geek.teacher

Comics:

• Blue Beetle #26 - A nearly all Spanish issue, and a delightful story that I (mostly) was able to understand
• DCU #0 - a decent introduction to the DC universe as of RIGHT NOW before things go crazy in Final Crisis
• Immortal Iron Fist #14 - if they ever get around to making that Iron Fist movie, it should be just like this.
• New Avengers #40 - Rewind to past events we glimpsed or had some ideas about from before and get a clearer picture of how the Secret Invasion started
• Thor Ages of Thunder - this book was beautiful and touched my mythology nerd core in all the right places
• American Way - I bought this trade at New York Comic Con for cheap based on vaguely remembering some internet recommendations, and I was not disappointed.  It’s a real world approach to superheroes, placing them in the midst of the civil rights upheavals of the sixties.
• Iron Man: Demon in a Bottle - I was at Borders and saw a copy of this opened on the shelf, so I took the opportunity to sit down and read it before the movie came out this week.  It’s a 30 year old story, and it’s great.  It was also pretty shocking at one point.

TV:

• How I Met Your Mother - some decent fallout from last week which could lead to some shift in the characters
• House - Nice joke played on the peons this week.

Movies:

• Iron Man - Awesome.  Great summer popcorn flick.

Games:

• Just Cause - I wrapped this game up.  It was actually a pretty cool ending that made use of the stunt system nicely.  As I said before, a decent enough $15 game, but not much more than that.  Clocked time, 25 hours or so, but you could do all of the story missions in under 5 hours easily if you don’t run around liberating villages, finding collectibles, and doing sidemissions.
• Mario Kart Wii - I’m really liking this so far.  Beth also enjoys it.  She plays with the steering wheel, while I prefer the wiimote + nunchuck.

In the last week, here’s what I’ve been reading/watching/playing:

Books:

• Our Dumb World by The Onion - This has been bedtime reading for a while now.  It’s great parody of an atlas, as it’s very dense but often hilarious.  For example, this bit on Hong Kong:

An exotic seaport off the coast of China, the Hong Kong province is plagued by massive, well-choreographed brawls that break out almost daily on every street corner.  The dazzling, high-speed, and acrobatic violence puts every citizen at constant risk of being thrown off a two-story balcony onto a pile of cardboard boxes.

• The Incredible Indoor Games Book by Bob Gregson - I haven’t looked at this book in years, and it reminded me of some fun games that I was able to play with my students for PAT on Friday.

Comics - I read almost everything, so some highlights and low points:

• Countdown #1 -  I already trashed this.
• Fables #72 - Cinderella is awesome.
• Mighty Avengers #12 - If you’re reading Secret Invasion and not reading everything else Bendis is writing at the moment, you’re nuts.
• New Exiles #5 - I already trashed this one, too.
• Ultimate Spider-Man #121 - The only Bendis book you don’t need to read if you want to keep up with Secret Invasion, and it, too, is great.  This is a nice done in one story that wraps up the typical high school baby project for health class.

TV:

• How I Met Your Mother - More Robin Sparkles?  Thank you!  Bonus for The Dawson balding.
• 30 Rock - Some delightful continuity this week that’s going to lead to interesting places, and, even better, more Will Arnett on my TV.  It also had my favorite line of the week.
• Lost - Poor Sayid.

Games:

• Just Cause - While it’s certainly not a great game, it was worth the $15 I spent on it.  It’s a fairly simple open world game overall, but I just find the concept of freeing tiny villages from tyrannical rule very appealing for some reason and always want to do just one more.  A grappling hook and a parachute both go a long way to making the typical open world experience more fun.
• Crackdown - This was another $15 game, and it was way more enjoyable than I thought it would be.  I finished up the co-op campaign with Brian, and it was pretty fun.  Again, having a fun way to move through the open world with awesome jumping abilities definitely improved the open world gaming experience for me.