Ep.15A: Falcon & the Winter Soldier FINALE! Mortal Kombat, Invincible, Comics Pull List, & more!5/4/2021
Happy Pink-Moon Monday!
This week's A episode starts off with the big-ticket item for the day: the finale of Falcon and the Winter Solder! It was a great wrap-up, and I discuss all the deets here. Then I talk about the Mortal Kombat movie on HBO Max, which I had a lot of fun with! I also had a great time this weekend binging Invincible on Amazon Prime, and I talk about my thoughts on the show thus-far, before it has its finale this Friday. No spoilers for Invincible, that'll be next week! I have some thoughts bout the Shang Chi movie, as well, specifically the character of Awkwafina's Katy and the mysterious "Great Protector" dragon. After that, it's finally into the new comics Pull List for the week, which includes spotlights on women, LGBTQ+, and creators of color. I wrap this segment up with a tip on how you might be able to get a very valuable comic this week from your own local comic shop, so stick around to check that out! I wrap things up with a few announcements based on DC and Marvel's July comics solicitations. I'll be back Friday, April 30th, to discuss what was best from this week's new comic book day, as well as any other comic industry or geeky news and updates! Have a sweaty week!
FATWS Finale
- overall a very positive review here, but I do have one major complaint I'll get into at the end. - the episode starts outside the GRC meeting, where they;re all prepping for whatever attack may come. Sam bursts throught hre window ins his NEw Captain America Suit from Wkanada! it translates soooo fucking well to screen, and they did an almost exact translation. it looks impressive, steve rogers could never. - Karli and her gang are there checking thigs out. she tries to call bucky and convince him she's right, he obviously doesn't go for that. SHe tells her friends this alarming speech about how they should all be willing to die for this cause, and they all look very unsure. she clearly didn't ask anyone their opinion before deciding that. she even says "one world" and they don't respond until she says it again, more forcefully. - sharon is there too, undercover. spoiler alert, she's here because she's the power broker and wants to get even with Karli. She hired batroc to be undercover with Karli and report back to her so she knows what the're up to. - they evacuate the government people from the building, and a secret flag smasher puts a heavy duty lock on their escape vans so they won't be able to get out. sharon then brutally kills the flagsmasher guy, and for some reason no one is alarmed. - Sam chases a helicopter through the air after fighting Batroc--he des a sick throw of hte shield and catches it midair. he gets intel on the epople inside the cpter who are hostages and finds out one woman is traiend to fly helicopters, so he manages to contact her and tell her to be readyy to grab the wheel. he takes out the pilot and she saves the helicopter from crashing, it was a great scene of him working in the moment to solve a situation the best he could, by utilizing EVERY resource at his disposal. - the flag smashers and karli take the vans of hostages to a random spot and light fired beneath one of the vans, in an attempt to cook the poeple inside. Bucky is able to rip the lock off and get people out of that van. - John Walker shows up, of course, with his janky-ass shield, and fights them for a little bit alongside Bucky, and his shield is surprisingly sturdier than it should be for a hobby welder, but still makes a hilarious tin can sound when struck, and doesn't bounce back to him when he throws it. so from the start, kind of a ba-dum-dum-womp of a fight for him. - the flag smashers manage to push the remaining van almost off a bridge, and walker tries to save it but is overwhelmed by the fag smashers. as it is about the fall, Sam shows up beneath it, and flies it to safety. this is Karli's first time seeing him don the CA suit, so she's taken aback a bit and tries to call him out on it, but he tells her he's trying somethig new. remember, this is sam declaring himself cap, not the government. very different than anyone who's come before him. - they fight, the fight goes into a nearby warehouse. - Sharon pops up and talks to Karli, confirming she's the power broker and was the one to "discover" karli in Madripoor and set her on this path. When Batroc overhears this, he confronts them both, saying he now wants 4x payment from Sharon instead of just double, now that he knows she's the power broker. which, I gotta say, felt a little flawed, because how did he not know that, but I guess you really have to assume he is THAT stupid. - Sharon kills Batroc, Karli almost kills Sharon but Sam stops her, then she and Sam face off until Sharon kills Karli. somehow, Sam doesn't immediately go "god dammit Sharon i had this handed you didn't have to kill her" but i guess he's just too