ANI-MOVIES, The Incredibles 2

Despite there being 2 sequels and 2 spinoffs to Cars, Pixar took its sweet time to finally come up with a follow up to The Incredibles. The Fantastic Four-inspired animated film was about two superheroes who were forced to retire from being active crimefighters and raise their superpowered kids, only to be dragged into a scheme where most of all the other heroes had been killed off during their retreat. Brad Bird returns to bring the superhero family back to the screen.

Taking place right where the previous one left off, The Incredibles try to stop the subterranean villain The Underminer, only for him to make a clean getaway, leaving our heroes to clean up after the mess they made confronting him. Their activity gets the attention of Winston Deaver, the rich head of a telecommunications company who wants to have supers being legalized again. Along with his sister Evelyn, they contact Mr. Incredible, Elastigirl, and Frozone about their plan, but choose Elastigirl to be the figurehead of their campaign. Elastigirl saves a runaway train, while Mr. Incredible, Dash, Violet, and Jack-Jack move into a new estate provided to them by Winston. A mysterious new villain called Screenslaver who can hypnotize people with screens is responsible for the train accident, and an attack on an ambassador, so Elastigirl manages to track the bad guy down with Evelyn's help. However, Elastigirl realizes the man she caught was just a fall guy, and that Evelyn was the one setting up all the attacks, getting back at supers for having the public relying on them too much instead of fending for themselves. Evelyn takes control of Elastigirl and Mr. Incredible, then sends a group of hypnotized heroes to round up their kids, who are having enough problems after finding out baby Jack-Jack has come into his own multitude of powers. The kid Incredibles have to rescue their parents along with Frozone and the other heroes from a plan Evelyn had for sabotaging the heroes legalization ceremony on a huge yacht. Evelyn is eventually captured, and the Incredibles continue their crusade as a superhero family.

After seeing this film after the first one, its clear that the animation is of a better quality, but still keeps the look and motif of the original using a mod/art deco style to the times and characters fashion. Not a lot is referred to the original movie, which makes it slightly convenient for those who didn't watch it and just wanted to see a good superhero film. Most of the previous cast is back, and hopefully will be around to voice a third chapter! If Avengers: Infinity War gave you such a downer, then Incredibles 2 will take you back up and away!

I'm sick of this FUCKING weather!

MISC. MANGA, *Plus-Sized Elf

Plus-Sized Elf is Synecdoche's premiere online Japanese manga mixing in fantasy females and monster girls with physical fitness. These are two concepts that blend together oddly well considering that most otaku aren't that much into getting in shape.

Naoe works as a massager at a health clinic, and on his way home one day he come across a honest for real elf named Elfuda. The pointy eared girl comes from a fairy world, and came to explore the modern day human world, but ended up being unable to return home because of her love for French fries. Now, she's a "plus-sized" elf, and seeks Naoe's help in getting back to her petite shape so she can fit back to her weight-specific wormhole back to her dimension. For some reason, Elfuda ends up becoming Naoe's roommate, and his constant attempts to help her trim down keep backfiring, even after she occasionally reaches her original size. Not only this, but other females from the fantasy world keep popping up with the same problem of not being able to return to their realm because they also get hooked on fast food. Despite this, the other dark elves, mermaids, dragons, ogres, and werewolves manage to blend into Japanese society well, sometimes being confused with cosplayers.

This manga presents a unique story that works for printed format, meaning it might not turn out as good as an anime. Aside from the engaging quirky characters, it also cleverly gives hints and techniques for manga readers to keep themselves fit. This is a little more appealing as a webcomic as opposed to a printed graphic novel series, but its still a charming read.

MISC. MANGA, *Batman And The Justice League

With Marvel movies doing well over in Japan, DC Comics decided to do its first manga modeled after the current DC Universe. There have been a trio of genuine manga about Batman, but this is introduces the rest of the JLA to manga readers. Shiori Teshirogi was tasked with creating this, as she already had success doing the colorful heroes of Saint Seiya, and does a reasonable job transferring the Justice League into a manga.

Japanese teenager Rui Aramiya travels to Gotham City looking for his parents who were recently reported to be dead. Rui encounters the Joker, who is using his mother to gain access to ley lines, which allow people to obtain ultimate power in the DC Universe. Batman shows up to rescue Rui, but once again, "the Joker got away!" The Clown Prince turns out to be allied with Lex Luthor who offers Rui answers to his parents disappearance. But Batman calls in the Justice League to help defend Gotham from the slew of villains like Ocean Master planning on using the ley lines for their own evil schemes.

The manga is slated to be at least two volumes long, but creator Teshirogi also did a short origin for Wonder Woman that looks similar to her initial scene in the live-action Justice League movie. Teshirogi brings a fresh look to the JLA, although Bruce Wayne looks a little younger than he usually does, but makes it seem like hardly anyone wouldn't be able to tell that he's really Batman. It's not exactly as memorable as the 60s Bat-Manga, however it performs well as a Justice League story for manga fans.

Via Con Dios, Stan Lee

MISC. MANGA, *Legends Of The Dark Crystal

Before the current renaissance of comics and novels based on Jim Henson's gamechanging fantasy film, Tokyopop acquired the publishing rights to The Dark Crystal, as well as Labyrinth. Their installment was a prequel taking place at least a century prior to the movie. Split up into two volumes, The Garthim Wars, and Trial By Fire. A third volume was planned, but canceled, possibly due to publishers like Archaia Comics also sharing in the franchise.

