Frankenstein, Agent of SHADE #16

Shit happens and destroys everything.

Simply hating (and despising, etc.) Savage Hawkman alone didn't end Savage Hawkman's agonizingly depressing existence. Seems historically, asinine DC executed some half-assed decisions. Ending S.H.A.D.E. shows how, again, DC expresses sheer hatred against dedicated enthusiasts.

Yeah, I'm going to stop with that because I'm just going to sound more and more illiterate as I try to force myself to stick with that pattern. I just couldn't resist since Savage Hawkman sets up that mini-SHADE-rant so nicely! But that last sentence? Ugh. Forgive me!

The final issue of Frankenstein begins in a Central City not currently full of monkeys. Maybe Keystone City was full of monkeys. Maybe both cities were full of monkeys. Why did DC even bother to keep both cities? They were basically the same city but on two different Earths. Were they that important that they couldn't be merged? You know what? Let's fuck Silver Scarab and Power Girl and Jade and Obsidian and all of the other Infinity, Inc kids in the ass but we can't lose Central City! (Some of you less sensitive people might be thinking, "Hey! I bet Obsidian loved being fucked in the ass!" Shame on you! DC does not fuck people in the ass gently or with consent!) Perhaps there are some stories I don't know about that were essential to keeping these two cities on one Earth but I doubt it since if I don't know about it, who fucking cares? Amirite?! This is where we high five and then look awkward and embarrassed that we partook of that form of social bonding until we both decide we did it ironically and thus can live with ourselves once again.

A bunch of freaky-deaky weirdos (no offense to freaky-deaky weirdos) have gathered to be weird and freaky underneath the Devil's Watertower.

Holy fuck these weirdos are freaky! Hey freaky weirdos! Put on some fucking suits and get jobs already! You slacker layabouts with your "art" and your "writings" and your "above average sense of self and consciousness"! At least get off the streets so you stop making people stuck in rote, meaningless existences feel insecure about their rote, meaningless existences! Jerks!

Once these weirdos are done squeezing weird blobs out of their orifices (I could probably make a really funny bathroom humor joke here, right?!), The Monster Bomb shoots out of the Devil's Watertower and rockets toward the streets of Keystral City! The freaks begin a celebration that mostly involves shoving their fists into the air and acting smug. But then Frankenstein shows up and they lower their fists and swallow their smugness. I'm thinking they might also end up swallowing a few teeth. And maybe their fists!

Meanwhile, a normal guy in a suit (hooray! He must be the hero!) that works for Homeland Security (boo! He must be the anti-hero!) Narration Boxes the last five years of his life in one page. Oh my fucking Chaos. That is the saddest thing ever! This poor suit's entire life fills up exactly eight Narration Boxes! Those evil freaks are once again flaunting their free-wheeling, living large at everyone else's expense attitudes! They think they can just go around calling themselves The Plague and hacking computers and dropping dirty bombs and high-fiving each other for fucking the status quo in the ear without anybody getting hurt? Well now someone has gotten hurt! Mr. Homeland Security! He's spent five years watching these guys party it up all over Europe and become virus monsters while living in Castle Frankenstein and all he got to do was sit in a comfortable chair drinking coffee. What assholes!

But this normal guy (that I'm beginning to suspect is a little weird himself) is really happy that he's about to catch The Plague. But then Frankenstein and Velcoro and whatever the fuck the Wolfman's name was (Griffith! They mention it later!) crash the party and ruin the normal guy's big chance at an even bigger promotion.

More freaks! Can't a normal guy catch a fucking break?

The normal suit finally realizes he wasted the last five years of his life watching freaks party across Europe because now some other freaks (including a Mummy!) have crashed his office party and xeroxed their monstrous ding dongs (monstrous in look and not in size. Although I can't imagine Victor Frankenstein chose a tiny ding dong for his Monster!). But the normal guy notices the Monster Bomb while Frank and his Creature Commandos are too busy eviscerating and decapitating the members of The Plague. So maybe he can still be a hero! A normal everyday working stiff hero! Go Team Human! You've always been so much better than Team Vampire and Team Werewolf! Team Human was smart enough not to get involved with that klutzy, narcissistic Bella! Three cheers for Team Human!

