Comics Of The Weak: Someday We Should Just Admit That We're Looking To Get A Big Juicy Hard-On, Like We Did From Mister Miracle

Batman Odyssey # 5
Written by Neal Adams
Art by Neal Adams and computers
Published by DC Comics

If there's any comic that can get away with mis-cutting the pages in such a fashion that four of them have the word balloons sliced neatly in half, thus resulting in a loss of text, it's this one. Sure, you'll miss some of the "jokes" as well as portions of the "plot", but truthfully speaking, the pleasures of Batman Odyssey aren't tangled up in those sorts of pedantic concerns. This comic is pure trainwreck fascination--why does Aquaman look like that, what's keeping Talia's breasts in place, why is Commissioner Gordon so quick to give Robin a ride, and seriously, is Bruce Wayne narrating this comic fully nude? And sure, you could get the same "look at this world's failure" thrill by reading the twitter feeds of Newsarama employees, but Odyssey is a route that doesn't produce a pesky "will these hands ne'er be clean?" attitude.

Shadowland # 5
Written by Andy Diggle
Art by Billy Tan & Guru eFx & Victor Olazabu
Published by Marvel Comics

Not much you can say about this one. It's the last issue of a mini-series where Daredevil was the bad guy, because he'd been possessed by a character last featured in Elektra: Assassin, which was a pretty decent comic that came out back when "taking chances" meant more than complaining about the treatment you got from American Airlines on fucking Facebook. You'd think this might be interesting to read--after all, everybody who read it hated it, and since everybody skipped Thor the Mighty Avenger and it was so wonderful that Jesus nearly came back to cook you a panini, you should always do the opposite of whatever everybody does and you'll end up only reading good comics. (Is that how it works?) Turns out a stopped clock is right twice a day, or whatever else it was that alcoholic vegan I thought was my father told me right before he said "come get these comic boxes out of the garage or I'll tell you exactly what it is that keeps me from loving you".

Detective Comics Annual # 12
Written by David Hine
Art by Agustin Padilla
Published by DC Comics

The one thing that Batman hasn't had in common with other DC characters in the last few years is pretty obvious: people still want to buy monthly comics featuring him. Superman and Wonder Woman comics keep setting records for how many readers they can shed, Green Lantern is incapable of producing consistent interest if he isn't involved in some kind of everybody-in-the-pool crossover, and the Flash gets a new relaunch whenever somebody shouts "nobody puts baby in the corner" loud enough. Batman's ability to survive is only surprising if you're smart enough to ignore comics websites--the company has spent the last year rearranging chairs and titles so often that it seems like DC is being run by the guy who prints their business cards, so it's not a shocker that Batman's hasn't experienced a break-this-so-it-can-be-broken experience to claim as his own.

Luckily, Grant Morrison came up with an idea that's going to pay off handsomely: Batman Incorporated. It's an unlimited credit card for DC to pump out a bunch of half-cooked stories, because all a writer has to do is propose the opening of a Batman office in whatever random countries Morrison hasn't claimed for himself, and bang, DC has something to fill out all those random spin-offs that they seem incapable of saying "no" to. And sure, you might think that brand dilution is a concern, but if you think that, you're probably waiting on Santa Claus to get your parents back together, because everybody over the age of six knows that Brand Dilution is the only business model that DC's executive team remember from their Devry classes. On top of that, we've just hit a solid ten years of not giving a shit whether the art in continuity comics makes any fucking sense whatsoever, so DC's free to hire the cheapest possible hands to churn out the most random stuff they can find--like this annual for instance, which is apparently about Batman's fetish for hiring strangers and making them wear the ninja henchmen costumes left over from Batman Begins.

Uncanny X-Force # 2
Written by Rick Remender
Art by Jerome Opena & Dean White
Published by Marvel Comics

Reading Uncanny X-Force is like sitting attentively through a Harry Potter fan-video with a Garth Brooks spousal abuse soundtrack: every fiber of your being will tell you that what you're doing benefits you nothing, and yet you sink in deeper, intoxicated by the thought that you'll soon be swallowed whole. And while all of the credit may be due to Jerome Opena's Euro-inspired pencil of detail, it's hard to forget about Daken (he's the dark wolverine), which remains a visual feast, and yet reads as if all possibility of pleasure has been surgically removed. God knows if something like this—the wonderful trash, about a team made of crazies, led by a monster, hunting a little boy—can maintain, but for now, this is your donut, powdered with cheap speed.

B.P.R.D. Hell on Earth: New World # 5
Written by Mike Mignola & John Arcudi
Art by Guy Davis and Dave Stewart
Published by Dark Horse Comics

And so we reach the conclusion of an action-heavy episode in Dark Horse's long-running B.P.R.D. series, and while the tale ends up being a particularly well-told piece of stand-alone pleasure, it's a bit curious--is this what we're doing, now? Monster-of-the-week stories, incremental movements in the lives of our heroes? Oh, it isn't a bad thing, if that's the case--hell, pick a television show that's still doing the once-a-week story well, name a comic, there isn't any comparison; this is the Mignola-verse, these are the one cherry bed left, a place where the visuals are a point of pride, where the stories are tightly plotted and no apologies (i just like art/i just like story) are required. It's a good comic, this one. But when something you love has been great before? You know how that story goes.

