Corner Box Designs

by | May 9, 2026 | News & Updates

I’m working on the corner box design for my upcoming comic The Monster of Blackenstyne (not to be confused with Blackenstein). Yes, this is a real comic project. In fact, I’ll be revealing the cover in early January, running an art contest in February (with cash prizes), and launching a crowdfunding campaign in April. More announcements coming soon.

BAMF Classic Film Reviews – ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN

by | May 9, 2026 | News & Updates

1967 director: Cheh Chang; starring Jimmy Wang Yu

The Shaw Brothers studio in Hong Kong was responsible for producing some of the greatest Wushu (martial arts) films of all time. Kung fu flicks flooded American drive-in theaters and grindhouses in the 1970s, and some of the most memorable films came courtesy of Shaw Brothers. But the style and genre of film most Americans associate with Shaw Brothers was relatively new to the studio, and these movies were part of a new generation Wushu action flicks that was ushered in during the 1960s with titles like the seminal classic One-Armed Swordsman.

Before the 1960s most martial arts films were more theatrical, drawing influence from the legendary Peking Opera. The action sequences were somewhat unsophisticated, and Hong Kong audiences had grown tired of what was being offered. What was proving to be popular were the gritty Japanese samurai films, which had started to influence Hong Kong filmmaking in the 1960s. Believing that the aesthetic of the samurai films could be merged with the conventions of martial arts films, Shaw Brothers set out to reinvent Hong Kong Cinema.

One of Shaw Brothers’ first forays into what would become the new wave of kung fu flick was King Hu’s tremendously influential 1966 film Come Drink with Me. The following year saw the release of Chang Cheh’s One-Armed Swordsman, which is widely considered by many historians to be the film most responsible for setting the tone and style of the modern martial arts film.

The action begins when evil assassins come to kill the headmaster of a powerful and prestigious school of kung fu. Faithful servant Fang Cheng (Feng Ku) defends the life of his master, and is killed in the process, but not before pleading with his master to look after his son, Fang Gang. Years later, Fang Gang has grown up–played by Jimmy Wang Yu, a former professional swimmer who made the transition to acting in the early 1960s–and is a brooding young man with a chip on his shoulder. Raised amongst the other students, all of whom come from wealthy and affluent families, Gang can’t change the fact that he is little more than a working class charity case, who owes his position in life the sacrifice his father made. This sense of alienation separates Fang from the other students, including Qi Pei Er (Yin Tze Pan), the daughter of the school’s master, who is spoiled young woman who lusts after Gang, even though she is simultaneously repulsed by his status as a commoner. During a confrontation between Gang and some other students, including Qi Pei, things get ugly, and she chops Gang’s arm off. Taking the severing of his arm as a cue that he needs to get as far away from the world of martial arts as he can, Gang flees into the countryside, where he is discovered by Hsiao (Chiao Chiao), a beautiful woman who nurses him back to health. Gang wants nothing to do with the world he has left behind, but when the gang of assassins that killed his father years earlier returns to wreak more havoc, our hero is forced to retrain himself and learn to fight with his other arm.

One-Armed Swordsman was a huge hit in Hong Kong as well as the rest of Asia, launching an entire series of films about one-armed fighters–man of them starring Jimmy Wang Yu–as well as a whole subgenre of martial arts flicks about disabled asskickers. But on a much larger scale, the gritty aesthetic and graphic violence that was lifted from Japenese samurai films was so well received that it became part of the new standard of filmmaking at Shaw Brothers.

Not only was director Chang Cheh influenced by Japanese films, he was also a big fan of James Dean and Marlon Brando and the new generation of brooding anti-hero they portrayed in films like Rebel Without a Cause and The Wild One, respectively. Cheh clearly infuses some of the Dean and Brando characteristics in Fang Gang, as Jimmy Wang Yu–not exactly the greatest of Hong Kong actors–does his best to play a tortured working class hero at odds with the upper crust of society. And while Wang Yu is not the greatest actor, he was successful in realizing Fang Gang as an alienated (not to mentioned broken) member of the working class, which is what led to the film and the character’s enduring popularity.

It is important to realize that One-Armed Swordsman does not look or feel like many of the martial arts films of the 1970s and 80s. This is the film that set standard and laid the ground work for what was to come. This is to martial arts films what The Searchers and Ride the High Country were to morally ambiguous westerns like The Wild Bunch and High Plains Drifter that came along in later years. Some people may be put off by the film’s slower pace, but that is not enough of a reason to not watch this film. One-Armed Swordsman is visually beautiful, with a tone and style that is so dynamic you can see within it the decades of other films that followed in its wake, drawing deep from its well of influence.

BATMAN MEETS SHAFT

by | May 8, 2026 | News & Updates

Here’s a little gem from 1999. This is an original piece that I drew in an effort to get DC Comics interested in doing the craziest crossover you could imagine — a team-up between Batman and John Shaft. I was publishing BadAzz MoFo at the time, and I actually pitched this to an editor at DC, and they laughed in my face. Undeterred, I submitted this piece for inclusion in the San Diego Comic Con souvenir program book…amazingly it was accepted. If you can get your hands on a SDCC ’99 program, look for this drawing. Although I never got to write this series, I did get to write two SHAFT comic series and one novel for Dynamite fifteen years later. Unfortunately, the Shaft meets Doc Savage series I developed for Dynamite with my friend Jeremy Love met the same fate as the Batman crossover.

