Thunder and lightning and gods seek revenge! This is the Covers Variant, your weekly destination to hear one comic book near blather. Blather incessantly about the titles he’s excited about picking up tomorrow. It’s a stacked week for me, as my diminishing insanity has increased my interest in the funny books tenfold. How else to escape from an army of due dates and end of the semester papers? Forwards! Backwards! Everywhere, through time.

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Northlanders #34
Brian Wood’s latest storyline wraps up this month in the conclusion of Metal. I’ll be sad to see it go. It’s been my go-to comic book every week that it’s come out. Kick back, crack the shit out of this one’s spine, and drift back into an age of Viking fury, axe wounds, and commentary on the power of faith. Fair thee well, Erik. You were a good dumb son of a bitch Viking, raging against the Christian machine. But I’m pretty sure you’re not going to make it out of this alive.

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Harlan Ellison’s Phoenix Without Ashes #4
The final issue of Harlan Ellison’s failed TV pilot turned graphic novel mindfuck comes out this week, and what a sweet embrace it shall be. It’s been a favorite comic of mine since it debuted, and the four issues have been taut and action packed. It isn’t so much that I lament the story ending because there is so much more to do with it, but rather out of an appreciate for the ride I’ve been taken on. Listen, it’s simple: science-fiction god is spinning a final tale that reeks of prescient tropes (he wrote this thing back in the day), and familiar narratives.

It’s easy to let this one slide past, particularly since it seems to have gone without being noticed by the Grand Hype Machine. Do yourself a solid and see a master explain through panel and pacing why he is a geek pillar.

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Batman Incorporated #1
Last week, without the majority of the comic book world noticing it, Grant Morrison turned Batman into a God. Literally.This week, Wayne undertakes the much more pedestrian task of turning Batman into a corporation. A globe trotting assemblage of Batmen and Batwomen, kicking ass and taking names as a collection of vigilantes. It stems off the recent reveal by Brucey not that he is Batman, but rather that he funds him.

Alright Morrison, I’ll give it to you, I’m intrigued. My main concern is how sustainable this storyline is; how long can a legion of Flying Rodents deal out justice before it comes crashing down around him. I’m a battered spouse, and I’ve been promised status quos being rearranged too many times to think something as drastic as this will persist. Maybe that’s just me.

Every week we’re promised something insane. This week it was the Death of Spider-Man, which will change the Ultimate universe forever! Yawn. Can’t trick me again. Actually, you can. I’m a sucker. Also dropping this week is nineteen other Batman titles, including Batman: The Return, a one-shot which will probably do nothing more than serve as table-setting for everything else in the Bat-universe.

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Superior #2
Mark Millar used to be a favorite writer of mine. These days, I find him far too obviously lusting for shock. We are not best friends any longer. That said, the first issue of Superior was decent to me, and I found that to be more than I could say for his other works, like Nemesis, Kick-Ass 2, or Ultimate Avengers. While it still served up the paste that used to be the trope of the Average Kid Desiring the Incredible that he’s beaten into paste, it dared to bring with it something that had been missing from his works: heart. Maybe I’m a sucker, but the starry-eyed kid with a disability getting the ability to be fantastic tugs on strings of empathy that bleed within my crusty dork heart.

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Remember last week when Previews teased the OMFG DEATH OF SPIDER-MAN last week? Well, new details have begun to trickle out about it. For starters, the son of a bitch takes place in the Ultimate universe. Which is a good thing, since while I snag a few titles from over in their alternate reality, it doesn’t excite me like it used to. Also, the entire endeavor is being overseen by Brian Marvel Bendis and Mark Swear Words Are Awesome! Millar. The storyline kicks off in February in Ultimate Spidey #153, then follows through into Ultimate Avengers vs. New Ultimates #1 (groan), while continuing through both titles during the month.

Five years ago, this would have excited me to pieces. Now I’m just weary. Good thing for me, both Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Millar are annoyingly hyperbolic as ever.

Comics Alliance:

“This is the biggest, boldest thing we’ve attempted in the ten years since we kicked this line off,” said Millar. “This is the one thing that could be bigger than the CREATION of the Ultimate line and it’s great to be a part of it. Being part of something like this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and soon you’ll all get to read the story we’ve written for you, This should be up there with the very small number of events that really mattered. This is going to be big.”

I don’t expect him to not be completely excited. Especially since it’s Mark Millar, and he super-hypes everything. So why wouldn’t he hype the hell out of this? But it’s hard to get super jazzed about anything predicated around THE DEATH OF CHARACTER X. At least for me. Right?