nice for that. - everybody heads back outside, and the media standing around with the remaining senators get their first look at Sam in his new digs. everyone is a little shocked, it seems, but Sam has a thing to say here folks so listen up. - Sam gives his speech. it is...perfect. I saw a whiny little bitch online try to complain about the writing being fro a 12-year old but...12 year old's generally don't have a solid grasp of the nuances of government, politics, race relations, international relations, or the idea of archetypes being passed on as mantles. but okay buddy. it was a great touching, thoughtful scene, where Sam basically tells the people in charge to stop ignoring the people they're meant to represent. - we got to see Isiah Bradley's reaction to seeing him as Cap on TV, listening to Sam set the governing forces right. - afterwards, he catches up with Bucky, who makes a joke about checking out after he heard him say "black man in stars and stripes," which I like the take as marvel's slight jab to the people who'll complain about "politicizing" captain america. If there is anything this show has taught us, it's that the whole idea of Captain America is VERY political. - some government him approaches Sam, calling him Captain America, and it sets in how this all just went down: Sam crowned himself, and they accepted it. I think the one thing that says is how the US government here KNEW they were pulling a shitty move with taking the shield and giving to John and naming HIM cap, even when everyone knew Steve wanted Sam to be his successor. they knew they were in the wrong as they were doing wrong, and they still did it. - the remaining flag smashers are taken into custody, put in the back of an armored van. as they get closed in, the guard whispers "one world, one people" which is their anthem or whatever, which got me SO MAD because i didn't want them getting off scott-free, but then they pull away from the curb and the van BLOWS UP! we see that it was Zemo's handyman who set up the bomb, and we get to see zemo satisfyingly listening to the report of their deaths on his prison radio. nice, tying up that loose end beautifly. No more supers hanging around to cause problems. - Except for: John Walker. we see his wife and the Contessa talking about this bomb news as they wait for John to finish changing into whatever she brought for him. When he comes out, h's in the traditional US Agent suit from the comics, the same as the last one but black instead of blue n - one thing that i find pretty funny is the issue he premiers as US agents (instead of his original title of Super-Patriot) in Captain America #354, he appears on the cover, punching ut the title, saying "I'm Back!" with a wicked grin. this definitely feels like the perfect launching point for us to see him appear as US Agent later, which the Contessa offers to him as a new name, and he takes. - we'll probably see him on a Thunderbolts team, which is generally a team of anti-heroes and villains working together. General Ross (who becomes Red Hulk) usually leads this team, and he's already made the crossover from The Incredible Hulk to the main MCU, so odds are he'll be connected to that team. - the other idea is obviously West Coast Avengers, the team he was on in the comics, but I kind of feel like that's further down the road for him. I think we'll see him dig himself in pretty deep with Madame Hydra before he digs himself out and officially becomes a hero. - then there' Sharon....ina formal government meetng, she is given her full pardon. she smiles and accepts graiously, before leaving to call her madripoor team to let them know to line up buyers for governemtn secrets, weapon codes, weapons themselves, etc. etc. etc. thats gonna be a problem. i love it. - and I'm not entirely sure when it happened in the show but towards the end, after everything, Bucky checks in with his old asian man friend, the one he sort of adopted as grandfather when he discovered that was the father of the boy he killed on a mission--wrong place, wrong time, but it was the mission. Bucky returns to the old man in this episode for the first time since the premier and tells him the truth of why he'd been stopping by all this time: because his son was killed by the winter soldier. him. he tells him he didn't have a choice, and leaves him shortly after. - while they don't interact again, he pops his head into the tea shop to check on the man secretly later, and sees the young woman who works there caring for him. so now bucky knows the man has someone to keep him company. - the end credits scene was two scenes. - in the first, Sam goes back to Isiah Bradley's house. He's there with his son/grandson, who we get to see a lot more of all of the sudden here, because they're definitely teasing him for Patriot in a Young Avengers movie. to further back my point, Sam takes the kid with him when he takes Isiah to see his surprise. - it's easy to figure