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Comics Catch-Up 063: Blood Pack
1.3k Plays2 months ago
We read 1995's Blood Pack for the show this month, a book that left us wondering, "Why did we do this again?"
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Transcript
Introduction to Comics Catch Up
00:00:13
Speaker
Oh, hey, Cor, you've been up to my heart. Oh my god.
00:00:33
Speaker
hey, it's been a minute. Why don't we catch up? That's right, this is Comics Catch Up, the show where Chris Simms, who is here with me, Yes, I am. And myself, Matt Wilson, we read the comics that we did not read when they came out, whether they be from a year ago, or 40 years ago, or I guess 30 years ago, which is what how long ago the comic we're talking about this time is.
Why Read Blood Pack?
00:01:07
Speaker
We were talking about Blood Pack 1 through 4. We made a perhaps rash decision
00:01:13
Speaker
on our last Every Story Ever special to read Blood Pack one through four. And speaking of rash decisions, Blood Pack one through four. Matt, why did we do this? i have like we I could not remember what prompted us to do this. Why did we do this? Why did we decide that this is what we should do? Because that's incorrect.
00:01:42
Speaker
We were not correct about that. Yes, yes, yes, you're right, you're right.
Character Spotlight: Razor Sharp
00:01:49
Speaker
The the reason we decided to read Blood Pack 1-4 was I don't want to name names, ah but a listener um often sends us Catwoman stories from the 90s to rank, also sent us Blood Pack 1-4, which was actually part of a complete list of I think basically every ah DC Comics appearance of Razor Sharp. Right, right, right. Who I will say is the best character in this and also quite possibly the only character in this? Characters are not what this book is about. this You could not put this on the USA Network, man.
00:02:39
Speaker
Characters not welcome razor sharp formerly a member of the cyber rats Is is then a member of the blood pack if you want to know what razor sharps deal is She's a computer hacker whose arms can also turn into blades Yep, I don't know how those two things fit together really I mean there's a there's a bit in this series where a Joke is made where like in order to advertise her to potential television audiences, someone's like, ah you know she's
DC's Bloodlines Event
00:03:18
Speaker
the hacker who can really hack. And then she herself goes, hacker who can really hack, Jesus Christ, that's bad. And it's like, you can't you do that. You can't say the thing. like that
00:03:37
Speaker
that's mid-2000s comic book movie ship. or or yeah Or what, second episode of Arrow? Where it's like, he wears green, he shoots arrows. Why could he be called Green Arrow? And Oliver Queen's like, fuck you. You have failed this meeting. You have failed this dinner where you suggest the name. And I forget what they called him in those early seasons, but it was not better than Green Arrow.
00:04:06
Speaker
Yeah, man, like, it's so weird when all those things go out of their way to not call things what they are, and they just come up with something infinitely worse. Yeah. Like in Smallville when they kept calling Superman the Red Blue Blur. The Red Blue Blur, yeah. Just fucking call him Superman at that point, man. I know you said you you were gonna save that for the last episode, but none of us expected or wanted that show to go on for 10 years. Oh, they just called him the Starling City Vigilante.
00:04:35
Speaker
We're visual and he's a different guy. Yeah. Um, and then I think the hood, it was another thing that they called him on that show. Also a different guy. Both worse than green arrow. Like ah he, I mean, green arrow is not a great superhero name, but but like, let's be honest, it's just one we're used to. And it's what he is. So but that is what he is. Anyway, onto, onto blood pack one through four, which emerged from the DC Bloodlines event. So Bloodlines was an event where ah every DC book, what in addition to like having the main miniseries about aliens, essentially from the movie Alien. Some of them. Some of them definitely look like Alien. The Alien from the movie Alien, yeah. Yeah. Well, they they do what the Alien from the movie Alien does.
00:05:34
Speaker
which is they shove a probiscus in you, and instead of ovipositing, um and and hey, if this if this is this is your thing, that's not the point of what I'm saying.
00:05:54
Speaker
i thought that The aliens from some of y'all are freaks and it's okay to be freaks, but like that's not the point of what I'm doing. Yes, yes. So they, and so instead of of putting a little ah face hugger baby inside you, they would inject you with a thing that would give you a superpower of some kind. Right. So this was this was DC Comics in 1994, 1995, because Blood Pack is from 1995. Sure is. Blood Lines started in 1993. So this was two years in the making.
00:06:36
Speaker
blood Maybe could have took a third one.
00:06:41
Speaker
Two might not have been enough on this one, bud. Remember like a couple years ago, ah
DC's Struggle with New Characters
00:06:47
Speaker
like everyone has forgotten all of these characters already. But ah remember when DC tried to like introduce a bunch of new characters in in a line just like two or three years ago? Was that when they did the New Bloodlines book?
