time, too.
Wait, what was I talking about again?
Crazy Mary graphic novel- right!
Well I’d suggest taking a look at the website after you scope out a few of the pages/images and the video I snagged for you. They have excellent previews of entire stories for you to enjoy and get a feel for the characters and the writing style, as well as bios and contact info for all the cool people involved that I talked about. So go look around at http://www.crazymarycomic.com before you head over to http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1164327580/crazy-mary-graphic-novel and become a backer.
Another fun thing to comb through would be artist J.K. Woodward’s blog about Crazy Mary, http://jkwoodwardart.blogspot.com/2011/12/crazy-mary.html which is filled with pictures of his works and descriptions of his process. Lastly I also recommend listening to the Crazy Mary interview on Comic Geek Speak, http://www.comicgeekspeak.com/episodes/comic_geek_speak-1521.php which can also be found on the Crazy Mary homepage.
So spread the word about this barmy broad and help make her messed up double-reality a part of our messed up single-reality while helping to make the whole world a better place by giving all of us something to look forward to whilst dying in the staggering heat that is the month of August!
Still Doing The Same Thing Over and Over
Expecting Different Results,
-Dianthrax
Info & Image Sources: http://www.crazymarycomic.com , http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1164327580/crazy-mary-graphic-novel , http://jkwoodwardart.blogspot.com/2011/12/crazy-mary.html , http://www.comicgeekspeak.com/episodes/comic_geek_speak-1521.php , http://crazymarycomic.com/wp-content/gallery . http://www.idwpublishing.com/news/article/2224/ , http://www.pinkraygun.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/totally-necessary-shot-of-deans-back.jpg , http://images.tvtome.com/tv/images/genie_images/story/2012_usa/k/killing_s2e1_linden.jpg , http://www.themarysue.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/GreenLady1-365×550.jpg , http://media.comicvine.com/uploads/0/40/1840327 mike_grell_marvel_girl_reflection_colored_comic_art_super.jpeg , http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lydnd9FZAR1r9yqvjo1_500.jpg
In Memorium of My Beloved Sabrina: A Tribute Video
My cat Sabrina died on Sunday April 15th.
This was what I wrote about how I felt at the time (with some help making my point,) It’s also a photo collage that I assembles, did some editing, played around with, dug up old photos for…you get it.
Then finally there’s a video tribute to her that I’ve been working hard on. It seemed important to get done for some reason…and it helped me not cry all the time by requiring me to focus on some internet work-like stuff.
But this is what’s been going on with me- why I’ve been such a slacker with my posts when I have so much I wanted to say. Now I just try and get through each day- one day at a time.
Anyway, I hope you like the tribute. Or at least the video. It was all made out of love.
My mom and I had been in Fresno and decided to come home Saturday night instead of Sunday night, otherwise I would’ve just found her dead. As it was I came home and she had been sick all over the living room. She came to the door to say hello to me as per usual, but when I fed her she couldn’t make it to her dish without limping. I brought the dish to her and figured it was a sore hip- arthritis, you know? She was, after all, about 15 years old.
She ate and once again I told me mom that I think someone thing’s wrong with her- that I thought she was sick and needs to go to the vet. My mom’s replay is that she’s “just old and sick and probably going to die soon.” This had basically been her reply every time I’d brought this up over the last few months regarding Sabrina’s deteriorating health. My mom wasn’t a big fan of pets- even though with my sister’s help, SHE was the one who picked out Sabrina because she had liked cats. She’d even made a few comments about her just “hurrying up and dying already” even though she knew it really upset me and pissed me off.
Somewhere along the line after my mom rescued her from the shelter, Sabrina became my cat. Everyone says they don’t know why, even though I’ve explained the reason why I think it happened that way.
Because I stayed up her first 5 or 6 nights in a row with the pathetic little kitten bed my mom made & expected her to sleep in, all alone, out in the cold living room up in my bed with me. I curled my arm and my comforter around her so that every time she woke up at 2 or 4am crying and freaked because she’s just a baby and suddenly in some unfamiliar place away from her siblings, I was right there to show her she wasn’t alone- that someone was protecting her and watching over her. I’d soothe her back to sleep no matter how long it took, even though I had to be up and go to school the next day. I explained this and still everyone complained about how I didn’t even pick her out- that I wouldn’t even go to the cat shelter to pick out the one we wanted (which they took to mean I didn’t care.) Part of that is true- I really didn’t care which cat they came home with; I knew I’d adore her and somehow I just knew that she was going to be mine.
