Eclipso: The Darkness Within: Detective Comics Annual #5 (June 1992)

If you want to destroy Batman's sweater. . .

Eclipso: The Darkness Within: Detective Comics Annual #5 (June 1992)
By Alan Grant, John Wagner, Tom Mandrake, Jan Duursema, Rick Magyar, Bill Oakley, Adrienne Roy
Cover by Sam Keith
Edited by Denny O'Neil

The Cover!
I'm not going to give Sam Keith a hard time about this cover because, I mean, it's fucking great. Did you look at it? Do you have eyeballs? Does your brain function? I suppose I could criticize Keith's vision of how clothing tears and comes apart but that would be an assumption on my part that Batman's costume isn't made of steel wool. And even if I was going to be an uptight prick and moan about the weird curly pasta threads hanging down from Batman's torn shirt, I'd only be doing Keith a disfavor in that I'm ignoring his (as far as I can tell) realistic gun. Did anybody ever think to show John Romita Jr. this cover (or, I don't know, an actual gun)? If I wanted to be a useless, whiny, piece of shit comic book reader, I could ask how the fuck this has anything to do with Eclipso? Oh, sure, there's a moon in the background and you usually (although not always) need the moon for an eclipse. I mean I don't know what those "not always" moments might be. Like, say, Galactus is fucking Venus or something and his great ass blocks out the sun. But I guess, technically, that's a moon as well. And also Galactus doesn't live in the DC Universe. So pretend I said The Authority's Carrier was fucking a space whale and got between the sun and the Earth. So, anyway, that's my ignorance exposed! But I'm telling you, why would I want to criticize this fucking cover? I love it! I bet if this hadn't been an Eclipso tie-in issue, I'd have picked it up anyway. I would have been all, "Hey Brent! Did you see this cover? I didn't know Batman's costume was made of steel wool and pasta noodles! And I think that's Tiny Toons Joker guest starring! That's a weird looking gun though." (Up until 1992, I'd only ever seen guns drawn by John Romita Jr.)

The Story So Far!
Eclipso has eclipsed Valor, Starman, The Creeper, and Star Sapphire. Am I missing any? I don't remember and I'm not bothering to check. Let's see if Batman falls to lovely purple diamonds! I mean Black Diamonds (but they're really purple). I bet Catwoman loses her shit (and not in the appropriate litter box receptacle (Goddammit I think I just developed a new kink)).

The Story
The issue begins with totally legit business-puppet Scarface re-opening his club, The Ventriloquist's Club, while Batman hassles him and his guests by just making himself obvious up on the nearby street buildings. He's purposefully swinging past streetlights so that his scary and terrifying shadow passes across the front of the club and mumbling to himself, "That'll strike terror in the hearts of these people just trying to have a nice time at a totally legal club run by somebody who has served their time for the crimes they've committed but whom I don't like or trust."

I'd sue his ass for trying to tank my business.

Imagine suing Batman and then finding out in the discovery phase of your civil suit that he's Bruce Wayne. The amount of "Cha-Chings!" rattling around in your head would probably send you straight to Arkham.

I don't know anything about law and law terms so I probably got the lingo wrong and I'm not bothering to check but you probably understood what I meant.

Batman ignores the club full of Gotham's most wanted criminals because he's got a robbery to stop down at the Old Egyptian Goods Shoppe. The criminals try to flee in their truck which is, you know, truck-sized. It's drawn truck-sized. I saw it with my own eyes over multiple pages that it was truck-sized. And then when Batman goes to stop them (by making the truck crash which obviously kills the men in the cab because they're criminals and they don't wear seatbelts), the truck becomes a fucking Mini Cooper.

I'm less concerned about the dead criminals than I am about Tom Mandrake's ability to pass off that panel as professional work.

At least I know what Tom Mandrake thinks of me early into the comic book so I won't feel bad at all when I trash all of his actually adequate and not-bad-to-look-at pencils. You don't declare I'm a stupid idiot that will accept any old shit you draw and expect me to act politely about it! If by the end of the book we don't find out that Batman was sipping on some Gingold earlier which is how he reached the steering wheel from outside the passenger door, I'm going to carve Tom Mandrake's name onto the skin of the yearly goat I sacrifice to Baphomet to curse those who have done me ill.

While Batman's engaged in M.C. Escher crime fighting, Scarface busies himself with insulting every major mafia boss in Gotham at his new club. Most of his insults have to do with plastic surgery gone wrong. Look, he's a little thug who shoots a gun, not a comedy writer. Somehow he (and the guy with his hand up his ass) survives the gig, probably because the mob bosses are using all of their brain power trying to figure out what Scarface's scheme is. I'm using all of my brain power trying to figure out what Eclipso's scheme is. Maybe he won't show up in this comic book at all since Batman doesn't have any super powers. Why would Eclipso want to possess him?

Oh no! A threat from a normal criminal who apparently wears his seatbelt while he crimes.

Batman ignores the threat because is any threat actually a threat to Batman? I bet he doesn't even hear the guy because he's too busy trying to figure out how to defeat Superman if he ever winds up mind-controlled or how to fuck Catwoman if she ever winds up mind-controlled. He does notice a Black Diamond earring on the ground near the crash after the cops have gathered up the loot and the criminals and left the scene to go enjoy some paperwork. They'll especially love the extra paperwork they'll be doing later since they just left the smashed truck and didn't cordon off the crime scene. You might be thinking, "How do you know they didn't do any of that? Maybe Al, John, and Tom just decided not to show all the boring procedural work, you fucking douchebag?" Well, they do show us because Batman calls for the cops to stop and take the Black Diamond for evidence but they've already left. And this is the scene as Batman leaves.

The cops: "Enh, leave it. It'll make a great artificial reef when the sea levels rise."

Oh! I didn't mention that tonight, this very night that Scarsfaceman and his fister are eavesdropping on all the good Gotham mafia goss while they serve them tons of free drinks and Batman has found some jewelry that hopefully Tim Drake won't think was a loving present from his second father . . . this night is the anniversary of Babs being shot in the back by the Joker and definitely not raped at all because when has, um, Alan Moore ever, um, written a . . . you know what? She was probably raped. But nobody needs to dwell on that because she's dealing with it in the best way she knows how: help a government black ops organization break tons of laws all over the world and kill loads of people labeled as enemies of the United States. Even in 1992, we understood that the best time to label a person an enemy of the United States was after you've killed them so they can't say on the record, "What the fuck are you talking about? I don't even think of the United States! Like that scene in the elevator in Mad Men that will be written in twenty years or something!" Just like everything else he claims he invented because he knows nobody will fucking say to his face, "You're a delusional narcissist who lies about everything and doesn't actually know any Goddamn facts at all," Trump didn't invent the state killing civilians and then dragging their names through the mud. That's a time honored American tradition that they stole from Great Britain who stole it from, I don't know, The Romans or Christians.

Anyway, The Joker will be broken out of Arkham on this auspicious anniversary by Scarsfaceman because The Joker, supposedly, knows where 25 million dollars has been stashed. At least that's what one of the crime guys thinks because he was a henchman for The Joker and somehow survived the job and is also incredibly credulous if he thinks The Joker actually gives a shit about money.

Cue Tim Drake snooping around the Batcave.

Bruce Gordon shows up because he's tracked a Black Diamond to Gotham. In a previous issue, he mentioned he could only track them while they're in use. The one Batman found is currently safe but there were two others in the loot from the robbery earlier. Those are in the hands of the police and there's nobody angrier than a cop who was just, in his own eyes, disrespected. That means there's probably an Eclipso or two smashing up the evidence room right now.

Commissioner Gordon finds the two gems still on an Egyptian statue. I was trying to give Grant and company the benefit of the doubt for breaking an rule established in an earlier annual. If Bruce Gordon can track the Black Diamonds while they're not active, this whole series is going to get pretty boring. The whole set-up is simply to get Commissioner Gordon's hands on one so that he'll be so angry at The Joker that he'll turn into Eclipso and strip The Joker naked and take loads of photos and also shoot him in the spine and probably almost certainly doesn't at all in any way, shape, or form rape him. That's probably what happens. I can just stop reading now, right?

Of course it's happening! You forgot to tell them the most important rule: don't get angry around the Black Diamonds!

Gordon's Eclipso manifestation, a massive twenty-foot tall monster with huge teeth and claws, smashes its way out of the police precinct and heads for the toy warehouse where the cops have surrounded The Joker and Scarsfaceman's gang. When it gets there, it immediately kills at least three cops which means Commissioner Gordon is a cop killer. Although I think the Comics Code Authority jerks demanded a later panel to make sure Gordon's hands were clean of any cop blood:

I mean, it is a miracle because I saw the way Tom Mandrake drew them all being gutted. But then I also learned not to believe that hack on page three.

While giving chase, Batman drops and breaks Bruce Gordon's solar light gun. That means he can't stop Eclipso now! Except we, the readers, know that some of the toys in The Joker's warehouse are lightsaber knock-offs called "solar lances". Well, they have "solar" in the name so they must have the same power as the sun, right? Not just shitty light enabled by two 'D' batteries.

During the fight, Batman crashes into a crate of solar lances where he reads the label: "Powered by the sun." Well, that's all well and good if only the toy hadn't been stashed in a crate for the last number of years and it was now currently night and there's no way the stupid thing would be charged.

Wait a second. I think I see my problem with this comic book. It can be sorted out with a hammer and three hard whacks to the back of my head. *whack whack whack* Ah! That's better. I'm now dumb enough to enjoy a comic book again!

