Planetary Loves The Authority: Ruling the World #1 (August 2000)

Why is the only thing I can remember about Swift is that she spent twenty grand on a boob job?

Planetary/The Authority: Ruling the World #1 (August 2000)
By Warren Ellis, Phil Jimenez, Andy Lanning, Laura Depuy Martin, and Ryan Cline
Cover by Phil Jimenez and David Baron
Edited by John Layman

I forgot I had this book while I was reading through The Authority. It was released between Planetary #10 and Planetary #11 (or close enough, anyway). It came out after Warren Ellis had ended his run on The Authority and Mark Millar (or whoever!) took over. Hopefully I'll be able to ferret out the reason Ellis wanted to dip back into The Authority enough to bring them to the page one more time. It's definitely a crossover that I think everybody wanted (if not expected) at the time. I actually can't remember anything about it and have no idea where it might lead. So that's the preamble. I know usually my preamble is all, "I wrote a song about a raccoon and possum having a Romeo and Juliet-esque romance but it didn't end in their suicide; it ended in all the cats in the neighborhood pregnant." My brain decided to be more aware of my tone this time and thought, "Let's class this shit up, motherfucker! Reviews are usually boring! Go for boring, butthead!" And then I was all, "But what about my epic nocturnal vermin love song?!" Then I felt a sharp pain in my right temple and decided maybe my brain wasn't fucking around. So boring it is!

This issue begins like Watchmen ended (or, at least, thirty-five minutes before the part I'm thinking about?) with a massive octopus creating havoc in an urban center. Although this octopus has attacked Rhode Island and I'm not sure how many urban centers exist in Rhode Island so maybe it's attacking a seaside town. Also, it probably didn't teleport in out of nowhere. I bet it was summoned up from the depths by the oddly fishy residents of the town. It doesn't have long to live because Jenny Sparks and The Authority have already arrived to turn it into deep fried calamari.

The attack takes place in Judgement, Rhode Island, even though it's an American town so you'd expect it to be Judgment, Rhode Island. Stupid Warren Ellis! What a stupid! Maybe I should blame editor John Layman for not catching this. Or, being that Rhode Island is part of New England, it's just one of those olde time leftovers from when they were a colony. Maybe I shouldn't have even noticed it? Especially when Angie's tits are right there for me to notice. What happened, testosterone? Why did you abandon me in my old age?! Is this why old men become so overly concerned with kids walking on their grass? Because they've stopped enjoying tits?!

Sorry, my gay friends, I don't mean to erase your experiences! I'm just speaking from the perspective of a long time tit lover. Although, really, butts are much better. I should have just stuck with butts so we could all be nodding along while also shaking our fists at those damn kids.

Planetary is also here "helping" out.

Halfway through the battle with the massive octopus and its flying piranha army, the narrative takes a quick trip back to Judgement, Rhode Island, in 1931 when Elijah Snow met with H.P. Lovecraft about a strange vision H. (can I call him H?) had while writing. A snowflake-shaped portal opened before him and he saw the terrible rectum of the universe. When it finally disappeared, he was left with a present from the abyss.

Um. Wut?¹

These eggs were why Elijah Snow was kicking the shit out of The Drummer seventy years later. He warned The Drummer not to touch them and The Drummer went ahead and touched them. That probably means they were full of flying piranha and not, um, you know. That other thing.

Planetary seems like maybe they're keeping a low profile. Or maybe they're just trying to avoid getting decapitated by The Authority's use of extreme violence. Either way, I suddenly can't remember what was annoying me.

And everything's suddenly right with the world.

I think it's okay for artists to portray Angie's nipples because they're actually mini gun barrels and it would be un-American to censor guns. I would love to say it's un-American to censor titties but our leaders have all the ethics and morality of a Reverend Dimmesdale: nipples for me but not for thee. That was his philosophy, right? It's been over thirty years since I saw the movie. I mean read the book. I mean saw the movie with my lesbian college professor while we were reading the book. I'm pretty sure she only wanted to see it for Demi's tits².

Angie breaks through Cthulhu's reinforced brain case with her tit bazookas so that Apollo can slam into the Elder God's brain with his entire body. The Authority loves to kill things in exactly two ways: decapitation and blasting themselves through their enemies. Even Swift does it! I think maybe that's all Swift can actually do though.

Planetary watches the battle from a basement stairwell because they're a secret organization, remember?

Seventy years ago? That's when H. to the P. found his alien space eggs!

Planetary decides they want to infiltrate The Carrier because it's sure to have loads of lovely information for them to steal. The Authority picked up on signals at the fight similar to those they found in the Adirondack Mountains a few years ago. So both teams are beginning to focus on the other team although The Authority don't quite know what they're investigating. They've witnessed unmarked helicopters all over the world in places nobody should be and they have some pictures of people Angie took when the Adirondacks first became a focal point for those unmarked helicopters. Those people are Elijah Snow and Jakita Wagner. Jenny Storm recognizes Elijah from somewhere but she can't quite place him.

