REVIEW: Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest

All right, I'm going to be frank: you might have noticed that this review is a little bit of a departure for me.  Not in the sense that it's done over a terrible, terrible horror film.  (I hold those to my bosom and perhaps coo over them a little bit.  The neighbors ask me to stop in increasingly worried tones.  We have a fun relationship.)  Rather, in the sense that it's a review of a horror film made in 1995 with the proceeds of my couch cushions delivered from the future.  The only two cast members who are remotely famous today are Nicholas Brendan, who is a basketball-playing extra, and Charlize Theron, who dies of being stabbed through the vagina.  I'm relatively certain that they both have attorneys drawing up C&Ds for me purely for mentioning their names in connection to this glorious hot mess.

Children of the Corn III first came to my attention due to the thespian talents of Mari Morrow and Duke Stroud, they who inspired the very astute question: "I write about superheroes.  Why the hell do people keep finding a straight-to-VHS mess when they search for my name?"

REVIEW: Thor 2

A few days post-premier, but I was busy chewing things over.  And generally twirling in a circle and cooing, because did I ever love this movie.  Actually cutting for spoilers for once!  (I know!)

On Kamala Khan

Marvel Comics is introducing a new Ms. Marvel.

She's Muslim.

Because I've already gotten into one dust-up that shocked me with how much casual racism is still acceptable (person who doesn't even read comics says that a Muslim hero anywhere, ever is unrealistic), I'm going to keep this short and sweet.

Buffy Summers, Rachel Berensen, and Xena were seminal (ironic, considering where I'm going) to me as an adolescent.  Do you know why?  Because they re-welcomed the era in which girls could be heroes.  Prior to that, I had to identify with the boys.  And I did, as the advertising agencies knew I would, but I still remember the incredible, exultant feeling of seeing a female hero and thinking, "Hey, maybe that could be me!"

So to everyone who wants to shit on Kamala before she even makes her debut: what if you never got to see yourself as the hero before?  What if she was the first time you got to identify with someone who looks like you and, rather than being a dirty terrorist, got to be remarkable?

I'm just sayin'.