And We're Back

Time to catch up on the past couple of weeks.

100. Ultimate Fantastic Four, vol. 8: Devils by Mike Carey, et al. Enjoyable. (Checked out of the library.)
     
101. House of Many Ways by Diana Wynne Jones. A sequel to Howl's Moving Castle and Castle in the Air. As always, very good. Reading this made me want to re-watch the movie version of Howl's Moving Castle (even though the movie is very different from the book.)
     
102. Ultimate Fantastic Four, vol. 9: Silver Surfer by Mike Carey & Pasqual Ferry. I have found that Carey's Ultimate FF is quite good. (Library.)
     
103. Batman: The Black Casebook by various. I would love to see more reprints of the wacky sci-fi Batman from the 50s.
     
104. Studs Terkel's Working: A Graphic Adaptation by Harvey Pekar, et al. Comics adaptation of Terkel's classic book. (Library.)
     
105. Fall of Cthulhu, vol 4: Godwar by Michael Alan Nelson, Markus Santolouco, & Mark Dos Santos. As I think I have mentioned with previous volumes, not terribly Lovecraftian, but good as standard horror. (Library.)
     
106. Ultimate Fantastic Four, vol. 10: Ghosts by Mike Carey, Mark Brooks, & Tyler Kirkham. (Library.)
     
107. Doctor Who: Through Time and Space by various. A collection of one-shot Doctor Who comics. Pretty good. (Library.)
     
108. Superman: The Man of Steel, vol.6 by John Byrne, et al. Superman comics from the late 80s.
     
109. Showcase Presents Sgt. Rock, vol. 1 by Robert Kanigher, Joe Kubert, et al. I had heard great things about these comics, but this was still better than I expected. I think my attitude was colored by Kanigher's superhero work, which is completely insane. While these stories aren't any more realistic, they are more down to earth.

Several movies since my last real update:

• Sherlock Holmes. Guy Ritchie's movie may offend purists, but it's a lot of fun, and I don't think it runs counter to the essence of the character.
  
• The Faux Film Festival. A collection of fake commercials, faux TV shows, and mockumentaries. Unfortunately, the shorts we saw were almost universally awful. Except for a couple of the movies, nobody knew when to end a joke. And the jokes were terrible.
  
• Doctor Who: The Robots of Death. I am very glad that Teena has been enjoying the Doctor Who DVDs I've been checking out of the library.
  
• Cinematic Titanic Live: The Alien Factor. The best Cinematic Titanic yet. The fact that it's live, and we can see the riffers' reactions to the jokes helps. Very funny.
  
• Doctor Who: Pyramids of Mars. A great story. One of my favorite adventures.