Tomorrow is FREE COMIC BOOK DAY 2022!

Saturday, May 7th is Free Comic Book Day! You can go to your local comic shop and choose from a variety of great comics from publishers like Marvel, DC, Darkhorse and more! If you want more info or need to know what shops are participating, check out the Free Comic Book Day website. Every year I take my kids out and make this day an event. It's something we look forward to every year. Here are my top five comics for the 2022 FCBD:

TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES

(W) Tom Waltz (A/CA) Sophie Campbell

The Ninja Turtles have broken out of the locked-down neighborhood of Manhattan known as Mutant Town . . . but which Ninja Turtles? And is that... VENUS(!)... spying on them?! As all new mutants haunt and terrorize NYC, enemies and allies of the TMNT alike prepare for a confrontation greater than any that has come before . . . the Rat King's diabolical Armageddon Game! The TMNT event of 2022 starts here from Tom Waltz, Sophie Campbell, Ronda Pattison and Kevin Eastman!

SPIDER-MAN & VENOM #1

(W) Al Ewing, Ram V., Zeb Wells (A) Bryan Hitch (A/CA) John Romita

Announced last week, Spider-Man is gearing up for a brand-new era just in time for the character's 60th anniversary! Fans who pick up FREE COMIC BOOK DAY: SPIDER-MAN/VENOM #1 will see the very beginning of the major storylines writer Zeb Wells and legendary artist John Romita Jr. have planned for their run on AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, including Tombstone's first steps towards becoming Spidey's most terrifying villain. FREE COMIC BOOK DAY: SPIDER-MAN/VENOM #1 will also give fans a chance to check out the thought-provoking work Al Ewing, Ram V, and Bryan Hitch are doing on VENOM! The groundbreaking changes this mastermind trio has in store for the symbiote mythos starts here!

STRANGER THINGS/RESIDENT ALIEN

(W) Michael Moreci, Peter Hogan (A) Pius Bak, Steve Parkhouse (CA) Diego Galindo

Celebrating the weird and wonderful, we present stories both strange and alien! In Stranger Things, Eleven, Will and Jonathan go to a drive-in theater for a double creature feature, but the local festivities and scary costumes bring back haunting memories. In Resident Alien, Dr. Harry and nurse Asta help an elderly patient in the sleepy, small town of Patience investigate a ghostly presence in her house!
Exclusive Original Material.

DISNEY MASTERS DONALD DUCK & CO.

(W) William Van Horn, Joe Torcivia, Dick Kinney, Bas Heymans, Pasqua Heymans (A) William Van Horn, Giorgio Cavazzano, Al Hubbard, Bas Heymans

A star bunch of Disney Masters bring us wild Disney adventures from around the world! In "Snore Losers," Uncle Scrooge has nightmares of giving Donald Duck a million bucks-and then dreamologist J. Slumberbunk Swoonsnooze insists Scrooge must do it for real! Next, in "Here Today, Gone Apollo," that mighty Mouseton madcap Super Goof faces evil Emil Eagle and Dangerous Dan McBoo in a booby-trapped castle... and in "Fall Guy," Cousin Fethry longs to ride over Niagara Falls in a barrel, but only Donald repeatedly takes the plunge!

STREET FIGHTER MASTERS: BLANKA

(W) Matt Moylan (A/CA) Genzoman

It's time to go green with Blanka, the Brazilian berserker beastman! This electrically-charged icon of Street Fighter tears through the jungles of the Amazon in his first solo comic adventure!
Exclusive Original Material

Funko Pop Collection: Part #1

I am a fan of the Funko Pop figures. They are inexpensive and feature some amazing characters. if you are a fan of any show or movie, Funko has probably made a Pop of it! That being said, I really don't collect Pops, but if I do see one of a character I absolutely love, I will pick it up. My collection is not huge, but it is selective and here are a few that I would like to share with you...

Blanka from Street Fighter

Around my neighborhood, Street Fighter II was the fighting game of choice. Me and my friends would play this game for hours on our SNES during the summer of 1992 trying to perfect all the characters special moves. Of course one of the easiest to master was Blanka's electrical attack. That paired with his crazy look, made him a favorite of mine to play with.

