I have to get out of here.

Soon, Blogger will stop supporting FTP publishing, which means that my little experiment with “trusting” servers I don’t own will soon end in tears and I won’t be able to go to the web to post these crazy little missives. If you see the little orange and white “B” next to the URL of this site, you’ll note that this is a Blogger-driven website. Change is coming to me whether I like it or not.

I am less than pleased about that, especially given that I don’t have much time to do anything about it. I mentioned this briefly already.

A host (pardon the pun) of alternatives present themselves, each zanier than the last. A good, good friend installed a Wordpress server on my personal domain, where I’m doing some experimentation. Here’s the options I’m debating:

• Go back to plain jane HTML blogging, manually FTPing files to my domain(s), creating my own RSS feeds (pain in the butt) and writing the blogs “on the road,” transferring them from plain text to the blog when I can sit down at a computer … retiring The Hundred and Four in the process and moving all blogging operations back to the mothership on The Operative Network.
• Let Google shake me down on The Hundred and Four for a custom domain and suck it up (less than attractive)
• Finagle the Wordpress install my homeboy did on my domain and somehow make it look like a page that doesn’t make me wanna throw up in my soul.
• Taking my year-long sabbatical from social networking a step farther into getting offline completely. However, given how therapeutic and helpful for my writing it’s been to shout from the digital rafters, that seems “un-possible.”

I have to make a decision by March 26th, a date that’s bearing down on my wife much harder than me (more on that in a bit … scratch that, probably just links when she’s ready to make her big reveal).

What’s funniest is that this happens less than a year after I finally completely relented to “blogging engines.” I’d done (literally) more than a thousand posts at MySpace and still considered myself keeping the torch burning since I was maintaining my Soapbox by hand, the way spirit intended you to. I created a client site which had Blogger integrated and was like, “oh, that’s not so hard” and now I’m screwed. Stupid trusting Google to not change up the game!

Playing (Music): “The Great Divide” by Vertical Horizon

First, some adminstrivia: these commentary tracks could hit a snag when Blogger goes dark on FTP (more on that shortly). I’ll see what I can do. There’s several possibilities, and I’m working on a blog about that, so I wanna stay on topic here.

Doomwar feels like the vindication of Christopher Priest’s run, as it does similar things as the two “Enemy of the State” storylines (in my mind).

As somebody who remembers Bob Layton’s Hercules series with great fondness (Recorder was the man!), the idea of a Marvel universe without the brash son of Zeus is oddly bittersweet. Wonder Man’s still shlepping around and Herc had to pass? Some comics shop pundits noted the circular path of divinities, much like Alan Moore hinted at when the officers of Top 10 investigated the murder of Balder, but I can’t imagine a way to bring him back and not have it take away a lot. Maybe the whole “Giffen/DeMatteis League Going To Hell For Tora” tactic. I can’t see any other way.

The opening strains of All Hail Megatron were the last time I enjoyed a Transformers comic as much as Last Stand of the Wreckers and that’s a good thing. Hopefully, unlike AHM it won’t fall apart at the end. Kup’s stepping up as a great point of exposition, Springer’s an interesting leadership type and the sole human has yet to annoy. Shocker!

Deadpool … when he’s on, he’s on. What more needs to be said?

As for Doctor Voodoo, I note that Earth’s new main mage has yet to be called in on a really high profile consult, and he didn’t make the “main” Avengers team (not publicly, anyway, a team which has zero non-Caucasians as of yet, but the Secret Avengers remain unrevealed), so even though he housed two major threats, I kind of feel like he didn’t get an appropriate moment to shine. Also, that coloring and muddy ink work didn’t help. Que sera sera.

If comics cost less, many, many books would have been contenders. I’m looking at you Incorruptible, G.I. Joe Cobra 2, Dark Avengers and … heck, all of the honorable mentions. They’re all good issues, just not good enough to justify the cover price.

Magog going “meh” was a surprise, but it just kind of Rashomon-ed stuff I’d already seen. Power Girl could probably reach just a little farther and make “Honorable Mention” status.

The bad … you know what? No need to give it more light. I’m sleepy.

More news as it develops …

Playing (Music): “Karma Police” by Radiohead

Another week, another set of reviews from “the critic comics fans love to hate” (according to Timelord, posting anonymously about me on a message board I’ve never heard of — thanks Google Alerts). To be honest, if I knew I could cheese off this many people by getting paid and doing something I love, I’d have started years before I actually did (and now it’s been … spirit, almost seven years of the Buy Pile come next month).

In any case, this week …

* Yes, I’ll be glad when “Blackest Night”/”Brightest Day”/”Mauvest Afternoon” are all over because it’ll let nice, weird books like Secret Six and R.E.B.E.L.S. get back to the depraved, sick things they do best. I’m not quite to the point where a Deadshot/Vril Dox team up book would get me to buy it sight unseen, but I’m not far from it either. Some of the best characterization around some of the worst people you’d ever wanna avoid on a dark street. In my meanest dreams, I want Amadeus Cho to grow up and be like Vril Dox (but more on young mister Cho in a bit).

I should really note that the cover for Phonogram: The Singles Club #7 shown in this week’s reviews is not what was available at retail, and that the cover I bought is so, so much better. The same was true of issue #6 … lemme see if I can find what I bought … here we go. Shame I didn’t find that last night while I was working on the reviews. Que sera sera.

There are so many stories I could write in the Phonogram universe. I have a third of an idea about a story about an American phonomancer (who’s very, very different from anything David Kohl would have ever seen) that could set the world on fire, and Kohl would be forced to deal with him (and that’s not always what you think). Maybe that’s too superheroish. Anyway, it rattles around in my head every time I see Jamie McKelvie’s perfect artwork (I would literally sacrifice puppies to Cthulhu to get him to work with me on a project) and see the all-too-clever riffs of Kieron Gillen’s scripts.

What else? Hm … I’m watching Human Target on TV and loving Mark Valley’s deadpan take on, well, everything. If the comic could capture that and match the content density at a decent price point, they’d have something. Queen and Country used to feel like that, but smarter, less popcorn.

Here’s a short story about Nate Grey: no.

Colt Noble and the Megalords was a web comic? Overpriced but funny, I could see signing on for an ongoing at a lower price point.

Explanation of “TV good” re: “Ultimate Comics Armor Wars.” It was good enough to watch on TV … for free. Paying money for it? Maybe not.

Coincidentally, I’m super excited about The Prince of Power featuring Amadeus Cho. An Asian male lead with no kung fu, just brains. I love it.

See you in the funny papers, kids, gotta run.

Playing (Music): “Can’t Fight This Feeling Anymore” from the first volume of the Glee soundtrack