Sabrina was an amazing cat- unlike any I’d known before. She wasn’t afraid of anything; she could sound as fierce as a tiger and she made sure no other cats dared to venture into the yard of our old house- it was her turf. I’d seen her make dogs 10 times her size turn and run.
You know those news stories about cats that save their owners by going all feral and crazily attacking a full-grown bear or some other large predator that wandered near the house and the attack is so swift and startling and frenzied that the bear ends up running away from the house-kitty? That’s the kind of cat Sabrina was; she had a wildness that never went away and I carry my scars with pride.
That doesn’t mean that she was in any way vicious or unfriendly or mean- quite the contrary. She was sweet and friendly and never once scratched or even put her ears back at my little nephew while he was running around, desperately trying to pet her. She loved being touched and cuddled and would scent-mark (rub her cheeks against) my face and neck and fall asleep right in your lap, purring up a storm.
Sabrina was so different, too. She loved rather than feared water and while I took baths she would push her way into the bathroom to walk around the edge of the tub and swipe at the water or sniff the bubbles or sometimes just sit there with me like she was reading over my shoulder. She loved to play and I bought and made toys of every type imaginable. We had these little mini-tennis balls- slightly smaller than a ping-pong ball and not terribly heavy but with a bit of heft to them. I’d roll or send them bounding out of the room and Sabrina would go tearing after them. Then a minute later she’d come trotting back with it in her tiny kitty mouth like it was no big deal, and drop it in my lap to throw again. I swear it was just like a dog playing fetch only without all the nasty slobber.
She was indoor/outdoor and needed to run and be free and patrol the surrounding area looking for fights (actually she mostly stayed in our front & back yards. Anyway…) but every night she always came inside. This is because inside is where the food dish lived, but even if it wasn’t time to come in or if she was already in the house and just hidden away in some nook somewhere, no matter where she was or what she was doing if I called her she always came to me. She only did this with me.
We had a language of purrs and chirps and meows and high-pitched tones that only she and I understood. I know it sounds stupid and you probably think I’m nuts for thinking I could speak cat. My family didn’t believe me and thought it was stupid too…until I stood in the driveway and showed them that at any time of day no matter what, if I called her she came to me every single time. That was why she never slept outside; I called her in to go to bed and she came up and got in with me. I could only demonstrate that part of it, but I knew by her meow if she was hungry or thirsty or hot or cold or bored and wanted to play, even when she wasn’t feeling well. I knew she had something wrong with her before we took her to the vet and she told us she had worms.
She knew how I felt too. When I was crying she came and wouldn’t leave me alone- kept jumping into my lap or on my stomach no matter how many times I pushed her off and told her to go away until I gave in and let her stay, and her cuddles and purrs always calmed me down and stopped my crying. When I was really depressed she’d do the same thing, and when I had surgery on my abdomen and was in a lot of pain she jumped up on the arm and walked along the back of the couch to get over to me and lay by me on my pillow. She went completely around my whole midsection; something she’d never done before, to get to my chest and neck for cuddles. It was awesome.
She was so special; my first cat. She was there for me for so much that I don’t think people understand what losing her has done to me.
For one thing I’ve never experienced grief or loss like this before. It’s like every second feels like I want to throw up all of my insides while tearing my skin off and screaming! I’ve been numb for so long- I don’t even remember the last time I really truly felt something with all of me. The closest feelings of happiness or joy I have like that are the births of my nieces and nephews, starting to seriously date someone I really like, and going to Comic-Con (before it go all lame and insane.) Those are probably some of, if not the only, happy times I’ve had, yet parts of them still don’t feel the way I remember joy is supposed to feel. It’s not supposed to have a dark haze around the edges like some fog-covered unreality that’s going to turn dark like the contrast on a screen at any moment. Is it? I remember a time when it didn’t.
Then there are these feelings: grief and loss.
I am totally not prepared for this!
Treating my depression with something as radical as ECT scared the crap out of me and I lost so, so much because of it. I can’t even begin to tell you how much I’ve lost and what that’s done to change me and the plans I had for my whole life. How I’m still discovering side-effects or ways in which my original side-effects have distorted aspects of my personality and life and daily living. Unless you’ve been through it, no one will ever understand what that damage does to a person.
Yet I’m here. And believe it or not this is considered better. The Novocain has worn off- I’m not numb to all of my emotions and the beautiful gift we call “living life” anymore. I feel everything.
I FEEL EVERYTHING!!
