Ryan Drost of Star Joes on Getting Into Comics

This is Kevin Connelly, and I am the goddamn

Batman. Welcome to The Pole Bag's Origins episodes.

Join TFG1 Mike as he grills this week's guest

on just how they got into reading comics and

more. So sit back, relax, and enjoy The Pole

Bag. Hello and welcome to The Pole Bag. This

is an Origins episode. I am your host TFJoneMike

and joining me this time around is Ryan from

Star Joe's. Hello sir. Thank you for having me

on. Pleasure to be here. That's very cool. Star

Joe's is one of the GCRN's affiliates, which

sadly I haven't listened to in a while. I'm sorry.

That's okay. I can tell you there's a lot of

our listeners, there are loyal listeners, that

do listen to all of our episodes that are behind.

So don't worry about it. And they just, they'll

catch up when they catch up. We'll just keep

putting stuff out. Because I've... Started as

a listener some other stuff and then I'm like,

hey, I can do this It's easy, you know, and I

was like, okay like like this year and Late last

year and all of 2013. I'm like, okay. I'm a producer

now. I have no time to listen I do find myself

especially because I do all of the Production

post -production work and everything else. I

do find myself with less time Because because

just like yourself, I want to make the show as

good as it can possibly be So I want to put the

time into it and everything else and coming up

and doing research for future shows and things

like that It's just you start going. Okay, if

I'm listening to another podcast I'm not going

to be focused on what I'm doing right now. Yeah,

exactly. So when I find myself listening to podcasts,

it's usually like I'm cleaning the house or driving

in my car somewhere. Here's a little trick to

do, which I know other people that do this also.

I listen to podcasts when I go grocery shopping.

Oh my god, that's awesome. I put my earbuds in

and here's the brilliance of it. Nobody asks

you for anything. Everyone just kind of gets

out of your way because they know you're listening

to something. You're not paying attention where

you're at, which I am paying attention. Sometimes

I have the earbuds in and I'm not even listening

to anything. Alright, so this is The Pull Bag.

We are here doing an Origins episode. For those

of you who are tuning into us for the first time,

what the Origins episodes are is I take someone

that we either have worked with or is on our

network or someone I've met online and if they've

been reading comics or if they have any interest

in comic books, I bring them on the show and

I basically dissect their comic reading. How's

it feel to be a frog? Oh, it feels great. I've

got a lot to dissect too Yeah, it's not easy

being green so not at all So basically what this

is is we will run through Ryan's you know comic

history There are several questions that will

pop up and everything else so usually the first

question that that I ask is Was there a certain

person in your life whether it be your mom your

dad your? grandparents you're an aunt and uncle

was there a certain person that as a young child

said here read this and you were on your way

um i don't know about a certain person uh per

se uh my parents definitely didn't discourage

me reading comics uh but i can't say they were

a proponent of it necessarily they did encourage

me a lot with i was very artistic as a kid and

i i loved drawing and everything else so they

were very supportive of me Drawing things and

I think it was a natural progression of liking

to draw things and then seeing oh There's these

books out there that have drawings in them and

words So I think if anything it was just friends

friends that had comics and and probably actually

my neighbors my neighbors They had a couple kids

that were like three, four years older than me,

and they had a couple long boxes, and I had never

seen a long box full of comics before. And I

was like, ooh, what is this? And they just let

me go through all of it. And they let me take

a couple home with me and everything else. So

that was really kind of the big start of it.

Very cool. Very cool. What were you reading as

a kid? As a kid it was mostly the stuff that

I was interested in in the sense of I wasn't

big into Necessarily the quote -unquote Marvel

in DC like the characters of Marvel in DC. I

watched, you know super friends and I watched

Spider -man as amazing friends, but I really

wasn't picking up the comics related to those

I was picking up I remember at least the very

first comic I can remember I got in one of those

I don't know if you Recall these are for listeners

recall these there would be at the toy stores

the three comics in a bag Pick up and one of

them. I remember having was return of the Jedi

number one It was a four -part miniseries and

it had I still remember the cover to this day.

It was purple with Jedi Luke on the cover Slave

Leia and Lando in his skiff guard outfit And

I didn't know it was only part one as a kid.