Casey Jones from the TMNT Movie (1990)

The summer of 1990 brought my favorite Heroes In A Half-Shell to the big screen. My Dad took my brother and me to the theater to see this movie and our minds were blown! The movie was gritty & dark, but it still had the humor and action that we loved from the TMNT cartoon show. It was the perfect balance of the Mirage comics and Fred Wolf cartoon. Of course one of the highlights was the appearance of Casey Jones. He had some of the best scenes in the movie and of course I needed a Casey Jones to go along with my TMNT Funko Pops.

Doctor Octopus

Spider-Man has always been one of my favorite comic book superheroes. So much so that I have a Spider-Man tattoo and back when I was a DJ, my stage name was Spyda-Man. Those days have passed, but Spider-Man is still one of my favorites and my family got me this Doc Ock Funko Pop as a birthday gift a few years ago. He's a bad dude and still looks awesome, even as a Funko Pop!

Gremlin from Gremlins (1984)

Seeing Gremlins with my Dad and siblings in the movie theater is one of the earliest memories that I have. I don't actually remember seeing the movie, but I remember getting home from seeing the movie and the power went off in our house. Of course everyone was joking that it was the Gremlins that caused the power outage, but in fact it was a blown fuse. I didn't know that and those innocent jokes led to a few sleepless nights in my bed!

Harley Quinn from Batman: Arkham Knight

I have the Batman Arkham games collection for the WiiU and honestly, I've only played it a handful of times. I'm not a huge fan of the game itself, but I do like me some Harley Quinn. I picked this Pop up at a going out of business sale at a retro store in our mall. So for a couple of bucks Harley came home with me.

Dustin from Stranger Things (Target Exclusive)

I have been a fan of Stranger Things since the first season hit Netflix way back in 2016. Recently, my oldest daughter has watched the series with me and my wife and now she is in love with the show! For my birthday, my wife and kids got me a Target exclusive Funko Pop Dustin set. The set came with this Funko Pop of Dustin in his "Camp Know Where" outfit and a shirt with the "Roast Beef" design on it that Dustin wore in season 3 of the series. I love this shirt!

That's it for this round. Check back next week for some more random Funko Pop figures from my collection!

Wax Pack Revolution #5

A recent obsession of mine has been collecting old wax & foil packs of trading cards from the 80s & 90s. Sure, I have a ton of these non-sport cards from when I was a kid, but the artwork and design of the packaging is something I missed. When you would buy one of these packs you would tear it open and throw away the wrapper. Never giving it a second thought. Seeing these again brings back memories of feeling the slick paper in your hands, seeing the simple artwork and the smell of bubble gum. Let's dive into a few of these packs that I have on display...AGAIN!

 Batman Forever Movie Photo Stickers (Topps, 1995)

Despite the appearance of the now infamous "Bat-Nipples", I always had a liking for the movie Batman Forever. I think Val Kilmer did a decent job as the Dark Knight and the addition of Robin was pretty cool. Jim Carrey was at his peak as a comedic actor, but the casting of Tommy Lee Jones as Two-Face always bothered me. After seeing Billy Dee Williams as Harvey Dent in the 1989 Batman movie, I wanted to see his take on the evil villain. Unfortunately Billy Dee was passed over in favor of Jones. Anyway, these sticker books were pretty commonplace back in the day for any hit movie, but these stickers were not the small Panini versions, these were full card sized stickers! Only something this big could hold in all of the action from the film that was Batman Forever.

Street Fighter: The Movie (Upper Deck, 1995)

Once again this is a movie that was hated by almost everyone who saw it, but I liked it. This movie brought my favorite video game characters to the big screen and the soundtrack was pretty bangin' too! What other album would have a duet between MC Hammer and Deion Sanders? This set produced by Upper Deck consisted of 90 base cards and had some randomly inserted F/X & LE cards. I have never seen these, but I know just like Raul Julia's award worthy performance as Bison, they were probably magnificent.