00:07:03
Speaker
No, it it was it was it was ah the new dc the new age of DC heroes, which is included damage, sideways, the terrifics, new challengers, and so on. um right Damage was but just was a new version of an existing character. but i mean they they all kind of they're They're all kind of Characters in new situations or or yeah, but but nonetheless what the point is to that point DC does this all the time all the time Yes, they did a series of annuals that the whole deal was that they were gonna introduce a bunch of international heroes ah That I think I think might have been called Planet DC ah And everybody's annual in that introduced a new character that ah were mostly like
00:07:59
Speaker
National stereotypes like there's definitely like a like an Irish hero with a shamrock motif in that one Yeah, the only reason that you cannot say None of these characters ever got over Was because hitman was one often there is like one character that comes out of the bunch or one concept that comes out of the bunch right like yeah, like I the Marvel version of this was like the tsunami line, right? where Where we at least got runaways out of the deal. Like, look, I liked Sentinel, but nobody else did. Yeah. Well, I feel like Marvel will do this with like,
00:08:43
Speaker
like a new imprint with like five books in it. Like, uh, like, uh, what is it? M two. Oh, MC two. MC c two Avengers next. And, uh, J two. Well, J two was in the Avengers next, right? Yeah, but J two also had a solo book. Okay. As did, uh, I think wild thing. They tried to get a wild thing over. Okay. Yeah.
00:09:09
Speaker
But yeah, Marvel will do it with like four or five. Every time DC does it, they're like everybody, every book in the line. One thing you gotta give to objective comics comics, they will throw the entire line behind an idea no matter whether it's good or not. And often it's not. Let's cancel everything and relaunch the entire line with new number ones. All right, let's do it. New universe. So the idea of this is that the all of these characters in the blood pack and several others were created by the aliens from bloodlines activating powers in them and they were dubbed the new bloods yeah
00:10:01
Speaker
And immediately found themselves in conflict with the millionaires club. I was going to make the same joke. I know you were. It was a
Blood Pack and Reality TV
00:10:08
Speaker
race. You can hear me. You can hear me trying to get it out faster. The same joke about what is it like 1999, 2000 WCW. Yeah, I think that's 2000 into 2001. Yeah. Uh, but also, okay. So this is like five years before that and Chris, you made the point that in 1995, it is not a good idea to have superheroes calling themselves Bloods. They just, like, they shorten it to Bloods. Like, yeah, the Bloods were involved in another incident this week. Like, that's...
00:10:51
Speaker
Guys,
00:10:55
Speaker
see you can't. You have to say the whole thing the whole like the whole time. DC at least had an office in Los Angeles at that time, right? like No, that it it was all New York. they had not they They didn't have any presence in Los Angeles at that time? I mean, I'm sure that they had like you know people in Los Angeles, and I'm sure that like you know But all the DC stuff went out of New York until very recently. Yeah, but somebody had to know. Somebody had to- Yeah, no, because I knew it. I lived in South Carolina. Right. Like, you might as well have just had them fight villains named the Crips because that's what you're doing here. That said, okay. But here's the thing, they're not the villains.
00:11:47
Speaker
It's, it is used as both a term for the people who were given superpowers by the alien invasion, uh, invasion, by the way, was another time that they did this, but they didn't, uh, they didn't do it with the whole line. They just did the, uh, uh, uh, snapper cars, band of of dudes after the gene bomb. Uh, but that's another big event that's going to give us an excuse to have a bunch of people's superpowers.
00:12:15
Speaker
It's ah a term for the people who were given powers or the team of the Blood Pack. The Blood Pack, yeah. The Blood Pack. Which, okay. Okay, Matt, Matt. Yeah. I read this today. Uh-huh. I'm gonna try to name all the members of the Blood Pack. I have a point to make about that. Okay. They don't do character introductions until the start of issue three.
00:12:43
Speaker
yeah in this four-issue miniseries. And then it's like a diegetic thing because that's when we're getting the like ah promo material for the TV show. yeah So yeah I have more to say about that in a minute, but before you try to name the members, let me say this miniseries ah was written by Charles Moore and has art by Christopher Taylor with inks by Andy Lanning.
00:13:12
Speaker
to one of those guys hung around. Yes. Uh, yeah, I am completely unfamiliar with the other names on that list. Uh, also the last issue does have a credit that, um, gave me a real rough chuckle, a real, a real dark laugh. Yeah. Uh, where, um, you know how sometimes there'll be like, uh, you get this in Marvel books a lot from, from like the bullpen days, but like,
00:13:40
Speaker
One person's going to get credited ah in a funny way and it's usually the editor. Oh, yes. Yes. yeah ah In number four, Eddie Berganza is credited as that guy. That guy. Charles Moore writer. And that's the most accurate one of those I've ever seen. Cause boy, Eddie Berganza, that fucking guy. That fucking guy. Good Lord. Um, also, uh, Mark Campos did pencils on the last issue too. Uh, they had to, that that had to be a,
00:14:09
Speaker
Two artist issue. just Just couldn't get it out in time. All right. Here we go, Chris. Try to name for me the one, two, three, four, five. Seven, I think. The seven members of the blood pack plus their team leader.
00:14:29
Speaker
Okay, well, well the ah the field trainer is Jenny Lynn Hayden, Jade. Jade. Jade is their... She's not an official member of the Blood Pack, but she is, like, their trainer and handler. There's a joke in there where someone's like, well, I hope this works out better than Infinity Inc. And it's like, woof. You're gonna step to Roy? But you're gonna step to Roy Thomas in the pages of Blood Pack?
