Batman Eternal #24

Because of this cover, how many nerd reviews are filled with assholes spoiling as many books and movies as they possibly can?

I'm going to spoil the entire Lord of the Rings series for those people that have never been able to slog through it but have read tons and tons of Lord of the Rings fan fiction. Sam and Frodo never buttfuck in Mordor. Legolas never fucks Gimli on horseback while humiliating him and his ancestors. Pippin is not gang banged by Ents (at least not explicitly). Eowyn never rides Merry's face after he becomes a Knight of "Ridemyfacemark." Saruman's ultimate goal is not to skull fuck one of every creature in Middle Earth plus a few he creates himself. Hobbits do not celebrate their eleventy-first birthday with a huge gay hobbit orgy. Just before he dies, Boromir does not pull out his cock to have it sucked by Aragorn while dozens of mortally wounded orcs watch and masturbate. Frodo does not emerge from Shelob's lair sick from too much spider pussy. Gollum does not have a twelve inch penis. Okay, he might have a twelve inch penis. The actual book doesn't mention it at all. Which is weird when you think about it since Tolkien felt the need to describe nearly every other thing in Middle Earth in excruciating detail.

I now think maybe I should be writing Lord of the Rings fan fiction instead of commenting on DC's The New 52. Or perhaps I just need to stick more throbbing, erect phalluses into my commentaries. For those of you who just thought "That's what she said," fuck you. I said I should be writing fan fiction so you should have thought "That's what he said."

I wonder if Slash from Guns N' Roses hates that his name now basically represents The Smoking Man using his mouth to tell Fox Mulder's penis the truth, or Superman taking a big fat batcock right up his K-hole?

Here's a spoiler for Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea: I've come to realize that I hate comic book fans far more than I hate DC Comics. I don't blame DC for putting Batman in every single one of their comic books. How does it seem that the comic book fandom can't stop masturbating on everything Marvel puts out and yet Batman still sells more comic books than any other title month to month? Hey, you fucking Batfans? Just because Batman isn't on the cover of a DC Comic book, it doesn't mean that comic book isn't worth reading! Start branching out! DC has some other really good books. Like Batman and Robin! No wait. I mean, that's good, sure. But my point was good books without Batman. Well, I'd say Swamp Thing and Red Lanterns are fucking terrific and they're barely selling but I'd hate to get people reading those just when Charles Soule has signed an exclusivity contract with Marvel. Demon Knights is really...oh wait. How about All Star...oh. Hmm, forget that. Fuck it. Keep buying whatever you want to buy and I'll keep enjoying for extremely limited amounts of time good books with characters that don't sell comic books.

I actually wouldn't be surprised to see Harley Quinn begin starring in more titles by the way her book is selling. Fucking comic book fans. I should actually say comic character fans because by the monthly sales stats, I'd have to say a large majority of people reading comic books don't actually care about the medium. They simply care about specific characters no matter how shitty they're being written. They've made an emotional connection to the character somewhere along the way and simply get squidgy feelings all up and down their insides that may or may not be (but probably are) connected to their genitals whenever they see the character. Even if that character is currently referring to her vagina as a clown car.

I'm just bitter that I can't have long runs of characters I identify with, like Etrigan and Jonah Hex. And Constantine will probably soon be canceled according to his monthly sales but that might be okay since he's been fucking neutered since being forced into regular continuity. Maybe Harley Quinn should start saying things in her comic book like, "I sure am interested in what happens to that Swamp Thing! Anybody that loves my adventures would certainly love the adventures of the Swamp Thing!" Or maybe all of DC's comic books should be team comics starring Batman and the other character that previously wasn't sharing the title with him?

Oh, who am I kidding? When I say that I hate comic book fans, I'm really just saying I hate myself. I hate myself for caring about this medium! I hate myself for reading issue after issue written by Ann Nocenti! I hate myself for...well, for other more personal and intimate reasons that I'm not sharing with the likes of you, perverted internet denizens.

It's Hush! It's already been revealed! It isn't a mystery anymore! You suck at spoiling!

Cluemaster reports to Hush that he and his gang are fucking with Gotham's infrastructure so that every citizen of Gotham will be kicking their pets. Signalman is fucking with the traffic lights because he chose a stupid name like Signalman. Serves him right. Ratcatcher is running around in the sewers trying to spread disease. He'll probably get picked up by Maxie Zeus or Killer Croc soon. And the Prankster has decided Chicago is no fun with Nightwing dead, so he's moved to Gotham where criminals seem to be able to do whatever the fuck they want, whenever they want. Sure, occasionally one of them gets some bones broken by Batman. But Batman can't be everywhere at once, right? Judging by the amount of crime in Gotham, the risk of encountering Batman seems low enough to overcome the fear of that encounter.

Later, Batman battles a deadly apparition at the Museum of Modern Art. Or it's possible he ruins a performance art piece by Doctor Ecks. Who can tell? I can't because I was programmed by the man.