It’s not like going from black and white to color- it’s like going to a world made of fluorescence and neon signs so bright it makes your eyes bleed! People’s cruelty or insults don’t hurt my feelings- they devastate me! Oh, and I discovered that I have one Hell of a temper! I want to rip everyone to shreds who pisses me off! I want to ruin the lives of the assholes that hurt my friends, and I want to yell at my family for expecting me to do everything they want when they don’t know a Goddamn thing about me!! When they’ve poisoned me and could’ve killed me more than once because of their ignorance and laziness!
I want to yell and scream at my mom for sitting in her room watching The Lakers and doing nothing while I’m curled around the body of my dead cat on the living room floor, crying like I think I’ll never stop!
I was numb when my grandparents died and I loved them very, very much. But I was in the middle of my depression and I couldn’t feel anything like my sisters could. I had to create and read the Eulogy for my Gramie and I read it without so much as a tremble in my voice. At first they said they were impressed with my composure, but when I tried to explain how I wasn’t inconsolably upset because I couldn’t be- I just couldn’t feel it.- they called me a heartless freak. Because I never cried in front of them I didn’t love her as much as they did. Do they have any idea how very much I wanted to cry and hurt along with them?! How desperately I wanted to feel sadness for the loss of someone I loved so much?! I have a disease and that is a symptom- that’s what it is and I have no more control over it than a Diabetic does over his own damn insulin production!! Aren’t you supposed to have some fucking understanding for people who are sick and suffering?? I was so hopeless and sedated and miserable and being punished for it.
No one even knows how many times that cat had saved my life. She seemed to know when things were the worst with me and she’d jump in my lap and wouldn’t leave me alone until I lost my window of opportunity or changed my mind.
“Who would take care of me once you’re dead and gone?” She’d look at me with little angel face and seemed to say “Don’t leave me here with these people; I’m your cat dammit!”
Knowing my family she’s probably end up at a shelter or something, never getting adopted, eventually put to sleep- just like me. She didn’t sign on for that. How could I look in her big green eyes and condemn her to death? There were times when I came close, but I never could. She loved me and saved me and last Sunday I couldn’t do that for her when she needed me to.
I feel asleep on the couch and after a bit noticed her nosing at the edge of it, but she couldn’t jump up. By the time I reached for her she was under the table a few feet away where she likes to sleep. So I dosed off again and didn’t think much of it.
When I woke up an hour or so later to get some water I saw her lying on her side by the sliding glass door, mouth open, panting a bit, but her chest barely moving. I dropped my water and went over to her and started petting her and talking to her- and I saw she wasn’t panting, she was gagging. I lay flat with my face near hers and she tried to meow and roll when she saw me, but only the faintest of sounds came out and she couldn’t roll. I started crying. I yelled “help!” several times to my mom but she was watching basketball in her bedroom and either “didn’t hear me (fucking unlikely) or just didn’t care or want to be bothered by/deal with it.
I lay down with my cat and told her I loved her and petted all her favorite spots: her soft chest and ears and forehead down to the bridge of her nose and cried the whole time. I kissed her and stayed right next to her and saw her beautiful green eyes disappear behind huge black pupils. She made one last gasping sound and then she stopped moving. My beautiful Sabrina just lay there staring at nothing. I tried to close her eyes but I couldn’t do it.
I stayed right there, just like that and cried like I don’t remember crying in years. I don’t know how long we stayed with me holding her to me like that but it was long enough for her tiny body and its soft grey fur to get cold. I remember my mom looked at me from down the hall very briefly. She saw us like that and said “Oh no.” Then she walked away. She walked away and left me there, going from her bedroom into mine and a minute later her usual cheers and curses that accompany a Laker game on TV resumed.
She also stepped over both of us in order to get through the glass door to go outside. Bitch.
I can’t remember crying like this- hurting like this.
Oh God- I can’t fucking take this!! I take it all back- I want to be numb again!
Please make me be numb again- I can’t handle this neon-green grief that burns and burns and fills me up with bile until I want to cut my insides out and pull them onto the floor so I can stomp them until there’s no feeling left inside me!
My head aches constantly from all the crying and congestion and my eyes feel like they’re alternately going to burst out of my sockets with the pressure, or wither up and dry out like crusty, puss-covered raisins. It’s not right for one person to cry so much and to make these sounds! Keening and gasping, this choking broken sobbing sound can’t be coming from inside of me, or any human being for that matter! Why won’t it just stop!?
我想昧耳，昧心，變石頭・我想昧耳，昧心，变石头 !