I was just like okay. It was my favorite part

in Star Wars It was the whole job of the hut

scene. And I'm like just reading it over and

over and over again. Picking up, you know, occasional

G .I. Joe comic when I saw it, occasional Transformers

comic when I saw it. I wasn't really heavy into

comics as a little kid, but I would pick up the

occasional issue here and there. And like I said,

it had everything to do with these cartoons that

I was watching growing up versus Marvel and DC

have their next line of comics coming out. I

didn't pay attention to those. I really just

paid attention to the comics that were what I

cover on Star Joe's now. And then one of the

other big things I got as a kid was I remember

a trip down to Florida and I picked up at some

shop down there. It was just like a novelty shop

or whatever. They actually had Teenage Mutant

Ninja Turtles. It was a collected edition. It

was book two. And what it was, I didn't know

it at the time, but what it was, it was a reprint

of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle comic book,

but colorized. Oh yeah, the color classic. Yeah.

And this was book two and had the Triceratons

in it. And I loved dinosaurs as a kid, I still

love dinosaurs. And I just remember poring over

that thing because I had watched the cartoon,

but this was so different from the cartoon. Like

this was really cool. The cartoon I liked, but

it was goofy. I mean, it was. Yeah. This wasn't

goofy. This was like just really cool. And obviously

with the Triceratons, I was a huge, huge Star

Wars fan. So, you know, the space action and

everything else was really cool, too. So those

are my early comics. I didn't really get heavy

into comics until the early 90s, like 90, 91.

That's when I got heavy into comics. and I remember

picking up, I remember watching the X -Men cartoon

and picking up the Muir Island Saga, which took

place right before the infamous or famous X -Men

number one by Jim Lee. This was the storyline

right before then. So I remember picking that

up. I remember picking up some Spider -Man finally.

So this is when I finally started getting into

some Marvel stuff. And the only DC thing I picked

up, I remembered was Gantlet's Tale, which was

a John Byrne graphic novel type thing because

I I remember loving Green Lantern from the Super

Friends and That was my favorite character from

the Super Friends and and to this day Green Lanterns

my favorite comic book character And so I even

the Van Wilder version There there was a lot

of I don't blame, let me put it this way, I don't

blame Ryan Reynolds for the failure of that movie.

I think he played a perfectly fine Hal Jordan

or would have played a perfectly fine Hal Jordan

if there had not been six writers on the project.

The direction of the movie was totally thrown

off. They picked the wrong villain for the first

one. They did the Spider -Man 3 problem, which

is they tried to put too many villains into one

movie. There were elements of the movie. I really

liked the constructs and stuff like that the

training that he went through like that stuff

was really cool But no, I loved Hal Jordan and

I saw this comic and I picked it up one of my

biggest regrets and I've mentioned it on our

show before was In the comic shop. I went to

this before, you know eBay and internet access

and all that type of stuff for people to know

what And this was before the big swell in comics,

so people really didn't know what comics were

worth. The comic shop I went to was a very small

place called L .A. Comics. And I thought, as

a kid, I thought it was, oh, L .A., like Los

Angeles. It's, you know, it's comics from the

West Coast. Cool, I'll go there. And it was probably

like the guy's name was probably Larry Anderson

or something like that. And that's why it was

called L .A. Comics. But they had in their...

like little showcase, Giant Size X -Men number

one, and they wanted 50 bucks for it. And I had

$50 on me, but I was like, I don't want to spend

50 bucks on a Giant Size X -Men. I want to get

50 comics for 50 bucks. And that's probably my

biggest regret of not buying that, because now

it's worth a grand. Yeah. But no, so I got into

a lot of the Marvel stuff. I didn't get really

much into DC. And then Zero Hour was coming out.

from DC and I had heard I fell for the classic

line from these two big companies. It's a great

jumping on point. So I picked it up and I'm reading

it and these characters are really interesting

and obviously I knew Superman and Batman and

stuff like that, but there was a lot of characters

I didn't know and I'm reading it, but I'm getting

confused. Yeah, because there's a lot of continuity

that goes into zero hour for those that don't

know There's a lot of history behind it So I'm

reading it and then I picked up the zero issues

that came out after zero hour because it was

like kind of their read one of their relaunches

Yeah, people think that the DC 52 was the first

relaunch. Oh nay nay DC has relaunched a couple

times But they yeah, so I started reading those

zero issues, and now I was starting to get those

characters, and now I was starting to understand

the characters, and I was starting to understand

more of what went into Zero Hour. So then I thought,

oh, I'll read, someone else told me, oh, in order

to really understand what's going on with Zero

Hour, you need to read Crisis on Infinite Earth.