This piece is called "Batman Standing in Front of a Picture of a Hamster Being Shrunk Down to the Size of a Hamster-Sized Candy Bar While Psychiatrist Sleeps."

Lastly, Spoiler manipulates her father, Cluemaster, so that he chases her outside Gotham city limits where he's picked up by state troopers who don't seem to be corrupt. Why is it Gotham cops are so corrupt? What is inherently wrong with Gotham? It must be Batman, right? I don't think Batman himself knows how he's being manipulated by Bruce Wayne. I really think Bruce Wayne is a master criminal. He controls real estate and technology in Gotham while he fosters the personality of Batman who goes about keeping the other criminal masterminds in check. Batman is a distinct personality that has an idea who Bruce Wayne is but doesn't truly know Bruce Wayne's plans and ambitions. But Bruce Wayne has no direct control over his Batman persona so he has to manipulate it in small ways, much like the protagonist of Memento manipulates himself to keep searching for his wife's killer no matter how many "killers" he kills. No wonder The Joker is in love with Batman. He's probably the only person that understands exactly how insane Bruce and Batman are.

Batman Eternal #24 Rating: No change.

Batman Eternal #5

Red Robin and Batman share a fun day out in the grey goo.

So far, Batman Eternal hasn't told a new story. I thought this series was going to blow my fucking mind. But it hasn't even blown my sexual organs. It hasn't even glanced at my sexual organs! It's just been sitting in the corner telling stories about its exes.

Batman Eternal: "This one time, Commissioner Gordon was fucking framed and I was all, 'Oh hells no!' But then the entire Gotham Police force was all, 'Batman gots ta be arrested!' And Harvey Bullock was all, 'Give me three foot-long meatball subs, yo!'"
Tess: "Yeah, yeah. I've heard those stories like a billion times. Just shut up and stick your tongue in my asshole."
Batman Eternal: "Hold on, hold on. We gettin' there. Then this tough guy Falcone shows up and everyone is all, 'Hell yeah! Year One is in the house!' And then when we found out Stephanie Brown's dad was Cluemaster? Not one pair of pants could remember what fresh air smelled like! Seriously!"
Tess: "Look, Batman Eternal. My pants are on the floor and I'm spread wide. Just, you know, how about a little pinky. Just lick a pinky and slide it on up in there."
Batman Eternal: "Did I ever tell you about the time a good cop came to Gotham and learned about how corrupt the city and Mayor Hady were? Or what about when Professor Pyg was all, 'Give me some children moth-er-fuck-eeerrrs!'"
Tess: "Oh fuck it. Where'd I put the plug?"

Just like Batgirl, Red Robin is doing some actual detective work while Batman is flipping the fuck out over Falcone coming back to Gotham and eying his pussycat.

Batgirl has discovered the identity of a person that might be behind the framing of her father, Batcommissioner. Now Red Robin has found a connection between the kids Professor Pyg tried to diddle and a building where they all lived in a Wayne Restoration Project in the Narrows. So two of the Batkids are following leads that might actually lead to setting Gordon free while Batman continues to think breaking through doors and windows and kicking people in the face will get him answers. We know that torture doesn't actually work in gathering intel so why does the World's Greatest Detective still think that breaking bones is an effective strategy for hunting down bad guys? Especially when the victims know Batman doesn't kill! Just give him some false leads and catch the first fucking bus out of Gotham!

The building where all the kids have gotten sick is where Harper and her brother, Cullen, live. And Harper's brother is currently suffering from flu-like symptoms! Is having an eyeball that looks like a computer chip a flu-like symptom? Because that's what Harper's brother has!

Meanwhile at the Gotham Gazette, Vicki Vale still thinks journalism is worth fighting for. I suppose she's correct if what she's fighting for is the right to bury the body respectfully. But it's way too late to save.

Everybody can probably spout dozens of different arguments on why socialism or communism doesn't work, but what's happened to journalism is a great example of why capitalism doesn't work either. When dollars are the bottom line for everything, nothing fucking matters but lining pockets. So who cares about truth or knowledge or information when all you care about are eyeballs.

People argue that money provides incentive to do better. But that argument falls apart over time. Eventually, competition is destroyed, laws are paid to be changed to the payer's advantage, and the rich and powerful can stop caring about better. All they wind up caring about is making money. And making money is simply incentive to make more money by any means possible. This is actually an argument toward a mix of socialism and capitalism. There are certain instances where people are better provided for by a dispassionate system that has no money making stake in their end product. Journalism and health care are a couple of these areas. If tons of money wasn't to be made by news outlets, news outlets wouldn't report on only stories that catch the attention of the most average (and worse) amongst us. Without profit, health care would cost what it costs without prices jacked beyond the extreme due to insurance company interference. You know the main reason wealthier people want privatized health care over a national system? Because they want their money to be able to get them to the head of the line should they ever have a serious problem. How can they buy an extra liver if money has no pull?

Anyway, what I'm trying to say is "Fuck the media."