I can hear my baby kitty’s least breath playing in my head over and over and over like some horrid broken record. It was a death-rattle; an actual, real-life death-rattle. I’d heard about them and read about them but never actually heard one, you know? It’s that last shuddering breath dying forces out of the lungs of someone you love while you watch the light just go out in her eyes. I’d read and heard about that too; seeing the light leave a person’s eyes as they die. Well now I know what it looks like; that exact moment when she goes from seeing you and looking up into your face right there- right fucking there in front of her- to suddenly seeing nothing. It’s just a silent, blank stare that will never see anything at all ever again.
She died right by the doorway- I have to see it every day. I can’t go to sleep at night without seeing it. I’m going to sleep alone forever and the night before she died I was too fucking lazy to pick her up and put her in my lap when I noticed she couldn’t jump up in it.
The last night I would have had with her and I was too tired and rejected her.
I’ll never get over that.
My lungs are on fire and I’m coughing, curled up in bed taking basically a Soma holiday and trying to forget the world. It’s not too hard- my mom isn’t really speaking to me. She didn’t even say goodnight the other night. My sisters each sent a text saying “sorry about your dead cat” the day it happened. Then a day after that I get a picture message from one of them of this Hello Kitty cake she baked with her new pan she just bought online and my other sister and all my cousin’s ooo-ing and aahh-ing over how cute it is. Hoo-fucking-ray for you Mel! A Hello Kitty cake is EXACTLY what I want to see right now! Maybe you could make it grey instead of white, put Sabrina’s name on it, and then all the kids can make like Chris Brown and smash it!
Be sure to take a picture of that and send it to me.
I literally have no one so I turned off my phone. Why bother when no one has anything decent to say? My closest friends are atheists and while I know they care about me what are they going to say that would make me feel better in even the slightest way? “Sorry your cat died and your whole making-a-headstone-for-her and having that little funeral service thing you’re planning is foolish because there’s no God and no afterlife and she isn’t chasing butterflies in some iconic cat heaven; she’s just ceased to exist”? They’d never say that but I know what they’re all thinking & what they believe and there’s no comfort to be found there. Sympathy, sensitivity and love- but no real solidarity or understanding. Which I don’t hold against them and I’m still unendingly grateful for each one of them that I have in my life. They are my real family.
I don’t know how to design this stupid headstone! Doesn’t a person ever freaking run out of tears? Christ…
You see, this is what happens whenever things start to go ok for me for a while; when the other shoe finally drops it lands on & kills my fucking cat!
Sabrina- you were a perfect example of the best kind of cat anyone could ever hope to have for a pet. I’ll miss you every day. This is for you:
R.I.P. Beana
A Titanium Rain Change, Crazy Mary, & Grieving for The Dead
A Few Updates:
Above is a link to a news article about the audio comic of Titanium Rain Vol. !; an amazing graphic novel/ comic book series by Josh Finney and Kat Rocha. I reviewed it a while ago for a couple of comic book news websites; here is a link to one such review so that you can get an idea of what I’m talking about & 
what the audio version would be like:
http://www.metalmachine.net/blog/2012/01/21/finney-rocha-titanium-rain/
But you can check out some info about it and other awesome audio works at This Is AudioComics
You’ll also be getting some info 
very soon about some chick called “Crazy Mary” & her kickstarter campaign with all of it’s donor benefits. Visit the Crazy Mary website to learn more & keep watch for updates from me…maybe even an interview…anything can happen!
One last thing- I haven’t forgotten about The Walking Dead & 
my reviews or image galleries; I’m just still grieving over the end of season 2 and the 7-month dry spell ahead before season 3 even comes close to premiering. I figure we all need time to grieve so they’ll be up when I’m ready and I feel like you 
guys are too; hope you stick with me until then because I do have some pretty cool things to share.
But I do miss it; I think I’m even getting withdrawals…
The other day I was reading a 2-page newspaper advertisement for a sporting goods store with tons of little pictures all over it of everything from hunting gear to yoga mats. After about 10 minutes of looking I realized I was mentally cataloging all the items that I would want with me during the Zombie Apocalypse!
(Binoculars? yes. Night-vision periscope? Oh yes. Steel-toe workman’s boots? Yup. Boxing gloves and bag? Not so much) and so on, just like that, in my head. I’ll probably do it with next week’s paper, too.
Sometimes even I find myself disturbing.
Update Concluded:
Dianthrax Out.
