Minorities in cartoons: George Takei

May 232013
 

Kevin Keller #6This week’s minorities in cartoons entry is George Takei, the Japanese-American actor most famous for his role as Lt. Hikaru Sulu on “Star Trek.”

Besides his role in the various “Star Trek” movies and TV series, Takei is known for his work in promoting gay and lesbian rights; Takei fully came out as gay in 2005, though his sexuality had been an “open secret” for years. Takei also is known for his work on promoting Japanese-American culture and history, including the history of the US’ Japanese-American internment camps of World War II, in which Takei himself and his family were placed. Takei’s served as a spokesperson for LGBT rights group Human Rights Campaign, and is also a member of the board of trustees for Los Angeles’ Japanese American National Museum.

Takei’s also been fairly active in voice acting in recent years, in addition to his role on radio’s “The Howard Stern Show.” Among the cartoon appearances of Takei include:

  • The Simpsons: Takei’s voiced several minor characters in the series, including sushi restaurant waiter Akira in a second-season episode. Hank Azaria’s largely voiced Akira since, however.
  • Mulan: Voiced one of Mulan’s ancestors.
  • Kim Possible: Takei voiced “Master Sensei,” a recurring character who mentors Ron Stoppable to preparing him for his “ultimate destiny,” which involves Ron making use of his dormant “mystical monkey power.”
  • Futurama: Takei appeared in this series as himself, having survived until the 31st century in an episode parodying various tropes from the original “Star Trek.”
  • Star Trek: The Animated Series: The 1970s Filmation-animated “Star Trek” series featured Takei returning to voice Lt. Sulu.
  • Kevin Keller: Takei appears as himself in Archie’s “Kevin Keller” #6 (January 2013), where he visits Riverdale High School upon hearing of a report Kevin wrote about Takei’s work on LGBT rights.

Anthony’s miscellaneous comics picks for August 2013

May 222013
 

Disturbingly Awful MADRounding out this month’s picks is what’s of interest from various random comic companies/comic strip compilations. Apologies for this not being longer, but I didn’t find much that struck my interest for this month’s installment.

Comic strips

  • Disturbingly Awful MAD, on sale Aug. 13, $13

Comments

Dark Horse features Art Baltazar and Franco (of “Tiny Titans”/”Superman Family Adventures” fame) working on a kid-friendly miniseries version of “Hellboy,” entitled “Itty Bitty Hellboy.” Yep, a kids’ comic despite his name staying intact…and not changed to “Heckboy” or somesuch. At any rate, here’s a Newsarama interview Baltazar and Franco did last month, where they discuss their current and future work, including their own effort, “Aw Yeah Comics.”

 

Kevin Keller finally kisses on-camera, plus a slight poke at One Million Moms

May 212013
 

Kevin Keller and DevonAs I noted in the Archie solicitations for last month, we’re finally going to get to see Kevin Keller kiss his boyfriend. And not just a kiss on the cheek, but an actual kiss on the lips. At least, that’s what the released advertising images indicate, as seen in this post.

Accompanying this is some publicity, including this Associated Press article about the upcoming story. One interesting tidbit is that there’s a scene with a woman protesting against Kevin and Devon kissing…meant to be a “playful poke” by Archie writer Dan Parent at the One Million Moms protesters campaigning against the adult Kevin’s wedding story.

Of course, I’ll assume that this “first kiss” won’t be the last for Mr. Keller, even if the second/third/etc. kisses don’t make headlines, just as Archie’s kisses don’t.

Flickr gets big overhaul, now offers 1TB of space for free

May 202013
 
The new and improved Flickr

The new and improved Flickr.

Today, Yahoo released a big overhaul for longtime photo storage site Flickr. The new design’s meant to give a 2013-style update for the photo hosting service, long accused of not “keeping up with the times”—read: not being Instagram or Facebook, plus a traditionally lackluster mobile presence.

The new version of Flickr removes a lot of the white space, and forming instead a heavy collage of tiled photos. The result seems a bit getting used to, especially with much of the photo’s information now moved just below the now-browser-window-sized photos. However, some of the old Flickr interface is still present on some parts of the site, such as when selecting different photo sizes or the site settings.

One big change in Flickr is that it now offers all accounts (free and pay) 1TB of space, along with photo uploads up to 200MB in size/videos up to 1GB in size or three minutes long. While “unlimited” space was long a feature of Flickr Pro, advertising an actual size limit might be more up-front about a lack of any mysterious unstated cut-off points.

