Greg LaRoque has worked on a plethora of titles both at Marvel and DC but the two books he´s mainly known for are LEGION OF SUPER - HEROES and FLASH. As everybody who has followed this blog for some time knows I´m a huge fan of the Legion and any excuse to put more Legion content on the blog is fine by me. But we had a lot of Legion of Super - Heroes covers in Yesterday´s post in honor of Tom Peyer and to tell the truth I am not so up to date with Greg LaRoque´s Legion issues as I am with his Flash issues. And it IS Friday so FLASH FRIDAY with Greg LaRoque it is. We will have to do another post with his work on the Legion of Super - Heroes at some other day. But don´t worry, as I have already proven over the last weeks nothing gets shelved indefinitely here on TALES FROM THE KRYPTONIAN.
Now that it was settled that I was going to make a special FLASH FRIDAY post for Greg LaRoque´s birthday the question was about what it should be ? The special FLASH FRIDAY post I had planned to do is a review of the recently published THE FLASH - A CELEBRATION OF 75 YEARS and how it compares to the german counterpart FLASH ANTHOLOGIE - 75 JAHRE ABENTEUER IM ZEITRAFFER. But the thing is that there is no issue from Greg LaRoque´s FLASH run in the US edition. So I thought about finally doing one of my long post poned FLASH posts - either DEATH IN COMICS : THE DEATH OF BARRY ALLEN or THE RETURN OF BARRY ALLEN - but then decided against it. For one, I still need to put a lot of work into the posts and I have to finish Yesterday´s post so I don´t want to spend all day on this post. Also these two posts are like my FLASH FRIDAY trump cards so I want to hold on to them a bit longer. And then there is the thing that writing about the last one involves one huge spoiler so I want to do that as late as possible. So instead I was just going to post one issue of FLASH.
Okay, all that was left to do was to pick one issue from Greg LaRoque´s entire run of FLASH that showcases his great art, Jose Marzan´s fantastic inks, William Messner - Loebs wonderful writing and also shows what a great character Wally West as the Flash was. No pressure there, right ?
Luckily for me it was not as difficult as it had been since there was one issue that came up in all the reviews of THE FLASH - A CELEBRATION OF 75 YEARS on amazon as the one issue that should have been included, the same issue that IS included in FLASH ANTHOLOGIE - 75 JAHRE ABENTEUER IM ZEITRAFFER. I don´t want to completely shoot my bolt here because I still plan on doing the review post but I think a lot of people who bought the US hardcover were disappointed because they came in with a wrong premise. It is not THE BEST FLASH STORIES FROM 75 YEARS nor GREATEST MOMENTS FROM 75 YEARS OF FLASH HISTORY. As it says it is meant as a celebration although if you look at the way how disparate the selection of stories is the word acknowledgement would be more appropriate. Anyway, we will discuss all this and more at length in another post. For Today I give you Nobody Dies from FLASH issue 54 which is not only a big fan favorite but also William Messner - Loebs´ favorite issue from his entire FLASH run.
With the number of FLASH FRIDAY posts I have done you must think there are no Flash related links left to post but as it is there are always some that are overlooked or fall through the cracks. Like the post on DIAL B FOR BLOG about Simpsons Super Spectacular 12 in which Milhouse becomes the Golde Age Flash and also Hawkman, Black Lightning and a bunch of other super heroes. And speaking of Jay Garrick, Dennis E. Power has an extensive post on WOLD NEWTON UNIVERSE : A SECRET UNIVERSE about one of the oddest DC super hero groups, The Inferior Five. You may ask what this has to do with the original DC universe speedster ? Well, one of the members of the Inferior Five is Herman Cramer who was adopted by Jay Garrick and there are more ties to other super heroes / pulp heroes like Superman, Wonder Woman, Tarzan or Ellery Queen throughout the teams weird family and history although I´m not exactly sure how much of this is official DC canon and how much of that is Dennis E. Power´s own deductions. In light of the NEW 52 and the REBIRTH the question arises what is official canon and if there is such a thing at all but nevertheless this is an interesting read. Apropos, one thing I don´t write often enough - although it is in my blog description in the blog header - are the foreign editions of US comics and QUIÉN ME MANDARIA A MI ? has an extensive archive on Classicos DC which published The Flash but also other series like Jim Aparo´s The Brave And The Bold issues, The New Teen Titans, All Star Squadron or Orion. My spanish readers are probably already be aware of the books but other spanish speaking people might find it interesting.
