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Ha! Separate continuties, yes!
Oct. 29th, 2014 07:55 pmSo I was re-reading the two separate The Batman Strikes! comics and the graphic novel compilation I have. As I mentioned before, I thought the third Riddler comic was very badly done and OOC for him. There were always oddities in their Riddler stories, however, and I found myself wanting to believe the comics were a separate continuity and did not take place in the same verse as the show.
Some of the specific oddities: The Batman Strikes! Riddler is always blowing things up. Compare this to The Batman TV show Riddler, who threatens to blow things up, but actually only has lime Jell-O in the canisters. LOL. He isn't trying to hurt random innocent people; he just wants a distraction to keep Batman away from where he's stealing technology information.
Also, while I loved the first of the three Riddler comics, one thing I always found a little strange was that in the climax, he's built himself what looks like a throne. Now, he's a very arrogant fellow, it's true, but that seems a little extreme even for him. In the TV show, he never does anything to give the impression that he actually thinks of himself as royalty/a king/etc.
To me it feels like the comics have a sense of who this Riddler is, yet they miss the mark and never quite grasp it all the way.
Yesterday I found proof that the comics are indeed their own verse. In the TV show, Bruce Wayne meets Selina Kyle at a dinner party in the episode From Ragdolls to Riches. They become more or less friendly and continue associating. But Bruce starts to become suspicious of her and is surprised when she cashes a large check he gives her and donates it to a pet fund. She wasn't fond of Bruce's dog art. Oddly, neither he nor Alfred ever considered that maybe she liked another animal instead of dogs. **rolls eyes.**
In the comics, he meets her for the first time at an animal shelter event, where she adopts every kitty there. He wonders if she's going to give some away, since that's a lot of cats, and she says she could never give one of her darlings away.
I suppose it could be argued that since in the comics they just had the one meeting, maybe Bruce had forgotten it by the time they met in the TV show episode. However, it would seem he would remember eventually, especially considering she adopted all those kitties. That's not something one could easily forget! And if he remembered about the kitties, he wouldn't be surprised at her donating the check to the pet fund.
Therefore, I can only conclude that the comics meeting came before the TV show episode aired and each is meant to be their own verse. It makes me feel a lot happier to have come to that conclusion.
I wish the comics had been a little better with their Riddler characterization; I love new adventures featuring the versions of characters that I love. But it seems like in general, whenever I venture into a media type other than the TV shows, I'm disappointed by the characterization or other things in them.
I was excited when I heard about the Diagnosis Murder series of novels that would be written some years back. However, they were written by one of my least favorite writers from the show, Lee Goldberg. I know he's usually praised, but I think a lot of it is misguided hype. I find it disgusting how his scripts and also the novels tend to feature death in the most bizarre and gruesome ways, like one episode where a man is crushed by a bed of spikes plunging through him. Horrifying! Also, he tends to rely a lot on stupid scatological humor more than other writers. And I don't always like his characterization. I wasn't entirely fond of his version of Jack Stewart, and in his Monk novels, I think he misses the mark on Monk's characterization and also on Sharona's. One novel even features Monk chasing after another character over continents because he can't stand them going away. That is not Monk. He might feel like doing it, but he doesn't do it. If he was going to, he would have done it when Sharona left.
And then there's the My Little Pony comics. Someone said that they felt the characterization in the comics is basically the stereotypes of what the characters represent, without really getting into all the facets of the individual characters. To some extent, I agree. I don't like the characterization in the comics, especially of Rainbow Dash, and the Cutie Mark Crusaders drive me bonkers. They're being held prisoner and all they do is sit and talk about how maybe they'll get their Cutie Marks for being kidnapped, and other silly things like that. They drive Chrysalis crazy, so if that was their purpose, it was genius. But instead it seemed like they really were being brainless dolts, talking about their Cutie Marks instead of devising a plan to escape, like I'm sure they would have on the show. And other comic arcs just really make me raise an eyebrow, like the pirate one with Fluttershy. She seemed OOC there, from what I've heard about her trying to keep a fish when it didn't want to stay, and there are others who feel the same.
I think just about the only thing I like in the comics is that they made Trixie a deeper character. In the show and the movies, she's pretty much the most shallow character there. But in the comics, she recognizes she did wrong and is honestly trying to better herself.
And then there's the recent Six Million Dollar Man comics, which are much more gruesome than the show and take things into really bizarre territory, like a scientist getting cut by an alien substance and mutating into an alien creature. And the substance has infected others and the entire base is now under siege by this nonsense. It sounds like something from Superman or Marvel Comics, not The Six Million Dollar Man. And in the main plot, a rampaging robot tore off all the prosthetic/bionic limbs from Barney Hiller, a twoshot character from the show played by Monte Markham. It's treated very seriously and isn't gory, but it's sickening and horrifying and is much darker than the show.
