Because Everybody Else Has One

Here, basically, are some of my favourite comics, movies, DVDs and albums of the week of Monday 22 June 2009. Also, a bit of a rant for a very undeserving multi-Oscar nominated Holocaust-related film. I'm going to break this down into seperate posts in order to ensure that this comes out before mid-August. Starting off with: Comic of the week: Batwoman in Detective Comics #854. A few years back, there was something of a fuhrer whipped up by the mainstream press in America about the debut of an all-new all-"lipstick lesbian" Batwoman . Presumably it was a slow news day as she was hardly the first gay mainstream comic book character but, for some unknown reason, a very big deal was made out of this. Brilliantly, DC Comics responded by totally downplaying her character by limiting her to various small supporting appearances. Now, with this non-news story far behind them DC have finally turned the spotlight onto this mysterious character with an (at least year lon...

OK, after a bit of an absence (for any of you who might have noticed) and a grand total of two posts, I'm back with some brand new ramblings. I do have some random thoughts and reviews to post over the coming days but first I want to start what will hopefully be only the beginning of a series of posts dedicated to some of my all time favourite comics/ novels/ TV shows/ films and, in this case, albums. It has to be said that I have no idea whatsoever what my single favourite album is of all time but I can usually narrow it down to three possibilities. Two of these hopefuls are always an album apiece by my two favourite musical artists, The Beatles and the Rolling Stones. The catch is, however, that the specific album has had a habit of changing over the years. For the Beatles, I've gone from Revolver to Abbey Road and, as it stands right now, Rubber Soul while The Stones' golden years yielded three albums that vie for my affections in the form of Let It Bleed, Sticky Finge...

As is the way of these things, what I consider to be the best film to hit South African screens so far this year was released well over a year ago in Europe and America and much like the best films of the last two years - Pan's Labyrinth and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly - also happens to be in a foreign (i.e. not English) language. Most surprisingly, it's an animated film that has nothing whatsoever to do with those magic-makers at Pixar. Persepolis is based on Marjane Sitrapi's auto-biographical graphic novels of the same name (that I haven't read, admittedly) and tells the story of a young woman growing up under the oppressive rule of Iran's fundamentalist Islamic regime that rose to power in the late 1970s. The film charts Marjane's growth from a vivacious, Bruce-Lee loving young girl to a headstrong, independant young woman and all points in between as Iran goes through its own revolutions and transformations. What makes Persepolis such a spectacula...

Welcome to yet another in a long line of some random bloke's self-indulgent ramblings and rantings on matters both trivial and meaningless. Oh joy, it's another scintillating addition to the " blogosphere " for you all to ignore in droves! I suppose I should introduce myself at this point so let me just say that my name is Ilan Preskovsky and I'm from South Africa and not, as the surname might suggest. Russia. Also, I'm Jewish and am apparently in my late 20s though I still have no idea how that happened. Most pertinently for the matter at hand however, I am enough of a liberal to have the sort of opinions that would piss off both the left and the right and am basically, for lack of better words, a bit of a geek. That's right, while I might usually express the odd "real-world" opinion or two when I feel like getting flamed, I'm generally going to spend my time and yours yakking on about films , novels, music and, oh yes, comic books. I...