00:14:58
Speaker
I'm not even, like, Infinity Ink's not good. I mean, look, now is not the time to be standing up for Roy Thomas, but... Oh, no, what did Roy do? Oh, never mind. Oh, wait, I know what Roy did. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Roy's trying to take... I know what Roy did. Roy's trying to take credit for shit that he didn't have anything to do with. Hey, honestly, kind of endearing.
00:15:22
Speaker
Of all the things you can do that you would want to take Roy aside, That one kind of endearing, honestly. Okay, so ah there's ah the the guy, the businessman who's running things is Baxter. Yes, yes. Who is referred to as a wunderkind, despite the fact that he is not just like a full grown adult, but like, like an old guy. What it's described as being is like he
00:15:55
Speaker
Was a TV like came up with the idea for a hit TV show when he was really young Yeah, and now he's he's older. So he's trying to make a comeback That's the idea and I mean that idea is you putting together a lot of stuff that is not explicitly stated. I Yes, it is me Forging on Context Clues, what is in the book. yeah It is said that he that he was like the youngest executive in TV history or whatever, yeah but none of the other stuff. So at this point, he's just a kind. He's just a kind, or maybe just a wunder. But either way,
00:16:41
Speaker
He is essentially, okay, the blood pack, the idea of this comic is- Wait, wait, let me see if I can, let me see if I can name them before we get it out. Okay, all right, all right, all right. Razor Sharp, that's the gimme. Razor Sharp's the gimme, yeah.
00:16:54
Speaker
Mongrel. Mongrel, you got Mongrel. Who I could not tell you anything about and who does not, I think, do anything in this entire series. um He turns on the team in the last issue and has one of the best slides in the book that I had to put on our Blue Sky Count. Okay, ah there's, I think I kept getting him confused with Nightblade. Nightblade is a very similar and similar looking character.
00:17:22
Speaker
Uh, but night blade also, here's how you know who night blade is night blade. His name has nothing to do with his power. Correct. What night blade does is he can get injured. Like you could cut his hand off and it goes, it grows back or like he can like heal really quickly. He's basically Wolverine, but like, yeah no, like they they refer to it as a healing factor, like full on.
00:17:52
Speaker
He is called Uncanny at one point. Yeah, but but like it's it's gross in a way that Wolverine's healing is not gross. To the point where they even say that they can't show it on TV. Which, what's the point of having him on the team then? Continue. ah Okay, so we got Razor Sharp, Mongrel, Nightblade.
00:18:14
Speaker
Is that dude's name ballistic? Ballistic? You got ballistic. Okay. Ballistic is the one that they keep calling a freak. You might as well just say his name is freak. ah Sparks with an X? Sparks with an X. She's got some kind of vague electricity powers. Yeah. oh She's basically live wire. She's basically live wire. That's five. That's five. There's two more.
00:18:44
Speaker
There's someone whose name is just, like, Loira. It's Lauria. Lauria. Lauria is only in the book to die. And Geist. Geist. Geist is a guy who can turn invisible. Geist is a guy whose superpowers are fucking hilariously bad. And that is like the one bit of genuine comedy is that the book seems to know that his powers are bad and no one likes him. But in any, like in any, like a story, like if this had been a story, it would have mattered at all. And it definitely does not matter at all. Geist's arc in this book, if, if I can put it that way,
00:19:40
Speaker
is that can but you're lying is that he any self-confidence, which makes sense because he's got terrible powers. And as such, he's afraid to tell anything to the team. So he sees Lauria get killed in issue two, but he's afraid to tell the team about it. So he never does.
00:20:10
Speaker
that's That's what Geist is about. So, he let's get into this. Because this is the best thing I have to say about the book, so I'm gonna get that sad. Oh, compliment sandwich. I don't know that I have the other bread, the open-faced compliment sandwich. Yeah. Compliment like hot wings, so the compliment is just that piece of bread down at the bottom. That's right. It soaks up all the all the sauce.
00:20:41
Speaker
This comic came out in 1995.
00:20:47
Speaker
The real world had been on TV for like two years. I think the real world debuted in like 93 or so. 92. 92. So the real world had been on there for three years. But reality TV was very new.
00:21:11
Speaker
when this comic started. And this is a comics series about a team of superheroes, seven superheroes made to live in a house and things start getting real,
Blood Pack's Vision vs Execution
00:21:29
Speaker
right? it's it is It is a superhero take on the real world. And it is almost prescient in not only the idea of reality TV becoming so much of television to this day, and also superhero comics that would be about this, that would be about entertainment conglomerates wanting to use superheroes like and film them and put them on TV and make them celebrities.
00:22:10
Speaker
That is a mine, that is a vein that comic books and superhero stories are still mining right now. So this comic is amazingly forward looking and ahead of its time in that regard. I agree with you in that I think that there are some interesting ideas here. However,
00:22:38
Speaker
I do think it's important to note that like ah three years before this, Youngblood was about celebrity superheroes. That's true. I'm not saying this invented celebrity superheroes because it didn't. Yeah, but i like like I do feel like but there's ideas in here that are so forward-looking that it sucks because they're happening in this book yeah and the book is bad.
00:23:06
Speaker
ah Spoiler warning for the end of this show, the book is bad. ah However, yeah I do think it's worth noting that other people had kind of done this before. Yes, I'm not saying this invented the idea, but right the specific element of it that is reality TV feels somewhat unique to this book.
