Just the Ticket

It's been over two weeks since I posted anything on here or on HeroMachine (which has been having slowdown issues with their forum software, so posting on HM is impossible now anyway). But lack of inspiration and a temporarily deactivated forum have been the least of my problems lately. I was hospitalized for chest pain last week, which turned out to be something called myocarditis (inflammation of heart tissue brought on by some kind of virus). If I had let it go (read: if I had been physically and mentally capable of ignoring the most annoyingly, distractingly, infuriatingly painful pain I've ever experienced at one o'clock in the morning), it could have progressed into heart failure and killed me. But two dozen vital checks, a helicopter ride, a heart catheter, an MRI, a mind-numbing amount of bed rest, and four medications later, I am getting better. Speaking of heart problems, you may recall that my last two Villains Are Made  posts focused on Greta Holz, a woman-...

Good morning, gang! (And team! And Ticketholders and HeroMachiners of all ages!) Before I get into today's character bio, I'd like to express how disappointed I am in Russell Peters, Roseanne, and Keenan Ivory Wayans. This week on Last Comic Standing , awkward, unconventional (and in all ways superior) funnyman Joe Machi was sent home after his funniest set in the competition to date. While he may not have any set structure to his material, it has consistently gotten the biggest laughs of any in the competition. I place his humor on a level with that of George Carlin and Robin Williams (that is, given a two hour comedy special, he could potentially make me laugh so hard that I would be on the floor, choking on my laughter through an aching face after the first hour). And yet the three judges mentioned above decided he had gotten too comfortable and gimmicky for his own good, denying him a spot in the final three. Following this post, I will promptly begin fixing them a humong...

Yo, yo, yo. Tickets to Stubs, and I ain't done. I got Mashup  issues, and the mix ain't one. Hit me. If my confusing post title and my pathetic attempt at acting gangsta are any indication, the latest mashup I'm going to share with you features "99 Problems" by Jay-Z. But as I learned during the end credits of Fright Night  (the Colin Farrell remake), Young HOVA isn't the only one with "99 Problems." A band called HUGO did a cover of Jay's hit song, and I liked it so much that I began thinking of ways to combine the two. The HUGO version didn't accommodate Jay's rap very well, so I looked at other "99 Problems" remixes on YouTube, and I got the idea to incorporate Florence + the Machine's "The Dog Days Are Over" as the glue for the track. This is what came out of it: And here's the link for it, too:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thv8tvi_bZ4 Thanks for reading, and watching, and listening. Stay tun...

When last I left off, I had just finished reading Unleashed #0: The Game . Things have heated up quite a bit since then, so let's kick off the series lineup from there. Unleashed : This story arc was a decent follow-up to the events of Godstorm.  A new villain (the same one who ripped off Venus' arms) unleashes an army of monsters, vampires, werewolves, zombies, and demons upon the world as a way to ultimately cleanse it so he can start fresh. But there's a lot more going on than what this Being is up to. We get to see what the big deal is with the Keepers. The Maker  is the chief creative force in the Universe, and the father of Unleashed 's all-powerful big-bad, The Being. Hate  ironically turns out to be the recently murdered Roman goddess of love, Venus. Love  turns out to be Alice Liddle, fresh from her death at the end of Down the Rabbit Hole , which I will get to later. Corruption , who we last saw trailing Sela Mathers on her journey through Myst to...

I just updated my last Mashup Issue  because of technical difficulties viewing the video on a smartphone. To rectify this problem with the post, and all future Mashup Issue s, I included a direct link to the video on YouTube as well. You can read (and check out the video for the first time if you're a smartphone-using idjit like me) this updated entry of  The Mashup Issue #2  by clicking here . Now, on to the business at hand. I have another fresh entry into the Timedrop Comics Fake Universe for you. You probably remember (or maybe you don't, but that's okay) that a war is raging between Covens of Elemental "Witches" (humans who have inherited certain Knavium-based alloys that somehow occur naturally in their bodies, and are therefore gifted with a command over specific cosmic elements like time , fire , electricity, or fate). You may also remember that no Coven or Witch is strictly good or evil, except as they are viewed by one another, so there is still plen...

As promised, I'm following up Mashup Issue #2  with a new Soundtrack . If you've read (and hopefully viewed) Mashup Issue #2 , you'll recall the two rappers up for review today are Riff Raff and Atmosphere . I first heard Riff Raff's single, "Kokayne" (off of his new album, Neon Icon ) where I hear most new music that grabs my attention these days: on Skratch 'n' Sniff . Living in the middle of nowhere (home to two classic rock stations, four country stations—at least—and one teeny-bopper pop station that barely comes in at all), iHeartRadio and Skratch 'n' Sniff have been a blessing to me. Titled "Video Games" for radio play purposes, the white rapper's white powder anthem sports a sped-up baseline that sounds like it came straight out of Fugazi 's "Waiting Room," what might be bagpipes or a squeezebox put to non-annoying use, slightly creative rapid-fire name-dropping ( Chris Rock , Carson Daly , Dolly Parto...

I decided to get back into the review scene, rather than give you another character "right away" (sarcastic quotes because it's been a month since I posted anything here). Welcome to The Mash-Up Issue , Ticketholders! You may have noticed that I started the numbering with two instead of one, and that is because there is already an issue of Bring Back the Soundtrack   with that title . In addition to reviewing movies (which I haven't done in months), books , and music, and designing cool comic book character concepts, and working at Safeway, and writing a book of my own (65 pages and counting), I also find time to create the occasional mashup, along with Photoshopped "album art," under the name DJ Timedrop. In an effort to get as many hits on my work as possible, I will use this title to share my (now small) archive of remixes and mashups with you, starting with this one: It is by no means my first piece, but I consider it my best work so far, and it is...