So I read that and became more confused, because

that relied on even more past continuity that

I was not familiar with. Um, but it's exactly

why I love the new 52 Here's the thing and this

is different nowadays than it was back then back

then What happened was I was confused. I didn't

know these characters, but I wanted to know them

So I went back and started reading stuff and

I read more and more and more and I can tell

you to this day Crisis on infant earth is my

all -time favorite comic book story now Because

of how much I know now versus then. And every

time I read it, I get something else out of it.

Because I've read something else since then.

And I read it, honestly, I probably read it about

once every year, once every other year. I have

like the absolute edition of it. And I actually

had it signed by George Perez, the artist that

was on it. So yeah, so that was exciting. And

then Yeah, and then I got a little bit more into

Marvel and I was reading a lot of X -Men, reading

a lot of DC, I was reading a lot of just everything,

anything to get my hands on. And then I went

to college and I had no money. And then when

I got out of college, I got my first job and

had a lot more money then. uh than I ever had

in college and started really getting into comics

um and really reading a lot and reading a ton

and then and we can always dive back into a lot

of the stuff but the synopsis is then I got into

podcasting uh about four or five years ago as

far as listening well five six years ago listening

to podcasts and that made me start paying attention

to writers and artists more than just characters

so oh yeah Before I was listening, I would I

would just read stuff because I like Batman or

because I like Superman or whatever Then I started

listening podcast and I started paying attention

to the wall This story was written by this guy

and I really liked it So maybe if I read another

thing by this guy I'll really like it also and

I found out that that was a lot of times true

Not always but a lot of times true I started

paying attention to artists and things like that.

And so then I started getting into independent

stuff and And I didn't leave Marvel and DC in

my wake and go right to Independence. That's

not the type of person I am. There are people

like that that know Marvel and DC are crap and

Independence are awesome. But I did find out

that there is awesome stuff in Independence stuff.

And then, yeah, then we started doing the podcast.

And then I got really, really heavy into... these

80s properties I grew up with and really digging

into the comics and finding out holy crap There's

all these comics coming out related to all this

stuff. I grew up with Let's do something with

this Yeah, exactly. So All right, so I Know that

was a lot If you get a knock at your door you

answer it and it's the Joker with a gun to your

face Who do you pick Marvel or DC? If I had a

gun to my face, I pick DC Especially because

it's the Joker Overall I started with Marvel

but overall I am more invested in the characters

of DC and like I said, I honestly attribute that

to reading Zero Hour and reading Chrysostom for

the Earth and deciding I need to learn more about

these characters and I learned so much more about

those characters than I ever did with Marvel.

And now I'm getting a lot more into the Marvel

stuff and I'm picking up a lot of trades of older

Marvel stories that I've never read before that

are classics or supposed to be classics and stuff.

Summer classics, summer 90s art crap. Yes. Although

I will say it's funny because there's so many

people that say oh like the 90s were horrible

and I'm like the 90s is when I got into comics

so some of the things that people don't like

in the 90s are the things I kind of you know

Got in that's the stuff I got familiar with first.

So I will say yes There's a lot of bad things

in the night in the 90s, but there was a lot

of good nuggets that people tend to forget So

should DC have Rebooted new 52 should they have

booted rebooted? Yes, but they should have actually

rebooted it Yeah, that's true. That makes any

sense There should not have been well We're keeping

this continuity or we're keeping that continuity

because those books are selling well Which is

essentially why they didn't reboot some of those

titles. They'll never say that but that's why

I Would have actually liked and I think that's

what people were excited about about because

they thought that's what was going to happen

was that they were going to actually do a complete

reboot where you did not have to know anything

from the past whatsoever. And I think that would

have been fun and interesting. Although I will

say there is a part of me that's sad that they

rebooted because I think part of DC's charm was

their legacy characters and passing. You know

the flashes and the and the Batman characters

and stuff like that having that that legacy of

characters I think is what made DC so strong

and different from Marvel and they kind of lost

that Although I think they're starting to slowly

get that back Yeah, um, yeah, it's It's one of

those things where I I came in right as it happened

Yeah, well, I actually know I came in a year

after it happened I came into one at the end

of 2012 with death of the family and I started

listening to podcasts I didn't I'd been listening

to podcasts, but I started listening to Fatman

on Batman with Kevin Smith and I'm like Oh, Kyle

Higgins. Kyle Higgins is writing Nightwing. Kyle

Higgins is talking about something else he wrote

this New York Times bestseller called Gates of

Gotham. What is this? Dick Grayson is Batman?

