drotto

A few things that in my mind must be stated first. 

1. What Ed did was wrong, he should not have responded to or continue to respond to Molly in a sexual fashion, or in any fashion. Furthermore, his solution was tragic and unnecessary. It was ultimately his choice, but does not come across as a choice of someone that was mentally stable even before this transpired. 

2. Molly was wronged, no question. I do have just a few questions concerning her. Was it just youthful naivete that prompted the initial text, how aware was she about what she was doing? What are her motivations for coming forward now?  Has she embellished or exaggerated her side of the story at all? These are not accusations or meant to shame her, but needed for clarification and context to the events.  

3. Ed, despite being wrong, was also a victim here.  

In some respects, it is this last part that bothers me the most.  We live in a culture where the standard has ALWAYS been innocent till proven guilt.  We are in theory a forgiving society, that is in search of truth not destruction and the mob mentality. We are a society that hopefully believes in right and wrong, and when needed will punish wrong, but always leaves room for redemption. Unfortunately, in this media obsessed, narcissistic world, we have a vocal minority that has appointed themselves as the ultimate arbitrators of  truth, and self appointed judge, jury, and executers of that truth. They act without full understanding of the situation, jump to conclusions, and with perceived moral righteousness never questioning if what they are doing is appropriate. Their intention is to destroy people at every possible level, and destroy not only people's present but also their prospects for the future. Rarely is it possible for the individual attacked to be redeemed, but still they insist the individual goes through a series of trials and apologies, to try and atone for their sins. Even if this mob is ultimately proven wrong, they never apologize themselves, never change, and they never look back. They have gone on to look for the next thing, because even if they were wrong, to them it was for the greater good. So while I can assign plenty of blame to Ed, these people that were waiting to, and seemly gleefully in destroying him are awful and guilty on every level. 

On 4/2/2024 at 3:55 AM, Cat said:

Good news! They're well into production of season 3, which has been greenlit. 

https://www.cbr.com/x-men-97-season-3-confirmed-marvel/

Hope that changing the showrunner does not change the feel of the show. 

On 3/31/2024 at 3:22 PM, media_junkie said:

 

Forbes

 

 

And that number doesn't include advertising, unreal.  I swear I have asked before, but man what type of dirt does Kennedy have on "Hollywood" that she isn't getting fired?

That is what they are admitting too.  I bet the number is even higher.

What I suspect is they are making all grading relative to the same book only.  Look at the video they released showing the grading of the 400 Power Ranger comics where there were 7x10.0 and 23 x 9.9.  They were comparing those to each other, and calling perfect based on how it compared relatively to the same book. The book they called a 9.9 or 10 in that video appeared to have defects.

Relative grading to other GSXM is the only way this is even in contention for a 9.9. Or maybe grading standars for each age is going to be different.  People for years have claimed a Golden age bump.

On 3/29/2024 at 5:09 AM, Bosco685 said:

While I can see why the omission of anything from the Japanese side was a controversial, I think much of that is offset by portraying Oppenheimer as very conflicted about what his team had accomplished. 

On 3/29/2024 at 1:37 PM, EastEnd1 said:

 

Nice book!  And yours has the added benefit of not having a spine mis-wrap (unlike the newly christened sole "9.9"!)...

 

 

 

To me square bound spines always look kinda crappy.  They are never "square". But thanks, I also think me wrap is nicer then the 9.9.

Here is my 9.4, no grading notes availible.  I think a really nice copy.  When I bought it, the well known dealer that owned it was debating pressing and resubmitting it thinking it may be a 9.6. The two flaws I see are color loss/rub at the two staple locations. Without grader notes, I always thought this was a fair 9.4, because of those defects.  So if that is not a defect, this should be an easy 9.6 or higher after a press (it was graded 10 years ago, and has not been pressed).

On 3/28/2024 at 4:27 PM, namisgr said:

It's the staple under the cover and holding the interior pages together.  When it produces a bump on the cover surface, it's a production feature.

With that said, in looking through the Heritage auction archives at 9.8 copies, I certainly couldn't say that this copy looks nicer or sharper.  But I'm neither a professional grader or potentially subject to motivated grading.

Yes, it is a production feature, but that feature does not result is color rub/loss.  That production issue makes this very likely to happen, but does not cause it. That occurs afterwards during handling.  To me this should 100% disqualify this book from a 9.9.

On 3/24/2024 at 5:21 AM, fantastic_four said:

Loved it.  They better have had a good reason for hiring the guy behind this.  

Have not watched yet, but hearing good things makes me happy.  The best that is out there so far pertaining to the firing is he has inappropriate photos which have surfaced from his Only Fans account. The other item that has been put out there is he is "very hard to work with," and this is the narrative of why he was let go from the Witcher. Granted why he was apparently unpopular on the Witcher is he was being very critical how far the show was straying from the source material. 

On 3/20/2024 at 6:56 PM, grendel013 said:

Did CGC collect every book on the list? Anyone still have their tainted slab?

This more books then not are still out there.  Based on the last update the slash through means a book has been reviewed, but that still lots to go.

Shall we vit on a new label color?  How about Chartreuse.

On 3/20/2024 at 2:54 PM, DoctorWyoming1 said:

That's why you just have two tiers. Witnessed and professional verified. 

Buyers can judge for themselves, and the witnessed ones would be perferred of course.

That said, someone can fake/lie that it was witnessed... these are all inductive claims after all, and all in doubt. 

You already had two tiers, yellow label and green label.  Green noted the signature and it was then up to the buyer if it was valid.

On 3/20/2024 at 2:40 PM, DoctorWyoming1 said:

Yes.

What do I do with comics, magazines and cards with autographs that have been encapsulated with a CGC Qualified Grade green label?

