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Venmoch posted:I'd love to see Constantine return to London at some point or see if they'll tackle some of the more "difficult" storylines (such as Constantine dealing with a bunch of Neo-Nazi's) but there's not much to go on with just a pilot which usually play it safe anyway. That said, Matt Ryan is basically Constantine so they got that bit correct at least! I'm very doubtful of that kind-of storyline ever actually happening. The show seems really in-love with portraying the supernatural and not exploring the human component of the supernatural beyond "wah I don't wanna get tortured by a monster." Kampfbereit posted:That bloodstained map is a bad omen, it looks like they are setting up a very formulaic "demon of the week". And I'm incredibly tired of Ye Olde Hidden Library With Ye Leather-bound Books Of Ancient Knowledge And Plot Expository Devices. "So, it looks like the Pittsburgh demon is Fnurzifer, he controls traffic, and he's allergic to nuts. I wonder if we can lure him to the abandoned nut packing plant?" This sounds a lot more likely for what we're going to get. Along with another neutered version of "Dangerous Habits." Eddain posted:"Arrogant English bastard con artist with knowledge of the occult"? If you need to describe Constantine to modern TV viewers it's best to go: "House, but he's a British punk rock demon hunter." You run the risk of making them think the show is a procedural, but in terms of how the character interacts with the world this is probably the best shorthand to get someone to understand quickly what Constantine's deal and appeal is. ---------- I didn't hate the pilot but there was a lot of stuff I didn't care for either. Dr. Fate's helmet is lovely pandering to grognards who go "OMG THAT'S A THING I KNOW I KNOW THAT THING", and Constantine's constant use of exorcisms was very stupid, and holy gently caress was rushing through what happened in Newcastle a dumb loving idea. That said Matt Ryan is a very solid anchor of a lead who seems to get the character, they did show Constantine being a con-man and wrecking the lives of everyone involved with him, and the Angel felt very Hellblazer. So yeah I could really see this shaking out either way and I'm going to have to give it at least a few more episodes before drawing a conclusion.
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Oct 27, 2014 14:36
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| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 00:04 |
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Guess it won't last too long then.
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Nov 1, 2014 03:02
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Deakul posted:Well, that was a bad episode of television. You know drat well it is. Josh Lyman posted:Zed is better than the old girl, yes, but she also has accent problem. She's trying to cover up her hispanic accent, but it just makes her voice sound weird. Which is weird because John calls her out for being Latina in a white-as-gently caress part of the Mid-Atlantic. I'm chalking it up to the producers being piss-scared of a main character who isn't white or token and asking her to "tone it down." ----------------- I liked this episode well-enough that Constnatine still gets to ride the wave of goodwill I have for it. Matt Ryan is still far and away the high point and I hope that this show's probable cancellation won't be the end of his career. I like Zed well enough so far, especially since they managed to make the stupid "person has dreams of someone and draws tons of pictures of them (and they happen to involve a lot of old comic art)" cliche work well enough. That said this episode felt really goddamn aimless. I just watched Constantine drift from set to set and character to character without much sense of progress beyond what Constantine was telling me the progress was, ultimately ending back with the wife and I was like "oh so that's the villain; wait why the hell are they the villain what did I miss?" The shower was cool, the car was cool, the concept and realization of the coal minor ghosts was really cool, the church scene was cool, but in the end it's just all a lot of filler that hasn't quite figured out how to hook the audience into giving a gently caress. Then again the pacing was much better. I like the visual style. I like that they kept Constantine's magic-casting to a minimum. For a network show it didn't seem to play things too safe or watered down, and the final moments of the villain were cliche but felt appropriately Hellblazer. So yeah still undecided on whether or not I like or hate this show. Could still go either way. gently caress.
