Well I didn't expect to see this when I went to check the weather:

There's another reason to love Plastic Man. Sure, I suppose Superman could have lifted a giant "O" or "E" over his head, but Plas can become the "O" and "E" and still be recognizably Plas.

Anyway, pretty neat logo today, Google.

Weekly Haul: July 22nd

Agents of Atlas #8 (Marvel Comics) As I mentioned in my previous post, I was unable to pick this issue up last week, when it was released, because Diamond operates like this. So chances are that if you like things that are awesome—talking gorillas wielding high-powered rifles, thought-controlled 1950s-style UFOs, blonde Namors with breasts—you probably already have this.

It is a comic book written by Jeff Parker in which The Agents of Atlas fight a bunch of Moduloks made entirely out of hobos and also The Hulk.

(And if you didn’t happen to play with the same toys I did growing up, this is Modulok:

He’s a member of Hordak’s Evil Horde, appears during the five most tolerable minutes of the He-Man/She-Ra movie, and is completely awesome. Much more awesome than the similar Multi-Bot. So that. Only made out of hobos.)


Avengers: The Initiative #26 (Marvel) I keep vacillating between dropping this book and not dropping it, as for the last few months it’s reached a point where I don’t really enjoy reading it so much anymore, but there’s always a little something in it that makes me curious to see how it plays out in the next issue, and then I end up getting one more and thinking the same thing again.

In this issue, it was the glimpse of The Mandrill in a couple of crowd scenes (I love the look of that guy!) and wondering how the to retake Prison 42 plays out.

The rest of the plot seems overly reminiscent of other Marvel books I’ve read in the past few years though, particularly the New New New Warriors as legitimate heroes on the run in a world gone mad, and writer Christos Gage’s intentional call-back to that nasty New Avengers issues where Brian Michael Bendis had some villains break into Tigra’s bedroom and pistol whip her in front of a video camera. Here, Tigra breaks into the bedroom of one of those villains, and beats him while filming it. Justice!

I like Rafa Sandoval’s pencil art, except I’m not quite sure why he’s given Tigra actual tiger paws. Each of her digits is about the size of Ultra Girl’s wrists now, and it just looks weird.


Captain Britain and MI13 #15 (Marvel) Farewell Captain Britain and MI13. The world—well, the direct market, was never meant for one as beautiful as you.

So yeah, this is the last issue of one of Marvel’s more enjoyable ongoings, the climax of the war between England and Dracula. It’s mostly wrapped up rather nicely, although some of the goings on here—the multiple couples, Union Jack suiting up, motherfucking Death’s Head appearing (!!!)—mostly simply hint at the interesting places Paul Cornell, Leonard Kirk and company’s ensemble title could have gone in the future.

Maybe it will end up like Young Avengers, and we’ll get a miniseries every year or so, tie-ing into whatever the big crossover of the moment is?

In the mean time, if you sat the series out, be sure to look for it in bargain back-issue bins in a few months time. The first and last arcs are fantastic, and the middle one’s pretty okay.


Final Crisis: Legion of 3 Worlds #5 (DC Comics) Well look who finally decided to stroll into shops this week, the final issue of a five-part monthly series that launched last fall, and tied (extremely loosely, to the point that this last issue never even mentions it) into a an event miniseries that ended (also late) back in March.

Now that I’ve read it, I think I see why it was so late. Artist George Perez didn’t fall behind schedule, despite having to draw every Legion character ever (gathering the costume reference on this miniseries alone must have been a six-month task). Rather, the final pages sat on Dan DiDio’s desk for a few months, while he and writer Geoff Johns fretted over whether the mean-spirited criticism of their fanbase as the ultimate villains was a little too on-the-nose here.

You know how everyone was always saying that Johns’ evil version of Superboy-Prime, introduced in Infinite Crisis, was basically a caricature of over-entitled superhero fans? Well, in the conclusion of this series, Johns takes that as literally as possible, to the point that Prime is actually logging in to the DC Comics message boards in his last appearance.

So was this series any good?

I don’t even really know how to answer that. I was pretty lost during this last issue, and had a hard time telling who was who. I’m not, never was and probably never will be a Legion fan, so keeping three different versions of the team straight in a story that pits them against all their villains ever and teams them up with all of their allies ever, was always a bit of a challenge, and the months between issues sure didn’t help any.

It kept my interest enough that I read all five issues, and I’ve yet to encounter a comic book drawn by George Perez that wasn’t worth reading if only to drink in the artwork. He’s definitely in his element here, and was probably the only artist capable of drawing this series and making it make any sort of visual sense.

I don’t think it met its own promise though. What really sold me on the series was the cliffhanger at the end of the first issue, where Superman announced that not only were they going to defeat Prime, they were going to reform him, which was obviously the much more difficult task, and I was extremely curious to see how Superman would attempt to do such a thing.

As it turns out, he doesn’t make more than a half-assed attempt at it, and ends up basically just beating Prime up for most of the series. At the end, Prime is—of course—defeated, but he’s still just a bad as a bad guy as he was going in.

Which I suppose means Superman failed, and that doesn’t seem all that Superman-like. (Not that his failure is brought up or acknowledged here; he seems to have forgotten that declaration, in much the same way that I forgot who half of these characters were).


Gotham City Sirens #2 (DC) Boobs, lips, crotch, lips, crotch, boobs, boobs, boobs, lips, boobs, boob, butt, boobs, boobs, boob, butt boobs, boobs, butt, boobs, lips, lips, lips, lips, lips, lips, boobs, boobs, boobs, boob, lips, boobs, butt, boobs, boobs, boobs, butt, boobs, crotch.


Green Lantern #44 (DC) Okay Geoff Johns, you really got me with this one. Seeing one of my favorite DC superheroes kick the hell out of two of my least favorite DC superheroes for the majority of an issue? I did enjoy seeing that, in a base my favorite hero is stronger than yours kind of way.

Johns does a pretty good job of writing Martian Manhunter, at least in terms of having him remember to actually use all his superpowers, and to have the other heroes legitimately afraid of having to take on a character who’s basically Superman Plus. (J’onn doesn’t just float up invisible and intangible and then blow their heads off with martian vision, but then he does seem to have some kind of unknown agenda that isn’t quite clear yet).

This issue picks up right where last week’s Blackest Night #1 left Hal Jordan and Barry Allen, at Batman’s desecrated grave, confronted by a zombie Black Lantern version of J’onn J’onnz. They fight a while, while, back on Oa, the vomiting guardian Scar exposits a bit and vomits a bit more.

The art is provided by Dough Mahnke, who I’m starting to wish penciled every DC comic. Even with three different inkers (in addition to himself), the art is smooth, clean and extremely detailed throughout.

Johns also gets off one of his biggest “Oh shit!” cliffhanger endings I’ve seen in a while here. Johns almost always tries to go out on a splashpage cliffhanger in which an unexpected hero, villain, team or plot complication arrives on the last page, and here it’s a big one. Completely obvious in retrospect, although I didn’t expect it.

(Confidential to J’onn J’onnz: That tiara isn’t really working on you. I think you need hair to really pull a tiara off.)

Question time! You know how the rings “talk” in Lantern-shaped, tail-less word balloons? Do they talk out loud, so anyone can hear, or do they just talk directly into their wearer’s mind? I always assumed it was out loud, but now I’m not so sure. For example, if Ha’s ring scans J’onn and then says “Vital signs: Negative,” can Barry and J’onn hear that, or is it telepathically communicating with Hal?


Incredible Hercules #131 (Marvel) Do you know the sound of Sisyphus having a brand new boulder appear before him after a pair of wrestling Herculi destroy his old one? “SISY-POOF” of course.

God I love this comic.

This issue brings to and end the Herc and Amadeus in the Underworld arc, with pretty disastrous results for their relationship. It’s another issue that reminds me that while Incredible Hercules is extremely funny and a very engaging look at the long-term fusion of Greek myth with Marvel mythology, it’s also about things and shit. I was honestly a bit moved by the climax of this book.

I didn’t think it possible, but apparently Marvel’s best comic book is getting…better?



Tiny Titans #18 (DC) The vaguely Vaudevillian three-page sequence in which The Anti-Monitor brings The Monitor his coffee is pretty much my platonic ideal of superhero comics. This issue is pretty heavy on the adults, with Principal Slade, Coach Lobo, the Monitors and Lunch Lady Darkseid getting a majority of the panel-time. Also, the cutest drawing of Man-Bat ever.