Batman picks up a Solar Lance which, having been charged by the sun, has the power to defeat Eclipso. So like something out of one of the two good Star Wars movies, Batman strikes Eclipso down!

Jim had to help for psychological health reasons. This was him dealing with his anger at Alan Moore.

Scarface and The Ventriloquist are arrested after everything calms down but The Joker manages to escape in a cloud of smoke, ninja style. An editor's note says that his story will be continued in Robin Annual #1 because of course Tim Drake found that Black Diamond Batman left lying around and was all, "Stupid teenager problems. I hate everybody!" Which will mean he'll have to kill everybody once he Eclipses. The main Eclipso story will continue in Superman Annual #4.

The Ranking!
That was fucking awesome, man! Incredible! What art! What story! And that part where Batman reaches in the truck window to steer the criminals into a streetlight? Phenomenal! The twist ending with the lightsabers? Genius! And I'm all on pins and needles about The Joker escaping! At least I think that's why I'm feeling pins and needles everywhere. Where'd all this blood come from? Whose hammer is that? I think I'm going to go lie down for a spell.

The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien (1955)

I finished re-reading this a couple of weeks ago and then set it down and forgot that I had read it because I was just relieved to have finally gotten through it again. The main thing I learned from re-reading The Lord of the Rings is that reading it once in one lifetime is enough. That's a tough lesson to have to learn in a finite lifetime! If I had children, "Only read The Lord of the Rings once in your life, and maybe zero times even," is the first thing I'd add to my list "Advice for Making My Child's Life Better (None of Which They'll Probably Take, the Ingrates)."

This might be a spoiler if you're a two year old with a Goodreads account but the One Ring is destroyed in this book by Chapter Three of Book Six (the Second Book in The Return of the King. Does that mean the trilogy is actually a sexology? I don't know. What am I? A person who can do math and knows words too?). That means there's something like seven chapters left! And one of those chapters involves a marriage! A MARRIAGE?! Between Aragorn and Arwen even! Which I'm supposed to believe is a happy ending? I guess the text doesn't definitively say Aragorn is gay but you don't go to the extremes that man was going to to avoid marrying a hot elf woman if you're into the ladies!

I suppose trudging through even more chapters about resting and traveling and singing is worth it to get to the most gruesome and bloody murder in the entire series. If only Peter Jackson had had the guts to film the Scouring of the Shire and the murder of Saruman. His throat being slit wide and the spray of blood splashing over the faces of the horrified Hobbits! I bet Ralph Bakshi would have done that scene right! But no! Instead Rankin and Bass screw it up and leave it out as well!

When I was younger, my favorite part of the book was when Éowyn kills the king of the Ringwraiths. I was all, "Ha ha! Because the prophecy said no man! But she wasn't a man! Ha ha! Stupid prophets! What a great twist!" But now I read it and I think, "Stupid prophets. This is why we, as a society, should try to encourage gender neutral terms and pronouns! So that if I ever become the lord of the dead and the lost King of Angmar, I certainly don't want to be killed because some jerk didn't account for half of the people who might kill me!"

In The Two Towers, my favorite characters were Treebeard and Gollum. In this book, my favorite characters were Pippin and Merry. Merry and Pippin are like a couple who decided to open up their marriage. First Merry is jealous of Pippin having gone to the big city, probably banging loads of studs, while he's stuck trying to get into the pants of a prudish horse king. Then later, Pippin is super jealous of Merry banging the hottest stud in Mordor and he's all, "Oh no! I'll never bang anybody as hot! But I've got to go and try!" But then Gimli is all, "You two are perfect together! Stop this nonsense! Never forget that troll I had to pull you out from under, Pippin!" And then Frodo is all, "At least your ex didn't throw your fleshlight into a volcano."

I highly doubt I'm going to read The Sillymarillion next.

The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien (1954)

I think the "two towers" referenced in the title are the two characters who carry the weight of this entire book: Treebeard and Gollum. At least that's what I think as an adult. When I first read this as a twelve-year old, I had no idea what towers were being referenced. Now, don't jump to the conclusion that I was a complete dimwit! It was obvious Orthanc was one of them! It's the most towery tower ever to appear in fantasy fiction. But what was the other one? Minas Morgul? Barad-dûr? The watchtower atop Cirith Ungol?

I know a lot of you are shaking your head and making "Pshaw!" noises at me and snorting, "It was obviously Barad-dûr, you stupid twit." But would you stake your nerdy life on that?!

Hmm, maybe you would. I bet there's a letter that J.R.R. Tolkien penned to some second cousin that was all, "It should be clear to everybody that the towers I was talking about were Orthanc and Barad-dûr. Only stupid dumb 12-year old twits who couldn't even tell the difference between Saruman and Sauron wouldn't understand that!"

Yeah, yeah. I was somewhat confused by those two wizards! I didn't say I was zero percent dimwit at twelve! But seriously, Tolkien had to pick two names that were that similar?! He was absolutely taking the piss.

Anyway, the tracking of the hobbits is boring. The Riders of Rohan are the worst characters of any book I've ever read (and I've read most of the Xanth books). Frodo might as well be a straw effigy with a ring tied to it. And Sam is just a bitter, thwarted cook. Gollum and Treebeard are the only interesting parts of this book.

Although I suppose the Battle of Helm's Deep was exciting because I was really wrapped up in whether the Elf character or the Dwarf character would murder more orcs than the other. You probably think the Elf would run away with that one because he could kill so many with arrows before one orc even got near the dwarf's axe but you would be surprised at how easy it is for a writer to pretend that wasn't the case at all and the dwarf actually could win that contest. So unbelievable.

Hopefully when I get around to reading the Sillymarillion, it explains what happened to the Entwives. If that mystery is never revealed, I suppose the next book I'm going to read is a Ouija board as I summon the spirit of J.R.R. Tolkien to explain his damned self.

The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien (1954)

This book is like The Seven Samurai except there are nine of them and they aren't samurai and they're defending the entire world instead of just a village. This is the book that introduced everybody in the Sixties to the idea of Lembas wafers and probably hobbits and almost certainly balrogs. It probably also made a lot of people cognizant of the amount of hair on their toes. I hardly have any and I always felt ashamed that I wasn't more hobbit-like, even if I walk about a mile every morning to get coffee and tea while barefoot.

I think Popeye's biscuits are probably what Lembas wafers tasted like and I also think the movie The Hangover was based on this book.

If you like books about traveling through exotic locations that are entirely fictional while an elf and a dwarf become the closest of friends, this is the book for you!

Spoiler: Some people think this is a book about how even the smallest and seemingly most inconsequential people can do extraordinarily good things to change the world while potentially sacrificing everything. But I think it's a tragic love story between a misshapen bug-eyed monster and a ring. How come nobody's written a musical from Gollum's point of view yet? I suppose it's because he's already too sympathetic. Better to write stories about characters who are so bad that you would be praised for your hot take showing how they're actually sympathetic characters caught up in a terrible world who maybe made bad decisions because of the way other people treated them. Or to show how a monster is just, you know, protecting his mom from a bunch of drunk jerks constantly partying at their log cabin.

Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea: The Newsletter #20 (Third Week of April 2018)

E!TACT! #20
Black Lightning: Cold, Dead Hands #6, Batman: White Knight #7, Justice League #42, Batman #44, The Curse of Brimstone #1, The Immortal Men #1, Grunion Guy's Musical Corner of Music Reviews, What Am I Currently Reading?, and Letters to Me!
By Grunion Guy


Comic Book Reviews!

Black Lightning: Cold, Dead Hands #6
By Isabella, Henry, Guichet, and Pantazis

Rating: With this issue, any continuity fans who were wondering if DC Comics Presents #16 was still in continuity have got their answer. Yes it is! I'm just going to use the scientific method and assume that every issue of DC Comics Presents has been returned to continuity since one has.

You might not find it surprising that I failed science. I certainly found it surprising that I couldn't cite comic books as proofs of my answers on tests. My physics teacher found it surprising that I couldn't tell the difference between reality and fantasy. I don't know why he was so surprised. One day for class, we went to the amusement park Great America to test physics theorems. So I was supposed to believe that everything in the park was regulated by physical laws but not believe that Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck were real? I had my picture taken with both of them! How was that not worth an A?!

Oh yeah. This comic is all about getting along with each other or something. Parts of it are based on The Twilight Zone episode where all the neighbors become paranoid and begin accusing each other of being aliens. I guess the lesson is not to listen to your gut instincts and your intuition because those things are ruled by superstition, paranoia, and systemic racism.


Batman: White Knight #7
By Murphy and Hollingsworth

Rating: After reading the first issue of this series, I thought, "Haven't we seen this multiple times already? Casting the villain as the hero who really shows Batman how to save Gotham?" So I started reading this encased in a hard, protective layer of cynicism. And yet it still somehow managed to break through that enamel and I've mostly enjoyed the story. Especially this issue.

In this issue, we learn that The Joker never killed Jason Todd. But Todd, completely broken by The Joker, believing his life was ruined by Batman, pretends to be dead after The Joker releases him. This is a way better version of Jason Todd's reappearance in the DC Universe. I especially like that Jason Todd has been convinced by The Joker that Bruce used and manipulated him. It gives Jason Todd a real reason to be hurt and angry at Batman, as opposed to the overly melodramatic teenage reason that everybody accepts: that Jason Todd is hurt and angry that Batman didn't avenge his death by killing Joker. I'm going to simply cut out the canonical part of the Jason Todd story that I don't like and replace it with this bit. How does one go about doing that? Home brain surgery couldn't be that hard, right?