We start Today´s birthday countdown with inker Wade Von Grawbadger, not because he is the youngest candidate but because his year of birth is unknown. He is best known for inking Tony Harris on Starman and Stuart Immomen on a plethora of books from New Avengers to All - New X - Men.
We DO know however Sophie Howard´s year of birth so it´s pretty safe to say that she turns 34. The mega busty page 3 girl started her career as a stripper at the age of 17 and was once named as having Britain´s Best Boobs. What I find a bit strange is that there is no picture on her imdb entry but I guess as a former glamour model ( whatever that may be ) with the stunning measurements of 38G - 26 - 34 all the pictures of her the staff had were from magazines such as Maxim, Nuts or Loaded and emphasized other parts of her body and not her face. Speaking of pictures I thought I had already posted something about her but apparently the picture below was not among it and it was extremely difficult to find in good quality.
Billy Zane celebrates his 51st birthday who was on season 7 of Charmed with sexbomb Alyssa Milano , in the episode Well Cooked Hams from the Tales from the Crypt tv series and Tales from the Crypt : Demon Knight.
He also did the voice of Jason Blood / The Demon Etrigan on The New Batman Adventures but Today I want to focus on another comic book hero namely Lee Falk´s The Phantom whom Billy Zane portrayed 1996 in a much underrated movie. There are a few video reviews of the movie on YouTube but I chose this one because it has a lot of info about the comic plus a tip where you can see an even better cut of the movie. Even if you don´t go for the fan edit you might try and watch the movie in black and white.
Speaking about The Phantom I think I have already posted this link but just in case I have not you can find Sal Velluto´s blog THE GHOST WHO DRAWS and also check out THE ART OF SAL VELLUTO for more great art.
Next we have Playmate of the Month April in 1986, Teri Weigel who turns 55. Because of Teri´s perplexing physique and her protruding torpedo shaped sweater puppies she became quite popular and was in a few specials from PLAYBOY. She also was one of the few playmates who also appeared in PENTHOUSE although not as a Pet of the Month. She was just everywhere during the 80s. She later had her breasts enlarged and did porn but she looked best in her appearances on Married with Children.
And we are staying in the 80s as one of Mtv´s best vjs EVER Ray Cokes celebrates his 59th birthday. Here is a video from the time when Mtv still played music videos most of the time and Most Wanted was must see tv.
Speaking about 80s must see tv, Edward James Olmos who turns 70 is best known to Today´s television audiences from shows like Marvel´s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. or Battlestar Galactica but for me he will always be the silent and charismatic Lieutenant Castillo from Miami Vice. No offense, but one of the things that always bugged me on the rebooted Battlestar Galactica series was the idea that the humans created the cylons. Although it would explain why two of the models were such hot sexbombs like Tricia Helfer and Grace Park. On the other side the cylons would never had to go to war against the humans because if you have an unlimited amount of copies of Tricia Helfer and Grace Park there is no male human who can resist you. I guess those toasters were still lacking in basic knowledge about humans.
Back to Miami Vice here is a fan made trailer from the episodes that centered on Lieutenant Castillo who was the real star of the show.
Our last birthday shoutout goes to the great late Ricardo Rinaldi who has left a footprint in the german comic scene not only through his work for the Kauka Verlag on series like Fix und Foxi and Die Pichelsteiner ( the last one was especially popular because of curvy cave woman Petra ) but also as one of the founders of the International Comic Salon Erlangen in 1984.
Since I had a clip from DC´s Legends of Tomorrow in Yesterday´s post our FLASH related video gives you a bit more background knowledge about Savitar in the comics seeing as he is the main villain in the third season.
Usually I end these posts with the Flash video but because Today all the videos are so short I want to close things up with a longer one. And since we are still missing a cartoon video here is another 80s throwback, Rock & Rule which I recently came across while looking for something completely different. It is a repost but the movie is good enough to deserve it and I am just too lazy - plus I also have to finish Yesterday´s post after putting all the bells and whistles on this one AND watch an episode of TnA iMPACT Wrestling I found just the other day because I´m only human - to go back and overdo a post that is almost four years old. As I will be probably busy the next two days check out last year´s post on Karl May and Winnetou since Tomorrow is Karl May´s anniversary. And now : enjoy Rock & Rule.
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Maybe this Agamotto dude just wants his eye back.
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