Geek Weekend

So I spent this weekend in San Antonio, visiting with some old friends of mine. It was a good vacation from Kerrville, and a chance for a geek weekend with the boys. I finally saw Avatar, Red and Zombieland…. I’d been waiting till I could get together with these guys to watch it. I’d been asked to come down multiple times, but just couldn’t swing it, which meant when I finally did come down, I was treated like visiting royalty. I enjoyed some fine Mexican food, Halo:Reach until the wee hours of the morning and rampaged through San Antonio’s comic shops and used book stores.

My list of swag is pretty impressive. The only thing I couldn’t find is Mutants & Masterminds 3rd Edition- that thing was sold out everywhere I went. I can get the PDF, but I’m liking the liscensing agreement Green Ronin put out and would like to produce M&M3 content. I can do that with a PDF but, I really prefer having a hard copy of the rules I can reference- and printing and binding the PDF would end up costing as much as the hard copy and not be as durable. I’ll end up getting the hard copy sooner or later, but for now, I’m glad for Green Ronin.

So what did I find?

First, I found one of the best roleplaying supplements ever: Federation of Magic for Rifts. Still one of my favorite sourcebooks, filled with tons of good ideas. I lost my original copy before I went into the Navy, and never was able to find a replacement. And with FoM, I picked up the old edition of the Rifts corebook (my copy is still in Corpus Christi in storage). It’s an amazing read, and maybe I can get a game going up here. I’ve always had a blast GMing Rifts.

I also picked up a copy of IDW’s G.I. Joe: Cobra issue 12…. I won’t spoil it too much for you, but some major shit goes down this issue. It’s the first actual issue of a comic I’ve bought in like four years…. And the content and the quality of the death inside is worth it. Loved this issue and can’t wait to see what’s coming next.

About a year or two ago, Jim Shooter was brought on board to write Legion for 12 issues- it was the ‘teen rebellion’ legion that Waid and Kitson came up with but Shooter made it worth reading. The man did some of the definitive LoSH stories back in the 60s, and fortunately, he’s still got it. Unlike Stan Lee, whose writing style has seemed to stagnate, Shooter still tells an entertaining story. It’s very good sci-fi, and boasts some of the best art I’ve ever seen on the Legion. Francis Manapul’s art is very flashy and reminiscent of Mark Silvestri’s early stuff, with absolutely amazing backgrounds.

Plus, Shooter created about two dozen new characters, and set up a ton of new subplots to a comic that was going no where. He also played up the sex- there was a lot of casual hook ups in this run, which added a ton of drama and character to the team. The romance- especially Saturn Girl’s subplot was very well done. There were two trades of it, Legion: Enemy Rising and Enemy Manifest and I scored both of them.

I also picked up this absolutely huge Dark Horse omnibus containing every single Martha Washington story ever published, entitled “The Life and Times of Martha Washington in the 21st Century.” If you don’t know the comic is a absolutely bad ass mix of military sci-fi and social satire, and it’s by Frank Miller and Dave Gibbons. Seriously, if you like Otherverse America at all, go buy this fucker, it’ll be worth it, because I wish my stuff was half as cool. Anyway, at 600+ pages, this trade will stop bullets.

Finally, I found a copy of Witchcraft Today, by Gerald Gardner, who founded modern Wicca back in 1953. I’ve seen excerpts referenced in other books, but never read the whole thing. So I’m very curious what old Gerald has to say for himself. Should be interesting.

So basically- sci-fi and Wicca this weekend. Rock on.
CHRIS