Carmine Falcone is an interesting character in the history of Batman villains. The story he was first created for, Year One, he's theoretically the Big Bad but really a back ground character mostly, Leob and Flass are the more direct antagonists just as Gordon is the real protagonist.
The Long Halloween fleshes him out some, drawing on Godfather imagery, but he's still not much of a Supervillian there, the story is ultimately about his demise.
In Batman Begins Nolan based him on very modern depictions of crime bosses, his name being Italian didn't influence how he was written much at all.
Gotham marks the first time I know of in which we really see the character at a time that isn't just as his empire is about to fall to the advent of the freaks. Yet the dialogue of the show constantly acted like he was about to fall anyway, everyone thinks he's become old and soft and weak.
At the end of Viper I like many others I'm sure thought of The Godfather seeing him in that hat feeding pigeons. It was an interesting contrast as Maroni has a more Goodfellas/Casino vibe.
As of the end of Penguin's Umbrella we realize that indeed this Falcone is not an old push over yet. He and Oswald are going to be quite formidable.
And of course I now find myself thinking of Paul Feval's Colonel Bozzo-Corona from The Blackcoats.
I find it very unlikely that's intentional, that the writers of this show are familiar with the Novels published by BlackCoatPress.
Part of it is because of The Godfather imagery, The Colonel is compared to Vito Corleone often, but I've always found that a very superficial comparison, The Colonel is much more Evil then either Vito or Michael. And his level of respectability in society is well beyond what Vito has in Part I, more like what Michael's trying o achieve with the Imobolari deal in Part III.
Gotham's status as a Prequel where we know Gordon will fail which we've talked about before. Now I'm realizing how that's similar to everything Stableford said about Feval's decision to make Prequel novels with Salem Street and The Invisible Woman, where continuity demanded none of the Habit Noirs we know from the prior Novels will be brought down.
And now I'm really loving that, this Falcone will be like The Colonel. People will keep trying to bring him down but they never will. And Oswald I'm thinking could be his Lecoq.
Wednesday, November 5, 2014
Tuesday, November 4, 2014
Gotham Penguin's Umbrella reaction
I didn't live Tweet at all yesterday. I don't have a Mobile so I can't really do it like most people do, I generally just do it during commercials. I can only do it at all if it's a show I watch with the rest of my family.
This episode was awesome Seventh episode twist.
Now that Gordon and Montoya are on the same side that triangle should become much more bearable.
Zass being a hitman for Falcone is something they borrowed form Begins.
Oswald is proving to be a magnificent little bastard. This should be fun.
This episode was awesome Seventh episode twist.
Now that Gordon and Montoya are on the same side that triangle should become much more bearable.
Zass being a hitman for Falcone is something they borrowed form Begins.
Oswald is proving to be a magnificent little bastard. This should be fun.
Friday, October 31, 2014
Well, Today is my Birthday
I don't have anything special planned, probably watch some monster movies latter.
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
Thoughts on Pretty Little Liars and Ezria
I'm not an Ezria Shipper, I watch PLL for the Slash ships.
But I have been someone who was, (before the Ezra as -A mislead) never offended by the relationship.
First of all it annoys me to no end when the word "Pedophile" gets misused. Pedophile refers to attraction to prepubescent children. It's not a synonym for Statutory Rape.
Statutory Rape laws are needed, but they are perhaps too simplistically written, situations need to be considered on a case by case basis. For most of human history a relationship between a woman in her late teens and an older man was perfectly normal. That so many people think it should be condemned now without exception is just ridiculous to me.
I keep hearing "A teacher is a position of authority" and that just reminds me how I hate the modern Pubic School system, because for most of history it was not. A Teacher used to be an employee, and if the student demonstrated a failure to learn by getting a bad grade, he failed at his job. There was no authority in the job at all.
Aria did always have the agency in the relationship, and at times she did seem more mature then Ezra.
While they were misleading us to Ezra being -A, the show was kind of at it's best, because Ian Harding made a very entertaining villain. And the tension with Spencer and Aria was great. And the Noir Episode was awesomeness.
But I also knew full well that they were gonna back out of it, and when they did they would be stuck in an inescapable corner. Because I also knew they would certainly try to redeem Ezra.
So many people hate the show trying to Redeem him now. "Getting shot doesn't take away what he did". Well to people who invested in that romance for 3.5 years this retcon (that is incompatible with many facts from early on) doesn't take away all of that.
