The Upper Hand

Someone's obviously in danger here... but I'm not sure who.

I'm experimenting with a few more dynamic "shots" in my drawings recently, so we're getting a lot of close-ups nowadays (like this last picture I did - that's meant to be the same woman, if you couldn't tell).

I don't know that I have a story I'd like to tell with these characters, but it sure is fun to draw them.

The 100 Most Recommended Classics

A friend of mine posted this list of top recommended books in classical literature. Enjoy.

Titles colored in blue are ones I've read.
Titles colored in red are ones I've read excerpts from.
Titles colored in green are ones which I suspect were made up, because I've never heard of them.
Titles colored in purple are Walden, which is not very good.

Novels and Short Stories

Jane Austen
•Pride and Prejudice
•British, 1813

James Baldwin
•Go Tell It on the Mountain
•American, 1953

Saul Bellow
•Seize the Day
•American, 1956

Charlotte Brontë
•Jane Eyre
•British 1847

Emily Brontë
•Wuthering Heights
•British, 1847

Albert Camus
•The Stranger
•French, 1942

Lewis Carroll
•Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
•British, 1865

Willa Cather
•My Antonia
•American, 1918

Miguel de Cervantes
•Don Quixote
•Spanish, 1605, 1617

Kate Chopin
•The Awakening
•American, 1899


Joseph Conrad
•Heart of Darkness
•British, 1902


Stephen Crane
•The Red Badge of Courage
•American, 1895

Daniel Defoe
•Robinson Crusoe
•British, 1719

Charles Dickens
•Great Expectations
•British, 1860-61

Feodor Dostoevski
•Crime and Punishment
•Russian, 1866

George Eliot
•The Mill on the Floss
•British, 1860

Ralph Ellison
•Invisible Man
•American, 1947

William Faulkner
•The Sound and the Fury
•American, 1929

Henry Fielding
•Tom Jones
•British, 1749

F. Scott Fitzgerald
•The Great Gatsby
•American, 1925

Gustave Flaubert
•Madame Bovary
•French, 1857

E.M. Forster
•A Passage to India
•British, 1924


Gabriel García Márquez
•One Hundred Years of Solitude
•Columbian, 1967

William Golding
•Lord of the Flies
•British, 1954

Thomas Hardy
•Tess of the D'Urbervilles
•British, 1891


Nathaniel Hawthorne
•The Scarlet Letter
•American, 1850

Ernest Hemingway
•A Farewell to Arms
•American, 1929

Zora Neale Hurston
•Their Eyes Were Watching God
•American, 1937

Aldous Huxley
•Brave New World
•British, 1932

Henry James
•The Turn of the Screw
•American, 1898

James Joyce
•A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
•Irish, 1916

Franz Kafka
•The Trial
•Czechoslovakian, 1925

D.H. Lawrence
•Sons and Lovers
•British, 1913

Sinclair Lewis
•Babbitt
•American, 1922

Bernard Malamud
•The Assistant
•American, 1957


Thomas Mann
•Death in Venice
•German, 1912

Herman Melville
•Moby-Dick
•American, 1851

Toni Morrison
•Sula
•American, 1973

Flannery O'Connor
•A Good Man Is Hard to Find
•American, 1955

Tillie Olsen
•Tell Me a Riddle
•American, 1956-60

George Orwell
•Animal Farm
•British, 1945


Alan Paton
•Cry, the Beloved Country
•South African, 1948

Edgar Allan Poe
•Great Tales and Poems
•American, 1839-45

J.D. Salinger
•The Catcher in the Rye
•American, 1951

Sir Walter Scott
•Ivanhoe
•British, 1820


Mary Shelley
•Frankenstein
•British, 1818

John Steinbeck
•The Grapes of Wrath
•American, 1939

Jonathan Swift
•Gulliver's Travels
•British, 1726

William Makepeace Thackeray
•Vanity Fair
•British, 1847-48

Leo Tolstoy
•War and Peace
•Russian, 1865-69

Ivan Turgenev
•Fathers and Sons
•Russian, 1862

Mark Twain
•The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
•American, 1886