Are you like me? Still not jazzed? Brian Michael Bendis up in your house!

Comics Alliance:

“As a group and as individuals we have made a conscious effort to create stories this year that no one has ever seen before… I am very, very proud to be a part of this storyline and very proud of Marvel for even attempting such a bold endeavor. Sit back and watch as we unveil a storyline unlike any other!!”

A storyline like any other? Oh, you mean a status-quo destroying storyline that features the death of a character? Jesus Christ, that’s new and exciting. I’m being a bitter dick. I know I am. Underneath it all, with two big names behind it, I am going to check it out of of nothing other than curiosity.

Also, although I only really enjoy Bendis’ for his work on Scarlet at the moment, and I checked out of Mark Millar’s retarded adolescent fantasies when he decided to have one gay character of his involuntarily rape his own sister (no, I’m serious, that’s from the piece of refuse that is Nemesis), at one point in my life they were two of my favorite writers. So when Bendis isn’t stretched completely thin, and Mark Millar isn’t devolving into a shock jock bullshit satire of himself, I love the two of them.

So I guess I’m excited?

Thoughts?

What a fucking confluence of awesome is coming together in Hollywood. As we speak. Or maybe, it happened a couple of hours ago. But somehow, something out of a nerd wet dream has occurred. Motherfucking Guillermo Del Toro of Hellboy and Pan’s Labryninth and of course fucking Blade 2 fame is teaming up with David Eick, the executive producer of my eternal television orgasm Battlestar Galactica to create a new live-action television show based on the Hulk.

Fuck yes to the fuck yes! It was rumored a couple of months ago, and now this son of a bitch is confirmed.

Deadline:

Details of the premise are sketchy but I hear that the series will follow an origin story. In it, physicist Bruce Banner, whose alter ego is the green and raging Hulk, will be in his mid-twenties, less reactive and more energized as the world is still his oyster. Unlike the two Hulk movies, in which the monster was a pure CGI creation, the series will employ a mixture of prosthetics, puppetry and CGI. Del Toro and Eick will break the story for the pilot script together, sharing story and created by credit. Eick will write the script, with del Toro attached to direct subject to his availability. Del Toro will also oversee the designing of the Hulk character, which is expected to draw on previous comic book incarnations, as well as the original 1978-82 Incredible Hulk TV series, with a few wild tweaks on the old look.

I find this wildly arousing. Del Toro is a straight-up panic attack excitement guru in my world, and Eick has guided one of my favorite franchises ever. It’s particularly exciting, given the fact that they’re going to take a prosthetic approach to some of the Hulk, and if there’s one thing Del Toro can imagine, it’s fucking monsters. I’ve always secretly jerked off to the notion that his eye for creatures could be directed towards some sort of Star Wars flick, but fuck it, I’ll settle for this.

Thoughts? Impressions? Hit the comments box with your take.

I can no longer worry about whether or not Kinect is going to succeed. I can no longer worry about whether or not yet another console is going to be indoctrinated into gimmicky, motion control bullshit. I can no longer worry about whether or not the Xbox 360 can stuff all those grandparents and happy family advertisements down the fucking Sarlacc Pit they belong in, incinerating their insipid banality into a forgotten realm of bullshit.

Who gives a shit if it’s gimmicky bullshit? Who gives a shit if it’s clearly spying on you for Big Brother Microsoft Cola? No ones.

I should have known better. Kinect isn’t just selling, it’s selling like fucking hot cakes.

Reuters:

Microsoft Corp said on Monday it has sold more than 1 million of its new hands-free Kinect gaming systems in the first 10 days since launch, putting it on track to beat its target of 5 million sales by the end of the year.

Son of a fucking bitch. Oh well. What does it really mean in the long run? A lot more units solid for the Micro-softs, right? They’ve totally out Wii’d the Wii. No longer must you sling phallic device! Now you dance your way into stupidity with Grandma! Watch as she dances her dying tribal dance! Watch as Papa’s hearing aid falls out in the middle of a lovely game of The Biggest Loser: Ultimate Workout! and the family cat dies from choking on it.

As long as it doesn’t affect the actual like, games being produced, I’m fine. There can be mountains of bullshit titles out there featuring Kinect-based controls, as long as I get my legitimate installments. But with news that there’s a Gears of War-related Kinect announcement soon, I fear! I fear the infection is spreading.

The bunkers, we must climb into them. The hatches, we must latch.

You fucking assholes.