out what's about to happen as this scene goes on, and oh. my god. it was MOVING. he takes them to the Captain America museum in DC, stuff we've all seen before, but then he turns a corner into a new part of the display, where there stands a bronze statue of Isaiah Bradley in his dress blues, alongside a display of photos and an inscribed pillar of his time in the military, serving for Americans who never knew he existed. Until now. as sam says, now they know, they won't be able to wipe him away. - I can't stop thinking about what a profound moment that would be. to spend almost your entire life, the better part of a century, with this weight, this burden of what he went through, what they did to him, and how they treated him for it. everything he lost, everything that he had surely long ago written off as something he'd die with on his chest, weighing him down. With this display, he's able to understand that the people of the US will know about him now. it won't change the awfullness of what they did to him, and how it affected his whole life, but he no longer suffers in silence, without a name or even a whisper of his sacrifice. as far as accountability goes, this isn't really mch at all, true. but before, there was less than nothing. he didn't exist, never had. now he has a legacy, one i have no doubt that young man next to him has been greatly inspired by. - the second scene is back in New Orleans, where Sam and Bucky attend a neighborhood party with his sister and her kids. Everyone is having a great time, it's a fun little scene, not really anything is said but it isn't needed. All the (primarily) black folks from their neighborhood are thrilled to take pictures with Sam, everyone is clearly having a fantastic time is so proud to have sam as their Captain America, a Captain America who represents them. As Sam said in his speech earlier on, he's a Captain America without blonde hair, bue eyes, or super serum. he's a new breed of captain america, one that stands for all people. - the show ends with Sam and Bucky standing and staring off into the distance together, and the titles roll as Captain America and the Winter Soldier. SO. SATISFYING. - and, announced friday, we're getting a fourth Captain America movie, written by the showrunners of FATWS! cearly they earned their stay, easily, with this show. THey impressed Marvel/Disney with the show the way the russo bros did with their Cap movies, which landed them the final Infinity Saga movies. - I was among the crowd who didn't see a fourth Cap movie coming. I figured they did a trilogy, and even if Sam became cap we'd just see him in team movies or this show and ones like it. I guess this makes sense, to make sure he's at the same level of accessible to viewers that steve was, the same amount of importance. No doubt bucky will be in it, too. - there WILL be a second season of this show, no doubt called Captain America and the Winter Soldier, or perhaps Captain America and Bucky, or whatever other title he might take up. - I loved this finale, but the character of Karli was such a waste. they just needed someone, it didn't really matter who, for these guys to end up teaming up to fight against. so she just ended up being this symbol for the people who fall through the cracks of the system and spend their whole lives feeling like they're screaming into a black hole. She represents that, but to no real point. you just acknowledge thats what she was, and move on. what else is there to do? she didn't change anything, that was sam's speech. she had already died. so they kind of refrigerated her, if you're going by the definition that it is killing off a female character for the benefit and/or growth of a male character. She was 100% killed so Sam could have that moment. Mortal Kombat - as I've said before, I never played the game and am only loosely familiar with the story and characters. but I wanted to talk about this just because it is a cool nerdy thing that's really enjoyable and fun to watch and discuss so why not? - I did have a ton of fun with this, even if I knew so little going into it that my husband actually laughed at me when I asked if it was going to be violent. it's not my fault our parents didn't let us play video games growing up! my mom would have disowned me if she ever caught me playing a game called Mortal Kombat and yes I do not understand I should have known something called Mortal Kombat would be ridonculously brutal. I do play some video games now but its mostly just HZD tbh. - I got a lot of insight going along with my husband filling me in, which helped for context a little but I think the movie would have been perfectly understandable without his help, they do a good job explaining things. - we start with Hanzo Hasashi played by Hiroyuki Sanada, he's almost always the wise asian man in things, you've definitely seen him at least one thing before. He has a wife and child and newborn baby, and he's off gathering