Set on a far off planet, the world is ruled by the large bird-like Skeksis, who fear their rule may come to an end one day because of a prophecy claiming the peaceful Gelflings will bring about their downfall. The Skeksis send their giant insect-ish walking suits of armor called Garthim to attack two separate Gelfling villages, each one of which has a single survivor, the male shepherd Lahr, and sewing girl Neffi. The two meet up and head another Gelfling village in the mountains. The Gelflings form a defense against another Garthim horde by using their broken instruments as weapons, and a large net thought up by Neffi. This uprising causes waves in the Skekis hierarchy, giving Lahr and Neffi the opportunity to sneak into their castle in an attempt to free their remaining kidnapped people.

This manga-styled series fits finely in the continuity of the movie. Barbara Randall Kessel did an admiral job adapting the story into a prequel, and Heidi Arnhold with Max Kim crafted the look of Brian Froud's original designs. The only downside is that it was printed on off-white paper in manga-size, when the splendid artwork would have been more enjoyable in at least standard comic book dimensions and at a higher resolution. The series is currently now out of print, and not available legibly online, so you'll have to search some used book stores to try and dig up copies of this hidden gem.

ANI-MOVIES, *Constantine: City Of Demons

The third DC Comics animated web series on CW Seed was based on the Hellblazer story arc involving Constantine, the main character portrayed by Constantine actor Matt Ryan returning to voice him for the second time, once before in the Justice League Dark movie. Whether this feature is part of the DC post-Flashpoint line-up, or taking place in the Arroverse like the previous two CW seed animated shows isn't fully revealed, as there's little to no mention of other characters outside of the standard Hellblazer comics.

Exorcist Constantine gets a call from his childhood friend Chas to save his daughter Trish, who is in an unexplainable coma. John calls in the Nightmare Nurse, a benevolent female demon, and realizes Trish is possessed by a demon lord Nergal, who wants Constantine to come Los Angeles. Once there, John and Chas are confronted by Nergal, first disguising himself as a slothful lower demon, and goats Constantine into getting rid of five demons muscling in on his turf, otherwise Nergal will send Trish's soul to Hell. John also meets the living spirit of L.A. who can temporarily possess its citizens one at a time, and wants him to find a way to snuff out Nergal. Constantine gets an Aztec god to take out the quintet of demon hoods, and then threatens Nergal with releasing hundreds of demons from Hell unless he frees Trish, but ultimately they had to sacrifice the memory of Chas' existence from Trish and her mother in order to overflow Nergal's body with love, which destroys the demon like a cancer. Chas suddenly has no memory of having a daughter, or even knowing Constantine, leaving our hero to wander back home alone with one of his leftover inner demons for company.

City Of Dreams works alot better from The Ray and Vixen animated projects as it flows as a full story as opposed to the previous episodic entries. The only major flaw storywise is the ruse Nergal tries to use on Constantine by taking on the persona of a Godfather-type demon, and revealing this to him a little earlier in the plot than was needed, and would've worked better near the finale. Matt Ryan does a fantastic job as Constantine, and Laura Bailey does an amazing Nightmare Nurse by doing her Lust voice from Fullmetal Alchemist. J. M. DeMatteis was a great producer in this picture, and a big improvement over his previous two Batman animated films. Anyone who felt stiffed over Keanu Reeves' performance will be pleasantly surprised by this Constantine movie.

MISC. MANGA, *El-Hazard

The original El-Hazard OVA was an anime reimagining of Edgar Rice Burroughs' Warlords Of Mars(i.e. John Carter), which was followed up by an OVA sequel, plus two TV series, the second of which continues the OVA storyline, all of which were produced by Pioneer Entertainment. With their Tenchi Muyo OVA carrying on to a successful manga, Pioneer got Hidetomo Tsubura to put together a comic combining elements from the El-Hazard OVA, and its TV series remake El-Hazard: The Wanderers.

Makoto is a high school student being chased by his self-proclaimed rival Jinnai, and then escapes into some ruins underneath the school's campus. He finds a beautiful girl locked in stasis who awakens claiming to know him. She then uses her apparent magic powers to send Makoto, Jinnai, Jinnai's sister Nanami, and their teacher Mr. Fujisawa to the alien world of El-Hazard. However, in the manga, all four of them don't end up there at the exact same time, as Makoto ends up there several weeks after the rest had. Jinnai ended up in the land of insect humanoids called the Bugrom, and becomes their general bent on taking over the world. Makoto meets up with Fujisawa and Namami who have allied with the kingdom of Roshtaria, lead by the slightly younger Princess Rune Venus. Along with three feisty elemental priestesses, our heroes fail to prevent Jinnai from gaining control of an ancient weapon as the Demon God, who it turns out is the Ifurita, an android similar to Amazo from DC Comics who can copy the attacks of anything thrown at her. Ifurita is also the same one who sent Makoto to El-Hazard in the first place, but has no memory of him. Another neighboring clan called the Phantom Tribe happens to have two of their own Demon Gods(both original to the manga), and the plot becomes a big arms race to claim power to a mini-Death Star known as the Eye Of God between the three warring kingdoms.

The manga tries to plug a lot of elements from the original OVA, along with Makoto's flirtation from The Wanderers with Rune Venus, as well as the addition of two more Demon God powerhouses that mainly act as an extra target for the heroes and other villains to deal with. Visually it works very well, with anime-accurate portrayals of the original characters. The downside is the plot of a 7-episode OVA series(some of which were double-length)into a 3-volume manga makes it seem rushed and condensed. The plus side is that there is a bonus chapter of El-H Campus featuring all the characters in high school parody, which was a concept that was used later on by several other series such as My Little Pony and Attack On Titan, and is actually quite funny. The manga was originally first put out in three single-issues mini-series from Viz, and then later on as a trio of trade paperbacks. If you really dug the original OVA anime, then the manga adaptation is worth considering.