I believe this is a photograph of Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. HQ

The new comics in my local comic shop are organized alphabetically, and when I show up on Wednesday afternoons, one of the folks who works there hands me the handful of releases that are in my pull-file, and then I walk along the rack, checking out what's new, flipping through books I'm mildly curious about but don't want to buy (so hey, who is that Red Hulk anyway?) and looking to see if there are any blurbs or pull quotes form me on the covers of any of 'em.

When I got to the the W's today, I noticed a blank spot near where the last two weeks worth of Wednesday Comics were shelved, and below the laminated orange New This Week card that the shop uses to designated new books was a handwritten sign saying "Diamond shortage."

Alarmed, I flipped through the results of my pull-list in my hands and realized there wasn't an issue of Wednesday Comics #3 there either. I spun and consulted the clerks, and one shook his head sadly.

Wednesday Comics #3 wasn't shipped to my local comic shop. It would probably arrive tomorrow, if I wanted to make a special trip then just to pick it up.

This isn't the first time a particular book was left out of a shipment to my shop. In fact, just last week Diamond failed to ship them Agents of Atlas. It is the first time that, as far as I can tell, an issue of one of DC's weekly comics failed to get delivered in time for new comic book day. I read every single issue of two of the three year-long series, so that's at least 104 weeks in which the books were there on new comics day. I'm pretty sure Countdown was always there, too, which would make it 156 weeks, plus the first two weeks of Wednesday Comics...that's 158 times DC's weekly books were there on a Wednesday, as advertised.

Failing to ship an issue of one of these books is a lot worse than failing to ship an issue of Agents of Atlas or whatever else, because DC's weeklies are, in large part, novelty, gimmick-y comics. Wednesday Comics has a couple gimmicks going for it, with the format being the most obvious and original one, but certainly the fact that it's a weekly and is always there on Wednesday is another of its gimmicks and thus major selling points.

Wednesday Comics is selling not just 15 installments of a series of serials by various acclaimed writers and artists, it's also selling a unique reading experience, and, well, if the damn things not there when it's supposed to be, that unique experience gets compromised.

I'm not going to not read Wednesday Comics #3 or anything. I guess I'll just read it right before #4 next Wednesday afternoon, and while it will be a less pleasurable experience, it's not really a big deal to me. But then, I'm a hardened, callused comic book reader with a lifelong commitment to the medium; I'm always going to go back the next Wednesday and buy the books whenever they end up getting there. And maybe that makes me representative of most current super-comics readers, but it can't be representative of anyone just flirting with the medium.

Now, I don't know if many—or any—people read about Wednesday Comics in USA Today, The Onion's AV Club, Pub, Publishers Weekly, The Chicago Sun-Times, Toledo Free Press, Cleveland Plain Dealer or the Honolulu Star Bulletin (or saw Dan DiDio—talking very fast and wearing a jacket!—on the Fox Business Channel) and thought "Hot damn! That looks cool! I'm going to read that thing!" and then made special trips to the comics shop each Wednesday to pick up the new issue of Wednesday Comics. But if any of them did? (There was a lot of mainstream coverage of this book, so it's possible, right?) And then they went in to the shop and were told, "Sorry it's not in today after all. Maybe tomorrow?"

Well shit, that's gotta be a little disheartening, doesn't it?

Wednesday Comics is really an experimental project, and it's really too bad that even a small aspect of it is completely out of the hands of the publisher, the retailer and the audience.

Oh well, I guess if my shop isn't happy about the service they get from their distributor and the potentials sales late shipments cost them, or if DC Comics gets pissed when their distributor fails to ship their products on time and potentially loses them future business, they could always just get their comics through a different distributor.

Oh wait...

Marvel's October previews reviewed

Only three more months until all these comics come out! Which means it's not too soon to start eagerly awaiting and/or bitterly complaining about 'em!


DEADPOOL #900
Written by JASON AARON, MIKE BENSON, CHARLIE HUSTON, JOE KELLY, DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI & FRED VAN LENTE
Penciled by KYLE BAKER, SHAWN CRYSTAL, SANFORD GREEEN, ROB LIEFELD, CHRIS STAGGS & DALIBOR TALIJIC
Cover by DAVE JOHNSON
Special SUPER-sized, ACTION-packed 104-page special to commemorate Deadpool’s historic 900th issue! ... Wait, has it really been nine-hundred issues...? Who cares! If this collection of octane-infused stories by some of comics’ hottest talent doesn’t make you want to genuflect at the Altar of Wade, nothing will. Thrill as the Merc with a Mouth squares off against probe-happy aliens, trigger-happy mimes and one seriously unhappy fanman – and that’s just half the book! Wince as Wade bares his soul (and lots more) to a shrink who’s got major squirrels in his own attic. Thrill as he travels around the globe and then some to settle a childhood bet. And chill as C.S.I. investigators at a blood-splattered crime scene attempt to piece together why this particular “unsub” needed battery cables, Crisco oil, three stacks of adult magazines and a live chicken to pull off the hit.
104 PGS./Parental Advisory ...$4.99

Clever. I just started reading some old Deadpool comics (the end of the Preist run and the beginning of the Palmiotti run so far) and it's...well, it's pretty all right I guess. This looks awfully cool though.

Deadpool is certainly popular at the moment, isn’t he? In addition to this issue, October also sees the release of Deadpool: Merc With a Mouth #4 and Deadpool #16, plus a poster book and issue of Marvel Spotlight dedicated to the character.


DOCTOR VOODOO: AVENGER OF THE SUPERNATURAL #1
Written by RICK REMENDER
Penciled by TO BE REVEALED AT SDCC
Cover by MARKO DJURDJEVIC
Variant Cover by BILLY TAN
Launching from the pages of New Avengers, Jericho Drumm assumes the role of Marvel’s new Sorcerer Supreme as DOCTOR VOODOO! Having foreseen an unimaginable evil that will soon envelop the Marvel Universe, the Eye of Agamotto has passed the mantle of Sorcerer Supreme on to the one man who has the unique gifts to stave off the coming darkness -- but is Doctor Voodoo ready for the momentous duty as avenger of the supernatural? As Jericho begins to grapple with his colossal new position, malevolent beings of vast power see his arrival as an opportunity to strike. Rising stars Rick Remender (PUNISHER) and *ARTIST TO BE REVEALED AT SDCC* crack open a new chapter in the Book of Vishanti to tell the ongoing adventures of the new Sorcerer Supreme in the Mighty Marvel fashion!
32 PGS./Rated T+ ...$3.99

So, Brother Voodoo is going to be going by the name "Doctor Voodoo" now that he's taken over Doctor Strange's gig as Sorcerer Supreme? I can understand the impulse to lose the "Brother" part of his name and make him see less...blaxploitation era, but, at the same time, he's still a black guy whose superpower is Hollywood's version of voodoo. At his core, Brother Voodoo is a character based on something of a racial stereotype, isn't he? I don't think changing his name a bit changes that very much.

I'm mildly interested in this storyline, but, at $4 a pop, that translates more into "Maybe I'll see if my local library orders a trade of this in a year and a half" then "I can't wait to start buying this."

Also, the costume looks kinda Spawn-y doesn't it? I suppose it's mostly the color scheme, but Spawnishness is probably something one wants to avoid when designing new superhero costumes.


GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY #19
Written by DAN ABNETT & ANDY LANNING
Penciled by WES CRAIG
Cover by ALEX GARNER
Will Kang Conquer the Guardians? Rocked by the aftershocks of War of Kings, Star-Lord’s team – now castaways across shattered timelines – are desperate to find a route home before all possible futures fuse into one dark nightmare! Guest-starring the original Guardians of the Galaxy (sort of) and the infamous time-traveling despot who may be their only hope! Yes, it’s more sci-fi shenanigans from the book that has ComicBookResources.com
raving, “Abnett and Lanning do an amazing job of delivering a
quick-moving, jam-packed, high-octane, bombastic epic.”
32 PGS./Rated T+ ...$2.99

I started reading this title based on teh strength of the Starlord miniseries it followed, but ultimately had to drop it from my pull list when I realized I probably didn't have enough money for two Marvel ensemble comics with quirky casts, and I stuck with Captain Britain (GoG crossing over into Marvel's "War of Kings" storyline was a strike against it, as I wasn't following any of the other moving parts involved with it).

Now Captain Britain is canceled, of course. I wonder if I'm too far behind with GoG to start picking it up again?

It was that big image of Kang that drew my eye to this particular solicitation. He's a pretty cool character design, and he's so simple and smooth that he honestly looks rather out of place on a Marvel Comics cover, doesn't he?


