Comics Of The Weak: Thank You Sir, May I Have Another? In The Hair, If You'd Like. You Earned It.

Wednesday Comics # 1
Written by Baker, Azzarello, Pope, Kubert, Gibbons, Bullock, Arcudi, Busiek, Gaiman, Berganza, Palmiotti, Didio, Caldwell, Kerschl & Simonson
Art by Allred, Pope, Conner, Lopez, Nowlan, Caldwell, Kubert, Fletcher, Stelfreeze, Risso, Sook, Baker, Heuck, Bermejo & Quinones
Published by DC Comics
Edited by Mark Fucking Chiarello

It's really fucking big, that's for sure.

Okay, this is actually a pretty nice surprise. A giant comic book, a list of creators that's got to have at least one fist-pump "fuckbloodyyeah" reaction in even the most jaded and cynical reader, a willingness to give those creators free reign to make the stories their own (and not continuity's), a sneering cuff on the chin to the "i must have mint copies, for I worship a false idol" types, and another shot for Mark "Shit, I actually care about art and taste" Chiarello, a guy who knows full well that more people talked about how brilliant Solo was than actually, you know, bought the fucking book. Wednesday Comics: it's more than was expected, possibly more than what is deserved.

Is it a surprise that not all the content lives up to the format? Naah, not really. Anybody who read "Aquaman saves the baby Jesus from pirates" already knew that Dan Didio's writing ain't going to cure herpes sores anytime soon. There had to be at least one "is this what children like, i've never met one" story, this one tastes like the Teen Titans. The only story that really shoots to utilize the one-page style as a done-in-one is a somewhat confused take on Little Nemo, featuring Wonder Woman. Everything else looks to be using a variation on the Prince Valiant "see you next time" serialization. But it's a comic--nay, a super-hero comic, for the most part--that's got some serious ambition to it. That's rare enough. This is a ride worth taking.

Batman # 688

Written by Batman

Art by Batman

Published by Batman

In a way, you can come up with a better interpretation for this story if you just make up your own personal thematic connection between the pages, like it's 2008 and you're still trying to come up with a way to apologize for Tony Daniel. Like, the first three pages is Dickbat--what's his clever nickname? is that his clever nickname?--getting the crap kicked out of him by an unseen person using Harvey Dent's fist. And then on the fourth page, it's three weeks prior, and Dickbat is smiling and prancing for the cameras like a ninny. So just stop reading there, and make your own decision on what the story is saying: it's saying that Batmen who smile are weak ass Batmen, and they will be punished with a beating. See, if you do that bit of intellectual calisthenics, you can skip the part where Dick acts like the runner-up to prom queen, you can skip the page where sweat gets colored with a sparkle pen, and you can avoid seeing Dick and Damian wear the Delta 6 Accelerator Suits from that awful looking GI Joe movie that's advertising itself as "From the Director of The Mummy", which...sorry, why isn't that an insult? The Mummy? Wouldn't it be more attractive to say "from the guy who ruined your daycare experience and caused all your failed adult relationships?"

So yeah, those first four pages. Alternatively, you can just read the whole comic and pretend you don't know why your hands are shaking.

Green Lant...

geeazus, what the fuck is this?