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Nov 1, 2014 08:25
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Firstborn posted:It kind of reminds me of Plinkett's review of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, where someone says what an icon Indiana Jones is, but then Plinkett brings up the point of why he had to wear the same outfit. Indiana Jones is my Star Wars, I'll be the first to admit he's an icon, but it is kind of funny to wear the suit like a uniform. John is on-screen like 90% of the time in this show, I'd still loving recognize him in a t-shirt, guys. He doesn't need to wear the trench and stuff all the goddamn time. B-B-B-B-B-B-But he's a superhero and superheroes wear a costume!  -- Someone up high on the show. I guarantee it. muscles like this? posted:It's not like John wears an elaborate costume, he wears a white shirt and a tie. Agreed but in the long run it's going to look really strange if he doesn't change his clothes up at all. Binary Logic posted:I thought that last bit was very loyal to Constantine's actions in the comic books. He doesn't run in (magical) guns blazing but often has to casually approach the antagonist, let her (or him) think they've tricked him and got the upper hand, and then he pulls out the revelation and/or incantation to take them down. I acknowledged this in my post and you cut off my quote literally 2 sentences before I acknowledged that. Binary Logic posted:Since he's in the USA it would be great to have an episode in Louisiana with John encountering Abby and referring to Swamp Thing. That would have to come later in the season with higher stakes involved, or part of an ongoing storyline with longer time span. Yeah but Swamp Thing means a heavy Special Effects budget for costumes, sets, and CGI. Constantine would have to be a pretty drat big hit before you could sell the network on that being necessary when most episodes you can get away with spooky ghosts and other low-budgets tuff.
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Nov 1, 2014 20:49
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He first appeared in the pages of Alan Moore's very famous and influential run on Swamp Thing (he also did V for Vendetta, Watchmen, and the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen books among many others), which was a very mature horror book that completely rewrote the mythology of the title character and took him on an epic across the dark Gothic South, then the dark Gothic USA, then the DC Universe (he literally holds Gotham City and Batman hostage at one point), and then the literal DC Universe (seeing Adam Strange and Darkseid among many others). It featured some truly scary stories and had some very scandalous content even by today's standards, and DC ultimately supported it and gave it permission to run without the "Comics Code Authority" sticker which basically coincided with the end of the Newsstand and Corner Store being the place most people bought comics and the rise of Comics-Only Stores and the "Adult" market. It was so influential it led directly to the creation of DC's mature readers "Vertigo" line and directly led into the critically lauded series "The Sandman" as well as Constantine's own "Hellblazer." Anyway about midway through Moore's run on Swamp Thing one of the main artists asked the writer to create a character that looked like Sting. Moore obliged and came up with a "low rent black mage" name John Constantine. Constantine shows up right after a formative experience has the Swamp Thing realizing he can grow a new body from any form of plant matter. Constantine is aware of rising dark forces and despite being a jerk convinces the Swamp Thing to go around the country dealing with all sorts of nasty riffs on classic horror icons (Werewolves and Vampires and Ghosts and the like), in exchange for the information Constantine knows about Swamp Thing's elemental nature. Pretty much all of Constantine's M.O. is there from the get-go-- he's a con man, a liar, a cheat, and any friends who get involved with his goals tend to end up much worse off for the trouble. Aside from one very poorly explained scene where Constantine takes great offense in a bar to being called gay, he arrived pretty much fully formed and ready to go and other British talent migrating to DC's nascent Vertigo line were very quick to take up the slack and get him his own book. Since then Swamp Thing and Constantine have had a mutual "frenemy" kind-of relationship, with weird and dumb poo poo happening between them every now and again like Swamp Thing growing Constnatine a giant pot plant for his birthday party or Constantine letting Swamp Thing take over his body so he can impregnate his wife (seriously). You can do one without the other, but their histories are pretty inextricably linked forever. mind the walrus fucked around with this message at 21:18 on Nov 1, 2014 |
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Nov 1, 2014 21:07
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You don't know the half of it friend  Moore's Swamp Thing is one of my favorite comics of all time and was very influential on me as a teen in the 00s. Even with the dated art and backgrounds it's still 100% worth a good long read. I know they still sell hardcovers of this run in your average Barnes and Noble and of course on Amazon, so there's really no excuse to not check it out at some point even if you don't give a drat about Constantine.                        Of course if these pages didn't already make you well aware-- Swamp Thing would be bloody expensive as hell to create and film on a Network Television Show, so while I think the showrunners should never say never we as fans should anticipate never seeing the big green guy. Ever. mind the walrus fucked around with this message at 21:39 on Nov 1, 2014 |
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Nov 1, 2014 21:31
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Trick R Treat has a really great sequence like that. And yeah the art is incredible but I've met more than one person who was put off by the loose linework on some of the faces and the garish neon one-color backgrounds. This is really the tip of the iceberg though-- there are so many great issues and pages of art that I simply couldn't find with a quick google search that need to be seen to be believed.
