So, the third Injustice DLC character IS in fact Scorpion

Which, if there was any doubt thus far, seems to make it pretty clear that the final one will be Zod.

Anyway, in case you didn't catch it yet, here's a lil' video revealing some gameplay, as well as the design of the new character.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/06/03/injustice-gods-among-us-scorpion-dlc-announced

I'll be honest, I'm not too pleased with this decision at all. I get that a log of commenters are saying that you should just be happy to get DLC chars and whatnot, but, as many people have pointed out, there already exists a MK vs DC game where they could do this stuff (and Scorpion was in that anyway, wasn't he?), whilst here he takes a spot that could be filled by a bunch of actual DC characters which, admittedly, were the characters people were excited to play instead of a video game character from another franchise. A couple of characters I'd rather have seen, just off the top of my head:

Martian Manhunter
Beast Boy
Black Canary
Power Girl
Hush
Robin
Deadshot
Poison Ivy
Metallo
Alexander Luthor
Superboy Prime
Owlman
Clayface
Elongated Man
Man-Bat
Metamorpho
Geo-Force
Star Sapphire
The Atom
Steel
Doctor Fate
Black Hand
Green Lantern Stewart
And more...

You know, just off the top of my head.

I'm quite aware that some of the choices above are repeatedly constantly online, but frankly, there's a reason everyone's howling for Martian Manhunter to be in the game: he's a great character, and his powers could make for both interesting gameplay and some freakin' rad animations.

My biggest problem, however, is actually NOT with the fact that it's Scorpion, of all characters, but the fact that I feel it undermines what I saw as a good attempt at telling a comic book story in a fighting game, and actually having a plot in it.

I love fighting games, and Tekken, Street Fighter and SoulCalibur are some of the games I've spent most time playing. Seriously, I played Tekken 3 'til frickin' blisters erupted on my fingers.
Repeatedly.

Although I have to say, I was never the biggest fan of Mortal Kombat. I've played 'em, and I own one or two, and they're decent games and everything, but it always felt a bit clunky to me, in some way. That's also why I was initially hesitant about investing in Injustice, seeing as it also had NetherRealm behind it.

... Of course, I wound up trying the trailer and bought the CE of the game and I'm happy I did, and that's in no small part because of the effort they put into the story. It's not the greatest Justice League tale ever told - far from it - but it's decent, and they put effort into it.

My only problem with the game from release, really, was that I felt some character slots were wasted on characters that were sort of shoehorned in. For example, Killer Frost, Bane and Grundy all play the role of "Henchman #2", essentially - was it really necessary to have two big, burly Batman villains in there? Grundy could've been sacked and the spot used for something else. I kind of feel the same with Raven, where we only see the evil version - and partially with Nightwing, but at least his role in the Regime universe helped illustrate some of the differences between the two parallel universes. I'd have liked to see characters who actually played a part worth mentioning in the story.


And there, enter Scorpion, because by the very nature of being from another franchise, he's just shoehorned in. The two first DLC characters, Lobo and Batgirl (and Zod, if he is indeed the final one for this season pass, which it looks like he'll be) could be integrated in expansion packs or new story DLC, and combined with having pretty rad gameplay (Lobo) and being one of my favorite characters (Batgirl - although admittedly, I wouldn't have minded if it had been Stephanie Brown), I can get behind these characters even if they had not been my own choices for DLC. But Scorpion WILL be an outsider in a story context, even if his gameplay looks crazy (and it does). And there are a LOT of DC characters that could've been given their  chance to shine, especially as NetherRealm are obviously willing to include pretty minor characters in their game (read Raven, Grundy, Killer Frost).

On the positive side, though? Scorpion's look was redesigned by fucking Jim Lee, who is just an amazing artist. The gameplay looks pretty wild, as mentioned - they've obviously stayed loyal to the Scorpion character. And his throw, clash and win animations are just absolutely the tits.

Best part though? Might that just be a Martian Manhunter teaser at the end of the trailer?

I'm hoping it is - MMH is still my number one wish for a DLC character.

Adlard, Azzarello, Irving, and my first venturing into a 'con!

 So today was day one of two of Copenhagen Comics, the closest you'll get to a Con in my native country. It's been on a short hiatus (last time it was held was in 2010, I believe, under the name of Komiks.dk), but it returned this year, featuring a host of Danish comic book artists and, as you might've guessed from the headline, a couple of names from the international scene, as well. This was my first ever visit to an event such as this, and having wanted to go to Comic Con for a couple of years now, checking the event announcements every summer and going "Goddamnit I want to go see that", it was kind of a big thing for me, even if this is, not surprisingly, somewhat more low-key than the real big ones.

I had a fucking blast, though.

Might not look impressive to anyone who's visited the international Cons, but this is not a bad show for -anything- at 10am in Denmark. Photo Copyright Martin Kornum Olsen

The event took place near the Copenhagen Central Station, and as one of the friends I went there with would attest to, I was more than giddy with anticipation (as she commented on already the day before when we were attending an Artist Talk with Charlie Adlard at the University of Copenhagen, and I might've gone sort of "squeeeeeeee" as soon as he showed up...)