Additional Info/Image Sources: http://01publishing.com/ http://www.glitchwerk.com/titanium/about.htm http://crazymarycomic.com/ The AMC Press Resource Center
The Walking Dead: Season 2 Episode 11 Review
The Walking Dead:
Season 2 Episode 11 Review
*Warning: The same old stuff- episode spoilers, mature language, graphic content, etc. etc.- so proceed at your own risk.*
There’s something about episode #11 in a 13 episode season that feels different from 9 or 12. I think it’s that the countdown to something going off is usually from 3. (Except for countdowns from 10; like NASA launches and New Year’s Eve.) When you were a kid you counted to three before you jumped in the pool from the high diving-board or raced your best friend just to know who was faster. In Mario Kart it’s always 3-2-1-Go, and when you were in trouble your parents said things like “If you aren’t over here cleaning this up by the time I count to three I’m throwing away all of your Legos!!” For whatever reason three is the magic number that seems to perfectly fit the interval of time required to prepare for that green light- that jump into the pool.
It’s also this big symbolic deal thing in numerology and mysticism and like, virtually every religion there is.
And it has its own “School House Rock” song all about it.
But coming back and bringing my original point with me; episode 11 feels like the first step in the countdown to dropping the nuke and obliterating everything we’ve come to know about these characters and their world. I know this is episode 3 in the 3, 2, 1- season over, so it should feel that way. I never got that feeling at any point while watching the first season; obviously not when only three episodes remained out of 6 episodes total, but just in general it never felt like this to me at any point. I didn’t have this increasing anxiety that each of the last three episodes is a step closer to devastation.
With that I give you my take on Step #1:
We learn a great deal about all of the main characters in this episode as far as who they really are as people and what they’re capable of. It starts with a bit of the old, squirrel-tossing Daryl coming out to play for a while in order to get information out of Randall, who is chained up in what must be the smelliest barn in history. He bloodies up his knuckles and takes out that giant freaking knife of his to threaten to re-open Randy’s nasty leg boo-boo, but eventually the kid gave up the info. It is not good news. A giant group of heavily armed men who go out “scavenging” for supplies and should the opportunity present itself, occasionally force fathers to watch while they gang-rape his teenage daughters. Oh but Randall would never do such a thing! He never laid a hand on those girls- he just watched.
I think Daryl should’ve saved everyone a whole lot of trouble and just killed the little fucker right there. He’s as much of a rapist as whoever he was with since he let it happen when he could’ve done something to stop it. And I can hear the argument now: “How do you know he could’ve done anything? He was out-numbered and I’m sure they were armed- if he tried to stop them he probably would have been killed!”
Well then he should have died.
If he couldn’t stop them without managing to get killed by them then he isn’t smart enough to survive. If they would kill him or shoot it out rather than stop raping a girl if he stood his ground and threatened to kill some or all of them then he can’t trust them and isn’t really safe with that group anyway. And if they would threaten to hurt/kill the girls or the father or call him a traitor with no loyalty to his own group then he only has two possible futures anyway: become a monster like the rest of them and assimilate or eventually be killed over something awful enough that he can’t ignore it.
I don’t buy that he couldn’t do anything- I don’t think he wanted to do anything. I think he’s sadistic and manipulative and all this talk over being innocent and just trying to survive is bullshit. For those of you who believe in that sort of thing, the Bible claims “So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.” James 4:17
But my summation of choice for how I see this situation comes in the form of a quote from one of my favorite movies:
“Now, we must all fear evil men. But there is another kind of evil which we must fear most, and that is the indifference of good men.” (Btw- 100 Super-Awesome Points to those of you who can tell me the name of the film in the “comments” section! 
This notion is important and brought up later in the episode, too.
After telling the rest of the group what he learned (except for the teenage rape story), Daryl, Rick, and all the others were pretty set on executing the guy rather than risking his release. Dale is the lone voice of dissent and convinces Rick to give him until sundown to talk to the other people in the group and look at other options before they kill a person who, for all they know, could be innocent. He has several very impassioned conversations with Shane, Daryl, Hershel, and Andrea before everyone gathers together in the farmhouse living room to have a group discussion and vote.
I particularly enjoyed Dale’s talk with Daryl; it made me happy that someone other than 
Carol showed they care about him. Saying that he’d have to do more than just move his tent away from the rest of camp if he wanted to “get away” from them was a surprise to me coming from Dale- up until that point I hadn’t realized anyone else actually noticed Daryl as a person, let alone as one they weren’t willing to lose. He still doesn’t think his opinion counts for anything and that no one looks to him, claiming he’s better off on his own. When Dale disagrees and says that he and Rick are decent men while Shane isn’t, I don’t think he was prepared to hear that Daryl figured out what happened with Otis a long time ago and, more importantly, that Rick did too- he just didn’t want to admit it to himself. Daryl says the group is broken. Dale looks a bit broken himself after that little exchange.
