REVIEW: A Comparision of Superfreaks Season 2 # 6 and Encyclopedia Brown

[Martin Phipps]

On Aug 10, 9:13 am, Tom Russell <milos_par... at yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Aug 9, 5:01 am, Martin Phipps <martinphip... at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > On Aug 7, 12:59 pm, Tom Russell <milos_par... at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Aug 6, 11:14 pm, Martin Phipps <martinphip... at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > > On Jul 30, 11:19 am, Tom Russell <milos_par... at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > > > And yet in Columbo mysteries, you already know who the killer is and
> > > > how the crime was commited and the only element left is watching
> > > > Columbo solve the crime.  Law and Order similarly, by its own
> > > > admission, spends half the time dealing with points of law as opposed
> > > > to solving crimes.  These are not good examples.
>
> > > They *are* good examples, because information is not withheld from the
> > > audience unless it is withheld from the detectives.  Of course it's a
> > > gradual process-- not all the facts are available on the onset.
>
> > I did not withhold information either, Tom.  You really need to grow
> > up.
>
> Martin, perhaps I have not made my point clear.  Since you did _not_
> provide the information re: Scott's power, you withheld that
> information.  That's not subtlety; that's not playing fair.

Stop being a baby, Tom.  It's getting really tiresome.  As I've
already pointed out to you, the normal procedure in mysteries is to
present information as it comes to the detective, him or her self.  As
it did not occur to Mary herself that Scott's power was relevent, it
did not get mentioned in their conversation.  If it had been mentioned
in the narration then the reader would have been privy to infromation
that had not occurred to her, ie that Scott's power was important.
_That_ would have been unfair.

> You're working in a serial format.  You must be aware that each issue
> has to not only work as part of a larger whole, but also stand on its
> own.  If I printed up this single issue of Superfreaks and gave it to
> someone to read, they would also feel that information-- vital
> information-- was withheld.

Try it.  It doesn't "reek of unfairness".  Most people would argue
that the information had to be "withheld" in order to sustain a
mystery and not give everything away.  It's that simple.

> > I don't mind criticism
> > but I do ask that you be specific and constructive and not just simply
> > continue to make sweeping statements that can actually be shown to
> > apply to your own writing and not mine.
>
> I believe I am specific and constructive.

I honestly don't believe you but it is possible that you do in fact
believe that "reeks of unfairness" is unbiased constructive criticism
and not a blatant childish insult.

> I have pointed out the
> problems in this specific example, and why I find it to be lacking and
> unsatisfying.  In fact, that's what I've done with every review I've
> written of one of your stories, many of which-- you will notice-- have
> been overwhelmingly supportive and positive.

Nonsense.  Twice now you've dismissed the vast majority of Season 2
without having even read it.  I am absolutely convinced that you're
only criticising #6 because you want to find some "bad" "clunkers" in
the series.  Whether or not you are even aware of it, you're trying to
justify your own prediction.  And you've been doing that from the very
beginning: your negativity towards the entire Superfreaks series has
no doubt been inspired by the fact that you didn't consider it "good"
enough for 8FOLD.  Frankly, I consider your "reviews" to be very petty
and immature.  To be honest, I was hoping that when all was said and
done you would have seen some value in the series.

> I'm not attacking you, and I wish you wouldn't respond like my initial
> review was some kind of attack.

And yet my story "reeks of unfairness" and I'm supposedly "allergic to
exposition" and my characters are "interchangable" "plot puppets"?
This is what you consider unbiased and constructive?

If you really believe that you weren't attacking me then by all means
tell me by e-mail, which is the internet equivalent of telling me to
my face.  I haven't been accepting e-mail from you lately but if you
really and truly (however unlikely it is) believe that you weren't
attacking me then you're going to want to clear this up.

> > > > > I like to have all
> > > > > the information that the detective has.
>
> > > > The whole point of a mystery is that the detective doesn't have all
> > > > the imformation to begin with.  The detective doesn't just solve
> > > > riddles: the detective detects.
>
> > > Yes, but when the detective has gathered all the evidence, I'd like to
> > > be privy to that evidence.  Perhaps you missed my point, because what
> > > you say has nothing at all to do with what I said.
>
> > You don't have a point, Tom.  You're just full of hot air.  Well, full
> > of something anyway.
>
> Again, uncalled for.

How exactly is an accurate assessment of your review uncalled for?
Explain that to me.