00:23:34
Speaker
certainly it didn't invent the idea of celebrity superheroes, but like the the boys, i'm like I'm not the biggest fan of the boys, but like you can see so like a seed of what the boys would eventually be in here. You know what I mean? Like, I just i just find that interesting. it's It's not well done, but it's interesting.
00:24:03
Speaker
Yeah, no, it's whatever it has in good ideas, it lacks in everything else. yes but To the point of like, I was reading this, this comic feels like there are pages missing. And there's like the right number of pages in this. But like, ah things do not... Events happen, and then other events happen that relate to them, but that like the middle parts gone the analogy i was gonna make and i was kind of holding on to but i'll use it now is you know how when we read a comic sometimes for this show in particular for comics catch up in particular that'll be like a ten or twelve issue run on a book and by around issue eight it gets really obvious that the book is on the chopping block for cancellation and so
00:25:03
Speaker
The writer is trying to cram all their remaining story into the last few issues. Uh-huh. Yeah, I mean, like, yeah, I didn't know we'd done X-Men 92 for catch up. This book is that for the whole series. Correct. oh It feels like writer a writer tried to cram all of the story they have into way too little space.
00:25:32
Speaker
But here's the thing. I felt so strongly that that had to be the case that I went and looked. It says a four-issue miniseries on the cover of number one. Oh, I know. I'm not like i'm not saying it was it was like it snuck up on him. I'm saying it feels like Charles Moore wanted a 12-issue series, got a four.
00:26:02
Speaker
and then had to try to make it work. Really enthmaned it. Really enthmaned it. Yeah, it's just it's just so weird to it's so weird to read this because it has that feeling of like I'm missing Like, I don't think there's a fight scene in this comic until the last issue, but there's like four fights that happen. Yeah, I mean, by the same token, it's like you're reading issues one and two. I mean, look, obviously there's an assumption being made here that you know who these characters are because you've read all of the bloodlines events leading up to it. But that's not a very fair or good assumption.
00:26:56
Speaker
Yeah man, you gotta introduce the X-Men and say what they do in X-Men. Right. and And people know what the X-Men do. So the fact that we're not told this is who this is, this is who these characters are, until the first couple pages of issue 3 of 4 seems like a huge problem. I think, I believe the first place that people actually like say their name and their powers is in a text piece that runs in place of a letters page. Yes. Okay. You know what? I am going to do a compliment sandwich. Let me do, okay let me say something that's not complimentary here in the middle. I mean, we've been saying it, but ah a continued part of the middle,
00:27:46
Speaker
the guy that you were talking about being like the Wunderkind producer, ah whose name I already forget, Baxter. Baxter. So like, the idea is that he's the the producer of this reality show, right? Like that's his job. He he is he is the creator and producer of this reality show. But he answers to a cabal of powerful people that are the,
00:28:14
Speaker
uh, the funders of the show, the people that want the show to get made, the people who were ensuring that the show happens, but that are all like stereotypical, powerful, rich people. Um, eat powerful, evil, rich people. Yeah. So one of them obviously has like, you know, a turbine on and stuff like that kind of stuff. Um, but they're called the producers.
00:28:45
Speaker
They sure are. Like, i I get it. I get like the gag. But what if if they're the producers, then what is Baxter? Well, you know, Matt, it seems to me like these days with comics, you can make more money with a flop than with a hit.
00:29:03
Speaker
ah That might be an explanation for blood pack. It's possible. Okay, let me let me do my other compliment because I do have a second compliment. I do think that the idea of the text pieces in the back, like obviously it's a rip off of Watchmen there. Charles Moore wanted to do a Watchmen thing. So we put letters and emails in the back between the characters, but I do kind of like it. I feel like the most story from this series is in those parts. Yeah. Again, that is where they like,
00:29:39
Speaker
It's either in number two or number three where that is where everyone actually explains what their powers are. Sort of. Like, sometimes they don't. Somebody's like, I think I'll keep mine a secret. Yeah. And it's like, please don't.
00:29:59
Speaker
Like, what is, like, what is ballistics power? Because it's not it's not the guns. He's not like a like what's his name? Idris Elba in the second Suicide Squad movie blood sport. It's not like blood sport. Uh, I only know this but Because I looked up the characters on keys to go to this you get to bloodpa ah fom the The DC wiki He's got like super strength and and really tough skin. That's ballistic steel. Yeah
00:30:30
Speaker
But like you think given the name and the fact that he's got all this giant gun, this giant cable gun, yeah ah that like it would be that, but it's not. It's not. It's just that he has you know your standard RPG superpower. Yeah. Yeah.
00:30:53
Speaker
This is like, look, we are not typically the type to complain about too much story being crammed into too little space. I think generally we would always prefer that to decompression to stories being stretched out for way too long, right? But this is the best example, or I guess the worst example of why sometimes a story needs a little bit of breathing room. Because the story of the show beginning starts at number one. They're talking about whether what network is going to buy it, right? Then by like issue two, people are watching it on TV.