Widowmaker # 1
Written by Jim McCann
Art by David Lopez, Alvaro Lopez & Nathan Fairbairn
Published by Marvel Comics

This isn't actually a new mini-series, it's the next issue in a series that just got cancelled. Same creative team, same characters, and the story is a direct continuation of whatever happened in the last issue of Hawkeye & Mockingbird. Marvel tried this same thing with the Agents of Atlas franchise, and while it worked for a little while, it eventually didn't. This probably won't be any different--whatever it was that didn't catch on with Hawkeye & Mockingbird won't catch on in Widowmaker, but the whole point of the choice has nothing to do with actually pleasing anyone, it's just a numbers game. Widowmaker #1's first issue sales have to beat Hawkeye & Mockingbird's last issue sales, and then whatever mini-series follows Widowmaker has to beat the last issue sales of Widowmaker. That cycle will continue until it's no longer profitable to do so, and then some other title will receive the same treatment. One could argue for the book's quality--it is competently made--but none of that has any relationship to why it exists. And since Marvel is so blatantly going to treat it like a product, here's the only review that matters: it comes with paper and staples. On that front, your mileage will not vary.

R.E.B.E.L.S. # 23
Written by Tony Bedard
Art by Claude St. Aubin, Scott Hanna, Rich & Tanya Horie
Published by DC Comics

In this comic, the reader discovers that one of the rewards of being promoted from cadet status in the Green Lantern Corps involves "customizing" one's uniform, and there's probably no better indication of the tediousness of the Green Lantern concept than that moment, as "customization" revolves around re-arranging the black and green colors on a form-fitting bodysuit. At one point, a character mentions that the rings "choose" their bearers based off "how good power rings are at reading the content of your character". Following that one down the logical rabbithole, part of one's "character" is tied up in being an unimaginative douchebag? To its credit, that seems to be one of the main narrative threads of the R.E.B.E.L.S. series--that Green Lantern's are a bunch of boring tools, and the only mature response is the one the main character of this series so frequently delivers: reminding them of this constantly.

The Incredible Hulks # 618
Written by Greg Pak
Art by Paul Pelletier, Danny Miki & Paul Mounts
Published by Marvel Comics

Here's the background plot for this issue: some bad guy named "the chaos king" made everybody in the world go to sleep, and then he made all the dead people rise up to "walk the earth", and then the Hulks showed up to fight them. (But first the Hulk cries.) If it mattered that this is the third time in recent memory that a super-hero "event" story revolved around zombie characters fighting living super-heroes, then this might be a subject of ridicule. As it is, the only way to figure out whether this is laughable or not would be to play catch up on a bunch of series that are so toxically unfriendly they should probably just rename the cross-over "Go the FUCK AWAY", and that ain't happening, at least not until they cut the number of Hulks in this book to a manageable number. Like eight.

The Boys # 49
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Russ Braun & Tony Avina
Published by Dynamite

Whereas a recent issue introduced a never before seen omniscient narrator who showed up to give a scene extra melodrama it most certainly didn't require, this issue contains a confusingly plotted flashback sequence that strains the dwindling goodwill that's been extended towards The Boys for the last year. Now that it isn't just the art that's falling apart, it's starting to seem like Dynamite's "editors? nahhhh" methodology might not be that great of an idea.

Wolverine The Best There Is # 1
Written by Charlie Huston
Art by Juan Jose Ryp & Andres Mossa
Published by Marvel Comics

This is the new Wolverine series. It's a thought project designed to make you believe that serious Wolverine comics focused on topics like "the animal inside" and "the cycle of violence" are what Wolverine comics should always be about. This way, anytime someone complains about comics where Wolverine talks a lot, has girlfriend trouble, grieves over whichever fellow X-men is currently on coffin rotation, or basically does a bunch of boring shit like cry a single tear and let Spider-man get away with asking him out for "sushi and talking" (that actually happened), Marvel can point at this The Best There Is thing and say "look, we did one that was just focused on exploitative violence, and it was a piece of shit, you don't know what you're talking about." It's a mean idea, but it's not a bad idea. It'll probably work too, because this is totally the piece of shit you'd need to prove that point.