> > > > > All the clues one needs to
> > > > > solve the puzzle need to be at one's feet-- something you can put
> > > > > together logically.  If the writer plays fair _and_ is good at what
> > > > > they do, I don't discover the solution but curse myself when I fail to
> > > > > do so.
>
> > > > Then curse yourself and not me.
>
> > > When, exactly, did I curse you?
>
> > This is usenet, Tom, and on usenet your posts are archived so you
> > can't get away with this sort of dishonesty.  You said "When the
> > writer doesn't play fair, I curse the writer".
>
> I'm not being dishonest; it was a lapse in memory, and I apologize.

(Martin goes back to tone down a little some of the things he said
above.)

> Let me further state that I did not overtly curse you, rather using
> the chaistic phrase as a rhetorical device.  I have not hexed you or
> declared any pox upon your house. :-)

Perhaps I should apologise for calling you dishonest but how does this
fit in with the original review not being an attack?  It's not like I
actually believe you to have magical powers after all.

> > You completely missed my point.  In the real world, amateur detectives
> > wouldn't even have access to the original evidence: it would be sealed
> > awaiting trial and the only people who would have access to it would
> > be the police, the district attorney's office and the defense team.
> > Evidence that is tampered with, whether it be at the crime scene
> > itself or any time after it is collected and before it is presented as
> > an exihibit in trial, can be thrown out of court.  Encyclopedia Brown
> > would then have to be called as a witness to explain what he was doing
> > handling police evidence in order for the evidence to be brought back
> > in.
>
> Perhaps you're not remembering the books correctly; in the official
> police type cases in which Encyclopedia assisted his father, he
> _never_ saw nor handled any of the evidence.

Even the notes that the police officers make at the scene are stored
as evidence to be presented in court and are not to be tampered with.
Police officers are trained not to rely on their memory and, in fact,
need to file an official report as soon as possible.  Encyclopedia
Brown would be allowed to look at the official report but his analysis
would not be based on the first hand "evidence".  It's unlikely that
he'd notice anything that officers at the scene had missed.  But
that's why these stories were aimed at kids.

> I understand your general point, though.

Fair enough.

> > When you realize this, it is hard to take kid's detective stories
> > seriously.  It's sad but true that a little knowledge of the real
> > world can take the fun out of such stories.
>
> I disagree.  They're still fun in spite of, or perhaps because of, its
> fantastical approach.  I know, for example, that superbeings don't
> really exist, and that if they did, they'd probably act like jerks.
> But that doesn't make superhero stories any less thrilling and
> inspiring and, yes, fun.

Let me say at this point that I appreciate you toning things down and
that for that reason I will not say some of the things that I was
thinking of saying, at least not in the manner I was planning to say
them.

Tom, I've never been a big fan of Superman because, frankly, I could
never believe that a man could fly.  The original motion picture (I
feel old now) changed my mind in that it did, as promised, make me
believe that a man could fly, at least long enough for me to enjoy the
movie.  (Superman lifting a mountain of kryptonite in the latest
movie, however, I couldn't swallow.)  To this day, however, I don't
believe that gorillas can talk, although I would be willing to accept
the idea of gorillas in the distant future learning to talk following
a nuclear holocaust on Earth (a la Planet of the Apes).  The point is
that my ability to suspend disbelief is far less practiced than yours,
proabably as a result of my scientific background.  I am aware of this
so I know that when I criticise another person's story that my own
personal disbelief is going to be a big issue for me, moreso than for
the writer himself no doubt who just considers superheroes and talking
gorillas (and snails) "fun".  Well me, I think it is fun to combine
the names Britany Spears and Paris Hilton to create Britany Hilton or
change one letter of Zod to make Zon, things like that.  You might
want to take in consideration in the future that criticisms could be
seen as attacks upon our own personal definition of "fun".

> > To be honest, I don't get a chance to read much fiction here in Asia:
> > I usually read whatever I get my hands on, newspapers, magazines and
> > internet articles, but I don't bother with most fiction because I'm
> > limited to waht I can find in local libraries and book stores.  When I
> > was in high school, though, I read a lot of Issac Asimov.  Some people
> > criticized Isaac Asimov for writing mysteries because, as a scientist,
> > he knew a lot more than the average reader and he could solve crimes
> > using techniques that the average reader had never heard of and the
> > reader would consider that a cheat.  Now, my question is why should a
> > reader curse a writer for being smarter than he is?  Isn't that a
> > little bit unfair?
>
> I think our aesthetic tastes are different; I don't like an author who
> talks down to his audience, and I don't like mystery stories that
> cheat.