BAMF Classic Film Reviews – Richard Pryor in SOME KIND OF HERO

by | May 8, 2026 | News & Updates

director: Michael Pressman; starring: Richard Pryor, Margot Kidder, Ray Sharkey

Beyond the shadow of a doubt, Richard Pryor was one of the funniest comedians of all time. The ironic thing is that if you were to watch any of Pryor’s movies that are not his concert films, you would never get a sense of how funny he really was. There is no denying that films like Bustin’ Loose and Brewster’s Millions were a tremendous waste of his comedic talent. But what’s even more ironic is that Pryor was usually at his best as an actor when he was in films that were more serious. Director Paul Schrader’s Blue Collar remains one of Pryor’s finest moments on screen (his comedy concerts not included), and showcases him as a versatile performer. Pryor would never star in a film as good as Blue Collar, although he would get other opportunities to showcase his abilities as more than just a comic, including 1982’s Some Kind of Hero.

Adapted from James Kirkwood’s book, Pryor stars as Eddie Keller, a soldier in Vietnam who manages to get captured at the very beginning of his tour of duty. Held captive in a North Vietnamese POW camp, Eddie resists all attempts by the NVA to sign a confession stating he is a war criminal. But when his best friend and fellow prisoner Vinnie DiAngelo (Ray Sharkey) becomes gravely ill, Eddie agrees to sign the confession in order to get the dying man medical attention. When the war is finally over, Eddie is released from the POW camp where he has been held for six years, and he returns to the United States to a hero’s welcome. But his happiness is short-lived when he discovers that his wife has taken up with another man and the two of them have lost all of his money and his business. On top of that, he discovers his mother has had a debilitating stroke, and is now in a convalescent home that is threatening to kick her out if he can’t come up with the money that is owed. And as if all of that wasn’t bad enough, the Army does not want to give Eddie his back pay, because of the confession he signed.

Released from prison after all these years, it soon becomes clear to Eddie that his life is not all that much better. At least in prison he had the fantasy of life back home to keep him alive, but the harsh reality of life stateside is pushing him to the breaking point. When he meets Toni Donovan (Margot Kidder), a hooker with a heart of gold, Eddie finds a brief respite from the unfortunate circumstances he has found himself in. Desperate to get the money to cover his mother’s medical bills, Eddie decides to take drastic measures, which find him in a situation where he must deal with a group of unscrupulous mobsters.

Some Kind of Hero has enough problems working against it that it will never be a great film, no matter how hard it tries. For one thing, it never finds an even balance between the comedy and the drama. The story itself was developed as a drama, but the script, adapted by Kirkwood and Robert Boris, tries clumsily to accommodate Pryor’s comedic ability. In fact, the comedy was only added to the script after Pryor was cast, and he was cast based on his tremendous box office success in the early 1980s. The result is a film that can feel awkward and forced, which is only compounded by Michael Pressman’s direction, which has that flat, generic sense of style that is rampant in films of the 1980s.

Pryor does a good job with the material, but he seems miscast much of the time. Eddie, as written in Kirkwood’s book was a white man, younger than Pryor who was over 40 when he made the film. Hearing co-star Ronny Cox’s Col. Powers constantly refer to Eddie as “son,” even though Cox was only two years older than Pryor when they made the movie, feels as awkward as it sounds. Likewise, the relationship between Eddie and Toni never feels real, and Pryor and Kidder don’t manage to generate much chemistry on screen. Some of the sex scenes between Pryor and Kidder were cut, but that doesn’t change the fact that with their clothes on they don’t make for a compelling (or believable) couple.

All of that said, Pryor does have some great moments in Some Kind of Hero. One scene in particular, where Eddie is being interviewed by an Army psychiatrist, is especially effective, and hints at the balance between comedy and drama that could have been possible in the film, but was most often missed. Pryor seems to be generally interested in proving himself to be a capable actor who can do more than just comedy–as he did in Blue Collar and Lady Sings the Blues–but it feels as if the filmmakers never quite know what to do with him.

As a testament to his popularity, Some Kind of Hero was one of three films starring Pryor to be released in 1982, the other two being The Toy, and the concert film Richard Pryor: Live on the Sunset Strip. But the thing to keep in mind is that 1982 is the same year that Eddie Murphy made his film debut in 48 Hrs. Murphy’s popularity as a movie star was just starting to take off as Pryor’s was starting to decline. With the exception of his performance in 1983’s abysmal Superman III (another role in which he was miscast), Pryor would not appear in another film until Brewster’s Millions (1985). And by that time, Murphy had made Trading Places and Beverly Hills Cop, cementing his place as one of Hollywood’s hottest stars. Pryor continued to make movies throughout the 1980s, but he never regained the box-office success he had enjoyed earlier in his career.