The other part I really loved was Bruce's discussion with Dick and Babs about why he does what he does. It's always nice when a writer thinks up a better way to look at a character instead of relying on tons of past writers who simply accepted the traditional version. And it's not like Murphy's version changes Batman's motives much at all. Batman simply twists the perception of why he does what he does so that it's not contextualized by past events but based upon a vision of a better future.

Don't get me wrong, though. My cynicism continues to control most of my brain's functions. I'm still annoyed by yet another story where the big twist surprise is that Batman and The Joker team up to save the day (and right on top of Metal's version of this story too! Sheesh. Don't editors at DC talk with each other?).


Justice League #42
By Priest and Woods

Rating: The Justice League continues to learn that justice is much tougher to accomplish when Priest controls the narrative. The team has had debates like this before where Superman says, "We must stop all war and killing everywhere!" and Batman says, "We can't do that, you dum-dum Kryptonian!" and then Wonder Woman is all, "Bruce is right. We can't interfere in geopolitical whateverisms!" Then Superman says, "Oh poo," and kicks a rock so hard it kills a dictator of a small fake European country which causes a massive war where millions of people are killed in the subsequent conflict to exterminate half the population of the country who just happened to have the wrong common ancestor. Then Superman is all, "Oh. I get it now! Whoops!"

Luckily, Deathstork arrives on the scene to administer the justice that the Justice League can't administer because they all have to listen to Batman for some reason. By the end of this story arc, I'm guessing it'll answer the question as to why Superman or Batman or Wonder Woman have never grabbed Deathstork by the scruff and tossed him in jail. It's because they know they need somebody who doesn't mind killing when killing needs to be done. Plus it has to be somebody that they pretend they can't stand and also whom they pretend they can't catch. "Oh no," cries Batman over his tea as he reads the paper, "It looks like Deathstork was in Gotham killing those bad guys whose lawyer just lawyered them out of jail. If only you'd have told me about Slade being in town, Alfred. I could have stopped this!" Then Alfred winks at Bruce and Bruce winks back and they enjoy some nice waffles with homemade butter.


Batman #44
By King, Janin, Jones, Chung, and Bellaire

Catwoman shops for a wedding gown this issue. My guess is Tom King was at a bar sitting across from Scott Snyder and James Tynion IV fawning over each other. Eventually one of them broke eye contact (probably Snyder because Tynion IV's gaze can get unnecessarily probing) and glanced over at Tom King. Scott said, "We were just daring each other to write a story that readers should hate but we do it in such a way that they'll wind up loving it. I'm going to write a whole epic story where Plastic Man saves the day. James is going to write a story about a pansexual misogynist gender fluid monster from Pluto who attacks Earth in an attempt to get Pluto's status as a planet reinstated. It will mostly feature Batman being lectured by a bunch of young people. What about you?"

Tom King sucked on his hot dog for a long minute before saying, "I'll write an issue that's just Catwoman picking out a wedding dress." Scott's eyebrow shot up. He knocked James's hand away from his crotch as he asked, "And you think you can get Batman fan's to rave about it?"

Tom King tapped his hot dog on the bar, knocking loose the long line of ash that had accumulated over the long expanse of time he spent thinking about Scott's question. He took another sultry drag off his hot dog before saying, "Rave about it? They're going to fucking lose their minds over it." Tom winked ambiguously before stubbing out his hot dog and getting up from the bar. James Tynion IV watched him closely before turning back to Scott.

"So do you think he meant they'll lose their minds in a good way?" James reached out with a kerchief to wipe some mustard off the corner of Scott's lip. Scott thanked him before saying, "When has a Batman fan ever lost his mind in a good way? They're going to fucking hate it."

Rating: This was the best issue of Batman ever! You should seen the wedding dress Catwoman eventually picked out! She's going to look spectacular! There was also some writing crap about how characters change over the years but they don't really change unless they do really change but in ways that we don't notice since it takes so long for them to change and we, as fans, are too busy to notice because we're arguing about their costume changes.


The Curse of Brimstone #1
By Tan, Jordan, and Beredo

Rating: I hated this comic book from page one when it began "Everything burns." Because everything doesn't burn, Mr. Justin Jordan. The truth is that everything eventually stops burning. It's more true to say, "Everything freezes." At least on a cosmically ending note. Because it's more true than "Everything burns." Look, we all know everything isn't going to burn. I mean, a lot of stuff will as every sun in every solar system expands to consume most of the planets orbiting the star. But it won't expand enough to burn all of the planets! Unless all stars go nova when they die (which might be a thing smart people know for sure without checking up on Wikipedia. I suppose I could check and seem like a smart person but I'd rather not spend that time just to look up a simple fact all fifth graders know) and they consume everything everywhere. Maybe just before everything freezes, everything burns?

You know what? None of that even matters because I lied. I didn't hate this book from page one. I hated this book from the moment I picked it up off the shelf at the comic book store and thought, "Why am I buying this garbage?"

Oh! I just realized I was mistaken again! I didn't hate this comic book from the moment I knew I was going to buy it. I hated myself at that moment!

These new comics from the pages of Metal (and how they're supposed to be from that story, I still don't know) have been billed as comic books by the greatest artists working for DC Comics. You can tell that's true because these comics list the artist first in the credits. That's why I found it so surprising that the art in this comic book was terrible. I hated it more than I hated myself two weeks ago when I purchased this book. I suppose the argument can (and will) be made that the style fits the story. But I don't have time to be smart about stuff. I only have time to indulge my id. My ego and superego can go fuck each other.

The only good character in this comic book is killed within the first few pages. That's when I stopped reading because I had decided he was the protagonist. I don't care what happens to the rest of the small town characters just struggling to make ends meet while forces they have no control over threaten to destroy their humanity. I read enough of those stories in The New York Times.

In the end, the actual protagonist is somebody I have no sympathy for. He wants his small town that grew up around the coal industry to still exist in the same way it did before the coal was gone. He both wants his sister and himself to be able to leave the town but hates that everybody is leaving the town. He can't accept change unless that change means he's getting his. So he makes a deal with the devil to put himself in a position to help people. As if he couldn't have done that without the devil's special Brimstone powers. My guess is he'll eventually learn his lesson and use the powers to fight against the devil while using his normal abilities to help revitalize the town and help the old townsfolk who have no recourse but to stay in the dying, dead-end little town. I just won't be reading this comic book long enough to find out if that's what happens. I don't even know why I read this issue.


The Immortal Men #1
By Tynion IV, Lee, Benjamin, Williams, Friend, and Sinclair

Everything I said about hating myself for buying The Curse of Brimstone #1 goes triple for buying this book. But if I didn't buy this book, how was I going to finish the poster that comes on the backside of the fold-out cover?! Not that I can finish it anyway since I apparently didn't hate myself enough the week Silencer #1 came out. What was going on that day that I allowed myself to not buy a shitty comic book? I probably ate some vegetables that morning.

If you love comics about a chosen one who also happens to be a young person, you should pick up a dozen copies of this book. The young chosen one seems even more special since he's being hunted by all the world's immortals. Apparently their power and experience can't save the world. What they need is a fresh perspective! They need the wisdom of youth! The world is doomed unless young Caden Park can say, "But seriously, guys!" after which he'll proceed to youthsplain his plan to save the world. That plan will be full of heart which the immortals don't have enough of, being that they're old people who have constantly gotten everything wrong and that's why the kids must save the world.

Rating: Look, I knew I was going to hate this book when I saw Tynion IV's name on the cover so I can't pretend that the following is an unbiased review: this book was terrible. I've also admitted over and over again that I don't like Jim Lee's scribbled faces art, no matter how often DC tries to convince me that he's the greatest artist of all time. The only reason I bought this book is because I like Vandal Savage. But then I realized that I almost certainly won't like the character when he's written by Tynion. So not only will I not be purchasing The Immortal Men #2, I am going to discretely sneak this copy of #1 back on the shelves at my local comic book store. Reverse-shoplifting isn't a crime, right?

Grunion Guy's Musical Corner of Music Reviews!

Rain by Concrete Blonde
Does nobody care about regulating the power that musicians have to control and contort our emotions?! If hypnotism were real, I'm certain they wouldn't allow hypnotists twenty-four hour access to our minds via radio so that we all wind up acting like chickens. And yet musicians are allowed to manipulate our emotions on a near constant basis? It's insanity! I suppose it wouldn't be so bad if every song out there was uplifting bubble gum pop that simply perks you up or makes you smile. But what about songs like this one? How is it legal to musically recreate a loneliness and heartbreak so bleak that you want to kill yourself?! And has anybody done a study on how many mass killings were perpetrated by somebody who just heard a Rammstein song?
Grade: A.

Hang Wire by The Pixies
I came to The Pixies too late in life to really love them. I feel like they distilled the confused anger of a growing teen into potent two and a half minute doses. Maybe they were what I needed to break out of the years I spent crushing on someone not interested in me. Instead, fucking Robert Smith and The Cure coddled my pain and heartbreak and told me to live there, forever. Fucking assholes.
Grade: C.

Prettiest Cop on the Block by Alice Cooper
This song is from one of the albums that nobody ever talks about, Special Forces. It belongs to that run of late seventies, early eighties albums where Alice tried to incorporate a bit of new wave and punk into his sound. He was always a bit of a chameleon, tailoring many of his albums to the sound of the day. By the name of the song, you might guess that it's about a cross-dressing man in a role society often thinks of as masculine. What you might not guess, if you don't know a lot about Alice Cooper, is that he has a number of songs along this theme. He also has a song about an ex-football playing construction worker who loves Hollywood and dresses like a woman and a song about a transvestite truck driver (but then who doesn't have one of those? Weird Al has one too! And probably The Doors, right?). I like the driving bass line on this song but overall it's a bit of a dud. It's no surprise that most of Alice's late seventies songs aren't often played on the radio.
Grade: C-.