Isaac Asimove never talked down to his audience.  Nor did Arthur C,
Clarke.  They were, in part, using fiction to teach scientific
concepts, as no doubt was Encyclopedia Brown.

> That being said, if one learns something from those stories--
> as I often did from the Encyclopedia Brown books-- then that goes a
> long way towards making it fun.  Details are a big part of the appeal,
> for me, of most genre fiction.

To be honest, I prefer non-fiction.  If I don't learn something from
what I read then I might as well be watching TV.

> For example, the little bits about your Atlanteans in the first arc of
> this Superfreaks season?  I loved those.  (And I said as much in my
> review of the first TEB.)  I found those details lacking in this
> particular issue under review, and often find it to be so in this
> series.  That doesn't diminish, however, those rare gems-- like the
> Atlanteans not being able to identify each other visually because
> eyesight is so poor underwater-- which are vastly enjoyable.

To be honest, I think a lot of dramas (police dramas, legal dramas,
medical dramas, sci fi dramas) do talk down to the audience, the
culprit being the aforementioned technobabble.  Granted, it's only in
sci fi that the babble is truly babble but an evening of CSI, ER and
Law and Order can be a bit much.  ("We have a 4-19 and a 2-11.
Officer down.  Repeat.  Officer down."   "He's hemoraging from the
Lumbar region!  We need an IV with a saline solution stat!"  "The
evidence was obtained through standard procedure, the defense's
objections notwithstanding.  The people versus Gimble, 1989.")  The
actors will admit in interviews that they have no idea what they are
saying sometimes.  Of course, this is excusable if police officers,
doctors and lawyers really talk like this.  This then brings us back
to the issue of speech patterns and how people from different
professions are expected to talk.

> > Except you're not eight years old any more, are you?  You might have a
> > point arguing that Encyclopedia Brown mysteries are too difficult for
> > eight year olds to solve but now, frankly, you're just being
> > ridiculous.
>
> My point wasn't the difficulty, but rather that the books were
> enjoyable for other reasons.

Why couldn't you have seen Superfreaks Season 2 #6 the same way
instead of just trashing it.  Are you at least going to admit that you
did trash it and, in fact, had nothing good to say about it?

> > In any case, the fact that I don't typically provide a characters life
> > story every time I reintroduce them would mean that it would have been
> > a massive giveaway if I had mentioned what Scott Grey's powers were
> > then it would have been a massive giveaway.  Are you at least capable
> > of admitting that much?
>
> Let me say this: if done right, it would not have been a massive
> giveaway; if done sloppily, then, yes, it would be.  I'm not saying
> that you would have done it sloppily, or that you would have done it
> right.  I'm just saying that the ability to put a clue right in front
> of our faces without us realizing it is a great skill for any writer
> to possess, and one that I myself feverishly desire to acquire.

There's no one word that I can point that pointed to Scott, only the
fact that Dr. Javier and Mary both knew him from before.  Obviously, I
was trying to divert suspicion away from him.  I admit that.  But the
fact that Scott was introduced in the story at all could have been
seen as suspicious: all he did was tell Mary where Quick Kid was and I
wasn't going to reintroduce a charcter just to have him do that.
Besides, it's standard procedure to introduce characters early in a
story and then reintroduce them as the culprit later.  I don't make a
habit of reading mysteries and yet I've seen this done time and time
and time again.  Do you consider it a cheat every single time a writer
does this?

> > You admitted yourself at the begining that Jolt City is not a police
> > procedural.  Perhaps you need to get some practice writing such
> > stories before you presume to tell me how to write mine.
>
> By that criterion, no one can offer critique to anyone.

By that criterion, we keep ourselves honest and don't pretend that
we're unbiased.  Truth is, nobody is unbiased when we're giving an
opinion.  That is why it is called "opinion".

> > Frankly, Tom, this is the problem we had a year ago when you were
> > _supposedly_ considering whether or not to allow Superfreaks stories
> > into 8FOLD: it wasn't that I was "allergic" to editting but rather
> > that, quite frankly, a bad idea imposed by you can ruin what would
> > otherwise have been a good story.
>
> It was not imposed because it was merely a suggestion, and one that,
> as I've said countless times both publicly and privately, I was
> willing to withdrawl.  Before we could get further into the discussion
> stage, however, you decided to go with your own imprint.  And that's
> certainly your perogative.
>
> But I'd like you to stop spreading the falsehood that Jamie and I were
> leading you along and that we were trying to impose ourselves on your
> story.