The suit manages to run outside of his van screaming, "NO NO NO!" and into the streets before his heroic charge ends and the bomb explodes. I think the bomb is going to turn him into a freaky-deaky weirdo and he's going to love it!

Meanwhile earlier in the day (can I say that? Does that make sense?), Frankenstein and the Creature Commandos get their mission from little girl Father Time to stop The Plague from setting off a dirty monster-bomb. As opposed to a dirty-monster bomb. If there is, in fact, any difference between the two. Before they catch up to the part of the comic book I already read, Nina sets off the B.I.G.F.O.O.T. to keep any nearby surveillance equipment from recording their images. This is the part of the Frankenstein comic book where I try to guess what one of their stupid acronyms mean!

Let's see. It stops surveillance equipment. So it must stand for Blackout Inducing Goblins Farting Over Old Tape. I bet I'm pretty close!

I'd rather use the farting goblins.

From Frankenstein's perspective, the reader gets to see that before killing The Plague members, he had Velcoro drop him on the Monster Bomb because his blood will somehow negate the virus inside. He brought some explosives strapped to his chest to blow himself up so that his blood can mix with the virus. This seems like a play out of Batman's recent playbook! Shower the city with blood (and possibly piss).

He survives the blast and then is dropped on the rooftop to kill weirdos. The timing and sequence of everything seems all over the place but since this is Frankenstein's final issue, let's just chalk it up to Nina's use of the B.I.G.F.O./O.T.!

And with the blessings of freak on freak crime, the normal guys win again! HOORAY?

Although the normal suit doesn't get a promotion or a raise or glory or a pat on the back. He simply gets a paid leave of absence while he recovers form his fatigue-induced insanity. That's even better than a promotion!

Frankensteing, Agent of S.H.A.D.E. #16 Rating: +1 Ranking. I had know idea the Homeland Security guy was going to be in this comic book when I began my freaks versus normal theme but I'm glad he was so that it made a coherent story, even if nobody has any idea what this issue was actually about after reading my commentary! Ha ha ha! Now DC's lawyers can't argue that I'm spoiling their comic books and cutting into their profits by exposing the story of every issue they publish each month. Sorry to see you go, Frank! Although you'll probably be hanging about in Justice League Dark from now on. So I'm actually sorry to see Khalis and Griffith go. Velcoro and Nina can go stuff toilets for all I care!

I'm sorry, Velcoro and Nina. I'll miss you too!

Frankenstein Agent of SHADE #15

This penultimate issue is "Last Stand Against the Rot." My guess is the ultimate issue will be "Last Stand Against A Giant Creature With No Eyes and A Steel Reinforced Belly."

Last issue ended with the death of Velcoro (or at least the bisection of him. He is a vampire, after all. Don't they need to have their heads doused in sunlight and steaks served with a whisky mushroom sauce?), the appearance of a tribe of Golden Robot Women, and Frankenstein fighting to the death on an island against said island. That's a lot of stuff happening!

Does the plan begin by entering its mouth?!

The Golden Robot Women transform into a Flaming Golden Sword which Frankenstein uses to hack the island to pieces and remove the last piece of the Soulgrinder from its stomach. Now that he has all of the pieces, he just needs to return to Nina and the last of the S.H.A.D.E. scientists that somehow survived the Rot. Maybe the rendezvous point is Galapagos.

I'm sure once he makes it there, the SoulGrinder will be remade. With it, Frank will make an army of Frankensteins. With his new army, he'll ride off to help out Buddy Baker in Animal Man #15. Ta da! That's it. If there isn't anything more important to scan or talk about, my rating will follow in the next paragraph.

Monument Valley, Utah. The rendezvous point.

