The Thing and I
I grew up on comic books, but maybe not the comic books you're thinking of. My childhood was spent invested deeply in Archie and Jughead, with a smattering of ancient hand-me-down Disney comics here and there ... and not even the good ones, like the Carl Banks Scrooge McDuck comics or anything.
During the height of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles boom, I was sucked into the Archie Comics kid-friendly Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures series, which surprisingly still mostly holds up as its own self-contained Turtles universe. In many ways, this TMNT series was an entree into what came next for me: "real" comic books.
A couple of months before sixth grade ended, I saw the above cover for Fantastic Four #350 on a spinner rack at Star Market, mixed in alongside the Archies. The composition of the cover stopped me cold. I couldn't even puzzle out what I was looking at, but it looked cool. And I have to admit that the "GIANT-SIZED 350th ISSUE SPECTACULAR" above the title convinced me this was some sort of big deal. I looked at the first couple of pages and made the hasty decision to stick it in the shopping cart with the rest of our groceries.
This was my first "real" comic, and within the next couple of months, I became a Fantastic Four fanatic, and then a Marvel fanatic. And pretty much from that first issue, my favorite comic book character of all time became Ben Grimm, also known as The Thing.
I didn't realize at the time how lucky I had it to have my first superhero comic be written and drawn by the incomparable Walt Simonson, but I sure as hell appreciate it now, and I know that without his dynamic art and peerless pacing, Fantastic Four would never have hooked me in the way it did. (Issue 351 the following month was a banked issue due to Simonson's next installment being delayed, and while I still enjoyed it, I noticed the dip in quality.) (Yes, it was penciled by Mark Bagley, but he wasn't quite the Mark Bagley he would eventually become.)
I was drawn to the art and the storytelling (and to the strangely compelling antagonist of the arc, who I would eventually come to know as history's greatest comic book villain, Doctor Doom), but especially to The Thing. I realize now that The Thing, always a very popular character, is likely the patron saint of Fat Kids Who Read Comic Books. For those unaware, the Fantastic Four (traditionally) are Ben Grimm, Reed Richards, Susan Storm-Richards and Johnny Storm. Richards, a genius inventor, masterminded a space flight, and the rocket was flown by Grimm. The rocket was bombarded by cosmic rays, and the four more-or-less family members were given superpowers. Of the four, however, only Grimm lost his humanity, being given super strength and durability, but being turned into a monster in exchange. Grimm was alienated from society as a result and eventually developed a gruff, joking exterior to mask his depression. Richards, tortured by what his experiment had done to his best friend, continued to seek a "cure" for his condition. Many times over the years, Grimm would shed his monstrous physique, but inevitably, he would become The Thing again, either by happenstance, by biology, or by necessity.
A person trapped in a body they don't want, developing coping mechanisms to deal with that reality and constantly searching for a way to shed their skin? Body dysmorphia gang, where you at???
One of The Thing's most notable lines is that, while he isn't the strongest hero (or villain) around, he's just too dumb and ugly to know when to quit. This is reductive, of course, as it's his inability to give up that really sets him apart. And that refusal to give up or give in doesn't just apply to fights; it's what keeps him going even when consumed by self-doubt, self-hatred and depression.
He's just like me for real. By which I mean I am also constantly tormented by a gang of cruel children who prowl one particular street in New York City.
My Library A to Z – C
Cooter - Looking Up
As has been covered here many times already, I have been deep into pop punk since approximately my sophomore year in high school, and when this Cooter album dropped in 1999, I was all in on it. A couple years later, they signed to Island Records and became Autopilot Off (hilariously because another band had copyright claim to the name and not because "Cooter" is objectively a terrible band name), where they had some minor Billboard success. Looking Up is a lot sloppier than I remember, production- and performance-wise, but it's still a solid effort, and is a good way to bring you back to feeling just as dumb and lost as you were in your early 20s, when you were barely an adult and writing lyrics like "I miss the innocence." Nostalgic for something that isn't even gone yet? Yeah; been there, bro.
A Chorus Line
This was one of my favorite movies as a kid, even though I understood precious little about it. It wasn't until many years later that I learned this adaptation of a phenomenally successful Broadway show was unanimously loathed and derided when it came out, but I still think it's great. I also think the songs created for the movie version (to try and grab that sweet, sweet Oscar nomination) are terrific. To this day, this is my preferred version of A Chorus Line. But I'm also a huge weirdo, so take that with a grain of salt. I also think Michael Douglas is strangely sort of the perfect person to portray a powerful director of musical theater.
Apologies if you see this movie and you feel nothing, but it couldn't be me.
