Firestorm Replica Leather Jacket

Ever since Firestorm appeared on Legends Of Tomorrow in an actual costume (as opposed to the look he had on The Flash), I've been waiting for someone to produce a replica costume. They've now started appearing for sale online, so I took the plunge and bought one. There are a few different places selling them, which I'll cover later, but for now, I present to you the Firestorm jacket!

I'm going to take a detailed look here, but a few initial thoughts:

• The chest plate is removable. This to me was a major selling point, as it can be used as a regular jacket the other 51 weeks of the year when the local Comic Convention isn't in town.
• The obvious flaw right off the bat is that the positioning of chest logo is not quite right.
• The colour is a fair bit brighter than the show, I'm contemplating getting it dyed a darker red. It's passable as-is though.
• Overall I'm quite happy with it. It appears to be well made, the leather is soft, and despite the problems I'm going to highlight below it's appearance is effective. It's not like I was ever going to whip out my sewing machine and make a leather jacket.

Here's an initial comparison vs a promo shot from the show:

Here's a comparison vs the eBay listing I bought it off:

Three things that jump out from this comparison:

• The chest icon is wrong on the finished jacket
• The ribbing over the abdomen is too close together
• The stripes down the arms are angled incorrectly

The picture from the listing looks a lot closer to the show version than the finished product. This was something I was wary of when buying it given that there were no modeled photos to go off. Like I said earlier, it's passable and most people aren't going to know the difference, but I want to take a bit of a "screen accurate" view here.

A closer look at the chest:

Icon aside, the other problem here is the big black line at the bottom. The show version is more molded in the chest which is too much to expect for a replica, but they overdid the shading quite badly.

The full chest piece:

I'm contemplating unstitching the reverse of the chest and putting it on the front since it's cut the same. It would fix the black line and let me put a better icon on it. I was planning on making a more "show accurate" icon (complete with lights) when I ordered it, but this version needs fixing first.

A closer shot of the piping on the torso:


A comparison of how the straps attach the chest piece:

The show version has the loops sewn directly in the chest piece, with rivets either side. The replica has an extra loop.

The straps themselves are loops secured by velcro:


Now here's an example of the show shifting the goalposts over the course of the season:

The replica has the right idea initially- ribbed straps. However by the time the final episode rolled around, they were using flat black straps on the suit.

On to the arms, because that's the other major thing that the replica gets wrong:

As you can see the stripe is supposed to be two distinct sections, which the replica doesn't do.
If you're a stickler for detail, the paneling on the shoulder is also wrong:

A close-up of the zipped cuffs (nothing wrong here, just figured it was worth showing every detail I could)

















Now, the jacket itself:

It has two pockets which, weren't mentioned in the listing (this is a big plus). If, like me, you're thinking that the ability to wear it as a regular jacket is a plus, there are a couple of things to point out. The first is the shading:

The manufacturer obviously shaded it while the chest piece was attached, as the jacket under it is completely clean and there's a bit of a "v" outline at the top of the chest. The other thing to consider is the six metal loops that connect to the straps:

Not really a big deal, but worth pointing out.

So that's basically it for the comparisons. There are a couple of extra things that are missing:

• There should be elbow pads
• The back of the suit is supposed to be yellow, not red. To be honest, I'm willing to give them a pass on both of these as there really wasn't an extended clear shot of Firestorm's back until the final episode of Legends Of Tomorrow.