Marvel Vs Capcom 3 is going to be the perfect bonerstorm of fan service. Between the Capcom characters, and the Marvel characters, and the idea of staring at She-Hulk’s seemingly endless taut green buns, how are we going to fucking function? Insane!

Today brought us the reveals of She-Hulk and Zero. Goddamn, I need this game. So I can get schooled by a pack of douchebags who will assuredly make me hit myself.

Hit the Jump!, for the reveal videos.

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Do you know what I have in my backyard? Dog shit and leaves. That’s about it. A few lawn chairs. But primarily? Dog shit and leaves. But that’s okay! Because I’m part of Spaceship Earth! And apparently astronomer wizard people have discovered a black hole that’s only thirty years old (if I understand this article correctly, which I probably don’t) close to us. Mind you, in space terms, close is a really fucking relative term.

Nasa via io9:

The 30-year-old object is a remnant of SN 1979C, a supernova in the galaxy M100 approximately 50 million light years from Earth. Data from Chandra, NASA’s Swift satellite, the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton and the German ROSAT observatory revealed a bright source of X-rays that has remained steady during observation from 1995 to 2007. This suggests the object is a black hole being fed either by material falling into it from the supernova or a binary companion.

[cont.]

The idea of a black hole with an observed age of only about 30 years is consistent with recent theoretical work. In 2005, a theory was presented that the bright optical light of this supernova was powered by a jet from a black hole that was unable to penetrate the hydrogen envelope of the star to form a GRB. The results seen in the observations of SN 1979C fit this theory very well.

These astronomer wizards man, I’m pretty sure they’re just magicians. The world is powered on magic. And we’ve all been tricked. This is some insane bullshit, and I love it. Of course, there’s the usual laundry list of “either” and “possibly” and “potentially” and “probably”, but who the fuck cares?

We’re neighbors with a black hole! Maybe! Sort of? That’s gotta be cool for you folks. I mean, my backyard is covered in dog shit, and my neighbors have to deal with me walking through our windows all day long covered in stains and merely boxer briefs.

[Source: Steven Anderson via Game Freaks]

Someone call the fucking Thought Police, cause Kinect is staring at you, reporting you to Big Brother. Seriously, how fucking creepy is this?

Kotaku:

Speaking at an investor’s conference on Thursday, a Microsoft executive offered that Kinect not only knows how many are in the room when an ad’s shown, but what kind of team colors they might be wearing. Uh-oh.

How Orwellian is this shit? This sounds amazingly like the point in 1984 when everyone has to go through their morning exercise routines while the television prompter watched. Except now, they’ve merely tricked you into playing Dance Central Titty And Dong Shake Time. Yessir. It’s the same deal. They’re spying on you. But they wised up, and they’re not as obvious about it as they were in Orwell’s novel. They wised up, and drizzled their eerie spying in glitter and pom-poms!

Creepy shit! I mean, instead of being forced into this creepy Big Brother environment, we’re instead giving the keys to our souls willingly to giant corporations and marketing entities. But watch the fuck out next time you’re boning your hand in front of your Kinect! Kinect sees all. Kinect knows all. Kinect is selling your attributes to the highest bidder, so they can stream advertisements subliminally into your skull while you sleep at night. Laugh all you want, it’s fucking happening!

I have to hand it to the writers. I don’t know about anyone else, but I’ve found the past two episodes in a fucking row! to be engrossing like woah. Ignore the fact that the side stories continue to underwhelm aside from Robocop trying to bring down Dexter and Lumen. The Dexter/Lumen/Jordan chase story has grabbed me by my impressively miniscule genitalia and refused to let go. A certain sadness pangs around my empty gut as I realize that nothing gold can stay, especially a cute relationship between a serial killer vigilante and the woman he saved from a trip to a swamp.

Catharsis. Underpinning this entire episode, and perhaps the remainder of this season’s arc is Dexter’s chase of the impossible. Relief from the murder of his mother. Relief from the murder of his wife. The double-smash of the two female figures he’s cared for the most. As we’ve watched our boy throughout the seasons, he’s struggled with an inability to cope with what’s been done to him. His murder serves, at best, as a mitigation. He never feels completely fulfillment, or complete release from his demons. His dark passenger. His demonic b-boy. Whateevr.

If anything, the show has underlined his hobby’s his continuing fading effectiveness. As seasons have marched, each kill seemed to bring him less and less satisfaction. Cut to this season, and they’re empty loads being blown. No gratification. A rote behavior done with the hope for gratification, only to be filled with Jordan Chase’s accurately diagnosed hole. His killing relief has flat lined.

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[Source: Renée Chio via Gamefreaks]