And yes, that’s “was” for Pro. Yahoo is now ending Flickr Pro service, in favor of folding almost all of Pro’s features into the free accounts, along with advertising. For an ad-free experience, Yahoo now charges $50/year, twice what Pro ran. Existing Pro users will be grandfathered in for the $25/year renewal rate, or given the option of downgrading to free service. However, if the downgrade option’s chosen, there’s no way to go back to the old Pro rate. Yahoo is also offering a “professional” service (2TB of storage space) for $500/year. I do wonder how many people will opt for paying for the ad-free experience with this change, especially with the existence of ad-blockers in web browsers.

Finally, the Android version of Flickr’s app has been upgraded to match the iOS version’s recent upgrades. Trying the app out earlier, I found it much better than the old version. Displaying images slide-show style is much easier than on the old app, which I’ll find useful. However, I’m disappointed there’s no “instant backup” option for uploading photos, similar to that for Google+ and Dropbox. With 1TB of space available, it’d certainly put Flickr up over either of those services easily for smartphone photo backups.

I’ll still be sticking with Flickr for the forseeable future, as I’ve found its service convenient and it integrates into my blog quite well. As a longtime paying Flickr Pro customer, I’ll probably renew it again to avoid ads as long as it’s at the $25/year rate, which is on par with what other sites (500px, etc.) offer. I admit I don’t use the social services (linking to photos aside) or user groups like others, so my experience might differ from more hardcore Flickr Pro users.

Anthony’s Archie Comics picks for August 2013

May 202013
 

Archie #647Here’s my alliteratively-titled Archie comics picks for August 2013. Full solicitations are available here.

Comics

  • Archie #647, on sale Sept. 4, $3
  • Betty and Veronica Double Digest #215, on sale Aug. 28, $4
  • Jughead Double Double Digest #196, on sale Sept. 11, $6

Trade paperbacks

  • Sabrina the Teenage Witch: The Magic Within, vol. 3, on sale Sept. 4, $11

Comments

The Archie-proper title seems to have eased off of the stunt storylines for the moment, though it’s delving back into parallel universes (again) with this month’s story.

Jughead gets the “Double Double” Digest treatment this month, coming in at 320 pages (and $6).

The third volume of the “Sabrina the Teenage Witch” manga paperback compilations is being released, completing most of the series’ run. One volume left to go!

“Archie & Friends Double Digest” features Kevin Keller on the cover. Until now, I don’t think Kevin’s ever appeared on a digest cover, this “Betty and Veronica” digest aside. Kevin’s also shown with Chuck; I don’t think the characters have interacted much in stories to date, despite that they both like sci-fi. In real world terms, both characters also were introduced to add diversity to Archie’s cast. Of course, like Chuck’s solo backup stories, I’d expect Kevin’s own stories to wind up reprinted in digests someday. I’d still like to see Chuck get his own solo series, something he’s never had; however, “Archie at Riverdale High” in the 70s/80s apparently became a Chuck-centric title for awhile.

“Teen Titans Go!” review: “Dude Relax” / “Laundry Day”

May 192013
 

Dude RelaxAnother episode of “Teen Titans Go!” is here…and another bunch of SPOILERS ahead.

“Dude Relax”

Plot: The team gets annoyed at Robin’s antsy behavior due to a lack of crime and his constant vigilance, and force Robin to learn to relax.

The funniest part was Beast Boy revealing he sometimes paints animals green to avoid going on missions. Guess it keeps with last week’s episode in showing Beast Boy’s not above using doppelgangers to get out of work.

Affirmation that this version of Robin’s Dick Grayson comes with a flashback to Dick’s days in the circus as a young child. The pre-Crisis Jason Todd was also a circus performer who was orphaned, but A) not a version anyone seems to use in favor of his more annoying post-Crisis characterization (that led to him being killed off), and B) he’s not well known as a Robin to the general public.

That monster the Titans are fighting looks a lot like the kind that usually appeared on “The PowerPuff Girls” or “Dexter’s Laboratory”…

“Laundry Day”

Plot: The team fights over who should do laundry, despite being Robin’s turn; meanwhile, Robin deals with being caught outdoors uniformless and nude.

This one was pretty amusing (a “grossout” gag with Beast Boy and nose mucus aside), particularly the parts with Robin dealing with being outdoors nude.

Gizmo from the previous Titans series puts in an appearance here.

