E!TACT #26
The Half-Year Anniversary Newsletter!
Also: The Wild Storm #13, No Justice #2, New Challengers #1, and Batman #47.
By Grunion Guy
The Retrospective!
The Half-Year Anniversary Newsletter!
Also: The Wild Storm #13, No Justice #2, New Challengers #1, and Batman #47.
By Grunion Guy
The Retrospective!
Here's the part where you sit patiently sipping champagne or apple juice as I fumble with the slide projector. It's also the part where you glance around at everybody else wondering if they're also thinking, "Why does he have a slide projector? Has he not heard of [Do research to discover name of new technology that does what slide projectors do and replace this with that. DO NOT FORGET!]?"
This is the part where you imagine me, in a tuxedo and looking as handsome and sexy as you feel comfortable, asking to have the lights turned down only to realize the projector still isn't working. I mutter, "Fucking cunts," before waving in the dark for a few seconds before I ask to have the lights turned back on. This is the part where I take an interminably long time to admit that I don't know what I'm doing before looking for the nerdiest person in the room to set up the projector for me. It's a woman with glasses and a pony tail in a frumpy dress that's probably disguising a chubby body and not the totally surprising hot body that will make everybody gasp when they finally see her polished up at the end of the Newsletter. She flips a switch and slides begin appearing on the wall. "Lights, lights, you motherfuckers!" I scream as I stumble back to my seat, bumping into a table shared by Scarlett Johansson and Jerry Stiller.
This is the part where you read a bunch of random quotes from my blog over the years instead of looking at pictures. Maybe you'll also get to look at some pictures. Either way, stop gabbing with the people at your table and pay attention!
Saturday, July 7, 2012
While Superboy and Wonder Girl are arguing, a dinosaur swallows Superboy whole. But Wonder Girl punches it in the stomach and it spits out Super Boy. Now, did you hear what I just typed? Oh, I mean read. Did you read it? Yes. A fucking dinosaur. Yay! The twelve year old boy in my basement is super excited about this turn of events. Did I say basement? I meant in my head. You know. The old me when I was twelve. Not that kid in the basement. That's nothing.
Saturday, August 23, 2014
I probably shouldn't objectify a fictional character, especially since I don't know how old she is. She isn't under eighteen, is she? She doesn't look like she is although you can never tell how old a character is because comic book artists are wildly inaccurate at portraying age. If David Finch were drawing this comic, I might think that Batgirl and her friends were still in middle school. If Chris Burnham were drawing this comic, I might suspect every character had had sub-dermal yogurt injections. If Rob Liefeld were drawing this comic, I'd probably consider seeking out a professional attorney and pursue a fraud lawsuit against him and DC. I may not be able to define "art" but I know it when I see it!
Thursday, June 5, 2014
What are DC editors paid to do? Because part of their job description obviously isn't taking a script back to Ann Nocenti and asking the important questions like "Why is Sam calling Selina a tease here?" and "Why is Swindle saying 'Never again' to Vice?" and "Who keeps signing your paycheck?"
This is the part where you imagine me, in a tuxedo and looking as handsome and sexy as you feel comfortable, asking to have the lights turned down only to realize the projector still isn't working. I mutter, "Fucking cunts," before waving in the dark for a few seconds before I ask to have the lights turned back on. This is the part where I take an interminably long time to admit that I don't know what I'm doing before looking for the nerdiest person in the room to set up the projector for me. It's a woman with glasses and a pony tail in a frumpy dress that's probably disguising a chubby body and not the totally surprising hot body that will make everybody gasp when they finally see her polished up at the end of the Newsletter. She flips a switch and slides begin appearing on the wall. "Lights, lights, you motherfuckers!" I scream as I stumble back to my seat, bumping into a table shared by Scarlett Johansson and Jerry Stiller.
This is the part where you read a bunch of random quotes from my blog over the years instead of looking at pictures. Maybe you'll also get to look at some pictures. Either way, stop gabbing with the people at your table and pay attention!
Saturday, July 7, 2012
While Superboy and Wonder Girl are arguing, a dinosaur swallows Superboy whole. But Wonder Girl punches it in the stomach and it spits out Super Boy. Now, did you hear what I just typed? Oh, I mean read. Did you read it? Yes. A fucking dinosaur. Yay! The twelve year old boy in my basement is super excited about this turn of events. Did I say basement? I meant in my head. You know. The old me when I was twelve. Not that kid in the basement. That's nothing.
Saturday, August 23, 2014
I probably shouldn't objectify a fictional character, especially since I don't know how old she is. She isn't under eighteen, is she? She doesn't look like she is although you can never tell how old a character is because comic book artists are wildly inaccurate at portraying age. If David Finch were drawing this comic, I might think that Batgirl and her friends were still in middle school. If Chris Burnham were drawing this comic, I might suspect every character had had sub-dermal yogurt injections. If Rob Liefeld were drawing this comic, I'd probably consider seeking out a professional attorney and pursue a fraud lawsuit against him and DC. I may not be able to define "art" but I know it when I see it!
Thursday, June 5, 2014
What are DC editors paid to do? Because part of their job description obviously isn't taking a script back to Ann Nocenti and asking the important questions like "Why is Sam calling Selina a tease here?" and "Why is Swindle saying 'Never again' to Vice?" and "Who keeps signing your paycheck?"
Oh Ann Nocenti! How I miss thee!
Monday, January 27, 2014
Fuck you, Apple! You're taking Whitman's poetry about life itself being a poem and a verse and trying to make it a call to arms for people to get out and create (with your product, of course). But Whitman's whole point is that we are here and that is life and we all have a unique identity and that's fucking enough! What we do, no matter what it is, is poetry in and of itself! So take your stupid ass fucking call to arms and shove it up your stupid ass fucking ass!