Interchangeable Knife by Electric Six
Sometimes I find myself thinking, "I don't have a headache and I really want one." On those days, I'm lucky to be an owner of this song! That might sound like a positive but it was actually a criticism couched in positive language! I'm a sneaky mother fapper! Although if you don't mind the headache from the first thirty seconds of this song, it slides into a sort of disco slash rave slash gay hiphop thing that won't cure the headache the first part gave you but might get you accidentally dancing. "Accidentally dancing" is the only way to describe how I dance.

It's not like the rhythm of the song changes at the thirty second mark. It's just that it sounds like somebody realized they were recording inside of a giant metal pan and quickly ushered the band outside of the pan to finish the song. They probably should have just rerecorded the first bit because now I have a fucking headache.
Grade: C+ (Lose the first thirty seconds and it's a solid B).

Been Down by Blue October
I suppose if I had to choose a song that gives me a headache and a song that makes me kill myself, I'd choose the headache. Of course when I'm down and out suffering from a migraine (which I just dealt with over the last 24 hours for the first time in a quite awhile, so I'm speaking from recent experience), I spend most of that time wishing I was dead. So maybe I'm wrong about choosing the headache and I'd rather listen to this song.

Actually, I would rather listen to this song because I love the way it sounds. If you can ignore the lyrics where the guy is telling the person he loves that she should understand why he's a big asshole, it might even make you feel good! I would probably sing this song at Karaoke but I still haven't found a place that has it. On the plus side, the new Karaoke place I'll be going to next seems to list "Hate Me" as one of their tracks! Maybe I'll record myself singing that so everybody can watch it and think, "What the fuck is going on here?"
Grade: A-.

This part isn't a review but it's still part of the musical corner! I still own the first mix tape I ever made (and it still plays (and I still have a vehicle with a tape deck!)). The first song on the tape is "Hello" by Lionel Richie which is a total stalker song and a weird way to begin a tape which was directly meant for a specific person although I never gave her the tape. So basically it begins, "Hey! I want to tell you that I love you! Now here are a bunch of other songs about how much I want to touch you!" The final song on the tape is "Like China" by Phil Collins which is a song about how careful Phil is going to be fucking the girl for her first time. So that's like not at all a weird song to stick on a mix tape for the girl you're crushing on, right? "Hello! I love you! Now we're going to fuck and I'll be super careful because I'm pretending it's your first time even though I'm sure it's not but it is my first time so I'm going to be really bad at it. Please love me anyway!"

What Am I Currently Reading?!

I just finished rereading Koji Suzuki's horror novel Ring. The reason I reread it is that, years after reading it, Powell's finally had a copy of the sequel, Spiral. Ring was a quick read so I knew I could breeze through it in a few days so the events would be fresh in my mind upon reading the sequel. It's a good thing I reread it because I certainly forgot a few major points, like how Sadako never actually crawled out of television sets like in the movie and how she had testicles and smallpox. The book was written in 1992 but seems to be commenting on modern Internet meme culture. I get that memes are just thought viruses and Ring's main plot point is that Sadako and Smallpox have a thought virus baby to enact vengeance on all the terrible people of the world (which are all the people). Maybe Koji had recently read Dawkins' The Selfish Gene which inspired this novel. Asakawa, the main character in the book, relies on a book about viruses and mankind to figure out how to break Sadako's curse (or, more accurately, to keep it going). Plus he and his cohort, Ryuji, discuss how viruses could be genes that have escaped our DNA to become free wheeling hippy genomes camping out on whatever gene couch will have them. Apparently there's a brand new fourth book in the series. My guess is that it will absolutely deal with the curse traveling along Internet memes.

Ring is one of those books I'd recommend for long flights. It's an easy read that holds your attention the entire way through. But if you're a young person who hates free speech, nazis, rape, and blunt assumptions of traditional gender based on sexual organs, you might have a couple of issues with this book. Those issues won't have anything to do with free speech or nazis though! You just have to wade through one main character occasionally bragging about raping women. But at least by the end, he gets his! That's a spoiler so try not to remember that if you're going to read this book. Also, it's unclear by the end whether or not he's actually ever raped anybody. I suppose that's not really the point though. The fact that he thinks he can make friends by admitting to having raped people probably makes him unlikable. You might also not like the main character since he knows about Ryuji's rapes since high school and has never turned him in nor stopped hanging out with him. Boy, if only I could have read this book in 1992 when everybody was totally cool with rape so that I wouldn't feel these conflicted feelings about the protagonist and his rapey friend.

The gender stuff just gets weird but I understand why Koji put it in there. He needed Sadako to think of herself as female so that she could long for a baby but also needed her to physically be male so that she couldn't have that baby. So Koji gave her Testicular Feminization Syndrome. It's almost as weird a beat as when the kids in It have a gang bang in the sewer so that they can lose their innocence and escape It's world. Sometimes writers shouldn't be allowed to come up with their own plot points.

I'm also up to Ogre, Ogre in my trudgingly trudging reread of Anthony's Xanth novels. I have to read them so I can finally discover what color her panties were in The Color of Her Panties which is where I stopped reading them because I couldn't be seen reading a book called The Color of Her Panties in high school! At least not if I wanted to get laid in high school! Not that I ever got laid in high school! But that certainly wouldn't have helped! Or maybe it would have? I bet some horny Xanth loving nerd girl would have totally been all, "Oh, you're into panties, are you?" Then I would have learned what finger banging was!

Letters to Me!

Anonymous Writes: (In response to me telling him, "You leave the worst comments! I can't believe how badly you misunderstand Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea!") What's to misunderstand? It still doesn't change the fact about Lobo becoming the very thing he was supposed to condemn even before The New 52. Even worse, you are a reviewer who lets mediocre/below mediocre crap like the Rebirth Justice League of America get a pass all because it features a character you like.

My Reply: Oh man, Cullen Bunn...I mean Anonymous! You're so close to understanding the blog! But you're unable to realize the joke is the thing you describe because you always have to be the smartest guy in the room, don't you? I rarely quote people (unless I'm misquoting Shakespeare and attributing the quote to Yogi Bear) but I think this calls for a Patton Oswalt quote: "You will miss everything cool and die angry."

* * * * * * * * * *

KB Writes: (In response to me writing, "Most Americans think Bon Jovi was a huge punchline to the joke of '80s rock music.") 'Lost Highway' is my go-to song when it feels like life has stopped shitting on me and I can finally breathe again. I'm not necessarily about Bon Jovi all the time, but he has his moments.

My Reply: I don't know that song. I guess I don't know much Bon Jovi after Slippery When Wet. But I should rectify that because I know why Bon Jovi has been so successful for so long. You've seen his smile, right? That smile is his music. Sure, some of his songs shouldn't be sung with that smile. But deep down, we all love Bon Jovi because you know he's going to treat you like his best friend even if he just met you. Unless you just fucked his wife or daughter or Richie, of course. Then he'll probably be all, "Say goodbye to yesterday, bitch!" After which he'll get his ass kicked by you because — let's face it — we all know Jovi can't fight.

I found it interesting but not surprising that under the Wikipedia entry for Jovi's album, "Lost Highway," they listed his genre as "country rock." I bet my fifteen year old self would have been all, "You take that back! Jovi don't country rock! Jovi just rocks! 'Love is a social disease yeah yeah yeah!'" Then whoever just told my fifteen year old self that Jovi was country would be all, "Dude. Stop headbanging in my face. Your leather fringes almost put my eye out." But my forty-six year old self is all, "Oh yeah. I guess Jovi found his true calling after the Young Guns II soundtrack. Totally country rock."

What I'm trying to say is that I'd probably suck Jon's dick if he asked. Just to see that smile.

* * * * * * * * * *

KB Writes: (In response to me writing, "We also learn how Lister became a crew member and that his breaking of quarantine by smuggling the cat on board was done on purpose so he could be in stasis for the entire trip back to Earth.") Blasphemy! Cloister the Stupid was trying to protect The Holy Mother Frankenstein, not exploit her and possibly leave her to starve. What are you, one of the orange-hat wearers?"

My Reply: He didn't leave her to starve! He made sure she'd be locked safely away in the ventilation system where nobody would find her and where she'd have plenty of opportunities for stealing food from cargo. And that's not my orange-hat wearing speculation. It's all written down in perfectly serviceable smells in the holy book, Infinity Welcomes Careful Drivers. You should try not to be so brainwashed.

* * * * * * * * * *

KB Writes: (In response to me writing, "I hate when people equate Jesus Christ Superstar with Godspell.") Oh don't get me wrong, I'm not equating the two at all! JCS good, GS bad. "Godspell" is way too precious and is an excuse for theater majors to embarrass themselves in a setting where nobody's allowed to mock them because that would be blasphemy. (And yet Jesus as a clown is neither blasphemy nor grounds for action from the Siegel and Shuster estates.)

My Reply: This is why I hate communicating on the Internet and why I have a rule of only responding to comments on my blog once (occasionally twice, if I'm feeling sassy and up to the mind-numbing drain of a discussion with an absolute moron (not that you, KB, are a moron! At least not an absolute one!)). Don't get ME wrong! I never thought you were equating Jesus Christ Superstar with Godspell! How could this conversation gone so far off the rails?!

Anyway, I do like your definition of Godspell.

