Post 450 - Best of the Best ( final version )

This has been a difficult post because on one side I really only wanted to include the very best of the best. On the other side these posts are all like my children and I don´t want to leave anybody out. But I have to.

Going over the last 5 years of posts - which is the time since I last did one of these posts to add to the bottom of each post - I found a lot of posts that would be worthy additions. But I had to narrow it down so I´m going in the order of what I think is most important for my readers.

Now in my first Top Ten post I included my first post ever which was a mission statement about the blog and what I wanted to achieve. I don´t have that kind of post in this one ( as obviously you can only have one first post ) but I touched upon similar ground on this post about the 5 year anniversary of spanish bloggers / independent comic publishers Rabtifuso. In the intro I´m writing a lot about how I write my own blog.

Likewise this post answers any questions you might have.

Okay, time to get serious. What I want to include first are my posts about one of the greatest comic artists ever, the late Moebius since I don´t get to write too often about comic artists who don´t make superhero comics. One of the reasons I HAVE to include these is that I worked a long time on them and the other one is that there still may be people in America ( or Europe for that matter ) that are new to comics and not aware of his art.

So far I have done four posts about Moebius : Worlds Greatest Comic Artists : Moebius which is about the science fiction comics he did as Moebius, Greatest Comic Artists EVER : Jean Giraud which is about his other work ( for some reason this is one of my most spammed posts ), Worlds Greatest Comics : Blueberry about his famous western BD and Movie rummage table : Time Masters about a french animation film from the 80s for which he did the designs. I still haven´t gotten around to do a post about his best known science fiction series THE INCAL. Sorry.

The next post I just had to include is of a more recent date, and it´s all about giving props to cosplayers which everybody seemed to like.

Cosplaying has become a sub culture in itself and a lot of the people that are involved have become professionals with costumes that are just incredible. So instead of the usual hot cosplay girls I wanted to showcase a few of the more unusual costumes. Don´t get me wrong, I´m not above appreciating a sexy girl dressed up as a comic character but there are so many hard working people out there who deserve a spotlight feature.

In the future there will be more of these posts - probably with a certain common theme from the various categories - and this was my first one.

Another source of excellent posts have been my trips to movieland and tv series from my youth. The first three posts I have to include in this list are movies that are related to comics like the sci fi classic Logan´s run which was adapted to comics a few times, the first time by George Perez ( ! ), horror cult flick Pumpkinhead which was adapted by Dark Horse and Dellamorte Dellamore better known as CEMETERY MAN in America.

It´s a horror cult movie based on a book written by Tiziano Sclavi, the author of Italy´s most successful comic DYLAN DOG which I wrote about at length in this post . The main character is brilliantly played by Rupert Everett and Anna Falchi plays the female lead ( and a few other women ).

Which brings me to my next section, the ever popular tv / movie cult sirens. And I say popular because I always get the most comments on these. They also get lot of spam but them´s the breaks as we say.

The reasons for these posts are not always happy ones, the post about Movie Cult Siren Tura Satana who died in 2011 was one of these cases.


On a more upbeat note is the next cult siren, Elvira, of who I did two posts, a rather long one about the Mistress of the Dark herself ( with her bio ) and one about her comics . This one is for my old pal Terry Hooper.

( Elvira picture above by DennisBudd on DeviantArt ) 

Horror is also the topic of my post about JaMILF Lee Curtis although I also talk about her comedy movies like SOLDIERS OF FORTUNE and A FISH CALLED WANDA. But most of it is about her sexy striptease in True Lies.
 

I also have to include the post about italian mega MILF Simona Ventura because of her good sense of humor and a body that just won´t quit.

She has the best outfits on tv ever and is not afraid to show her stuff. She´s not megastacked but she has a lot of sexappeal no matter if she´s wearing a shirt with a cleavage or a black dress that barely covers her.

And she also has no problem with bending over a lot especially when she could spill out of her dress at any moment. Really, she shows a lot !!!

A bit more " over the place " is the post about movie cult siren Janet Jones Gretzky , Playboy model and wife of famous hockey player Wayne Gretzky who was in POLICE ACADEMY 5 - ASSIGNMENT MIAMI BEACH.

Which in this case means anything from the Police Academy comics to the Police Academy cartoon show ( the less said about that the better ) to the Police Academy movies with real life Power Girl Leslie Easterbrook who played officer Debbi Callahan and had her best scene in POLICE ACADEMY 4 - CITIZENS ON PATROL where she was in a pool with a wet t - shirt.
 

( There have been some requests for HQ pics of the scene but these are the best I could find. If you find any in better quality let me know.)

We then continue to - naturally - Dirty Harry, Carmen Electra, Pamela Anderson and Becky Mullen a.k.a. Sally, the Farmer´s Daughter on GLOW  which brings us back to comics via ROBI a.k.a. Rochus Hahn a.k.a. Horst Brack Der Bestrafer on Germany´s cult wrestling show CATCH UP on RTL.

