Convergence: Blue Beetle #2

Fists for everybody!

Here's a secret: I hate you all. You all disgust me.

Now please enjoy this review I wrote especially for you!

Convergence: Blue Beetle #2 was written by Scott Lobdell which means you probably love it. You have absolutely no taste. Your ability to discern intelligent, well-crafted writing is as vibrant and alive as a still born baby in the toilet of the downstairs bathroom at a junior prom. Your approach to living is as haphazard as a seventeen year old boy trying to undo his first bra on his exasperated underage cousin who only got into this situation because she wanted to see her first erect penis and was willing to endure some awkward groping of her newly budding breasts to satisfy her curiosity. That last sentence probably titillated you, you disgusting perv. I can't believe I'm writing this review for you.

Even I never assumed Lobdell could Lobdell a first page even worse than he usually Lobdells it.

Somebody once said (and I know it wasn't you because the last time an original thought flitted its way through your mind, Bill Cosby had yet to rape his fourteenth victim. So, you know, a long time ago) that the first page of a comic book sells the comic book and the last page of the comic book sells the next one. This page is not trying very hard to sell anything except blue paint for the walls in your downstairs pantry. I don't know who said that previous thing about first pages because most of my brain space is used for coming up with original thoughts (as opposed to yours which is mostly used for remembering the items on the Taco Bell menu). It is not used for remembering quotes or who they should be attributed to.

Blue Beetle's question "How hard can it possibly be..." ends with "...to fight a flying legion of super-heroes?" He goes on to say, "You know -- when I started that question it was supposed to be rhetorical." It still is rhetorical, Blue Fuckyou. It's rhetorical because it's a silly question meant to show that you realize the odds are stacked hugely against you. You never once fucking expected a realistic answer that would somehow save you from the situation you've found yourself. But guess what? I suppose you morons reading this commentary probably chuckled at it. You probably thought, "Why that Blue Beetle! Always keeping his sense of humor even in the face of overwhelming teenagers!" No wait. You never would have said that because it only played on a cliche and didn't actually deliver one. Replace "teenagers" with "odds" and that's more like something you'd say. Also maybe misspell a few words and punctuate the statement like Howard Mackie might. Or like Scott Lobdell considering his use of the double dash in the previous Blue Beetle quote.

Also, why is Blue Beetle asking the questions? It seems to me one of the other Charlton characters is much better suited for that task.

Firstly, "Blue Beetle" isn't a stretch. If you're Dan Garrett. I suppose if you're Ted Kord and you're just borrowing the name from Dan and have no actual relationship to the blue scarab, it's kind of a stretch. Secondly, how does he know "Cosmic Boy" is a stretch? He doesn't even know the kid's powers. They could be totally cosmic and boyish!

Blue Beetle pulls the old "Surrender and we'll let you live" routine that so many other Convergence characters prior to this have used. Now, it's not Scott Lobdell's fault that I'm reading his comic book nearly last and I'm as sick of this plot as I am of your breath, so I won't harp on it too much. But Blue Beetle is acting awfully arrogant for a guy whose only power is the ability to constantly verbally abuse his friends.

While Cosmic Boy, Timber Wolf, and Brainiac 5 speak with the Charlton gang, the rest of the Legionnaires float around in the sky in standard action figure poses. They must realize that there are far too many of them for Scott Lobdell to deal with. Oh, look how cute you are, turning red and sputtering because I ended that last sentence with a preposition. How much does it bug you that I know it and I don't give a fuck?

Typical Scott Lobdell. Everybody is more amazing than the next person right up until he's written enough pages for the month.

Tracy is in charge of a computer that can decode Interlac in 0.06 seconds but she doesn't know enough to realize Interlac is a language and not just a "something." Also, she doesn't know how to write her decimal correctly in her speech bubble. Not that it matters when Neanderthals like you are reading the comic book.

Colossal Boy shakes the Bug which will probably be the best part of this entire comic book even if nobody inside dies immediately from broken everythings. Instead the Bug teleports away, sadly not taking a few of Colossal Boy's fingers with it.

Jesus fucking Christ. Am I the only one paying attention to these things?! Hello? Comic book fans? Are you fucking literate? You people actually enjoy poorly written garbage?

Go ahead. Reread that page and tell me why it's fucking stupid. If you don't know what's wrong with it then you are not allowed to have opinions on whether comic books are well-written or not. Chameleon Boy begins a philosophical and ethical discussion about how if they win, a city full of innocent people will be destroyed. He has a problem with that. He's thinking maybe they need to deal with that instead of just going in and winning the fight. Catspaw and Robot Arms Snake Lass continue this discussion. It's an important discussion. But then Green Skirt Lad says it's a moot point because they're going to defeat these Charlton guys easy-peasy. Which is not a "moot point" at all but the entire point of the fucking conversation! Fuck you, Green Skirt Lad!

Blue Beetle needs precisely six minutes to enact some plan that will be so amazing that they'll beat Telos at his own game. Captain Atom's plan to distract the Legion of Super-heroes?

Poorly set-up and contrived one-liners!

No! Stop it, you! Do not laugh at that. I understand it's hard for an unimaginative moron not to laugh at all of the simple-minded bullshit that the entertainment-industrial complex spews into your eager for any kind of entertainment face receptacle. But if you're going to read my comic book reviews, I need you to have some kind of minimum standard. I'm not exactly sure where to set the bar for jokes you may find funny but I know Scott Lobdell's jokes are far, far beneath that bar.

Legion fails to stop Captain Atom even though they outnumber him infinity to one but I guess we're all still waiting on Blue Beetle's plan to save everybody. His plan is whatever and it whatevers then they all whatever and Telos smiles knowingly.

Convergence: Blue Beetle #2 Rating: I'm not going to give this comic book any rating because that would only encourage Scott Lobdell.

Divergence: Black Canary
"The newly rechristened band Black Canary seems to be a magnet for trouble...and Dinah's not gonna believe it when she finds out the reason why!"

What was wrong with the name "Ashes On Sunday"? It was more upbeat than Black Canary!

Does nobody else have a problem with Black Canary being the lead singer of a rock group? It seems a bit irresponsible. All it takes is one slip up, one well-timed mind control attack by a super-villain, one wrong note...and the heads of everybody in the audience explode. I guess Black Canary has walked away from worse disasters without any consequences. Like that time she and her Birds of Prey blew up an entire hotel without evacuating any of the occupants.

Black Canary and her band cause trouble at every venue in which they perform. Why? I don't know. Is Blue Devil in the band? He was a weirdness magnet, remember? I think Black Canary must be a violence magnet. She does try to smooth over all of the trouble when it confronts her but I guess her tour schedule is too hectic for her to pay people or apologize to people or to break up with people or to do anything except flee from city to city with a wave of angry people following in the band's wake because these angry people apparently don't have lives of their own.

I don't get it. This Sneak Peek doesn't make me want to read this comic book. It makes me want to murder everybody lining up at the Hawthorne Theater every night. It also makes Black Canary look like a huge dick. I think it's supposed to portray her in the opposite way because she tries to make amends with all of the angry people gathered at her show. But why does she leave so many angry people in her wake? Because she's a huge, selfish, narcissistic dick, right?