About Site

Once, long ago, in those lost days of the Internet before CSS was a thing — before, even, the word "blog" was invented — there was a little website-that-could called Shanghalla. It was many things over the few fleeting years of its existence – a Legion of Super-Heroes fan site, an attempt to create an online APA (Amateur Press Alliance) magazine, a place to publish work in hopes of landing a job in comics, and a place to rail against the industry professionals who, as Yogi Berra might say, stayed away in droves.

And then, sometime shortly before the turn of the century, it went away.

Now, Shanghalla back. The intent this time is to be a comic book review site. As many of you who've landed here may know, Shanghalla is an asteroid cemetery, the final resting place of all great heroes in the 31st century world of DC Comics' long-running franchise, The Legion of Super-Heroes. Here, on Blog Shanghalla, we hope to erect memorials to the four-color glories of this fading medium I have been personally invested in since childhood.

The reviews will take many forms, at least initially, as we try to cypher which types serve the fan community best. What you can expect at the onset includes:

Capsule Comments: A rundown of comics purchased that week, with a story letter grade and a paragraph outlining some general thoughts on each book.

Full DNA Review: An long-form review based on a 0-100 score called Duke's Numeric Assignment, because my name is Duke and I assign the number (see how clever!) The score is derived by adding up a 0-10 score in 10 different categories – cover, plot, script, layout, art, production, editing, value, collectibility and the "gosh-wow" factor. The review discusses each category, which break down as follows:

• Cover: To what degree does the cover compel the potential reader to pick this book up off the stands?
• Plot: Is the basic story structure sound and do we even have a complete reading experience, with beginning, middle and end, in this one issue?
• Script: Is the dialogue and/ or narration natural and believable, or forced and full on needed exposition?
• Layout: To what degree do the pictures tell the story?
• Artwork: Apart from how well the pictures tell the story, how good are the individual drawings?
• Production: Largely a look at the coloring, but also taking into consideration the lettering, printing, packaging and logo work.
• Editing: Covered in large part in the other categories, this is where we dock points for critiqued items the editor should have caught and fixed. Here we also consider the overall direction of the book.
• Value: Basically, does the reader get his (or her) money's worth?
• Collectibility: No so much a measure of how much this book can be expected to rise in value, but a prediction of how likely the average collector will want to hang on to this book, and how hard it may be to locate on the market at a reasonable price in future years.
• The "Gosh-Wow" Factor: Perhaps the most important category of call, although all are weighted equally. Essentially, this asks, to what degree awaken my inner 11 year old, from 1978, when comics were as incredible and awesome as they would ever get.

Pre-views: At some point, maybe some publisher will start sending advance copies for review here. Until then, this will most often be a look at the monthly solicitation catalog from Diamond Distributers, and an explanation of what I've chosen to order at my local comics shop.

Synopsnark: As it sounds, a snark-filled synopsis of a comic's content, generally reserved for Silver and Bronze Age issues, or modern books that are particularly awful.

Time Bubbles: A comparison of comics now on the stands that bear a marked similarity to works of yesteryear.

The Run of Things: An overview of an entire series, or a run of issues within a series.

Panelology: A panel-by-panel review of a given comic, usually reserved for my fanboy obsession with books starring the Legion of Super-Heroes.

Great Rao!: An examination of the works of individual writers and artists.

Legion Lore: Just because, well . . .  Long Live the Legion, baby!

*****

Below are the pictures used in the "Featured Posts" slider on the main page. Google+ does not provide a link to pictures stored on its site, and the ones Picassa gives do not work, at least in Blogger. So, the only way I've found to make the slider work is to upload the pictures to Blogger (which, oddly enough, also uploads them to both Picassa and Google+) and copy the src link from the HTML code for that picture into the slider widget - or gadget, as Google wants to call it. It's a convoluted process to be sure, but its all part of the war between Google, which, recall, promised it was not going to be evil, and every other internet service on the planet.