00:31:44
Speaker
Like, Superboy is watching it on TV. Yeah, and then in in issue three, they're at CEX trying to sell it. They're at the up front. So, like, that can't work. it Either you're trying to sell the show while you make it, or it's on already on TV and airing. It can't be both things at once. Then by issue four, Loria, who is now a consciousness,
00:32:11
Speaker
it living inside a simulacrum because her body was killed is sacrificing herself to destroy the producers so that the show won't exist anymore. And like you can't do all that in four issues. Or can you? Or can you? Well, you can, but you shouldn't.
Storytelling Challenges in Blood Pack
00:32:35
Speaker
This this is bad aesthetics.
00:32:39
Speaker
It's bad statics. It's bad statics, yeah. Like, if you've read Exbatics. Exbatics. Exbatics is pretty good, Matt, I gotta say. If you've read, like, again, to its credit, this came out six years before Exstatics. Um, but I would say Exstatics is at least seven years better. Yes. so Yes.
00:33:04
Speaker
It's not that it's missing like you you talk about breathing room. I feel like the breathing room isn't what's missing. The stories what's missing. Any any sort of character development or.
00:33:21
Speaker
Or like it's all premise. Yeah, you know we get a scene where the characters like. you know, oh, they went through like a rough mission. So, uh, Jade tells them to like, Hey, have a board game night, get to know each other a little bit. And then, uh, you know, that'll, that'll be like your, that's your team building assignment for this. We get that whole scene of them playing Monopoly, which is the, which they call Monopoly, but which they have given like funny DC universe.
00:33:58
Speaker
oh ah versions of things. Yeah. Oh, that's right. Like, but they look like it looks like a monopoly board. Yeah, it's so close to monopoly. And they and they call it monopoly. But like, it's got the Wayne Railroad and go to jail is go to bell reef should have been good Arkham but ah the we don't learn anything about the characters in that scene. No, they don't actually like we never get like the bonding aspect of that entire story well the part of it is that all the all the members of the blood pack simply have antagonistic relationships with each other right like there's no opportunity for them to ever be open and vulnerable with each other because they all hate each other which like i guess is what charles more thought the real world was when he watched the real world um which i mean there's there's a lot of bickering on the real world you know but like
00:34:58
Speaker
There's also like people getting to know each other. like You know what I mean? One of the first things that happens in this book is that a guy is kind of giving his backstory and then there's like a cut, we need to need take this again. Like right after he talks about his dad being a NASCAR driver who died in a crash, I don't know if that was mongrel but which is a very unfortunate name. I think it is. I think it is mongrel. Yeah. Or, or Nightblade. It's one of the two of them. They look exactly the same. But then they never like do that neck that that second take where we actually get any of that information. And then the scene that happens right after that is razor sharp and sparks in their room. And sparks is like, so what's your deal? And razor sharp is like, I can't talk about my past. And
00:35:53
Speaker
like, okay, like, you know, narratively, sure, like we we do find out that like, the sparks goes, Oh, are you wanted? And razor sharps like not yet. Which is, we we find out that, you know, she has some kind of mysterious criminal past. But that's not actually finding anything out. And you can't have a bunch of characters who actively refuse to tell you about themselves. And then become characters. like they There are no characters in this comic because no one does anything. No one has any personality. They expect you to know about Razor Sharp from reading the pages of cyber rats. What happened to every comic somebody's first, man? Yeah. Where's Dick Giordano when you need him?
00:36:49
Speaker
one Two more points to make. One bad, one neutral. um I should like that there's a Superboy cameo in issue two, or guest appearance in issue two, but it's nothing. And Alan Scott is in issue three for literally one page. Just just to show that he's Jade's dad.
00:37:15
Speaker
We do get a one panel appearance from Superman who straight up says this book sucks. He sure does. he said He's part of a bunch of interviews, like man on the street interviews about this shit, this like reality show. Which again, they're still trying to sell to a network. Yeah. I do not get it, man. It's like that, that part, that whole thing where it's like, we're trying to sell it to a network, but it's on TV now is,
00:37:46
Speaker
mind blowing. Somebody should have said it's gotta be one or the other. Maybe it's like how the state was on MTV. Yeah. And then they had the state Halloween special that aired on NBC. And then that was gonna be like,
00:38:15
Speaker
That was kind of like the pilot for like more stuff with the state that never happened. Cause I guess the state Halloween special, uh, which the, the gimmick of it was that it was the last state Halloween special. Right. Uh, and they did like a chorus line number and it's stuck in my memory ever since. Cause they go, it's the last state Halloween special. We'll see you in hell. Uh,
00:38:45
Speaker
So, but, you know, that was, I think supposed to be like kind of a pilot for a show that did already exist on a, on like eight, not a smaller network, but like, you know, MTV compared to the broadcast, but right maybe it's like that. Maybe there's a blood pack TV show that's airing on W G B S plus. I went back and looked, um, the,
00:39:12
Speaker
The one who had the NASCAR driver dad was, in fact, Nightblade. Yeah, I don't...Mongrel doesn't do a thing, except I believe that he's the one who, when they're like in Hawaii and they're saving some people, ah he looks at like these these pretty girls and he goes, so girls like that wouldn't spit on me back when I was living in the projects.
00:39:38
Speaker
And I'm like, so so hang on, he wants them to spit on him? Is that? I mean... I mean, yet it looks like I'm not yuckin' his yum. Again, ahead of its time. Girls like that wouldn't step on me. Girls like that wouldn't hock to a me. ah Oh man, man, that's... Oh, we time stamped this episode.
