SUPER HEROES ,SUPER POWERS, SUPER SWINGERS AND SPANDEX UNDIES OUTSIDE THEIR TROUSERS????

 

I'm now sadly a middle aged ol' fart and my reading matter these days is reading comics on disc....I'm ploughing through decades of DC and MARVEL comics ,THE AVENGERS to AQUAMAN; SPIDERMAN TO SUPERMAN and THE X-MEN and the list goes on!....Sad and tragic?..Yes i know i've been told many times, butit keeps me happy ,so all you mature ,know it all friends and family.."Shut yer gob!"

The American idea that the world begins and ends at the borders of Manhatten and is filled to the gunnells with all kinds of super heroes ,good and diabollically evil, monsters ,alien races ,etc knocking 7 bells outta each other is fascinating. 

New York is the home of the skyscraper and is known as 'THE CITY THAT NEVER SLEEPS!' Which is reasonable enough if you imagine yourself trying to sleep as THE INCREDIBLE HULK and GODZILLA are flattening skyscrapers ,THE X-MEN or THE AVENGERS are fighting mystic alien hordes at the bottom of your street most nights of the week.

The two main creators of our beloved SUPERHEROES are MARVEL and D.C. comics. Marvel tend to stick to 'Noo-YOIK!' while DC tend to have their 'heroes' in their home cities....BATMAN/GOTHAM ;   SUPERMAN/ METROPOLIS; THE GREEN ARROW/CENTRAL CITY; FLASH/STAR CITY. But the main thing is they are all based on 'THE BIG APPLE', the artists don't have to be too geographically or architecturally accurate, whereas Marvels may be able to take liberties, but only sometimes.

It amazes me how old some of these characters are ,most of the existed popular ones sold even today ,came about in the early 60's SPIDERMAN,THE X-MEN,FANTASTIC 4, etc and many DC guys n' super gals. But the biggies SUPERMAN, BATMAN, CAPTAIN AMERICA ,jeez!..They came out in the 30'-40's

DC were a bit more traditional and BATMANwas a masked detective ,but their superheroes tended to be from outer space. Whereas those whizz bang futuristic new boys at Marvel went for the exposure to radiation angle . In the MIGHTY MARVEL UNIVERSE if you were exposed to cosmic or gamma rays ,they always seemed to be the favourite forms of radiation at Marvel....Whereas you or me would be irradiated and suffer agonising illnesses and certain death they would be endowed with super powers.....Force beams from your eyes;Super strength ; Turn into the biggest ,greenest man in ripped trousers; Given the proportionate strength ,speed n' reflexes of a spider; Even fly; Turn into an elasticated stretchy man ,etc,etc.....

When i was a kid there was a few heroes without super powers ,to which i would groan with bored disgust. But one of the all-time classic comic characters is BATMAN and he's a self trained super detective, and his history of stories and villians are known to all even those who dont read comics. So i bite my middle aged tongue and say some of these athletic non super heroes are great. They were often trained for years in lost temples in the himalayas or by lone masters living in the middle of nowhere....Theres nobody like that or mystic temples in Warrington so i don't s'pose i'll be a hero around here!

BATMAN is an interesting character and has been around with his trusty sidekick ROBIN since he was a small minor character in DETECTIVE COMICS no:27 then there was no looking back. He was made into a few American black n' white telly serials and on the radio. In the 1960's a television version starring ADAM WEST hit the tellys of our green n' pleasant land. Everybody of a certain age can still hum the dynamic theme tune and had a toy BATMOBILE as a kid! It was on over two nights ,always with a cliffhangar and a fight with the baddies along with graphic comic sound effects on screen like ...POW!..SOCK!...KERSMACK!...ZINGO!....

It was played totally camp with tongue firmly in cheek and it was wonderful. All kinds of celebrities wanted to appear as baddies or to make appearences in the legendary Batman and Robin walking with the aid of the BATARANG and BATROPE up the side of a skyscraper, celebrities would hang out of the window holding conversations with the 'DYNAMIC DUO!'...Great stuff!...The silliness and campness may have damaged the comics ,etc, but later the character became very grim and dark indeed in comic and in film beating the shit out of the nasty underworld of GOTHAM CITY swooping out of the darkness from his grapling hook and line the trusty batarang!


Various heroes can fly ,but the other mode beloved of those sad one who can't is 'swinging!....These swingers have a variety of shooting lines between skyscrapers and swooping between them or grabbing a flagpole as every skyscraper in the US has a handy flagpole. BATMAN has his Batarang and ropes all tucked up in his UTILITY BELT. The GREEN ARROW fires his bow n' arrow firing an arrow into a building wall and using them as a zip line. DAREDEVIL who was blinded by radioactive chemicals which enhanced his senses and gave him a form of radar sense he has what the yanks call a 'BILLY CLUB' but it has a line for all those flagpoles.