Star Wars: Journey To The Force Awakens (Topps, 2015)

I absolutely love this set of cards from Topps! I bought a couple boxes of these cards so me and my kids could open the packs in the hopes of completing a full set. I believe we opened 3 boxes and didn't get a full set of 110 cards, but we had a lot of fun while trying. This set from Topps also had some cool subsets & bonus cards including cloth stickers, silhouette foils & patch cards. Collecting this set was a cool way to teach my kids about the movies that led up to The Force Awakens.

X-Files Season Two (Topps, 1996)

My Dad was a huge X-Files fan and in turn I saw almost every episode of the show. I enjoyed it, but the later seasons when Mulder disappeared were not very good and my interest waned. These trading cards from Topps feature stills from some of the classic early episodes along with art cards from the Topps produced comic books. This set had a total of 72 cards and featured some pretty inserts with their Etched Foil & Hologram chase cards.

In Defense of Street Fighter: The Movie

This week I was able to borrow a copy of Street Fighter: The Movie from a friend at work. It had been decades since I had seen this movie and I remember liking it. Again that was in 1994 and I was all of 13 years old, so my perspective may be skewed. Recently I watched the Mortal Kombat movie on Netflix and was pretty underwhelmed at that flick. I also remember seeing that movie in the theaters and liking it. This gave me little hope that I would enjoy a rewatch of the Van Damme action packed classic.

But guess what? I actually did enjoy rediscovering this much maligned video game adaptation. It's actually a pretty decent action flick, if you know what you're getting into. Yes it is cheesy, yes the acting is iffy, but here are a few reasons why I had fun watching Street Fighter: The Movie!

1. The action sequences were surprisingly well done!

With a movie based on a fighting game you would expect it to be full of great action sequences...and it is! The fights between Vega/Sagat & Ken/Ryu and the final fight between Guile & Bison are just a few of the cool sequences in this flick. In addition to a  huge smattering of fighting the movie balanced some comedy in there to make it a fun journey through Shadaloo in the name of freedom!

2. Raul Julia is fantastic as a villain

The dialogue Julia spits out is absolutely insane and the facial expressions he exudes could only have been done by him. Some of the casting in this flick are suspect, but the crew really nailed it when they hired Raul for his last performance before he passed. The above clip where Chun Li pours her heart out over her deceased father is played off wickedly by Julia as he responds with the best FREAKIN BRILLIANT line in the entire film. "For you, the day Bison graced your village was the most important day of your life. But for me, it was Tuesday."

3. The Characters were made to look like their counterparts

Most people gripe that the characters in movies based on beloved franchises never really look like the source material (ex. Masters of the Universe). But the people who worked on Street Fighter: The Movie did their due diligence and had each character look as close to the game version as possible without being too over the top. The one exception would be Dhalsim, he looks nothing like he did in the game, but in the movie makers defense it would be pretty hard to pull off the look of a skinny, bald yogi who shoots fire from his face back in '94! Also, I give them credit for trying to make Blanka look imposing, but he comes off looking like a demented Battle Trolls doll!

4. It gave us this absurdly awesome music video!

The soundtrack to Street Fighter: The Movie by Priority Records had some big names on it including Ice Cube, NAS, LL Cool J and The Pharcyde. None of their songs got music videos, but this tight collaboration between MC Hammer & Dion Sanders did and it is magnificent! The video for "Straight To My Feet" features cameos by many of the actors in the film, most notable are the scenes where Jean-Claude Van Damme himself dances alongside Hammer! Great stuff in here! The album sold over 500,000 units and topped out at #135 on the Billboard 200 list.

5. It left me wanting more!

After the destruction of Bison's headquarters the good guys celebrate...maybe a little too soon! In a post credits scene I just found out about, the hand of Bison pushes through the rubble and rises triumphantly to set his computer back to "World Domination" mode! What had me excited was the blue glow coming from Bison. This reminded me of his special moves in the game where his fists would glow before landing in an unsuspecting opponents face. Could he have been doused by some of the chemicals and gained super-natural powers? Director Steven deSouza said he left out these elements in the first movie, but was open to exploring them in the sequel. Maybe if the movie had made more money ($33,423,521 domestic total), we would have had a super powered sequel? I guess, sadly, we will never know! All we can do is play out these "What If?" scenarios in the Street Fighter: The Movie video game by Capcom.