* * * * * * * * * *

KB Writes: Boy wouldn't Superman feel stupid if he'd wiped out his powers "just in case", and then a meteor wiped out Metropolis.

My Reply: I guess that's why he never takes Batman seriously when Batman is all, "You're too powerful. You should cancel yourself." Superman is smart!

This doesn't remind me at all but I'm terrible at segues, I had a dream last week where my high school English teacher, Mr. Borror, was holding a class where we were discussing Jesus Christ Superstar and some poems I can't remember (Dammit! If I were better at segues, I would have introduced this during the replies about Jesus Christ Superstar! So dumb!). One of the people in the class was you, KB. I was really terrible at explicating the poem and couldn't even, in the dream, remember what it was about. So instead I decided to say some nice things about Mr. Borror and the people in the class. I said this about you, KB: "He's said some really sweet things in his emails." So there you go! Even my subconscious likes you! I think that means we're real boys now! I mean real friends!

* * * * * * * * * *

Anyway, that's all for now! I can't remember my sign off. I'm terrible at consistency. I think it had something to do with calling everybody twats or losers or something. Bye!

Invasion! Book Three: World Without Heroes (December 1988)

Looks more like Heroes Without a World, amirite?!

The Cover
Somehow Bart Sears pulled a cover out of his ass that I appreciate. Did Bart Sears begin doing Artist Steroids in the early '90s? I don't know what they are but the symptoms are drawing all of your characters like they just took steroids and got done lifting at the gym. Here, they're all just regularly muscled and Wonder Woman isn't scaring my penis away. I think that's just because I'm old though. In 1988, I'm sure my penis was cowering inside me at the thought of a strong, independent woman who knows what she wants and what she might want is for me to satisfy for her sexually. My penis, at 17, was definitely not up to that task and it knew it. I've heard from a comic book reading friend that Bart Sears got over his '90s fixation on drawing everybody like they were burly pieces of beef jerky but I'll have to take his word for it because I'm not in any hurry to hunt down any Bart Sears comic books. I'll never get the taste of early '90s Power Girl out of my mouth. Dammit. Now I'm horny.

The Story So Far
It doesn't matter! The first two Books told a complete and coherent story of the invasion of Earth by tall toothy bastards whose foreheads looked like they never missed a Wesley Willis concert! I once had the opportunity to headbutt Wesley Willis at his merch table when I went to see him decades ago in Portland but I was too nervous. How do you prepare yourself for meeting a man who beat Batman's ass? It's impossible.

I suppose the story so far is that the nerdiest Dominator of all time has developed a bomb that will disable the Meta-Gene in Earthlings. He's so hyped to stop getting Dominator Swirlies and Dominator Wedgies that he's going to break the terms of the Dominator's Unconditional Surrender to Earth and restore the Dominators to glory! In his mind, at least. Obviously he's going to wash out and wind up stuffed back in his Dominator locker.

The Story
Before I get to my little comic book, I want to post a quote from the book I'm currently reading, John Barth's The Sot-Weed Factor (1960). I've owned this book for about 27 years and am finally getting around to reading it which is fitting if you know anything about the main character in the book. Anyway, here's the quote:

"I fear me what Father would say, did he hear of't."

"My dear fellow," Burlingame said, "we sit here on a blind rock careening through space; we are all rushing headlong to the grave. Think you the worms will care, when anon they make a meal of you, whether you spent your moment sighing wigless in your chamber, or sacked the golden towns of Montezuma? Lookee, the day's nigh spent; 'tis gone careering into time forever. Not a tale's length past we lined our bowels with dinner, and already they growl for more. We are dying men, Ebeneezer: i'faith, there's time for naught but bold resolves!"

Sure, this is sort of a standard profound thought, a bit of the old seize the day mundanity. Barth was 30 when he wrote this and there's a weird twilight zone in a young person's life where the realization that you only have the one life hits you pretty hard and you wonder what the fuck you're doing with it. But I just love the way this is expressed. The concept of how fast everything goes remains the theme throughout, that and nobody else caring what you do with your life, even the worms who will eventually eat you. It's not just about life going by fast; it's about not living for other people as well. I don't mean in an isolated, uncaring and selfish way! I mean in a don't let the authoritarian control freaks make you think twice about doing something you long to do. Look, maybe it's simpler if I just let somebody who expresses things better than me say it. Somebody like Chris Onstad:

It's fake ideas all the way down, man!

Not only is the rock careening through space: the space is careening through space! Everything is careening, faster and faster. If the planet is revolving around the sun at X speed and the sun is moving through space at Y speed and the galaxy is moving through space at Z speed and, and, and, well, it's all additive, you know? That's reality! Making sure you're home at 10 PM because your parents proclaimed that was your curfew? How the fuck does that stand up to what's really happening out past the roof, the atmosphere, the edge of the solar system?! Just fucking go for it, man!

At the moment, I may be a little drunk on misfiring brain chemicals due to reading and possibly genetics and I did drink a Monster energy drink because I hate my kidneys. Let me calm down a bit and we could get back to reading about that Nerd Dominator. I also need to process the loss of Todd McFarlane on this series. Gone too soon, especially when replaced by Bart Sears.

This is fucking page one. I guess we're just getting right into it, eh?

Okay, great, Gene Bomb deployed. What exactly does that mean? Earth will still be protected by Superman, Green Lantern, Batman, Green Arrow, Aquaman, Wonder Woman, Martian Manhunter, Starfire, Nightwing, Blue Devil, The Spectre, Jason Blood & Etrigan, Doctor Fate, Hawkman, Hawkwoman, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold, Guy Gardner, and so, so many others. The meta-gene explains maybe — and this is being generous — fifty percent of Earth's heroes? Of course I'm only on page one and I'm bringing logic to an irrational gun fight. I bet Aquaman loses his powers because the entire race of Atlanteans are based on a meta-gene. And the Amazons too. And maybe Martian's have a meta-gene being that they're part of the Sol system so J'onn will just turn into a big green powerless gumby dude. And maybe Batman's meta-gene runs his memory so he'll forget his PIN and not be able to access his money so he'll lose all of his wonderful toys?

It turns out the Gene-Bomb doesn't immediately shut down the powers of every superhero. First, it makes their powers spike so they go out of control. In Moscow, Firestorm begins transmuting everything into everything else. In Manhattan, Captain Atom almost causes a nuclear incident. At JLI Headquarters, Fire begins barfing up green flame everywhere.

In the Dibny home, Sue considers divorce on the grounds of "My husband is gross."

Most of the heroes I named earlier aren't affected and they're called in to help stop the out of control heroes. The one exception in my list is Doctor Fate. Why is he out of control? He's not even really human when he's got the helmet on, right? Is this evidence that the Lords of Order are humans super evolved from the Meta-Gene?! I suppose Kent Nelson could have a Meta-Gene that allowed him to use the helmet effectively. I guess. I might as well let comic book logic lead my thinking or else how am I going to understand any of this shit?

By the end of Chapter One, the crisis is over. The non-affected heroes didn't defeat the out-of-control super-powered heroes. The out-of-control super-powered heroes just wore themselves out and collapsed. Having them collapse immediately after their meta-genes were turned off by the Gene Bomb would have resulted in a comic book with far less than 80 pages. And probably a really boring comic book. Also, without the sudden burst of power, how could Terra have come back to life?

Far, far away, Deathstork feels a mysterious movement in his pants.

All of the downed heroes are gathered in a large Lex-Corp medical facility where they're strapped to beds, hooked up to monitors, and supplied super bedpans. But the one thing the doctors don't do is remove any of their masks. Because even if they're dying, they wouldn't want their identities exposed! Also I don't know what kind of pillow they gave Firestorm since his head is still on fire. Were we still consciously using asbestos in 1992?

That bit about asbestos reminds me: I grew up in the '70s! That's my excuse for being as stupid as I am. I was huffing lead gasoline exhaust! I should get a medal for never becoming a violent criminal with all the lead, asbestos, and nuclear fallout from weapons testing I sucked down during my youth! Fuck, why didn't my Meta-Gene ever kick in?!

Since the medical community has failed at finding a way to reverse the meta-gene meltdown taking place (even the greatest scientists in the DCU like Doc Magnus, The Chief, Lex Luthor, and Dr. Megala), Hal, Guy, J'onn, Starman, Robotman, and fucking Dmitri the Rocket Red travel across the universe to have a word with the Dominators. They're obviously the cause even though there's no evidence as to the cause. Batman probably figured it out.

Guy stole my favorite line when I'm visiting the bath houses down on Castro in San Francisco.

The group run into Superman in orbit around Earth who claims he won't set foot back on Earth for some reason. He'll think twice when he's about to run out of oxygen. Why he needs oxygen when the yellow sun basically gives him everything he needs, I can't say. Maybe he just needs to keep some kind of gas in his lungs so they don't collapse in the vacuum of space? No wait. That's like backwards! Oh, never mind! I keep forgetting I'm reading a comic book and not a scientific journal!

While trying to find out while Superman won't go back to Earth, the Omega Men arrive in a star ship. They were headed to Earth to join the battle but it's over. So they agree to transport everybody to the Dominator's homeworld using their ship's hyperdrive.

Tigorr's an intelligent man. Err, cat. Um, man-cat?

Back on Earth, the heroes begin dying.

"Who's that?" you're probably thinking. That's Scott Fisher. "Who's that?" you're probably thinking.

It feels wrong that I used the whole "Who the fuck is that hero?" joke for two members of the Doom Patrol. But let's face it: it wasn't exactly the greatest run for those guys. And they needed to really start building up some solid wreckage so that Grant Morrison could crawl them out of it.