And then there's a whole other category of "this isn't as good" when it comes to The Saint. I still feel like the TV show is better, but I don't think I'd ever dare say that to a nest of Saint fans. Most of them prefer the books and the character in those. Of course, unlike with the other things I've been talking about here, the books came first, so there wouldn't have been a TV show without them. I appreciate the books to that extent. But I really don't like how much more permissive The Saint is in the books and how he'll even let murderers go free if he thinks they were justified in killing. Sometimes, in some books, I believe he even kills himself, and not just in self-defense. I think it's only if the person is particularly evil, like a mad scientist or something, but still.
This week, MeTV has up two episodes based on short stories in the one short story collection I have: The Gentle Ladies and The Ever-Loving Spouse. I don't really like The Gentle Ladies in either incarnation, but I certainly prefer the TV version overall. The blackmailing bad guy is killed by accident when he falls down the stairs, instead of one of the ladies killing him on purpose. In the episode, Simon helps them make it look like the guy was trying to rob the place to avoid scandal about the creep's blackmailing ways. In the book, Simon buries the body in the yard.
The Ever-Loving Spouse follows the plot of the short story a little more than The Gentle Ladies does, but it expands on it favorably and I quite like the TV version. The book version annoyed me not just for Simon's reaction to the revelation of the murderer, but because Simon seemed to just be sitting by and letting things unfold around him. He wasn't really actively involved, except for finding the first body and then confronting the two-time murderer later. And he just lets the guy go free because he feels that blackmailers are so repulsive and that killing two of them isn't a great loss to the world. What he doesn't seem to consider is that perhaps the murderer will someday be afraid Simon will talk and so he'll come after Simon to kill him too! I wouldn't put it past the guy, since he killed twice and since he didn't really seem to trust Simon.
The TV version has the same murderer, but Simon figures things out before the second death and calls the person to try to warn her. Then he comes to stop the murder and is able to, and is going to see that both people go to prison for their respective crimes: blackmail and murder. He expresses a bit of sympathy for the murderer due to his desperation and seeming madness from what the blackmailers are doing to him, but he isn't going to let the guy go scot-free.
I know the idea in the books is that Simon feels that legal justice isn't always good enough for some criminals and so he takes the law into his own hands a lot more. But I guess I'm just a prude; I prefer the more cleaned-up version of the character in the TV show.
Some of the specific oddities: The Batman Strikes! Riddler is always blowing things up. Compare this to The Batman TV show Riddler, who threatens to blow things up, but actually only has lime Jell-O in the canisters. LOL. He isn't trying to hurt random innocent people; he just wants a distraction to keep Batman away from where he's stealing technology information.
Also, while I loved the first of the three Riddler comics, one thing I always found a little strange was that in the climax, he's built himself what looks like a throne. Now, he's a very arrogant fellow, it's true, but that seems a little extreme even for him. In the TV show, he never does anything to give the impression that he actually thinks of himself as royalty/a king/etc.
To me it feels like the comics have a sense of who this Riddler is, yet they miss the mark and never quite grasp it all the way.
Yesterday I found proof that the comics are indeed their own verse. In the TV show, Bruce Wayne meets Selina Kyle at a dinner party in the episode From Ragdolls to Riches. They become more or less friendly and continue associating. But Bruce starts to become suspicious of her and is surprised when she cashes a large check he gives her and donates it to a pet fund. She wasn't fond of Bruce's dog art. Oddly, neither he nor Alfred ever considered that maybe she liked another animal instead of dogs. **rolls eyes.**
In the comics, he meets her for the first time at an animal shelter event, where she adopts every kitty there. He wonders if she's going to give some away, since that's a lot of cats, and she says she could never give one of her darlings away.
I suppose it could be argued that since in the comics they just had the one meeting, maybe Bruce had forgotten it by the time they met in the TV show episode. However, it would seem he would remember eventually, especially considering she adopted all those kitties. That's not something one could easily forget! And if he remembered about the kitties, he wouldn't be surprised at her donating the check to the pet fund.
Therefore, I can only conclude that the comics meeting came before the TV show episode aired and each is meant to be their own verse. It makes me feel a lot happier to have come to that conclusion.
I wish the comics had been a little better with their Riddler characterization; I love new adventures featuring the versions of characters that I love. But it seems like in general, whenever I venture into a media type other than the TV shows, I'm disappointed by the characterization or other things in them.
