Convergence: Supergirl: Matrix #1

This issue should be called "Supergirl: Bum #1".

One of the reasons I can't stand lawmakers (as opposed to how I like everybody else so much) is how they spring to action to create a new law for public safety whenever anybody dies or gets hurt. But they only do it to make it look like they're doing something positive instead of merely sitting in a domed building collecting money from lobbyists to create fucked up laws that nobody ever hears about. They don't want people to know about those laws but if they spend all their time making those laws, it looks like they're slacker politicians that spent their term playing Angry Birds. So up here in Oregon quite a few years back (there are other more recent examples but I want to go with this one!), a police officer was killed on the side of the highway while performing a traffic stop when a car veered off the highway and hit him. So law makers rushed to create a law that said drivers have to move to the left and clear the lane by the shoulder if a traffic stop is taking place. The only problem with this stupid fucking law is that it wouldn't have saved the police officer's life in the accident that prompted the law because the kid that hit him fell asleep at the wheel. But the politician who came up with it got to stand around proudly proving that they were committed to the safety of the public! Or at least public servants. Plus it was a nice stupid fucking law that could probably raise some revenue through ticketing.

Lawmakers also tend to make laws that actually do the opposite of public safety. I would argue that laws proclaiming that pedestrians always have the right of way makes crossing the street more dangerous. People are stubborn and careless with their lives when they know they're in the right. Here's how to make everybody safer on the streets: tell them their lives are in their own hands and allow everybody to build up their cars like the cars in Road Warrior. Then turn traffic court into Thunderdome.

Goddammit. I actually had real points to make and then I couldn't stay serious. I should go into politics just to see if I could get the Mad Max Bill passed!

This comic book was written by Keith Giffen so should we set up the Supergirl Version of the Keith Giffen Drinking and Eating Cookies Game (last seen in Threshold #8)? If you want the game to be wholesome family fun, you can choose to drink milk. Let me remind you of the rules!

1. Whenever a character says “literally”, you have to take a shot. If they use it correctly (very rare!), you get to eat a cookie instead!
2. Whenever a character defies another character (without violence), drink.
3. Whenever a character acts rationally and engages in normal conversation when confronted with defiance or potential violence, eat a cookie!
4. Drink every time somebody is punched or kicked or hit with electricity.
5. Eat a cookie every time something is annotated.
6. Finish your drink whenever a character dies. Or thinks they've died. Or comments about how they're going to die. Finish everybody's drink if the character is Blue Beetle or Booster Gold.
7. Eat a cookie every time Keith Giffen writes a meta-textual statement.
8. Drink after every time you turn a page.
9. Drink every time the panel layout looks like the opening to the Brady Bunch. Although this is more of a Keith Giffen as artist rule.
10. Take a dainty sip of alcohol and a tiny bite of a cookie whenever Supergirl's bum makes an appearance. Okay, this doesn't have anything to do with Giffen but look at that cute bum!
11. Drink whenever Batman makes an appearance (mandatory rule for all DC Comics Drinking Games).
12. Two drinks if Lady Quark and Lord Volt bicker.
13. Eat a cookie and take a drink whenever a joke is repeated. If you remember the joke from a previous Keith Giffen comic book, write a letter of complaint to DC Comics.
14. Finish your drink if Planet Brainiac mentions a convergence!
15. Drink if Supergirl punches somebody before asking their name; eat a cookie of Supergirl is punched while asking the other person their name.
16. Drink and eat a cookie if you have to read some dialogue more than once to get the gist of what they're saying.
17. Down three shots if Supergirl and Lady Quark kiss.
18. Finish your drink with a cookie in your mouth if one of Giffen's jokes actually makes you laugh out loud (Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea is not responsible if you choke like an idiot).
19. Eat a cookie every time a female character does a Boob/Butt Showcase (if the character is Supergirl, remember Rule #10!). Drink a beer every time a male character does.
20. Finish a six pack if Ambush Bug somehow makes an appearance in this comic book.