HALO: HELLJUMPER #4 (of 5)
Written by PETER DAVID
Pencils & Cover by ERIC NGUYEN
With an entire Covenant regiment hot on the trail of their comrades, Dutch and Romeo don’t have a lot of options...the radios are out, so they can’t alert their CO as to what’s behind them, and they don’t have enough firepower to take the Covenant force out on their own. But... hey, what’s this here? A lightly guarded Covenant Drop Ship? But who’d be stupid enough to steal a Drop Ship? Two of the UNSC’s finest, perhaps?
32 PGS./17 & Up ...$3.99

This book doesn't really interest me, since I've never played this Halo game that the kids (and grown-ups) all love, but I noticed that Peter David is scripting this. In addition to this video game adaptation, he's also scripting prose adaptation Dark Tower: Fall of Gilead, and writing X-Factor and Wolverine First Class. And that’s just his Marvel Comics work being published in the month of October; I believe he also has an IDW series, and I know he writes prose as well.

Basically, I just wanted to pose a moment and say, “Wow, Peter David sure does a lot of writing of a lot of different types, doesn’t he?”

Um, that’s all.


I've mentioned before that Herc looks kinda weird wearing so much clothing, but Thor really makes Herc's skirt and sash get-up work for him, doesn't he?


OZ: THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ HC
Written by ERIC SHANOWER
Penciled by SKOTTIE YOUNG
Cover by SKOTTIE YOUNG
The premiere American fantasy adventure gets the Merry Marvel treatment! Eisner Award-winning writer/artist Eric Shanower (Age of Bronze) teams up with fan-favorite artist Skottie Young (New X-Men) to bring L. Frank Baum’s beloved classic to life! When Kansas farm girl Dorothy flies away to the magical Land of Oz, she fatally flattens a Wicked Witch, liberates a living Scarecrow and is hailed by the Munchkin people as a great sorceress...but all she really wants to know is: how does she get home? Collecting THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ #1-8.
208 PGS./All Ages ...$29.99

Huh. I assumed the collections would be substantially cheaper than the serial, comic book installments—which I thought were $3.99 for each of eight, 22-page installments—but at $30, this is actually only two bucks cheaper. On the other hand, it is ad-free, a hardcover, and with an oversized trim size, so there's an awful lot of added value for even the slightly cheaper price.

Or were the individual issues each longer than 22-pages? Because eight times 22 is only 176, and this collection is over 200 pages long? Oh, I don't know. The point is—Jesus Marvel, you charged $4 a pop for a kids comic?


IRON MAN: IRON PROTOCOLS
Written by ROBERT VENDITTI
Art by NELSON
Cover by ARIEL OLIVETTI
Deep within a secret government base beneath the arctic tundra lies the “Ark”: a vault containing the genetic codes for all life on Earth. But there’s a problem—a rogue Artificial Intelligence has decided that the best way to protect the samples is to eradicate every living creature! Only Iron Man has the knowledge to stop the machine—and he’s only got an hour to do it! Join Robert Venditti—creator of The Surragates, now a major motion picture—and fan-favorite artist Nelson (X-FACTOR) as the fate of the world hangs in the balance!
40 PGS./One-Shot/Rated T+ ...$3.99

Hey, that was the plot of an anime movie I saw like a decade ago, Spriggan. Well, except for the Iron Man part.


MARVEL ADVENTURES SUPER HEROES #16
Written by PAUL TOBIN
Penciled by DENIS MEDRI
Cover by SEAN GALLOWAY
Spider-Woman, Beast and Giant Girl team up to play detective when Hercules is found unconscious after falling all the way from the moon. But what was the son of Zeus doing on the moon, and how did he manage to fall off? And how did Hercules’s day full of book-signings, pinball and origami lead him, and our trio of heroic detectives, into an all-out battle against Hydra for possession of the mysterious substance known as “delirium?”
32 PGS./All Ages ...$2.99

I take pleasure in just reading the solicitations for Tobin's Marvel Adventures books sometimes.


MARVEL MASTERWORKS: ATLAS ERA JUNGLE ADVENTURE VOL. 1 HC
Written by DON RICO & VARIOUS
Penciled by WERNER ROTH with JIM MOONEY, JOHN BUSCEMA, GEORGE TUSKA, SYD SHORES & JIMMY INFANTINO
Cover by CARL BURGOS
LEOPARD-PRINT NEVER LOOKED SO GOOD! Beginning the complete collection of Atlas’ action-packed 1950s jungle adventure comics, the Marvel Masterworks venture into the oh, so attractive heart of darkness to meet Lorna, the Jungle Queen! Her jungle-faring father mauled by a lion, the seventeen-year-old Lorna embraces her unexpected new home – becoming a fierce and stunning girl of the wild and the last word in jungle justice! Trained in the ways of the African wilderness by her mentor, M’Tuba, Lorna is joined by her ever-helpful monkey companion, Mikki, and the bold, two-fisted hunter, Greg Knight. From the murky Black Swamp to the Dead Lake, the pre-Code adventures of Lorna and her cast of characters find them pitted against vicious headhunters, voodoo priestesses, killer cavemen from the Lost City, and Agu the Giant—a gorilla that could give King Kong a run for his money! You’ll also enjoy the tale of two Lornas and stalk creatures both strange and fierce as Lorna uncovers all the mysteries of the jungle. With lush artwork by Werner Roth at his career best, forget it, this is a jungle adventure from which there's no coming back. Get ready to go wild with ATLAS ERA JUNGLE ADVENTURES MASTERWORKS! Collecting LORNA, THE JUNGLE QUEEN #1-5 & LORNA, THE JUNGLE GIRL #6-9
248 PGS./All Ages ...$59.99

Damn, I wish I could afford this. Hey Marvel, I will totally review the hell out of this book at Newsarama if you want to send me a review copy!


MARVEL ZOMBIES: EVIL EVOLUTION
Written by KARL KESEL
Penciled by ROB DISALVO
Cover by MARCOS MARTIN
Fur and severed limbs fly in a story that reveals an important missing link in the saga of the Marvel Zombies! Two worlds of hurt collide as the popular Marvel Zombie Universe gnaws its way into the cult-favorite Marvel Apes Universe with a handful of our Earth's furriest heroes stuck in the middle! Who will be the last man (or monkey) standing? SEE -- IRON MANDRILL'S descent into Zombie Madness! FEAR -- COLONEL AMERICA'S battle with THE AMAZING SPIDER-MONKEY! Who will come out triumphant? What will be left of them? Can Gorilla Girl, the Gibbon and Ape Speedball survive?! No one is safe and nothing is certain in this destiny-altering battle between the flesh-eaters and the feces flingers! Apes mastermind Karl Kesel teams with rising star Rob DiSalvo (Dark Reign: The Sinister Spider-Man) for MARVEL ZOMBIES: EVIL EVOLUTION!
64 PGS./One-Shot/Rated T+ ...$4.99

I believe an "It Had To Happen!" would have been perfectly appropriate here, Mr. Marvel Comics Solicitation Writer.



STRANGE TALES #2 (of 3)
Stories and Art by PETER BAGGE, MAX CANNON, JACOB CHABOT, JONATHAN HICKMAN, R. KIKUO JOHNSON, MATT KINDT, MICHAEL KUPPERMAN, TONY MILLIONAIRE & JIM RUGG
Cover by PETER BAGGE
Red Hulk Variant Cover by PETER BAGGE
You won’t believe your senses!! Marvel is proud to present the second issue of this hotly anticipated three issue anthology showcasing Marvel’s greatest characters re-imagined by the best and brightest talents working in independent comics today. Don’t miss what’s sure to be one of the most exciting collections of comics short stories ever produced!!! Every issue stars a stunning array of the best, most exciting cartoonists on the planet—showcasing the Marvel Heroes as you’ve never seen them before! Featuring the long-awaited Peter Bagge “Incorrigible Hulk” serialized over all three issues!
48 PGS./Explicit Content ...$4.99

Is this the first Peter Bagge comic to feature a variant cover? Just wondering.


ULTIMATE COMICS AVENGERS #3
Written by MARK MILLAR
Pencils & Cover by CARLOS PACHECO
THE SEARCH FOR STEVE ROGERS CONTINUES! From the mad minds of MARK MILLAR (ULTIMATES 1 & 2) and CARLOS PACHECO (X-MEN), Nick Fury assembles a new team of deadly operatives to track down the renegade Captain America! But what will the Avenger’s resident marksman HAWKEYE have to say about Fury’s tactics and will these new faces make the cut when the %^&( hits the fan?

