You know, we’ve taken some pretty hard shots at James Robinson here on the ISB over the past few weeks, but just imagine how much better this panel would be…
…if Daredevil’s dialogue was “But compared to you, Bullseye, I’m Chris Isaak!”
That line will never stop making me laugh, but enough veiled criticisms of comics from 1994! It’s Thursday Night, and that means it’s time for the Internet’s Most Somnambulistic Comics Reviews!
Here’s what I picked up this week…
…and here’s what I thought of ’em!
Agents of Atlas #11: Earlier today, Kevin said pretty much everything I wanted to say about this one, so I’m just going to quote him wholesale and hope he forgives me if I throw up a link to his all-new (and quite good) webcomic, She Died in Terrebonne:
I’m just going to presume Jeff Parker writes Agents Of Atlas for me and Chris Sims and the rest of you are lucky enough to be along for the ride. The latest issue has a terrific gag centering around a personality implant for M11 just identified as “The Greatest.” I won’t spoil it, but I’ll say it’s a perfect example of how to slip neat asides into your superhero comics without getting bogged down in the too-cute-oh-hey-here’s-a-meme syndrome that some writers fall into.
So yeah, what he said. And considering that Jeff Parker’s the next guest on War Rocket Ajax, there’s a pretty good chance I’ll be talking about it quite a bit then, too.
Amazing Spider-Man #605: Okay, first things first: This comic is $3.99 for 48 all-new story pages, offering up three complete stories. Say what you want about Marvel’s price hikes, but on this one at least, they’re giving you your money’s worth.
All three stories are awesome, too–thanks largely to writer Fred Van Lente, who scripted the whole shebang [EDIT: That’s a lie, Brian Reed wrote the third one!]–but it’s the first one that steals the show. Believe it or not, as much as she sucked through the ’90s, I actuallly really like Mary Jane–and not just for SMLMJ
Plus, it’s got Javier Pulido drawing the White Rabbit, and if we can’t agree that this is awesome, you can see yourself out.
The other stories too are standouts in the art department, featuring Luke Ross on the second and Yannick Paquette straight up channeling some Terry Dodson on the third, and Van Lente ties them all together for an extremely fun portrayal of Peter Parker’s love life, which, if you’ll remember, is so disastrous that the direct intervention of Satan was seen as an improvement.
Batman: Streets of Gotham #4: It shouldn’t surprise anyone to read this, but a while back, I came to the conclusion that I could pretty much just sit around reading Batman comics and be perfectly happy, and on a day off last week, I took the opportunity to put that theory to the test by re-reading Paul Dini’s
Point being, this issue of Streets of Gotham is the best of the series by far, and fits in pretty well as an extension of what Dini was doing on ‘Tec, although I’ve still got mixed feelings about it. There are parts of it that come off as problematic even while Dini’s doing something interesting with them, as though he’s not so much taking a step forward and a step back as he’s just continually shuffling sideways. Hush is still in it, for example, but this issue keeps him limited to two pages, and even I’ll admit that having Batman’s network of assorted sidekicks and hangers-on keeping him in line is probably the most entertaining way you could deal with having an evil doctor who, when he wasn’t extracting hearts, performed plastic surgery on himself to look just like Batman. And after that point, the focus turns onto the guy that handles real estate for the super-villains.
And I’ve got to admit, that is a great idea, functioning as a nifty little callback to Silver Age stuff like Paul Gambi (Central City’s tailor to the Rogues), and while it’s an explanation for something that didn’t necessarily need to be explained, Dini’s talented enough to present it in an engaging way. But he’s using it to set up Mr. Zsasz as a force to be reckoned with, and the problem with that is, well, it’s Mr. Zsasz.
As far as Batman villains go, Zsasz, a muderer with a gimmick that involves self-mutilation, is about as standard as you can get. In other comics, a serial murderer with a body count in the hundreds who carves a mark on his own skin might be a little more potent (and from a real world perspective, it’d scare the crap out of me) but for Batman, he presents about as much of a challenge as a jaywalker. Batman deals with guys who poison reservoirs with fear gas on a monthly basis, and his tough fights see him facing down the God of Ultimate Evil
So if Dini wants to use him as a credible threat, he’s got to present him as one, and he chooses to do so by having a character in the story literally tell you that he’s worse than the Joker. Specifically, the Real Estate Broker says that while he’s sold property to the Joker, Zsasz is the only one “who makes me feel dirty about what I do.”