The old guy, Joey Day, tries to teach Vicki Vale about real investigative journalism. You remember that kind, right? No? You're too fucking young? Oh shit. Go watch All The President's Men if you haven't seen it already. It's a good reminder of what journalism should be but very rarely has been and almost never is now. Just don't watch it while on LSD. It'll send you into some really fucked up recursions of reality.

Anyhow, Joey Day gives Vicki the scoop on Falcone being back in town. So now Vicki will be getting in Batman's way along with everybody else.

Notice Red Robin is back to having the Red Robin emblem on his shoulder instead of the stupid "T"s that I guess were for "Teen Titans" even though that's fucking stupid.

Tim points out to Batman that there was once this story called Death of the Family that never really made very many waves so he thought he'd bring it back to the surface, what with Damian and Nightwing dying (I guess? Fuck you, Forever Evil delays (meaning David Finch)) but mostly with Scott Snyder writing this and having written that. Batman doesn't want to talk about it. It's like his signature move or something. So Batman leaves leaving Tim Drake to poke around in the kid's nanobots and piss them off so they're forced to go all sci-fi cliche on him and say, "Eliminate threat."

Since Red Robin is about to die, the scene shifts to Harper saving Vicki Vale's ass from some thugs in the Narrows after which she takes her back to her apartment where Red Robin crashes through the ceiling after the thugs kick in the door. I made that sentence extra long to be able to contain all of the confusion and excitement of the actual scene!

Why? The Titans were awful! Ohhhh. Wait. I get it.

Red Robin figures out how to make the Nanobots go dormant which also causes the Nanobots to flee from Cullen and knock him into a coma.

And meanwhile in Tokyo...

It's the monkey from Batman #22 with the robot leg named Maxwell! Maybe now we'll find out the name of his other leg! Ha ha ha ha!

Batman Eternal #5 Rating: Still no change because I still haven't been blown away by it! Vicki Vale doing some investigative journalism by threatening people didn't do it for me. Seriously, people. Can we stop believing that confessions under threats of physical violence are reliable sources of information? Also, nanobots have attacked Gotham. I've lost interest in nanobots and gray goo. Now, that monkey at the end with the mechanical arm and leg? That has me interested!

The Joker #1

I'd recognize that spit curl anywhere! I know who The Joker is!

Since this is Batman 23.1 and it's about The Joker, I'm hoping it's by Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo. I actually kind of like that each of these issues' creative teams is a surprise to me. Well, kind of a surprise. I figured Nocenti was doing The Creeper but I didn't know who would be doing the art. And I was hoping Michael Alan Nelson would continue with Supergirl's Cyborg Daddy. But I really wasn't positive. The first thing I do after I buy my comic books on Wednesday is go to lunch with the Non-Certified Spouse. While we're eating lunch, I'll look over the covers and see if there are any changes to the creative teams. Mostly nothing much has changed but every now and then I get really excited about a change! Like when Scott Lobdell's name wasn't on Superman! I had to excuse myself from the table for a few minutes over that one. And apologize to the staff for desecrating their bathroom.

The cover is signed by Fabok so maybe it's the Detective Comics team of John Layman and Jason Fabok.

I'm not going to say DC would be fools not to release this image as a t-shirt but they might be able to use the $20 that I'd spend on it.

So the issue begins with a poor boy with chalky white skin and green eyes being screamed at by a woman with black fingernails and chalky white skin and blood red lips. I can't wait to find out who these people are!

The monkey's name is Gaggy so that mystery is quickly revealed! And the horrible woman is the aunt of the scared little child that probably grows up to be The Joker's first victim or something! Because this can't be The Joker! How dare DC Comics give me any reason to sympathize with that murderous devil! But they want me to believe I can sympathize with him for at least a little bit! It's a big joke to tug at my heartstrings and say, "See? You can't judge even the worst psychopath until you've spent nineteen pages in his shoes!" But then the twentieth page will be the punch line and it will say, "Surprise! That wasn't The Joker at all! It was his first horrible dick of a boss at the first lab the Joker worked in!"

Because I refuse to empathize with this clown! I refuse! But the way she yanks Gaggy out of his hands and throws him in the corner! It's so SAD!

Poor Gaggy!

The art is fantastic and I can't be certain who it is because the title page hasn't appeared yet. And I'm not going to flip through to find it and have the big joke ending spoiled for me! But then I think, "I bet since I'm writing about it, it'll appear on the next page since it looks like this little prologue thing is over!" So I turn the page and walla walla onion rings! There it is! Andy Kubert, Writer. Andy Clarke, Art. Well, Andy Clarke. Those were some spectacular first few pages. Bravo!

That may have indeed been a memory of The Joker which he was trying hard not to remember several years ago while he was hanging out at the Gotham City Zoo with some friends, feeding a man to a snake.

Or he was reveling in the memory. He is a fucking nutjob!

The Joker ignores his henchmen as he wanders off to look at the gorillas. A mother gorilla with her baby gorilla who is holding a gorilla doll that vaguely resembles his old puppet Gaggy. Run, baby gorilla! Run! The Joker is thinking about turning you into a puppet and forcing you to wear stupid clothes! Get out of there!