Not surprised to see Beast Boy not mind being nude as much as the others…something he’d probably be used to from the constant animal shape-shifting. Also seen here is Beast Boy’s interest in tofu, as he’s chowing down on the stuff en masse.

Nexus 4 smartphone review

May 192013
 

Nexus 4About a week ago, I bought the Nexus 4 smartphone via Google’s website. After much consideration, I decided the Nexus 4 sounded like the best option for the following reasons:

  • It’s inexpensive. I bought the 8GB model for $299 + two-day shipping + tax.
  • It’s unlocked and not part of a contract, allowing me to use a range of company’s prepaid services via swapping out the micro-SIM card. Even with the cost of going through several lesser smartphones in the past few years, I’ve calculated being on prepaid has still been much cheaper than what being on a contract during that time would’ve ran.
  • The only other prepaid option at the $300 range would’ve been the Samsung Galaxy S II. While it’s a nice enough phone, I didn’t think paying that much for 2011-era smartphone tech was a good idea.

Registration and set-up

The phone arrived pretty quickly, as did the micro-SIM card I ordered from T-Mobile, the prepaid carrier I’ve decided to use. Registering on T-Mobile’s website lets one choose a $30/month prepaid plan that offers “unlimited” 3G/4G data (data capped at 5GB) and 100 minutes per month. If one needs more than 100 minutes, extra time costs 10 cents/minute, which would be $6 for an hour. While the Nexus 4 doesn’t have “true” 4G (no LTE), it’s still much faster than my former Virgin Mobile/Sprint network, so I’m fine with it. I also don’t get many phone calls, so 100 minutes (and any extra time as needed) should work fine.

Setting up the Nexus 4 is just like setting up any other Android phone, including its hardware “cousin” the Nexus 7 tablet. After entering your Google email address and password, you’re prompted whether to restore previously saved apps/some options, which I chose to do. The Nexus 4 went ahead and downloaded most of the same apps I used on my previous phone and Nexus 7 tablet; for some reason, the Nexus 4 also imported the tablet’s wallpaper, which I soon changed.

Porting the phone number from Virgin Mobile ran into some problems. Porting required my Virgin Mobile account number, which forced me to call Virgin to acquire; the number wasn’t available via their online account management system. I finally got the number, after dealing with attempts by their customer service associate to hard sell sticking with Virgin. I then called T-Mobile and let them know I didn’t enter the account number when I registered online, which they soon entered for me. After this, the registration and number porting went through, and I set up the phone’s voice mail. Another reason for calling: when I initially went through T-Mobile’s online registration, the final step threw up an error message stating I hadn’t chosen some (unchoosable) payment option, an error I presume was related to my first account number-less attempt at porting the number from Virgin.

For more setup tips, GottaBeMobile’s Nexus 4 guide has some decent ones.

Android software

One of the Nexus 4′s signature traits is its use of a pure Android installation, without any manufacturer “skins.” Thus, things work quite smoothly, with the Nexus 4 running the newest version of Android. If you’ve used the Nexus 7 tablet, you’ll find the Nexus 4 works similarly. I am, however, still getting used to the size of the phone. With a 4.7-inch screen, it’s definitely the biggest smartphone I’ve ever used.

Protecting the phone

I purchased a case and plastic screen shield for the phone, as I usually do for smartphones. It’s also to address my one hesitation I had about buying the Nexus 4: comments online about the glass back cracking. However, none of the tech sites I usually read, nor Amazon.com’s user reviews, seemed to find it as prominent a problem as the comments made it out to sound. Phones made of glass don’t seem to have slowed down sales of the iPhone 4 or 4S, though Apple did wise up and dropped the use of glass from the iPhone 5. Hopefully, LG/Google will do the same for the next version of the Nexus phone.

Camera and photos

Taking photos works nicely, but some of the pictures have the wrong datestamp, defaulting to December 8, 2002 for some reason. While it’s easily fixed in iPhoto or Flickr, it’s still a concern.

The automatic backup of photos to either Google+ or Dropbox is nice. I’m still trying to figure out which one to stick with, though Google+ doesn’t expire access to most of its free storage space after a few years like Dropbox does. I wish Flickr would improve its Android app; automatic backing up of photos to Flickr doesn’t seem to be an option.