Frankenstein has brought the pieces of the Soulgrinder but he's also brought Victor Frankenstein and thousands of Victor's Rot monsters as well. Khalis remains below to fight them. I guess Khalis must be semi-immune to The Rot since he's a mummy! I think Khalis should get his own title. It should be like Highway to Heaven. Khalis could wander from town to town helping Atheists with problems in their lives. It should be called The Itinerant Mummy. Maybe he could have a skeletal raven as his sidekick. Maybe he'd have a group of fans following him around in VW buses although they would only be in a couple of episodes a season. And he wouldn't just help good people! Maybe a child molester would be having problems at work because his boss is a raging asshole. Khalis would arrive to put the boss in his place while his skeletal raven would keep saying things like, "Why the hell are we helping this sicko?" and "Don't we have better things to do?" And Khalis will merely intone his signature line in a voice which shows it means nothing to him at this point because he's been repeating it for centuries on his quest to help the helpless: "It is not for us to judge." And then when he's done the job and he begins walking to the next town, sad music will play as the credits roll.

Khalis is eventually overrun and rotted although it took a lot longer than most organic material. Victor Frankenstein floats up to the top of the Butte to break Frankenstein's heart.

You say semantics, I say semen-ticks.

To destroy Victor Frankenstein and his Mushroom Cloud, Frankenstein shoves him through the Soulgrinder that was quickly set up by the S.H.A.D.E. scientists. It destroys whatever Victor had become but since he was still choking Nina, it turns Nina into a FrankencreaturefromtheBlackLagoon. The rest of the scientists line up and walk through it as well so that Frankenstein now has his legion of Rot-Proof monsters to help defeat Arcane. But he also had a little something more.

Oopsed!

I say "Oopsed" because there's no way Frankenstein would have agreed to have another baby after the shitstorm caused by his last child. How does it work, anyway? Do they have to keep upgrading the baby's body parts with bigger and bigger dead children as it needs to "grow"? Or does it just automagically become an adult over time? You know what? I don't want to know! I'm not interested in babies at all and only very slightly more interested in undead babies. I'd read a comic book about one but I don't think I need to know how it was made. You know, the Birds and the Zombies?

Frankenstein, Agent of S.H.A.D.E. Rating: No change. One more issue to go before the end of Frankenstein and he has to find a home in one of DC's other 52 titles. Where will he end up? Teen Titans? Justice League of America? Oh, probably Justice League Dark. Or maybe now that he's made friends with Princess Amethyst, he'll take a vacation in Gemworld.

Frankenstein Agent of Shade #14

They fight yet another giant beast. Place bets now! Will they kill it by stabbing it in the eye or exploding out of its stomach?

I gave the last issue of Frankenstein a +1 rating but I couldn't even remember what was happening in this comic. Even after reading the commentary, I just had a vague, nagging memory about Dr. Victor Frankenstein's Soulgrinder being the weapon The Red and The Green need to fight The Rot. But the parts are supposedly scattered all over the world. I don't see how Frankenstein is going to have time to find all of these parts before this Rotworld crossover is over. Maybe it's composed of only two pieces.

Turns out it's three pieces. And Velcoro and Frank find one in the first few pages after eviscerating a gigantic bull and pulling the pieces from its stomach. I have the feeling Matt Kindt got roped into this Rotworld crossover and was told specifically what he needed to make Frankenstein do. They probably said to have Frank get the Soulgrinder to Alec and Buddy by the end of Frank's issues. However he did that was probably up to Matt. And since he wasn't planning on writing this story anyway, he decided to make Frank go on a quest. A really boring quest. Super boring.

SO BORING.

Underneath the Golden Gate Bridge, they encounter the giant Rat King Thing from the cover. This may be the most realistic part of this comic book yet. Frankenstein distracts it while Velcoro gets the kill.

And who took "exploding out of its stomach"? Collect your winnings!