Apparently the person coming back to life in Markovia was Metamorpho and not Terra. That's too bad. Not that I'm not happy for Metamorpho. I just wanted more Terra. I guess I have to wait for fake Terra from the future (unless she wasn't fake?) in Team Titans! No wait. I already re-read Team Titans. I guess I'll never again have any Terra in my life!

The mission to the Dominator's home planet takes two seconds. Snapper Carr (who now has a super power because his Meta-Gene was activated by the Dominators in Book One and who is now a member of a superhero team named The Blasters) has the power of teleportation. He teleports J'onn to the surface of the planet where J'onn disguises himself as a Dominator (luckily one with a huge red spot). J'onn then infiltrates the locker where the Nerd Dominator has been stuffed, reads his mind, learns the antidote, and he leaves. That's it! They've got the cure! Story over!

Oh, right. They needed to fill 80 pages.

So all that's left is a bit of a space battle so that Superman and the Green Lanterns can have an excuse for being here (although Robotman, Starman, and Rocket Red really weren't needed in this entire plan). And we meet Frag who, I'm assuming, is one of Carr's Blaster buddies? But that's pretty much it. J'onn makes the cure, the team hyperspace back to Earth, Superman acts weird, and they explode the antidote in the atmosphere, curing everybody immediately!

Okay. Not everybody.

The Ranking!
If you don't take into account that Book Three was used as a launchpad for the whole "super powers are caused by a meta-gene" shit that DC will use to empty my pocketbooks with Bloodline a few years later, this really should have just been a two 80-page book series. This was an unnecessary third chapter! Maybe editorial also felt they needed to highlight the Earthlings that would become The Blasters since The Blasters was an new series about to hit the shelves that I'm positive absolutely nobody was interested in. Finally, the back cover proclaims, "We have no idea what we're doing! Did we need this third Book? Do we need a fourth?! Who wants more Meta-Gene stuff! DC! We're Putting the Meta-Gene Back Into Comics!"

Um. Yes?

Batman: Shadow of the Bat #15 (August 1993)

The design team decided Baby Diarrhea Green would be too off-putting. So they went with Baby Diarrhea Yellowish-Brown.

The Cover
I don't think I have any comments left in the tank for the technical proficiency of Brian Stelfreeze's painted covers. We get it. You can paint shiny abs and thighs. What most upsets me about this cover is how it doesn't relate to the first part of the story at all. Does it? Am I missing something? Did the brain damage I must have received as a child (which also caused me to forget that I was brain damaged) make me unable to understand the theme of the previous story? Was there a Hell and/or hors d'oeuvre theme that I didn't catch? How hard do you have to be hit in the head, and by what object, to cause you, later in life, to not understand simple plot developments in a fucking comic book? Also, in case that symptom is too vague to diagnose my issue, what injury also causes somebody to be able to spell "diarrhea" without looking it up but can never remember how to spell "hors d'oeuvre"? Can a doctor who reads my blog get back to me on this? I understand that by reading this blog it means you'll be a pretty average doctor who probably really only deals with feet. But I'll take the medical diagnosis anyway! Thanks!

The Story So Far
Batman has not pissed off a devil or a chef or a 17th Century witch-hunter so I'm not sure this issue continues the story from last time. The only reason I'm going to assume it does is that it says, right on the cover, "Gotham Freaks, Part Two". In that story that doesn't involve Batman battling a giant hungry for S'mores, Batman was patrolling the Black neighborhood in Gotham when he saw a white guy out after dark and thought, "He must be robbing bars because there's no other reason for him to be here at night!" If you're thinking Batman is racist because he profiled a white man, you're wrong. He's racist because he was patrolling the Black neighborhood. He followed the possible thief (who was the actual thief because he's The Fucking Dark Goddamned Knight Detective, you dumb bitch) to the Gotham Fun Fair where he immediately accused all of the Freaks of being criminals. Gina, the hot G-word Lady who runs the Freak Show, ran Batman off because she knew that her boyfriend who recently escaped prison was actually stealing from the bars and she was hiding him in her vardo. Batman, knowing his stuff and not trusting the woman (not because she was Romani but because she was so defensive and obviously lying and also a little bit because her ass was chef's kiss), decided to go undercover at the Gotham Fun Fair to catch the petty thief. Yeah, I know, Batman's wasting all of his time and resources to catch a guy who had been robbing bars. Who fucking cares?! It's not like at eight years old, Bruce Wayne's bar was once robbed. He really should leave this kind of shit to the police. Anyway, he discovered Gina's secret but she once again drove him off using the law which made Batman go, "How the fuck does a woman with that nice of an ass know so much about the law?" Did I say Batman was racist earlier? I meant he's racist and sexist.

Also, Bruce wants to fuck Gina.

The Story
Batman does some investigating but in plain clothes because if he gets caught as Batman, Gina will have him arrested for trespassing, breaking & entering, harassment, stalking, and threatening her with violence. Although if he gets caught snooping around as Bruce Wayne, wouldn't that be worse? He should at least be wearing his Matches Malone disguise!

While snooping, Batman discovers that the Gotham Fun Fair is 50 thousand dollars in debt and Gina's about to lose it to foreclosure. Also, Gina and Mike, the prison escapee boyfriend who's been robbing bars, had a double act where they would hypnotize audience members. Bruce didn't recognize Mike earlier even when Mike opened his huge stupid mouth and told Batman that Batman had apprehended him years earlier, but Bruce recognizes him in old photos because of a gem he's wearing in the act.

Well you can't not do crimes with a magic rock like that while living in Gotham!

Batman finally remembers this Mike character: Mirage! A character nobody but Alan Grant probably remembered in 1993! Other than Alan Moore and Grant Morrison, I mean. An old foe like this appearing makes me think I need to resurrect my Who's Who posts from my time on tumblr! Because I definitely have plenty of free time to shoehorn that in along with all the other stupid shit I'm doing! I can probably pet my cat less, right?

Discovering the thief is Mirage, a man who can make people see illusions with the power of his magic gem eye contacts, Batman knows where he's hiding: the freak show! Hmm. Either Batman's detective skills and instincts are far better than I realized or he just really fucking hates people with disabilities.

Spray him with mace! Beat his criminal ass!

Look, we all knew Texas was somehow involved as soon as he was introduced as a "new member" of the Freak Show. What a perfect disguise, right? A guy with no limbs robbing bars? Preposterous! Although in Tod Browning's movie, I'm pretty sure the guy with no arms and no legs knifes a guy.

Mike stops the illusion and all of his freak friends discover he's not one of us. Meaning he's one of Them! They'll no longer help harbor his ass on their turf. Mike flees, leaving Batman trapped in an illusion of being strangled. But the freaks (and Gina!), recognizing Batman is more one of us than Mike ever was, help break the illusion and set him free. Instead of rushing directly after Mike, he takes a few panels to scold Gina for harboring a felon. Justice!

Or should I say "just ass"? No? Whatever. You just don't appreciate hot comic book asses. Not like me and Dwarf Dave!

Batman gives chase and winds up in an illusion of Hell. So the cover makes sense. So what? I was wrong to criticize it? Fucking sue me. I don't care!

Oh, also Batman catches the guy and sends him off with the cops without ripping his contacts out. So, you know, he's going to escape while the cops wind up in a massive orgy back at the precinct. And just like so many other endings where Batman solves a crime where the money from the crimes was going to help regular people, Bruce Wayne buys up the Gotham Fun Fair to make sure the freaks don't try to fit into normal society. So typical of a rich guy. He could have just paid to bail out the Gotham Fun Fair with an anonymous donation. But instead he buys it for himself. Bastard.

The Ranking
Well that's it for my Batman comic books! I highly doubt I own any older comics starring Batman that aren't ensemble casts. Sure, I have tons of The New 52 Batman comic books. But I've already done reviews on those. I'm not going to re-read anything I already wrote about! What a waste of my not-very-precious-at-all time! I'd like to thank Alan Grant (if he can read this from Hell (or heaven, I suppose!)) for some pretty decent Batman stories, most of which ran only one or two issues at most. I don't think that's possible these days! It's definitely not editorially possible since editorial demands six issue stories so they can be collected and more money can be made from them. Although why they can't collect a bunch of shorter stories, I don't know. It's not like I know how to run a business! I mean, yeah, sure. I own my own business. But I never said I know how to run it!

Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea: The Newsletter #62 (Fourth Thursday of January 2026)

E!TACT! #62
Invasion! Book Two: Battleground Earth, Eclipso: The Darkness Within: Superman The Man of Steel Annual #1, and Cerebus #40
By Grunion Guy!


Comic Book Reviews!

Oh fuck this issue had a Globalist agenda!

Invasion! Book Two: Battleground Earth (November 1988)
By Keith Giffen, Bill Mantlo, Todd McFarlane, P. Craig Russell, Al Gordon, Joe Rubenstein, Tom Christopher, Carl Gafford, Agustin Mas, and John Costanza
Edited by Kevin Dooley and Andrew Helfer, of course.