Monday, October 15, 2012
Does anybody know how many non-venomous spider bites it takes to kill a person? If it's more than thirty-six, my body is still probably in the crawlspace of my house. When history remembers me as the genius I'm pretty sure I am, I hope they remember my last spoken words were "That's weird. Who would carpet a crawlspace?"
Thursday, July 23, 2015
That was probably the least interesting confession I could have made. "Hey! I run people over in a video game and I thoroughly enjoy it!" Like, who doesn't?
Thursday, March 2, 2017
Right now, I don't know if I want to name my own price on car insurance or fuck Flo deep in the ass.
Also Thursday, March 2, 2017
Supergirl has worse Daddy Issues than that stripper I tipped too well and made too much eye contact with who thought that was an invitation to provide a therapeutic ear for her as she gyrated near my vinaigrette decanter. Is it too much to ask that when I walk into a building that screams in bloody neon "Objectify women sexually here!" that I not have to learn that they're real people with real problems?!
Sunday, October 20, 2013
I think I met a stripper super villain in Vegas this weekend. She told me her name was Princess Unicorn Pants and for $25, she'd stab me in the face and choke me. All that for $25?! How could I refuse! I wonder if that's why I can barely speak now? It could also be the cause of my spontaneous loss of depth perception.
Friday, March 22, 2013
People say Portland has too many homeless people. I say Portland has an abundance of opportunities for people in the "I love to assert my power against targets incapable of standing against me" career field.
Saturday, March 22, 2014
Look, I can't hold your hand while reading this commentary and explain every single thing I say! If you're a regular reader of my commentaries, you know exactly what and who I mean by "barn owl." I suppose I could have easily explained it in far fewer words than it took to explain why I wouldn't explain it. But I think I'm standing on principle here! I've never done it before so I'm not sure if this is it or not.
Fuck you, Apple! You're taking Whitman's poetry about life itself being a poem and a verse and trying to make it a call to arms for people to get out and create (with your product, of course). But Whitman's whole point is that we are here and that is life and we all have a unique identity and that's fucking enough! What we do, no matter what it is, is poetry in and of itself! So take your stupid ass fucking call to arms and shove it up your stupid ass fucking ass!
Monday, October 15, 2012
Does anybody know how many non-venomous spider bites it takes to kill a person? If it's more than thirty-six, my body is still probably in the crawlspace of my house. When history remembers me as the genius I'm pretty sure I am, I hope they remember my last spoken words were "That's weird. Who would carpet a crawlspace?"
Thursday, July 23, 2015
That was probably the least interesting confession I could have made. "Hey! I run people over in a video game and I thoroughly enjoy it!" Like, who doesn't?
Thursday, March 2, 2017
Right now, I don't know if I want to name my own price on car insurance or fuck Flo deep in the ass.
Also Thursday, March 2, 2017
Supergirl has worse Daddy Issues than that stripper I tipped too well and made too much eye contact with who thought that was an invitation to provide a therapeutic ear for her as she gyrated near my vinaigrette decanter. Is it too much to ask that when I walk into a building that screams in bloody neon "Objectify women sexually here!" that I not have to learn that they're real people with real problems?!
Sunday, October 20, 2013
I think I met a stripper super villain in Vegas this weekend. She told me her name was Princess Unicorn Pants and for $25, she'd stab me in the face and choke me. All that for $25?! How could I refuse! I wonder if that's why I can barely speak now? It could also be the cause of my spontaneous loss of depth perception.
Friday, March 22, 2013
People say Portland has too many homeless people. I say Portland has an abundance of opportunities for people in the "I love to assert my power against targets incapable of standing against me" career field.
Saturday, March 22, 2014
Look, I can't hold your hand while reading this commentary and explain every single thing I say! If you're a regular reader of my commentaries, you know exactly what and who I mean by "barn owl." I suppose I could have easily explained it in far fewer words than it took to explain why I wouldn't explain it. But I think I'm standing on principle here! I've never done it before so I'm not sure if this is it or not.
Oh Rob Liefeld! How I miss thee!
Saturday, June 27, 2015
It's just like watching a Looney Tunes cartoon. Except with masturbation and beaver jokes.
Saturday, May 6, 2017
People who liked Twat Lobo are beneath Trump Supporters on my list of people I would never have breakfast with. And I love breakfast!
Friday, June 26, 2015
After the fight, Superman meets up with a cop whom he recognizes from events in Action Comics #42 which, once again, I missed due to my time machine having been stolen because I left it unlocked in front of that 1983 Red Barn I visited last week to pick up a Foghorn Leghorn glass.
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
When I first moved into this place and looked under the house, I was like, "Holy shit! You can probably fit ten corpses down here!" But now I feel like a soccer mom who buys a minivan because she's sure she can fit ten bags of groceries in the back only to find on her first shopping trip that only eight can be squeezed in.
Thursday, September 15, 2016
Who would have thought that the Hanna-Barbera comic books would be the cutting edge comic books commenting on our modern times? Wacky Raceland is over there commenting on the important aspects in our journey through life. The Flintstones are commenting on the ridiculousness of our modern way of living and how we believe much of that idiocy is just the way things are, shrugging off any belief we can change it and just struggling through the roles others have given us. And Scooby Apocalypse is commenting on how fighting for survival at the end of the world in a short skirt doesn't provide as many on-panel upskirt shots as a reader might expect.
Sunday, June 21, 2015
I don't like having to figure out what things mean. I just like pointing at stuff and saying, "I saw that! Did you see that? Totally saw that. Means something, probably."
Wednesday, November 23, 2016
Could it be true? Could it be that we...were too free?! Before I get on with my point, let me just start by saying I'm not suggesting we should corral stupid people and butcher them for their meat! I mean, that's probably going too far. But maybe we should consider demoting them to the level of urban wildlife, on par with squirrels, raccoons, and opossum? If a stupid person tries to make conversation with me in public, shouldn't I be allowed to swat them away with a broom while yelling, "Shoo! Shoo!" or "Oh my god it probably has rabies!"? I don't know how we can test the intelligence of everybody in the country to see who gets what rights but I think I have an idea! We seem to be okay with enacting laws that make it more difficult to vote, right? So how about each ballot comes inside a puzzle box that must be solved before the vote can be cast! This will limit the amount of dumb people who get to ruin a pretty good system. It might also accidentally send a few people to hell but I think Americans have shown that they'd totally be okay with that.