goods or someting when Bi-Han / Sub-Zero kills his wife and firstborn, they end up fighting and Bi-Han kills Hanzo, who was the first Scorpion. We then see Lord Raiden take the baby that the mother hid, and bring it to safety. - the story then picks up in modern day, with the obvious descendant of that baby, and Hanzo, working as a fighter in a club. He's got a dragon birthmark and a wife and tween daughter, his name is Cole Young. he meets Jax played by Mechad Brooks (Supergirl, some other things), and learns that there is someone out there hunting down people with that mark. he learns about Mortal Kombat, whihc is the fight between worlds, and they're being hunted because the ruler of this other world Chin Han playing Shang Tsung, who is the soul sucker, he wants to take out earth's champoions before they have a chance to battle. so that's the plot at that point--Cole, Jax, this woman Sonya Blade and this annoying guy Kano all fighting Shang Tsug's fighters. - At one point, Kano predictably betrays the rest of them, and Sonya eventually gets hers and kills him, taking his dragon mark for herself. nice. - it is a truly brutal movie, here's some of the more memorable brutalities: - jax getting his arms ripped off, basically - winged demon lady gets sawed in half - guy who did that to her gets his soul sucked out - Melina getting a hole in her mid-section and seeing her spine - the 4-armed Goro guy getting brutalized by Cole when he gets the Scorpion powers, slicing him up and spilling his guts out into the dirt - Kano getting a lawn-gnome through the eye, fuck yeah - sub-zero freezing scorpions wife and child to death - Kano ripping out the heart of one of the champions - and finally, Scorpion frying Sub-Zero at the end of the movie - because yes, the movie actually gets to end with the two it started with, thousands of years ago. Joe Taslim's Sub-Zero (he was in Warrior on HBO- good show, check it out) against the origial Scorpion was SO COOL, speaking their native tongues. that's something else I took away f rom this movie, how the first, what, 10minutes? all you hear is their native languages. it's awesome, seeing these asian cultures handled at all better than they have been in the past. It's such a relief. - In the end, after his ancestor beats Sub-Zero for him, Cole is able to save his family and forces Shang Tsung to retreat. - there's talk of making this a saga of movies, and I'd be down for that! This was surprisingly enjoyable, and it was really genuinely fun to hear from my husband what was taken directly from the same, because he's a nerd about the game, and I can appreciate the filmmakers for having taken that time to add those accurate moments for fans like him. Invincible - never read the comic, but I've seen it around and am impressed with how exact the animation captured the main characters, at least. I'm not sure how much wiggle room they used because again. didn't read the comic. - created by writer Robert Kirkman and artist Cory Walker. - follows Mark Grayson, a teenager who's dad is a superhero from another planet and he inherits those powers. - I'm actually not going to spoil it because it's only in it's first 7 episodes, with a new one each friday, and it was really easy for me to binge watch yesterday while doing some personal projects. there are only 8 total episodes in the first season, so maybe I'll go ahead and spoil it all next monday, but i definitely recommend checking it out. - that being said, do NOT check it out if you're squeamish. it's surprisingly violent, but not in the way the Boys is--totally different concepts here. but this is really enjoyable, with a star-stdded voice-over cast! - Steven Yeun/ Sandra Oh /J.K. Simmons /Zazie Beetz /Gillian Jacobs/ Zachary Quinto /Jason Mantzoukas; smaller roles by Clancy Brown /Mark Hamill/ Mahershala Ali /Jon Hamm/ Seth Rogen Shang-Chi theories - Katy - so far, with what little insight we've had, we've been entirely led to believe Awkwafina's Katy is going to be a side-kick buddy companion comic relief character and not much else, just kinda morally supporting Shang-Chi more than anything. - BUT. the facts are starting to say otherwise. - Katy has a marvel legend figure out already, and I have mine here, i'm posting a review on it later today on my youtube page. but whats interesting about it is, she's wearing traditional-looking red robes and comes with a boy and arrow, and some odd headless winged floof creature. - based on this. I'd bet all kinds of money Katy isn't what she seems on the surface. Whether it's going to be that she's under cover, "wakes up" to who she truly is, or turns out to be a spirit or goddess figure, there is definitely more to Katy than that first trailer showed. and I cannot wait to find out what it is! september seems so far away. - "the great protector" - when my husband was at target picking Katy up sunday, he also grabbed a toy of a dragon that's apparently from the movie. the