00:40:07
Speaker
one Two more observations. One, ah the posters in the background of every panel are very funny. Like there's a Jamiroquai one in issue one. I had to text you about one, I think it's in issue three, where it's literally Goku. Yeah. you ah You were like, hey, do you want to know what the wildest thing about blood packets? And I was like, yes. And you were like, you said Goku's in it. Yeah. And I said, say, where does Bond?
00:40:35
Speaker
And I did. Cause I do not want you to fuck with me on that one, Matt. And I wasn't. You weren't because go because they're at the fucking upfronts and they're trying to sell Dragon Ball, which makes me think like you have put into my, into my head, if I'm a network executive in the DC universe and you tell me I could have the blood pack or Dragon Ball. I mean, I know which one I'm picking. Yeah, that's true.
00:41:05
Speaker
The other thing I want to point out, um I talked about how mongrel has the best line in the book, but there are several lines like this throughout the series. Now, I'm not going to say that they never use the, what is what is Chad's word for the the symbols for zagnuts? I'm not going to say they never use the zagnuts because they are used occasionally, but more often than not, this book just uses alternate words instead of cuss words.
00:41:35
Speaker
So when, when mongrel approaches the evil network executive to fight her in issue four and she's trying to like bring him over to her side, he says, flunk that witch I'm gonna, and then, and then he gets cut off. Yeah. But there's also a bit in the first episode that I thought I was having a stroke because like,
00:42:03
Speaker
One of them says something about like one of the the girls on the team, and I guess it's it's mongrel goes, oh, you're just flunked because she doesn't want to hang out with you. Yeah. And I like, I had to read that like three times because it's kind of the first example of them boatlorizing the cussing in this. And I was like, is there a meaning of flunk?
00:42:32
Speaker
with which I am not familiar. And then now I'm like, is there a meaning of fuck with which I am not familiar? Because that doesn't fit there either.
00:42:50
Speaker
Yeah, what he means is pissed, right? But instead of just flunked. So he says flunked. We also get somebody says shocked. Uh, like, oh, shock this or something. And I was trying to remember, cause that's, I, it's not. Sprock is legion of superheroes. Right. Freck is, uh, uh, Battlestar Galactica. I think shock is either like, like the, the pre late, like the 30th century guardians, the galaxy or.
00:43:30
Speaker
No, it's not, it's not Judge Dreg, because that's a droch. That's droch, yeah. Shock is so... Oh, oh! It's, uh, it's 2099. It is, yes, it's 2099, yes. Yeah, but that's not what you say in the DC Universe. Well, that's what these people say. Well, you know, Matt, they're all attitude. They're all attitude. Boy, are are they described as that.
00:43:58
Speaker
over and over again. I think the idea is that they don't need to have personalities as characters because they're just all 90s attitude. They're all attitude, man. Also, there's all this shit about how ballistic used to be a cop. it There's multiple things in this book about like people having been cops. like To be fair, the other guy who is who was a cop is like a real shitty guy. That's true. He's the bad guy. But I do think Mongrel is here, despite being otherwise indistinguishable from... ah God, it is so hard to remember names. Nightblade. Nightblade. Mongrel is here to be like...
00:44:49
Speaker
The angry one, the mean one? Yeah, because he gets his powers from his anger, which is not something that I knew until I read the text piece. Yeah. And I still don't know what that means. Yeah. Oh, man. ah it's it's ah It's rough stuff, buddy.
The Role of TV in Blood Pack's Plot
00:45:12
Speaker
Do we want to actually talk about the plot? Because it kind of doesn't matter. I mean, we did. We we said what happens. They tried to start a TV show. There's a group of evil rich people who were the producers of the show. They're set up to fight the demolition team. Yeah. Which are DC's worst version of the wrecking crew, which means I love them.
00:45:34
Speaker
Oh, and they lose. They lose. And then the secret team of like, just dudes in armor suits called the sweepers show up and beat those guys. And then they ah use deep fakes to make it look like the blood pack won that fight. Yeah, that's definitely that's definitely ahead of his time. Yes.
00:46:03
Speaker
Hey, there's a part of this where they're like Like yeah, we've got all this technology that's that can fuck up the world and everything but we need the reason we've got the blood pack is because we need to win the hearts and minds we need these heroes and that and that way people will I i Don't know like like us more or something even though we're gonna take over the world and also like destroy all nations and you they're They're going to protect the world from devastation and unite all peoples within their nation. and Um, but they have these guys in like Iron Man suits who can beat the blood packs asses and are better trained, better equipped and like better at being at like fighting people. So why don't they just, why don't they just, why aren't those guys, it's a TV show.
00:47:03
Speaker
ah Well, they want to keep them secrets because so when Lauria walks into a room, she's not supposed to and see those sees those guys like being created because they're like engineered. Um, the leader of that group shoots her in half. Yeah. but Why couldn't those guys just be the heroes and then they would be like,
00:47:30
Speaker
Like this is our, you know, robotic fighting force. Because they don't have the attitude. But I mean, they do have the attitude. They wouldn't be entertaining on a TV show. I mean, the blood packs not entertaining. Like, like textually, the blood packs not entertaining. Like, Jade is there. But Impulse loves them.