At first I thought maybe the voting booths could be inside of locking garbage cans to test people's intelligence but then we'd have a spate of raccoons voting. They might even win some districts. Before you know it, we'd have a bowl of cat food for president and a bird bath for vice-president. I mean, we sort of had that from 2001 to 2008, so I think the country would survive.
Saturday, August 30, 2014
How many months in a row can you convince your neighbors that the stench coming from your house is due to fertilizing the garden before they think, "Wait. What garden?"
Friday, October 21, 2016
I didn't realize I'd watched Footloose wrong for years. It wasn't until I heard somebody talking negatively about the adults that I realized Kevin Bacon was the hero! Shit. I thought he was the villain who destroys a small town and gets away with it! How could you not root for the people trying to stop idiots from dancing?! Go read a book or something! Express your zest for life in painting! Quietly! In your garage!
Saturday, May 30, 2015
Speaking of beat-up covers, I dug out my copy of Walking Dead #1! Wait, I phrased that wrong. I meant that the cover wasn't beat up at all. In fact, it looked flawless! When should I sell it? Has the show jumped the zombie shark yet? Oh man. I hope at some point Rick jumps a zombie shark to prove to some other gang of survivors that he's the coolest. And then the term "jumping the shark" would have to begin meaning the opposite of what it means now!
It's just like watching a Looney Tunes cartoon. Except with masturbation and beaver jokes.
Saturday, May 6, 2017
People who liked Twat Lobo are beneath Trump Supporters on my list of people I would never have breakfast with. And I love breakfast!
Friday, June 26, 2015
After the fight, Superman meets up with a cop whom he recognizes from events in Action Comics #42 which, once again, I missed due to my time machine having been stolen because I left it unlocked in front of that 1983 Red Barn I visited last week to pick up a Foghorn Leghorn glass.
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
When I first moved into this place and looked under the house, I was like, "Holy shit! You can probably fit ten corpses down here!" But now I feel like a soccer mom who buys a minivan because she's sure she can fit ten bags of groceries in the back only to find on her first shopping trip that only eight can be squeezed in.
Thursday, September 15, 2016
Who would have thought that the Hanna-Barbera comic books would be the cutting edge comic books commenting on our modern times? Wacky Raceland is over there commenting on the important aspects in our journey through life. The Flintstones are commenting on the ridiculousness of our modern way of living and how we believe much of that idiocy is just the way things are, shrugging off any belief we can change it and just struggling through the roles others have given us. And Scooby Apocalypse is commenting on how fighting for survival at the end of the world in a short skirt doesn't provide as many on-panel upskirt shots as a reader might expect.
Sunday, June 21, 2015
I don't like having to figure out what things mean. I just like pointing at stuff and saying, "I saw that! Did you see that? Totally saw that. Means something, probably."
Wednesday, November 23, 2016
Could it be true? Could it be that we...were too free?! Before I get on with my point, let me just start by saying I'm not suggesting we should corral stupid people and butcher them for their meat! I mean, that's probably going too far. But maybe we should consider demoting them to the level of urban wildlife, on par with squirrels, raccoons, and opossum? If a stupid person tries to make conversation with me in public, shouldn't I be allowed to swat them away with a broom while yelling, "Shoo! Shoo!" or "Oh my god it probably has rabies!"? I don't know how we can test the intelligence of everybody in the country to see who gets what rights but I think I have an idea! We seem to be okay with enacting laws that make it more difficult to vote, right? So how about each ballot comes inside a puzzle box that must be solved before the vote can be cast! This will limit the amount of dumb people who get to ruin a pretty good system. It might also accidentally send a few people to hell but I think Americans have shown that they'd totally be okay with that.
At first I thought maybe the voting booths could be inside of locking garbage cans to test people's intelligence but then we'd have a spate of raccoons voting. They might even win some districts. Before you know it, we'd have a bowl of cat food for president and a bird bath for vice-president. I mean, we sort of had that from 2001 to 2008, so I think the country would survive.
Saturday, August 30, 2014
How many months in a row can you convince your neighbors that the stench coming from your house is due to fertilizing the garden before they think, "Wait. What garden?"
Friday, October 21, 2016
I didn't realize I'd watched Footloose wrong for years. It wasn't until I heard somebody talking negatively about the adults that I realized Kevin Bacon was the hero! Shit. I thought he was the villain who destroys a small town and gets away with it! How could you not root for the people trying to stop idiots from dancing?! Go read a book or something! Express your zest for life in painting! Quietly! In your garage!
Saturday, May 30, 2015
Speaking of beat-up covers, I dug out my copy of Walking Dead #1! Wait, I phrased that wrong. I meant that the cover wasn't beat up at all. In fact, it looked flawless! When should I sell it? Has the show jumped the zombie shark yet? Oh man. I hope at some point Rick jumps a zombie shark to prove to some other gang of survivors that he's the coolest. And then the term "jumping the shark" would have to begin meaning the opposite of what it means now!
And aroused!
Saturday, July 7, 2012
Lobdell's target audience are either the kind with no short term memory or the kind who just say, "FUCK YEAH FIGHTING AND SEXY BITCHES!"
Lobdell's target audience are either the kind with no short term memory or the kind who just say, "FUCK YEAH FIGHTING AND SEXY BITCHES!"
* * * * * * * * * *
This is the part where the lights come back on and everybody gives me a standing ovation. Go ahead. Give me a standing ovation. I don't care if you're reading this at work. I demand respect!