Green Lantern # 43

Written by Geoff Johns

Art by Doug Mahnke, Christian Alamy & Randy Mayor

Published by DC Comics

You're supposed to complain about how gory this is, apparently. Or you're supposed to talk about how awesome sauce it is. One of the two. There doesn't seem to be a lot of middle ground about it, like you either think this is just the Tits, or you think it's just for sick fuckups. You can't just be in the middle, is what we're saying. But god, it seems like that would be the most immediate response to a story like this, 20-odd pages of some creepy loser who sleeps, Requiem For A Dream style, at the bottom of an open grave when he isn't retelling his origin. He does this so he can get himself worked up enough to go and kill his entire family before killing himself--with a crazy flashlight?--all of which leads up to some little Gremlin thing vomiting jewelry on the floor. It's not offensive, suspenseful...it's not anything, really. It's just...that's the stuff that happens in it. Doug Mahnke draws it, and he does a fine job of depicting the events that are described, in that you can tell that's what happened. They aren't exploitive, they're just all matter of fact drawings of horrible things. But that's it, really. It's just a bunch of random stuff that happened in some asshole's life surrounded by portions where he sleeps in open graves, and like most comics that Geoff Johns writes, every single page reads like it could be the first or the last. That's sort of the problem with all these Green Lantern epics though--they don't dream very big, and without the dream, they don't build--which is the only thing that never-ending super-hero stories can do, it seems. Sinestro Corps was their big action epic, their big cosmic throw down war, and yet it was just a lot of people screaming at each other and killing each other with jewelry. The Black Lanterns--which is about raising people from the dead, so they can wear jewelry, probably kill each other--that's going to be more of the same. Screaming and violence. There's no high stakes involved. Nobody wants anything beyond killing somebody else, just because they're in the general vicinity. It's not like it would be better if it was about bank robbers or something. It's just not very epic to find out that the big problems that the Galaxies Ultimate Space Cops face are going to be the problems caused by a dyspeptic smurf and a creepy deviant who wears black vinyl. Don't these stories have a vomiting cat too?

R.E.B.E.L.S. # 6

Written by Tony Bedard

Art by Claude St. Aubin, Scott Hanna & Jose Villarrubia

Published by DC Comics

You used to get porn videos by buying them at gas stations with a fake id, or by "borrowing" them from older brothers, shit like that. So you'd make do with what you got, which is how you'd end up remembering weird shit when you actually got down to the real business of penis-in-other-person. Nowadays, you got the internet, and shit, it's whatever you want, 24/7, so you can just focus really specifically on your predilections, as soon as you decide what those are. But every once in awhile, you'll accidently stumble across something you'd never have picked out in the first place, like BBW incest POV stuff, and it's like the world teaches you something all over again, because fuck, this may not be what you think you're going to like, but hell: it's likable!

That's pretty much R.E.B.E.L.S. It's a comic written by the same guy who wrote all those Birds of Prey issues where the main bad guy was the Calculator, it's full of characters actively working towards irrelevance, and it does splash pages where a bunch of Dominators--those yellow aliens with the exposed teeth--get the shit kicked out of them by bad guys from other terrible comic books. And shit man, it ain't what you wanted, asked for, or anticipated. But it will make you cum. You just have to be open minded.

Crossed # 6

Written by Garth Ennis

Art by Jacen Burrows & Juanmar

Published by Avatar Press

In case Chronicles of Wormwood wasn't evidence enough that Jacen Burrows should draw more "cutesy animal comics", the latest installation of Crossed includes his blow-the-Pet-Avengers-out-the-box depiction of a dumbass canine so adorable it practically crawls off the page and nuzzles your crotch. It's still got all the depth and texture of plastic wrap, but fuck: this guy can draw the cute. The rest of the issue is a jacknife tonal shift away from last installment's "let's just talk and walk around in the moonlight", but it stops so short of the initial status quo (being gross) that you can practically hear the tires screech. After six issues, Garth's committment to the idea of the post-apocalypse as a place where nothing happens, so everybody gets disgusting to fill the time, has turned itself into the modern day equivalent of Brenda Starr. "Ready for nothing?"

Born ready.

B.P.R.D. 1947 # 1

Written by Mike Mignola & John Arcudi

Art by Gabriel Ba, Fabio Moon & Dave Stewart

Published by Dark Horse Comics

Whereas Some Guy: Witchfinder might have read like there's a bit of content exhaustion over in the Mignola-verse, the opportunity to see the Brothers Casanova tear ass through the properties of Davis & Azaceta would even make repititon worthwhile. And in a way, that's what you're getting: it's the same mix of high octane easy cheese that made B.P.R.D. 1946 such an electric remix of classic BPRD tropes. The nazis are roaming into grisly deaths, the death girl debutante has returned, and Hellboy is still relegated to cutesy adolescent cameo. The new squad of soon-to-dies aren't relatively new--one of the guys fought on the Normandy Beach, just like every other World War II soldier in a comic, another one survived a Shackleton-style horror expedition--but they're sturdy and loud, which is exactly what BPRD does right. 1946 was one of the best comics of 2008--Fuck You--and seeing the well returned to, with a couple of inventive artists in tow--that's cheer-worthy shit right there.