What the hell are you smoking? You know? And

I'm like, ooh, I must read this. So one of our

listeners, one of our fans actually gifted it

to me and sent it to me. Nice. And I read it,

and I'm like, OK, this happens in the old continuity.

The new continuity still picks up on it in because

I believe Nightwing number one says oh Yeah,

I used you know when I was Batman for a time

ball I don't mind if it's something that like

gates of Gotham as a collected edition the five

issues I think yeah four or five five or six

I forget Don't have it in front of me. Yeah,

so the collected edition I'm like, okay. This

is a complete really awesome story and I can

then jump over tonight Oh, hey, it's the same

kind of continuity because as you were saying

they they rebooted most of it they kept Some

of it still in the old kind of continuity thing

And I'm like, hey, I don't mind reading one story

from the old continuity and then jumping on and

continuing with the new continuity, but, and

I've said this many times on these origins episodes

before, I'm sure the listeners are groaning at

their iPods or iPhones or iDevices saying, oh,

why is he saying this again? My biggest problem

with comics originally, I respected the hell

out of them as a kid, my biggest problem was,

hey, you need to read this number to this number.

Because it's an awesome story. And I'm like,

OK, well, Batman number 675, don't I need to

read the other 674 issues? And I'm learning.

I'm totally learning with the new 52 that new,

as I go back to some stuff, I don't always have

to go back to the beginning of everything. But

the new 52, it's... I wish they would have used

a different bad character. the really would like

uh... and i don't know how many listeners are

and i don't even know if you're a fan but i have

no interest whatsoever in batwing uh... it's

like i do think that unless it's unless it's

the friggin plane yet i don't care about a guy

named batwing whatsoever when i put him at the

crux of this forever evil crap and leave Dick

Grayson alone. And I'm a huge fan of Dick Grayson,

so I do share your your interest in leaving him

alone. Dick Grayson is actually my third favorite

character in all of comics or third or fourth.

He's right around there. I have it's Green Lantern

Flash, probably Cyclops of the X -Men, then Dick

Grayson and then. probably Havoc of the X -Men,

which I know that's a weird one to pick, but

I've always really liked the character. So those

are probably my top five characters in comics,

at least with the big two. Yeah, the thing with,

like I said, with the new 52 and everything else,

I think it gets a bad rap because I think there's...

They're starting to get their legs back underneath

them I'm noticing the stories are getting more

substance to them. There's there's more of a

shared universe coming together Which I like

because I mean why have a DC universe if everyone's

just gonna be on their own title I do know exactly

what you're talking about as far as like well

read 670 whatever through 680 whatever and it's

like well, why don't I have to read all the other

ones? that would to me was the beauty of comics

when I was a kid was I I could pick up Spider

-Man 135 and just read it. And I didn't care

that I didn't read the ones before or the ones

after it. And I think I'm starting to get back

to that moment in my life where I don't have

to read all the stories that came before it.

If I can, that's great. But I don't mind, like,

if there's a book on the shelf at the comic shop

and it's part three of a four -part mini -series,

but it's something that I think looks interesting

to me. I am back to that stage where I'll just

pick up that third issue and I'll read it and

I might not know everything that's going on,

but if it interests me enough, I'll go find issues

one and two if I know it's a four -part mini

series or something like that. That's how I was

with Transformers Prime Beast Hunters Rage of

the Dino -Bots. That's how I was with Rage of

the Dino -Bots where I picked up the third issue.

That series really surprised me. And how good

it was yeah, because I picked up Transformers

Prime They did a four -issue miniseries which

had Cliffjumper in it and everything else and

the art wasn't very good I didn't really like

the story in it And then so I was a little nervous

picking up Transformers Prime again Yeah, because

I have found and I'm sure a lot of listeners

have found this and you may have found this also

That when you pick up a comic that's were direct

relation to a movie or a cartoon series More

times than not. It's not gonna be very good the

only exception I see to that at this very moment

is Rage of the Dinobots and Prime Beast Hunters

because you have two of the show's writers, right?