Come on, comic book writers! Whenever a giant creature is being battled, it seems you have all decided there are only two ways to kill it. I'm still waiting for a surprise battle against a giant monster! Frank and Velcoro have one more gigantic beast to kill. Perhaps Kindt will think up something cool and unusual for the last battle.

Velcoro and Frank need to fly a small plane to their next stop because the last creature is on Easter Island.

Correction: the last creature IS Easter Island. And Velcoro is a Jaws fan.

Velcoro gets bitten in half by this creature while Frank lies in a hole in the ground because he refuses to wear a parachute when he jumps out of a plane. When he climbs to the top of it, he discovers he and Monster Island aren't alone.

What is this? Robot Amazon Easter Monster Island?

Frankenstein Agent of Shade #14 Ranking: No change. Overall, this issue was just a disappointing addition to the Rotworld storyline. A mundane quest to battle boss creatures. At least one of the giant creatures being killed in a cliche way. Golden robot women. No, wait. That last one was one of the highlights! But they only appeared at the end of the comic, so there wasn't enough of them. Velcoro getting bitten in half was nice and since he's a vampire, he's probably lying in the creatures digestive juices cursing his ass off. Or back on. A mediocre filler issue that I'll probably forget about by Issue #15.

Frankenstein Agent of SHADE #0

Doesn't everyone already know Frankenstein's monster's origin? A crazy doctor sends his disfigured assistant to get body parts. The doctor sews them together while a bunch of zany things happen. Then he puts the body on ice for awhile while he tends to his second job as a candy maker. Then he returns to zap the body with lightning and his creation comes to life. Then his creation meets these two buffoons and more wacky hijinks ensue. There might also be something about Niagara Falls and some poorly named baseball players at this point in the story. Then the monster kills a little girl out of kindness and he's chased by a mob into the arms of Elvira. And right around there he's approached by some three month old named Father Time that recruits him into S.H.A.D.E. which stands for Some Hackneyed Acronym, Disappointing Everyone.

Frank is partially made from Bunny Rabbits just like Resurrection Man. Is this a trend in comics today?

Frankenstein's monster was brought to life by something called the Soulgrinder. Dr. Frankenstein kidnapped inmates from an asylum and threw them in the Soulgrinder which powered the machine that would bring his monster to life by consuming their very souls!

*CRACK OF LIGHTNING! MANIACAL LAUGHTER!*

It took fifty inmates to bring Frankenstein's monster to life which means Frankenstein's monster has the crazy memories of fifty asylum inmates rattling around in his corpse brain. I think the rest of Frankenstein's monster was created in the old fashioned way with Igor digging up corpses and sewing them together into a big, green monster that retained only a nagging sense of its own humanity. And maybe the monster retains the memory of the corpses he's made out of instead of the inmates but I doubt that after seeing the crazy memories that have been plaguing him lately.

SHADE had been monitoring Dr. Frankenstein for potential recruitment into SHADE. But they noticed that anybody willing to throw living people into a fiery pit to use their souls as fuel to bring a corpse back to life was probably a little bit too insane even for their Machiavellian machinations. But they did see potential in the reanimated corpse!

If that top panel were narrower, I'd turn it into the new banner for EEE! Tess Ate Chai Tea!

Frankenstein's monster had escaped into the world. Where he went and what he did next remain a mystery. Well, they're a mystery to me since the comic book doesn't depict any of it. But it does show what Dr. Victor Frankenstein did next! He became a Pirate Bounty Hunter and Leader of an Army of Corpses!

Why can't the Doctor be happy with these monstrosities? Have they only been fueled by one or two souls each and rendered permanently mentally handicapped?

Since leaving his home, Frankenstein's monster had walked across the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean and arrived in the Amazon rainforest where he met a group of natives living in the vicinity of a baby-stealing Great Old One. The natives appealed to Frankenstein's monster for help and he granted it, proving to SHADE that Frankenstein's monster was not a monster at all. He was simply Frankenstein and he had indeed retained his humanity.