Wait, Millar already wrote a story in which Nick Fury and his newer operatives tracked down and captured a renegade Captain America, during Ultimates 2. Will this time be different? Yes, yes it will. Because one of the new operatives will be wearing a funny Wasp hat, similar to the one that was part of her first (of five thousand) costumes.


ULTIMATE COMICS SPIDER-MAN #3
Written by BRIAN MICHAEL BENDIS
Pencils & Cover by DAVID LAFUENTE
The world of Spider-Man is turned upside down! Friends are enemies and enemies are friends!! Mysterio is on the loose and gunning for Spidey big time. And the Hulk is back!!!?? Plus--and this is a biggie--you'll never believe what iconic super hero is moving into Aunt May's house!!
32 PGS./Rated T+ ...$3.99

Oh yeah, this reminds me, Bendis actually still had several significant plot irons in the story fire when Ultimatum knocked his USM off the rails, including the all-new Ultimate Mysterio and that supervillain/mad scientist Aunt May started dating (Who was it again? The guy who turned into The Jackal in the 616 or something...?)

So I guess for all the talk of an all-new Ultiamte Universe and what-not, there won't be the sort of hard, Crisis On Infinite Earths style continuity reboot or anything.


WOLVERINE ART APPRECIATION
Written by JOHN RHETT THOMAS
Art Canvas Cover by JOE QUESADA
Assembling all the variant covers from April's Wolverine Art Appreciation Month, this special collection will take a trip through art history with Logan as your guide! Meet the artists who made this such an innovative and cool event - luminaries such as Ed McGuinness, Paolo Rivera, Russ Heath, Skottie Young, Laura Martin and more - as they adapt the artistry of Van Gogh, Magritte, Warhol, Dali and other towering titans of the art world, all in celebration of that lovable little furball's 35th anniversary in comics! This is Art History 101 with claws, so handle carefully!
32 PGS./One-Shot/Rated T+ ...$3.99

Goddamit. This is on the other side of my Don't Buy Any Comics Over This Price line, especially considering it's simply a collection of pin-ups, but I think I'm going to break down and buy the damn thing anyway. A lot of these images were really cool.

DC's October previews reviewed

For the complete list of comic books and suchlike that DC Comics plans to publish in the month of October, click here. To read my thoughts on those plans, read on...


ACTION COMICS #882
Written by Greg Rucka & Sterling Gates; co-feature written by James Robinson & Greg Rucka
Art by Julian Lopez; co-feature art by CAFU
Cover by CAFU
“The Hunt for Reactron” part 3! Supergirl and Flamebird continue their slugfest, with poor Nightwing caught in the middle! Wait, isn’t that man standing over there the same Reactron who murdered Supergirl’s dad and Flamebird’s surrogate father? Get him! Continued in SUPERGIRL #46...

And in the new Captain Atom co-feature, the mystery of where (and when) Captain Atom is heats up when someone with a connection to Metropolis arrives on the scene. But are they friend or foe?
On sale October 14 • 40 pg, FC, $3.99 US

I can’t decide if “The Hunt for Reactron” is a really dumb name for a storyline, or if it’s kind of cool in its simple, declarative, unashamedly cheesy way. Like, it’s not called “World Without Superman: Radioactive Requiem—Dusk” or something like that.


AZRAEL #1
Written by Fabian Nicieza
Art by Ramon Bachs
Cover by Jock
Variant cover by Frazer Irving
Following the events of “The Eighth Deadly Sin” in BATMAN ANNUAL #27 and DETECTIVE COMICS ANNUAL #11, the new monthly series starring Death's Dark Knight begins! Michael Lane is a man in search of redemption, but does serving the Order of Purity as God's Angel of Justice bring him closer to achieving his goal – or simply send him further down a road paved with good intentions? When a hired killer comes to Gotham City seeking revenge for crimes committed decades in the past, Azrael faces an impossible conflict: What if God's justice forces the hero to claim one of God's servants? From writer Fabian Nicieza (SUPERMAN, TRINITY) and artist Ramon Bachs (RED ROBIN)!

Ha ha ha ha! Look, an Azrael ongoing! Ah ha ha ha ha! Oh man. Yes, if Azrael was unable to carry a monthly series, perhaps Azrael II will fare better. Shouldn't this be a back-up in Red Robin or Streets of Gotham or something? I'll give it 12 issues...no, there's the Batman factor in its favor. Eighteen issues.


Whoever the new Batgirl is, she has violet eyes, which eliminates all of the popular candidates. I guess this means the new Batgirl is...Tempest?


Ha, I bet Grant Morrison wishes he thought of this.


BATMAN: THE UNSEEN #1-2
Written by Doug Moench
Art and cover by Kelley Jones
The fan-favorite Bat-team of Doug Moench and Kelley Jones reunite to introduce the newest member of Batman’s rogues gallery in this twice-monthly, 5-issue miniseries! Horrible and unexplained murders have Gotham City held captive. Bizarre deaths have been occurring throughout the city, but the perpetrator is unknown. Even when the crimes have been committed in view of witnesses, all that is seen is a glimpse of a weird, skinless “meat-man” who seems to fade away after the crimes. Gotham’s only hope is their Dark Knight Detective, but how can Batman find and fight an Invisible Man?
Issue #1 on sale October 7, issue #2 on sale October 211 and 2 of 5 • 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

Oh hell yes. I didn't have to wait that long between issues of Kelley Jones drawn Batman comics at all. And this time, he's reunited with Moench, and you know what that means: Awesome sound effects.


BATMAN: WIDENING GYRE #3
Written by Kevin Smith
Art by Walter Flanagan & Art Thibert
Cover by Bill Sienkiewicz
Variant covers by Gene Ha
As The Dark Knight stalks the night preying upon Gotham City’s criminals, Bruce Wayne spends his days getting reacquainted with former girlfriend Silver St. Cloud. Plus, Batman learns the name of his mysterious masked ally. From superstar creator Kevin Smith and guest-starring Aquaman, the New Teen Titans and Deathstroke the Terminator!

Aquaman...?


THE BRAVE & THE BOLD #28
Written by J. Michael Straczynski
Art and cover by Jesus Saiz
J. Michael Straczynski (Amazing Spider-Man) and Jesus Saiz (OMAC PROJECT) continue their series of unlikely pairings with a match that spans the decades! When an experiment meant to alter the speed of light goes awry, Barry Allen finds himself face-to-face with some surprising allies – World War II’s legendary Blackhawks! But Barry isn’t the Flash they know, and he’s not even the kind of hero they need to help fight history’s most grueling war! What must Barry sacrifice to serve his country – and his world?
On sale October 21 • 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

Hmm, not as unlikely a pairing as Batman and the H-Dial, but still on the off-the-beaten-path side of DC team-ups.


DC COMICS CLASSICS LIBRARY: SHAZAM! – THE MONSTER SOCIETY OF EVIL HC
Written by Otto Binder
Art and cover by C.C. Beck
At last, DC Comics collects the legendary serialized story from the pages of CAPTAIN MARVEL ADVENTURES #22-46 (1943-1945). The Big Red Cheese battles foe after foe as he inches his way toward the malevolent force behind it all: the two-inch long, superintelligent worm known as Mr. Mind!
Advance-solicited; on sale December 23 • 272 pg, FC, $39.99 US

Oh shit, it's a comic I demanded! I guess I better buy it then, although yikes, $40? Hmmm...Okay DC, I'll buy it, but it might be the only DC comic I can afford in December.

Now let's make with the Shazam Chronicles already.(I'm never happy, am I?)


THE FLASH VS. THE ROGUES TP
Written by John Broome
Art by Carmine Infantino, Murphy Anderson and others
Cover by Ethan Van Sciver
These seminal tales from the 1960s, torn from the pages of SHOWCASE #8, THE FLASH #105, 106, 110, 113, 117, 122, 140 and 155, introduced the Scarlet Speedster’s Rogues Gallery, including Captain Cold, Mirror Master, Gorilla Grodd, the Weather Wizard, Captain Boomerang and Heat Wave — all prominently featured in FINAL CRISIS: ROGUES’ REVENGE.
Advance-solicited; on sale November 25 • 144 pg, FC, $14.99 US

This looks fun. Not sure why you'd want a Van Sciver cover over a collection of Infantino art, but whatever.


Have I mentioned how dumb the John-Stewart-as-sniper thing is here before? I'm not sure I understand what the point of using a magic wishing ring to create a gun that you then have to shoot a bullet or laser beam out of when you can just shoot the bullet or laser beam directly out of your magic wishing ring. Also, what's with the scope? You don't need to aim John, it is a magic wishing ring.


JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #38
Written by James Robinson
Art and cover by Mark Bagley
Variant cover by Andy Kubert
A new era begins for the World's Greatest Heroes as superstars James Robinson (STARMAN, SUPERMAN) and Mark Bagley (TRINITY, Ultimate Spider-Man) take over! It all begins as a one-time member of the JLA falls before he can warn the team of looming peril while what's left of the JLA journeys to the heart of their past to decide if the team has any future at all.

Of course, that means this is the best time for a savage villain from the team's past to attack the demoralized heroes! The team will have to muster enough will to win not only today, but in the harrowing months to come. It's the start of a spanking new odyssey for the JLA that will lead in the coming months to a fresh line-up for DC's flagship team. Get onboard now for the next epic chapter of the Justice League's legacy!
On sale October 21 * 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

I was pretty excited (and surprised) by the announcement of this creative team, given that I love the Justice League, but have hated the work of either the artist, the writer, or the artist and writer on the title since it’s troubled relaunch, and it’s been off my pull-list for a while now.

But James Robinson? That guy’s pretty good (although his JSA work was sorta on the so-so side, and the first issue of his Cry For Justice was shockingly bad). And Mark Bagley? I like him a whole lot, and considering he’s one of the few working artists who seems capable of drawing 22 pages of pencil art a month, he should help give the title the visual consistency it’s lacked since it’s relaunch.

As for surprise, I was surprised that Geoff Johns wasn’t writing it, given the hints that have been dropped in Green Lantern lately, and the fact that he’s essentially writing most of the Satellite Era Justice League in Blackest Night at the moment (even if most of ‘em are zombies). But then, Robinson and Johns are pals, and are on the same page in general, so JLoA should at least be “in the loop” of goings-on in the DCU in a way it hasn’t been for a while.

And hey look, there’s EDILW favorite Plastic Man on the cover! Will Robinson keep him around? He did wonders with the Dibnys during Starman, so he’s done right by at least one old-school stretchy hero before.

Personally, I wouldn’t mind seeing the Cry For line-up merge with the current JLoA line-up (John Stewart, Vixen, Dr. Light II, Firestorm II and...is that it? I think that's it) to form a new JLA, but I guess we’ll see. In the meantime, just having an artist whose work I can stand looking at on the title is a big improvement.


JUSTICE LEAGUE: CRY FOR JUSTICE #4
Written by James Robinson
Art and cover by Mauro Cascioli
How far would you go for justice? The heroes have found themselves turning to darker tactics in their search for retribution. Starman and Congorilla have captured the killers who took down some of their friends, but now what do they do with them? Meanwhile, Green Lantern and company wrestle with the idea of torturing villains for information in order to save lives.
On sale October 7 * 4 of 7 * 40 pg, FC, $3.99 US

Oh man, this thing’s only going to be half way over before Robinson’s run on the mother title begins? Interesting that in this issue “Green Lantern and company wrestle with the idea of torturing villains for information in order to save lives.” Um, weren’t they already torturing villains for information in the very first issue…?


SCOOBY-DOO #149
Written by Paul Kupperberg and Frank Strom
Art by Fabio Laguna and Robert Pope
Cover by Vincent Deporter
The gang slips into a slimy mystery when a Nevada mining
town finds itself terrorized by what the locals describe as a giant, mutated snake-like creature! But is a real threat looming? Or is this all just a ruse?
On sale October 21 • 32 pg, FC, $2.50 US

Every month when I'm scanning through these and I come to the Scooby-Doo solicitation, I see the name "Robert Pope" and think for a split-second it says Paul Pope and get super-excited, then realize my mistake and feel heart-broken that the awesome comic I imagined—Paul Pope's Scooby-Doo!—existed only in my mind. For a split-second. At least until next month, when I'll make the same mistake and it will exist for a single split-second more.


SHOWCASE PRESENTS: DC COMICS PRESENTS – SUPERMAN TEAM-UPS VOL. 1 TP
Written by Len Wein, Paul Levitz, Cary Bates and others
Art by Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez, Murphy Anderson, and others
Cover by Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez
Superman meets DC’s greatest heroes including The Flash, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman and many more in this title collecting DC COMICS PRESENTS #1-26.
Advance-solicited; on sale November 18 • 512 pg, B&W, $17.99 US

Fuck yes. It's just like Brave and the Bold, but with Superman instead of Batman.


SUPERMAN: WORLD OF NEW KRYPTON #8
Written by James Robinson & Greg Rucka
Art by Pete Woods
Cover by Gary Frank
Variant cover by Joe Kubert
On a mission in space, Superman and his fellow Kryptonians encounter the might of the Thanagarian Army. Can Superman keep things peaceful between the two races – or will The Man of Steel discover that Hawkman’s legendary temper is shared by all his people?

Retailers please note: This issue will ship with two covers. For every 25 copies of the Standard Edition (with a cover by Gary Frank), retailers may order one copy of the Variant Edition (with a cover by Joe Kubert). Please see the Previews Order Form for more information.
On sale October 7 • 8 of 12 • 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

Oh Man of Steel, haven’t you read any books featuring Thanagarians in the last 25 years? Of course they’re a bunch of winged a-holes just like that cock Hawkman. Actually, the Hawks were supposedly the more mellow, laid-back Thanagarians, weren’t they?

Hey, a Joe Kubert cover on a book featuring some Hawkpeople! That sounds sweet, why I--Oh, it’s one of those 1-in-25 variant scheme dealies, so it’ll cost like $20 at my shop or some shit. I bet it looks cool though!

By the way, have many (any?) of you been following World of New Krypton series? How is it? I didn’t care for the first issue and bailed, thinking if it got better I’d check it out in trade. What’s the verdict so far?



WONDER WOMAN #37
Written by Gail Simone
Art by Bernard Chang
Cover by Aaron Lopresti
It's a civil war – and the world hangs in the balance! Zeus has made Achilles ruler of the Amazons, and Diana finds herself in battle against the people she loves most! And what is the secret behind the sudden rash of pregnancies on Paradise Island?
On sale October 28 • 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

Sex? Is it sex? Or is that too obvious?


GEN13 #32
THE AUTHORITY #15
WILDCATS #16

Hey, they still publish these books? Weird.

The patrons of the Hold It Inn bar in New Jersey aren't very bright

Okay, so a huge, heavily-muscled, pissed-off guy with weird hair, a pair of some kind of crazy shoulder pads and a wrist-mounted crossbow comes into the bar and their first impulse is to make fun of him?

Granted, he hasn't quite made it apparent that he's completely insane just yet—he has two personalities, a fancy-talking smart guy named Donald and a violent, stuttering thug named Roadpig—and he did live his huge-ass cinder block-topped club outside with his motorcycle, but still, dude doesn't exactly have the Safe To Fuck With aura about him, does he?

Now, in the defense of the Hold It Inn patrons, Donald/Roadpig did order a plate of chocolate doughnuts from a bar. What kind of bar serves doughnuts? By the plate full, no less?

At any rate, three panels and a SPLAT! CRUNCH CRACK! later, two of Roadpig's tormentors go flying through the front window and the others are eating his boots and fists.

*********************

That scene was from 1989's G.I. Joe #83, by Larry Hama, Ron Wagner and Fred Fredericks. It was in the stash of old comics I received last week, and one of the handful of issues of Marvel's old G.I. Joe comics I actually bought and read as a little kid.

I remember it very clearly, because of this particular panel:


I thought that panel was totally hot when I was 12. Not only could you can see Zarana's bare mid-riff and left shoulder as usual, but you could also see a small part of her left breast! Wow!

While Young Caleb had a thing for Zarana, the pink femullet-ed Dreadnok and sister of Zartan, it paled next to the crush he had on his true love of the G.I. Joe universe:
Lady Jaye, seen here in a one-panel appearance in the very same issue.

The cartoon version of Lady Jaye was even hotter than the comic book version, as she had a much cooler hair cut on the TV show:
See?

I'm hopeful that IDW will eventually collect the entire 155-issue Marvel G.I. Joe series, in large part so I can find out what happens in this particular issue:
It sure looks promising.

********************

Found in another old issue of Marvel's G.I. Joe series:

This was on one of Marvel's Bullpen Bulletin pages. You can read his responses to a variety of questions if you click on the image. I didn't realize just how long Dwayne McDuffie's been working in comics. It was very cool to read this and see that he had listed his "greatest unfulfilled ambition in the comics field" as writing Fantastic Four. About 20 years later, he got his chance to do so during a short but very successful post-Civil War, pre-Mark Millar/Bryan Hitch run on the title.

A conversation with a casual comics reader

(Above: Just what my apartment needed!)