Now hold on! Wait a second! Let me explain! I didn't mean "Globalist" as an antisemitic dog whistle! I meant it as a cat whistle for people who understand that we're all just human beings and we shouldn't be denigrating other people simply because of man made imaginary lines crisscrossing the globe! You know, borders! I'm talking about borders! Globalism should be considered the opposite of Imperialism. We don't want to force our beliefs and way of lives on other people; we want to integrate all of our ways of life so that anything can be experienced, everything available to all. Fuck Gatekeepers and Imperialists and Xenophobes and ICE and Donald Trump and every fucking Republican who somehow thinks there's still a difference between MAGA and conservatism. Oh! Also fuck neo-liberal Democrats who have basically decided they're the new Reagan Conservatives. You know, the ones who think they can steal votes from centrist Republicans without fucking realizing that even so-called moderate Republicans have been so brainrotted by propaganda that they will never consider voting for an awful, terrible Democrat even if those Democrats' values and beliefs basically mirror '80s Republicans. Embrace progressives and the left, you dumbies! There's nothing to gain in the center! FOX News and MAGA propaganda have tainted anything labeled "Democrat" and they'll never fucking vote for you, no matter how many one-off Liz Cheneys you court to your side.

I wonder how many people in 1988 exploded into apoplectic rage when they saw Wonder Woman and Captain Atom raising the flag of the United Nations? Obviously that communist Martian Manhunter would be doing it! And that half-liberal academic Firestorm! What makes me laugh (angry laugh!) is that no matter how rational the reason given by some anti-Globalist jerk, all it ever amounts to is "I hate foreigners but I know I shouldn't say that." I mean, okay, since 2016, they've begun to learn that they can say it. But pretty soon, they're all going to re-learn consequences. I don't have any power to deliver those consequences myself which is why I no longer speak with my father or many friends I grew up with. Because withholding the joy of being my friend is the only power I have over anybody. Mostly because I never wanted power over anyone! Desiring power is a fool's game only played by self-loathing jerks who need constant affirmation from others, even if that affirmation must be coerced. I'm just a smol guy!

The DC Universe's post-Crisis map of Earth was all kinds of fucked up.

Between Invasion! Book One and Invasion! Book Two were a number of crossover issues in DC's monthly titles. In 1988, I couldn't afford to purchase every book with an "INVASION! CROSSOVER!" label across the top. Luckily, the important bits are recapped at the beginning of this issue because DC probably still thought mostly kids were reading their comics in 1988 and not middle-aged losers still living with their parents. Sorry! I meant smart middle-aged people saving a buck who loved their parents dearly and would never trade them for their independence and their virginity.

Apparently during the crossover issues this guy died when Aquaman failed to save him:

"Who's that?" you're probably thinking. That's Celsius. "Who's that?" you're probably thinking.

Also during the crossovers, Superman negotiated a 24 hour ceasefire to give the Earthlings time to round up all the superheroes and offer them up on a silver platter. The Dominators were dumb enough to fall for that ploy because Superman's so honest, I guess? They must have heard he stands for truth so they were all, "Well, we have to believe him then!" But they forgot he also stands for The American Way which is all about lying your ass off to get one over on the next guy and make a shit-ton of money. As for the "shit-ton of money", Max Lord will probably give Superman a huge bonus if this works.

Even with only half of that cake showing, it's fucking mouthwatering.

I should explain for my more prudish readers that by "cake" I meant "Captain Atom's ass."

Captain Atom, being the super general assigned to this war, maps out his strategy: attack the aliens! Batman agrees that's a good strategy but he's afraid too many superheroes suck ass and won't be able to do it. So Amanda Waller steps up and is all, "Well you'll just have to team up with the super villains!" Nobody mentions that most of the super villains suck as well. My suggestion would be to break open the bottled city of Kandor and send six hundred Supermen and Superwomen off to battle the aliens.

Couldn't somebody — anybody! — have shown Todd McFarlane a map of the Earth?

So Chapter Two sees the heroes of Earth break the ceasefire. This isn't dishonorable because their home is under attack and also they're the heroes and also most of them are Americans and that's three categories of people who feel righteous when they use violence so take that, Dominators! In your fucking face which is mostly teeth anyway! The most important part of the battle is when Superman learns the Daxamites are as strong as he is. But also the next most important part is when he realizes they're all losing their powers because of something in the air and he has to save their lives. That was almost six more deaths on Thomas Midgley, Jr's conscious. As if his conscious would even notice a mere six more deaths! The third most important part of Chapter Two is when the Daxamites are all, "Hey, you're pretty noble, Superman! Maybe we're on the wrong side!" That'll probably come back to bite the Dominators in their almost certainly way too toothy asshole.

Chapter Three takes place across the universe where the nerd Dominator has isolated the Meta-Gene. He believes it will make the other Dominators respect him but they won't because he still just has a tiny little red circle on his forehead instead of a massive one. Also there's a fatal flaw in his calculations that won't be exposed for another thirty years or so: the letter "L". Because it's the Metal-Gene and not the Meta-Gene, idiot!

Like every other gene in a person's body, it's found in just a single location. I wonder where the Penis gene is? I bet it's somewhere stupid like between the 3rd and 4th toe on the left foot.

This nerd dominator has invented the Meta-Gene-Bomb that can negate the Meta-Gene rendering all of Earth's super-heroes harmless! Except Superman because he's an alien. And also Batman because he doesn't have a meta-gene. And maybe Blue Beetle but, like, who cares, right?

The Daxamites call home and invite more Daxamites to play. When they arrive, they basically rout what's left of the alien alliance. The Dominators decide to blow up Earth rather than surrender but never get the chance because Boston Brand's been possessing characters right and left throughout this issue, even people just off at the bottom of a panel doing nothing. You could always tell because they had a glowing aura around them. I guess The Spectre allowed him to fight with the heroes because nobody would really notice.

Boston even gets to blow his own brains out at one point.

You would think that was the end of the invasion but there's still one 80 page book left. I guess that nerd Dominator with the Meta-Gene-Bomb is really going to fuck things up all on his own. Too bad all the Dominators with massive red dots are too dead to notice him.

The Ranking
Book Two ends on a high note without any suggestion that more tomfoolery by the Dominators is afoot (other than the back cover). If you were a kid in 1988 who couldn't afford Book Three, it wouldn't matter! The first two books tell a solid tale of a near catastrophic invasion that forced the people of the world to come together to battle their massive squid overlords. I mean the yellow toothy overlords. That squid thing was a big fake that probably didn't allow for world peace to last long because of stupid Rorschach and his stupid diary of stupid and violent observations. What a jerk that guy was! Anyway, that was kind of fun and I didn't mention Wally West's dad sacrificing his life to stop the Durlans because his sacrifice apparently doesn't take and he pops up again later to be a pain in Wally's ass. I think the only other heroes that died were about twenty-eight different Omega Men.

I can't decide which I think is too wide: Superman's thigh, his S-logo, or his face.

Superman: The Man of Steel Annual #1 (1992)
By Chris Wozniak, Robert Loren Fleming, Brad Vancata, Albert de Guzman, and Matt Hollingsworth
Cover by Joe Quesada and Jimmy Palmiotti
Edited by Mike Carlin and Dan Thorsland

In the opening issue of The Darkness Within DC money grab, Eclipso managed to possess Valor when Valor entered into Eclipso's palace on the moon which, we learn, basically means Valor penetrated Eclipso. Valor is inside Eclipso. Valor took his whole body and he slid inside Eclipso's gaping orifice. Before now, Eclipso didn't realize he was powerful enough to possess superheroes. He just thought his abilities allowed him to possess one schlub of a solar scientist named Bruce Gordon (hmm, I wonder how Bob Haney came up with that name? (Oh, look. It explains in the Wikipedia. Excuse me while I have a private chat with Wikipedia: "No duh!" Okay, I'm back)). Now, this wasn't just because Eclipso was hell bent on tormenting Bruce Gordon. No, we have just learned that it was Eclipso's master plan to make sure that Earth never developed decent solar energy. So fucking Eclipso's a Republican? Why am I shocked? Is it because I'm stupid?

Hmm. I should turn comments off before people begin answering that question.

Now that Eclipso possessed Valor in the absolute perfect conditions for him to be able to possess somebody, he thinks he can now just go around possessing anybody. He practices on The Creeper which sounds a lot like practicing on any non-powered Earthling walking around New York. How is that a test of his power? The Creeper? What are his power levels? They might be high in laughing loudly and jumping around like The Human Pubic Louse but not much else. With that test successful, the obvious next person to possess is Superman. See? That's probably the dumbest conclusion Eclipso could have made. He is a Republican.

This issue begins, as you might have guessed being a Superman book, in Metropolis.

Really seems like they're having a go at Gotham here.

Another reason Eclipso shouldn't be going after Superman is because solar power is Eclipso's only weakness and Superman is full of yellow sun juice. He, and I mean this literally, literally cannot be possessed by Eclipso. It wouldn't make any sense! I will get so angry if Superman winds up Eclipsed.

"It's eeeeeviiiiiiil!"

You know what? I didn't understand the ending of Time Bandits. Does the kid just wander around as a houseless orphan after? Does he wind up back in the time burglary game? Does he go on to life with firefighter Sean Connery? And was that the same Sean Connery from earlier having done his own time travel? Was the villain, the ultimate evil, just a burnt meatloaf left in a microwave for too long? Was there supposed to be a sequel?

Am I in a rage now, you might be wondering? Well, yes and no. Superman's face does do the Eclipso thing when he picks up the Black Diamond. But he fights it off and tosses the diamond aside. Superman believes he's testing himself and that he's too good and honorable to have the capacity for vengeance. But I still think it's because he's full of yellow sun, the anti-Eclipso element.

Partway through the book, there's a scene that made the entire issue worth buying. I don't fucking know what's going on in the scene but I'll tell you, the art really moved me. Well parts of me. Okay, one part of me.

I just "eclipsed" my underwear.

I just had to recheck the cover to see if this book was approved by the Comics Code Authority. It was because the guys running the CCA were fucking horny bastards, I guess.