Frank learns a valuable lesson in self-sacrifice and helping others. This message brought to you by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Soon after Frankenstein's celebration with the natives, Dr. Frankenstein catches up with him. His steampunk corpse pirates destroy the village and kill everyone within it. Except Frankenstein. Frankenstein they have a little bit of trouble with. Both physically and philosophically.

Just another guy with severe daddy issues trying to prove himself to the world. Could you be more cliche, Frank? If you'd been female, you'd have been a stripper.

Frank and the Doctor have a good old fashioned knock down drag out fight over a cliff and down a raging river and over a waterfall before they have their final confrontation. I think it's probably done perfectly but I might be biased since I just called out the whole daddy issue thing.

I like how the confrontation is built up by Victor as this grand God versus creation thing when it's really just father versus son. And Frank brings it right back down to that level with the simplicity of striking out and a tantrum-like "Shut up." This is how anti-climactic can be done excellently.

After this fight, the final scene that I'm going to scan plays out. After that scene are a couple of pages of Frank fighting enemies across the years and those pages are pretty great. Seriously, this comic book has style. And if this is the kind of story that Matt Kindt can write, I'm all aboard for his future stories of Frankenstein. And I hope Alberto Ponticelli continues to do art for it. His style matches perfectly with the feel of this book. So, finally, here's that last scene.

When is Father Time going to be a kitten?

Frankenstein Agent of SHADE #0 Rating: Literally epic.

Frankenstein Agent of Shade #11

Hasn't Franky already killed a giant sea monster by stabbing it in the eye?

During their mission into the fourth dimension in the city of Untropolis, Velcoro was confronting their target while Frankenstein was falling into the ocean where he'll supposedly die. But he doesn't die. He survives because Nina flies to catch him using the trans-dimensional jetpack that allows them to breach the barrier between dimensions without dying. They end up in an ocean back on Earth.

This is the majority of the rest of the issue.

Frank and Nina end up inside of the Leviathan because Crowly told Frank that the message she received about Frank becoming a traitor originated in the Leviathan field office. Apparently the Leviathan Field Office is an actual Leviathan. Inside of it is where the Frank whines and moans about being composed of the parts of murderers and psychopaths. I don't know why Frank acts all emo because when Nina tries to cheer him up, he tells her his only interest is finding Satan's Ring. Then get on with it, you crying lump of self-loathing!

Frank uses a device called a M.R.H.I.D.E. which is a Mentally Retarded Heavily Idiotic Dumb Expression for the Dermal Reconnaissance Hiding for Influencing Disguise Expectations. Oops, look at that! I got it wrong by calling it a M.R.H.I.D.E. because it's actually a D.R.H.I.D.E. Stupid! Maybe Kindt should go back to just quoting Byron. Anyway, the first half of this incomprehensible paragraph just means that Frank wears a disguise while going about the city inside Leviathan.
Frankenstein's Monster eventually finds some guy he can rough up to figure out what's going on inside the belly of this creature.

Long story short: Frank is going to kill the creature housing this city.

That's all, folks! Except maybe Khalis the mummy gets teleported into the Leviathan to help heal Nina since she was injured in the dimension crossing. Also, the Leviathan is actually some Wizard of Oz type guy watching everything inside the Leviathan on a wall of monitors. Well, he should be easy to kill.

Frankenstein Agent of Shade #11 Rating: -1 Ranking. It's been awhile since Frankenstein has fallen in the ranks but it can't be helped. This issue was boring. And the cover probably should have been saved for next issue. I'm getting the feeling that a lot of comic book writers think that big stories are those that involve changing the perspective on a character or organization so that good guys become bad guys and vicy versy. Now, SHADE is already a pretty gray organization at which Frank and his wife are already pissed off. So it's not a huge jump to show that SHADE is actively making the world a worse place by hiding technology that could help millions. And then SHADE is probably using that technology for themselves. So now Frank is going to turn on SHADE and kill their Leviathan, rescuing old SHADE Agents and setting them loose on the world to help humanity. Which will probably brand him as a traitor! See? Self-fulfilling prophetic warning!