Anyone who's had to move since they started reading comics is well aware of one of the side effects of the hobby—comics tend to quickly accrue. You may bring them into your house only a handful at a time, but handfuls become stacks, stacks become piles, piles get put into white, rectangular cardboard boxes and those boxes multiply. Comic books are fun to read, they're fun to talk about, some people find the act of collecting them really fun, but man, they are not fun to move from old apartment to moving truck to new apartment.

Robert Duffy, the creator of indispensable Columbus website Donewaiting.com and a friend of Every Day Is Like Wednesday, has hauled comic books from apartment to apartment before, but he's planning to move to New York City soon, and understandably doesn't wanted to have to haul them there. In central Ohio, as with much of the Midwest, space is of course in no short supply, whereas from what I understand, most New York City apartments are only slightly larger than your average comics longbox, and I guess for some reason Duffy didn't want to share a longbox with his wife, cat, dog, and a bunch of old comics he was never going to re-read.

Duffy considers himself a casual comics readers—"I'm not in deep, you know?" he's said a couple time—he had a pull-list at the Laughing Ogre, he's been to local comic cons and to San Diego before, and follows particular writers, but doesn't, like, blog comics are follow comic characters' fictional lives (That is, he doesn't read Batman comics just to keep up with Batman, or X-Men comics because he started reading X-Men comics and wants to keep his collection complete). Like a lot of casual readers, Duffy reads a lot of trades, and he was planning on taking those with him, but as for the comics? The single issues he had in a few white short boxes? Those were going in to a garage sale and, if they didn't sell there, into the trash.

If I didn't want them.

So the other night I met Duffy on his porch, where there were maybe a half-dozen short boxes full of comics mostly from the late-nineties and early aughts, bagged and boarded and not bagged and boarded, and a large, re-purposed grocery store box, crammed with wrinkly, yellowed books from the '80s, although they looked more like they were discovered in an Egyptian tomb of some sort. The books were books of Duffy's, as well as ones a friend who was moving had previously given him (yes, apparently comics are sometimes spread like an unwelcome burden, given from one moving friend to another).

Sadly, there were no first appearances of Batman, or even Spider-Man, but a lot of Vertigo books and early Ultimate books I already had, plus a ton of old X-Men and mutant comics I didn't. (So if EDILW does a Deadpool, Cable, Wolverine or Gambit week later this summer, you'll know who to blame). Oh, and there was exactly one (1) issue of Warriors of Plasm, which is a requirement in every comics collection, I think. I'm not sure I've ever flipped through a set of longboxes without finding a copy of Warriors of Plasm. Maybe they came free inside all longboxes?

Anyway, while looking through the boxes and determining which I'd take off Duffy's hands to add to the comics-midden in my apartment, which prevents me from ever even contemplating moving, and which he should add to the garage sale pile, we, naturally enough, talked comics.

"Oh! While I've got you here in front of me," he said at one point, "Can you tell me, in as simple terms as possible, where Bruce Wayne is at the moment?"

I paused, and then asked if he'd read Final Crisis.

"No, but I read the one where Batman died and came back to life, with the guy who was really his father or not his father."

"Okay. So you read the one where he came out of the ground and was all, 'Batman and Robin can never die'?"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah..."

"And did you read the one with The Lump and the, like, dream sequences and..."

"Yeah, I read the two-part tie-in Morrison wrote, just not Final Crisis or any of this Battle For the Cowl stuff..."

"Okay," I said, pausing again. I suppose the number of follow-up questions necessary to determine how to explain a simple question like where Bruce Wayne is should be a pretty good indication how relatively complicated this stuff is, even for those who buy and read the damn things.

"Okay, well, in Final Crisis, Batman got shot by Darkseid's Omega Beams, which have various effects, including killing people. So Batman was, like, skeletonized by them, and later we see Superman with Batman's corpse. But at the end of the story, there's a scene where we see Anthro the First Boy back in caveman times, and Batman—well, a shirtless Bruce Wane with a beard and his Batman pants on—is in a cave. And he picks up a piece of chalk and starts drawing a Bat-symbol on the cave wall. So he's apparently been sent back to caveman times. In another series, another guy got hit with Darkseid's Omega Sanction [Morrison's four-part Mister Miracle series, EDILW-ites!], and he was sent to a kind of hell where he had to keep reliving his life and all this terrible stuff would happen to him. So that's probably what happened to Batman. Or his soul was separated from his body. Are you reading or aware of Blackest Night?"

He wasn't, as he doesn't read Green Lantern, so we didn't really get into theories of how Batman can be both alive in caveman times and buried in a Gotham City cemetery, although Duffy kind of rolled his ideas at the idea of Batman's corpse being brought back to life as a zombie Black Lantern.

(Aside: Er, how was that? I was thinking on my feet! Is there an easier, more simple way to tell someone where Bruce Wayne is at the moment in DC Comics?)

Duffy mentioned that he just wanted to read Grant Morrison's Batman, and wasn't interested with the crossovers with the rest of the DCU. I mentioned that Morrison was writing Batman again in new series Batman and Robin and that Frank Quitely was drawing it, but the fact that it was former Robin, former Nightwing Dick Grayson starring in the series was a bit of turn-off.

That was prompted by a copy of one of Neil Gaiman's two "Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?" issues. Below that was a copy of Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, and so we started talking a bit about the series' former writer Sean McKeever, who also lives in Columbus. It turns out we both tried out his Teen Titans run and dropped it at the same time (the issue that ended with that huge roster of Tomorrow Titans or whatever the future Titans were called appearing in a cliffhanger splash page).

I dropped it because at that point I was trying to steamline my weekly purchases as much as possible and books I wasn't really enjoying were obviously good candidates for dropping (I was conflicted though, as that was the first time I deviated from my longstanding Buy Whatever Sean McKeever Writes policy). Duffy was turned off by the site of dozens of alternate versions of a bunch of characters he didn't know or care about.

So the news that McKeever was going to be writing a new series for Marvel, but that it would be about an alternate dimension girl version of Bucky who worked with an alternate dimension version of Captain America coming to the Marvel Universe obviously didn't sell him on the series. And that was before I even mentioned the names "Rob Liefeld" or "Jeph Loeb" or Heroes Reborn!

In talking about trades vs. single issues and crossovers, Duffy mentioned that "The Great Fables Crossover" actually forced him to drop a Vertigo monthly. Not out of disgust with the concept of the crossover or anything--he was reading both of the books involved in the crossover anyway--but because he was readign the books in different formats.

That is, he had started reading Fables in trade, so he continued to read it in trade. Jack of Fables, the Fables spin-off following the Jack character and his adventures away from Fable Town and the cast of the main book that live there, launched a while after Fables was already being released in trade, so he was reading that in monthly, single-issue installments. The two books—plus a special, three-part miniseries—started crossing over recently though, which meant Duffy had to quit reading Jack if he wanted to avoid the single issues of Fables.

Crossovers are common to the point of ubiquity in superhero lines of course, but relatively rare for the Vertigo imprint. Other than the Neil Gaiman spear-headed "Children's Crusade" crossover in the '90s, I can't think of any "hard" crossovers in which the chapters of a particular storyline appear in different titles like "The Great Fables Crossover." (Various Vertigo characters would appear in one another's titles now and then of course, particularly in that first generation of Vertigo titles like Hellblazer, Swamp Thing, Sandman and so on).

The point of such crossovers is, of course, to sell more books (if you were just reading one of the two, there's a pretty good chance you'll pick up the chapters in the other book, and, if you like them enough, maybe add it to your pull list—I know from personal experience that when I was first getting into comics, DC sold me on a lot of new series through their summer crossovers like this). In Duffy's particular case though, the exact opposite was true—they lost a monthly, single-issue sale through the crossover.

He'll probably start reading Jack in trade too, but here's at least a single study of a particular publishing strategy pushing a reader of a monthly away from the format and towards the trade format.

"You could do a blog about this," Duffy said. "A conversation with a casual comics reader."

So I did.

An interesting use of comics dialogue bubbles as an art element

Billy Twitters and his Blue Whale Problem is a new children’s picture book written by Mac Barnett and illustrated by Adam Rex, the prolific artist responsible for such books as Frankenstein Makes a Sandwich and Frankenstein Takes the Cake (both of which I’d highly recommend, particularly to comics fans).

To be honest, I didn’t really care for it. Billy Twitters, who would have had a kind of funny name if Twitter hadn’t ruined the word “twitter” for all time, is a grade school boy whose mother is always threatening him with the purchase of a blue whale.

