Cover Story - Top 12 Twilight Zone Covers

Hello and welcome to Cover Story, diving as little into the world of comic books as possible.  Well it’s a new year and with a new year comes the annual Twilight Zone marathon.  In case you’ve never encountered it before, every year on New Year’s Eve and the Fourth of July the SciFi channel hosts a massive marathon of the sci-fi/horror/fantasy anthology TV series the Twilight Zone.  Given that just happened and there’s nothing else topical to base this week’s Cover Story on we’re taking a look at the Twilight Zone comics that were published alongside the original show back in the 1950s.  Given that comics of that era were all about weird stories and anthology storytelling the Twilight Zone was the perfect fit for a comic adaptation.  So, let’s dive into the shallow end and get the cover story on the top 12 Twilight Zone comic covers.

Static Thoughts - Black Mirror, Good Episodes

So, I’m not exactly sure who reads this blog but on the off chance you aren’t clued up on world politics here’s a quick recap: the world has gone completely and comically insane.   I don’t have time to cover the massive cavalcade of political shenanigans that have turned our world from one of sane rationality into a nightmarish, Twilight Zone-esc re-imagining of every political satire script the ‘70s chose not to publish.  However, the latest cherry on the sundae of insanity was the revelation that British Prime Minister David Cameron had stuck his junk in the mouth of a dead pig in order to gain access to the college society that served as his entrance to the world of politics.  This is the kind of incredibly stupid, incredibly embarrassing, instantly mockable story the Internet never dreamed of getting its hands on, except for one man who saw it coming: Charlie Booker, writer and developer of the British dark Sci-Fi show Black Mirror.

Static Thoughts - True Detective Season 2

Edited by Robert Beach

Follow-ups are always difficult. It’s a rule of life that a 2^nd installment of anything is severely hit or miss. The general logic behind this is sequels are faced with a number of difficult choices: whether to provide more of the same or take a different approach, for instance. 

Even if the creators decide to simply produce more of what’s already proven successful, there’s the question of what worked so well in the original piece. A story is made up of so many individual parts it can be hard to pinpoint the exact aspects of it that resonates with an audience. This is where True Detective season 2 goes horrible, terribly, catastrophically wrong.  

Static Thoughts - The Thick of It, In the Loop, & VEEP

A couple of weeks ago HBO’s VEEP concluded its 4^th season.  This marks the end of showrunner and creator Armando Iannucci’s phenomenal work on the series as season 5 will see the show enter a period of new leadership.  This also marks the conclusion to a 10 year cycle of Iannucci’s in the realm of televised political comedy.  Iannucci first entered this domain in 2005 with The Thick of It, a political comedy show that revolved around a minister in the fictional British cabinet position of Secretary for Social Affairs.  The show proved popular, lasting for 3 seasons and 2 specials from 2007-2009 when it spun off into a feature film called In the Loop. 

In the Loop marked the first shift over from Iannucci towards American politics in addition to the previous British focusing, revolving around the misadventures of Simon Foster, secretary for international development, who is caught up in pre-war fervor surrounding the launch of the Iraq War.  After a fourth season of The Thick of It co-produced through Hulu Iannucci made the full transition to American politics with HBO’s VEEP in 2012.  With VEEP’s conclusion now seems like a good time to examine Iannucci’s ultimate commentary on American politics compared to England. 

The Strain S2E1 "BK, NY" Review

If you like this review feel free to 'like' Lido Shuffle on Facebook here or follow me on Twitter here.

The Strain returned to televisions this past week and I was there to review it for All-Comic.  It's a mixed 90 minute premiere with a great opening sequence directed by Guillermo Del Toro himself.  Read the whole thing here:

http://all-comic.com/2015/strain-s2x01-bk-ny/

iZombie - Blaine's World Review

In case you aren't one of my normal readers over at Front Towards Gamer you don't know that I also review TV shows, specifically shows adapted from comics or that have been featured as comics I've reviewed.  My previous reviews include Gotham, The Flash, Doctor Who, The Strain, Constantine, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Agent Carter, Powers, and Daredevil.  This week however I take a look at the season finale to iZombie, a series that started out bland and mediocre but clawed its way up to being a stand out creative endeavor with a ton of passion behind it.  See the full review here.