Frank Castle Is The Punisher Comic Book # 72

Written by Victor Gischler

Art by Goran Parlov & Lee Loughridge

Published by Marvel Comics

The current storyline in the horribly named Punisher MAX comic is one where the Punisher has been added wholesale to the plot of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the story has been reset in a Southern bayou. Unlike previous not-Ennis writers, Victor Gischler has been smart enough to realize when he's struck gold, so he's laying back in the cut and letting the scenario work itself out. Hopefully, that will teach other writers to do the same, and the next few years of not-Ennis Punisher stories can consist of Frank Castle messing around in all manner of classic films. He could go to Antarctica and fight The Thing, he can go to space and fight HAL, he can fall asleep and wake up in Los Angeles and fight Rutger Hauer, and then he can go to a high school and kill Fred Savage in front of Winnie. That show was fucking lame.

-Tucker Stone, 2009

Comments

[Chris]

Have you even read another Green Lantern comic? You make it sound as if Geoff Johns just pulled the events of issue 43 out nowhere. The "flashlight" has been used by the Black Hand since the 60's and the vomiting "gremlin" has been in issues of Green Lantern on and off since Sinestro Corps War. Additionally, you obviously didn't understand the conclusion of Sinestro Corps War because it explains that the entire reason Sinestro started the war (and even why he created his Corps) was to force the Guardians to rewrite the Book of Oa. I'm not saying the issue will be for everyone, but if you want to be so critical, at least admit you haven't been paying any attention to the story that's been building for over a year.

[Tucker Stone]

okay. i haven't been paying attention. it's still a boring comic book. i don't believe reading a years worth of back issues will change that.

[Chris]

Fair enough. Also, you should be reviewing Grant Morrison's Batman & Robin. Or do you only review comics you hate?

[Sean Witzke]

Admit it Tucker, admit it you motherfucker.

[John K(U.K.)]

Yeah! Busted! You totally hated on Wednesday Comics and that REBELS thing too! Face it, you gave up on life, didn't ya! Also, you should be getting more fruit than that in your diet.

[Chris Jones]

I loved that Green Lantern issue. I thought it was one of the best things written this year, sincerely. I'll have a review of it on my site later in the week, but daaayyyyum. I liked it a lot. MUCH better than the average issue of Green Lantern in my eyes.

[Kenny Cather]

" a list of creators that's got to have at least one fist-pump "fuckbloodyyeah" reaction in even the most jaded and cynical reader"

I must be more jaded and cynical than I thought, because the only creators that piqued my interest are Gaiman/Allred and Baker.

" But it's a comic--nay, a super-hero comic, for the most part--that's got some serious ambition to it. That's rare enough. This is a ride worth taking."

I dunno...maybe for people who get excited about design, but at $4/apiece, I can't find anything worthwhile about it. But I'm much more a function sort of person and I don't see what function any of this serves. If they were done in one stories, then that would be pretty cool - like a superhero version of Kramers Ergot.

[seth hurley]

You didn't even talk about how there is a Green Lantern CORPS and a Black Lantern CORPSE.

I can rub your neck while you write these if you need me to.

[MarkAndrew]

"a list of creators that's got to have at least one fist-pump "fuckbloodyyeah" reaction in even the most jaded and cynical reader."

I had a conversation about this at my shop, and cold, hard, facts say you are wrong. Many readers like things that are horrible.

(Your comment section confirms.)

And I got a little lost in the first review: DOES Green Lantern have a vomiting cat in it?

[Joe Willy]

So, you have a read a year's worth of comics to appreciate the new issue? Not exactly a ringing endorsement. Did you have to watch "Breakin'" to fully understand the nuance of "Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo?"

