Justice League of America # 33
Written by Dwayne McDuffie
Art by Rags Morales, John Dell, & Pete Pantazis
Published by DC Comics
If you look at the last page of this comic, it says "To Be Concluded", but if you look at the "solicit" information for the next issue, it's apparently about the Royal Flush Gang fighting the Justice League, which is a story that's been told so many fucking times that it's mostly a surprise that this latest incarnation of the Justice League comic took 34 issues to get around to it. Either way, this is the last hurrah of Dwayne McDuffie's tenure on the JLA title, as he's been canned due to not being able to lie and say that writing Justice League comics under editorial fiat isn't as awesome as really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really stupid people think it would be. There's seriously a large enough group of people who think that it would be fucking dope to be handed a list of nothing but C-list DC characters and told "make this work, and try to convince the readers they should give a shit about Salvation's Run and Tangent revamps while you're at it" that that group gets to show up at local bars and clubhouses and start "debates". Wasn't part of debate club that the other side couldn't be made up by people who need bibs when drinking out of a straw? Since when did democracy and free speech mean that you had to listen to the opinion of hamsters on deforestation? Justice League of America: nobody understands you anymore.
Written by Brian Michael Bendis
Art by Billy Tan & Matt Banning
Published by Marvel Comics
The best way to enjoy an issue of New Avengers, if you don't really like the artist for New Avengers, is to figure out which funny voices the characters are speaking in, and then read the comic as if it is an off shoot of that voice. For example, Captain Bucky America is regularly featured in a title where he usually comes across as competent and terse. When he appears in the New Avengers, he seems confused by both the people around him and breathing. So when he stops prior to a big assault and starts telling everybody that they "need guns", no matter that Spider-man cries around guns because he can't stop obsessing about the random pervert who raised him for all of ten minutes and was shot at some point, by a scary gun, you should imagine that Captain Bucky is talking like that fat guy from Super Troopers, when that fat guy from Super Troopers stood in the doorway and said "Cream? Cream? Anybody want cream?" After that, the pieces start falling into place. Wolverine can be Gilbert Gottfried. Luke Cage can be any cool black guy you see on television who hangs out with white people for no logical reason whatsoever, because that's the way Bendis writes him. You get the point.
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Jacen Burrows & Juanmar
Published by Avatar
After four issues, five if you're counting # 0, Crossed finally veers into controversial territory, with Ennis and Burrows delivering a game-changing "Nobody Dies, Nothing Gross Happens" issue. Don't be fooled by the wrap-around cover--the only individual going postal here will be the reader, who will settle down for an evening in, looking forward to a comic full of testicle-exposing underwear and infanticide by way of Pulling Really Hard On Hands & Feet, only to find out that they've been had. Yep, this is it: the chapter where Jacen Burrows gets to draw a two-page spread of nature photography. The part of the story where Garth Ennis has a male character respond to another male's "I happen to be a homosexual, thank you very much" moment by saying "Huh....like, really gay?" That one never gets old.
Wolverine # 72
Written by Mark Millar
Art by Steve McNiven, Dexter Vines, Jay Leisten, Morry Hollowell, Nathan Fairbairn & Paul Mounts
Published by Marvel Comics
The problems with Millar's Old Man Logan story can all be laid at the feet of hoary old "predictability" complaints--if you read the first issue, with Wolverine's touchmetal retelling of William Munny's backstory as his own, then you already knew what was coming: if a Wolverine story opens with Wolverine refusing to use his claws because of a promise to his kids, that means you'll eventually reach a point where those kids die, the promise dies with them, and then there will be a Snikt, and we'll be back in familiar territory. And so we are, and so it happens, and while Millar can, and has, written generic boilerplate Wolverine-kills-everything stories with pizzazz and panache before, this one goes down a lot more blandly. Will it matter, when the story is collected? Probably not. It reads quickly enough, that's for sure. But it's just another mercenary comic, and another piece of evidence why Mark Millar, for all his success, doesn't have anything that interesting to say. Lookie at all those drawings of dead people though! That shit is edgy as hell.
Written by John Arcudi
Art by Zach Howard, Mark Irwin & Wes Dzioba
Published by Dark Horse Comics
Whereas the original Alien comics started showing up back when the film franchise was a going concern involving actual filmmakers, the last couple of Alien related flicks were so bad that the bar has effectively been set at absolute zero. (Unsurprisingly, Predator, the other stalwart Dark Horse movie comic is right around the corner as well.) For the most part, this thing is the same kind of jazz as any of the older ones where, although Dark Horse somehow convinced John Arcudi to head back to the movie comic bench, which gives it a sheen of overkill. (Does the target audience for Aliens comics really check the credits prior to purchase? This shit ain't Judge Dredd.) Some artist you've never heard of who knows enough to stick with Giger imitation, a bunch of space miners, and a hint of problems to come--what a cum-curdling surprise. Although the entire mini-series probably won't be that interesting, it is kind of pleasant to watch Arcudi go through the motions of Introducing The Cast only to have almost of all of them massacred before the first issue even ends. It's like watching Death Proof for the first time and thinking the movie is going to be about the characters who yammer throughout the opening scenes. It's still a comic book spun off from a film franchise that should've been smothered in the 90's, but hey: original ideas are hard to come by in comics. Just ask Chris Claremont.
