The Ricochet Reviewer: Books, Movies, and Comics

Writer / Editor: Len Wein Illustrators Extraordinaire: Ross Andru & Mike Esposito & Frank Giacoia Spider-Man has been sealed into a rapidly filling sewer line by the Shocker. The party is over and Peter must come up with a life to explain his disappearance. A bit of foreshadowing for a future storyline with a sly clue to his identity. Len Wein is doing a good job of rooting Peter’s adventuring in the kind of soap opera life drama that helped distinguish Spider-Man from other superheroes. He also has a flair for the humor. The reason behind the Shocker’s scheme is revealed. The mayor of the unofficial capital city of the Marvel Universe should know better than to think the normal police force would be an adequate precaution against super villains. They do, however, come in handy as distractions. But that only lasts for so long. Spider -Man triumphs again. This issue stays within the series formula, which is part of the charm of Bronze Age Spider-Man, and Shocker fits that world ...

by Larry McMurtry Chronologically second in the Lonesome Dove series, this excellent novel is less an adventure about winning the West than a sorrowful account of worlds dying.  It follows the younger Woodrow F. Call and Augustus McCrae on the Texas frontier, but author Larry McMurtry spends more time exposing the costs of frontier heroism than celebrating it.  Larry McMurtry The result is a novel that makes the frontier feel dangerous, absurd, comic, grotesque, and tragic all at the same time.  McMurtry does not simplify either history or character.  The leader Buffalo Hump is not presented as a straightforward villain but as a tragic figure who understands that his people’s way of life is ending even as he continues to fight against that reality.  By contrast, his son Blue Duck is darker and more chaotic, emerging as a figure of almost pure menace.  McMurtry also depicts some of the harshest realities of frontier life with unflinching realism, including I...

Director: Victor Fleming Writers: Noel Langley & Florence Ryerson and Edgar Allan Woolf, adaptation by Noel Langley, from the book by L. Frank Baum Stars: Judy Garland, Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger, Bert Lahr, Jack Haley, Billie Burke, Margaret Hamilton, Charley Grapewin, Pat Walshe, Clara Blandick Like most Americans of my generation, the annual television broadcasts of "The Wizard of Oz" were a part of my childhood.  I still remember the delight I felt as a child when Dorothy would open the door of her cabin and step into the land of Oz--suddenly the screen would explode with color.  This was a family film that wasn't afraid to be scary--I was terrified by the scene in which the flying monkeys captured Dorothy and Toto and attacked their friends, tearing the Scarecrow to pieces in the process.  Years went by and I fell out of the habit of watching Oz.  Of course, I was aware of its status as a pop icon.  However, what surprised me upon a recent viewing is how ...