Yeah, sparkle pen sweat beads is a good description for the ugly coloring in that Batman comic. For a second all that red/blue coloring reminded me of Creepshow- you always know the "scary" stuff is coming because Romero breaks out the red/blue lighting to telegraph it. In this case I guess it was a warning that a 10 year old was going to be drawn like a 25 year old (you could only distinguish him from the adult by the color gloves they were wearing). My just-turned-8 son even asked "isn't he supposed to be a kid?" Which lead to yet another discussion of how some artists/writers/colorists/letters can't do their job well (Marvel's Adventures line is rife will spelling and grammatical errors). Speaking of which, anyone else notice Judd Winick using the wrong word in one instance? When DickBat is whining about his cape (which we've already read him do in Batman & Robin) he says: "I'm not going to augment my fighting style for the sake of the costume!" Isn't this an incorrect use of augment, shouldn't he have just used "alter" since he means he's not going to change? It stuck out and perhaps explains why I hear so many bad things about Winick's writing. I only bought this for my son and haven't read any other Judd Winick comics. Maybe I should augment my purchasing habits, by which I mean not buy any more Judd Winick comics.

[david brothers]

Green Lantern has a vomiting cat, yep. It vomits blood.

Also, Green Lantern was only really enjoyable if you imagine that Black Hand had, not a flashlight, but a Fleshlight. It makes the book funnier.

Otherwise, that joint was terrible. Beautiful, but terrible. Who cares about space power rangers doing interpretive dance?

[Nathan]

It's weird, I completely understand why people dislike GL and stuff, but I still can't feel anything but white hot love for it.

Guess autism must be contagious, what I get for using my brother's toothbrush that one time.

[Guy Smiley]

"You make it sound as if Geoff Johns just pulled the events of issue 43 out nowhere."

Yeah, Stone. Geoff does not pull this stuff out of nowhere. He pulls it out of his ass!

I'm just starting to page through someone else's copies of the Sinestro Wars storyline, because I got tired of waiting for the trade, I guess. Tucker's right, it's much shouting and fighting, and it's just ... "We've turned this comic up to eleven. Other comics only go to ten, see, but ours? Ours goes to 11."

I would actually like to read a Green Lantern comic, I suppose, and some of Johns' work has pointed toward the GL book I'd like to read. But this ...?

I looked at Blackest Night (by the way, the cover -- Bruce Wayne's grave? He's not really dead. So they ... I guess ... oops, stopped caring) and it looked like more. More "11," the point and plot of which is to be as eleven-y as possible.

[Nathan]

" (by the way, the cover -- Bruce Wayne's grave? He's not really dead. So they ... I guess ... oops, stopped caring) "

Superman was holding a body wearing a Batsuit in FC, so they buried that and assumed it was Bruce

[Chris Jones]

I gave in and bought Wednesday Comics.

I think I will be back next week.

[Kenny]

"Superman was holding a body wearing a Batsuit in FC, so they buried that and assumed it was Bruce"

And people wonder why comic sales are almost dead?

[david brothers]

Why would that mean comic sales are dead?

[Chris Jones]

I think he's saying that the heroes in the DCU must be retarded to assume that just because a dead body in a Batman suit was found, that dead body has to be Batman. I would be hard pressed to disagree.

Halloween must get just traumatic for these dudes.

[Kenny]

No no no, I mean if Batman's dead, he's dead, right? Like, if you kill Batman and have a story called Batman RIP and stuff, it's logical to assume the old Batman, Bruce Wayne, is dead.

But no, he's not? Another Batman died? So, Batman RIP wasn't the death of Batman?

Like, this stuff is so totally insular that there's no way to even understand very basic concepts, like someone being dead. I feel superhero comics are so completely insular there's no hope of getting people who aren't currently reading them to start reading them. Like, if someone stopped collecting comics for say, I dunno, 5 years, would they even have a clue what's going on? Could they catch up, or would it just be totally pointless?

Don't get me wrong, I like a healthy superhero comic market. While they're not my cup of tea, I don't have anything against them in the abstract. What I do have a problem with is books that are so confusing. So, even though the guy in the old Batman suit died and they buried him - that wasn't Bruce Wayne? And if you read enough comics, you know that? So, if you're not reading the entire line of DC comics, you're thinking Bruce Wayne is dead? I don't get it.