Batman & Robin # 17
Written by Paul Cornell
Art by Scott McDaniel
Published by DC Comics

The big question with comics that are often referred to as “fun” is what the fuck “fun” actually means. See, some people use the word “fun” to refer to comics that don't have rape or giant vagina shaped monsters in them, comics that focus on people patting each other on the back and grinning like Bruce Vilanch just showed up on a unicycle, while other people just use “fun” to indicate that they read something really fucking stupid, knew it was fucking stupid, and still enjoyed it without feeling the need to come up with arguments for why the people involved in said thing's creation are some kind of collective of geniuses. When “fun” is used as a slam—as it should be for this comic—it can be in reference to dopey shit like a couple of people jumping into an open grave to have a conversation, in which it's revealed that the open grave is a crime scene that's now rendered completely useless in terms of evidence gathering. But dopey shit isn't enough: for “fun” to be a slam, the comic should also have 1) jokes that aren't funny 2) a general failing to conceal the mercenery nature of the product and 3) i don't know. Like this:

 

Invincible Iron Man # 32
Written by Matt Fraction
Art by Salvador Larroca & Frank D'Armata
Published by Marvel Comics

We're out here on the edge of the pop consciousness, making trips to the seventh sector, this is just what Kirby would've dreamed off if he had lived in a bisected digital mind, retweet that, yesss, and this: it's talking, baby. The talk-talk-talk. Underscore it, if you feel it. I'm saying--wait, i'm saying. Talking. Talk.
--
I've never wanted to be in comics, more, you know? Like: living the dream. My super-hero power is making up arguments why what I do should be called art.
-

See, some people--i call them "fanboyz"--they complain to me baby. Baby baby, I'm telling you that they complain to me. They say: Nothing ever happens in Iron Man comics. Wait-Aziz is calling.
-

Nevermind, I text him later. Bananaphone. I was saying?
-
Oh yeah, nothing happening? Fix the way you read, that's the program. The action IS there--it's in the salt, the meal is prepared. I have the the matrix on lockdown, i rub them with oils. The three kings, you understand language.
-
The art? I don't look at it. Its like--is there a better word than Chi? Chi seems retro. I'm more about the futuristic. But chi: i can't look at art. The words are art enough. Them shits flow like the river Styx. One love.

-Tucker Stone, 2010

Comments

[Amy Lopp]

Best line = "whatever else it was that alcoholic vegan I thought was my father told me right before he said "come get these comic boxes out of the garage or I'll tell you exactly what it is that keeps me from loving you"

[Lugh]

thanks for that trenchant showcasing of what makes a tucker stone diatribe work, amy

[Chris Jones]

I don't remember you being this much of a dick in the past, Lugh.

[Tucker Stone]

lugh--you get that Amy and I share a source uterus, right?

[John Fellows]

WOLVERINE: THE BEST THERE IS is the most insanely targeted piece of shit I've read in weeks. There's a scene where Wolverine gets monged on happy gas and cuts people's hair in a nightclub? And has a go at Simon Cowell? The issue is how I imagine a WOLVERINE comic would read if you based the script entirely on things you scrawled in a dream diary at 3am. Like, if you actually just woke up at 3am and rang your artist and just hazily explained this awesome dream you just had. Only it actually happened.

I made it roughly 3 pages into that DETECTIVE COMICS annual before I realised the reason I couldn't turn the page was because I had both hands jammed into my eye-sockets. There's some nice art in the backups, if you ignore everything else about it. Including its existence.

[Jim]

I'm not sure whether I think the Shadowland storyline was thoroughly disheartening or oddly admirable. Now that it's over, I can see it for what it was meant to be, a masterpiece of scorched earth. Sure, Marvel is going to carry on with the pretext of rejuvenating their "street-level" characters via another pointless Heroes For Hire launch (I only hope they can top the tentacle rape controversy from the last series), but clearly, the true purpose of the story was to kill off any interest in Daredevil for the foreseeable future. On that score, the creators involved could hardly have been any more successful. And have we really lost anything in this transaction? Another year or three more of redundant Matt as martyr stories, perhaps. So thanks, Marvel, for that, at least.

[LurkerWithout]

That Wolverine book just makes me sad. I mean it could be the best comic about Wolverine ever written. But Charlie Huston wrote "The Mystic Art of Erasing All Signs of Death", one of my favorite books for '09. And this year had a pretty damn good new school cyberpunk book in "Sleepless". Not to mention his more often enjoyable then not Joe Pitt vampire series. And yet he still felt like coming back and writing a fucking WOLVERINE book...

[Lugh]

Man. I try to be Mr. Cool Internet Guy once and it totally backfires on me. Sorry.

As for Shadowland, I heard that Diggle really, really, really didn't want to do it, but wanted to write Daredevil anyway, so he just phoned it in. If that's true, it sucks that they scuttled his run so fast with crossover bullshit. I mean it took them what, 11 years to screw Peter David with that, right? Of course, I could totally be full of shit.

[Chris Jones]

It's alright Lugh, it happens to everyone.

Also Tucker I think I need to apologize to you for giving you so much shit about liking Rise of Arsenal since I'm pretty sure how you felt about that comic I feel about The Best There Is.