Oh poor baby new Gaggy!

The Joker names his new child Jackanapes instead of Gaggy because he's a stupid dickhole. I'm glad he didn't choose Gaggy because that might make bond a little bit with the Joker and then I'd have to reevaluate everything I've ever believed and maybe possible take up a life of random, psychotic crime.

For a few pages, The Joker raises Jackanapes to be just like him. The Joker's pride and joy! A better upbringing than The Joker ever had! Father and son, raining chaos down on Gotham like monkey shit raining down on tourists at the zoo. It was the best of times and sometimes even the betterest of times. The Joker actually teaches Jackanapes a lot of the qualities that Cyborg Superman is looking for in a perfect specimen! If only Cyborg Superman had come to Earth to find his roses!

Just you wait, The Joker! Kids always turn on their parents no matter how fantastic the parents think they're being! It's practically a universal law! Or at least a shitty law of Western Culture. And everybody knows that's practically universal law!

Who does The Joker's and Jackanape's tailoring?

The Joker and Jackanapes engage in one final mission to save the Gotham Zoo. On that mission, Jackanapes escapes The Joker's clutches by faking his own death. He just never could live up to his father's penchant for death and destruction. Deep down, it always caused him pain and misery. So he did what all the ungrateful snots wind up doing: he ran away. The Joker believes he drowned and just thinks it's a big joke because he's an asshole, even if he did have a horrible upbringing and his aunt treated Gaggy like crap.

The Joker #1 Rating: A decent story with some fantastic flashback art. I like the story of Jackanapes and the fact that the gorilla had more empathy and feelings than The Joker, so it escaped his lunacy. It helps to balance out The Joker's total shitballs childhood as a means of explaining why The Joker acts the way he does. Because Jackanapes the Gorilla was raised by a madman to be a monster and he breaks out of the cycle. So The Joker either had the possibility to break out and change his ways and chose not to, or The Joker was just born a psychopath and happened to be raised by another psychopath. So Jackanapes was more human than The Joker although I still feel bad when I think about The Joker being separated from Gaggy. I bet if Batman found Gaggy and returned him to The Joker while The Joker was incarcerated in Arkham, The Joker would never need to breakout again.

Detective Comics #19

I don't know. What is the goo?

Eighty pages? Are you fucking kidding me? It takes me nearly two hours to do a stupid twenty page comic book. I'm going to be here all day! I have to figure out a way to make this easier on myself. Perhaps I'll just make a quick comment on each page instead of trying to pull together some kind of coherent summary of the entire issue. You don't think I see you smirking because I called my commentaries "coherent"?! I'll show you!

Page 1: This is the page where they stick the credits but nothing else when DC publishes an extra long issue. So now the issue really only has 79 pages because no fan would actually count this as one of the pages. This is a page for Roman Numeraling! It informs me that there will be five stories and some pinup art. Oh boy! Bombshell shots of Batman in one pieces! Woo hoo!

Page 2: A splash page showing an indeterminate number of Men-bat (well, indeterminate if you're too lazy to count them) flying down from the moon with Kirk Langstrom, the inventor of Man-bat Flavored Gator Water, declaring, "I did this." Luckily the Men-bat are wearing pants so Gotham isn't going to be covered in Man-bat Guano come morning.

Page 3: Gordon and some nobody fire up the Bat Signal to inform Batman that Gotham has a Man-bat problem. Has someone already written a story where Killer Moth is captured by firing up the Bat Signal and waiting for him to start flopping and flapping around the light?

Page 4: Citizens of Gotham are running about the streets helter-skelter getting Men-bat caught in their hair. Kirk Langstrom holds his serum the way he usually holds his penis. His girlfriend begins fucking him from behind. That's a thing, right? I can't wait to see what women have in their panties some day! I hope it looks like the thing in my panties because that thing is E-ROTIC.

Kirk's girlfriend is fugging uckly. She should lose the glasses and lower the hair. Then she might be presentable. Or super duper hot!

Page 5 Advert: This page is an advertisement for Midtown Comics in New York City. It has a picture of Batman taking a crap while riding a horse.

I'm pretty sure fecal accidents are fairly common in Batman's line of business. Alfred definitely knows his way around sewer pants.

The real Page 5!: The Man-bat outbreak occurred in a part of Gotham called "The goo" by its residents. They call it that because it takes place on the goo block between 9th and 10th. Batman doesn't patrol this part of town very often because the residents aren't crazy or Irish or black or Italian. Hey, Batman is the racist, not me! Blame Bruce Wayne for his fascist, racist policies to manipulate real estate prices.

Page 6: One of the goo shop owners lets a woman and her baby into his shop after closing and pays the price when they turn into a Man-bat and Batboy. If he were being interviewed after the case on Judge Judy, the lesson he would have learned would have been "Never help anybody."

Page 7 & 8: This is the staple of The New 52 Detective Comics: the double page splash title page with Batman flying across both pages. In this one, he's surrounded by about 800 Men-bat.

