I’ve noticed the Watchmen trailers include the phrase "Based on the graphic novel."

Watchmen wasn’t a graphic novel. It was a comic book. It was twelve issues, published monthly. It was published in comic-book form, meaning that the pages were creased and held together by two staples. They published a collected version in trade paperback form the following year, but I wouldn’t say that makes it a graphic novel.

I know why they use that term: they think the ordinary people will be afraid of the term "comic book." The thing about that is…I don’t think people who aren’t into comic books know what a graphic novel is. How often do you hear that term outside of a comic book shop?

When I saw the movie Road to Perdition, the opening credits included that phrase: "Based on the graphic novel." (As far as I know, the phrase was applied correctly in that circumstance.) From the row behind me, I heard a question: "This movie is graphic?" Her date replied with something I couldn’t hear clearly. He may have known the term and been explaining, or maybe he just said "Idunno."

Sure, to some extent they have to cater to the "norms," but they should at least do it in sensible ways. This subject reminded me of how movie makers try to avoid making comic book movies too "comic booky," and how they adapted a different Alan Moore work into LXG, which was more "comic booky" than the comic book.

Well, I actually know who’s writing this crap: Jeph Loeb. This really surprises me, actually. I’ve been impressed with Loeb in the past.

Anyway, the crap he wrote is Ultimates 3. This book has none of the "wow" of the previous two series by Mark Millar. It’s got its own crappy kind of "wow."

"Wow. I can’t believe they came right out and actually stated that Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch are in an incestuous relationship, because it was much better when they were the ambiguously incestuous duo."

"Wow. It seems like they’re trying to make this book more like the Avengers, but Ultimates was good because of the differences between the two."

"Wow. Why did they think changing Ultimate Thor’s speech pattern to more resemble mainstream Marvel Thor was a good idea?" (Well, there’s something going on in the book that may undo that once it’s resolved. I have a feeling it won’t happen, though.)

On to a little bit of something else, check out the panel at this link.

Why would Janet say "Who told you about that?" to the only other person she would expect to know that, even if she kind of suspects he might not be who he says he is?

Ugh.

I assume this show is going to be on HBO, because in an early scene, one of the televisions appears to be showing "Real time with Bill Maher" (an HBO product) in which Bill is talking to a vampire about their history of exploiting humans for their own needs. There’s also boobs and f-bombs, so it’s certainly not going to be on network TV.

The title of the show is also the name of a brand of synthetic blood, the invention of which has encouraged the vampire race to "come out of the coffin," (as they say on the show) and live among humans openly. Since vampires now have a safe product to consume, they no longer have to feed on the humans.

Vampirism is treated by the writers as both a minority race and an alternate lifestyle. Likewise, the fear of vampires is treated as something akin to both racism and homophobia. They’ve yet to show if the tales about evil vampires are misleading the way gangster rap culture is misleading, nor have they shown whether or not most drinking of humans has been done consensually. So I don’t know (within the show’s setting) if the fear of vampirism is truly analagous to fear of gays and other skin colors.

The two main characters appear to be Sooky the mind-reader (played by Anna Paquin) and Bill the vampire. On Bill’s first night in Sooky’s small Louisiana town, he’s drawn away from a diner by two people who plan to subdue him and drain his blood, because vampire blood (also known as v-juice) fetches quite a high price in the illegal drug trade. Sooky catches on to the plan, and rescues him.

Eh. Some other stuff happens.

So far, this show looks like a soap opera with vampires, f-bombs, and boobs (but not Anna’s….yet). I’m interested in seeing if the vampires’ reputation is deserved or not. I’m also interested in seeing Anna’s boobs. However, True Blood hasn’t made me say "wow" yet.

Well, the first episode did end with something of a cliffhanger, but I’m not going to elaborate.

So this is my "blog." There are many "blogs" like it, but this one is mine.

Have I ever told you that I don’t really like the word "blog?" Did "web log" have too many syllables or something?

There’s a certain segment of the US population that seems to fear a new language becoming prominent in America. They claim to believe that their children growing up bilingual will bring this country to its knees.

From what I’m seeing, another language is going to replace English in usage, but it won’t be Spanish: it’s going to be Chatroomese, Textian, or Lolcatsois.