Batman Loves Superman #23

I'm in love with the Honey Bunny Batman Armor even if it did completely ripoff Appleseed.

The Honey Bunny Batman Armor is the only recognizable person on this cover. Who knew Gordon would be completely unrecognizable without his cop mustache and his cop glasses and his cop cigarette? And Superman just looks like a douche with that haircut. I'd rather--and this isn't hyperbole of any kind--have Mullet Superman than three months post chemo treatments Superman. But then I'm not a mullet hater like everybody else in the world who hates mullets because they've heard over and over that mullets are the stupidest haircut in the world. It's incredibly easy to hate something for which everybody in the world has declared their hate. It's so easy and clever to hate on the mullet because you know your audience will be receptive of that hatred and you won't be called out for being a dick. You can replace the mullet with virtually anything though. Most people are so afraid to have their own opinions on things that all the unique snowflakes eventually turn into that huge pile of dirty snow which refuses to melt as the days start getting warmer. Strengthened by the cold generated by the sheer amount of snow, they resist the warming conditions. This isn't a new problem. I'm not pointing fingers at recent generations at all. Peer pressure and bullying (and believe me, a lot of y'all who think you're anti-bully wind up being some of the biggest bullies of all) is just a feature built into growing up within a civilized society. Stating that fact doesn't mean I approve of it but then I don't approve of most of civilized society anyway.

Hipsters are cowards! This will relate to the last paragraph in a second! I just have trouble with segues! Hipsters will wear anything ironically but only if it's already been subtly approved by the rest of the hipsters. If any of them were really brave, they'd bring back the mullet. Of course, once a few daring pioneers prove that it gets them lots of ironic attention and ironic sexual encounters, the rest of them will jump on board and honestly believe they were the coolest of the cool for bravely bringing it back into ironic style. I'm sure some hipster geniuses have already brought it back and I haven't noticed because I usually don't obsess over hipsters (they're just so hard to define anyway since almost nobody will admit to being a hipster (especially if they're a hipster!)). Plus I live in Portland where the streets are awash in a sticky veneer of hipsterism, so trying to tell the difference between a hipster and an older person who just never stopped wearing the clothing or the look which the hipsters have brought back can be difficult. You can usually tell when you've sighted an actual hipster though because they're usually in a group of three or more and they all look vaguely the same.

I should probably just discuss the comic books in my comic book reviews so people will like me.

But before I do, I have a mullet story! I was walking around in downtown Lincoln, Nebraska, quite a few years ago (I can't even remember the last time I was there). At the time, I had long hair. I was wearing a hat though so you couldn't tell that my hair was the same length all the way around. Some male asshole college student with his two female hangers-on came up to me and asked if he could take a picture of my mullet. I pulled off my hat and said, "Fuck you, you derivative piece of shit scumbag. Your University of Lincoln dot edu slash website making fun of people for having mullets doesn't just prove you're an asshole but that you're an unoriginal, play-it-safe piece of shit with no imagination to boot." At least I think I said that. My memory isn't that great but that's what I would have liked to have said, so it's probably what I said. And then he probably slunk off defeated, deleted his webpage, and never got laid again.

Okay, so Superman without a mullet wound up going back to Subterranea last issue! That's good because I didn't get enough of the place last time when Clark and Lana freed all of the fuzzy munchkin creatures that were being used as fuel to light the caverns. I've often been thinking, "What happened to that place after Superman shut down their entire economy?" I've been like, "That world was so interesting, it should have its own monthly comic book!" I was thinking, "Boy, I sure do lie a lot in these commentaries!"

Luckily Commissioner Batman and Powerless Superman have communicators so that they can continue calling each other names at a distance.

Remember when comic book heroes were heroic examples of who we should strive to be instead of being dragged down to colorful characters used simply to hold up a mirror to who we actually are?

Now that Ukur attacked the surface world trying to steal Wayne Industries miniature sun (which he heard about how? The Subterranean Internet?), Superman remembers how he stole this civilizations means of power because his ethics were different from their ethics. They were using living creatures as fuel and I guess that's wrong although Superman has yet to shut down the beef and dairy industry which is, you know, the exact same thing. And by fuel, I mean fuel for our bodies, asshole. I think the main difference is that the creatures being used as fuel in Subterranea were cute or sentient or something. I suppose it's like how we rankle at the idea of eating dolphins (well, some of us Earthlings do) but we don't give a shit about pigs. I suppose if dolphins were the source of bacon, a shitload of people suddenly wouldn't give two fucks about sentience.

Superman must now negotiate with Ukur to help bring power back to Subterranea. That means he's going to have to give them Waynetech's miniature sun which means he's going to have to call Commissioner Batman an idiot a few more times and maybe even punch him in the face.

Even if Superman had the power to fly down and "force" everybody to play nice, he wouldn't do it. At least not the Superman I believe in!

The previous page is an example of how, I think, Greg Pak is just writing to fill pages. You can see how he wants to show what Superman is going through and how he's trying to deal with not having any power. He almost seems to be the Superman that I expect him to be, the one telling Commissioner Batman to back off while he has a rational discussion with the antagonist of the comic book. But then he winds up obliterating all of his ideas about doing things Superman's way and being a job for Superman when Superman has the thought, "I can't just fly down and force everyone to play nice. I have to find another way...". If he had his powers, that would be a good thought for Superman to have! But since he doesn't have his powers, it takes on the meaning that if he did have his powers, he would do it that way. He's admitting that he would use his powers in a fascist way to force people to live by the way he thinks they should live. Which, come to think of it, is what he did to these Subterraneans in the first place.