The goo must refer to the Gotham suburb and the Man-bat Serum!

Page 9: Batman flies about fighting Men-bat and thinking about how they resemble Talia al Ghul's Man-bat army. I would be wondering why they all have jeans on and nothing else. Does the transformation include the clothing into jeans?

Page 10: Batman takes a sample of blood from a Man-bat that he fell out of the sky with. Batman is okay though because he landed on the Man-bat. I guess the Man-bat is okay because Batman would be sad if he inadvertently killed one. I hope Batman doesn't discover that he has to douse Gotham in his semen to cure everyone. No wait! I DO hope that!

Page 11: A large shot of half one-quarter of the Batcave.

Page 12: Another quarter shot of the Batcave! Batman is spouting cliches at Alfred who is just telling Batman that he can't speed up the Bat Computers! If Batman wanted the blood screening faster, maybe he should upgrade his 486 PC to something modern. Also the dinosaur in the Batcave is in this shot. I think it should have feathers and be peacock colored. Unless it's a female dinosaur. Then it's probably the right color.

Page 13: Alfred is also running a program on Batman's computer to try and identify a recent John Doe that appears to be a victim of Victor Zsasz. But the thing that's taking up most of the 486's memory is Alfred playing Pools of Darkness on it.

"But Batman! I'm in the middle of a huge battle with dozens of Bits 'o Moander! I can't shut it down until I get an opportunity to save!" "Alfred. Shut it. The fuck. Down."

Page 14: Batman lies to Alfred.

Page 15: Batman lies to the readers.

You would never be able to tell the Bat Family was angry at Batman in any book written by Lobdell! They were all hanging out like nothing happened in Red Hood's Death of the Family aftermath!

Page 16: Batman Narration Boxes about how he doesn't want to hurt any of the Men-bat because they're just simple, innocent goo victims. He wants to learn the antidote for their condition. I think the cure will be one of Kirk Langstrom's bodily fluids. You know? His goo!

Page 17: Alfred figures out where Patient Zero lived so that Batman can investigate the cause of the outbreak. At the apartment, he finds a body with a Talon dagger embedded in it.

Page 18: Batman discovers the source of the infection and the goo and Zsasz-bat all at the same time.

I bet Victor Zsasz has 900 scars on his body.

Page 19: Zsasz-bat attacks Batman in a big splash page. For the first time ever, I wish there were more splash pages. Eighty pages is ridiculous!

Page 20 and 21: Batman ties up Zsasz-bat and tackles him out of a window. Batman is getting a lot of mileage out of the "fall out of the sky and land on top of a man-bat to survive" move during this adventure.

Page 22: This story is still going on? Batwoman arrives with Kirk Langstrom and Francine in tow. Kirk mentions how this is all his fault but he knows how to fix the problem! All he needs is a hot air balloon, a really powerful fan, and some hot man on bat pornography. Luckily Batman has two out of three of those. And he knows of a place to rent balloons.

Page 23: Kirk Langstrom begins priming the pump so he'll be ready to spurt his cure into the fan once they're high over Gotham.

"Kirk, NO! Let me do that!"

Page 24: Langstrom releases his DNA into the atmosphere.

Gotham is the grossest city in the DC Universe.

Page 25: Langstrom transforms into a Man-bat and attacks Batman. I guess the antidote reverses the process for everyone but Langstrom. So now Langstrom has to be a Man-bat so that everybody else can return to normal.

Page 26: The Man-bat infestation has ended and Zsasz has been caught and returned to Arkham. Zsasz mutters something about the bird giving him the goo but nobody listens because Zsasz is a crazy bastard. Well, nobody listens on THIS page! You have to wait until Page 27 to see that Batman is listening.

Page 27: For the first time, Batman is hearing about Emperor Penguin. That can't be good for Ogilvy. Meanewhile, Ogilvy is harassing Poison Ivy so that she'll do a favor for him. See, he buried her alive for Penguin but then helped dig her up again, so she owes him her life. I know he actually just made things even by saving her after trying to kill her but she doesn't know that! And that's the end of the first story. Just four more to go!

Page 28: Story #2 is called "Birth of a Family" and it stars Man-bat.

Page 29: Francine, Man-bat's ex-girlfriend, is Narration Boxing about how much Kirk loved bats. He knew all the bat facts there were to know. Which is why when he wanted to create some way to help people in the world, he decided to use Bat-Genes to inject into people and make them more like bats. He was trying to help deaf people by giving them the bat DNA goo shot so that they could use echolocation to help them hear. Except they can't hear so how the fuck is echolocation supposed to help them?! Stupid Kirk Langstrom.

Page 30: Man-bat screams at a puddle.

Page 31: Francine reminisces about her life before Kirk Langstrom turned into a giant bat. He told her he's going to find a cure for deafness and says it's a shameful, disgusting character flaw in Francine that she doesn't know sign language. I know how to say cookie! And raccoon! And goat! Oh, she also remembers that she married Kirk.

Page 32: She falls in love with Kirk because of his terrible, terrible idea.