Phantom "Girl" is somebody totally different dude. Also, why do you want to shoot Phantom Lady so badly? Seems weird.

I don't know why Phantom Lady and Starman feature so heavily in this annual because I really didn't read Superman's books in 1992 and, even if I did, this took place in 1992. I mean, I think I know why Phantom Lady was there but that has more to do with Chris Wozniak being a huge pervert than the plot. I suppose Starman was here to get eclipsed since Eclipso needed to get a success in the first annual after The Darkness Within special or else readers would have been thinking, "This is the God of Vengeance? Pathetic!"

Fat Elvis also makes an appearance and he has heat vision for some reason?

The Ranking
I'm glad Eclipso never possessed Superman but I suppose I could have lived with it if he had. The basic reasoning being that Eclipso's powers are based in magic (which readers were reminded of time and time again in this issue, probably to curtail all the letters from super fans which begin "Actually, . . ."). Since Eclipso is the God of Vengeance that means that Gods in the DC Universe derive their powers from magic. I suppose anything that isn't based in science, facts, and reality is just "magic". Although I would have chosen to separate powers of gods from powers of women in fishnet stockings who speak backwards.

Eclipsed Heroes/Villains Count after 2 Issues: Two! (The Creeper and Starman).

Dave Sim could have breezed through 300 issues with just this crew. And yet he did so much more!

Cerebus #40
By Dave Sim

Page One: Sim just sets up the conceit of this issue: Cerebus on the campaign trail. A map displays the names of all the districts along with their electoral votes. A brief blurb from The History of the 1413 Election by Suentus Po, and the title of the issue, "Campaign", hints at the least funny issue of Cerebus on the horizon.

Page Two: Dave Sim, realizing that an idiot reviewer in 2026 was about to call his comic book boring, launches straight into the comedy. Six panels of Cerebus stumping in front of a crowd at the docks. But Sim, being a comedy genius, doesn't allow the reader to hear Cerebus's boring platform. Instead, we sit in the audience, fairly far from the stage, listening to some loudmouth New Docker running his mouth the entire time. He's pretty funny!

Page Three: Dave Sim introduces the reader to Cerebus's campaign trail entourage as they're doing an Aaron Sorkin walk and prep through the rain. Astoria acts as Cerebus's campaign manager. Bran Mak Mufin runs the data from the electorate. The Moon Roach serves as Astoria's personal bodyguard, mostly to keep him out of trouble, while he believes he's serving as her love interest. And the McGrew Brothers are security.

I love Dirty Fleagle and Dirty Drew so much!

Page Four: A bit of slapstick to remind the reader that this comic book isn't just for smart people who understand political maneuvering. Also by now, the reader should notice the pattern that every page is a short sketch because focusing on the actual specifics of a political campaign would put the reader to sleep. Too bad Dave Sim forgot that he didn't want to put the reader to sleep by the time he got to his penultimate story arc! Hoo boy! I'm yawning just thinking about it!

Page Five: The bodyguards eat.

Page Six: We get a glimpse of Astoria's negotiating tactics with one of the prominent members of The Docks. Her tactics might be illegal but who can say in the medieval world of Estarcion? Maybe it's totally fine to offer government contracts to the districts that vote for Cerebus and punish those who don't vote for him with higher import taxes?

Page Seven: We learn that Bran Mak Mufin has other plans for Cerebus. He still believes in the Earth Pig born as the coming Pigt conqueror of the world. He's advising Cerebus on a military campaign to take over the world. You know, once he becomes Prime Minister and has access to Iest's armies.

Page Eight: Cerebus, sharing a bed with Astoria, dreams of the coming Aardvarkian Empire. We also learn that the campaign trail next heads to Grace District where Good Abbey controls all 15 of the district's electoral votes.

Page Nine: Am I going to do this for every page? I mean, I'm already very nearly (only inches away, actually) to the middle of the issue (Sim's issues being 20 pages) so why not, right? "Don't quit!" might be something my father would have instilled in me if he hadn't quit being my father when I was two. Plus, this page was just a visual gag of The Roach replacing a broken wheel on the carriage by holding the axle and running along side. Does all the text from Suentus Po's history of the incident make the gag funny because it shows how history books get shit wrong because we often can't imagine the reality of the situation at the time and project our own mundane and normal thoughts on the event? I mean, probably. Dave Sim was basically a professional joke writer at this point so who am I to say different?

Page Ten: Speculation on Astoria's political and religious beliefs by Suentus Po the Secret Aardvark! Unless this is one of the other Suentus Pos? I know Sim had to retcon the whole identity of Suentus Po at some point to make him one of the three aardvarks of Estarcion because he'd played fast and loose with this drug-addled philosopher slash magician guy. Sim had to do that a lot with characters introduced willy-nilly (will-he, nil-he?) during the first 25 issues when the comic book was ostensibly just a parody of sword and sorcery comic books (while The Roach himself parodied DC and Marvel). Has Kevillism been broached yet? I'd remember if I hadn't stopped reading this series for a year or two or three or . . . or . . . five? Has it been five years?! Anyway, never mind how I'm shaking in disbelief, I'm pretty sure Po has mentioned it some in the "Mind Games" issues. Whether it has or not, Suentus Po speculates on Astoria's connection to the Cirinists here as the campaign tries to get their votes.

I think the context missing from Po's history is actually Astoria's personal connection to the Abbess of Good Abbey and less Astoria's political and religious affiliations.

Page Eleven: Page Ten wasn't funny at all! It stunk of Dave Sim getting too serious. Page Eleven stinks of Dave Sim getting too misogynistic. But I only say that in hindsight, of course. This first page of Cerebus meeting a leading Cirinist sets the tone for a story four "chapters" or so away. The Abbess or "Great Mother" is a caricature of a woman using her power to humiliate men in a reversal of a medieval patriarchy (okay, fine: a modern one too). Also she's very masculine. Remember, Dave Sim learned that he had no interest in women if he didn't want to fuck them. The Abbess is probably how he sees any woman he doesn't find attractive: grating, overbearing, and needing to humiliate.

But ignoring hindsight for a moment and just taking this moment as it comes in context of what's come before: it's pretty funny! And it's a pretty good skewering of absolute power corrupting. The Cirinists may be a technically matriarchal society that worships the mother and her place in society but they're really just a mirror image of the patriarchy. It's just a reversal of the concerns of the people in power.

Page Twelve: Did we know Lord Julius was running a goat as his candidate for Prime Minister before this page? Or do we read it here first and think, "The Abbess must mean 'goat' as a pejorative for his puppet candidate." Unless you've been paying attention and realize running an actual goat against an aardvark is exactly the kind of thing that Lord Julius would do simply to amuse himself. And since everybody just sort of figures Astoria and Cerebus are fucking, they're all going to jump to the same conclusion with Julius and his goat.

The Abbess informs Cerebus that he will have the district's fifteen votes if he dismisses Astoria (with the full knowledge that Cerebus's military advisor, whom she doesn't seem to mind, is Bran Mak Mufin (spelled "Bran Macmufin" on this page while "Bran Mak Mufin" on the page where Cerebus is dreaming. I suppose the dream spelling's probably wrong but if Sim can't even standardize it, I should probably stop beating myself up over how it's spelled every time I want to type it)). Cerebus later tells Astoria what the Abbess says which is why in Suentus Po's history of the time, he notes Astoria wrote in her journal, "The Abbess is unable to aid us." And since Cerebus has abdicated his own agency some time ago, he fails to move toward a future where he rules Estarcion. Could he have still been elected Prime Minister if he dumped Astoria at this point and simply moved on with just Bran? According to Pigt prophecy, probably? Except Cerebus has no ambition so without Astoria, he'd probably lose interest and just disappear into a tavern for a few months with his campaign funds to back him.

Page Thirteen: Dirty Fleagle screams his head off about somebody eating his last dried apricot.

Page Fourteen: Dave forgot to put a joke on this page.

Pages Fifteen to Seventeen: Hmm. I think what happened is that Dave Sim abandoned the one joke per page thing he was doing and forgot to inform me. I guess Astoria manages to secure some more votes in Harbourside for various reasons. But mostly for one main reason.

What's so awful about a goat Prime Minister? I wish we had a goat for president right now.

You know the best thing about a goat? You can sacrifice it! Yes, you're allowed to follow that chain of logic all the way through. I don't mind.

The issue ends with Cerebus gloating about how he's going to be the most loved Prime Minister ever which is when an urchin in the poverty-stricken Lower Iest pelts him with some mud. Man, I'm so envious of that urchin! What I wouldn't give to throw a shit milkshake at Donald Trump!

Sim's letter pages are getting fuller! But his replies aren't worth discussing. Yet! In time, youngster. In time.

Ranking
Some good jokes and more lore. We've got Bran coming in hot with his Pigt prophecies. Cirinists taking an interest in Cerebus while also discovering that he loves his mother more than his father. And, um, Dirty Fleagle likes dried apricots? Yeah, that'll do.

Final Thoughts

Yeesh. I really need to tone down how much I discuss these comics in the Newsletter. These are practically all normal review entries! The whole purposed of the Newsletter is to read a comic book, write about six lines in The Ranking section that have absolutely nothing to do with the book and then move on! I guess I'm out of practice at not doing reviews in my comic book reviews. I thought it would be way easier reading Eclipso annuals! I blame having to scan those pictures of Phantom Lady to share with everybody. I might not have known what great art was before today but Chris Wozniak cleared that right up for me. Wowzers! What a set of arts on that lady!

That's all for now! Later, jerkos!