Like that irritating rash on your crotch that won’t go away, it’s the best comic book review column that you and your friends may or may not be reading!
Last week’s pick-ups were small, and one was so hard to read that it took days to finally get this column started. Which one was it? FIND OUT BELOW!
And beware of the spoilers!
Action Comics #3
UGH. What a mess this one was. I had been enjoying this series (other than the endings) too up until this point. We start out with a completely random sequence showing robotic creatures invading Krypton and Baby Superman barely escaping thanks to Momma Superman. Turns out the entire sequence is a dream, and Clark Kent is rudely awakened by government types searching his apartment for evidence against him because apparently Clark is writing bad things about them in his paper and on his blog. We suddenly jump to Clark eating at a diner and watching news reports on TV of people calling for Superman’s head since he’s a destructive alien. Then we get a bunch of random crap that has nothing to do with the story and goes nowhere when all machinery on Earth is suddenly taken over by the same robots that destroyed Krypton. And they plan on destroying Earth too. It literally took me three tries to actually sit down and finish reading this thing. Not a good sign. Jumped all over the place and was VERY hard to read. What a disappointment, especially after the first two were generally very good.
Detective Comics #3
These lesser Batman titles are really starting to blend together, especially since the regular Batman series is blowing everything else out of the water. Anyway, this is the one with the Dollmaker cutting people’s skin off. So the cliffhanger ending from last issue is that it isn’t really Commissioner Gordon that has been killed, just a dead dude with other people’s skin sewed on. Yuck. Anyway, Batman is able to escape Dollmaker’s clutches and takes a goon with him. We find out that Gordon is alive, although they’ve taken some of his organs. The girl from the first issue, Olivia, informs Gordon that he can only escape with Batman’s help. But she’s really been brainwashed into thinking she’s Dollmaker’s daughter, and Gordon unknowingly sets a trap for Batman. When Batman arrives at Dollmaker’s hideout, he is captured and tied to strings like a puppet. The issue ends with Dollmaker unleashing “The Jokers” (victims surgically altered to look like the Joker) on his new puppet Batman. I ended up really liking this one by the end, but this series’ problem (and 99 percent of the other Batman comics) is that it’s too forgettable. Oh, I did also enjoy the brief backstory of Dollmaker, which explained why he has a vendetta against Gordon.
Batgirl #1
This was a holdover from my original post on all of the New 52s I read, that I never got around to reading until just now. Let’s see what happens. The Internet has been ragging n this one because apparently Batgirl was left paralyzed from the waist down in a previous storyline and now she isn’t. We start things off with “The Mirror” killing an old man and crossing names off his hit list, and Barbara Gordon is next. Meanwhile, Batgirl foils a home invasion and we get a little backstory, basically that she was shot and paralyzed by Joker but somehow has been fully healed. She moves out of Commissioner Gordon’s house and moves in with a chick, but before they can get to know her, Batgirl is called to action as the Mirror strikes the hospital room of the criminal who led the home invasion at the beginning. It’s Batgirl to the rescue! Or maybe not, as Mirror points a gun at the same spot she was shot at previously, and she freezes, allowing for Mirror to kill the crook. A downed cop declares Batgirl a murderer and the story ends. Intriguing comic, but I doubt I’ll continue to pick it up since it blends together with all the other Batman titles.
Catwoman #1
Remember how I said I would start reviewing this one because I needed more consistently bad comics to review? Well here we go. You may remember how I sort of criticized Wonder Woman #1 for having a bunch of random nudity/T&A? Well the first whole page of this one is Catwoman in her undies, putting on her outfit and digging through her underwear drawer. I should point out that her bras and thongs have way too much detail drawn in than is necessary, making me wonder what exactly the artists were thinking about while drawing this one. So anyway, Catwoman’s apartment is invaded by thugs and blown up for some reason. She actually laments the loss of her underwear, the horror! So Catwoman crashes at her friend Lola’s place, and gets hooked up with a gig as a bartender at a strip club frequented by Russian mobsters, where she overhears their secrets since she speaks Russian. She also seduces criminals in the bathroom, and for no reason whatsoever we get spread-eagle shots of strippers when she escapes the club. Then she’s approached by Batman and in one of the most ridiculous things I’ve ever seen, proceeds to have sex with Batman, with both in their full costumes. And we’re out. This was weird, but I give it the edge over Wonder Woman because the story actually made sense, although it doesn’t appear to be leading anywhere. We’ll see where this goes. I also find myself wondering if the people writing and drawing this comic are sexually deprived nerds or something.
Let’s finish things off with some MARVELocity...
X-Men #20
I reviewed #16-19 of this series, which is basically X-Men Team-Up, a while back and saw the new one was on sale and thought “why the hell not” and snagged it. It’s actually pretty cool! This one starts off with an arms deal going down in the Czech Republic in the middle of the night, with some Sentinels being sold. But the deal is broken up by some special agents, who turn their attention to X-(wo)Man Domino, who was photographing the entire deal for the X-Men. On their way to help out, a group led by Storm encounters War Machine, who warns that the Eastern Europe area is about to be in a territorial war, and international incidents are brewing, so he wants the X-Men out of the area. Of course the X-Men disobey and before long, Colossus and War Machine are fighting each other. Storm tries to step in, telling War Machine that the Sentinels are a bigger threat. And almost as if on cue, one of the stolen Sentinels attacks, critically injuring Domino. This one flew by, and was pretty enjoyable. I actually like this series better than the main X-Men line, at least as of now. We’ll see how everything turns out.
Uncanny X-Men #1
So this is the story of the Cyclops led X-Men team, and basically a reboot of Uncanny X-Men. We start off with some small backstory, as Cyclops has moved his team to a laboratory on Utopia Island, located in San Francisco Bay. Cyclops assembles his team and talks about how they need to work together to get the public to view mutants in a positive light again. But things soon go awry after a few weeks of training when a villain Sinister (the same guy writing the book in Uncanny X-Men 544) takes control of a giant robot on the outskirts of San Francisco and forces the X-Men to fight some robots. It takes the help of Namor and Colossus transforming into the Juggernaut to stop the threat, but Sinister crashes the head into the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, hyping it as some sort of carnival, and the issue ends. Really confusing ending aside, this wasn’t bad, it was just really dull. But it was necessary to set up the future stories. I enjoyed this one a LOT more than I did the Wolverine version, which is saying something because I like Wolverine way more than Cyclops. I look forward to seeing where this one goes.
OVERALL, a weak offering this week, with X-Men #20 being my favorite and Uncanny X-Men following closely behind. I’d avoid the DC offerings though. Though I should point out there was an issue of Amazing Spider-Man released, which was the conclusion to Spider Island. Like I said, I’ll review all of those in a single column, sometime soon. Hopefully this week, along with another column for this week’s releases!
Coming Next Week – Batman and Robin #3, Green Lantern #3, a new series, Avenging Spider-Man #1, and OH HELL YEAH, Ultimate Spider-Man #4!
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