I think he counted on Hershel backing him up since he was such a religious man, but Hershel surprised both Dale and me by saying he didn’t want Randall anywhere near his daughters and that he was leaving the whole thing up to Rick. (Since the guy is a creep and a rapist I’d say Hershel has good reason for feeling the way he does.) Though where he is now compared to where he was when we first met him in the season, Hershel has such vastly different morals and convictions! It’s like all of his confidence has been squashed out and he doesn’t trust himself not to let everyone down again by making the wrong choice, so he doesn’t make any choices and leaves everything up to Rick. This isn’t something he can just shake off, either- meaning Dale couldn’t count on his support to stop an execution of a possibly innocent man on his own land.
Satan was snowboarding in Hell because Dale even approaches Shane to plead his case and *gasp* Shane was actually pretty reasonable about the whole thing. There’s a particularly important bit where in arguing the numbers: 12 of them and 1 of him but 30 of his gang, Dale tells Shane “killing him doesn’t change that; but it changes us.” Killing this one man won’t really make them any safer- it wont make a difference when it comes to the threat of attack by an armed gang- but it will make them less than what they were. It will diminish the humanity of the group in an irreparable way.
However Shane is certain that this is the right choice to make. If they spare Randall- let him join the group, see if he’s useful and maybe even a nice guy- one day he will kill someone, and that will be blood on Dale’s hands. It isn’t a matter of convenience or just being ruthless- Shane truly thinks that Dale is wrong. Yet he agrees to back him up if he can get the whole group to share his opinion on the matter. That’s a whole lot more than I ever would’ve expected from Shane. Honestly that whole conversation was more than I expected from him.
I think maybe Shane’s going to kick it at the end of the season and this is the start of a campaign to make him into less of a psycho and more of a good guy so that he doesn’t die a creep and a villain. I’d even go so far as to say that I think he might die in order to save someone else- like Carl or Lori or my favorite, Rick. That would be cheese-tastic!
I think Hershel is going to bite it as well- though I’ve said that before. Giving the watch to Glenn felt a bit like his character was having his affairs put in order- wrapping up his loose ends in the sense of making sure Maggie has a good man to “take care of her.” One who also cares about and will help her look after her little sister once he’s gone and there’s no one else to do it. At the same time he’s also letting Glenn (and therefore Maggie) know that they have his blessing/approval as a couple, in case he never gets the chance to tell her so outright. It may have seemed a bit lame and contrived to some of you but I thought it was a nice way to cover an important moment in the progression of those three characters.
It felt real, too, because of Steven Yeun’s portrayal Glenn’s surprise and awkwardness and not really knowing what to say or do in that situation. I mean the guy is given a very precious and meaningful family heirloom and he says “thanks” like he was just given a bag of Doritos! I’d have gone with something like “thank you, sir” at the very least! There’s totally no breaking up with her now, either! For all intents and purposes Glenn just got married to the farmer’s daughter, and in this world you have to fight tooth and nail for a divorce- literally- because the only way out of a marriage is if one of you fails to fend off the teeth and nails of the walkers!
Another important character we get a good look into the nature of is Carl Grimes, who’s always somehow in the story and important to it, yet still manages to be peripheral. We see what this world and all this loss and death and violence has been doing to him because you just know it’s gotta be turning him into a little psycho! Virtually all serial killers have violent, abusive childhoods and I’d say that’s not a poor description of Carl’s life lately. He’s been showing little signs of coldness and detachment and this episode we saw some real creep-factor behavior on his part.
First I’d have to mention how he was sitting in the barn, looking down at Randall in chains like he wasn’t a person. Randall starts talking; appealing to Carl’s concern for safety for him and his family, his sense of mercy, and trying to seem like a nice guy. Carl looks at him without a response, as though he couldn’t hear a word the guy was saying. He stared at him the way people who don’t like animals stare at some exotic creature in a zoo- curious and interested but without any emotional involvement or sympathy. He’s so empty in those moments that it seems almost fake for him to be afraid of getting in trouble with his parents when Shane catches him. It’s a great way to show that while he has this morbid, developing darker side he’s still just a kid.