We will offer a service for autographed collectibles that are already encapsulated in the CGC Qualified Grade green label to be recertified by JSA and CGC. An announcement will be made when this service is available.

 

So you can finally get rid of those ugly green labels.

A key issue here is that there are plenty of obvious signatures: The Todds and Stan Lees that should have never gone green in the first place.

They should have been green, the existing policy is only witness signatures get the yellow label, and they had no way to say otherwise. There is no way a submitter or grader should have been taken as an authority on signatures. There are many very talented people out there that can fake signature or certificates of authenticity. Hell, I have seen many determined kids that can do a great job faking their parents signature. 

On 3/20/2024 at 12:57 PM, Mdesimone said:

They never told me to contact any law enforcement. I myself work for NYPD. This is being handled civilly not criminal on cgc end at the moment. Cgc holds the burden of proof that the comics were swapped. I am not a grading expert I cannot state the grade of the comic, I cannot prove who was the person who reholder the book because I have no access to that info. If I went after them in court myself I would get decimated by the defense. In NYC this case would go nowhere since I cannot prove it on my own

This is the inherent problem.  An individual stating something is fraudulent will never hold up in court, without having an expert testify to the fraud.  They will need an expert to prove the case. In comics CGC is that expert, and possibly one of the other grading companies. So without CGC an individual would likely lose the case. Not to mention in this case a court would not consider the available witnesses as impartial. 

On 3/20/2024 at 2:35 PM, lostboys said:

Well, the dude on Pawn Stars authenticates sigs for Rick but he didnt witness them being signed.

 

And he always hedges his bet just a tiny bit. He will never say he is 100% sure. It is always, it looks good, it appears authentic, I think you have the real thing here, or something like that.  He never say this is 100% no question real.

On 3/20/2024 at 2:31 PM, DocGo said:

Do you think there’s a difference between witnessed and authenticated? 

Yes, there is still a difference. Witnessed is 100% valid. Authentication is not an exact science so it means the signature is very likely real, but you can never say with 100% certainty.

So will these all be yellow labels? If so, will the label say if it was witnessed vs authenticated?

On 3/19/2024 at 2:18 AM, Silver Surfer said:

Yup I thought that the Kang version in Loki could not be more boring, time to side step this character and cut their losses. A Masters of Evil plot line or Olympus battle with Zeus would be great but they would have to bring back Cap and Thor to make this work. Even a Bronze Age classic Nefaria story arc (incorporate Wonder Man) would be awesome. 

They should step back, get FF and X-Men done right, then revisit the  Avengers.

On 3/18/2024 at 11:00 AM, Bosco685 said:

 

Seems like a questionable move.  They have already beaten him 3 times, and it does not seem like he was getting any traction with fans.

Could this be one of the films that Iger has cancelled?  I know he said Eternals 2, Captain Marvel 3, and Ant-Man 4 are gone, but could there be more?

On 3/14/2024 at 4:26 PM, fantastic_four said:

Wow, he was there for Roseanne too, so yep, I guess he may have done it to DeMayo as well.  I tried to figure that one out but never could make sense of it--including after hearing her air her side to Marc Maron on his "WTF" podcast.

I'm five times more interested in the DeMayo firing now that it looks like X-Men '97 is better than expected.  

Full naked pictures of DeMayo have surfaced apparently from only fans.  Not sure if there is even more, but this has been confirmed.  

On 3/15/2024 at 10:08 AM, fantastic_four said:

Many states have laws that make it pretty easy to fire commercial sector employees for virtually any reason as long as it doesn't violate Constitutional rights protections like race, gender, sexual orientation, etc.  From what I can tell Carano's lawyers filed the suit in California which doesn't have as many of those laws as other states do, so I have no idea what they'll be able to do there.

Florida does have some of those laws and that's where Disney is based out of, but certainly Carano did most or all of her work in Los Angeles so maybe that's the right venue.  I dunno how venue is determined for jobs that involve frequent travel, but you've got to pay state tax somewhere for states that have income tax so if she paid California tax on her Disney income then I doubt Disney can argue they brought it to the wrong court.

Filming was done in California so this would fall under that jurisdiction. Also CA laws in this case conveniently are very much in favor of the employee. 

On 3/15/2024 at 8:21 AM, fantastic_four said:

Given that it's Elon Musk backing her she may not settle.  One of her demands is that Disney immediately re-hire her and cast her in their content, and it's easy to see Musk continuing to back her until he's made his point about free speech in a way that inflicts maximum pain and public exposure to Disney.

The being rehired in the Carano case is a California law item, from what I have heard.  The CA law states the individual must be reinstated to their former position if wrongful termination is determined.  So, I am not sure it is something she wants. Her case hinges on two point by CA law. Did she have an oral or implied contract, which CA does recognize, and was this political speech. CA laws states you can not be fired for political speech, baed on laws put in place after the McCarthy era to protect people in Hollywood with socialist or communist views.

I do not think she will settle, it is no financial risk or cost to her, and Musk wants to make a point in his mind.

On 3/14/2024 at 4:26 PM, fantastic_four said:

Wow, he was there for Roseanne too, so yep, I guess he may have done it to DeMayo as well.  I tried to figure that one out but never could make sense of it--including after hearing her air her side to Marc Maron on his "WTF" podcast.

I'm five times more interested in the DeMayo firing now that it looks like X-Men '97 is better than expected.  

Especially since it has now been reported that season 2 is apparently fairly far along in development.  Feels like Disney knows what the second shoe is and is trying to get ahead of this.  Of course, this knowledge also worries me, since their firings have been very uneven.  It feels like they moved too quickly on Gunn and Carano, but they waited too long on Majors, where the evidence seemed like it was more damaging and sustentative from the start.