John Updike
•Rabbit, Run
•American, 1961

Voltaire
•Candide
•French, 1759

Kurt Vonnegut
•Slaughterhouse Five
•American, 1969

Alice Walker
•The Color Purple
•American, 1982

Eudora Welty
•Thirteen Stories
•American, 1965

Edith Wharton
•The Age of Innocence
•American, 1920

Virginia Woolf
•To the Lighthouse
•British, 1927

Richard Wright
•Native Son
•American, 1940

Drama

Aeschylus
•Oresteia
•Greek, 458 BCE

Aristophanes
•Lysistrata
•Greek, 411, BCE

Samuel Beckett
•Waiting for Godot
•Irish, 1952

Bertolt Brecht
•Mother Courage and Her Children
•German, 1941

Anton Chekov
•The Cherry Orchard
•Russian, 1904

Euripides
•Medea
•Greek, 431 BCE

Johann von Goethe
•Faust, Part I
•German, 1808

Henrik Ibsen
•A Doll's House
•Norwegian, 1879

Christopher Marlowe
•Doctor Faustus
•British, 1604

Arthur Miller
•Death of a Salesman
•American, 1949

Molière
•The Misanthrope
•French, 1666

Eugene O'Neill
•Desire Under the Elms
•American, 1924

William Shakespeare
•Hamlet
•British, 1600


George Bernard Shaw
•Pygmalion
•British, 1913

Sophocles
•Oedipus Rex
•Greek, 430 BCE

Oscar Wilde
•The Importance of Being Earnest
•British, 1895


Thornton Wilder
•Our Town
•American, 1938


Tennessee Williams
•The Glass Menagerie
•American, 1945

Poetry*

Allison, Alexander, Editor
•Norton Anthology of Poetry (Shorter Edition)
•British & American

Anonymous
•Beowulf
•British, c. 700

Anonymous
•Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
•British, c. 1350-1400


Geoffrey Chaucer
•Canterbury Tales
•British, 1387-1400

Dante
•Inferno
•Italian, c. 1320

Homer
•The Odyssey
•Greek, c. 9th C. BCE

John Milton
•Paradise Lost
•British, 1667

Vergil
•The Aeneid
•Italian, c. 18 BCE

Walt Whitman
•Leaves of Grass
•American, 1855

Miscellaneous

Aristotle
•Poetics
•Greek, 4th C. BCE

Saint Augustine
•Confessions
•Italian, 397-401

The Holy Bible (esp. King James Version)

Charles Darwin
•Origin of the Species
•British, 1859

Ralph Waldo Emerson
•"The American Scholar"
•American, 1837

Benjamin Franklin
•Autobiography
•American, 1771

Sigmund Freud
•Civilization and Its Discontents
•German, 1930

Edith Hamilton
•Mythology
•American, 1940

Niccolò Machiavelli
•The Prince
•Italian, 1532

Karl Marx
•Communist Manifesto
•German, 1848

Michel de Montaigne
•Selected Essays
•French, 1580

Plato
•Republic
•Greek, c. 370 BCE

Henry David Thoreau
•Walden
•American, 1854

*Apparently, there hasn't been any poet worth reading in the last 150 years.

My Geek Pedigree

I get a lot of flack from my parents sometimes... and not always about the obvious subject. Most recently, any time I have discussion regarding The Avengers movie provokes the same response from my parents:

"I raised a bunch of geeks."

I'm sure they mean to say "geek" in a loving voice. Still, I can't help but sense a little of the stigma that usually accompanies that particular epithet. So I would like to take the opportunity to say now, loud and proud, that I AM a total geek. And I learned how to be a geek from my parents.

Parents who geek out have children who geek out.

I want to make it clear that my parents are MORE than enablers. It wasn't just all the trading cards, video games, and comic books they bought their children over years of Christmases and birthdays that prompted such deep-rooted nerdery. No, my parents are, themselves, pretty darn geeky, too.

Take my dad, for example. I grew up reading from his Dragonlance book collection. He's got the biggest collection of Godzilla movies I've ever seen. Oh, and a lot of the superhero movies and cartoons I enjoy? When they come out on DVD, I borrow them from HIM.