And I will say I will totally agree with you

that that is an exception I was nervous picking

it up because because of like I said the history

of running into bad things But then like you

said I read it and I was like, wow, this is actually

really good. So All right, so yeah, we'll talk

about the new 52 in the future possibly in a

future after dark episode in more in -depth because

it just I Don't know maybe you're just reading

the wrong books And we'll get into that later

Yeah, okay then All right, so And I will tell

you it's not all sunshine and roses for me with

the new 52 either I'm just saying I think I'm

a little bit more positive with some of the books

that I'm reading because I've cut a lot I've

cut a lot. I started off reading all of them

because I got a good discount to read all of

them and I got about five issues in and I definitely

Picked which ones I was going to continue with

and which ones I wasn't and then even from then

there's been ones I've cut and ones I've added

and things like that So see that's the same thing

with me, but mine is more so based on character

Yeah, like I knew as soon as I even though I

kind of didn't get the end of Batgirl 13 And

I didn't see where it was supposed to I didn't

see how it was a prelude to death of the family

at the time You know, I was like, okay. This

is really good writing. This is really good art

I'm gonna continue with this same thing with

with see the thing with me is not only is it

characters, but it's also What voice actors I

have in my head. Every time I read Gail Simone

Batgirl, I can hear Tara Strong in my head. Same

thing with Kyle Higgins on Nightwing. Every time

I read Nightwing, I started with, actually I

started a little later on Nightwing, I started

at 15. because that's when his death of the family

run starts uh... for the couple issues there

but uh... you know i hear laura and i've i've

interviewed lauren lester twice so i hear lauren's

nightwing voice in my head when i read that comic

believe me i mean doing star joe's i hear peter

cullen's voice when i'm reading optimus prime

or oh yeah or ryan patrick you know we're reading

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and I'm hearing

you know it's weird now for that series though

because sometimes I'm hearing the voice from

the 80s cartoon and sometimes I'm hearing the

voice from the new animated series. See the new

animated series because we are also we just episode

51 we just released the free comic book day and

issues 1 -3 of the new animated adventures comic.

ongoing tie -in to the new Turtles animated series.

With that, I can hear those characters, but sure,

I have the first two trades for the regular IDW

ongoing of Turtles. I have yet to dive into them,

but I'm sure once I start to dive into those,

that I will be hearing classic. Yeah, it happens.

You can't avoid it. And I'll tell you right now,

I still hear Green Lantern from Super Friends

in my head when I read green Lantern when I read

Hal Jordan, so I mean Yeah, you're probably gonna

drop the mic and walk away when I tell you this,

but I'm so sick of Hal Jordan Why can't they

give proper credit to John Stewart and Kyle Rayner

damn it? Because how I know Stewart has core

and and Kyle has yeah guardians or whatever Did

you just say Green Guardsmen? No, New Guardians.

Oh, New Guardians, okay. I was just going to

say, wait a second here. But yeah, I don't know.

I just... I will tell you the happiest day in

my... one of the happiest days in my comic life

was when I heard Rebirth was coming out. Green

Lantern Rebirth, because I knew it meant Hal

Jordan was coming back. It's... Again, I grew

up with the character and I'm sure that's why

it's because I grew up with that character He

means something to me just like there's people

I know people that said wait a second I thought

Green Lantern was black because they grew up

with Justice League Yeah, and Jon Stewart so

it's like and I've had to literally tell people

that are not comic book people like no Here's

the progression and and I love Jon Stewart. I

love Jon Stewart. I love Kyle Rayner Kyle Rayner

is my number two favorite Green Lantern character

And Jon Stewart's probably number four, Killawog's

number three, because Killawog's just awesome.

But I will say, in the new 52, lately, whoever

the new writer is, and I can't remember who it

is that's on it right now, he is writing Hal

Jordan very inconsistently for me. One moment

he's the heroic Hal Jordan the cocky pilot guy

that I know and then there's the next moment

He's the uncertain guy. That's not sure about

what to do Yeah, I think that was probably one

of DC's biggest mistakes was Jeff leaving. Yeah

Yep, I agree. I agree and some of his stuff was

getting a little weaker too after a little while

but he's yeah I'm not even reading it yet. I

still have to because we're Coming up in july

twenty fourteen will be green lantern month inside

the pullback and we're starting with rebirth

we're going through Rebirth is an amazing piece

of we're starting with rebirth and we're going

all the way through Brightest day volume three

and then eventually we'll break into I I know

I have at least volume one of the new 52 stuff.