And what Ezra is guilty of is exaggerated, if they'd paid attention they'd know he was not aware of -A the whole time. The full on surveillance was only going on during season 4.
The book reveal makes no sense with the extremeness of how we saw Ezra behaving, but that's fine, the show is contrived melodrama and that's what I love about it.
I just wish they'd done one thing differently. Keep Ezra having the past relationship with Ali, and knowing about the other liars from her, and coming to Rosewood for the intent for investigating and writing the Book. But still have him not know that was Aria at the Bar, still allow that one moment to be just a coincidence. It would still make him very shady from what happens latter on, but allow enough of the sort of innocence of how their romance started to remain.
Thing I like about the reveal in the season 4 finale of how he and Ali met, which I don't think many others noticed. Is it parallels the original scene of Ezra and Aria meeting. Ali does kind of the exact same thing Aria did.
People overlook that Aria didn't know that would be her teacher but certainly did know that was an older guy, and deliberately withheld information that might have discouraged an older man from making out with her in the bathroom.
What I've always liked about Aria is how she is in a strange way the most exactly like Alison of the Liars. Hanna has her looks, Emily has her Heart (which she usually hides) Spencer has her Brain, but Aria has the same Soul. Aria is Vivian Darkbloom.
But I have been someone who was, (before the Ezra as -A mislead) never offended by the relationship.
First of all it annoys me to no end when the word "Pedophile" gets misused. Pedophile refers to attraction to prepubescent children. It's not a synonym for Statutory Rape.
Statutory Rape laws are needed, but they are perhaps too simplistically written, situations need to be considered on a case by case basis. For most of human history a relationship between a woman in her late teens and an older man was perfectly normal. That so many people think it should be condemned now without exception is just ridiculous to me.
I keep hearing "A teacher is a position of authority" and that just reminds me how I hate the modern Pubic School system, because for most of history it was not. A Teacher used to be an employee, and if the student demonstrated a failure to learn by getting a bad grade, he failed at his job. There was no authority in the job at all.
Aria did always have the agency in the relationship, and at times she did seem more mature then Ezra.
While they were misleading us to Ezra being -A, the show was kind of at it's best, because Ian Harding made a very entertaining villain. And the tension with Spencer and Aria was great. And the Noir Episode was awesomeness.
But I also knew full well that they were gonna back out of it, and when they did they would be stuck in an inescapable corner. Because I also knew they would certainly try to redeem Ezra.
So many people hate the show trying to Redeem him now. "Getting shot doesn't take away what he did". Well to people who invested in that romance for 3.5 years this retcon (that is incompatible with many facts from early on) doesn't take away all of that.
And what Ezra is guilty of is exaggerated, if they'd paid attention they'd know he was not aware of -A the whole time. The full on surveillance was only going on during season 4.
The book reveal makes no sense with the extremeness of how we saw Ezra behaving, but that's fine, the show is contrived melodrama and that's what I love about it.
I just wish they'd done one thing differently. Keep Ezra having the past relationship with Ali, and knowing about the other liars from her, and coming to Rosewood for the intent for investigating and writing the Book. But still have him not know that was Aria at the Bar, still allow that one moment to be just a coincidence. It would still make him very shady from what happens latter on, but allow enough of the sort of innocence of how their romance started to remain.
Thing I like about the reveal in the season 4 finale of how he and Ali met, which I don't think many others noticed. Is it parallels the original scene of Ezra and Aria meeting. Ali does kind of the exact same thing Aria did.
People overlook that Aria didn't know that would be her teacher but certainly did know that was an older guy, and deliberately withheld information that might have discouraged an older man from making out with her in the bathroom.
What I've always liked about Aria is how she is in a strange way the most exactly like Alison of the Liars. Hanna has her looks, Emily has her Heart (which she usually hides) Spencer has her Brain, but Aria has the same Soul. Aria is Vivian Darkbloom.
Monday, October 27, 2014
Gotham Goat Reactions
Tweets first
@JasonColavito Actually my overall theory could work without the Vleikvoskly connection
0 replies
0 retweets
0 favorites
@FlashTVTalk @GothamPodcast @xoMalese @CW_TheFlash THAT IS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! @hhoagie #Gaytham #booradleyvancullen @GothamPodcast
0 replies
0 retweets
2 favorites
0 replies
16 retweets
23 favorites
Jared Welch retweeted
The CW has cast @xoMalese in the role of #LindaPark for @CW_TheFlash! - http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=56635 … #TheFlash
The first two have nothing to do with Gotham actually, but it's something I feel like celebrating.