I was excited when I heard about the Diagnosis Murder series of novels that would be written some years back. However, they were written by one of my least favorite writers from the show, Lee Goldberg. I know he's usually praised, but I think a lot of it is misguided hype. I find it disgusting how his scripts and also the novels tend to feature death in the most bizarre and gruesome ways, like one episode where a man is crushed by a bed of spikes plunging through him. Horrifying! Also, he tends to rely a lot on stupid scatological humor more than other writers. And I don't always like his characterization. I wasn't entirely fond of his version of Jack Stewart, and in his Monk novels, I think he misses the mark on Monk's characterization and also on Sharona's. One novel even features Monk chasing after another character over continents because he can't stand them going away. That is not Monk. He might feel like doing it, but he doesn't do it. If he was going to, he would have done it when Sharona left.
And then there's the My Little Pony comics. Someone said that they felt the characterization in the comics is basically the stereotypes of what the characters represent, without really getting into all the facets of the individual characters. To some extent, I agree. I don't like the characterization in the comics, especially of Rainbow Dash, and the Cutie Mark Crusaders drive me bonkers. They're being held prisoner and all they do is sit and talk about how maybe they'll get their Cutie Marks for being kidnapped, and other silly things like that. They drive Chrysalis crazy, so if that was their purpose, it was genius. But instead it seemed like they really were being brainless dolts, talking about their Cutie Marks instead of devising a plan to escape, like I'm sure they would have on the show. And other comic arcs just really make me raise an eyebrow, like the pirate one with Fluttershy. She seemed OOC there, from what I've heard about her trying to keep a fish when it didn't want to stay, and there are others who feel the same.
I think just about the only thing I like in the comics is that they made Trixie a deeper character. In the show and the movies, she's pretty much the most shallow character there. But in the comics, she recognizes she did wrong and is honestly trying to better herself.
And then there's the recent Six Million Dollar Man comics, which are much more gruesome than the show and take things into really bizarre territory, like a scientist getting cut by an alien substance and mutating into an alien creature. And the substance has infected others and the entire base is now under siege by this nonsense. It sounds like something from Superman or Marvel Comics, not The Six Million Dollar Man. And in the main plot, a rampaging robot tore off all the prosthetic/bionic limbs from Barney Hiller, a twoshot character from the show played by Monte Markham. It's treated very seriously and isn't gory, but it's sickening and horrifying and is much darker than the show.
And then there's a whole other category of "this isn't as good" when it comes to The Saint. I still feel like the TV show is better, but I don't think I'd ever dare say that to a nest of Saint fans. Most of them prefer the books and the character in those. Of course, unlike with the other things I've been talking about here, the books came first, so there wouldn't have been a TV show without them. I appreciate the books to that extent. But I really don't like how much more permissive The Saint is in the books and how he'll even let murderers go free if he thinks they were justified in killing. Sometimes, in some books, I believe he even kills himself, and not just in self-defense. I think it's only if the person is particularly evil, like a mad scientist or something, but still.
This week, MeTV has up two episodes based on short stories in the one short story collection I have: The Gentle Ladies and The Ever-Loving Spouse. I don't really like The Gentle Ladies in either incarnation, but I certainly prefer the TV version overall. The blackmailing bad guy is killed by accident when he falls down the stairs, instead of one of the ladies killing him on purpose. In the episode, Simon helps them make it look like the guy was trying to rob the place to avoid scandal about the creep's blackmailing ways. In the book, Simon buries the body in the yard.
The Ever-Loving Spouse follows the plot of the short story a little more than The Gentle Ladies does, but it expands on it favorably and I quite like the TV version. The book version annoyed me not just for Simon's reaction to the revelation of the murderer, but because Simon seemed to just be sitting by and letting things unfold around him. He wasn't really actively involved, except for finding the first body and then confronting the two-time murderer later. And he just lets the guy go free because he feels that blackmailers are so repulsive and that killing two of them isn't a great loss to the world. What he doesn't seem to consider is that perhaps the murderer will someday be afraid Simon will talk and so he'll come after Simon to kill him too! I wouldn't put it past the guy, since he killed twice and since he didn't really seem to trust Simon.
The TV version has the same murderer, but Simon figures things out before the second death and calls the person to try to warn her. Then he comes to stop the murder and is able to, and is going to see that both people go to prison for their respective crimes: blackmail and murder. He expresses a bit of sympathy for the murderer due to his desperation and seeming madness from what the blackmailers are doing to him, but he isn't going to let the guy go scot-free.
I know the idea in the books is that Simon feels that legal justice isn't always good enough for some criminals and so he takes the law into his own hands a lot more. But I guess I'm just a prude; I prefer the more cleaned-up version of the character in the TV show.