Next is the part that's just beginning right now. It's where I read some comic books and people who aren't into comic books tune out until I start reviewing music. Unless they're not into music either. Although if they're reading this, shouldn't they be into me? Like really into me? Like if you saw me on the street, you'd-want-to-give-me-oral-sex into me?
Next is the part that's just beginning right now. It's where I read some comic books and people who aren't into comic books tune out until I start reviewing music. Unless they're not into music either. Although if they're reading this, shouldn't they be into me? Like really into me? Like if you saw me on the street, you'd-want-to-give-me-oral-sex into me?
* * * * * * * * * *
Comic Book Reviews!
Comic Book Reviews!
The Wild Storm #13
By Ellis, Davis-Hunt, and Buccellato
One year of Ellis's The Wild Storm contains too much information for my head. I have to remember dozens of characters, half a dozen organizations vying for control of the world, and which characters work for which organizations. Hopefully he'll reboot everything with this issue!
Ellis does not reboot the world this issue. But he does spend most of his time saying, "Hey, you know that story I've been telling for a year in which I've been hinting at an underlying alien invasion? Well here are a bunch of those aliens and guess what? They've all got factions as well! So now you have to remember all the different characters, who those characters work for, if they're aliens or not, and what alien race or faction they are if they are indeed aliens! Oh, and guess what? Sometimes I'll have scenes where I don't use the names of some of the characters in those scenes and you'll never be able to tell who they are unless you're a rabid fan who reads and rereads every single issue multiple times! Good luck understanding any of it!"
Rating: I know I'm not following about thirty to forty percent of this series (mostly because I'm reading it monthly) but it's still better than anything else DC Comics is publishing. Except maybe Batman and Mister Miracle. I should be putting this series off to the side to reread all at once later, like I'm doing with Mister Miracle. But at this point, that would mean digging through a bunch of poorly labeled comic book boxes. I'm forty-six! I don't have enough life left for those kinds of mundane tasks. Maybe I should rehire Pickle Boy.
By Ellis, Davis-Hunt, and Buccellato
One year of Ellis's The Wild Storm contains too much information for my head. I have to remember dozens of characters, half a dozen organizations vying for control of the world, and which characters work for which organizations. Hopefully he'll reboot everything with this issue!
Ellis does not reboot the world this issue. But he does spend most of his time saying, "Hey, you know that story I've been telling for a year in which I've been hinting at an underlying alien invasion? Well here are a bunch of those aliens and guess what? They've all got factions as well! So now you have to remember all the different characters, who those characters work for, if they're aliens or not, and what alien race or faction they are if they are indeed aliens! Oh, and guess what? Sometimes I'll have scenes where I don't use the names of some of the characters in those scenes and you'll never be able to tell who they are unless you're a rabid fan who reads and rereads every single issue multiple times! Good luck understanding any of it!"
Rating: I know I'm not following about thirty to forty percent of this series (mostly because I'm reading it monthly) but it's still better than anything else DC Comics is publishing. Except maybe Batman and Mister Miracle. I should be putting this series off to the side to reread all at once later, like I'm doing with Mister Miracle. But at this point, that would mean digging through a bunch of poorly labeled comic book boxes. I'm forty-six! I don't have enough life left for those kinds of mundane tasks. Maybe I should rehire Pickle Boy.
* * * * * * * * * *
No Justice #2
By Snyder, Tynion IV, Williamson, Manapul, To, and Hi-fi
By Snyder, Tynion IV, Williamson, Manapul, To, and Hi-fi
What? Armageddon unleashes what?!
From this moment on, I'm going to describe my orgasms as "when the dark seed blooms." Hopefully that gave you enough of a mental picture to make you sick. If not, I'll try to think up something grosser before I'm done.
Thinking of gross things, how was it we had so many dead baby joke books in the eighties? Was that the most shocking thing anybody could come up with? Maybe it was because dead baby jokes were actually preferable to Ronald Reagan and his cronies razing America.
I just looked up "dead baby joke books" on Amazon and found one from 2011. The first review was from Paul Majors who gave it three stars and titled his review, "Not for kids." Did that need to be clarified? Maybe he wanted to be sure that parents of dead babies weren't accidentally buying this book for their dead baby because they'd misconstrued the title. He does go on to say that he told lots of dead baby jokes when he was thirteen but somehow the dead baby jokes in this book are too adult for thirteen year olds. How is that possible? That's the target demographic for dead baby jokes, isn't it? Paul Majors must not understand that today's thirteen year olds are much more sophisticated than the thirteen year olds from the eighties. They need more anal rape and skull fucking in their dead baby jokes or they just can't be shocked by them.
Some people really seemed upset about a book with juvenile humor about dead babies. But come on! Some of them are funny, right? I mean the ones that aren't punching down at the dead babies but making fun of something else entirely. Like this one:
"What's the difference between 100 dead babies and a Ferrari?"
"I don't keep a Ferrari in my garage."
Ha ha! See? It's relatable! Although I have to admit a lot of them are just covering the same ground. There's a lot of "What's a specific color and sits somewhere?" Then there's a description of a baby that died in such a way (or has been dead long enough) to be a certain color. That's just lazy comedy! Some of the other ones make no sense unless you assume the joke teller and everybody else in the world simply hates babies for obvious reasons.
"What's the difference between a baby and an onion?"
"Nobody cries when you chop up the baby."
See? What kind of sociopath tells that joke?! I just got done reading reviews of a dead baby joke book on Amazon and I can attest that there are a lot of people who would cry about chopping up a baby!
"What is the definition of revenge?"
"A baby with a dog in its mouth."
What? Why?! If this is the quality of dead baby jokes in that dead baby joke book, maybe I should give it a one star review too! So offensive!
Most of the dead baby jokes I'm finding online are just terrible jokes obviously written by people who don't understand how to write a joke. Here are two final dead baby jokes that I want to discuss before I get back to reading more mature literature.
"What's the difference between a soccer ball and a baby?"
"I've never kicked a soccer ball 50 yards."