A note on sizing: I got a Medium, and it's pretty snug, especially with the chest piece on. I typically wear Large tshirts etc, but last time I bought a leather jacket at a proper store the assistant recommended a Medium, and I have to say she knew what she was talking about. So that's the approach I went with here. The replica is tighter than my other jacket, but then that's had the benefit of the past year to stretch a bit so I can't really give you a definitive answer. It kinda feels like an extra inch in the shoulders might be a good thing, but not to the extent where I'm regretting it or hesitant to wear it. I realise I've basically said a whole lot of nothing in this paragraph; Just think about it before you buy (oh yeah, the neck is a pretty close fit also)

There you have it. A final note about where I bought it, and a possible alternative: I got mine on eBay from this seller. The listing said the jacket was made in the USA, but it shipped from Pakistan, so I kinda doubt that ;) It took 5 weeks to get to me, which frustratingly was two weeks after my local convention (although I was buying it just to have it, the con was a coincidence). It cost $150US.
Now, a quick google search will show a few outlets selling replica jackets. They pretty much all have the same stock photos and are around the same price, so I assume from that that they are selling the same jacket that I received.
There is one site selling the jacket, which actually has multiple shots of it being worn:

The site is NewLeatherJacket.com (which as I post this is currently not working, but it was yesterday). As you can see from the picture above, it gets right all the major things that my jacket gets wrong. From memory (since the site is currently down) it's a fair bit more expensive, and made of synthetic leather. But the fact that they have modeled photos leads me to conclude that they are legit and the jacket you see is what you'll get. If you care about being as close to the real thing as possible, I would consider trying them (disclaimer: I'm totally guessing here).

2012 Year In Review: Comics

2012 solidified my move away from DC. In 2011 before the New 52 launched, I was buying 11 DC titles a month. As 2012 comes to a close, I'm now buying one. Not so good for DC, but it's been a motivator for trying a few different things, including some non-fiction graphic novels.

Comics I've added to my pull list:

Voltron

A nostalgic add, but I enjoyed the old Devil's Due series so it was worth a go and met my 2012 mission of paying more attention to the smaller publishers (in this case Dynamite) . I dropped it after 8 issues since it wasn't very good but hey, worth a go right?

X-O Manowar
I was never a consistent buyer of the original series, but I did enjoy the occasional issue I picked up and I've since completed the run. I've been very happy to see the return of Valiant, adding all the titles to my pull list as soon as they've been announced. For all that it's the flagship title of the new Valiant I'd probably site it as the weakest of the bunch, but it's worth sticking with for now. I just wish the pacing would speed up a bit (and by "a bit" I mean "a lot" ;))

Bloodshot
Solid.

Shadowman
It's only just getting started so the jury's still out, but it has potential. So long as it doesn't go overboard on the voodoo like the old Acclaim relaunch did with Vol 2, things should be just fine.

Archer & Armstrong
This has been really fun so far. Got to the point quickly, and has kept things rolling since then.

Harbinger
My pick of the new Valiant. A good dose of the current "grim and gritty" style of comics, without *quite* tipping the main character over to the point of "unlikeable bastard". Story pacing has been effective.

Comics I've dropped:

Voltron
As mentioned, it just wasn't very good. Off the top of my head, I think it was about 5 issues before Voltron itself actually joined the action. Too much standing around talking, and too long to get to the point. Plus the art is a bit on the weak side.

Blue Beetle
I'm not quite comfortable calling this "bad". All I can really say is I just didn't enjoy it. It shares the same problem several of the New 52 titles have - the character just hasn't been around long enough and doesn't have enough past stories under their belt to warrant starting their story all over again from the very beginning. We went through the origin story of the character too recently for me to be able to emotionally invest in it all over again, but really there's no way around it for the current creative team. To fit Blue Beetle into the current DCnU he has to start from the beginning. Just one of those things.

Aquaman
I really like what Geoff Johns has been doing with Aquaman. I just don't like how god damn slowly he's doing it. The Trench storyline was an issue or two too long, but it was cool so I kept on with it. The Black Manta story that followed was slow even by Johns' standards. I just don't feel it's worth my money, even though the overall concept is a good one.

Hawkman
This was terrible from the very beginning, both in the writing and the art.

JLI (cancelled)
I reasonably enjoyed this title but DC got rid of it, seemingly for story reasons rather than low sales. I don't get it but hey, if DC don't want my money...