Nygma is an awkward creeper, this isn't gonna work out well
Oswald and his mother have a Creepy Norman Bates vibe going for them.
Female hypnotist supervillian, that is literally one of my Fetishes.
Montoya and Barbara are getting more believable
Selina Kyle is totaly going on Padme on Bruce
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
Gotham episode 5 reaction
I didn't tweet much during this episode because I was sleepy
This episode was good, I suspect the Venom connection early one.
Wednesday, October 15, 2014
Rocambole in London
For now I decided to skip Volume 2 of Basil Balian's abridged Rocambole translations and go right to volume 3 with his London adventures.
The first story in the Volume was really the epilogue to Rocambole's India adventure. It was amusing.
The summery of the Rocambole saga on CoolFrenchComics is sometimes misleading. Part of it may be how abridged this Translation is. But I take notice that Jeon-Marc seems to want to encourage people to compare these characters to Iconic Modern characters, in ways that may or may not be accurate. In the case of this first story, they describe The Beautiful Gardiner (Romia) in a way makes her sound kind of like Poison Ivy.
I did my post that talked about the Strong Female characters of Ponson and Feval. Now that I've read this there are more I could add. Vanda, Romia, but most of all Ellen Palmure. At least in the first book of the London trilogy she is a really intriguing character. The way her character completely changes at the end is kind of hard to swallow. A problem that faces many female villains when they make a Heel-Face turn.
One of the main things I was looking forward to reading about was Reverend Peters Town. Who's called Bishop Towne in this translation. He's been called a sort of Protestant counterpart to Eugene Sue's Father Rodin. Thing is, he's not actually clever enough to fit that analogy I feel. It's always a different Villain who actually seems to be a match for Rocambole's ingenuity. Towne is maybe more comparable to Father D'Aigrigny, Rodin's superior.
Rocambole was a character who started out a villain. What's interesting here is that while operating as part of this Irish Resistance in London he kind of seems effectively like he's a Supervillain again in terms of his tactics. Comparable to Anime characters like Lelouch Vi Britannia.
Feval and Ponson both wanted to play on French reader's tendency to sympathize with the Irish under British occupation, but Ponson was willing to go much further. Because Feval still had Fergus O'Breanne and Henri Belcamp as villains rather then heroes.
There are flaws, but overall I recommend it.
The first story in the Volume was really the epilogue to Rocambole's India adventure. It was amusing.
The summery of the Rocambole saga on CoolFrenchComics is sometimes misleading. Part of it may be how abridged this Translation is. But I take notice that Jeon-Marc seems to want to encourage people to compare these characters to Iconic Modern characters, in ways that may or may not be accurate. In the case of this first story, they describe The Beautiful Gardiner (Romia) in a way makes her sound kind of like Poison Ivy.
I did my post that talked about the Strong Female characters of Ponson and Feval. Now that I've read this there are more I could add. Vanda, Romia, but most of all Ellen Palmure. At least in the first book of the London trilogy she is a really intriguing character. The way her character completely changes at the end is kind of hard to swallow. A problem that faces many female villains when they make a Heel-Face turn.
One of the main things I was looking forward to reading about was Reverend Peters Town. Who's called Bishop Towne in this translation. He's been called a sort of Protestant counterpart to Eugene Sue's Father Rodin. Thing is, he's not actually clever enough to fit that analogy I feel. It's always a different Villain who actually seems to be a match for Rocambole's ingenuity. Towne is maybe more comparable to Father D'Aigrigny, Rodin's superior.
Rocambole was a character who started out a villain. What's interesting here is that while operating as part of this Irish Resistance in London he kind of seems effectively like he's a Supervillain again in terms of his tactics. Comparable to Anime characters like Lelouch Vi Britannia.
Feval and Ponson both wanted to play on French reader's tendency to sympathize with the Irish under British occupation, but Ponson was willing to go much further. Because Feval still had Fergus O'Breanne and Henri Belcamp as villains rather then heroes.
There are flaws, but overall I recommend it.
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