Don't accuse me of lying, Tom.  It's uncalled for.  The fact is that
your 8FOLD FAQ claims that the only criterion for accepting stories
into 8FOLD is that they be "good".  So obviously you and Jamie didn't
consider my writing "good" and that wasn't likely to change.

The 8FOLD FAQ never said that stories would require any editting by
yourself or Jamie and, indeed, it was my perogative to decide to go it
alone.  (And, yes, Tom, you did "suggest" changes that would have
required me to scrap at least one entire story.)  I admit to feeling a
bit bitter but that's not what this is about.  If to this day you
really and truly still don't like Superfreaks then there would have
been no point waiting for you to change your mind way back then.

> > > > it.  It's that simple.  I'm so sorry you weren't able to pick up on
> > > > that.  I honestly thought you were smarter than that.  Clearly I was
> > > > wrong.
>
> > > That, too, was uncalled for, sir.
>
> > Again, I call it as I see it.  Besides, Tom, where do you get off
> > trying to act like the victim here?
>
> I'm not pretending to be a victim; I don't appreciate insults on my
> intelligence, however.

Then you know how I feel.

> > You didn't think that the tone of
> > your "review" was uncalled for?  You didn't think I'd find it
> > insulting?
>
> Frankly, no.  What was wrong with the tone of my review?  I feel it
> was level-headed and not insulting in the least.  I provided what I
> felt to be constructive criticism.

I don't believe you.  Not at all.  Period.

> >  Have you ever heard the expression "If you can't say
> > anything nice then don't say anything at all"?
>
> That's not the way it works, Martin.  You have two options: an honest
> review, or no review at all.  You only get to choose one.  Not "an
> honest review when it's positive and gushing" and "no review when it's
> not gushing".
>
> I have, in fact, not written a really negative review of any of your
> writing.  I sling no bile.  There is no anger; just the willingness to
> provide feedback, and the impulse to help.  And, as you say, to call
> it like I see it.

And yet my story "reeks of unfairness" and I'm supposedly "allergic to
exposition" and my characters are "interchangable" "plot puppets"?
This is what you consider unbiased and constructive?

> But I don't insult your intelligence, or sling explectives in the
> review itself.  Please make note of those last four words.  With my
> use of profanity, I only responded in kind.

You said my story "reeks of unfairness" and I said that your review
"reeks of bullshit".  _I_ responded in kind.  Stop being so blatantly
dishonest!

> >  At the same time, however, I don't feel it is a
> > valid for you to go back and criticize the first "season" if you
> > honestly don't remember it very well: all you can do is say whether or
> > not you remember liking it ot not but the fact that you now don't
> > remember it very well precludes you from providing any constriuctive
> > criticism.
>
> Did you miss the part where I gushed on Edward and Mary?

How is that consistent with saying that my characters are
"interchangable" "plot puppets"?

> > A good story should satisfy two criteria: internal consistency and
> > believability.  I wasn't criticizing your internal consistency so much
> > as your believability.  Perhaps Martin Rock has some healing factor
> > that you've never previously mentioned that allows him to wake up in
> > hospital fully awake and fully recovered.  I still fault your
> > dialogue, however: perhaps this is a case where your dialogue is
> > overwritten where you thought a joke should be inserted here for comic
> > relief whereas you should really have been thinking about what Martin
> > Rock would most likely have said first thing after waking up in a
> > hospital bed.  You should have just "let him talk".
>
> Your point is taken; I'll fix this in the TEB edition.

Fair enough.

> > > WHO ARE DICKENS AND THURBER??!!!
>
> > > Did you just ask me who fucking Dickens and motherfucking Thurber
> > > are?
>
> > Now THAT was uncalled for.
>
> > > Did you miss the part where it explains that Dani's apartment is
> > > lined with rows and rows of stacks of books on the floor?
>
> > I've never heard of James Thurber.  Sue me.  The exact quote was "They
> > come to an entrance-way: guarded by Dickens on one end and Thurber on
> > another."  It didn't say "books by".  You've often criticized people
> > for being obtuse.  Is this how you react when people are confused by
> > something you've written?
>
> No, it's not, nor do I think I was being obtuse.  Since the beginning
> of the scene set up the insane number of books, arranged in rows, I
> figured-- oh wait, you probably didn't read it; it was description.
> My bad.

I'll resist the urge to respond in kind to this blatant insult, one
that is in keeping, by the way, with the tone of your original
review.

> It didn't say "books by" because I was using a metaphor.

An obtuse one.