This is one of the laziest tricks a writer can pull, and in this case, it’s also completely disingenuous. I’ve rambled on about the Joker at length before, but the short version is that he’s as far above other criminals as Batman is above other heroes. He operates on a completely different scale. The idea that Zsasz–again: Guy-With-Knife–could inspire a worse sense of dread than the guy who was sniping random citizens at Christmas
And again: I’m not saying that Zsasz is necessarily a bad character or that he can’t be the focus of a good story, or even that he can’t be made into a credible threat. Heck, Dini almost pulls it off in this one, as the rest of the setup is perfectly interesting and very well done (and of course, beautifully drawn by Nguyen). But he torpedos himself by going for the cheap comparison to the Joker, and rather than building Zsasz up, it just serves to remind you of everything he’s not, and reaffirms his place as the character that we all know from the Arkham Asylum video game–which Dini also scripted–and reminds us that that place is to be the guy that Batman takes down with exactly one hit while he’s on his way to fight more important villains.
Beasts of Burden #1: If you’re like me, then you’ve often wondered what Hellboy would be like if the title character was a bunch of adorable neighborhood pets.
Actually, that’s a lie. I’ve never wondered that, because by the time it had occurred to me, Evan Dorkin and Jill Thompson had already done it in the pages of the hardcover Dark Horse horror anthologies, offering up stories that were far and away the standouts of those books. And now they’ve finally gotten a longer-form story (with a bigger page size!) and I’ve gotta say, it reads like what you’d get if HP Lovecraft had written Bunnicula, and that is totally rad.
But again, that’s not really a shock, and neither is the fact that Evan Dorkin’s script is sharp and frequently funny, or that Thompson’s painted pages are absolutely gorgeous. But what was a nice surprise was that Dark Horse–in this week’s example of comic book companies doing something really cool–put the original stories on their website to read for free. So if you’re curious about the series, check them out there and then head to your local shop to pick on up. It’s well worth it.
MODOK: Reign Delay: If this were the VMAs, Kanye West would’ve grabbed the microphone when I named Spider-Man the best comic of the week and told me that he was going to let me finish, but Ryan Dunlavey’s MODOK was one of the best comics of all time. And he would’ve been right.
(Note To People From Two Or More Months In The Future: This was briefly a thing.)
Uncanny X-Men First Class #3: I’ll be honest with you, folks: I’ve been on the fence about whether I was going to keep getting First Class.
It’s not that it’s bad at all; the two-part Inhumans story that the book led with was pretty fun, and did some very neat things with Nightcrawler. But as much as I love the X-Men (though as often as not, that love has been pretty theoretical), my interest in the title was less out of wanting to read about the characters than wanting to read a comic by Jeff Parker, and with him gone, I wasn’t seeing much reason to continue.
And that was before Scott Gray referenced Banshee’s love of country music.
Long-time ISB readers will no doubt recall that I am amused to no end by the issue of Captain America where Banshee goes to Nashville for a Merle Haggard concert, mostly because Cap hiply refers to country music as “C.M.”, and Gray’s reference to that bit in the opening of this issue was exactly what I needed to get me to pay a little more attention and not dismiss the book as readily as I was planning to, and I came away really enjoying it. Gray does a fun little done-in-one with Banshee that delivers the best kind of all-ages action, combining super-heroics, romance, the supernatural and a mystery story in a way that most writers wouldn’t even attempt, let alone pull off with this much fun. And the fact that Roger Cruz does an amazing job with the art is no big shock either as he’s been awesome on this book since jump street, especially under Val Staples’ colors. It all makes for a very, very entertaining combination, and I’m glad I was hooked enough by a mention of Merle Haggard to stick with it.
And that’s the week. As always, if you’d like to ask about something I didn’t review–like how great Wegener’s art was in Atomic Robo this week, or how Batman plus the H-Dial should be awesome but came out mediocre–feel free to use the comments section below. Otherwise, just bask in the glowing radiance of the fact that someone just wrote 800 words about Mr. Zsasz.
I would argue that the Broker gets upset over working with Zsasz because of his lack of flair or style. It must be easier to accept that you just cater to ex-convict “eccentrics” when they’re wearing a leotard speckled with question marks, or are buying an abandoned zoo to fill with deadly birds, but with Zsasz. His sort of evil is positively banal compared to the likes of the Joker, and that’s what makes it so hard for the guy to accept.