SPIDERMAN'S alter-ego was a scientific genius PETER PARKER who created this incredibly strong elasticated web fluid and web shooters to fire them at skyscrapers up the Avenue. I wondered did they ever shoot a bit too far so when they swang did they ever swing down too far and scrape their spandex drawers on the road tarmac or smack into a truck or a car!

The real daddy of the heroes is SUPERMAN, he is so powerful he can push planets out of orbit and fly into the core of the sun just to light a ciggie ,if ,god forbid he had bad habits like smoking. He could fire heat beams ,x rays ,telescopic rays from his eyes . He could freeze deserts with his breath , he was totally invulnerable . I wonder how he controlled that almost infinite strength ,if he shook your hand would you ever play the piano again? If him and his lady, LOIS LANE ever 'got to it!' how would she survive? I believe in the later comics Superman and WONDER WOMAN got together ,i'd imagine she could handle our man from KRYPTON.

SUPERMAN is the one who created all the od superhero cliches, the changing in the phonebox, the tearing the shirt oen to reveal his costume. Mobile phones have got rid of phoneboxes ,so our heroes have nowhere for the quick change to save the world ...So if the world isn't saved it's your fault for having a mobile texting all day n' night, while diabolical evil geniuses and super villians overun the planet.

Maybe public toilets can take the phone booth's place , but maybe  all those strange fellahs arrested in public toilets are superheroes trying to save the world....Maybe George Michael is a superhero and thats why he got arrested in so many!

SIR MACCA'S BACK HOME IN LIVEROOL AT LAST, GOOD ON YER 'R' KID!

Possibly the most famous man on the planet and he's a SCOUSER'!....Which seems perfectly reasonable to me.....MR /PAUL (SIR MACCA) McCARTNEY once of a poular little beat combo that went by the name of 'THE SILVER BEATLES' when they wore leather cloths and greased hair in the strip joints of the Reeperbaum in the naughty red lit streets of Hamburg where they played almost constantly and got the hang of playing this ROCK N' ROLL stuff. Coming back home playing around various clubs n' boozers sleeping in vans before getting a posh manager who smartened them up much to the orgasmic pleasure of the growing numbers of screaming female n' male fans as they played in a grotty little warehous in a grotty cobbled little back street ...THE CAVERN in MATTHEW STREET in the fair city of LIVERPOOL.

50-Very -odd years have passed and MATTHEW ST and the CAVERN is one of the worlds major tourist sites from a world still full of BEATLES(the SILVER was dropped) manic fans.....No other band in the world can claim to illicit the fervour displayed by so many of all ages at any time during or after their career any where or anytime on the planet. The old boozers where they drank are still there, some with 'the lads 'scribbles on the wall. THE GRAPES was right opposite the CAVERN, many bands ,THE WHO,THE STONES ,etc all dropped in for 'a few scoops!', to sit there is amazing ,the history of a time long gone ,i once spent an afternoon having a skinful and a gab with ALAN WILLIAMS the BEATLES first manager and BOB WOOLER the DJ of the CAVERN ,a fascinating ,drunken afternoon.....Much to my disgust theres a karioke there now instead of Macca n' Lennon swopping ideas.

As we all know JOHN LENNON and GEORGE HARRISON died tragically leaving RINGO STARR, whom gets a lot of stick ,maybe as he's not the rock drummer we are all accustomed to, but he was a skilled talented drummer who drummed on the finest songs ever recorded for the finest band ever ,so he can't be too bad. He's travelling the world with his 'BLUES BAND' telling how PAUL McCARTNEY actually did die all those years ago and was replaced by a look-alike BILLY SHEARS who is the guy we've really been listening to all these years. He's also the reason for the BEATLES bust up ,as LENNONdidn't get on too well with the imposter SHEARS!

But BILLY SHEARS or PAUL McCARTNEY, we'll call him Paul McCartney ,i think for ease! SIR MACCA, his official LIVERPOOL title ,cos the Queen invited him to 'er 'ouse!' for some 'sarnies' n' a bevy! Macca's always loved playing live and has never stopped ,way back to his WINGS days where this superstar ,bored, wanting to get back on the road ,jumped into a truck with his new band and literally turned up at collages and universities and offered"to play that night!"...Slightly gobsmacked student union staff ...."...Er go on then?" I will always love him for that!

He's beenhome this week. ,As my other hero ,MR PETE TOWNSHEND once described it "It's great to be back in the MERSEY MUD!".....Sir Macca was back in the MERSEY MUD. In the massive ECHO ARENA which now stands on what used to be the KINGS DOCK which is where i saw 'The Man' out in the open sunshine and it was a joy....I'll never forget 'LIVE AND LET DIE' i'd never seen it live with the fireworks and explosions...Wonderful!