> My profanity was not in response to you not getting the metaphor.  It
> was in response to, first, your profanity, and, secondly, the fact
> that you, at that time, appeared to not know who Charles Dickens is.
> I'm glad to find that you do know a bit about the man.

Don't talk down to me, Tom.  It's uncalled for.

> And, like you said, USENET preserves everything.  I'm certainly not
> perfect; I remember, years ago, when I asked a similiar question
> because I hadn't heard of Acton Belle.  The response I got back was
> one of incredulity, just as mine was intended.

Since when is "m-----f---ing" an expression of incredulity?

> >> > > and why
> > > > is Martin Rock going on about "Injuns"?  Is this supposed to be
> > > > funny?  It would have made more sense if Danielle didn't get it.  Or
> > > > perhaps this is a case where one has to be there.
>
> > > It's a bad joke, and admittedly it doesn't work.
>
> > That's twice you've made the "joke" excuse.
>
> That's twice I used a joke in the stories you quoted. :-)
>
> >  If the joke didn't flow naturally out of your first draft
> > then it probably isn't a good idea to go back and insert one.
>
> That's a good point.
>
> > > >    "Two objects-- two atoms-- cannot occupy the same
> > > > space, right?"
> > > >    "That's basic physics," says Dani.
> > > > I'm sorry, Tom, but this is nonsense.  First of all, the idea that you
> > > > can vibrate and end up in a parallel world is not real world physics
> > > > but comic book physics so it's annoying to have Dani claim that this
> > > > is "basic physics" but, worse, neither Dani nor Martin are
>
> > > Dani's claim about basic physics applies only to the statement about
> > > two things not being able to occupy the same space, as that is what
> > > she makes it in reply to.
>
> > But look at what else she says.  ("I know that," snips Dani.)  Here
> > Dani comes across as a know it all.
>
> She says that in response to:
>
> "The way that works is, your body is made up of
> molecules and the molecules of atoms."
>
> She's being talked down to, and reacting in kind.  Not "being a know-
> it-all".

It was rude of her.  You could equally well accuse Dr. Fay of talking
down to her by using language she couldn't possibly understand and
then saying "Oh, sorry, I guess that was too much for you" or
something of that nature.  Dr. Fay was legitimately trying to get Dani
and Martin to understand and she threw it back at her.  (I seem to
recall Dr. Fay being a woman.)

> > Stop being so damned dishonest, Tom, and reread the part you snipped:
> > "neither Dani nor Martin are physicists
> > so even if what they were saying did make sense then there's the
> > question of how they would know about it."
>
> They're not saying it; Fay is.  Reread the scene.  It's Fay doing all
> the explanation.  Fay, being a doctor, would know what she's talking
> about.  Dani is just asking questions and, ocassionally, taking
> insult.

Why?  Again, why should she be expected to know anything about quantum
physics (which is what the discussion would be about if it were real
science and not pseudo science).

> > > 1. Could you point out _any_ pop culture references?
>
> > Um, Dickens and Thurber? :)  Obviously I meant _modern_ pop references
> > but if Thurber isn't part of popular culture then why in God's name
> > would you have expected me to know about him!
>
> 1. Dickens and Thurber are part of Culture.  Along with Shakespeare,
> Ogden Nash, Beowulf, and Beethoven.
>
> 2. Your point was that Martin Rock would not be knowledgable about pop
> culture; even if Dickens and Thurber could be considered "pop"
> culture, Martin Rock says nothing about them.  It's in the narration.

Martin Rock would know something about pop culture but there would be
huge gaps due to having been a superhero sidekick, a soldier and a
vigilantee.  When I first came back from my wife's hometown, I didn't
know who Tiger Woods was, I didn't know who Bill Gates was and I
didn't know that Priness Diana was dead.  It was like coming back from
suspended animation: it's a weird feeling, being away from TV,
internet, newspapers and magazines for seven months.

> > Besides, it goes beyond how well educated Martin Rock is: he still
> > can't perform magic; he's not psychic.  I'm thinking in particular of
> > how Martin Rock was able to determine that the Crooked Man was a man
> > with twelve foot arms with very little evidence or how Martin and the
> > Speedster were able to follow a car on a city street hours after it
> > had already passed by.  You criticised me for having Edward make what
> > you considered to be wild deductions based on the evidence he saw but
> > at least he is a trained forensic expert.  Martin Rock isn't.  That's
> > my point.
>
> I concede that point, and you'll be happy to know the bit with the
> Crooked Man's arms is being fixed, as you suggested initially, in the
> TEB.

