The Warlock's Home Brew: poll

Showing posts with label poll. Show all posts

Friday, April 8, 2011

Poll: Who's Your Bond, James Bond

It's poll time again (keep it clean ya dirty grognards!)

While Ian Fleming's Bond novels (written between the early 1950's through the early 1960's) fit perfectly well within the gritty pulp genre the films take off in unexpected and sometimes absurd directions. Always with a dose of action, beautiful women (some much smarter than others) and intrigue, the Bond films are always anchored around the leading man played by more than eight actors spanning almost 50 years.

So today we come to one of the most controversial questions in pop history;
Who gave the best portrayal of Ian Fleming's iconic British secret agent James Bond, 007?

1. Barry Nelson
First appearance of James Bond US Television 1953 - clip

2. Sean Connery
Set the standard by which all other Bonds would be judged. -clip

3. George Lazenby
Ausie British Secret Agent
Clip

4. Roger Moore
Cigar smoking suave -Clip

5. Timothy Dalton
Was actually asked to play Bond in 1969 for OHMSS but HE felt he was too young. - Clip

6. Pierce ("I though Christmas came only once a year") Brosnan
Clip

8. Daniel Craig
Clip

10 David Niven
(blame YouTube/Google for the ad) Clip

11. Peter Sellers
Clip

12. Mike Meyers
(okay, so it's Austin Powers) - Clip

13. Secret Squirrel
Have fun it's Friday - Clip

As usual, you can vote Chicago style.

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Poll Results: Who's Your Barbarian?

The results are in!

It seems, almost without surprise, that Frank Frazetta's vision of the swords & fantasy barbarian is by far the most popular based on the Warlock's No-So-Scientific Poll.

It's not hard to wonder why as his paintings and drawings exemplify the explosive fury and savagery of this warrior archetype and has defined it for over 40 years. See for yourself.

You can't disagree with that!

The second most popular vision/version of the barbarian archetype goes to John Buscema and his iconic Conan the Barbarian illustrations. It's hard to dispute that when a whole generation grew up with his interpretations of the exploits of Howard's Hyborean-aged savage-warrior-king. Buscema does have a very dynamic classical quality with everything he does, whether it's superheroes, Tarzan or Conan.

Finally, coming in as the third favorite of everyone's concept of the barbarian, we surprising have Saturday morning's Thundarr the Barbarian. It's hard not to see why when you have the character concepts of Jack Kirby and an impulsive barbarian in a mutant future age. Savage, fearless and not taking shit from any mutant wizard Thundarr was a Barbarian through and through and the cartoon captured the world and character like a bullseye. There's no way a cartoon like this will ever make it onto the post-Nancy-Reagan era Saturday cartoon world.

After that we have a tie between Arnie's portrait of the warrior and the classic, historical image of those marauding hoards.

Sorry Groo!

Though there are many images that try to capture this savage warrior in all it's glory there was one that we all agreed upon that wasn't even close. You never want your barbarian to appear as this guy here:

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Poll: Who's Your Barbarian?

The Barbarian in Public Consciousness
Somewhere along the path of pop culture the concept of a barbarian became this hulking musclebound idiot.

Barbarians are really nothing of the sort. My friend Mike put it in the best possible terms when he said "They're warriors, not body builders."

And he's right.

Somewhere, the concept of barbarian became this bulky, giant sword wielding, long-haired heavy metal freak (no offense to any bulky, sword wielding long haired heavy metal fans out there).

So I'm taking a poll as to what is your iconic image of the Barbarian?

The samples are below while the poll itself is to the right.

1. 1930's pulp hero Conan?