“Billy, finish your baked peas,” she’ll say, “Or we’re buying you a blue whale.”

Having a blue whale, of course, kind of sucks, given the exhaustive amount of care it requires, and the incredible inconvenience of having to bring it to school with you and so forth. But it’s an odd way to punish a kid for not cleaning his room or brushing his teeth.

If Ms. Twitters can’t get Billy to finish his peas or clean his room, how does she get him to haul a blue whale to school with him, or feed the beast ten-thousand-gallon mouthfuls of sea water?

The narrative didn’t have enough interior logic for me to ever really buy the premise, never mind my practical adult questions or the random nature of some of the nonsense.

The pictures are really cool though, and there are some neat blue whale facts couched within the story.

While the book is a straight, illustrated-prose style picture book rather than a comic or comics-hybrid type of story, Barnett and Rex do one pretty neat thing I thought worth pointing out.

Billy’s parents appear in several illustrations, but their faces never do. These are always covered by their dialogue, which, is usually presented in the form of a comics-style dialogue bubble.

The book isn’t devoid of grown-ups, we see the faces of an old boat captain, Billy’s teacher and bus driver, and a delivery man with FedUp (Get it?), and hear dialogue from a few of the above, as well as Mr. and Ms. Twitters. So it’s not as if Barnett and Rex were striving to create a Peanuts-like world without a grown-up presence; they just keep the Twitters as faceless elements of the story. They’re not characters, so much as characters that say particular things to Billy.

It also looks pretty cool.

Here are sections of a few of Rex’s illustrations featuring Billy’s mom and dad:

And here’s one from the title page, in which Billy’s mom storms into the first page to tell Billy to clean up his room or she’ll buy him a blue whale:
Neat, huh?

One good children's book deserves another

Last summer I talked at some length about a children’s picture book with an unbeatable premise, Monkey With A Tool Belt, by Chris Monroe, a very gifted artist with a skinny, slightly shaky line whose drawings are a perfect balance between child-like and professional.

Well, Monroe has a sequel to Monkey With a Tool Belt, entitled Monkey With a Tool Belt and the Noisy Problem (Carolrohda Books).

In this installment Monroe doesn’t restate the brilliant premise in the straightforward, elegant manner she did in the first book (That is, ““Here is Chico Bon Bon. He is a monkey. Chico is a monkey with a tool belt”). Instead, the story simply opens with Chico Bon Bon in bed, being awoken by a loud noise, written as “AROOGA BOOM CLANG CLANG.”

Chico, who is an extremely helpful monkey and not anywhere near as mischievous and malicious as the picture that probably arises in your imagination when you hear the words “monkey with a tool belt,” leaps out of bed to solve the problem, revealing that he sleeps with his tool belt on over his pajamas.

He takes off his pajamas, and Monroe gives us another look at his tool belt and what it contains:
“He had every tool a monkey would ever need,” the narration tells us. What does a monkey need with a pug wrench or a buck wrench? I don’t know. It never comes up.

Thinking it’s the wind, he fixes his bedroom window and goes down to breakfast, but he still hears it 17 times, so then he begins to investigate his house for the source of the noise.

This means busting out such particular tools as his “hear-a-lot-tool” and “stair-staring tool,” but no luck. Then he imagines various explanations, which Monroe provides funny little drawings of (termites, talkative squirrels, etc.)

Finally he searches his entire house, which leads to a wonderful two-page spread that was waaaaaaaay to big for the scanner. Here are the two halves of it:

Would you believe Chico Bon Bon lives in that huge house all alone? I guess that’s the benefit of being so good with tools; you can build yourself as a big a house as you want.

When I finally become a millionaire, and it’s really only a matter of time since comics blogging is such a lucrative field, and I decide it’s time to stop renting and start living in an eccentric mansion, I think I’ll just take a copy of Monkey With a Tool Belt and the Noisy Problem to the architect, open it up to this page and say, “Make it just like this. Only with some trapdoors, and a secret passage behind a revolving bookcase.”

Chico finally discovers the source of the big noise about halfway through the book—there’s something noisy in his laundry chute.

It’s a pretty unusual problem, one few homeowners probably ever experience themselves. I won’t reveal it here, as the discovery is such a delightful surprise, but rest assured Chico is up for the challenge.

In a 12-panel, two page sequence—the only part of the book where it takes on the structure of comics—Chico makes his plans and calculations and, using his banana cannon, he takes care of the problem.

Like a lot of sequels, this one is weaker than the original in that the premise is no longer as original as it was, but it’s still a book about a monkey with a tool belt, and it’s kind of hard to imagine that ever getting old. Monroe is still a great drawer, and, in fact, here Chico seems rounder and cuter here than he did in the first book.

If you only read one new children’s book about a monkey with a tool belt this year, make it this one.

Meanwhile...

I reviewed Kevin Cannon's Far Arden and Jason's Low Moon at Blog@Newsarama this weekend, and Wednesday Comics in this week's issue of Las Vegas Weekly.

Weekly Haul: July 15th

All Select Comics 70th Anniversary Special #1 (Marvel Comics) The lead story in this one is probably the worst of the lead stories in any of these issues I’ve read before, in large part due to Marc Guggenheim’s pretty generic “Murder on Another Planet” script (which, despite this being a Golden Age inspired story, does not actually occur on another planet). The hybrid prose way he presents that story (let the record show that I am not a fan of extended bits of prose in my comics) and the confusion of the setting don’t help one bit either.

The majority of the specials in this series have been set in the Golden Age, with the Young Allies special being set in both the Golden Age and the modern Marvel Universe. This one? I don’t know. It has hackers and hard drives, and heroine The Blonde Phantom talks about how old her dress is and how she’s old-but-not-old, but there’s no mention of her being unfrozen from a block of ice or taking the Nick Fury longevity treatment or whatever. What decade it is and why the main character isn’t in her seventies probably isn’t that big a deal, but, when added to the other minor complaints, well, it’s a lot of minor complaints for a single story.

But Javier Pulido draws the story and looks completely gorgeous so who really gives a shit? It would take some awful, awful writing to cancel out the positives that Pulido brings to the table, and while Guggenheim’s script is somewhat sub-par for the 70th Anniversary Special series, it’s not that awful.

That’s followed by a Marvex, The Super Robot story written and illustrated by Michael Kupperman and it is something. Marvex, an indestructible Super Robot, just kind of wanders around, looking for stuff to do. Mostly, he removes his clothing to show women that he can’t go on dates with them, earns $20 bills, and buys more clothes. (Plus, at least one truly bat-shit insane thing happens, but it’s more fun to discover on your own than have me point it out, I think).

I would be quite content reading a Marvex The Super Robot Does Stuff ongoing series by Kupperman.

But wait, there’s more!

Also included are two Golden Age Marvex tales from 1940, one of which Invincible Super-Blogger Chris Sims detailed here. All in all, not a bad way to spend $3.99.


Batman: Streets of Gotham #2 (DC Comics) I don’t think Paul Dini’s done such a crackerjack job of making this new series a good place for someone who wasn’t already reading every Bat-title to jump on to, something that was at least theoretically possible, given the fact that it’s a brand-new Batman series and that its back-up should attract the eyeballs of the tens of thousands of Manhunter readers.

For example, did you know Dr. Thomas “Hush” Elliot, Bruce Wayne’s boyhood best friend who grew up to be an evil plastic surgeon not only gave himself plastic surgery to look like Bruce Wayne and was being held in a high tech prison cell, but that the prison cell was actually in the new Batcave? I didn’t, until a scene where Alfred was like, “Oh snap, I gotta go check on Hush” and then is in Hush’s prison cell in the very next panel.

Dini introduces a somewhat interesting plot twist near the end of the issue, where Elliot calls a press conference and announces on live TV that he was planning to start giving away the Wayne fortune, as Dick Grayson and Damien Wayne/al Ghul look on helplessly (It’s not like they can be all, “You’re not Bruce Wayne! He was destroyed by the Omega Sanction when that evil god took over the world, right before Superman rebuilt the universe or whatever the hell happened in Final Crisis!” without compromising their secret identities, see).

Unfortunately, Dini does get around to that until around page 18 or so. The preceding pages are mainly tired Batman-scripting as action-figure-playing-with, wherein a Batman (who might as well be any Batman) and a Robin (who might as well be any Robin) must save Gotham City from Rogues Gallery Villain #36, who had teamed up with Rogues Gallery Villain #21, who he betrays, but then Rogues Gallery Villain #21 is luckily saved by Rogues Gallery Villain #45.

Dustin Nguyen, Derek Fridolfs and John Kalisz make for a great art team, though.