box calls it the "great protector," and i have to wonder if that's fing fang foom. they likely wouldn't want to give him away on the marketing so that could explain the weird name, or this could be like how Shang-Chi's father was called Foo-Man-Choo in the comics originally, because casual racism against asians was seen as okay in popular media until...like, now really. But they changed that for the movie, making his father the Mandarin, instead. They could be doing the same with the dragon Fing Fang Foom, and give him a refresh to remove as much light racism as possible. - it also looks hilariously like Sisu from Raya and the last Dragon, who was voiced by Awkwafina. Comic Book Pull List -here - note about a potentially VERY valuable comic coming out this week and how you might be able to get it DC July solicits - SUPERMAN: SON OF KAL-EL #1 - SUPERMAN AND THE AUTHORITY #1 of 6 Story by Grant Morrison Art by Mikel Janin - STATIC SEASON ONE #1 Story by Vita Ayala. DC's Milestone Imprint Returns - ICON & ROCKET SEASON ONE #1 (under Milestone) - SUICIDE SQUAD: GET JOKER! #1 Story by Brian Azzarello Art by Alex Maleev, Matt Hollingsworth - BATMAN/CATWOMAN SPECIAL #1 - BATMAN SECRET FILES: HUNTRESS #1 Story by Mariko Tamaki. - BATMAN SECRET FILES: THE SIGNAL #1 - BLUE & GOLD #1 Story by Dan Jurgens - UNEARTHED: A JESSICA CRUZ STORY GN Story by Lilliam Rivera.Art by Steph C. - GREEN LANTERN #4 w/JO - THE OTHER HISTORY OF THE DC UNIVERSE #5 Anissa Pierce Marvel July solicits - AMAZING FANTASY #1 (OF 5) by Kaare Andrews - SINISTER WAR #1 (OF 4) by Nick SPencer and Mark Bagley - EXTREME CARNAGE ALPHA #1: EXTREME CARNAGE: SCREAM #1; EXTREME CARNAGE: PHAGE #1 - X-MEN #1 Cyclops, Marvel Girl, Sunfire, Rogue, Wolverine, Synch and Polaris - MOON KNIGHT #1 by JED MACKAY - AMAZING SPIDER-MAN ANNUAL #2 by KARLA PACHECO; THOR ANNUAL #1 by AARON KUDER - ALIENS: AFTERMATH #1 BENJAMIN PERCY - MARAUDERS #22 with Lourdes Chantel on the cover (w/ Emma) - AVENGERS #46 eesh... - AMERICA CHAVEZ: MADE IN THE USA #4 (of 5)? - DAREDEVIL #32 still Elektra
Spotlights:
Black Widow #6 - by Kelly Thompson (with Rafael de Latorre and Jordie Bellaire) - starting Natasha on a new story arc with new characters and villains--and a new costume! - still in San Francisco, which I LOVE Harley Quinn #2 - by Stephanie Phillips (with Riley Rossmo) - Harley and Kevin vs Hugo Strange Silk #2 - by Maurene Goo (with Takeshi Miyazawa and Ian Herring) - the werewolf cat thing is killing low-level criminals, and cindy is going to have to protect them - also the new protection for JJJameson New Mutants #17 - by Vita Ayala (with Rod Reis) afro-latinx non-binary writer, seen all over comics and writing the new Static Shock series for the Milestone imprint, coming in July - Dani and Karma are i Otherworld sesrchig for a lost mutant teen--remember if they die in otherworld, they come back very different in the resurrection eggs. just how it is. - On Krakoa, Shadow King is grooming the youngest of the New Mutants, and it looks like Magik has a big role in this issue so that's exciting Bitter Root #12 - by Chuck Brown, David F. Walker, and artist Sanford Greene - "LEGACY," Part Two-Cullen and Ford are in a fight to stay alive while Ma Etta makes a decision that will impact the entire Sangerye family. Meanwhile, Enoch makes an important discovery...but will he live long enough to tell anyone? Pull List: Beta Ray Bill #2 - Bill goes hunting for Odin, still desperate to resurrect his lost hammer Stormbreaker—but the former King of Asgard is far from his glory days. Stormbreaker is never coming back…but there is one place where Beta Ray Bill could restore his full powers. The All-Father of nothing offers the Korbinite a path to immortality—at a price not even a god can afford. Nuclear Family #3 - also by Stephanie Phillips - based off Breakfast at Twilight by Phillip K Dick Batman: Black and White #5 (Jenny Frison Variant Edition) - Mariko Tamaki and artist Emanuela Luppachino - Jorge Jimenez - Jamal Campbell - Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie - Lee Weeks Cable #10 - still searching for whats up with the missing mutant babies and stryfe Spawn #317 - "CHAIN GANG," Part Four-The CHAIN GANG arrives! Spawn comes to terms with new allies as well as new threats! Spawn/She-Spawn/Reaper/Gunslinger/Redeemer BRZRKR #2 - Don't forget if you bought the foil edition of BRZRKR #1, it came with a little proof of purchase card on the inside with some instruction. bring that card back to where you bought the comic and buy issue 2 this week, and you'll get a free copy of Something is Killing the Children #1, 8th printing, a special surprise variant. - And make sure you don't putz around--comic shops can only get one copy of that 8th printing edition for every 2 copies of #2 ordered, so if #1 didn't sell well for them, they might have ordered less of #2 and be low on those 8th printings.
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