Moon Knight (cancelled)
I loved this. Moon Knight channeling Wolverine, Spider-Man, and Captain America was a brilliant approach to his schizophrenia. I have no idea if this thing ended due to sales or if it was just due to end anyway, but I was sorry to see it go.

Hellblazer (soon to be cancelled, at least)
OK, this isn't ending until 2013, but I'm gutted about this so I'm adding it here to indulge in some extra angst. I buy it in trade format so I'm technically not losing it off my pull list, but well... for me it's the shining beacon in DC's roster, certainly as far as the last 16 months have been concerned with their superhero output. *sigh*

Comics I'm still reading:

So this is the section where I mention all the comics that I've been collecting for longer than just the past year. Somewhat depressingly, the list rounds out at one.

Firestorm

There will be a separate post coming about this series in the near future, but I will say this: I'm excited to see where Dan Jurgens will take the character, I just hope he gets a chance to do it before getting cancelled.

That rounds out the monthly titles I bought on a regular basis. There's a couple of graphic novels I'd like to mention, but I think I'll make a separate post for those. This post is a bit on the long side ;)

X Marks The Spot... Reboot Edition

All the cool kids are rebooting their comic book lines these days, so Dark Horse have decided to join in. It started a few months ago with Ghost, and now it continues with something that has me unreasonably excited: the return of X!

Way back in the dim dark past when I actually posted content to this blog, I had a bit of a thing for this guy. The regular series was written by Steven Grant and had a host of excellent artists throughout it's 25 issue life. It's been collected into two volumes, which I recommend highly. Now it's receiving the reboot treatment via Dark Horse Presents, with the aim for an eventual stand-alone series. So I thought I'd take a look at it.

This new story is written by Duane Swierczynski, with art by Eric Nguyen. While I can't claim to be overly familiar with Nguyen's work, Swierczynski's proven himself to be pretty decent - I enjoyed his run on Iron Fist and the new Bloodshot over at Valiant has been enjoyable. At the very least, he's shown he can write violent characters with a decent use of tough-guy talk (one of the things I LOVED about Steven Grant's work on the character). Obviously things are going to be updated with a reboot, but I was anxious to see how the team handled what I consider to be the core aspects of the character. They only have 8 pages to play with, but I felt they acquitted themselves very well.

The story kicks off with some resident bad guys having a meeting about the costumed vigilante. We're immediately re-acquainted with the basic operating method of X: marking people for death.

There's the intimidation aspect of sending characters photos of themselves; the creative team also keep alive the old device of people encountering objects that form an 'X', in this instance while X himself is carrying out a hit.

The only difference I'd point out is that in the original series such a sign would indicate impending death for the 3 people in the panel, whereas this occurs after the intended target is dead. So it would appear it's not going to be handled quite the same, but I'm happy to see the idea still present.

Next up, it's established that X is very driven and pretty damn tough. After catching a bullet in the arm, we see him in an alley rendering first aid:

That had to hurt. No indication from this if his regenerative powers are present in this incarnation - this could merely be to stop the bleeding while the wound regenerates, or it could be a necessary patch to stop him bleeding to death. We shall see.

Right at the end, we get the first taste of dialogue from our "hero".

I assume this is interrogation rather than a slow death - X was never one to prolong things, although he was not above trying to pump someone for information. To be honest I could've done without all the blood (on this and page 3), but that's a tiresome trend in comics that's unlikely to go away any time soon. Plus it drives home the uncompromising attitude of the character, that he's willing to hack limbs off to make a point. Maybe that's pushing the character a bit more into the realm of 'psycho' than he was previously (and he was pretty psycho to begin with...), but it'll be interesting to see where they go with it. X's own dialogue didn't set my world on fire, but it's his first words we're hearing and this is only 8 pages.