This is a good example of how most people writing dead baby jokes don't understand joke writing. The joke seems to be that kicking a baby is funny. But it's illogical to think you could kick a baby further than a soccer ball! I need a more realistic scenario if you're going to entertain me with your dead baby joke. The humor can't just be in the premise that I'm hurting a baby or reveling in the death of a baby!
"What do babies and baseballs have in common?"
"The neighbor gets angry when you throw them through their window."
I like this joke because it tells a story about the relationship between the joke teller and the joke teller's neighbor. It also makes the neighbor seem like a huge jerk because they seem to have the same reaction to a baseball coming through their window as a baby. Shouldn't the neighbor have greater concern over one of those things? Maybe I just like this joke because now I can't stop singing the Mormon commercial, "Who broke my window?", with the line, "Who could the little culprit be? Who threw this baby? Did someone see?!"
Okay, back to No Justice. The four new Justice League teams based on entropy, wisdom, wonder, and mystery have decided to follow Brainiac's plan on Colu. Back on Earth, Green Arrow and Amanda Waller are the world's last hope. That's a pretty good way to make things seem as bleak as can be but might I suggest a way to make them bleaker for the next story, Mr. Snyder? You should have made Earth's last hope Green Arrow and Aquaman.
Team Entropy (aka as Team Beat People's Asses) stars Batman, Lex Luthor, Lobo, Deathstork, and Beast Boy. If the idea was to have the most "chaotic" characters on a team, I can see why Lobo was picked. He's Chaotic Evil, after all. And Batman is Chaotic Good (as is Beast Boy). Deathstork is probably Chaotic Neutral. But is Lex Luthor really chaotic? Maybe Neutral Evil at his worst although, being that he once became the president of the United States, I'd suspect Lawful Evil fits a bit better. Maybe Brainiac decided this team would need somebody to keep them focused and it's not like Batman can be bothered to lead another team.
Team Wonder is composed of Raven, Doctor Fate, Zatanna, Wonder Woman, and Etrigan. I guess this is just Team Magic. Apparently wonder has died on Colu because they're so into science and facts. The Tree of Wonder thrives on faith and magic and other bullshit. I was hoping it was fed on the starry eyed stares of children seeing a bunny rabbit for the first time. Although I probably shouldn't complain since DC's magic users are generally my favorite heroes. Stupid cynicism is making me forget this is my favorite team.
Team Mystery is comprised of Superman, Sinestro, Starfire, Martian Manhunter, and Starro. So basically it's Team Not-Earthlings. I'm not sure how "mystery" is one of the four major cosmic forces. This should be the cosmic force based on faith. It would become the most powerful force on a planet where everybody just shrugs their shoulders and refuses to discover how anything works because "God." He works in mysterious ways, you know!
Team Wisdom is made up of The Flash, Cyborg, Harley Quinn, The Atom, and Damian Wayne. I guess this is Team Doctorate. Sure, Cyborg doesn't actually have a degree but thanks to his constant connection to the Internet, he now knows everything there is to know and all Rule 34s that go along with it. And Damian is just wicked smart, right?
Thinking of gross things, how was it we had so many dead baby joke books in the eighties? Was that the most shocking thing anybody could come up with? Maybe it was because dead baby jokes were actually preferable to Ronald Reagan and his cronies razing America.
I just looked up "dead baby joke books" on Amazon and found one from 2011. The first review was from Paul Majors who gave it three stars and titled his review, "Not for kids." Did that need to be clarified? Maybe he wanted to be sure that parents of dead babies weren't accidentally buying this book for their dead baby because they'd misconstrued the title. He does go on to say that he told lots of dead baby jokes when he was thirteen but somehow the dead baby jokes in this book are too adult for thirteen year olds. How is that possible? That's the target demographic for dead baby jokes, isn't it? Paul Majors must not understand that today's thirteen year olds are much more sophisticated than the thirteen year olds from the eighties. They need more anal rape and skull fucking in their dead baby jokes or they just can't be shocked by them.
Some people really seemed upset about a book with juvenile humor about dead babies. But come on! Some of them are funny, right? I mean the ones that aren't punching down at the dead babies but making fun of something else entirely. Like this one:
"What's the difference between 100 dead babies and a Ferrari?"
"I don't keep a Ferrari in my garage."
Ha ha! See? It's relatable! Although I have to admit a lot of them are just covering the same ground. There's a lot of "What's a specific color and sits somewhere?" Then there's a description of a baby that died in such a way (or has been dead long enough) to be a certain color. That's just lazy comedy! Some of the other ones make no sense unless you assume the joke teller and everybody else in the world simply hates babies for obvious reasons.
"What's the difference between a baby and an onion?"
"Nobody cries when you chop up the baby."
See? What kind of sociopath tells that joke?! I just got done reading reviews of a dead baby joke book on Amazon and I can attest that there are a lot of people who would cry about chopping up a baby!
"What is the definition of revenge?"
"A baby with a dog in its mouth."
What? Why?! If this is the quality of dead baby jokes in that dead baby joke book, maybe I should give it a one star review too! So offensive!
Most of the dead baby jokes I'm finding online are just terrible jokes obviously written by people who don't understand how to write a joke. Here are two final dead baby jokes that I want to discuss before I get back to reading more mature literature.
"What's the difference between a soccer ball and a baby?"
"I've never kicked a soccer ball 50 yards."
This is a good example of how most people writing dead baby jokes don't understand joke writing. The joke seems to be that kicking a baby is funny. But it's illogical to think you could kick a baby further than a soccer ball! I need a more realistic scenario if you're going to entertain me with your dead baby joke. The humor can't just be in the premise that I'm hurting a baby or reveling in the death of a baby!
"What do babies and baseballs have in common?"
"The neighbor gets angry when you throw them through their window."