So Yeah, I haven't even read. I just rebirth

is a rebirth is is written extremely well and

it is absolutely gorgeous to look at. The art

is phenomenal. It is a really well -told story

and I'm not just saying that as a Green Lantern

fan, I know that that story got other people

to read Green Lantern. Alright, so what non -superhero

comics are you reading? Favorites right now is

a comic called skyward It's by action lab entertainment.

So it's a smaller company, but I know the guys

that put it together I got to know them through

podcasting and everything and They've been in

the business for a while and they just side all

come together and make this company And then

it's written and drawn by Jeremy Dale and Jeremy

Dale used to do some GI Joe comics So that's

what got me a little interested to check this

thing out. It is If you like Legend of Zelda

with a little bit of Jim Henson magic in there,

that's what this comic is. It's kind of like,

the best way I describe it is it's Legend of

Zelda meets Lord of the Rings meets Labyrinth.

Put it all together and it's just, it's beautiful.

It's a fun story. So I'm reading that. I'm reading

Three Guns from Boom. It's just like a nice It's

a nice action comic, comic book. I am reading

Imagine Agents, which is like Men in Black meets

Monsters, Inc. It's kids with imaginary friends

and there's this agency and when the kids turn

eight years old they can't see their imaginary

friend anymore and these agents come and take

them from the kids and... give them housing and

stuff like that. And some of the imaginary friends

get a little rambunctious, as you can imagine,

and it's very interesting. It's just one of those

palette -cleansing comics where I'm just having

a lot of fun reading it. And then obviously everything

in Star -Jose is not Marvel and DC other than

Masters of the Universe, so probably my top favorite

read, two of them, is one of the Star Wars by

Brian Wood, which is... He's telling the Star

Wars story after A New Hope with no other concern

for any other continuity. So if you are someone

who's been afraid of the EU of Star Wars, which

is something we're addressing on Star Joes very

soon, we're going to start helping people through

the EU. But if you're someone that's always been

afraid but you've seen the movies and you love

the movies... pick up Brian Wood's Star Wars

because all you need to have known is Star Wars

A New Hope, the very first original movie. And

you don't need to know anything else. And you

can understand what's going on and it's a lot

of fun. It's well written, well drawn. And then

the one series that I absolutely love, but unfortunately

it's ending and I hope it comes back in another

form like it has in the past, is G .I. Joe Cobra

Files written by Mike Costa and artists by Antonio

Fuso. And that is just... It's very adult GI

Joe. It is espionage and and it's twists You'd

never see coming and it reinvents some characters

in a very deadly and really cool way. So So I'd

say those are probably some of my my biggest

ones that are not Marvel DC Yeah, I don't know

it's one of those things where the other thing

that kinda really gets to me and people have

heard this on the podcast before because There

are times when we've covered when JT and I have

covered superior spider -man where I will just

go on a five -minute ad I Understand comic books

need to make money and comic books need to have

ads in them, but can't they be more And can't

they be more story conscientious and just maybe

put like one ad in the beginning and all the

rest at the end kind of like what IDW does Yeah,

I love I love reading IDW single issues because

it's the whole story before you get to any or

there's one in there or something like that and

Devils do used to do that. Also when they had

the GI Joe series, which is something I'm doing

now for our website is I'm going back and rereading

the the image Devils do GI Joe run and Doing

a full in -depth review of it and all the ads

are in the back None of them are in the story

at all. Oh, that reminds me, another great one,

I don't know how I forgot to mention this, is

Saga. I'm reading Saga from Image. It's weird

to describe. Aliens and there's a whole you know

Romeo verse Romeo Juliet thing going on with

you know two families that shouldn't be getting

along and there's there's magic and there's tech

and it's I mean I grew up with Star Wars and

Masters of Universe and things like that where

there was you know mysticism and science and

Saga fits that also except. It's very grown -up.

It's very adult first thing that pops into my

head is Are you the cave master? Are you the

gatekeeper? That is my all -time favorite comedy,

Ghostbusters. We actually did a spotlight on

Ghostbusters one time, episode 52, actually,

speaking of DC. I believe it was episode 52,

and I only know that because someone asked me

recently, like, have you guys ever covered Ghostbusters?

I'm like, yes, we have. And yeah, I love Ghostbusters.

All right. Is there anything new coming up in

the new year that you're going to be picking

up? Anything that you're not currently reading

that solicits out that you're interested in?

I'm interested in the Inhumans from Marvel, just

because of the whole Infinity story. I'm kind

of interested to see where they go with that.