Speaking about coming back to more comic content : the next cult siren post contains the usual musing from me about the cult tv series Wonder Woman played by Lynda Carter on one of her birthdays . I also did another post on Lynda Carter about her work as an actor and singer outside of the Wonder Woman series and one about Wonder Woman comic covers . 

A rather new post is Wonder Woman Wednesday ( once again on Lynda Carter´s birthday ) about John Byrne´s run on the book I just re - read.

John Byrne brings me back to the next point on the agenda, which are my favorite artists. Which means two of my favorite Batman artists. For me Jim Aparo was always the definitive Batman artist but I also was a huge fan of his other series like AQUAMAN, THE SPECTRE or THE OUTSIDERS .

The combined original covers to the crossover from The New Teen Titans 37 by George Perez and Batman and the Outsiders 5 by Jim Aparo.

Anybody knows who did this homage with the Avengers and the X - Men ?

Number 3 on my list of Batman artists is Norm Breyfogle ( number 2 is Neal Adams ) who got his own Greatest Comic Artists post. There´s also Norm Breyfogle´s Batman : a different look an article written by David Fernández on the occasion of the release of his Batman run with Alan Grant in the spanish hardcover edition which I translated to english. And there´s this years Norm Breyfogle Wednesday done on Norm´s birthday and which covers everything I haven´t talked about in the previous posts.

George Perez.

I just love me some George Perez. He´s one of my favorite artists of all times and I get all excited whenever a new hardcover collects some of his work. Just last month I got the fabulous The Art of George Perez book and it´s incredible. So it´s no wonder that some of my longest and best posts are about his work. Remember The Titans is as the name says all about his time on NEW TEEN TITANS or rather the german version JUNGE GIGANTEN which is where I read those comics first. I continued this a bit with The Dual Dynamics of the Dynamic Duo , which goes on about why Robin gets older but Batman doesn´t and the many deaths of the Robins.

Of course he worked on other books like his AVENGERS which I mentioned in this post where I whined about the fact that there is not enough of John Buscema´s run available in hardcover as well as in my Guardians of the Galaxy - my Secret Origin post which I´m including here since there´s a big blockbuster movie coming out now. With Rocket Racoon in it.

George Perez also worked on one of Mark Gruenwald´s most beloved stories The Project Cadmus epic from MARVEL - TWO - IN - ONE .

Darick Robertson Donnerstag made on his birthday takes a look on his career and NEW WARRIORS, WOLVERINE and TRANSMETROPOLITAN.

I tried to continue it 2 days later but ended up with something completely different : a post about german horror comics and cheap pulp novels .

Other artist spotlights include Pasqual Ferry , done on his birthday

and this post about the passing of Gene Colan one of the comic greats.

Most posts here are about superhero comics but there are a few exceptions where I wandered outside of my comfort zone - or at least found some interesting independent comics to write about.

First I have to mention Black Tower Comics, the one man independent publishing machine of Terry Hooper from the excellent ComicBitsOnline blog. I haven´t done as many reviews I would have liked and I hope to continue with them as soon as I can. So far I have done reviews on One bat, two bats, The Bat triumphant ! , Germany´s first super hero team called D - Gruppe, D - Gruppe returns and it´s about time ! and Twilight of the super heroes . Terry Hooper also brought the work of Dave Gordon to my attention. You can check it out yourself in my excessive reading .

Have sword will travel is about one of my favorite independent books Usagi Yojimbo by Stan Sakai ( sadly on hiatus at the moment ) and Mike Mignola´s Hellboy is mentioned in a number of posts. Viva Hellboy ! is about HELLBOY IN MEXICO by Richard Corben, Mike Mignola´s work on HULK and ROCKET RACOON ( did I mention Rocket Racoon before ? ) in the 80s and masked luchadores like El Santo De Plata ( I have finally managed to see El Santo y las Mujeres Vampiro ). Another Hellboy comic by Richard Corben, THE CROOKED MAN, is one of my recommendations on this Halloween post ( the other is BATMAN THE UNSEEN ). Hellboy is also mentioned on this post about german censorship and swastikas, What could possibly be my last post but wasn´t. Instead this was the post that nearly ended my blog , maybe someday I´ll tell the story behind it.

Yes, Tales fro the Kryptonian also does westerns. Not often but Hex appeal takes an indepth look at JONAH HEX by Jordi Bernet and Wild Wild West Germany is all about the german western comics I read as a kid.

And speaking about comics I read as a kid IZNOGOUD one of the best comics in the world was among them. It´s a french BD and since it may not be well known outside of Europe I had to include it here. I also did a post about the Iznogoud and Mick Tanguy movies that might interest you.

Now I can´t talk about indie comics without mentioning the great Mike Allred.  Don´t get even - get MADMAN ! is ultra long and one of the few posts where I managed to stay focused. It´s also the famous post where I explain what Rubbelbilder are for all my readers outside of Germany.