Or maybe he just has a thing about scars.
I am absolutely not saying this to be a dick (which is, regrettably, exactly what a dick would say, but I totally mean it in a good-natured-ribbing-in-a-way-the-internet-can’t-actually-convey way) but in 10 days you are going to regret that Kanye joke.
So… Was Tan really that bad?
Fred Van Lente scripted only the first two episodes in ASM 605. The third story was written by Brian Reed.
But I agree. Best of the week.
I kind of like the really lo-fi quality of Zsasz, although the “brilliant serial killer” character idea is about as fresh as Kanye West’s shenanigans. I mean, I’ll let Silence of the Lambs finish, but The Joker is one of the greatest villains of all time! That said, having him buying themed hideouts seems off-character. He doesn’t have obvious access to the kind of revenue streams other Bat Villains do. He has a nice iconic niche in the Rogues Gallery as the random Bad Thing that happens to people. He’s like a non-stop Joe Chill, except weirdly emo. I have to read this to see what I think, but he always struck me as too anti-establishment to have a “hideout.” I just imagined him killing someone and wearing their skin while he lounged around their house for a few weeks. I agree 100% about that literary device being a cheap way to pump him up.
This week’s Brave and the Bold reads like an okay first draft to an animated Batman episode (TAS or B&B), but it’s a poor comic book, especially if compared to the done-in-one stories Will Pfeifer did with the H.E.R.O. ongoing a few years back. At least Saiz draws a cool-looking Joker.
I didn’t know they had superdeformed art in superhero comics.
…Did Bullseye go from briefs to boxers?
Was I the only one who was hoping to see Batman use the HERO Dial in B&B #27? If not, poor show, DC. Poor show.
Zsasz will always be Tim Booth from the band ‘James’ to me (thanks to his brief appearance in Batman Begins), and that’s why he’s terrifying.
The absence of a Batman and Robin review I take as approval enough that you allow it to sell itself at this stage, and while I think Tan struggles with some of the stuff Quitely pulled off, it’s not enough to actually ruin the experience.
Zsasz kinda sucks through overthinking the concept – he’d be super-scary if he was just walking down a street, stabbing people at random and somehow still not getting picked up by cops, but writers tend to flesh out his schemes or personality too much and lose the ‘mental patient accidentally released by a bureaucratic error’ potential to turn him into less of a supervillain and more of an urban terror that’s frightening to a citizenry if not a dude who has high-noon shoot-outs with the Space-Devil. Apart from that, some of the faces in any given rogues’ galleries will always be cannon fodder – though that in itself can lead to good stories.
No Dominic Fortune? Two months in a row?
That “Beasts of Burden” alt-text is FANTASTIC.
…it reads like what you’d get if HP Lovecraft had written ‘Bunnicula’.
That is one of my favorite sentences of all time.
Thank you.
Whoa! I’d not yet heard about Beasts of Burden–and I just burned twenty minutes reading the past issues. Fantastic stuff–I would have never in a million years thought I’d like it this much, but the art is great and writing is dead on.
I CANNOT look at that Batman cover with Zsasz without seeing him as Rage from the New Warriors. How the HELL does a naked white guy look like a black luchadore to me?
I’m looking forward to the Alien Legion Omnibus when it comes out. 300-plus pages of Nomad Squad goodness, out in December now, I believe…
MODOK should stand for Mobile Organism Designed Only for Kawesome (the K is silent).
I love him so much it frightens me.
Also, that issue features the triumphant return of Karl. OH SNAP.
I’ve always dug Zsasz as a concept, but he really doesn’t work as a credible bad guy for the dude who keeps a flying saucer in his broom closet. But you could probably say the same thing about the Riddler, and he was always awesome, so…
I am absolutely not saying this to be a dick
And yet, you succeed anyway.
but in 10 days you are going to regret that Kanye joke.
See, the nice thing about doing weekly reviews is that in ten days, no one’s going to be reading this post. It’s not like anyone’s still dogging me over my “LEAVE WOLVIE ALONE!” joke from ’06, or my “Where’s the beef?” reference for Crisis on Infinite Earths #4.
So… Was Tan really that bad?