I know.  I didn't want to bring it up again but, to be fair, you've
been criticising Superfreaks Season 2 #6 for being weak as a mystery
and I honestly and truly don't think it was a good idea for you to go
there because that's not where your talent lies.  The best part of
Jolt City has been the action scenes.  The best part of the original
Green Knight series were the first three issues focusing on Ray
Crandle's illness and how he chose to deal with it.  The best part of
Speak was not so much Greggory but the villainous Gas Man who, like
Kaiser Souze, told stories that weren't always true.  Come to think of
it, starting with Net.Heroes on Parade and all the way through to the
first few issues of the original Green Knight series your
characterisation was pretty good: you could tell from the way they
talked that Gas Man and Ray Crandle were older men with experience.
That's exactly the sort of thing I'm talking about when I talk about
speech patterns: they didn't use catch phrases but you could still
tell who was talking just from snippets of their dialogue.  Honestly,
your stories since then haven't featured characters that are that well
defined.  I wouldn't go as far to say that Dani and Pam are
"interchangable plot puppets" but it's an accusation you should be
willing to defend against if you are going to level it against others.

> > > Granted, you would expect a man who teaches for a living-- regardless
> > > of the subject he teaches-- to know who the fuck Charles Fucking
> > > Dickens is, but not everyone falls into stereotypes.
>
> > Again, Tom, this is completely uncalled for.
>
> Probably was, but insulting my intelligence-- and that of my
> character-- kinda threw down the gauntlet, didn't it?  At any rate, it
> could have used a smiley.

An apology would be better.

> > > Martin only goes to crime scenes that would be within his
> > > jurisdiction-- i.e., the capture of a supervillain or something Snapp-
> > > related.
>
> > He's a frickin' vigilantee.  He has no official jurisdiction, not in
> > Pepperon and not anywhere.  Hence the Beverly Hills Cop comparison.
>
> Well, since he doesn't live in the Superfreaks universe... :-)

Jolt City.  Jolt Cola.  Dr. Pepper.  Pepperton,

> > > > Instead of going to all the trouble of trying to pass off your
> > > > opinions as professional literary criticism, perhaps you should pay
> > > > more attention to your own writing and it wouldn't suffer so much.
>
> > > I never pretend to offer anything but my opinions.  If you don't want
> > > them, don't ask for them.
>
> > And if you don't like reading Superfreaks then, fine, don't bother but
> > if you DO read Superfreaks and you DO choose to criticize it then I
> > expect you to make constructive criticism and that means actually
> > backing up what you have to say with actual examples.
>
> Like Scott's powers?

That's not an example of me withholding vital information, as you know
full well.

> > > And, no offense, but I don't think anything I've ever said in any of
> > > my reviews of your stories has ever matched this recent post of yours
> > > for pure, nasty, unwarranted malice.
>
> > Do you live in the same world as the rest of us?  I dare say it is
> > obvious that you have some axe to grind.  Perhaps you can explain what
> > the point of this was: "Some of these were good, some of these were
> > bad.  Sometimes I found
> > the stories to be quite clever; other times, I found them lacking."
>
> You know what the point of that was, and I might add that there were
> no insults or malice or nastiness in that review.

I can suspect what the point of that was but perhaps you'd like to
come out and explain.  Oh and by the way, did you actually read all of
Superfreaks Season 2 #'s 4-17 before you "reviewed" them?

> > > I bear you no ill-will; I have no intention of escalating this into
> > > some kind of flame war.  Let's let by-gones be by-gones, and get back
> > > to something close to friendly terms.
>
> > You must be joking.  Your "review" of Superfreaks Season 2 was
> > bullshit as I call it like I see it.
>
> This review, and the first TEB review?  You call it bullshit because
> you don't like it.

I called it "bullshit" because I know more than you about the thinking
that went in to writing that issue.  You essentially accused me of
cheating whereas what I was really doing was holding back just enough
to not make things to obvious.  That's not the same thing.  You should
be willing to concede this to be true.

> > For the record, adults don't use words like "motherfucking" and then
> > claim that they aren't trying to start a flame war.
>
> Adults also don't call other adults idiots, or accuse them of
> projecting, or get upset when someone writes an honest review of their
> story.

But adults get rightly pissed off by insulting malicious bullshit and
adults are liable to get even more pissed off when the culprit refuses
to come clean.  If you want to return to "friendly terms" then you
need to admit that your recent reviews don't qualify.  Again, Tom,
perhaps you can explain for the record what the point of the "review"
from a month ago was?

Martin