00:47:51
Speaker
impulse can't get enough of them on tv because they're on tv even though they're still trying to sell the show but again impulse is dumb and like textually i look i think we've i think we've said all there needs to be said yeah so at one point this evil cabal like starts their um evil plan using all this alien technology that they've uh smuggled onto earth oh And that includes an earthquake in London that destroys Big Ben like a fucking Jenga Tower. Yes, it it falls to pieces. it It goes into different pieces at falls, yes. all And also a tidal wave taller than the Twin Towers hits Manhattan.
00:48:48
Speaker
That, I think, maybe in 95 they didn't know, but I can tell you from here in 2024, that would be devastating.
00:49:03
Speaker
And then it's like, it's up to the blood pact to stuff all this and I'm like, Superman also lives in this universe.
00:49:12
Speaker
I don't know, man. It's like nothing in this is thought out. They only do it because Loria sacrifices herself and and everything blows up and that's the end of the miniseries. Yeah. ah But then they're going to keep on being the blood pack and then they'll die in Infinite Crisis.
00:49:36
Speaker
Let's rake this. um Okay, it sucks. Yeah, it's bad. ah Certainly quadruple digits, probably 1400s. We have 1567 stories. Why seven of them? Because there were seven people in the real world. Oh, yeah. Seven strangers picked to live in a house. True story.
00:50:05
Speaker
ah
00:50:09
Speaker
so And we'll see what happens when people stop being polite and start getting real. Okay, that's too many for a four issue comic. Yes, it is. But the that is 100% the reason there are seven of them. Yeah, I mean, like, like, I, when you said it, you are exactly right. Yeah. Oh, yeah, man. Um,
00:50:31
Speaker
I don't know. I'm pretty, where are you at? I'm pretty low on the list. All right. Number 1499 on the list is new 52 suicide squad. That's pretty bad, but this is also very bad. This is also very bad. I don't know. I don't know that it's worse than that or than like flashpoint, which we have at 1495. I mean, we're at 1498, we have supreme power, which is bad, but it is well drawn.
00:51:00
Speaker
it's it it it It's offensive in a way that this book is not. I mean, yeah. I guess this one's not offensive. Other than having a character named Mongrel. Yeah. That I feel like if I knew anything about that character, I would feel bad about it. um I'm glad I don't. I'm glad I don't. Yeah.
00:51:29
Speaker
So it's, there's nothing offensive. It is bad in every way. It is bad in every way. I'm i'm trying to chris eliopoupolilo's lettering is like not great but you go but i'm trying to find the part of the list where it, like we get above offensive and into just bad, right? Like, like flash Batman, the button. Is it 1483? Yeah. I mean,
00:51:56
Speaker
The crossing is at 1479. That's not offensive. That's just quite bad. Okay. So that's around there. Like Batman, whatever happened to the great Cape Crusader is not a good story, but it's a story. yeah that's That's very debatable, bud. Okay, sure. I've been on the hate train from that one since it left the chain the station.
00:52:22
Speaker
Like, art are you really gonna sit there and tell me that that you've forgotten about Martha Wayne's bat-shaped vagina? Oh god, okay. yeah Yeah, you had, hadn't you? I think it's one of those put it out of my memory situations. Oh, lucky you! I wish I could. I wish I was not burdened with that knowledge every second of my life.
00:52:48
Speaker
Okay, better or worse than DC Universe Decisions. DC Universe Decisions is one about how Lois Lane's a Republican. Jesus Christ. Because you know her dad was in the military. Right. Like you have ever met a Republican newspaper reporter in your life. Louis Lane doesn't like her dad. Canonically. Canonically. I mean, there are Republican newspaper reporters. They work for the post, but... Wait, the Amazon Washington Post? No, the New York Post. Oh. But like the Daily Planet, not the Daily Planet. Um, okay.
00:53:39
Speaker
Vision Quest also bad. Vision Quest very bad. a Vision Quest offensive though. Who is Wonder Dog bad? Okay. Is this better or worse than Mr. Graves? Bud, you ask me some tough questions sometimes and I appreciate that about you. Yeah. I appreciate that you like you're a reporter. I like to challenge my friends.
00:54:03
Speaker
you're ah You're a ah journalist by training. That's true. And so you know how to ask the hard questions. I know how to nail them, yeah. um Similarly to anything that happens in Blood Pack, I also can't remember what Mr. Graves' mr graves's deal was.
00:54:26
Speaker
like why he hated the justice. I think maybe the justice league killed his wife, but that doesn't sound right. It is it is so can't be right it is something like that. Like I just searched my memory palace for why does Mr. Graves hate the justice league. And I came back with the justice league killed his wife. That can't be right. If you search, uh, by the way, if you search, uh, Google for Mr. Graves DC,
00:54:56
Speaker
The DC Comics character is not even on the first page of results, or he's at the very bottom of the first page of results. Everything else is about the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, whose name is Matthew Graves. Mr. Graves. Esquire. David Graves. David Graves. Let's see. He was a historian and published author interested in fringe history.
