The CloakRoom, and I saw Transformers One & BeetleJuice Beetlejuice!

A movie review, some comics recommendations, and a new Kickstarter about to launch...

Friends,

First, I’d like to welcome all the new subs. This newsletter grew by about 25% this week when I added people who opted in through the Reign of Dracula and The CloakRoom #2 surveys. I’m very strict with myself on this list, never adding anyone that didn’t explicitly opt in. I have like 8 active email addresses and get hundreds of garbage emails every day. So when someone CHOOSES to hear from me on a semi-regular basis… let’s just say it means a lot to me.

It also means something to you. It means $4 off at the shipping stage when you back any one of the Thorny Comics projects. As long as you are a subscriber before the campaign ends, I give you a $4 discount through Backerkit.

Those of you who just joined will have the chance to take advantage of this pretty soon because…

SCOTT SNYDER PRESENTS: THE CLOAKROOM #3 - HOLIDAY SPECIAL!

We only just wrapped up issue two, which is already with the printer. I’ll have those in hand in about 10 days, so you’ll start getting them in your hands in about 14 days, barring any delays… But we’re rushing to get issue 3 out into the world because it’s a special HOLIDAY issue. Christmas, Passover, Halloween and others! And we want to put the book (which is almost complete already) in your hands before the end of this holiday season!

Here are the two Kickstarter campaign cover images. One is based on cover art by Jimmy Kucaj, and the other by Xander Wise. Both are links to the campaign pre-launch. Please click and follow!

We’re also working on a third cover with a Passover theme, because we got THREE PASSOVER STORIES and ZERO CHANUKAH STORIES. I’m told by my Jewish friends that this is shocking.

TRANSFORMERS ONE!

I did not grow up with Transformers. Like, I’m sure I had a few over the years, but He-Man was my jam on TV, and Voltron was my jam in the toy bin. I say this just to explain that I didn’t come into this origin story with any pre-conceived ideas of what the origin of Optimus Prime and Megatron SHOULD be.

Unburdened as I was, I found this to be a clever concept with a lot of heart and fun/funny moments. Lots of winking at the audience, making references to the Transformer toy line, and to their competitors (if you can even call them that), the GoBots. One inside joke requires you to be familiar with Key & Peele (Keegan Michael Key voices the goofy bot who will one day be Bumblebee, but who, for now, calls himself “Badassatron”).

It’s hard to watch movies these days and separate their stories from the politics of our world. Even older movies - I defy you to watch the OG Superman movie and not feel like the first 20 minutes is anti-fracking propaganda. Transformers’ main story is about two miners who learn that the government has been lying to them about their own potential. Their different reactions to that revelation are what put them on the path to hero and villain. But along the way, one starts to sound pretty Trumpy, while the other tries to free laborers from the shackles of the caste system. In the background, they’re trying to restart a massive AI that does all the manual labor on Cybertron so all the robots are free to transform themselves into whatever they want to be. That whole part of the story is, I think, inadvertently super pro-AI. So those of you in comics who are very sensitive about AI out here IRL, try not to hold it against the movie.

All that, and it’s still a really fun kids’ movie. I swear. Really great voice performances all around. As soon as Orion Pax opens his mouth and Chris Hemsworth’s voice came out, I was nervous. We were getting goofy Thor, but when the time came to turn up the melodrama necessary for all Optimus Prime performances, Hemsworth made the turn so seamlessly that I forgot for a while it was him in there. Brian Tyree Henry, similarly, was friendly and then totally believable when he made his big heel turn. Scarlett Johansson, Key, Steve Buscemi - all great sidekick character voice work here. Jon Hamm as the last “Prime” transformer, is his usual hammy self (sorry), but it’s right for this character.

Highly recommend this one.

I ALSO SAW BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE…

… which felt like one giant wink at people my age who used to watch the Beetlejuice cartoon series where the Juice and Lydia go on fun adventures together. It also felt like Tim Burton was trying to make up for underusing Catherine O’Hara in the original movie. But holy hell do I miss Tim Burton movies.

OK that’s it for now. Thanks for reading and for supporting these projects. I’m excited to keep sharing with you!

Jerry