My mom's not as obvious a geek as my dad is. She almost never watches TV, has never touched a video game controller, and only played Magic: The Gathering once while my brother watched over her shoulder and told her exactly when (and how) to play Mana Short.

It's a really rare card. You've probably never heard of it.

That said, my mom's still pretty geeky about some things. She loves her some good showtunes - and I'm pretty sure, in terms of pure geekiness, "musical theater" ranks right up there with "Pokemon" and "calculus." I'm pretty sure you could call her a geek over her love for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, too.

Oh, and she really likes The Wizard of Oz. Not the movie, mind you, because the movie gets it wrong - Dorothy's shoes are actually silver. She's got just about every book in the Oz series (that's right, The Wizard of Oz is part of a SERIES). While she doesn't engage in conversations about who would win in a fight between the Tin Man and the Scarecrow, I think that type of adoration for an obscure fantasy series qualifies as a "geek" trait.

Of course, none of this is meant to be a slight to my parents. I love them both, and I'm pretty sure that their taste in obscure genre works baffles me as much as my affection for stories about a vagabond samurai in feudal Japan who is also a rabbit confuses the HECK out of them. All's fair in love and geekery, I guess.

Well, that's it for today's blog post. I hope you all come back in a few days to catch my blow-by-blow analysis of the epic Scarecrow/Tin Man battle.

Braddy Reads A Good Man Is Hard To Find

Hey, look, it's a literature book. That sounds like something someone would read if it was on a list of goals or something. Pretty cool, huh?

I've joked before that literature is all about how depressing a story one can tell. That's not entirely true - there are plenty of happy, cheerful stories out there that end well for most of the parties involved. The stigma that all literature is dark is fairly undeserved.

This collection of stories, however, is the reason that stigma exists. Flannery O'Connor's story collection is called A Good Man is Hard to Find, but it could just as easily be called Miserable People are Miserable to Each Other Until Someone Dies.

There's not a single likeable character in this entire collection of short stories, except for possibly the wide-eyed, innocent boy Harry in the story "The River" (spoiler alert: he dies). Everyone is conceited and self-righteous. They're cruel out of some sick sense of entitlement and, in some cases, piety. If the book had ENDED with the story "A Good Man is Hard to Find" rather than starting with it, the bald-faced cruelty of The Misfit would be almost refreshing.

None of this is to say that the book is terrible, mind. Since most of the characters are devout Christians, their often contradictory behavior serves to mirror some of our own hypocrisy's, whether we profess a Christian faith or not. And O'Connor is a great writer who employs dialog with tremendous skill.

A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories isn't a relaxing bedtime read, but, like most classics, is classic for a reason. Well worth the time spent.

Things I'll Love Forever: Avatar: The Last Airbender

One of the terrible things about being a geek is the near-overwhelming tendency to obsess over the stuff we enjoy. Thankfully, one of the NICE things about being a geek is the seemingly endless supply of QUALITY stuff to obsess over. So it's with great delight that I take a minute to gush over one of my new favorite programs, Avatar: The Last Airbender.

I'm a little late to the Avatar game - the series ended a couple of years ago. Apparently, there's a spinoff series and some comics in the mix, too, but I haven't indulged in those. I'm talking about the original, three-season story - a fairly standard children's fantasy show with a LOT of sophistication and depth.

• Honestly, one of my favorite aspects of Avatar: The Last Airbender is its brevity. One of the creators (I have no idea which) said (roughly), "If I were to tell you, 'I have this great story for you - it never ends,' you'd walk out of the room." The creators intended the show to last three years, and then, when they'd told the story they wanted, they ended it. It's admirable.


• I'll admit to not being a huge fan of the animation, but the character designs for Avatar are excellent. Each character has a distinct flair, yet each also contains elements in their design that link them to their heritage. There's a visual sense of community between members of the same tribe that help to establish a real depth to the world-building the creators have done here.


• The characters themselves are fantastic. While each character has a distinct set of personality traits, no one is confined solely to their archetypal role (there's no set "comic relief" or "love interest"). Everyone's fully fleshed out, and everyone is given the opportunity to change.