LOVE AND CAPES is another great independent superhero series which gets my unconditional recommendation and I´m sure it´s also going to be your next favorite superhero book . In more indie related stuff I wrote about the resurrection of Valiant in The fall of DC - The rise of Valiant ? and I did a rundown on the Valiant books I used to read in this post . 

Before returning to superhero books here are the links for my Neil Gaiman tribute , Die großen Phantastic Comics about the german fantasy comics I read as a teenager and My epicly illustrated journey to Dreadstar about the german edition of EPIC COMICS, Marvel graphic novels in the german and original version, Jim Starlin and the COSMIC ODYSSEY saga.

As you could guess from the title I´m a big Superman fan so I should have probably started there. Since my last roundup of excellency there have been quite a few number of posts about The Man of Tomorrow on my self declared Superman Day , Man of Steel Monday , Man of Testosterone Tuesday and me bitching about the new Superman movie . Great Rao !

One of my favorite super teams is the Justice Society of America ( and not only because Power Girl is a member ) and I blame the Society is about my favorite JSA story Thy Kingdom Come as well as the penciler for the following storylines, Jesus Merino and which comics he did in Spain.

Readers seem to especially like my posts down memory lane so I want to close the DC section with It´s ( not married anymore ) Flash Friday and The return of Flash Friday a new series about how I started reading the FLASH books with Wally West and why he´s my favorite Flash.

The Marvel section starts with  I`m recommending a Spider - Man book because this will probably be the only Spider - Man recommendation for the forseeable future. I think this was the last good Spider - Man story and if there are posts about Spidey they will be like  Some Spider - Man for your ears and eyes about some spotlight episodes on ComicGeekSpeak and the beloved Power Records or Enter : Die erstaunliche Spinne ! and Make Mein Marvel Monday about the german Spider - Man comics of my generation. The same is true for THE INCREDIBLE HULK and I pay tribute to one of the best runs of HULK - the one by Len Wein, Sal Buscema and Ernie Chan ( and Josef Rubinstein ) - in This man this monster Tuesday .

Another favorite Marvel series of all times is FANTASTIC FOUR and there have been some great posts on the book. It seems that I especially like to do them on the anniversaries of the blog since Essential ESSENTIAL Fantastic Four was done on the fifth year anniversary and there´s also A post for this blog´s sixth anniversary ( which continues The Coming of Gabriel storyline from the More essential Fantastic Four reading post ) and goes into the german publishing history of DIE FANTASTISCHEN VIER.

Speaking about another Kirby creation form the pages of THE FANTASTIC FOUR, I want to mention Instead of Halloween - Black Panther and Black Panther - a different kind of monster , two excellent posts.

More Bronze Age Marvel stuff in these posts about the David Micheline, John Romita Jr, Bob Layton run on IRON MAN in this post and here , I re - visit two of the most iconic stories from the Chris Claremont and John Byrne run on UNCANNY X - MEN in Days of Future Pasts long gone by and What happens in Phoenix stays in Phoenix about PHOENIX : THE UNTOLD STORY, take a look at old crossover events like INFERNO in Like a book out of hell - start the fire and Like a book out of hell - fan the flame , get all misty eyed in This was my Secret Wars and Secret Wars II : black was the new black and even find something positive about the AVENGERS period between the end of John Buscema´s and Walter Simonson´s tenure on the world´s greatest superheroes´ book and the HEROES REBORN re - start with Mark Waid and George Perez namely The Gatherers storyline  .

Wow, this really has gotten longer than I expected. As a bonus for holding out so long I want to include is my post about  Popculture TV Siren Markie Post . I know that this post is in the " most popular post " sidebar gadget ( although only at number 5, what´s up with that ? ) but I´m including it just in case that ever changes. You never know. And a lot of people seem to have discovered my blog through this post so it helps increase traffic. 

There is also some stuff about Heather Thomas in the post since she also appeared on FALL GUY. I still haven´t gotten around to give Heather a post of her own which I´m hoping to do on her birthday one of these days.

And with that we really are at the end of the posts that is going to be included at the bottom of each new post on Tales from the Kryptonian.

I´ll try to shorten it a bit in the coming days but I´m not sure I can leave out anything else. If you want to see the parts I had to cut just click on the next post or follow this link . Me, I´m going to be busy the next few weeks ( or rather months ) going over all the posts I linked to - when I´m not writing a new post - so I´m wishing all my readers a Happy Easter !

I thought about which clip I should add that would be right for the best of post but since I couldn´t decide which of the ones I hadn´t posted yet was the best - and I couldn´t find It´s the Easter Beagle Charlie Brown !  - here´s a movie I mentioned in the Hellboy in Mexico post : It´s SANTO EL ENMASCARADO DE PLATA CONTRA LAS MUJERES VAMPIRO. Not really the right thing for the holidays but a long post deserves a long video. Arriba !



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