I can understand him lashing out at Carol; anger is a stage of grief. I can even understand playing around at Daryl’s campsite while he’s away. There probably isn’t much for him to do and for a young boy Daryl would have some really cool stuff. He’s like the older step-brother whose room you’re never allowed to go into or you’ll get your ass kicked, which means, of course, that you have to see what’s in there so you sneak in while he’s not home & just try not to move/break anything so that he never knows you were there. Only Carl doesn’t seem to get that last part- the not wanting him to know you were ever there part- because while playing with the super-sweet motorcycle that would give Daryl a stroke if he caught him touching, he just pockets a gun that was stashed in there.
First of all, if there’s anyone at camp that you do not want to steal from or piss off, it’s Daryl. Second, you might get away with maybe taking a knife or one of the animal skins, but a gun is something that is going to be missed. Third, that gun was there for a reason- what if Daryl is on his motorcycle and counting on having it to save his ass, then reaches in and finds that someone has stolen it?! Fourth- it’s stealing! What the Hell is wrong with you?! You steal a gun from someone when guns are “worth more than gold” then like a retard, you lose it!
So is carrying a stolen gun to go for a stroll in the woods the substitute for stealing your dad’s cigarettes to smoke with your friends? You know- the stupid shit kids do to feel like grown-ups? Because it didn’t seem like he had any plan in particular in mind while on his little hike. It was more like he wanted to do what the grown men do and not be afraid to go into a dangerous area because he can protect himself with his stolen gun. Or at least that was the idea when he found the walker stuck in the mud.
As soon as he stopped the more appropriate running away in order to do the far more 
disturbing staring and throwing of rocks I knew that walker was going to get out of the mud and go for him. My other thought was that Carl must really, really, really want to shoot someone/thing. Think about it: if he puts down the walker with a gunshot the whole camp is going to hear it. Not to mention other walkers in the area; aren’t they supposed to be drawn by loud noises?? Everyone is worried about a gang of armed men coming to the farm and attacking them, so if all the adults are accounted for and Daryl gets back from hunting and says it wasn’t him, who do you suppose they’ll think is shooting in the woods? That would surely speed up Randall’s “trial”! Plus for all we know that gang actually could have scouts or something nearby who hear the shot and because of it, find the camp!
But as soon as that shot goes off Lori and Rick will want to know where Carl is and when they can’t find him right away they’ll have everyone searching around camp for him. It’s not going to be possible for him to just sneak back out of the woods without someone seeing him and telling Rick and Lori, who will want to know what he was doing out there. He’ll probably be so excited about shooting his first walker that he’ll tell them everything; including the little detail about how he used the gun he stole from Daryl after he found it while going through his things. But no matter what his parents are going to find out about all of it and then his ass is toast- and none of this occurred to him because he’s a kid and wants to be an adult and he really wanted to shoot something.
He also wants to hear the group debate over the fate of Randall, but he isn’t allowed. That’s a bit of a shame because Dale was simply amazing. Jeffrey DeMunn was captivating, arguing with so much passion and feeling and eloquence. It was like watching the play “12 Angry Men” (or when I was in it “12 Angry Jurors” since there were chicks involved) and Dale is Juror #8- the single “not-guilty” vote trying to convince a room full of people who were so set in their “guilty” verdict that they thought there wasn’t even any need to discuss the matter. Dale pleads so effectively and with such sound arguments that you almost find yourself changing from “guilty” to “undecided” in Randall’s case. Then Carol speaks up, proclaiming that she just wants the arguing to stop and for someone to decide, but either way to leave her out because she wants no part of it.
Dale tells her “Not speaking out, or killing him yourself; there’s no difference.”
Really Dale? Then by your own logic you’re arguing to save the life of a violent sex offender- a man who is, by your definition, a rapist, ephebophile, and a sadist. (Here is where that whole doing-nothing-to-stop-someone-from-committing-an-atrocity-makes-you-just-as-guilty-as-them thing comes in.)
But the only person who heard that story and knows what a piece of trash this guy is won’t say anything and claims not to care: Daryl. Maybe that wouldn’t make a difference to Dale.
No one is in agreement with Dale- not even Glenn who is usually on his side in everything. I thought it was interesting when Glenn says “he’s not one of us.” What defines “us” versus “them” to the group now? It used to be just the living and the dead, but Rick said things changed when the living started trying to kill them too. Obviously Hershel and his people are among the “us” even though Otis was expendable. I’d be curious to hear how Glenn defines the two and when exactly Hershel’s people became a part of the “us” group.