Overall, this was a good beginning. In 8 pages a fair amount happened to establish the character of X while still leaving a ton of questions. We saw a little bit of the criminal element and the world of Arcadia. Enough to give us a feeling, if not a well defined guide. The pacing was excellent, and the art was great both from a storytelling point, and for setting the mood of the book. As much as I hate reboots, this is a situation I can live with. I'm happy to have one of my favourites back, and this was a positive enough beginning that I hold hope for the future of the character.

How Did This Thing Even Look Good On Paper?

There's a new line of Star Wars figures that came out recently (they were embargoed here until August 6th, don't know about the rest of the world). Apart from being some of the best looking Star Wars figures yet, they come with the added feature of being playable in a game. Potentially interesting, lets have a closer look.

I bought Bossk. He's the best bounty hunter, and I will hear no arguments against him :p

I haven't bought a SW figure in years, but yay for including a stand. Anyway, the game: each figure comes with their own card with a bunch of stats on it.

Also included is this die.

Both players pick figures, then player 1 rolls the die. You take the point value for the corresponding icon rolled, with the highest value winning. The losing figure is discarded.

That's right, the figure you just paid $20NZ for got discarded on the back of a single die roll. If you're player 2, chances are you could lose without even rolling anything for your shiny new toy. Of course, the marketing gurus that came up with this expect you all to have a bunch of figures so you keep playing until last man standing, but any way you look at it this is totally lame.

Sexy Time Week: Backlash

I'm rounding out Sexy Time Week with a look at Backlash, an adult comic by Caragonne and Beachum. It was serialised in Penthouse magazine (US edition) as part of their Penthouse Comix imprint. This episode is from the Feb 1996 issue.

Errr, nice ass. I guess that's what one should say when faced with something like that, heh. It's a given that things are going to revolve around naked people, but how about the actual plot?

Lesbo-Feminists! Gyno-Traitors! Oh the horror!

Heh, they said "penetrated"...

That would be the high tech bike they mentioned. I haven't read the rest of the series (honest), but that panel right there is all the action (violence related atleast) you're gonna get this issue. That may or may not be a bad thing depending on what you want from your porn comics.

Our troubled heroine needs to get things off her chest*, and stops by the local church for confession. Here's as good a time as any to pause and admire her costume.

That's taking the dental-floss g-string concept to a whole new level, it's a wonder she can walk.

Not content with just listening, the priestess has a confession of her own. Dark sense of foreboding anyone?

Hey, I don't go to church, but I'm pretty sure that's not how it's supposed to work. Maybe I need to start going...

Can I get a "yay, lesbians"?

Yes, yes I can.

Don't be fooled though. This is a grim and gritty tale of the future!

As opposed to Jaguar God, this writer actually makes an effort to atleast make things a little interesting. Or at the very least, they know what caption boxes are for.

Just in case you were in any doubt as to how large Backlash's breasts are:

One explosion, a lesbian scene, and a little bit of plot advancement. Mission accomplished, agent Backlash!

*yes, I actually managed to refrain from adding a bad joke there. I'm amazed too.

Sexy Time Week: Can't Sing, Can't Write Comics

.....aaaaand we're back. Today, it's a look at the oh-so-awesome Jaguar God #4 from Verotik Comics, the adult line overseen (and in this case, written by) one Glenn Danzig.

The series premise being that there's a primitive jungle land overseen and protected by the mythical Jaguar God, who manifests as a barbarian cloaked in Jaguar skins. Your basic excuse to have naked jungle chicks, and people getting hacked up with axes. That's an idea I can get behind, but will it be any good? The readers seemed to think so:
On with the show!

In this tale, Spanish forces led by some 3-armed dude have invaded the jungle and are enslaving/killing/torturing the natives.

Don't forget, this is an adult comic. There's not just going to be nudity, there's going to be "adult situations". How will the male captors handle being surrounded by all that girl flesh?

Cue explicit rape scene where 4 guys try to have their way with one of the slave girls. I'll spare you the visual evidence, and just skip to the rescue by our hero!