I'm very excited about New Warriors, because

I've loved the Nova series. And Nova's gonna

be in it and I love the Scarlet Spider series

and Scarlet Spider's gonna be part of the team.

And I'm just kind of interested to see what they

do with that. I am not interested at all in the

new Ghost Rider. I would spit on that thing if

I could. From DC, I'm very interested to see

what follows after this whole Forever Evil. And

they're talking I think in the fall. They're

going to do a five year jump. Yeah. And they

did a one year later story before the new 52

thing. And that was really cool. It worked really

well for me. And I really liked it. So I'm very

interested to see what they do with that. If

they're going to jump five, if they are actually

going to jump five years in the future with all

their characters and all their books like they

did with the one year later. I'll be very interested

to see the changes that happen with the characters

and what what goes on I'm very very interested

Although it's gonna hurt the wallet a little

In they're gonna do to at least net so far. They're

gonna do two weekly comic series. Yeah, it's

her Batman eternal and Futures and yes, so I

Very interested in the Batman one just I like

Batman and they're gonna be bringing spoiler

back in that story from what I understand and

everything else Or Stephanie Brown. I don't know.

She's gonna be spoiler, but it'll be Stephanie

Brown is returning. So I'm interested in that

That was one of my things I missed with the new

52 launch is that the step when Stephanie Brown

became Batgirl that was a fantastic series and

Then they did the new 52 and suddenly Brown you

she's nowhere to be seen. Yeah That and Wally

West, but everyone misses Wally. Wally was my

flash. I like Barry's okay, but I prefer the

amalgamated version of Wally and Barry from Justice

League. There are certain times where he has

Barry's background of being a police scientist,

etc. Wally is my flash as well. You mentioned

Killawalk earlier. Nobody does Killawog. Well,

okay, two people do Killawog really great, but

at first, before the second one, no one. I had

never heard, I had never seen Killawog done as

well as President Pom or Dave Dennis. Oh, yeah,

yeah, yeah. 24. And then, of course, Kevin Michael

Richardson has to come in and blow us all away.

Yeah, yeah. But yeah, so I'm interested in the

two weekly series because I loved the 52. Weekly

series that they did and I thought countdown

was pretty good and then if Trinity was horrible

So I'm hoping that they're going back to the

formula that made the 52 weekly series work And

I think they are from everything that I've been

reading about it. So I'm very interested in both

weekly series I just wish they weren't doing

two weekly series at the same time But I will

be checking them out for me I want to expand

the show a bit. I want to kind of not just stick

to Marvel, DC, and IDW while I love all three

companies, certain aspects of all three. IDW,

there's pretty much nothing that they can do

that I would fault them for. DC and Marvel on

the other hand, 70 years of questionability.

But I want to expand the show a little bit. I'm

toying around with possibly going back and reviewing

some old Sonic comics. I do know that I think

it's Dark Horse. I think it's Dark Horse. I could

be wrong. Gail Simone is writing the new Tomb

Raider. Ongoing Tomb Raider. Yes, I'm looking

forward to that. I'm very much looking forward

to that. Did you ever read the old, I'm trying

to remember who did it before, Top Cowl series

of Tomb Raider? No, that was well done. It was

pretty well done. It got bad near the end, but

that's probably to this because it was getting

cancelled Well, this new one is it's coming off

the latest game. Yes It continues the events

of the game. So I've got a I've got a buddy of

mine That's gonna be streaming the game for me

when it hits ps4 so at least I can see cuz I'm

like Great now I have to figure out what the

hell kind of story happened in the game and the

guy was a little my buddy was like Yeah, what

story there is no stuff. That's why I love YouTube

because people make movies on there of the games

and I'm like Sometimes I find really really bad.

Oh, yeah a meatic playthroughs. Yeah, that's

not what I need I don't need to hear you doing

your best Gravel in mouth Batman voice or You

know, you know which ones were done really really

well And I know you're a fan of the property.

Anyways is both Transformers games I found really

good versions of where they actually felt like

I was watching a movie. Yeah. Yeah I I have war

for Cybertron I played part of the I get all

the way to the end of the trypticon but the second

trypticon battle after he crashes And I think

that was like chapter 6, I don't even remember

it. It was close to the end of the game. And

I couldn't beat him. I'm like, ah screw it, I'll

do it later. And I still have yet to see a really

good, and I'm sure you'll link me at some point,

but I've yet to see a really, really good non

-idiot talking over... Well, here will be an

incentive for you to get caught up on Star Joe's.