00:55:22
Speaker
Wait, the ah U.S. Attorney or? No, no, no. David Graves. That's Matthew Graves. This is the U.S. Attorney. This is David Graves from Justice League. Okay. David, his wife, Jennifer, and his two children, Jason and Emma, came under attack by Darkseid's forces.
00:55:39
Speaker
ah hu Graves and his family are eventually are saved by the superheroes that eventually become the Justice League. ah He wrote a book about the Justice League called Justice League Gods Among Men.
00:55:52
Speaker
ah bad i A year after the formation of the Justice League, Graves and his family developed an unspecified malady which killed his family and left him dying in a wheelchair. So he hates the Justice League because they saved him and his family. Okay, that also can't be right! Mine couldn't be right because it didn't make sense.
00:56:16
Speaker
for the Justice League, that can't be right, because that doesn't make sense for anything. Oh, wait, okay. He went on a vision quest to Central Asia. He encountered a large deity with six arms yeah that told him he needed to complete the journey of his own power. At the urging of this deity, David continued to head toward a mystic temple ah looking to reunite with his deceased family members and saw this them in spirit form.
00:56:46
Speaker
The deities told Graves he would rejoin his family and would have his vengeance, therefore incorporating themselves into Graves' body painfully. we ranked this a long time ago and i do not Like we ranked this, we only ranked this in 2022 and all of this feels like new information to me. Oh, I remember it. This is this ah is the information I'm cursed to remember. i I went to the wiki to actually read it out so I can remember it, but I knew it was something about like, he hated the Justice League for saving his family. Does he have powers? And are his powers the powers of
00:57:30
Speaker
like four average people? He does not have powers. He is presented as simply being very smart because he's in a story. Okay, here's the problem with that. Is that the Justice League has a smart guy on the team? Uh-huh. And that guy is Batman. Uh-huh. So you're telling me that he's- Oh wait, no. He does get powers from the god. He does get powers from the god.
00:57:59
Speaker
He gets god powers. um He gets god powers, yeah. ah One of his abilities given on the DC Wiki is writing.
00:58:08
Speaker
ah Weirdly enough, I don't think that's ah in my listing on the Marvel Wiki. It's just a little depressing. But but yeah, the the thing is, his family got sick and died, and he got sick, and he blamed the Justice League for that.
00:58:29
Speaker
I don't, why would he but why why he, why would he do that though, Matt? I'm asking you like you wrote it, but like why would he do that? I don't want to talk about talk talk about it anymore. I think it's worse than Blood Pack. Okay. Yeah. Good. Look, we we've, we've mentioned this before, but like one of the things that you have to consider when you're judging like, like these these kinds of comics and these kinds of stories is,
00:58:57
Speaker
If you're making the blood pack, then the recipe that you have is the blood pack. If you're making the Justice League, the recipe you have is the Justice League. Yes. This could be the best story it is possible to tell with the blood pack. That's definitely not the best story it's possible to tell with the Justice League. I think the death of the new gods is also worse. Death of the new gods is pretty bad. I will put this below the Charles Atlas ad.
00:59:26
Speaker
above that. Oh, I think that, yeah, this is definitely worse than Charles Atlas. ah Okay. So the new number 1481 blood pack, blood pack 1995.
00:59:39
Speaker
hoof It's not good. It's, I, I, I give it credit for some ahead of its time ideas. Uh, but everything is X is, uh, executed very poorly.
00:59:57
Speaker
All right, that's it for this comics
Conclusion and Listener Engagement
00:59:59
Speaker
catch up. Thanks for listening everybody. If you want to make sure that we keep doing comics catch up and every story ever monthly and our weekly War Rocket Ajax show and movie fighters next situation, please contribute to our Patreon at patreon dot.com slash War Rocket Ajax.
01:00:17
Speaker
um We would very very much appreciate that if you would go do that um If you can't contribute to the show monetarily You can leave us a five-star review on the podcasting app that you use or spread with the word about the show via word of mouth If you want to email us a comics catch-up candidate or an every story over list or anything else you can email us at our email address which is war rocket podcast at gmail dot.com our Tumblr is warrocketpodcast dot.tumblr dot.com. You can also send us messages there. We're on Blue Sky at warrockethx.bsky.social. We also have a Discord, and you should join it. um You have to be invited to be a member, but if you ask us for an invitation, we will send you one kindly, and you can ah join over there. So um just ask in any of those places I just mentioned for an invitation to our Discord, and we will get you one.
01:01:09
Speaker
And hey, if you are a Patreon subscriber, there may be i a cut segment where we try to remember who Mr. Graves is. It's honestly not very relevant to this episode, but it's staying in. Okay. Well, there's other good stuff there. If you want to find me and my stuff, go to MattDWilson.net to find links to my comics, my books, my other podcasts, and my social medias. Christopher can be behind you.
01:01:36
Speaker
they can head over to the ISB, that's the-isb dot.com, that is my website, it's got stuff. Links, also a thing I wrote, also gonna be another thing I wrote there, at some point, fairly soon. Exciting. Thanks for listening, everybody. We'll ah be back in October with another Comedy Sketchup, so we should probably read something spooky. Yeah, i hate to I hate to put off the shadow, but yeah, we should probably read something spooky.
01:02:06
Speaker
uh until then we appreciate it and uh hey good to see ya yeah good catching up