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Nov 1, 2014 22:16
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Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I am really not a fan with where the took Constantine after the New 52. I'm completely nonplussed that they have intentions of making a JL:Dark but I also have zero interest in seeing it come to fruition. And yeah it's definitely a "never say never" situation with Swamp Thing, but I really wouldn't bet on it if the ratings and critical reception of these first two episodes are at all indicative of where the show is headed. I do hope it picks up though, even if it does go into that pit of dumb known as JL:Dark.
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Nov 1, 2014 22:24
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Well, yes and no. I've never checked it out in-depth but looking at both movies and the TV show my impression was that they held fast to Len Wein's original conception of the character which was more of a horror anthology story that covered mostly disposable characters week to week encountering some kind of monster and Swamp Thing would get involved somehow. There was Anton Arcane and his evil chemical company that'd usually create monsters-of-the-week and antagonize Swamp Thing and his regular supporting cast, and that was about it. I know they at least had an eye towards Moore's Swamp Thing since the second movie opens with a montage of 80s Swamp Thing art, much of it recognizable from Moore's run and Moore's run is pretty much what has kept the character from being a 70s relic like Marvel's own Man-Thing, but I would be very surprised if they had done any direct adaptations or Moore's work. The entire premise of the character is rewritten from Moore's very first issue, the scope goes beyond the confines of the Louisiana swamps and some evil chemical company very quickly (in fact Anton Arcane is presumed dead at the outset of Moore's run), and there's a TON of DC stuff involved including Batman, the Justice League, the Crisis on Infinite Earths, and literally Hell. It's pretty much an epic you could only really pull off in a written medium like comics or literature due to the sheer breadth of impossible locations and characters it covers, and I'm 99% sure the producers of the movies and TV show didn't even begin to attempt to cover it. Also  I never knew that about the guy who played Swamp Thing in the live action versions. You're not kidding that dude put up with some heavy poo poo.
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Nov 1, 2014 22:43
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bobkatt013 posted:Also some of the poo poo Anton pulls would not be on network tv. In Moore's run? Abso-loving-lutely not would it never EVER be shown on Network TV. It'd come across as pushing the boundaries on HBO or film. But on Wein's run? Eh, it's Saturday Morning Cartoon premise'd enough to be made "safe" for the kiddies.
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Nov 1, 2014 22:46
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And y'know, someone asked so I figured it'd be polite to show and tell.