As a person that can hardly stand most of the noises I hear now, I would hate to suddenly hear even higher frequencies! There might be a very good reason humans have evolved to hear only what they can currently hear. Perhaps those that could hear higher or lower frequencies were driven insane or their heads blew up or they just sat their unable to function. I'm okay with the restorative features of the goo, but fuck that biosonar bullshit. Can you imagine how fucking confused and dizzy you would become in a city with a bunch of people squealing away?

Page 33: A man on Page 32 asks Kirk if he's encountered any side effects and Kirk shrugs them off and says they're working to remedy them. In the meantime, he's got a lab full of screaming bat-children tearing the place apart. I'm not so sure those are "side-effects". I guess if you were using acid to remove a wart, you would call the loss of your appendage a "side-effect" too.

Page 34: Back in the present, Francine is getting super horny watching the lab bats hanging on their branches together. So she gets a really super hot and sexy idea!

Page 35: Francine drinks the goo so that she can become a Man-bat as well! Also, Page 35 is the first page of the second half of the comic book according to the staples I'm looking at. Which means the adverts also count as part of the 80 pages! What a fucking ripoff! How dare you proclaim an "80 page spectacular" when about ten of those "spectacular" pages are advertisements! Now my whole counting system is off! Jerks!

Page 36 & 37: A pinup by Alex Maleev and Nathan Fairbairn of Batman having anal sex with the Bat Signal. It looks like the Bat Signal really likes it because it's shooting its load straight into the sky.

Page 38: A pinup by Brett Booth, Norm Rapmund, and Andrew Dalhouse of Batman farting in Clayface's face.

Clayface looks horrified.

Page 39: The Bane story begins with Bane inspecting his army at a prison. Or else he's delivering a gigantic throat lozenge to the warden.

Page 40: The story is called "War Council." Bane has overtaken a prison and become king shitheel. He now has some Brainstorm looking nutjob working on a prison version of venom out of the toilet.

Page 41: Malicia, Wolfspider, Brute, Bane, and the Brainy Guy are planning on taking over Gotham. So they're in the prison courtyard discussing plans on dealing with the other mob bosses and crazies of the city.

Page 42: A year previously, Bane was going to reenact The Dark Knight Rises but was stopped before he could even begin by unknown forces.

Page 43: Those unknown forces were The Court of Owls' Talons. They killed all of Bane's men. I guess all of Bane's men were on The Talons' hit list.

Page 44: Bane tears the head off a Talon or two but doesn't exactly finish the story about that night. What night was it? If there were that many Talons, it had to be The Night of the Talons, right? Because they were brought forward that night. The Talons make Bane so angry that he screws up in his next fight against The Batman.

Page 45: That next fight against The Batman, that fight that takes place after The Night of Owls, is the one that takes place in one of the worst story arcs of The New 52: David Finch's Scarecrow run in The Dark Knight. I guess The Dark Knight #1 doesn't even take place until after The Night of the Talons. Maybe that would shine some light on why the fuck Venomized Deathstroke drops out of the sky and onto the Batplane just before Batman fights Superman and Bane.

Page 46: Bane was approached by one of the Court of Owls at the base of the cliff Batman just threw him off. It's probably Sebastian Clark already setting plans in motion to destroy the Next Generation Court of Owls rising from the ashes of his failed Court. So he tells Bane the rhyme and that the Court were as much responsible as Batman for Bane failing and Bane believes this mysterious asshole because he's a gigantic pile of shit that can't accept his own failures. He's always got to blame somebody else even when that somebody else is an urban legend.

Page 47: Bane reveals to everyone his personal item he smuggled into prison up his ass.

Notice their reaction to the mask? They know exactly how Bane smuggled that thing into prison.

Page 48: Bane walks away from the smashed and stinking mask and heads to Talon #7 while his army prepares. The End.

Page 49: This fucking comic book is way too long! I can't believe I paid $7.99 for it. I skipped dinner because of this comic book! Oh, and this page is another pinup. It's by Chris Burnham and Nathan Fairbairn. It depicts Damian Wayne spending quality time with his mom and dad.

Page 50: Another Bat Pinup. This one by Jason Fabok and Emilio Lopez. It depicts Batman standing on a roof trying to untangle his bat grapple's rope.

Page 51: The third story begins. It is called "Birdwatching" and it stars Mr. Combustible. Hopefully this story ends with Mr. Combustible trying to smoke a cigarette and killing himself instead.

Page 52: Emperor Penguin is using the cover of the Man-bat infestation to send his minions (in this case, Mr. Combustible!) to loot the city. One of the minion's minions removes his gas mask to scratch his nose and Mr. Combustible has him killed. He's volatile!

Page 53: Mr. My Head Is A Glass Flask Full of Flammable Gas's thugs refuse to shoot Rizzo. Right up until he turns into a Man-bat.

Page 54: Rizzo is shot to death. Mr. Combustible looks at his watch. How does he tell time?! Does he have eyes somewhere inside his glass flask face? He's like Mr. Monopoly and Mr. Peanut and high school Chemistry Lab all rolled into one.

