Wonderful

Wonder Woman (dir Patty Jenkins, 2017)

So this is what winning feels like?

After the turbulence of DC's first three (and largely male-dominated) superhero outings, the time has finally arrived for Diana of Themyscira/Wonder Woman to fully take the lead. Very happily - and despite assurances from too many places that WB could do no right, Patty Jenkins' film is a triumph.

It's not only director Patty Jenkins who is vindicated here, of course. There's the matter of the casting of Gal Gadot by Zack Snyder; set up in BvS and, by all accounts, widely regarded as the highlight of that movie by audience reaction. Gadot's early casting image and announcement was, while not controversial, not without comment from the peanut gallery  and a fair amount of it negative. "Too skinny!" "too dark!" "Not American-looking enough!" (??) "She should be [insert actor from other IP/MMA fighter]. But once again, Snyder's casting eye has been proved dead-on, and our new Wonder Woman is truly a household name. Not bad for an actor on the verge of quitting Hollywood.

Gadot is helped along the way of course by a very capable supporting cast: Connie Nielsen is majestic as Hippolyta, Robin Wright is formidable, Chris Pine every bit his charismatic self as romantic lead Steve Trevor, Danny Huston intimidating as Ludendorf, David Thewlis layered in his role, and Ewan Bremner and Lucy Davis? Just fantastic. The story is straightforward, but not too by-the-books, and I would say perfect for a full-length debut. There are equal pars humour and emotion, and the film's European and WW1 setting is both unusual and novel - we definitely need to see superhero movies escape modern day US more, and with a near-immortal as its hero Wonder Woman was a very good choice indeed

There are a few weak spots, naturally. The setting, as contained as it is, occasionally makes the film seem small in scope, and the CG-heavy finale, while de rigeur, doesn't counteract this. But when used for Themyscira it's wonderful, and the intimacy of the movie actually helps the story (plus Diana and Steve's dance in the snow at Veld looks beautiful)

Foe the moment, though, the big win for Wonder Woman the movie and character is its message. The power of love is a tough sell - even tougher in an age of digital explosions, outlandish set pieces and  epic battles. Unless those things are part of the message (in which case, god help us all), then the story has to go small - but Wonder Woman does it's damnedest to have it both ways, throwing in sacrifice, mercy, and the unforgettable bravery of the No Man's Land scene, and Diana emerges from all of these things stronger, more sure of her purpose, and still the same idealist she was as too adorable youngster back on her island paradise. That's winning.

The next movie is going to have to work very hard to top this.

Legends of RPG Art: David C Sutherland III

Whenever the subject of old school D&D art is mentioned, certain names will inevitably pop up: such as Erol Otus, Dave Trampier, Jeff Dee, and Larry Elmore  - some of the greater and most celebrated early artists of the TSR stable. But among the greater number of artists, including those no less recognisable, but for whom the ages haven't preserved in as high regard, there are other names which are perhaps less celebrated. And today I'm thinking of the late, great Dave C Sutherland III, who died this day in 2005.

You've seen Sutherland's art if you've seen anything from the early days of RPGs, including Holmes Basic D&D and its companion 1st Edition AD&D - hell, Sutherland's art to me is 1st Edition AD&D, good and bad.

It's unfair that Sutherland's work suffers the lot it has, while those of his immediate peers have over time accrued comparatively greater glory; and yet maybe it's because Sutherlands work sits so readily alongside the likes of Dave Trampier's and Erol Otus, that comparison damns him. Sutherland's art has been called a lot of things;  naive, 'aspirational', amateurish, goofy, and just ugly. The website Something Awful in its one-time series WTFDnD? lumped his work in the Monster Manual alongside other, earlier D&D Holmes era art, "Outsider art" - a deeply unflattering term. Sutherland's art is what it is - varied and variable, but I would say that when on form he truly held his head high. Just as Trampier had the Players Manual cover with its demonic stone idol and adventurers, and Otus Deities and Demigods, Sutherland produced the Dungeon Master's Guide and, for his sins, the Monster Manual. Though the latter has aquired a sort of kitsch following with its busy, garish and literal layout, there's nothing wrong with the cover of the DMG; the efreet depicted on it looks appropriately saturnine and dramatic, and his interior full page piece 'A Paladin in Hell' is a recognisable classic. Sutherland's box art for Holmes edition Basic D&D presents a shortform imagining of a D&D game conclusion, featuring a Fighter, a Wizard, a Dragon and its hoard. Sutherland was a literalist, if nothing else.

But then DCS was a player as well, and what I like most about Sutherland's art is that it is player's art. He played the game, sculpted his figures, and he mapped his adventures. In fact, among Grognards of the early years Sutherland's creative reputation exceeds his graphic works  - not only was he a valued a cartographer for some very highly regarded modules, but he created the Wemic and was co-creator of Queen of the Demonweb Pits. He's one of a breed of early TSR employees for whom their work was also their play, one of those special few around whom the game evolved. So then Sutherland's art is a touchstone from a time when D&D had left its wargaming Chainmail incarnation behind - but in a highly organic evolution; hence his Fighters wear chivalric chain and helms, or have swords-and-sandals well-proportioned arms and kite shields; his Magic Users are bearded, pointy-hatted conjurors, and his demi-humans scatter about their feet like children.Often these chracters are caught mid-combat, or in the base of the Holmes set and AD&D rulebooks actually exploring caverns and ruins, drawn from the days when adventuring was likely fifty per cent traipsing down corridors with a ten-foot pole. I like that Sutherland's art speaks to the foundations of the game and the less sanitised, cookie cutter heroic art of the recent present. And yes, at times it resembles the distracted, slightly scribbled marginalia of a player's Character Sheet, but that's authentic, too.

Alongside the illuminated style of DAT, Sutherland's 'DCS' (the C often styled to reseble an 'I', hence DIS and DAT) work in tandem, two sides of the same coin. Sadly, Sutherland's future with TSR post-Wizards of the Coast buy-out was lessthan triumphant, and feeling rejected by the industry he'd loved, his income and health suffered, and it was only in his last year, through the attention and efforts of fandom that his work was recognised and given real value. 

The Little Shop... of Hours

I love a little shop!

Specifically, I love THIS little shop. J Grubb's General Store, located on the outskirts of the Gloucester village of Stockbridge; an unassuming hamlet which by quirk of the space-time continuum has hosted the odd alien incursion and dimensional breach since the 17th of October 1979.

 

As it happens, the Doctor likes this shop, too - or has at least enjoyed its services on at least one occasion. Over the years and since its debut in the first ever Doctor Who Weekly feature strip The Iron Legion, Grubb's Store has been an essential part of Stockbridge, which has now been a location in six comic stories, five Big Finish audio stories, and has been visited by no fewer than five incarnations of the Time Lord in question.

I love this shop so much I decided some time ago to make a model of it to scale with my metal figures. It's actually going to be the first model of a building I've ever made for that scale (it may be my first ever in any scale, come to that), and as usual, I'm making it with as few bought pieces as possible.

The shell is a workplace cast-off - an easy-assemble pencil holder made from sturdy card and rescued from a recycling bin during a clean-out, while its 'skin' of brick, slate and wood is also scrap card. I toyed with the idea of purchasing ready-moulded styrofoam brick walls, but wanted to see if I could make them myself. It took a while, and so far the project has been bested by the usual hurdles: bad measuring, planning on the fly, time. Here's the work so far...