I don't know if I'm going to remember all of these rules as I read the comic book because I just made most of them up. At least when I made up the rules for the Threshold Drinking Game, I had seven previous issues to know exactly what Giffen loved doing with the characters in that comic book. But he's still Giffen so I have a feeling most of the rules have a pretty good chance of taking place. Except the Ambush Bug one and the one where one of Giffen's jokes makes me laugh.

Uh oh! Get your cookies and drinks ready!

Eat four cookies for the four annotations even though two of them are commenting on the same bit of text. I think the title of the comic, "Who the Hell is Lord Volt?", qualifies as a meta-textual comment, wouldn't you? Eat up! Take a dainty sip and tiny bite because Supergirl's fantastic bum is totally right there in your face. I think you should eat one cookie for Supergirl's Boob/Butt Showcase and throw a cookie against the wall for Lady Quark's horribly aborted attempt at one. Also, is her costume painted on her? And I'm going to have to finish my drink with a cookie in my mouth because the title did make me laugh. Dammit.

Take a drink because we're turning to page 2!

Supergirl meets up with Lex Luthor pouting in the park. Since he has red hair and isn't bald, I'm guessing this is the Junior Alexander Luthor variety. I think he's depressed because Superman was away on business when Metropolis was taken away. Now he has nobody to try to kill. Nothing worthy of drinking or eating cookies happens on pages 2 and 3, so drink again as we turn the page.

On Page 4, Brainiac makes the Multiversal Thunderdome announcement but skips the line about a Convergence, so it's a missed opportunity to finish your drink. If you're thirsty, you can say "Bugger all!" to the rules and just drink whenever you want, you know. I prefer anarchy anyway.

Turning to Page 5 so take a drink!

The dome recedes and Supergirl gets her powers back. Although I guess she retained her natural, protoplasmic ability to look like Supergirl or else she would have spent the last year in a Petri dish. Thanks to the advertisements, we're now turning the page again to Page 6! Drunk! I mean drink!

Luthor, while being a complete dick to Supergirl, mentions how much he hates when people say, "Look! Up in the sky!" I think that qualifies as a meta-textual comment. Eat a cookie!

I don't know if this qualifies as Rule #16 but I reread it a few times before realizing I'm not meant to understand exactly what Supergirl is talking about yet. So eat and drink. Or not. Whatever!

Turning the page! I've lost count of the number! Drinks!

On the page I can't remember, Lady Quark and Lord Volt make their first appearance. And even though I've never read a comic book where Keith Giffen has written these two characters, they pull off Rule #12 about...let me count the panels...five times! Possibly more! I don't know if this is all one big bicker or several bickers across time!

I'm not sure Giffen knows how to write dialogue that isn't complete bickering. If I had made the rule any time any two characters bicker, we'd all be dead by now. And fifty pounds heavier.

Turning another page! Drink up, sluts!

This is the page where the confrontation happens! Lord Volt threatens Supergirl but Lady Quark doesn't approve of the way he does it and they begin to bicker for the rest of the page while ignoring Supergirl. I think the page has five completely separate topics about which they bicker. So that's ten drinks!

Plus a dainty mini-meal! Rule #10 is the best! Okay, turn the page! I said turn the page! I said...get your hand out of your pants! Jesus!

I can't be completely sure that Giffen is repeating jokes from other comic books but I have a feeling he's just writing Blue Beetle and Booster Gold and told Timothy Green II to draw them as Lady Quark and Lord Volt. So you should probably write a letter to DC Comics. I don't know what their new West Coast address is though!

Lady Quark calls Lord Volt gay and Lord Volt mentions how black that kettle is and then Supergirl is all, "Y'all are both so very, very gay!" Then Lady Quark and Lord Volt are all, "Look who's talking!" And Supergirl is all, "I'm a protoplasmic ball of organic slime! I have children by fission! Which is probably what Luthor was hinting at back there when he was talking about a spurt of children!"

Look, this comic book is just one long bickerfest. Just finish all the alcohol you have in the house. Plus a bite of cookie because that bum!