[Kenny]

And yeah, Chris Jones is right on, too. If a superhero dies, doesn't it just make intuitive sense to take his mask off so you can tell his family? So, it's not really a huge assumption to think if they're going to bury a superhero, they looked to see who it is. Otherwise, why should the readers believe anyone is who they say they are under their mask? It calls into question the basic premise of the book.

[seth hurley]

Projecting real world logic or intuition onto fictional 70 year old characters written by hundreds of different is insane.

It's a given that people can fly but completely without reason that they don't lift a mask?

That is pathological behavior on the part of the reader.

[Jake]

a sneering cuff on the chin to the "i must have mint copies, for I worship a false idol" types
--------

I admit, this is part of the reason why I want Wednesday Comics to succeed. I wanna see fanboys cry. I really, really do.

[Kenny Cather]

"Projecting real world logic or intuition onto fictional 70 year old characters written by hundreds of different is insane."

"That is pathological behavior on the part of the reader."

So, I'm insane and/or pathological?

Think of it this way. Have you ever been to a funeral where someone was buried in the exact clothes they died in?

I'm saying - if a basic assumption such as that one doesn't apply to superhero comics, and readers are just supposed to know that sort of thing going in, then the world of superhero comics is hopelessly insular. So, unless you're in the inertia of reading superhero comics regularly, there's no realistic hope of ever picking a story up and understanding things.

I dunno, maybe this is where my disconnect with superheroes lies. I feeling thinking, "Well, we never saw them take off the mask for the funeral, so clearly it's a different person," is too far to stretch, but if you don't, cool. I just think that stretch is so far that it's a barrier to people buying more books.

I need to get off this soap box and move on. Call me "insane," call me "pathological," whatever, but I see rapidly declining comic book sales and I don't think that's good for anyone.

[seth hurley]

"Think of it this way. Have you ever been to a funeral where someone was buried in the exact clothes they died in?"

Of course not, but then I have never seen someone punch the universe and bring that person back to life, so what does it matter what clothes they were buried in? They are going to smell like a tire fire full of hobos anyways.

Readers don't need to know that going in, as there are no readers coming in. I agree with you, the genre is completely insular. Publishers are interested in getting their existing readership to buy more titles, not bring in new readers. New readers of old media? No way, that is what movies, cartoons, video games, toys, and underwear are for.

I don't really care about new readers, declining sales or if the industry dies. I will read something else. Maybe go for a walk or tell my mom she made awesome pancakes for dinner when I was a kid.

What I do care about is readers who complain that "Batman shouldn't smile" or "Nobody would do that in the real world" since they get in the way of me talking about how fucking great Jim Aparo is.

If those things are your sticking points for why you feel a disconnect, great man, at least you know why, can articulate it, and enjoy other books. It's the guys who make the above complaints and still read this shit that make my dick soft while I think of the KGBeast, and that isn't fair.

so, so unfair.

[Zebtron A. Rama]

I don't car if Zombie-Batman's puking up the ectomplasmic likeness of Geoff Jones as long as it's written and drawn well. (Think about it...Grant Morrison could pull it off)

That being said, Wednesday comics was the bomb.

[Matthew J. Brady]

Yes, Kenny, Batman didn't actually die in RIP. He "died" in Final Crisis. I know, this stuff doesn't make any sense, does it? You can probably still pick up a Batman comic and figure it out, but nobody except addicts like Tucker want to.

Batman and Robin is an exception though, but you still need to know one or two things to get it. It's all explained pretty well, so it works anyway, but all the other stuff seems pretty stupid. Superheroes! They suck!

[AERose]

"Green Lantern has a vomiting cat, yep. It vomits blood."

Reading this made me think of that one Achewood arc where Ray and Bensington Butters end up in Mexico and the juxtaposition of Green Lantern and Achewood made me :)

Then people started REAL TALK arguing about the logical mechanics of superhero comics and it made me :(

(It doesn't help that I'm sitting here thinking "this argument is bunk. The body they buried WAS Batman's, but because the effects of the Omega Beam are weird and magical Batman is also alive in the prehistoric past. Don't these people even read comics? GAWD." Man, I'm terrible at this.)

[david brothers]

I just leave that continuity cop stuff for the birds and obsessives. Whose body did they bury? Who cares!