All the reviews of his tour and the LIVERPOOL shows were all 5-stars, he even let a couple propose marriage on stage with him.....is that not a story to bore the arse of everybody for ....Well ever!

He told stories of 'the early days' and his Liverool days much to the joy of the Liverpool audience. I read of his trip from JOHN LENNON airport through SPEKEand GARSTON his and GEORGE HARRISON'S childhood home and stomping ground, all familiar sights as he drove into town, i'd say a few tears were shed.

You can't knock the fellah for lack of effort ,as he was up for over 3 hours and 38-40 songs were performed, thats not bad, boss !

Not bad 'r' kid! 

SEPP BLATTER THE HONEST ,PURE AS THE DRIVEN SNOW GODFATHER OF THE MAFIFA.....(Joke courtesy of my mate Graham (Hit man)Fowell...So don't blame me!)

                                                                         

                                                                          Over the years the so called beautiful game ,our main national sport ,soccer ,footy, whatever you want to call it has been the passion of many working class men all over our green n' pleasant land. In the old days ,i remember the 60's up until the 80's the game was watched by fellahs who paid a respectable price for a match ticket and had a couple of pints and a pie at the ground and pee'ed in the pocket of the poor sod in front who was probably crushed up against the crash barriers that kept the crowd fairly stable and he was probably peeing in the pocket of the fellah in front of the barrier who was under no pressure and was lounging comfortably against it puffing away on his ciggie. The players were ,in those days not particually well paid and used to have testemonial games towards the end of their carreers to help start a business ,or run a pub ,or something in their 'retirement' years as their late 30's drew close. Players didn't move around that much and a side could have virtually the same squad for ten years ,or so. I remember the evolution of the great 60's LIVERPOOL side into slowly into the great 70's LIVERPOOL side, then a slight press 'on the gas' and the slightly faster evolution into the great 80's LIVERPOOL side. After that you had to have a photographic memory to keep up with the players coming and going and computer like grasp of mathmatics to keep up with transfer fees and with the introduction of agents wages soared and ,despite what they said about being true to their club and giving younger players a chance and facing new challanges ,etc,etc, it was money ,pure and simple.

On the international scene players played for the honour of playing for their country, look at the heroes of 1966, the great players, none of them refused to play in case it interferred with their clubs league ambitions, etc. There was a purity and schoolboy honesty and naivety which has all but gone now.

No doubt naughty dealings, etc have always gone on through the years, but these days ,well ,'WOW!' As i said the players are all ridiculously paid club hopping foreigners in grounds full of corporate booths full of canopies and 'champers for company clients and celebrities, the grounds have expanded ,all seated to drag ridiculous numbers of fans who's dedication which has often reached back for generations binds them to 'their' club and is how the clubs screw these 'true fans blind' with the ridiculous prices of match tickets week in and week out. The whole thing stinks.

The international scene is run by a proud noble organisation called FIFA they make the decisions and organise international competitions like that little tournament called THE WORLD CUP. Only a few years ago all the prospective countries put in their bid to host the next world cup. Apparently the U.K. put in a really good bid and was a tip top favourite to host the tournament, but were unceremoniously kicked out of the 'offing' and forgotten .It went to a place Quataar ,(i think)....A lovely place in the middle of the desert where even in the depths of winter temperatures are close to the boiling point of  water. Nobody could believe it and accusations of corruption,bribes and general naughty doings being afoot were hurled around. They said they'd play it around Christmas time as its cool ,the fact that it is also the middle of most northern hemispheres season wasn't really mentioned. The other country to get a World cup is Russia ,where even in the middle of summer it's cold enough to freeze nitrogen.

Everybody in the world thinks FIFA is rotten and the guy who runs it ,an obnoxious little turd by the name of SEPP BLATTER who hates the BRITS with a vengeance is the man who makes the decisions for this rotten sporting MAFIFA!.....Any doubts were shattered in the week by the F.B.I. busting the men at the top for corruption ,fraud, bribery ,etc of magnificently ridiculous proportions over the last 3-4 decades....Thats a lot of kickbacks ,nothing has been levelled at BLATTER, but you cannot run an organisation this rotten and not notice a few little discrepencies as you travel the world in untold luxury with ridiculously rich and 'connected' people.

He's been voted back in ,Russia, PUTIN and the RUSSIAN MAFIA like him and the African states love him, but them goverments wouldn't know anything about corruption n' stuff would they? But SEPP BLATTER is back to sort out this terrible situation .....Hmmmm?