After Lord Volt says that "There you go again" line, Lady Quark hits him with an electric bolt. That's a drink. When she does that, she doesn't go into a Boob/Butt Showcase exactly but she definitely develops the waist of an Escher Girl.

That costume is definitely painted on.

Supergirl flies off to mess with the gadget Luthor gave her and to let Lady Quark and Lord Volt fight it out. While she does, I need to catch up on my drinking after all that bickering. I should probably just finish the huge bottle of sake in the fridge. Be right back!

GLUG GLUG GLUG GLUG!

Okay! Now I'm ready to fake being drunk!

Lady Gaga and Lord Voldemort catch up to Superbum and say, "You and us and me are going to battle, you got that, tits?" And Tits is all, "I have the things to do that don't involve the punching and the kicking and the electric bolt blasting." Then the beards bicker for awhile. Then they turn back to Supergirl and go, "No. We must fight now. It's in the contract, see?" So Supergirl is all, "Okay!"

But then after agreeing to fight, Lord Volt is all, "Wait! What?! She wants to fight Lord Volt?!" And Lady Quark is all, "More like Lord Homo!" And he's all, "Oh, that's nice coming from Lady Queer!" And the readers are all, "Jesus Christ, Tess! What the fuck?" And Tess is all, "Are you fucking reading this comic book? I'm only slightly fucking paraphrasing this shit!" And the readers are all, "That's no excuse!" And Tess is all, "Stop picking on me! I have feelings too!" And the readers are all, "Oh, so you can dish it out but you can't take it?" And Tess who is me is all, "I'm going to quit if I'm criticized!" And Scott Lobdell is all, "Welcome to the club!" And I'm all, "I wish you'd quit!" And Lobdell is all, "Hashtag I love cookies and Hashtag drink up and Hashtag hashtag abuse!" And then everybody has to drink a bunch more because of this:

"Hi! My name is Supergirl! Pleased to meet you!"

Too bad we're all out of alcohol and cookies by this point because here's some more confusing conversation! And it's not confusing for the usual reasons that Giffen's dialogue is confusing! I think.

Supergirl's bum kind of makes an appearance! Masturbate! I mean, drink and eat! Daintily!

Holy shit my stomach hurts. And not from laughing, Mister Giffen! After Supergirl throws Lady Quark into the street using her telekinesis, her device begins meeping again. That's when Supergirl says, "You're alive! Anthropomorphically speaking!" And the "anthropomorphically" is annotated because who doesn't learn what that means in third grade? And it isn't annotated with a helpful definition (because Giffen knows people already know what it means), it's annotated with an aggressive note to the reader! Sheesh! I didn't pay four dollars to be yelled at! Go fuck yourself, DC Comics!

Supergirl finally gets fed up with the device Lex gave her. A device that's supposed to look for the machinery capable of teleporting Metropolis to another planet. So when it finally started working and Supergirl began following it, I completely forgot to remember that there is one person in the DC Universe that loves Metropolis and also teleports.

I know I told you to drink all of your alcohol but who knew this would actually happen?! I sure as hell fucking didn't when I made Rule #20! Go out and buy a six pack and drink the fuck up, motherfuckers! Ambush Bug is back, baby!

Convergence: Supergirl: Matrix #1 Rating: Holy shit! Not only is Ambush Bug back but Cheeks the Toy Wonder as well! I was preparing to photoshop Ambush Bug into the last page of this comic book to declare that everybody get drunk and then he actually appeared! I'm so elated! Moments like this are what makes successfully avoiding spoilers so satisfying. I hope Ambush Bug becomes an important player in saving all of the cities! And with Cheeks back, I should actually pitch my Cheeks the Toy Wonder comic book idea to DC Comics! Although I might have to publicly apologize to all the employees of DC Comics if they're ever going to consider hiring me to do anything. I don't even think they'd hire me to mop floors at this point! Although, seriously, what are the chances they even know this site exists?!