Superman covers himself in garbage and tries to sneak into Ukur's camp. He's super happy about covering himself in garbage because it feels like being hugged by Lois Lane. Or something. I sort of stopped reading the Narration Boxes and have begun making up my own story.

Oh! I remember this part from real life! This is where he falls off and breaks his neck, right?!

Clark Kent (why do I keep calling him Superman?! Apparently he's completely powerless! I think?) becomes distracted on his mission of diplomacy because he has to save a bunch of humans from being trampled by wild horned horse lizards. He saves them all and thinks about how lucky he is to survive. That's what he's been thinking every other page lately! If his entire superhero career is now down to being lucky, I think he should just fucking retire.

The humans are escaped prisoners from Blackgate and also their families or something. I don't know. You make sense of it. I'm too weary to care anymore. I mean, who gives up everything in the world to follow their ex-con family members down beneath the Earth to live like troglodytes and kobolds?! How about convincing them to go back to fucking prison and just do their fucking time?! I'd rather have internet than intimate contact with a loved one!

Oh, I see. Only prisoners who got a raw deal from the justice system escaped from Blackgate to live down here. No rapists or murderers down here! Just a harsh indictment against our politicized criminal justice system!

I guess the people running Blackgate are so corrupt that they buried the paperwork on all these missing inmates. And who is Clark Kent to try to bring them to justice? He's just a reporter who sucks at doing his job and wouldn't recognize a Pulitzer if it were wearing an orange jumpsuit and lying to his face about why it was in prison.

Angie, the one prisoner who will talk to Clark, points out how the people upstairs won't share their shit with Ukur and a bunch of escaped felons. How fucking dare they?! And since they won't share even when not asked at all, Ukur is going to steal their shit! It's only fair! Theft is just justice from the point of view of the person getting more free shit.

Dawn Command happens by and collects Clark because they recognize the garbage that he's wearing as one of their own. So now he's infiltrated Dawn Command and made friends with a bunch of thieving escaped convicts who have right on their side (if you define "right" as getting your way no matter what (which I usually do, by the way!).

Holy shit the characterization in this thing is going to give me a stork! I mean a stroke!

I joke about it all of the time but I think Greg Pak sincerely doesn't know the difference between Perry White and J. Jonah Jameson. Perry liked Clark and he like Superman, so why would he suddenly hate them both when they were revealed to be the same person? If J. Jonah Jameson discovered that Peter Parker was Spider-man (which he may have at some point but I've never really read Spider-man), I could see him calling Peter a weasel because Jameson fucking hates Spider-man! Or he did. Who knows what the fuck is going on at Marvel nowadays (I mean besides people who read Marvel!)? But this is just more of that easy drama where a character finds out another character lied so now they get to hate that character for lying.

The worst part about people hating Superman for having "infiltrated" the human world as Clark Kent is that Clark Kent is an actual person raised on a farm in Kansas who lived a human life as normal as anybody else's with just a weird hidden hobby. Where the fuck is the infiltration?! Clark is as American as any other American! I guess every character without a costume in DC Comics is just a hateful bigot.

Gordon meets up with Lois and Lois badgers him until he says things he doesn't actually want to tell her. But I guess if she's going to keep following him around, he may as well tell her everything! Except that he's Robo-Batman. Which is odd because every time he tells Lois something, she says "More cards!" because she knows he's not being entirely truthful. You know, right up until the point the only card he's kept back is his new secret identity and then she's all, "Okay. Cool. You should trust Clark!"

Back underground, Clark learns he's about to go to war with the surface people! Ukur gives a rousing speech to his followers about how he knows where the miniature sun is located and how he's going to bring it back and everything under ground will be roses and super roses and things that aren't roses even if they're called by other names.

"How dare I promise to keep your tiny, shrunken men safe?!"

At the end of the speech, Ukur introduces everybody to their new ally in the war to bring back the miniature sun and save the underground empire that isn't allowed to burn cute fuzzy animals for fuel anymore. Upon seeing their new ally, everybody yawns.

God damn, Arthur. Put that fucking erection away!

How has nobody in the Goddamned art department at DC Comics pointed out that Aquaman just looks like he's sporting a massive boner now? It's obscene!

Batman Loves Superman #23 Rating: -2 Ranking. This comic book is terrible and I don't know why Aquaman is so visibly excited to be dragged into it. Maybe it's because he's got a good chance to be the most likeable character in it! None of the characters particularly know what they're doing. Instead of getting dragged down into violence, they should be trying to solve problems. Clark knows what he needs to do and he knew before he followed Ukur back underground. He needs to help the underground empire find a new source of power since he came by and told them they couldn't continue to use the source of power they were using previously. And then he just left them in the dark. So Ukur needs the miniature sun for power, an object Commissioner Batman is trying to protect for some reason that isn't any of his business. Clark needs to speak with Lucius Fox or whoever is in charge of Wayne Industries and work out a deal to purchase the mini-sun as a power unit for Subterranea. Instead of helping them steal it, help them fucking purchase it, Clark. Ask Alfred for a loan if you need some help. It's at least a responsible way to fix the problem Superman caused. You know how he shouldn't fix the problem? Joining a bunch of escaped convicts (one of which has a prison sob story that apparently answers for all of the escapees) to storm Gotham and steal something that doesn't belong to you. And I guess nobody should even worry about how dangerous the new power source could wind up being, right? I don't even care why Aquaman is helping at this point or how he's going to help when he doesn't have access to Atlantis's armies. It should be Mera who was revealed on the final page. Did I mention this comic book was terrible?