The back-up is infinitely more interesting, in large part because writer Marc Andreyko gives the characters he’s writing, those he created an those he inherited from other writers, personalities. It’s a generic vigilante-pursues-villain-in-both-identities plot we’ve seen a million times, but hell, it’s presented with some snap. Andreyko doesn’t seem bored by the task, and the results therefore aren’t boring.

Interesting to see Jane Doe, one of the minor villains Dan Slott created to fill out the cast in his 2003 miniseries Arkham Asylum: Living Hell, being treated as a Batman big bad. Slott only wrote a Batman comic for a few months, but in that time managed to create more villains for future creators to play with than many other Bat-writers do in the space of their entire runs.

I think this will be my last issue of Streets of Gotham for the foreseeable future. I’ve certainly read my fill of these sorts of Batman stories by now, and I’m certain the back-ups will eventually go into future Manhunter trades.


Blackest Night #1 (DC) Writer Geoff Johns has two strong ideas in this 40-page first chapter of a story he’s apparently been wanting to tell almost as long as he’s been at DC (threads from his runs on Flash, Hawkman and JSA also come into play, in addition to all of the Green Lantern material).

One of those is unfortunately a really dated idea, while the other a little more evergreen.

The dated idea is, of course, the zombie angle, which is a very 2002 angle to explore in popular fiction of any medium, and marrying it to superhero comics seemed rather inspired when Mark Millar first did it in 2005 or so. Johns narrows it down even further, moving from superhero zombies to Green Lantern zombies, but it still seems like an idea past its expiration date (And the Black Lanterns work just like movie zombies; they kill characters, and then the recently dead get rings and rise again as zombies, adding to their ranks).

The other idea is that “years ago, the day everyone thought Superman died was declared a national day of mourning. Since he returned, it’s become a day to honor the super-beings who gave their lives protecting the world-- --and the innocents [they] failed to save.”

I like these sorts of little world-building touches Johns occasionally works into his comics, and it gives him a great excuse to run down the various burying rituals and cemeteries of the DCU (some of which he created) and check in with whose dead and who’s morning those dead. It’s a pretty natural way of reminding readers who’s where before launching into the jist of the story.

As for the comic book housing those ideas? I don’t know. It’s not bad, provided you like this sort of thing. The sight of a zombie Elongated Man beating Hawkman to death with his own mace, the arm delivering the beating being naturally elongated, isn’t really the sort of thing I read comics to see. This is gross, it’s decadent, it’s laughably “mature” in the more-gore-and-violence-the-more-sophisticated-the-comic-must-be kind of way, and yes, it balances quite well on that razor thin line between “completely retarded” and “totally awesome” that Johns’ monthly Green Lantern has been dancing upon for the last year or two.

But hell, this is Night of the Living Dead in the DCU—by this point in the game, everyone should be fairly well forewarned as to the fact that Geoff Johns’ Green Lantern is for fans of a very particular aesthetic sensibility and/or embrace of his particular worldview of the DCU.

I mean, Black Hand is licking the mud off of Bruce Wayne’s skull on page two (“SLLK”), by the point where one of the Guardians chomps another, tears out his still-beating heart (“KRAAATCHH”) and holds it aloft (“CCHHRFFFFFF”) and eats it, well, it was hard to even get terribly surprised, let alone shocked.

Surprise and shock are both in rather short supply here, the Black Lanterns that are shown rising are all ones we already knew about or expected, and the characters who “die” are ones DC already telegraphed as far back as Final Crisis (apparently, after being killed in the climax of Final Crisis they had to be un-killed in a few lines of dialogue in Justice League of America so they could be re-killed here).

What I did find in lieu of surprise and shock, however, was satisfaction, and it was satisfying to see Johns bringing closure to certain conflicts he generated years ago or when it became apparent why attention was focused on this or that in other comics before.

That may all seem like faint praise but, hell, how else are you gonna praise this thing, really? I didn’t feel like I had just been mugged, like when I finished an issue of Secret Invasion, nor did I feel disappointed, like I did when I finished the first issue of Final Crisis. So…a success?


Marvel Adventures Avengers #38 (Marvel) Well, Paul Tobin loses some points right off the bat for having a character named “Caleb” in this story, and making him a pigtail-pulling, peer-pushing around little brat. If you must include characters named Caleb in your comics, then they should probably be handsome, heroic comics bloggers.

Okay, so anyway, this is another issue of Paul Tobin’s MA Avengers, so you already know it’s going to be pretty great, right? All that really matters is what the plot is, so you can determine if it’s as great as past issues, and who the artist is, and how great they might be.

Well, the plot is that a class of third-graders won an essay contest and the prize was getting to hang out with the five of The Avengers for the day. The Mandarin decides this is the perfect time to attack the Avengers with his power-sucking Cyclone robot. Hilarity ensues.

The art is by Jacopo Camagni. I really want to say this is the best looking art I’ve seen in an issue of Tobin’s run on MAA, except I think I might have said that before. Maybe Camagni also drew the issues I said that about before? I don’t know. I suppose I could look it up, but that sounds like an awful lot of work to go to just to say that this is another fun, funny issue of my favorite Avengers comic. (And since there are currently about eight Avengers comics, that’s saying something!)


Rasl #5 (Cartoon Books) I may have said this four times already, but I half-wish I would have waited to read this in trade, as I tend to forget elements of the plot between issues, only to be reminded of them while reading the new issue. But then, I love the fact that Smith is publishing this as a comic book at all that I don’t want to not read it in comic book form.

Basically I’m saying it’s a big story, with a lot of moving parts, and I don’t feel I’m going to do this chapter much justice in a few hurried paragraphs.

The art is still great, I still love the tactile experience of reading it (the way it looks, smells, feels), Smith is still introducing outré ideas that make me think the story is still getting bigger and weirder than it’s dimension-hopping art-thief first issue implied, and I still haven’t quite gotten used to the ideas of Jeff Smith drawings smoking cigarettes and doing it while talking n Jeff Smith-lettered dialogue bubbles.


Wednesday Comics #2 (DC) I was curious if the novelty of this…project would ever wear off and, if so, at what point. I’m still wondering, as it hasn’t worn off seven days later. My intense curiosity about the format was sated last week, and my excitement and awe over it has waned, but my affection for it hasn’t.

Not yet anyway.

So…how to talk about this…maybe a sentence on each? That’s fifteen sentences. That sounds do-able.

Batman answered my question regarding how the strips would reference the previous ones, tackling the problem of keeping the reader up-to-date; apparently by not repeating panels or story points, but working that information organically into the story. Wednesday Comics trusts its readers a lot more than most newspaper serial drama/adventure strips trust their readers. (Okay, that’s two sentences, shut up!)

I’m not a fan of the sort of hybrid storytelling seen in Kamandi (see my complaining about it a few reviews up), but goddam can Ryan Sook sell a Jack Kirby-as-Prince Valiant strip.

So Superman and Batman are dating right?

Deadman remains awesome. Green Lantern? I like the art, but hate the coloring…particularly around the character faces.

Man, fuck Neil Gaiman for teasing me with the existence of a comic book starring “Metamorpho’s Canine Pal, Element Dog.”

The second installment of Teen Titans includes backgrounds this time out, as well as “older Titans” Nightwing, Starfire and Cyborg. What is this feature even doing here?

When they collect Paul Pope’s excellent Strange Adventures strip, I sure hope they"He has the strength of ten Paladors” as a cover blurb.

In Supergirl, Krypto chases the mailman. Well, the U.S. Postal Service.

Dan DiDio’s script for Metal Men is cheesy, but in an acceptably old school sort of way, with each character making a pun about their powers in the space of two panels.

Ben Caldwell’s Dr. Poison is a wonderful design; give this man another Wonder Woman project in a normal comics format when this thing is all done, guys!

That Nazi in Sgt. Rock holds his cigarette the way a very evil or very effete man might.

In this week’s Flash Comics, Iris West walks in on Barry doing something you never want your loved on to walk in on you doing.

My thoughts while reading The Demon/Catwoman were two: “Damn, these are nice drawings” and “Nooooooooooooooo! He’s not rhyming!”

Kyle Baker’s Hawkman is fucking fantastic; having the winged hero fight sky-crimes is so simple and yet still seems inspired. In the last panel, he tells the remaining terrorists on the hijacked plane, “Your companions are dead. The rest of you will envy them before I’m done with you.” And then there’s a little blurb saying “Next Week: Mile High Clubbing!” Apparently, Hawkman is going to have violent, violent sex with the terrorists next week? Now that’s a cliffhanger!