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Nov 2, 2014 04:14
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Red Oktober posted:These posts have really interested me. This is the current reprint of Moore's run. Start here and go through the collection until you hit Vol. 6 here. As I mentioned in an earlier post I see this particular collection in almost any Barnes and Noble as well. The story hits the ground running and doesn't give you any exposition on who Anton Arcane, Abby Arcane, or Matt Cable are; but you don't need to know to pick up the story-- I didn't on my first read-through and followed just fine. According to Amazon reviews these reprints have some weird errors and digitally re-color everything, which kind-of sucks, but unless you want to special-order the old Trade Paperbacks (the ones I have) there's not much you can do. If you want you can always go check out Len Wein and Bernie Wrightson's stuff, particularly Swamp Thing's first story in House of Secrets #92, but if I'm being honest it's more of a historical curiosity and preamble than a memorable saga in its own right. After Moore's run if you feel like digging you can always look into Rick Veitch's run afterwards-- this is where stuff like Swamp Thing possessing Constantine's body to impregnate his wife comes from, along with a time-travelling story where Veitch had to cancel an issue where Swamp Thing met Jesus. I've never had the spare money to check it out but I honestly don't hear bad things considering they were following a run as formative as Moore's. After that you can basically skip forward to the 00s and check out various attempts to uh--ahem--resurrect the character in the pages of Vertigo. I hear particularly good things about Scott Snyder's run, but I'll be dead honest I've never been truly grabbed by any of it. That's not to say it was bad per se, but it just lacked that electricity present in Moore's work and felt like new writer's trying out the old warhorse. Avoid the New 52 stuff. If you read it before the classic stuff it will give you the wrong impression, and if you read it after you've read the classic stuff it will most likely make you angry. Another good follow-up is to check out Swamp Thing's two progeny-- Hellblazer and Sandman. Hellblazer is obviously thread-appropriate, although as others have mentioned it's more of a "gently caress Thatcher" book at first like 80% of all British-themed comics were back then. Sandman is an evolution and expansion on many of the ideas introduced in Swamp Thing and a critically lauded epic in its own right that firmly cemented Vertigo as DC's prestige line; it was created by Neil Gaiman who got his start in comics thanks to a correspondence with Moore (Gaiman actually snail-mailed Moore fan-scripts and Moore liked them so much he helped get Gaiman a job). Also no spoilers but a minor character from Swamp Thing who ends up dead finds a literal new life in the pages of Sandman as a raven.
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Nov 2, 2014 15:42
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bobkatt013 posted:There is also an evil monkey! He's got a gun!
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Nov 2, 2014 18:31
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Desperado Bones posted:I don't know if this spoilers or not, I just watched one of those special videos they've been posting on youtube: According to it, the story that will run in this season is the Rising Darkness and it's based on a story from Swamp Thing. And I haven't read Swamp Thing, and I have no clue what was it about in the comics. Can someone care to sort of give a small description of it? Those words "rising darkness" mean absolutely nothing as far as I can recall and find with a quick Google search (just results from the show), and the only thing I can see them adapting from Moore's run is the Brujeria and Invunche--a tribunal of male witches in South America who dismember and warp a sacrificed infant to serve as their undead muscle. They're ultimately trying to capitalize on the rifts in reality caused by Crisis on Infinite Earths to get Evil as a concept to overwhelm the universe, or something to that general effect, and if memory serves they're behind the general uptick in monsters and ghosts and undead poo poo across America/The World. There is literally no other Constantine plotline in Moore's entire Swamp Thing run. There may be something from Veitch's or some later Swamp Thing run, in which case I definitely don't know it, but for some reason I doubt it because Moore's Swamp Thing is what anyone "in the know" is going to think of when the showrunners say "We're adapting something from Swamp Thing."
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Nov 3, 2014 04:33
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Desperado Bones posted:Oh,thanks a lot! I guess is that one, because it's the closest to what supposedly is happening/will happen during the show. That also explains a reference that was made in Hellblazer that got me all confused. It is time to get my hands in Swamp Thing. Definitely. I forgot to add If they do go with the Brujera you can obviously expect all that poo poo about Crisis on Infinite Earths to be gone, and likely the scale pulled back immensely to just them summoning some ancient demon or something similar. The Invunche would be cool as gently caress to see on-screen though, and if they had the balls to go with the "Vampires in a Flooded Town at the bottom of a Lake" story from Swamp Thing I'd be a happy camper indeed. There's a really cool abstract moment involving a severed head and a crow that I'd hope they keep in too.