I like this joke because it tells a story about the relationship between the joke teller and the joke teller's neighbor. It also makes the neighbor seem like a huge jerk because they seem to have the same reaction to a baseball coming through their window as a baby. Shouldn't the neighbor have greater concern over one of those things? Maybe I just like this joke because now I can't stop singing the Mormon commercial, "Who broke my window?", with the line, "Who could the little culprit be? Who threw this baby? Did someone see?!"
Okay, back to No Justice. The four new Justice League teams based on entropy, wisdom, wonder, and mystery have decided to follow Brainiac's plan on Colu. Back on Earth, Green Arrow and Amanda Waller are the world's last hope. That's a pretty good way to make things seem as bleak as can be but might I suggest a way to make them bleaker for the next story, Mr. Snyder? You should have made Earth's last hope Green Arrow and Aquaman.
Team Entropy (aka as Team Beat People's Asses) stars Batman, Lex Luthor, Lobo, Deathstork, and Beast Boy. If the idea was to have the most "chaotic" characters on a team, I can see why Lobo was picked. He's Chaotic Evil, after all. And Batman is Chaotic Good (as is Beast Boy). Deathstork is probably Chaotic Neutral. But is Lex Luthor really chaotic? Maybe Neutral Evil at his worst although, being that he once became the president of the United States, I'd suspect Lawful Evil fits a bit better. Maybe Brainiac decided this team would need somebody to keep them focused and it's not like Batman can be bothered to lead another team.
Team Wonder is composed of Raven, Doctor Fate, Zatanna, Wonder Woman, and Etrigan. I guess this is just Team Magic. Apparently wonder has died on Colu because they're so into science and facts. The Tree of Wonder thrives on faith and magic and other bullshit. I was hoping it was fed on the starry eyed stares of children seeing a bunny rabbit for the first time. Although I probably shouldn't complain since DC's magic users are generally my favorite heroes. Stupid cynicism is making me forget this is my favorite team.
Team Mystery is comprised of Superman, Sinestro, Starfire, Martian Manhunter, and Starro. So basically it's Team Not-Earthlings. I'm not sure how "mystery" is one of the four major cosmic forces. This should be the cosmic force based on faith. It would become the most powerful force on a planet where everybody just shrugs their shoulders and refuses to discover how anything works because "God." He works in mysterious ways, you know!
Team Wisdom is made up of The Flash, Cyborg, Harley Quinn, The Atom, and Damian Wayne. I guess this is Team Doctorate. Sure, Cyborg doesn't actually have a degree but thanks to his constant connection to the Internet, he now knows everything there is to know and all Rule 34s that go along with it. And Damian is just wicked smart, right?
This sounds like a book written by Chuck Tingle.
Team Mystery discovers a shitload of shrunken planets in jars. To increase the amount of mystery in the universe, they decide to free the planets. I guess that increases the mystery because all of the readers are now thinking, "Ooh! I wonder what will be on those planets?!" Oh wait. That just increased the wonder. Maybe the wonder increases when Grant Morrison tells us about all of these new planets. The mystery increases when DC chooses Scott Lobdell to write about them instead. And entropy increases when Rob Liefeld does the art.
On Team Entropy, Lobo takes on the role as Beast Boy's mentor. What is it with Rebirth Lobo constantly trying to take on sidekicks? First he takes on the role of sensei with Atom and now he's taking Beast Boy under his wing? Not that I'm against it! The more heroes who learn to act like Lobo, the better!
Green Arrow and Amanda Waller discover that the Omega Titan seed on Earth has already been activated thanks to the death of Brainiac. So now when the Omega Titan arrives to destroy Earth, Green Arrow will have to shoot it in the butt with an arrow to defeat it. Goodbye, Earth!
Back on Colu, Team Entropy discover Vril Dox locked away in the deepest dungeon of a Coluan prison housing the worst villains in the galaxy. I guess that means somebody pitched a new L.E.G.I.O.N. book?
Rating: As blockbuster comic book events go, this one has a lot going for it: Lobo, Etrigan, lots of different heroes and villains that I like less than those first two, and, most of all, only running for four issues.
On Team Entropy, Lobo takes on the role as Beast Boy's mentor. What is it with Rebirth Lobo constantly trying to take on sidekicks? First he takes on the role of sensei with Atom and now he's taking Beast Boy under his wing? Not that I'm against it! The more heroes who learn to act like Lobo, the better!
Green Arrow and Amanda Waller discover that the Omega Titan seed on Earth has already been activated thanks to the death of Brainiac. So now when the Omega Titan arrives to destroy Earth, Green Arrow will have to shoot it in the butt with an arrow to defeat it. Goodbye, Earth!
Back on Colu, Team Entropy discover Vril Dox locked away in the deepest dungeon of a Coluan prison housing the worst villains in the galaxy. I guess that means somebody pitched a new L.E.G.I.O.N. book?
Rating: As blockbuster comic book events go, this one has a lot going for it: Lobo, Etrigan, lots of different heroes and villains that I like less than those first two, and, most of all, only running for four issues.
* * * * * * * * * *
New Challengers #1
By Kubert, Snyder, Gillespie, Janson, and Anderson
Talking about the differences in dead baby jokes has me thinking about the differences in humor between conservatives and liberals. It strikes me that conservative humor would find the outright vulgar dead baby jokes more appealing than the subtle ones that are doing something other than saying, "Ha ha! A baby has been killed!" Not that conservatives would ever be caught dead baby laughing at a dead baby joke! Or would they? Maybe they just don't laugh at dead fetus jokes. What I mean is that their humor resides more in the playground bully style of humor. If they can make somebody cry, it's funny. Whereas liberals laugh at things that are actually funny. When a conservative is mocking somebody, they're angry and red-faced. For their audience, this is the height of entertainment. When a liberal is mocking somebody, they've got that stupid smirk on their face and their eyes light up and they're preparing their elbows for a good poke in the listener's ribs. Of course there is some overlap between the two, especially with Trump as president of the United States. Sometimes it's just cathartic to say something like, "What's worse than 100 dead babies in the White House?" Then you don't even need to say the answer and nobody is really laughing because now they're depressed that 100 dead babies could run the country better than Donald Trump.