Here’s a few of the photos I’ve taken with the Nexus 4:

Downtown Milwaukee, May 2013

IMG_20130518_160227

IMG_20130518_160553

Conclusion

Overall, I’m enjoying the Nexus 4, and so far, I’m glad I bought the phone. I’m hoping the phone’s strong, mid-to-high-range specs (glass back/lack of LTE aside) make it last longer and have fewer problems than the previous two prepaid smartphones.

Those looking to buy a new unlocked or prepaid smartphone would probably be well served by the Nexus 4, keeping in mind the above mentioned caveats about the glass back/LTE. If buying a phone on contract, however, I’d also look at the HTC One, iPhone 5, and Galaxy S 4.

Anthony’s Marvel picks for August 2013

May 172013
 

Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #26Here’s what’s of interest from Marvel for August 2013. Full solicitations are available here.

Comics

  • Ultimate Comics Spider-Man #26, $4

Trade paperbacks

None.

Comments

As I said for July, my reading of Marvel’s slacked off. I really wish they’d make like DC and offer their single-issue books digitally for Nook/Kindle/Google Play instead of just Comixology. Still, I’ll recommend the above books anyway…

This month apparently sees another huge crossover featuring Thanos. Also, the build-up for “Guardians of the Galaxy” continues…

Minorities in cartoons: Trixie Tang

May 162013
 

Trixie TangThis week’s minorities in cartoons entry is Trixie Tang, a supporting character on Nickelodeon series “The Fairly OddParents.”

In the series, Trixie is Dimmsdale Elementary’s most popular and wealthiest girl. Most of the boys in the school have a crush on her and strive to attract her attention, usually without much success. Trixie spends much of her time hanging around two popular, wealthy kids named Chad and Tad who, like “Johnny Test”‘s Mr. Black and Mr. White, look like they could be twins if they weren’t of different ethnicities. She’s also been known to snub unpopular students in her class, even calling in bodyguards, etc. to remove them from her presence if necessary. Said unpopular kids, of course, include series star Timmy Turner, who has an unrelenting crush on Trixie and tries various tactics to win her over. One episode, “Information Stupor Highway,” revolves around Timmy trying, via wishing himself into the Internet, to prevent Trixie from reading a mushy love email he wrote, but didn’t mean to send.

In perhaps a nod to Archie’s Betty and Veronica, Trixie’s best female friend is Veronica, a blonde girl who does like Timmy, but is secretly and crazily obsessed with wishing she was Trixie.

A few episodes show Trixie actually indicating she might like Timmy on some level, or has some less-than-shallow interests. However, she usually reverts to type by the end of the episode.

Trixie is voiced by Dionne Quan, a Chinese-American voice actress who’s legally blind; her scripts are written for her in Braille. Quan also was the voice of Kimi in “Rugrats” and “All Grown Up.”

 

Anthony’s DC Comics picks for August 2013

May 142013
 

Batman '66 #2Here’s what’s of interest from DC Comics for August 2013. Full solicitations are available here.

Comics

  • Adventures of Superman #4, on sale Aug. 28, $4 (digital-first)
  • Batman ’66 #2, on sale Aug. 21, $4 (digital-first)
  • Batman: Li’l Gotham #5, on sale Aug. 14, $3 (digital-first)

Trade paperbacks

None.

Comments

More cancellations coming this month, including “Threshold” (so much for the new and “improved” “Captain K’Rot“) and long-time DC title “Legion of Super-Heroes.” I guess being set 1000 years in the future makes it difficult to have forced crossovers with the present-day DCU, and/or it’s hard to forcibly tie it into one of the 876 Bat-titles…

In more interesting areas (read: not the “New 52″), the digital-first weekly titles continue to roll along unabated with their paper versions, compiling several digital issues at a time. “Batman ’66″ sees the appearance of classic TV show villain King Tut, as well as a “1966″-ized version of Killer Croc. I assume we’ll surely be seeing a “1966″ version of Harley Quinn before long.

No “Showcase” volume this month, but there is a trade paperback release of the “Secret Society of Super Villains,” the classic super-villain team from their 70s run in various titles. This volume includes a reprint from “Cancelled Comic Cavalcade,” an “ashcan” black-and-white title “published” (via several dozen photocopied copies) by DC for copyright purposes. Said “title” consisted of several otherwise-unpublished black-and-white stories from titles that feel victim to the infamous “DC Implosion,” a mass cancellation of titles during the late 70s. The Secret Society consisted of various foes ranging from Star Sapphire to Gorilla Grodd.

 

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