• Speaking of characters, these guys are the best:
  
  
  The dude on the left, Zuko, has one of the most complex character arcs I've seen. He's confused, angry, and frequently makes the wrong decisions. It's pretty awesome. On the other hand, Toph is pretty straightforward. She's tough, rude, a bit gross, and always ready for a scrap. She's a completely un-typical female character, and totally awesome for it.

The tremendous attention to detail and the dedication to telling story above all else set Avatar in a league all its own. Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, it may be my favorite animated show ever. Avatar is funny, exciting, and full of enthusiasm, and that's why I'll love it forever.

No relation.

Unfortunate relation that no one mentions at reunions.

Cooking with Braddy: Cheese Quesadillas with a Green Mole Sauce

Not pictured:  Sesame Seeds

It seems like every time I get a free evening with absolutely nothing planned, I feel an almost overwhelming impulse to try a new recipe. It's shaping up to be quite the expensive habit, as I almost always have to run to the store to get new spices and herbs. Sometimes, I have to go twice, like when I forgot to write down that I needed sesame seeds for this recipe from the Mighty Spice Cookbook.

My mother will tell you that I used to eat a TON of quesadillas - although I'm a little confused as to why you're actually talking to my mother right now. Anyway, I always wanted to try this recipe, as it looked to be pretty darn easy. Basically, you take everything pictured above except the tortillas and mozerella, add the one ingredient not pictured (sesame seeds), and mix it in a blender. Then you let it all simmer for a half hour, blend it again, and serve.

I actually felt pretty handy putting this recipe together, as I had food going on two different burners at once. It wound up being a lot of work for what basically amounts to a glorified appetizer - especially since the mole tended to spit a bit. Perhaps it was angry that I'd forgotten the sesame seeds.

Still, the end result, after minimal fuss, was pretty delicious.

Seriously, though, don't forget the sesame seeds.

The Other Side of the Kirby Conundrum

Okay, so I eventually did make it out to see The Avengers, despite the misgivings I expressed in this post here. As if anyone REALLY though I was going to completely boycott the most anticipated super-hero move of the past ten years. Apparently, the only person I managed to fool was me. Go figure.

(I'll get the review out of the way quick: The movie was good. There's no reason for the Hulk to be as enjoyable as he was, but that actually happened. I like my entertainment to be a little more thought-provoking, but I still liked all the punching. Also, Thanos is cool.)

My main hang-up with The Avengers (and superhero comics in general) is how the corporations that own the trademarks treat the men and women who CREATE the characters that build their companies. I specifically cited Marvel's treatment of Jack Kirby, but, really, it's been DC comics who have been the worst offenders - at least, if Alan Moore is to be believed.

The tricky part, though, is that DC comics owns one of my favorite characters, Batman. And I love Batman. His original creators told some fun stories about Batman, but, for me, the best Batman stories have come about in the last fifteen to twenty years - between Batman: The Animated Series, The Dark Knight, and Grant Morrison's recent run in the comics, there's been a lot of good Batman stuff to love.

And it's not like Mr. Kirby never intended anyone else to write his characters. The work he produced for Marvel was work-for-hire, so I imagine he MUST have known his work would be used by other writers. And, every now and then, those writers do a pretty bang-up job.

So, on the one hand, we've got creators who are treated unfairly with regards to the creations they worked so hard on. On the other hand, we've got the creators who are paid now to continue to tell stories with those characters. Sometimes, the stories are awesome. Othertimes, you get Halle Berry's Catwoman. Both groups of people are artists, and both deserve support. After all, we don't penalize the actor who plays Hamlet, even though he didn't invent the character.

Still, I get the sense that even other creators understand that there's a problem. To go back to The Avengers, Joss Whedon (Firefly is still overrated) directed a near-perfect superhero film. However, he's gone on-record to say that he may not be involved in Avengers 2, as it's "an enormous amount of work telling what is ultimately somebody else’s story, even though I feel like I did get to put myself into it."

It's that last part I think that's key - we should support work (be it comic-booky or other-wooky) where the artist has something to say with the material. As long as people can continue to bring something new to the table, I have very little problem with a creator playing with someone else's toys.

But I still reserve the right to complain about the ridiculous number of remakes/reboots/sequels every year.