I'm all for rapists getting cut in half, tbh

Conveniently, the men get to wear clothes or loin cloths. The women just have to stay naked and strike revealing poses. Come to think of it, this jungle must be in Brazil, because the girls all have the wax jobs to prove it. Pubes do not a good comic make.

So anyway, Jaguar God runs around killing people for a few pages, then it's time for the boss fight.

Have a read of those awesomely descriptive captions. I'm so glad they thought to describe what was happening in the pictures, because I couldn't figure it out on my own.

That's that, and it's all over bar the letters page, which is just as 'good' as the comic.

Behold, the "real world" goodness of the Jaguar God!

Yeah, DC and Marvel would be totally jealous of all the artists causing the several-month delays between issues. Having a different artist every issue (and 2 in this one) had absolutely nothing to do with scheduling ;)

This thing really is crap on so many different fronts. Weak plot (why would Jaguar God let dozens of his people be slaughtered, but intervene when one of them gets raped?), very skimpy dialogue, captions mirroring exactly what the artist is showing you. Not to mention the typical idea of "adult" comics meaning you get to show all sorts of things happening to women, rather than coming up with interesting stories that happen to involve sex related stuff.

Spawning Hype

So there's this book called Spawn that's been around a few years. You may've heard the massive hype that's been going on for months about a "relaunch" of sorts. Or you may live under a rock, and not heard it. Whichever, I thought I'd take a look at the "bold new direction" that was getting kicked off with Spawn #185.

I used to love Spawn. I stuck with it from the beginning (well, technically #16 was where I jumped on) up to #120 before I chucked in the towel. There's probably more issues in that run that I found frustrating than issues I truly loved, but I still have somewhat of a soft spot for the character. Old fans were being invited back for the new story, and I figured I'd see what it looked like to someone who's had a 65 issue break from the comic.

First thing to check out, the recap of recent events on the inside cover:

My scanner may have decided to render that almost unreadable, but that actually sounds like a story I'd love to read. If only that was the relaunch.

The comic proper gets going with a 7 page, almost text free, sequence showing Spawn returning to Earth from Hell. Then he sticks a finger in his eye.
Damn contact lense. If felt so good, he has to do it again, this time with the whole hand.

And hey, if you're gonna do that, may as well rip off your head while you're at it.

Interesting...

Presumably at that exact moment, a comatose patient known as "Patient 47" wakes up. This guy right here:

The main mystery of the issue (and presumably the arc) is introduced here. While the hospital staff rush to attend him, we find that some less than desirable people have been watching, waiting for him to wake. We get the hint that he's important (new Spawn, anyone?), but that's pretty much where things are left.

The final sequence deals with Violator, doing his usual tough-guy ranting about being "pissed off" etc (*yawn*), when he stumbles across Headless Spawn (wait for the toy!)

Classy!

So yeah, impressions: I'm left feeling pretty "meh" about it. For a start, it was very light on the text- 12 pages which were 95% visual, and the whole thing felt like it read in 5 minutes. Never a good thing in my book. The story itself? It sets a couple of threads off (who is Patient 47, what's happened to Al Simmons), but really it just touches on those. For a relaunch, there's nothing to grab you and draw you in to the book. Spawn's major failing as a book (atleast when I read it) was always the god-damned eternity it took for the story to advance and answers to be given, and as a returning reader, I really can't face the prospect of having to go through all that again. The whole idea that I liked in the recap is also somewhat done in, with the appearance of the big V, and a preview of next issue showing an Angel hunter. Seems like status quo to me.

Predictions: Spawn has died, eventually passing the mantle to Patient 47. He'll fight Violator, and the angel, and the shady guys will try to manipulate the new Spawn. "New Spawn" will be on a quest to find out why all this is happening to him. All of which was done 185 issues ago. I may be totally wrong here. Even so, like I said, there was nothing in this "relaunch" to grab me, shake me, and scream "you must read the next issue!". If you're a Spawn fan, I hope you enjoy it. Me, I think I'll pass.