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Nov 3, 2014 05:09
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Nov 3, 2014 05:13
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Further reading: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imbunche
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Nov 3, 2014 05:27
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TheJoker138 posted:They should just digitally replace the cigarettes with something ridiculous like a miniature version of himself. Only if the small version has a cigarette. ---- I am completely unsurprised that a show in the "Friday Night Death Slot" isn't gathering hot ratings. Predictably reddit tried to rake me over the coals for saying that because "What about DVR and Hulu the TV landscape is not the same dammit!", but I mean come on it's called the "Friday Night Death Slot" for a reason.
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Nov 3, 2014 16:31
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Desperado Bones posted:There's hope that it can be a survivor like Hannibal...which did much worse in rantings, but then it has a very artsy direction and several other companies are ready to jump and keep it if NBC decides to kill it. I'm guessing that....  .... it's all going to come down to how well they can sell NBC/other networks on the long-term idea of a Justice League Dark.
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Nov 3, 2014 17:08
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Clamknuckle posted:Well Walrus you sold me on Swamp Thing. I've always been a Marvel guy but I've been meaning to get into some DC titles for years. I'll be getting the first volumes of Hellblazer and the Moore Swamp Thing trades. Wow thanks. I do hope you like them. They really are some of my favorite comics of all-time. I was just fan-gushing so it's really surprising to me that others are like "wow that looks awesome" and not just "  shut up no one cares," but then again Moore is considered one of the all-time greatest comics writers for drat good reasons and Swamp Thing was his American break-through.
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Nov 3, 2014 21:35
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Xealot posted:Supernatural has already done every possible variation of a one-off whodunnit with demons and monsters. There's no uncharted territory left for Constantine to go on that front. Well there are but they're either too expensive or too graphic for network TV. Also whoever said Supernatural fans don't take kindly to pointing out that Castiel wears Constantine's outfit were not kidding.
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Nov 4, 2014 01:14
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Gyges posted:the TV says they're going to be the last tobacco generation or something. Having just been to a school and seen the number of 18-25 year-olds lighting up, I can safely say this is absolute horseshit.
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Nov 4, 2014 15:08
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Well that description is so vague as to mean absolutely nothing, but then again that's true of a lot of TV episodes and sometimes the thinnest premise makes for the best story.
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Nov 8, 2014 01:26
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David D. Davidson posted:And he has Psychic Paper, lovely. Yeah that was lame as gently caress. There's bound to be some real overlap between Doctor Who and potential Constantine fans so straight-up using one of the Doctor's biggest narrative cheats is not going to win them over. That said I'm only 15 minutes into the episode and already it's leaps and bounds better. Constantine dancing in blood, the ice record, Chas and Zed's characterization, it's all noticeably better than the previous two episodes. A pity this show seems destined to die.
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Nov 8, 2014 05:03
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Even for fans most comic-wikis are absolutely terrible. They tend to fall exclusively on one of two extremes: - Next to no useful information whatsoever beyond the broadest strokes possible - Insanely detailed on pet stories some crazy goon wrote one lonely misguided night with next to no information on any other stories out there.
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Nov 8, 2014 06:21
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Hidingo Kojimba posted:Possibly, but the Ace of Winchesters is actually from Hellblazer as well, at least as far back as the Ennis run, it gets referenced every now and again in random plot points. Yeah this show is really having to fight uphill to appear different from its derivatives and progenitors.
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Nov 8, 2014 21:42
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Desperado Bones posted:Also,walrus? Good news(?), the show had a small up in viewership and ratings. Well at least it should keep the show going another week, and if the uptick in quality continues or at least sustains there's a shot at the show lasting. Just a shot though.
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Nov 9, 2014 01:08
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Desperado Bones posted:My question is, what if by some Christmas miracle it gets renewed, would a change of the airing day help out the series? Almost certainly. It's not called "The Friday Night Death Slot" ironically and even with DVR tracking and the like now it's still where networks put shows they have low expectations for.
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Nov 9, 2014 03:29
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| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 00:04 |
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The AV Club put it best when they said that the movie Constantine has a really great eye, but no ear. That seems about right.
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Nov 14, 2014 16:46
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