Page 55: The voice of the Narration Boxes always hint that the story is being told to a second party somewhere in the future. But that's never the case so I just grumble and rant and move on. But this time, it turns out that Mr. Combustible IS telling the story of the night of the goo while in prison on a prison phone to whoever his visitor might be. Oh wait! I just realized who is visitor is! It's him! He's the visitor and he's relating Emperor Penguin's plans of that night to The Penguin! Ha ha! In your face, Ogilvy!

Page 56: Mr. Combustible wasn't the only criminal on the street working for Emperor Penguin. Mr. Mosaic and Hypnotic and Imperceptible Man and all of the new second string Gotham Mob Bosses were out stealing shit for Emperor Penguin that night.

For somebody who once preached lying low as the key to success in Gotham, Ogilvy sure is reaching for the fucking stars.

Page 57: The Penguin blows a brain gasket and freaks the fuck out.

Why does Mr. Combustible have to hold the phone up to the side of his flask?

Page 58: By kidnapping and threatening the Judge's family, Mr. Combustible helps to get The Penguin out of the stupid fucking trespassing charges that Batman seemed to think were going to put The Penguin away for life. Or at least that's the premise. The actual courtroom battle to determine if The Penguin is guilty of trespassing continues in a future issue. I don't even know why it matters! Trespassing probably will just result in community service. And Oswald Cobblepot loves serving his community.

Page 59: A Batman pinup by Andy Clarke. Batman is either skulking in an alley lit by a single streetlamp or he's delivering a Shakespearean soliloquy on stage under a spotlight.

Page 60: A pinup of a thug terrified by the bat shadow puppet that his friend just made. It's by Francesco Francavilla.

Page 61: The final story begins. It's called "Through a Blue Lens" and stars the Gotham City Police Department. I smell graft!

Page 62: The scene takes place in a hospital room where one of Gotham City's less than finest is recovering from a broken arm. He had turned into a Man-bat and got into a scrape with Batman. His fellow police officers toast to his fighting Batman.

Page 63: While the men foam at the mouth about Batman getting his comeuppance for making them all look lazy, Nancy Strode stands up for Batman. She's the police officer that had to guard The Joker's face in one of the earlier backup stories for Detective Comics. I guess she's trying to become as recognizable as Renee Montoya or Harvey Bullock.

Page 64: The most rabid officer declares that Batman first appeared in Gotham five years ago. I guess. Maybe he was just an urban legend up until he joined the Justice League. This officer's first meeting with Batman ended with him taking some shots at Batman.

Page 65: Nancy suspects this asshole was just pissed that Batman got all the credit for taking down the man he was after. Although if I were a cop and suddenly some guy in a scary Bat outfit that was created to scare people suddenly jumped out from the dark, I might shoot at him too! If I wasn't a cop, which I'm not, I wouldn't have though. I was just trying to put myself in the shoes of a police officer and I know they love to shoot off their weapons because no court on Earth will convict them even when they kill an innocent bystander as long as they keep repeating, "I thought he was armed."

Page 66: The other cops get pissed and storm out because Nancy is speaking her mind instead of towing the fraternal line. After they're gone and Nancy is leaving Hector the Ex-Man-Bat, he tells her to hold up. He lied to the others about what happened with The Batman.

Page 67: He remembers wanting to kill. And he remembers Batman breaking his arm to stop him.

Page 68: Strode and Hector become the best of friends. The end!

I think all police forces in the DC Universe should be disbanded and replaced by Super Hero teams. I think there are enough B-list super heroes to fill out the major cities' departments.

Page 69: A Batman pinup by Cameron Stewart showing Batman sitting on the top of a skyscraper and looking into the abyss.

Page 70: A pinup by Dustin Nguyen. Batman and The Joker are engaged in strangulation sex play. From the looks on their faces, they're both thoroughly enjoying it.

And that's that! It was really just a 70-page spectacular with 10 pages of totally terrific advertisements! Holy fuck. What an ordeal.

Detective Comics #19 Rating: +1 Ranking. I'm giving it a positive ranking even though I think I'm completely burned out with Batmen and Men-Bats and any other combination of bats and men you can think of. But I'm not burned out on Emperor Penguin and most of this comic was about his scheming and being a generally arrogant douche.

Also, yes, I fucking know it was about the 900 and not about goo. Sheesh.

Detective Comics #17

Batman versus a baker, faker, and balloon animal maker? This shouldn't last long.

On this special day (You know what day! Valentine's Day! Or as my friend Doom Bunny mysteriously likes to call it: Hal Mark Day! Who is Hal Mark? I wonder if it's Doom Bunny's long lost romantic love interest! I bet he was an elderly neighbor Doom Bunny had while growing up. He probably brought Doom Bunny chocolate hearts filled with rum! And then he'd drag Doom Bunny's tiny, unconscious ass into his garage for a romantic encounter that may or may not have been against the law and not actually very romantic at all! Unless you were Hal Mark and then it was probably really romantic! Everybody has their own ideas about what is romantic, right? So far today I had a super duper romantic Valentine's Day! I woke up and had sex and a cookie! It doesn't get much better than that!), I forget where this sentence was going because that parenthetical reference took too long. Anyway, it's Valentine's Day and Batman has a really romantic story in store for everyone! Yay Batman!