I traveled to Los Angeles a number of years ago to visit my friend Bobby Henline while he was getting some consultations for surgeries concerning rebuilding his eye after having been blown up in Iraq. Before the incident, he had been atheist and mostly apolitical. Afterward, he became Christian and a huge conservative. We stayed in adjoining rooms at the hotel and left the door between rooms unlocked. One morning, I was watching The Daily Show and laughing loudly. He came over to find out what I was laughing about. Upon seeing The Daily Show, he mentioned how he liked the show that followed: The Colbert Report. I didn't ask him if he thought Stephen Colbert's show was satire or not because I think I knew the answer. He mentioned that he was just in the other room watching Fox News which wasn't funny at all. I couldn't understand how somebody could have access to cable and choose to watch Fox News. Didn't he know there were channels like Comedy Central and the Game Show Network? Later in the evening, I was watching a show on space about novas and deep space and gamma ray bursts. He came over so we could drink and hang out and asked, "How do they know this stuff?" That question boggled my mind but it explained so much about people who fall for religion and right-wing propaganda. They often don't have the imagination or the patience to understand the way science builds upon all that science has learned to eventually make statements that sound fucking crazy. And they are crazy if you ignore that a fuck-ton of other science took place before the crazy sounding science could even be attempted. Much easier to think, "There's a magic being that answers all of my questions about how things work," than to have to read in-depth about evolution. Easier to think, "God thought we should see so he made the eye," than to read a ton of boring papers on how eyes developed via evolution based on light sensitive tissue and all that other stuff I don't know about because, I mean, those papers are so boring! And even if The Bible is often boring, at least it isn't overly long (I mean, it is, but who reads it all in one sitting? Besides, it's practically an abridged audiobook with a guy who reads the important parts to you every Sunday).
What I'm trying to say is "Have you seen the Game Show Network?" Fucking fantastic. I could watch it all day long.
I decided at some point in the last ten minutes that ending long rambling rants with "What I'm trying to say" is my new thing. What I'm trying to say is I've become a hack.
None of that had to do with New Challengers. I haven't even read it yet. But it was written by Scott Snyder so I already feel like I read it.
The New Challengers are a bunch of people who have just died. They've been conscripted to solve the mysteries of the universe before the tattoo hourglass on their arm runs out and their deaths become real. That's about all the information from the first issue. Everything else is there to seem mysterious. Unless you're a huge DC nerd and then maybe you know what the runed bone was and what the giant corpse lying against the mountain was and where the end of the world was and if Trina Alvarez is related to Nocenti's Detective Alvarez. The unexplained stuff did its trick though because I'm intrigued enough to buy the second issue. Although they already killed off the best member of the new team, an agent of Spyral.
Rating: It was a difficult read because my copy was only stapled to the cover by the bottom staple. Was that supposed to be the challenge?!
By Kubert, Snyder, Gillespie, Janson, and Anderson
Talking about the differences in dead baby jokes has me thinking about the differences in humor between conservatives and liberals. It strikes me that conservative humor would find the outright vulgar dead baby jokes more appealing than the subtle ones that are doing something other than saying, "Ha ha! A baby has been killed!" Not that conservatives would ever be caught dead baby laughing at a dead baby joke! Or would they? Maybe they just don't laugh at dead fetus jokes. What I mean is that their humor resides more in the playground bully style of humor. If they can make somebody cry, it's funny. Whereas liberals laugh at things that are actually funny. When a conservative is mocking somebody, they're angry and red-faced. For their audience, this is the height of entertainment. When a liberal is mocking somebody, they've got that stupid smirk on their face and their eyes light up and they're preparing their elbows for a good poke in the listener's ribs. Of course there is some overlap between the two, especially with Trump as president of the United States. Sometimes it's just cathartic to say something like, "What's worse than 100 dead babies in the White House?" Then you don't even need to say the answer and nobody is really laughing because now they're depressed that 100 dead babies could run the country better than Donald Trump.
I traveled to Los Angeles a number of years ago to visit my friend Bobby Henline while he was getting some consultations for surgeries concerning rebuilding his eye after having been blown up in Iraq. Before the incident, he had been atheist and mostly apolitical. Afterward, he became Christian and a huge conservative. We stayed in adjoining rooms at the hotel and left the door between rooms unlocked. One morning, I was watching The Daily Show and laughing loudly. He came over to find out what I was laughing about. Upon seeing The Daily Show, he mentioned how he liked the show that followed: The Colbert Report. I didn't ask him if he thought Stephen Colbert's show was satire or not because I think I knew the answer. He mentioned that he was just in the other room watching Fox News which wasn't funny at all. I couldn't understand how somebody could have access to cable and choose to watch Fox News. Didn't he know there were channels like Comedy Central and the Game Show Network? Later in the evening, I was watching a show on space about novas and deep space and gamma ray bursts. He came over so we could drink and hang out and asked, "How do they know this stuff?" That question boggled my mind but it explained so much about people who fall for religion and right-wing propaganda. They often don't have the imagination or the patience to understand the way science builds upon all that science has learned to eventually make statements that sound fucking crazy. And they are crazy if you ignore that a fuck-ton of other science took place before the crazy sounding science could even be attempted. Much easier to think, "There's a magic being that answers all of my questions about how things work," than to have to read in-depth about evolution. Easier to think, "God thought we should see so he made the eye," than to read a ton of boring papers on how eyes developed via evolution based on light sensitive tissue and all that other stuff I don't know about because, I mean, those papers are so boring! And even if The Bible is often boring, at least it isn't overly long (I mean, it is, but who reads it all in one sitting? Besides, it's practically an abridged audiobook with a guy who reads the important parts to you every Sunday).