Eh, it’s readable, but brother, if you guys thought Tony Daniel couldn’t keep up with Morrison on Batman RIP, then you should see this. But I’ve got to wonder if it’s really all him, or just the fact that he’s getting sandwiched between Quitely and Cameron Stewart that’s making it seem like he’s worse than he is.
Fred Van Lente scripted only the first two episodes in ASM 605. The third story was written by Brian Reed.
Whoops–the post is corrected now.
This week’s Brave and the Bold reads like an okay first draft to an animated Batman episode (TAS or B&B), but it’s a poor comic book, especially if compared to the done-in-one stories Will Pfeifer did with the H.E.R.O. ongoing a few years back. At least Saiz draws a cool-looking Joker.
I agree completely. Saiz is great on the art, but the story, which should be incredible based on concept (Batman! Dial H For Hero! The Joker!) is mediocre, heavy-handed and a chore to read.
No Dominic Fortune? Two months in a row?
Not a big fan of Chaykin.
I’ve always dug Zsasz as a concept, but he really doesn’t work as a credible bad guy for the dude who keeps a flying saucer in his broom closet. But you could probably say the same thing about the Riddler, and he was always awesome, so…
Again, I don’t hate Zsasz, he’s a fine character for what he is, but yeah. Batman’s in the Justice League. If he can’t take out a serial killer in a page and a half, then something’s wrong.
But comparing him to the Riddler isn’t quite right either; the Riddler has the gimmick and style that Zsasz lacks. Zsasz is, relatively speaking, fairly realistic (there certainly could be a guy in the real world that knifes people and then carves a tally mark on his arm, stranger things have happened), but the Riddler, by virtue of his existence being predicated on Batman (his function is to provide fitting challenges for the World’s Greatest Detective or, of late, compete with him on his own level, another take on the character I quite like), fits in better as a super-hero antagonist.
TODAY’S STUPID QUESTION: If Zsasz cut himself accidentally, would he then go out and murder someone to make sure the tallies matched?
Relatedly, what would make him cool is if he were the guy that Batman simply could never catch. Sometimes through trickery or luck, but mostly due to his low profile. He has no predictable theme, either. He’d be the beneficiary of Batman’s distractions by showier villains like the Joker and Professor Pyg. Zsasz could be “the killer who’s always out there.” Of course, eventually, he’d have to be caught, and there goes his appeal, but hey. He’d be interesting as a subplot for a while.
Thank you for linking to those Beast of Burden shorts. They’re terrific – and it’s the first time I’ve ever actually enjoyed a zombie story.
I think DC writers should be reading these comments about Zsasz… these are great ideas on what to do with the character.
I agree that as it is he’s not exactly an A-grade villain for the Batman, but he has a lot of potential in my opinion.
Certainly he’d be a great story in a new Gotham Central comic…
Zsasz seems to always be walking around shirtless. Guys who never wear shirts are never cool.
I can’t believe you didn’t mention Galactica 1980.
And, before I read it, I would have said that I can’t believe I would ever say something like that. Well, maybe in a sarcastic sense, but not seriously.
But I did read it, and, while it’s too early to say how this series will go, the beginning is promising. Now, they gratuitously stole some things from the new Battlestar Galactica (the gun and locker Lorne Greene’s Adama has even look like Dualla’s), but at least they’re stealing quality. And the end of the issue shows that they’re clearly not following the TV series (the plot point that the women of the fleet are, out of despair, sterilizing themselves means no space scouts, which alone makes it a marked improvement).
“Yannick Paquette straight up channeling some Terry Dodson on the third”
I had to check to make sure it wasn’t Dodson. Twice.
“and reaffirms his place as the character that we all know from the Arkham Asylum video game–which Dini also scripted–and reminds us that that place is to be the guy that Batman takes down with exactly one hit while he’s on his way to fight more important villains.”
Twice in one night! The game is, if I remember correctly, my only exposure to him. I did start reading Batman around the time he debuted, so I may just not remember him at all. But yeah, what you said in 800 words, totally.
Also, good idea Harvey. They should put you on that. If Kevin Smith gets to write Batman, so should everyone else with a halfway decent idea, I say.
And I was going to buy Showcase Warlord, but the shop didn’t have any, and I don’t need half naked Grell dudes in my life enough to re-order. I get enough half naked dudery from WWE, thanks.