Written by Mark Waid
Art by Diego Olmos & Marta Martinez
Published by DC Comics
One of the minor problems created by the juvenile sexism super-hero comics so often contain is that when it comes time for a male character to turn to a female character and say "You really should mind your own fucking business" or "Why don't you shove your bitch advice up your ass" maybe "Just because I didn't sleep with you doesn't give you the fucking right to judge me, cunt", it can't happen, even though it should, because that's how anybody would react if some lady walked up and said "I realize we barely know each other, and we aren't in a relationship, but I really think you should change the way you live your life because your current existence is one that would be a disappointment to your parents, who were shot right in front of you." Especially if the female follows that up by handing the male a fucking diary and pen followed up with the smug sanctimony of "Write the story of your future. Chart a destiny for yourself, Bruce Wayne. Live a life of meaning."
Yeah. Hey lady. Lady that we'll never see again. Lady that Bruce Wayne barely knows.
Go fuck yourself.
Written by Fabian Nicieza
Art by Dustin Nguyen, Guillem March, ChrisCross, Jamie McKelvie, Alex Konat, Mark McKenna & Guy Major
Published by DC Comics
Although the Tony Daniel portion of the Battle For The Cowl show ended last week, there's still this thing to get through, which is the follow up to Battle For The Cowl: Gotham Gazette: Batman Dead?, which means DC made the stupidly optimistic assumption that the people who read that particular piece of fucking garbage back in early March decided to hang onto their copies so they could find out what kind of two page follow-up chapters there are in the story of Leslie Thompkins, a character that is about as interesting as it would be if she were a real person who hung around and insulted your life choices the way she insults everybody else. Jesus Christ, when did fucking general practitioners get such a fucking ego? If anybody ever read an issue featuring that irritating character and walked away thinking "I'd like to be a doctor when I grow up," that's a comic reader who should be crushed under a cashew truck. Beyond that, it's nice to know that the world of comics still equates "having a scar on your face" as being a shortcut to "badass", becasue Tim Drake has one now. Nice try, Nicieza, but Tim Drake? The only way you can get more whitebread pussy than Tim Drake would be if he magically turned into the only Robin who is also a My Little Pony.
Written by Jeff Parker
Art by Kyle Hotz & Frank Martin
Published by Marvel Comics
The room was a dark one. I'd been there before--not too long ago, if I remembered correctly, but it was all a blur of sweat and degradation, promises and lies, prostitutes and pies. "You're doing good for us", he said, his voice hinting that the sentence wasn't finished yet, "we're wondering if you might be what we call a team player." The snickering fuck in the back room said something, that guttural prick toying with a jar of moisturizer, I couldn't hear it, but I didn't care. He was out of ideas anyway, everybody in the room knew it, it's why i was there. "The sales figures are in", came the voice from the corner, a jovial tone from that sycophantic monster, "maybe you want a challenge." A challenge, I thought? Wasn't picking up after Claremont and Winick, trying to make that fucking Exiles thing work..wasn't that challenge enough? How much farther did I have to go to prove myself, I wondered. There was a folder on the corner of the desk, the stubby fingers flipped it open.
No, I thought.
Goddammit, no.
"How about the Hood", they said. "Think you could make that work?"
It took everything in me not to run away screaming. Before I knew what was happening, the contracts were signed. It's two months later now.
I can still hear that fucker laughing.
Written by Joshua Dysart
Art by Alberto Ponticelli & Oscar Celestini
Published by Vertigo/DC Comics
Your enjoyment for Unknown Soldier can probably be gauged by your answer SAT question:
Although Angelina Jolie's adoption of babies from 3rd world countries is a very ____ thing to do, it might also help if the bloodthirsty warlords of Uganda were framed for her murder, because then the millions of tabloid readers of the world would _________ about what happens in Uganda.
A. HAWT....know
B. selfish....still not care
C. adorable....give a shit
D. i like chicken....i like fish
E. It's so hard when my husband looks at me and says "Did you do anything besides gossip and eat bon bons today? Don't lie. I've got a camera in the Hummel cabinet."
Africa!
-Tucker Stone, 2009
As soon as I scrolled to the picture of the "Gotham Gazette" issue, "Come Running" by Van Morrison started playing.
And now I don't think I'll ever be able to look at that cover without thinking that Gordon is standing outside of his apartment, waiting for Batman to run into his arms.
"With your hound dog by your side
And your arms stretched open wide
I wanna keep you satisfied
In the morning sun"
Posted by: Chris Jones | 2009.06.01 at 00:27
"Wasn't part of debate club that the other side couldn't be made up by people who need bibs when drinking out of a straw?"
Nope.
Posted by: AERose | 2009.06.01 at 16:29
Yeah, but seriously, if Batman's parents were alive, and saw him running around in his bat-tights and his bat-plane pretending to be a bat, they'd probably just slink away pretending to be dead still.
Posted by: moose n squirrel | 2009.06.05 at 11:55