The story begins in a beautiful pink and red mansion with a lovely garden of roses surrounding it. That day, that very special day of special days, the air was filled with the scent of freshly cut grass and the twisted screams of the insane patients inside. One doctor on duty was oblivious to the romance in the air because he had yet to learn the truth about love. Not real love which is mostly boring but Disney love where two people are made for each other and if one of them dies, the other person might as well die as well since the only person they could ever truly love is gone and what else is left except growing old and alone with cats? This doctor didn't know any of this because his heart had withered while his brain had flourished. And everybody knows that thinkers and smart people are unfeeling and cynical jerks full of cold and rational logic. Only people who let their hearts rule them could know true love and murderous passion.

I think someone's heart is going to grow a half dozen sizes some day!

But that day was a long time ago and now this next day I'm going to write about is not so long ago as to not be relevant to our interests but not so close to today that you would think it was happening right now as you read this and mistake the main character for somebody who could sue me for stealing their story. But it was still Valentine's Day or else this story couldn't be about love and redemption and doing it to people.

This cold and logical doctor pretended to be killed by his crazy patients so that he could become one of those crazy patients because this doctor figured out why people in Gotham went crazy and began acting like The Joker! It was because they were all in love with Batman! Dr. Byron Lovemonkey wanted to feel love too! He was tired of always being the nerd who knew everything without having to pull out his phone to Google it like all the other brain-dead assholes in the room. He wanted to love Batman as well! But he also wanted to hate being smart so he pretended to die in a fake Joker related fire!

See? He's dead! He isn't the Merrymaker at all!

And since that happened yesterday (in terms of the story and not really yesterday!), today (remember! Not really today but a different Valentine's Day!) the Merrymaker is sending his League of Smiles out to invite Batman to his special Valentine's Day party which will end in Merrymaker kissing Batman right on the mouth!

But Batman doesn't know a romantic evening is in his future! So he's out fighting a guy who must be known as Everyfreak.

I think this thing loves Batman too!

Batman meets and defeats Everyfreak while prowling about Dr. Lovemonkey's psychiatric offices. He finds a hard drive off Byron's computer and takes it back to the Batcave hoping to find evidence to the leader of The League of Smiles. After wading through dozens of files that scream motivation for faking one's own death and describing patients like Everyfreak as "too willful" and "too difficult to control", Batman decides he can't find any evidence as to the identity of The Merrymaker. I'm beginning to suspect that Batman is the World's Worst Detective.

Batman did, however, find files on the other three lunatic members of the League of Smiles!

Oh look! One of them is an insane dentist! Probably could pull out someone's teeth to shove on a corpse for a good death faking!

As Batman obstinately refused to acknowledge Dr. Lovemonkey's flirtatious advances (you know, the clues!), The Merrymaker and the League of Smiles are busy killing mob members. These are just more love notes to Batman! They're Valentine's Day gifts! You're always supposed to get people things that they can't get themselves, so giving Batman murdered bad guys is perfect! Except Batman figures out that this was perpetrated by someone else which means they were killed by Emperor Penguin. How come Batman figures this out immediately but he doesn't know The Merrymaker is actually Dr. Byron Lovemonkey?

Finally! Sheesh!

Now Batman's detective work kicks in because he also suddenly knows where the League of Smiles will attack next! I haven't even figured that one out yet! He is amazing. I mean, he's amazing once he figures out who the bad guy actually is. Batman decides to surprise his Valentine's date by telling him he's not interested in front of his date's henchmen. That's pretty embarrassing.

"It was easy to see what you were up to. Trying to win my love and affection and butt sex."

So while Batman can't figure out Dr. Lovemonkey is The Merrymaker from some pretty obvious clues on the hard drive he searches through, he does put all the information from the hard drive together once he realizes Dr. Lovemonkey faked his own death. He allows The League of Smiles to beat The Merrymaker nearly to death simply so he can taser the whole batch of them. Batman is the biggest sadist of them all with the smallest heart! He doesn't learn anything about love on this day. He will remain sad and alone forever. Unless The Joker can teach him about love in Batman #17!

The back-up story shows Dr. Lovemonkey being evaluated by another insane psychiatrist and being sent to Arkham Asylum. Looks like the Merrymaker is going to truly go insane once "treated" at Arkham and become a regular member of the Bat Villain club.

Detective Comics #17 Rating: No change. It was a decent comic book with just the one flaw: Batman sucks at detective work until he doesn't and then he's a fucking psychic intuitive genius. I actually hope The Merrymaker becomes a staple of future Batman comics once he loses his fixation on people fixated on the Joker and just gets his own brand of crazy from being institutionalized at Arkham.