Another surprise comes when Andrea speaks up in agreement with Dale, though it doesn’t matter since everyone else is still all for offing Randy. Dale is disgusted and asks if they’re going to watch too; then saying “no, you’ll hide in your tents and pretend we aren’t slaughtering a human being.” I thought that would be an interesting concept; saying that everyone who votes to execute Randall also has to watch that execution be carried out. No one can cast a vote to end someone’s life then pretend they had nothing to do with it while Rick, Shane, and Daryl do the real dirty work. In one of my favorite sci-fi book series the main character becomes a politician and makes some really radical social changes. One of them deals with the death penalty and forces the sentence to be carried out by a family member of the victim. So if a guy rapes and kills a girl & is found guilty, that girl’s mother or father or husband etc. has to be the one to shoot the guy in the head in a public execution. That way the family gets their own brand of justice & the government isn’t responsible. That’s because if the person can’t carry out the execution- if they just can’t do it- then it doesn’t happen.
I think they should’ve done something like that for Randall. Everyone who votes for his death has to watch and has their name put in a hat to randomly decide who has to be the one to do it. I think it may be more difficult for people to vote if they knew it meant they had to watch the kid beg and cry for his life, and even more so if they knew it could possibly mean they had to be the one to pull the trigger. If they can’t stand to see it or can’t make themselves do it, maybe it’s because they know it’s wrong? Personally I wouldn’t have a problem with it- mostly because I would’ve killed him a long freaking time ago- like back when he was Shish Kabob-ed on a fence- without him seeing it coming or asking for a group vote.
He’s taken out to the barn and about to be blown away when probably the only thing that could possibly make Rick stop actually happened- Carl went all uber-creepy and snuck away to watch them kill the guy and urging his dad to do it. I knew there was no chance 
Rick was doing it then and he tells Daryl to take him away.
Just like I knew something bad was going to happen when I saw Dale out by himself in a field at night.
Sure enough there was a still-living but completely eviscerated cow lying in the grass, 
which is seldom a sign of imminent safety. Dale turns and is pounced on by the nasty shirtless walker with no eyelids who doesn’t manage to bite him but does tear open his abdomen and create a hubcap sized hole in him before Daryl gets there and stabs the thing in the head.
A few notes/questions on this situation- what made the walker stop eating the cow to creep up on Dale? Shouldn’t he have been in a feeding frenzy and thus distracted? The walkers eating that horse Rick rode into the city on in season one didn’t stop eating in order to chase him, even though you would think human is preferable to animal. In fact that was how he was able to get away; so why did this walker leave his tasty living cow meal when he should’ve been distracted and all up in that shit?
Also, for those who wonder about how the walker was able to rip Dale open like he was a birthday piñata I have a theory that explains that in great detail in my article “Talking The Dead to Death.” Check it out if you’re curious about zombie super-human strength.
And finally; what the fuck was up with Daryl sharpening his knife while he has Randall all tied up and gagged and hanging by his wrists from the ceiling with no shirt on in some secluded part of the barn?? I mean, obviously I know what that’s about but what I don’t get is why that scene is put in there at all? Implying that Daryl is going to torture Randall to death after laying all this groundwork to show that he’s a good man makes no sense to me! I thought the whole thing was stupid, especially since they had him be the one to find him, kill the walker, call for help, and be the one to “put Dale out of 
his misery” immediately afterwards!
You knew there was no saving him but they needed Hershel there to tell say it and make it true, otherwise he wouldn’t have been there. None of the other people from the farm were present, but every single member of “our” group of 
survivors was there for Dale’s final moments; even Carl who was told to go into the house. Of course Carl also had to be there in order to see that it was the walker he failed to kill and pissed off enough for him to free himself from the mud- the walker he knew was out roaming the woods and didn’t tell anyone about in order to avoid getting in trouble- that killed Dale, making it his fault. But it was also worth noting that the entire group was gathered together and present when they lost another one of their own. Rick couldn’t bring himself to end his friend’s suffering, so Daryl has a very emotional moment with Dale, who puts his forehead up against the barrel of his gun and urging Daryl to do it, so he says “sorry brother” and pulls the trigger.
Dale was the voice of reason and morality in the group. He kept them from veering too far off course and forgetting the kind of people that they are and want to be- and now his voice is gone.
Their Yoda is dead and strong the temptation of The Dark Side is…
Second step- episode #12- this Sunday at 9.
Not Spending My Life Trying to Conquer Time,
-Dianthrax
Info/Image Sources: the AMC Press Resource Center, AMC networks
*Sorry for the lack of an image gallery. I hope to upload more episode 11 images very soon, after I finish editing them.*