I loved Amazing Spider-Man this week; it was nice to see Peter and Harry acting like best friends like they were suppossed to be; I mean if they went all the way to a deal with the devil to revive Harry, at least they should give us more light-hearted interaction between him and Peter. Anyway, great issue
That Warlord Showcase volume is BEAUTIFUL OMG.
Chris, what’d you think of Wednesday Comics and Daredevil: The List? I can see why you didn’t review WC since everything was pretty much the same as it was quality wise (Hawkman: Still great, Teen Titans: still awful on almost every level), but I’m looking forward to see how everything wraps up next issue.I thought Daredevil was excellent, if only for Bullseye’s singing and murder. Really excited to see what Diggle’s doing with the threads Brubaker left for him (The Hand, Crazy crazy Kingpin, Izo)
First Class convinced me more than ever that Moira MacTaggart needs to be the next X-men-related person brought back from the dead.
“…an extremely fun portrayal of Peter Parker’s love life, which, if you’ll remember, is so disastrous that the direct intervention of Satan was seen as an improvement.”
Line of the year, Mr. Sims.
I can’t believe you didn’t mention Galactica 1980.
I’ve never watched or read anything with the word “Galactica” in the title and I don’t intend to start now.
kinda hoping to read another Blackest Night review after the review of the first issue was hilarious
oh and still no REBELS?
At the risk of being too agreeable, I second John Trumball on line of the year.
And I third Harvey Jerkwater on the Zsasz cutting himself idea. I think the way that you make that work is for him to be “cured” only for him to cut himself shaving. (That could even be the last panel.)
And to second what Chris said, part of the problem with Zzasz isn’t Zsasz, it’s Zsasz in Gotham. Put Zsasz in Metropolis, have him start killing people and when Supes catches him, have him tell Supes that one way or another he will be back out killing eventually and there is nothing that Supes can do about it. There’s an element of psychological torture there that would work in Metropolis that doesn’t really work in Gotham.
Oh hey I can disagree with Brad Curran! As the owner of a full run of the Original Warlord, let me assure you that Grell drew half-naked men because it also allowed him to draw gorgeous half-naked women.
Harvey, this might be taking your question more seriously than you intended, but I think the “extra cut” scenario wouldn’t really happen, unless it left a scar. The scars are the crucial part. I think if he cut himself accidentally, he’d probably put some Neosporin and a Band-Aid on it and think nothing of it. Otherwise, its not really a trophy of his having killed someone. It’s kind of putting the cart before the horse. That said, he IS crazy.
I think he belongs in Gotham. Gotham is kind of a museum of all these different kinds of horror; just because there are skeletons of dinosaurs and sabre-toothed tigers doesn’t mean the stuffed polar bears aren’t also cool.
I’ve been trying to clarify in my mind what I said earlier, and I think he works best not as the Hannibal Lecter-type I think he was originally intended to be, but as something like Anton Chigurh in No Country For Old Men. The story isn’t really about him going toe to toe with Batman, its how he interacts with ordinary people before Batman catches him.
The story isn’t really about him going toe to toe with Batman, its how he interacts with ordinary people before Batman catches him.
Yeah, but the book’s not called Zsasz, it’s called Batman.
Grell’s Warlord is one of the best books DC has ever put out. Definitely their best work from the ’75-’85 period. Yes, the art is great, and the hairy-chested love-godliness is campy fun, but the real treat is the stories. The stories actually have stories! They have twists and turns and they have set-ups and pay-offs and everything! The characters actually have character! Here’s the best part: there is some genuine bad-assery, but it’s not ALL bad-assery. Bad-assery only maintains its effectiveness in moderation.
I hope Chris gets some columns out of this material.
Well, Blackest Night… I’m still kinda wondering what’s the point of it.
Shocking gruesome deaths of B-Listers! OMG!
Really, I wouldn’t mind except they are B and C listers I actually kinda like.
Hal’s Amazing Technicolor Ring aside, I’m still searching for point.
I realize it wasn’t in the reviews, but I had to get that off my chest. ;)
I said months ago that the ending of Blackest Night could be summed up in two words: White Lantern.
Blackest Night #3 seemed to confirm my fears.
Zsasz worked great for what he was-a one time villain for a short story arc set in Arkham Asylum. Outside of that, he’s rather silly. I won’t argue that you can’t make him more interesting, but the best way to do that would be to write good stories where he plays an important part, instead of talking about how he’s so intimidating and chilling to deal with.