That's actually not a bad story. I think I'm still a bit grumpy from Liefeld's Grifter where suddenly Niko was a traitor with no real warning except suspicion that one of them had to be. She's the worst traitor ever though. Why save Grifter's life multiple times when the whole plan is to kill the Chosen One so Helspont can rule the world? Just help kill him when he's on the ropes, you dumb cunt! But why am I bitching about this here in Frankenstein?! It's like a secret being kept from the dumb-ass Grifter fans that like Liefeld's take on the character. Shhh! Don't tell them how I really feel!

Frankenstein Agent of SHADE #9

Ha ha! The Rot is coming to reclaim your body, dead boy!

Last night I dreamt that I was playing Call of Duty. The game was Capture the Flag on Oasis. As far as I can tell, the dream began with me lying on some stairs looking at the enemy flag. An enemy player dove on the stairs beside me (like in Black Ops! I miss being able to dive.) and I turned to shoot him with my MP40 (like in World at War!) and the gun would only shoot one bullet and freeze up. So I panicked and began yelling to my team that my gun wasn't working. I got up and jumped around and rand out of the building and dodged about bushes until I was safely hiding. Then an enemy approached me with a Riot Shield. My gun finally started working and I shot him. I approached the flag with two enemies in the distance who didn't notice me. I grabbed it and ran, screaming to my team, "Behind me! Behind me! They're coming!"

That's me, The Red Lizard, diving!

I made it back to my base without incident and noticed that our base was overrun by skeletons. My teammates were busy battling them and I ran through the brouhaha toward a woman in gold chains and silks standing near our flag. She had summoned the skeletons yet I hesitated to shoot her. I scored the flag and she began telling me that, "The Rot was coming. You need to help him." It gets fuzzy right about here but eventually I was running about with Frankenstein and trying to help him fight The Rot. But that part isn't clear anymore.

If I were a super villain written by Scott Lobdell, I'd say, "That was part of my plan!"

I had a sinus headache all day yesterday and wasn't able to read Frankenstein but I guess the cover image stuck in my head. And I fell asleep right around when I was planning on playing some Call of Duty, so that was stuck in my head as well.

On to Frankenstein #9: The Ant Farm currently hovers over the San Diego Zoo investigating the disappearance of Animal Man. Why the disappearance of Buddy Baker would be on anyone's radar, I have no idea. Frank only agrees to investigate because of the detective that also went missing at the same time, Krenshaw (the guy that The Rot took over). Father Time seems to be interested because of the report of zombie pets. He wants one! To experiment on, not to hug and kiss and lover forever.

Frank and Nina wind up at Animal Man's mother-in-law's farm in Sacramento investigating the weirdness. That's where they find Krenshaw.

The colorist does a good job approximating the lousy coloring of Animal Man.

Frank and Nina investigate the body and it comes to life, briefly possessing Nina when she touches it. It decides it's going to possess these new creatures and bring them into The Rot as well.

I guess I was wrong! The Rot can't even sense Frankenstein since the process that created him needed to make his dead flesh incapable of decay.

DC Comics is doing a lot of this casual crossover crap. I like the idea in theory. That all of these superheroes exist in the same world and their stories should make waves in the stories of other heroes. But I have yet to seen it executed very well. They all seem a bit forced, as if the editors are sitting in a room and drawing the names of two different titles out of a hat and declaring that they need to crossover. It all just seems a bit too random and chaotic.

Frankenstein finds he can't kill The Rot. He can't burn The Rot. The Rot just becomes more Rot. So what he ends up doing is having Father Time secure the area with a Firewall and then dropping a Blackbomb within the Firewall. It atomizes every living thing. But it doesn't kill Frank and it doesn't kill Nina because Frank lies on top of her. They win! But then Frank feels depressed because even the Blackbomb couldn't kill him so he must be an aberration and a freak and an abomination and a monster (he is! He's Frankenstein's Monster!). But Nina holds his hand and says he's more than everyone and he's okay again. The end.