As you know next year is going to be the 30th

anniversary of Transformers. Yes So we're gonna

be focusing on as much as we can Try to put some

spotlights on different Transformers throughout

the ages and stuff like that One of the things

I was able to do is I was able to get it take

those YouTube Movie versions of those two games

the war for Cybertron and fall like Cybertron

that I thought were very well done, and I'm going

to actually put snippets of it as like a multi

-part story at the end of each of our episodes

in 2014. Oh, cool. And so it'll be kind of like

a story for the mind, and I'm going to do some

editing with it so it makes sense when someone's

just hearing it and they're not seeing it. Yeah.

But yeah, I've listened to it where I'm just

listening to it, and it works really, really

well. So look forward to that. Yes, the pull

bag. We have huge plans for 2014 for our second

year online. You're going to be hearing this

will come after episode 52, which was supposedly

the last episode of the year. Actually, this

will also come after the first after dark topic

we discussed variant covers and the inconsistent

costs of them. just for the fact it's a cool

cover and it's the same damn story I wish one

of my arguments with that is I always wish that

if this is the really cool cover then that should

be the main cover of the book that was that was

my argument with Batman 66 number five All right,

so I think that's gonna do it for us here in

the pull bag. Why don't you inform the listeners

where they can get in contact with you or where

they can listen to Star Joes. Absolutely, you

can find us, well obviously you can find us on

the GeekCast Radio Network. Ta -da! We are located

there. You can also find us at StarJos .com.

Just type in starjoes .com and you'll find us

and I do the show. Just to give a short synopsis

of it, it is Star Wars, G .I. Joe, Transformers,

all your favorite 80s properties with a big focus

on the comic books that are coming out today

and the ones that have come out in the past.

We do touch on some other things. I do have two

co -hosts now. We used to just have one, which

was Chuck, who started the show with me, but

we have since added officially Robert Atkins,

who is a comic book artist and he has actually

worked on GI Joe comic books many times in the

past and Chuck and I focus on the the comic issues

and the comic reviews and doing spotlights on

certain things and Robert and I do Two shows

now we do one show where we review the old 80s

cartoons much like a lot of the shows on geocast

radio have done and we look at them through adult

eyes and have a lot of fun and and waxing nostalgia

and all that and then we have just started it'll

be out in an Just a few days We are going through

this is the EU thing I was talking about We are

going through all the Star Wars books that have

come out and we are going to do a review on each

book in Chronological order with extra little

snippets to help people understand how it fits

into the Star Wars universe And kind of help

people get a little more comfortable with the

Star Wars expanded universe So we've just started

doing that we hit our first book and that episode

should come out in the next day or two So yeah,

check us out at starjoes .com. Everything else

is there. As far as any other information, as

far as our Facebook and forums and all that fun

stuff. Very cool, very cool. Alright, ladies

and gentlemen, make your great escape into comics

and we will catch you next time. I must admit...

It's sadly anti -climactic. So let's say you're

looking for a podcast of your favorite 80s comic

books, G .I. Joe, Transformers, Ninja Turtles,

He -Man, et cetera. Where are you going to go

to find this? Welcome to Star Joe's Podcast.

I'm your host Ryan. And I'm Chuck. That's right

everybody, we're the Star Joe's. We host a podcast

called Star Joe's Podcast. where we talk about

your favorite comic books, your favorite toys

of all the 80s properties. Star Wars, G .I. Joe,

Transformers, Mask, Thundercats, Voltron, you

name it, we cover it. If it's in the 80s, we

will cover it at some point. Yes, so what you

want to do to find us, you can go to iTunes,

you can go to www .starjoes .com. And remember,

the Force will be with you. Because knowing us

is half the battle. You just heard the latest

episode of The Pull Bag, GCRN's comic book review

podcast. There are several ways to get in touch

with us and leave feedback for the show. You

can visit the website geekcastradio .com where

you can comment on the episode and all of our

different podcasts. You can rate our show on

iTunes and be sure to leave us feedback. Call

the voicemail line. 502 -526 -5821. Please remember

to tell us the show you're leaving the message

for, and your name. Become a fan of us on Facebook

by searching Geekcast Radio Network. You can

send us an email, feedback at geekcastradio .com.

Follow us on Twitter at Geekcast Radio. So until

next time, unleash the geek in you.