Anyway, my personal interest in the event was mostly to catch the international names I already mentioned - and whoddoyaknow, all of 'em were featured in some sort of panel on this first day, starting off with Frazer Irving in an interview titled Shadows and Superheroes

Frazer Irving signed my copy of Batman and Robin Must Die! written by Grant Morrison (I mentioned how I fucking love Grant Morrison, right?) and drawn by Frazer. The autograph is accompanied by a quick sketch he whipped up of the Joker. It's bitchin'. Photo Copyright Martin Kornum Olsen


Frazer Irving is a British comic book artist who's drawn for all of the big names and done stuff like X-Men, Batman & Robin, Seven Soldiers, Xombi, Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Hellblazer - you name it, essentially. I was a bit shocked to learn that Frazer apparently has barely touched a comic book other than the ones he illustrate for the past nigh seven years, but there you go - it's like chefs not wanting to eat their own food, I suppose? My own reason for going all fanboy over his appearance was that he did, as mentioned, Batman & Robin, with probably my favorite comic book writer, Grant Morrison (it's the thing he's signing on the picture, by the way), and my head was just about to burst when I saw his name announced. Morrison's Batman & Robin is some of my favorite stuff in comic books, and the final part, which is what Irving has drawn, is particularly epic - because it ties together a fantastic series run for Morrison (including a long Batman run, the Final Crisis crossover and his Batman & Robin), but also because Irving's style of drawing is creepy and dark, and he does a great job at conveying, through his art, the sense of impending doom that you have in the story. His artwork fits the satanic tones of the book well, and that one scene where everything comes to a head... Just read it, it's good! I promise!

Charlie Adlard is the handsome guy with the microphone, by the way. Not the stoned-looking interviewer in an NPC tee in the background. Picture is from the interview Talking the Dead. Photo Copyright Martin Kornum Olsen

I'll be honest and admit that I only recently got into The Walking Dead, the comic book that Adlard has been illustrating for almost ten years now. And shame on fucking me, because if it's somehow blown past you, it's absolutely brilliant, and if you're into comic books you should really go ahead and give it a try. Adlard has been in the comic book industry for a good bit longer than Irving, and Adlard, too, has illustrated all sorts of book: Judge Dredd, The X-Files, Batman, Savage, Warlock, Hellblazer - but, of course, he has most famously done The Walking Dead, which he took over from Tony Moore from issue 7 onwards (this was back in 2004. It's now 2013 and there's more than 100 issues out. That's a lot of fucking zombies)

The Walking Dead is not about the zombies, and thank fuck for that! As Adlard himself pointed out at aforementioned Artist Talk at the University of Copenhagen the day prior to the event (Where I totally caught him too - and I'm glad I did, since I didn't get a spot in the signing queue today. Guy's popular), zombies are really, thoroughly, incredibly, not-at-all interesting characters. The people who have to deal with them are, however, and while there's no doubt that the writing is absolutely excellent, it wouldn't shine in the same way without Adlard's talent - there's so much to be found in those facial expressions, and while black-and-white (and some grey!) titles might notoriously not sell well in the US, it really works here. For me, the black-and-white presentation of a destroyed version of our modern society really shows how the world of The Walking Dead is just absolutely broken, and you're walking around in the leftovers of what was once good, but where it just all went wrong, somewhere. It's the same sense of Broken World you get from (excellent) video games like Fallout 3 and Bioshock, and this overwhelming sense of utter despair and defeat combined with great characters is one epic comic book.

According to Brian himself, he really enjoyed some of the older Superman stuff because he thinks it's funny when Superman is "really just a DICK to Jimmy Olsen". Photo Copyright Martin Kornum Olsen

Brian Azzarello, besides being bald and rockin' a goatee, also spends a lot of time writing comic books. He's written Luthor, Joker, Superman: For Tomorrow, 100 Bullets, Hellblazer, Flashpoint tie-ins, Doc Savage, Before Watchmen: Comedian and Rorschach, and is currently writing Wonder Woman for DC Comics. Brian's appearance was at a panel commemorating the 75th anniversary of the Man of Steel (the panel also featured what might arguably qualify as the Danish Kevin Smith, or at least nerd extraordinaire - Marvel-Morten, comic book fan for more than 50 years, and comic book retailer for 36 years, you can find him behind the counter at Fantask, one of the biggest comic book stores in Denmark, pretty much every day of the week. This guy answered questions from fans in the Danish translations of super hero comics, back when many titles were still translated. I remember seeing his name in comic books that I took over from my older brother. Guy's real passionate!)
I try and read a lot of comic books, but as any fan will know, there are a whole fucking lot of them out there. And since it's only a couple of years ago I really got aggressively back into the medium, I still have some bullet points that lack crossing-off on my must-read list. But I'll tell you this: Azzarello writes a creepy joker, both in the book actually entitled Joker, but certainly also in his Batman Flashpoint miniseries, which I thoroughly enjoyed. His Superman in Superman: For Tomorrow is a scary one, too, because it reeks of the one you might see in stuff like Injustice - the Superman who's about to just take it too far because even if he is the Man of Steel and you need Kryptonite, magic or Doomsday to hurt him, he's as vulnerable emotionally as the rest of us - and as Azzarello pointed in the panel, he needed to find a weakness in Superman for him to be worth writing, as character is best revealed in flaws. Azzarello went for the flaws in Superman himself, and I think that's the right way to go if you want to have a chance at writing a good Supes story.




These Cons are the sort of events that really make it worthwhile being a nerd: as I discussed in my first blog post, it's all about the passion, and you really get to just embrace that fully at places like this. And meeting those guys that create those mediums we love like that - heck, I was starstruck, and I'll proudly stand by that. And if I wanted to go to Comic Con before, I reaaaaaaaaaaally want to go now. The panels, as well as the prior Artist Talk with Charlie Adlard, are the kinds of places where the media is taken seriously not just as entertainment, but as an art form, and where if you, like me, might want to engage with these things in a scholarly and academic manner in the future, you can really feel inspired.

All in all, I really enjoyed my visit to Copenhagen Comics, and I'd probably be returning tomorrow if my goddamn exams didn't demand I stay at home and study - good thing all the most interesting things were scheduled for today!

And I'll totally be returning for the next Copenhagen Comics!