What I'm trying to say is "Have you seen the Game Show Network?" Fucking fantastic. I could watch it all day long.
I decided at some point in the last ten minutes that ending long rambling rants with "What I'm trying to say" is my new thing. What I'm trying to say is I've become a hack.
None of that had to do with New Challengers. I haven't even read it yet. But it was written by Scott Snyder so I already feel like I read it.
The New Challengers are a bunch of people who have just died. They've been conscripted to solve the mysteries of the universe before the tattoo hourglass on their arm runs out and their deaths become real. That's about all the information from the first issue. Everything else is there to seem mysterious. Unless you're a huge DC nerd and then maybe you know what the runed bone was and what the giant corpse lying against the mountain was and where the end of the world was and if Trina Alvarez is related to Nocenti's Detective Alvarez. The unexplained stuff did its trick though because I'm intrigued enough to buy the second issue. Although they already killed off the best member of the new team, an agent of Spyral.
Rating: It was a difficult read because my copy was only stapled to the cover by the bottom staple. Was that supposed to be the challenge?!
* * * * * * * * * *
Batman #47
By King, Daniel, Florea, and Morey
Rating: This is what time travel and alternate time line stories should be about. It should be how the alternate life affects the only person who experienced it. The time travel and alternate time lines should only be remembered by a single person (or more, if they can all fit inside the same time sphere). Obviously that means this isn't a Batman story. This story has little to do with Batman and it shows, at the end, when he and Catwoman sit and listen to Booster Gold explain his gift. At worst, Batman's simply confused by it. At best, he's concerned for Booster Gold's mental well-being. And why shouldn't he be? This might be the most honest version of how time travel could (and probably should!) cause the traveler PTSD. I mean after Primer, of course.
I like this story. A lot. And I don't have a lot of room in my heart for Booster Gold. I get how some people would be disappointed that this story isn't a Batman story, or how it's not serious. It's definitely presented in such a lighthearted and whimsical way that the intensity and pessimism and seriousness can easily be ignored. For some comic book readers, comic book characters should be taken as seriously as a thing that should be taken seriously. I was going to say a warm coffee enema but immediately began laughing so I knew that wasn't the right image to conjure. Although maybe it is! Because people who take that shit seriously really take it seriously even if the rest of us can't stop making jokes about it. And that, to me, is Tom King's story, "The Gift". He writes Booster Gold as the silly, Giffen/DeMatteis Justice Leaguer of the 80s but puts him through some Frank Miller shit. The reader has to begin to question how many times Booster Gold has been through horrific time travel situations like this. How many depressing alternate timelines has he had to experience? And how does he keep his shit together afterward? Maybe by treating all of space and time and existence as a joke? I mean, seriously...I've never felt more empathy toward Booster Gold than after this story arc.
As for Batman? This wasn't a Batman story. But unlike Scott Snyder, Tom King didn't spend ten pages constantly Narration Boxing, "This isn't a Batman story." Maybe that was a mistake because hardcore comic book fans (like the jerks at Weird Science Blog) didn't seem to realize it. Or maybe they were just pissed that they spent $2.99 on a Booster Gold comic book when they wanted a Batman comic book. That seems like the kind of review I'd give so I'd accept that criticism. I'm always angry when I buy a comic book that purports to be one thing and then winds up being something totally different. Some times I even resort to calling people the C-word!
By King, Daniel, Florea, and Morey
Rating: This is what time travel and alternate time line stories should be about. It should be how the alternate life affects the only person who experienced it. The time travel and alternate time lines should only be remembered by a single person (or more, if they can all fit inside the same time sphere). Obviously that means this isn't a Batman story. This story has little to do with Batman and it shows, at the end, when he and Catwoman sit and listen to Booster Gold explain his gift. At worst, Batman's simply confused by it. At best, he's concerned for Booster Gold's mental well-being. And why shouldn't he be? This might be the most honest version of how time travel could (and probably should!) cause the traveler PTSD. I mean after Primer, of course.
I like this story. A lot. And I don't have a lot of room in my heart for Booster Gold. I get how some people would be disappointed that this story isn't a Batman story, or how it's not serious. It's definitely presented in such a lighthearted and whimsical way that the intensity and pessimism and seriousness can easily be ignored. For some comic book readers, comic book characters should be taken as seriously as a thing that should be taken seriously. I was going to say a warm coffee enema but immediately began laughing so I knew that wasn't the right image to conjure. Although maybe it is! Because people who take that shit seriously really take it seriously even if the rest of us can't stop making jokes about it. And that, to me, is Tom King's story, "The Gift". He writes Booster Gold as the silly, Giffen/DeMatteis Justice Leaguer of the 80s but puts him through some Frank Miller shit. The reader has to begin to question how many times Booster Gold has been through horrific time travel situations like this. How many depressing alternate timelines has he had to experience? And how does he keep his shit together afterward? Maybe by treating all of space and time and existence as a joke? I mean, seriously...I've never felt more empathy toward Booster Gold than after this story arc.
As for Batman? This wasn't a Batman story. But unlike Scott Snyder, Tom King didn't spend ten pages constantly Narration Boxing, "This isn't a Batman story." Maybe that was a mistake because hardcore comic book fans (like the jerks at Weird Science Blog) didn't seem to realize it. Or maybe they were just pissed that they spent $2.99 on a Booster Gold comic book when they wanted a Batman comic book. That seems like the kind of review I'd give so I'd accept that criticism. I'm always angry when I buy a comic book that purports to be one thing and then winds up being something totally different. Some times I even resort to calling people the C-word!
* * * * * * * * * *
And Now Some Closing Words from Henry Winkler!
"Ayyyyyyyyyyyyyy!"
"Ayyyyyyyyyyyyyy!"
* * * * * * * * * *
Now here's the part where you leave. But not before first seeing the nerdy girl let down her hair, take off her glasses, and break her nose walking straight into a wall. Who knew she was so hot and blind without her glasses?!
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