MCU: Phase 4 — thoughts and reflections

After Black Panther: Wakanda Forever was released in the theaters, I heard that it was the final movie of the MCU’s Phase 4. Final Phase 4 movie? What?!? How could this possibly be? I’ve defended Phase 4, time and again. And I’ve watched every movie and Disney + streaming series. Back in October 2022, my […]

10-List: Firewater’s Top-10 MCU Properties (New and Improved!!)

I assembled a comprehensive list of movies and television series that I believe would be considered to be a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Not just motion pictures this time. This included the various Marvel One-Shot short films but excluded the pre-Tom Holland Spider-Man movies and the X-Men and Fantastic Four movies. I look […]

Agent Carter: Seasons 1 & 2 — a review

I just watched the Marvel Studios series Agent Carter on Disney +. No, this wasn’t my first time watching it. I watched it the first time it aired, way back in 2015 and 2016, and was sad that it was cancelled. It has joined that list of television series that were cancelled too soon, in […]

George Pérez: Losing a Comic Book Legend

I first became familiar with George Pérez’s artwork in the pages of The Avengers comic book. This was the mid to late 1970s, and Pérez would become my favorite Avengers artist until John Byrne took over the penciling duties on the title. When Pérez became a recurring artist on Marvel’s flagship series, Fantastic Four, I […]

Hawkeye: Season 1 — a review (Disney +)

My street cred as a comic book geek is mostly nonexistent. My personal slice of the space/time loaf—the timespan in which I actively purchased and collected comic books—was in the 1970s until the beginning of the ’80s. There was some Silver Age influence, especially on the DC Comics side of the equation where I cut […]

Tiger-Man, Tiger-Man…Does Whatever a Tiger Can? (or: a brief digression about the pursuit of happiness, Steve Ditko, and how memories sometimes resurface without warning)

My personal pursuit of happiness involves several variables, two of the most important being looking forward and looking back. The looking forward component involves the planning for—and anticipation of—future events or activities. This can be special moments, such as birthdays, anniversaries, holidays or vacations. Or, it could be the release of an anticipated movie, book […]

What If …?: Season 1 (Disney +) — a review

As soon as I watched the first episode of this series, “What If . . . Captain Carter Were the First Avenger?” I knew that I was going to like it. Although the movie Iron Man was the official kickoff of the MCU, it was the first Captain America movie that really set the tone […]

WandaVision: Season 1 (and only?) — a review

The finale of this series aired back at the beginning of March 2021. I was still quarantining with my wife back then, with a lot of extra time on my hands. Still, I never watched an episode of WandaVision the same day it aired, even though I was watching them soon after, perhaps even just […]

What Stan Lee Said (Or: Not a Review of Comic Book Confidential [1988])

Comic Book Confidential is a cool documentary from 1988 about the history of comic books. I recommend it just to see a young Frank Miller with hair. Otherwise, you already know the stuff in this documentary. Superman, EC Comics, Dr. Frederick Wertham, underground comics—nothing really new. But, there are a lot of filmed interviews with […]

S.H.I.E.L.D., by Steranko — a comic book review

This trade paperback collects Strange Tales 151 – 168 & Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. 1 – 3, 5. All of these individual issues, as you may have guessed from the title, feature the art of Jim Steranko, from the period 1966 through ’68. I never read any of these when I was a kid, […]

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