Yeah, but the book’s not called Zsasz, it’s called Batman.
Sure, but one of the books is called Detective, so whatever makes a better detective story. Even Batman: Streets of Gotham I thought was supposed to be more like Spider-Man’s Tangled Web, focusing on secondary characters. Either way, no big deal. There’s always more psycho killers in Gotham.
It would be interesting to see what Zzazz would do if SOMEBODY ELSE carved marks on him- who he go “Ah man, now I’ve got a QUOTA to meet!”
Come on, Chris, you know that Zsasz is as unique and original and thematically appropriate to Gotham and Batman’s rogues as Amygdala or Cornelius Stirk…
“I’ve never watched or read anything with the word “Galactica†in the title and I don’t intend to start now.”
Marry me! (That’s both an Arrested Development ref and actual marriage proposal. I’ll leave.)
I think the big problem with Zsasz is that there is no consistency in how he is written.
In his first appearance in Shadow of the Bat, he was all about horror underneath a veneer of normalcy. He carved tally marks in his body, but when wandering around Gotham he wore a suit which covered them all up. His face was was bland, pleasant and cheerful but forgettable. He would kill people with his knife, but would arrange their dead bodies so that they appeared to be eating dinner, watching TV, or performing some other mundane activity.
Please note that this MO, which was so distinctive that Batman knew Zsasz had to be the one responsible, hasn’t really made an appearance since.
In his first appearance Zsasz was also shown to be a decent planner. I think they went a little far in talking about how smart he was rather than showing us, but he definitely fell into the category of villains that Batman had to outthink rather than outfight.
In this form I think Zsasz would have made a decent second tier villain.
However, in his very next appearance, in Knightfall, Zsasz was running around his boxer shorts and seemed to have no plan deeper than to stab Batman with his knife.
Since then, Zsasz has been slotted into whatever role he was need for by the writer. As a result, he is a completely forgettable villain.
However, in his very next appearance, in Knightfall, Zsasz was running around his boxer shorts and seemed to have no plan deeper than to stab Batman with his knife.
He also had these crazy janked-up triangular eyes that extended about two inches to the side of his head in those issues. What was up with that?
those same triangular eyes make an appearance in No Man’s Land as well. Those always annoyed the crap out of me.
I liked how the Arkham Asylum video game remembered his MO about positioning people in mundane ways. I agree, that original take on the character was far more chilling than the always-naked psychopath with no plan.
You know, I’m the hippiest, most PC tree-hugging liberal that ever grilled tofu patties in an Oberlin vegetarian co-op, and even *I*, whenever Zsasz gets mentioned, think “OMG, what an obvious candidate for the death penalty.”
The only reason I can think of for him to still be alive is that somewhere, somehow, a DCU judge realized that if he was killed he’d wind up a Black Lantern, and they couldn’t allow that level of lameness.
See, Chris? Even Dorian agrees. And he usually only says sarcastic stuff!
So, no dice on the marriage proposal, huh? Yeah, it was a joke. Totally.
I will die alone.
“Amygdala or Cornelius Stirk”
Are those real guys or did you make them up?
Oh, I wish I had made those two up, but no.
You know, Dorian, there are a lot of terrible characters in those first few issues of Shadow of the Bat.
Chris, you say that as if there was more than one, maybe at the outside two, good Batman villains introduced after, say, 1985.
I’ll take ’em all if it means I get KGBeast.
History will vindicate Alan Grant, dammit.
I’m just curious, but why did you drop/not begin R.E.B.E.L.S.? it’s awesome so far, Bedard has made me love hating Vril Dox II and he mentions old crap in a fun way, plus I’m liking the new Starro.
also in the battle of the Tans, Phillip or Billy?
Sims, thanks for recommending Beasts of Burden and linking to the dark horse page with their earlier adventures. You are a gentleman and a scholar, sir. Pair them up with We3, the Legion of Super-Pets and a few more and and you have the makings of another column…
I don’t blame you for skipping Chaykin products; we’ve all been watching the man phone it in for years. But, I’ve got to come out and say that the new Dominic Fortune is sharp. Sharp enough to make me understand a little how he achieved such a reputation back in the day. You’d be doing yourself a favor to check it out.