This ending sucked! The Rot can be destroyed by atomizing the organic material which it infests. But shouldn't fire have done that as well? I guess the fire couldn't do it quickly enough and The Rot could just move to other organic things as well. I think they should have brought in some jackals and vultures to devour The Rot! Scavengers should be immune from The Rot possessing them since they spend their whole lives feeding on decaying matter.

The rest of the comic that wasn't the ending also sucked. These casual crossovers need to pick up their game if this whole "building a universe" thing is ever going to work well. Just let the writers stick to their own stories and build their own worlds. But hey! Look at the bright side! All Animal Man and Swamp Thing need now are a few Blackbombs and they can destroy The Rot! As well as The Green and The Red! Just do away with them all and turn Earth into a big steaming rock.

Frankenstein, Agent of S.H.A.D.E. #9 Rating: -1 Ranking. I didn't need a story to make me feel like Frankenstein and Animal Man were existing in the same universe. We already has the Ray Palmer link to clue us in, right? And Frank already fought OMAC and that tie-in sucked as well! DC would be better off just letting each individual title do its own thing and build its own story instead of concentrating on linking them all together.

Frankenstein, Agent of SHADE #5

Somehow His Arm Does Exist?

This comic begins with Frankenstein on a mission in Tibet turning Mountain Dwarves into jelly. And this issue gives all the lazy people who couldn't figure out how to decipher Old Portuguese a translation key!

Spoiler: Frank kills him.

I'm not sure why DC finally decided to provide a key to their alien language. Perhaps it was a mistake and they never actually meant to give the fans an easy way to decipher the language. Or maybe they wanted everyone to purchase a copy of Frankenstein, Agent of Shade Issue #5 to get their hands on a copy of the key. It's a pretty good key. It provides 14 letters. Anybody who can't figure out the rest of the letters of any future Old Portuguese statements isn't trying hard enough. Or the future statement is only composed of Qs, Xs, Zs, and Js.

Once Frank is done killing Dwarfs, Father Time's head appears and tells Franky that he's needed at Checkmate Headquarters! Again! Or, um, the first time? Am I just going to read the same story as in OMAC #5 except with different art? So, Frankenstein meets up with Maxwell Lord to find out what his mission is.

How can he know that?! Does he understand the meaning of the word, um, uh, doesn't this seem a little familiar?

Do I really need to comment twice on the same story?

Story Has Already Diddily Ended?

Once again, I read an issue out of order when I really didn't need to. This issue is just a retelling of OMAC #5 with a slight modification of the viewpoint. In OMAC, it seemed as if Brother Eye was getting the better of SHADE.net and reducing its defenses to rubble. But in this issue, those defenses seem to be a trap and allow Father Time and Ray Palmer to download all of the information from Brother Eye. I'm guess they both got information from the other without realizing that the other one was successful.

Brother vs. Father. It's cute the way those labels were juxtaposed in this issue.

The fight with OMAC ends the same way although Frank doesn't throw a gas tanker at OMAC's head. But Frank does lose his arm when OMAC teleports to safety! Frankenstein is evacuated immediately and brought to Nina from the Black Lagoon who is working on a new arm to graft onto his body. She suggests to Frank that she might be able to learn who is body parts belonged to through DNA analysis.

Study His Antique DNA, Extracted?

Can't he undergo past life regression hypnosis?

After he sees Nina, Frank yells at Father Time about being used and storms off into his room. You know, like Hellboy always does! Just like OMAC is really just The Hulk with some satellite talking in his brain, Frankenstein is just Hellboy but green instead of red.

This version of the story was more enjoyable than the OMAC version but there's no way a comic book is going to rise any rungs in the rankings by retelling another story! Sorry, Frank!