Fucking another Century Baby must be like fucking a sibling. It's hot right up until the moment you come.

Meanwhile some serial killer has infiltrated Planetary working on as one of their information analysts while waiting for an opportunity to open a portal like the one that opened on H.P. Lovecraft's basement. He finally found one in Doc Brass's team's secret base in the Adirondacks where the multiversal computer is housed. He plans on destroying the world with it because world-ending threats are the only things The Authority bother with. If this guy were going to just kill a few more scientists (which he just did and The Authority didn't notice at all), The Authority wouldn't notice at all. But killing the entire world?! That's what they do! I mean, that's the kind of thing the thing they do is meant to stop other people from doing. And when the serial killer initiates the multiversal computer so he can kill the world, they notice immediately! As does Planetary.

All that is to say that "the most powerful heroes" and "the world's smartest"³ are about to have one of those good guy misunderstandings that lead to them punching each other in the baggage. Plus a serial killer will wind up without his head. Although Mark Millar isn't writing The Authority here so maybe they'll think of a different way to end the maniac's existence. Something way more creative. And sexual.

Both teams use The Carrier's junction room teleporter to arrive at the site but because Planetary knows exactly where the multiversal computer is, they wind up inside the mountain while The Authority wind up outside. The Authority is greeted with scads and scads of maxi-nano-machines⁴ while Planetary find . . . um, I'm not sure what Planetary finds.

A dead serial killer and, I think, the womb that gave birth to the maxi-nano-machines?

Angie calls the maxi-nano-machines "self-replicating war robots" so disregard the footnote where I said, "Fuck you!", to any readers who thought "maxi-nano-machines" might have been a stupid term. I want to to change it to "super fuck you" because I was proven correct. The original "fuck you" was just me being defensive because I figured I was being ignorant and dumb. But now I'm confident and smart because the comic book agreed with me!

While The Authority tries to decapitate the extradimensional invasion's ass, Planetary tries to cut the invasion off from its head. They figure the war machines are still connected to from wherever they came from via the multiversal computer's snowflake portal and The Bleed. But before Drummer can cut the connection, the womb decides it wasn't done being pregnant.

If this is a literal depiction of a baby being born, birthing babies should be outlawed.

I know that's not a literal depiction of a baby being born because one of my ex-girlfriends when I was about 21 showed me her mother's birth video of her youngest sister. Or at least tried to show me. Maybe halfway showed me? It's not a memory the brain is conditioned to retain. The depiction of birth in that panel is more like if your nose had diarrhea.

Angie connects to one of the maxi-nano-machines and realizes it's called a Worldruler. It was designed to simply destroy every world in every parallel dimension it could find. And it was created by her. Or a version of her, I mean.

This Authority comes from a parallel dimension where the only difference is that everybody's nipples are inverted.

Jakita Wagner dropkicks the womb back into the snowflake where it takes off inverted-nipple Jenny Spark's head. I should probably add that to The Authority Decapitation Counter, right?! It basically counts even though it was Jenny who lost her head and Jakita who did the losing.

Outside the mountain, The Authority finish off the maxi-nano-machines. They then rush in to destroy the Worldruler to find it already gone. As is Planetary. The world is safe again. At least until the next womb slips into their reality and begins laying fish eggs or self-replicating war robots or, I don't know, sentient penis whips covered in barbs?

The Ranking!
At the end of this issue, Elijah Snow recalls when Alex Brass told him that "if you save the world, it will repay you every second of every day." We see the seed planted by Brass begin to grow as Elijah Snow get his first taste of being an active participant in moving the Earth toward a better future. Planetary will not long remain in the shadows doing nothing but collecting knowledge and dust. I mean, sure, they'll continue to remain in the shadows! But now they'll be fucking useful for once.


__________________________________________________________________________________
¹ Like, um, seriously. Wut?!
² See? It all comes back to tits! And negro eggs!
³ I put these descriptions of the two teams in quotes because that's how the back cover refers to them.
⁴ Fuck you. It's my blog and I'll use language however the fuck I want!

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #37 (September 1992)

This cover looks like some project Glenn Fabry would have done in Year 7.

This cover also looks like one of those '90s Personality Comics of Bon Jovi. I owned the Christina Applegate issue.

Man, I hope I still have this in one of my short boxes!

Currently on my down time, I'm reading the collected Fire & Ice: Welcome to Smallville and it's fucking adorable. As some of you may know, there are two things I want in my comic books: adorableness and Lobo's erect cock. I never get the latter one so I'm super happy when I get the former. One of the reasons this series is so fucking adorable and whimsical and cute and all the things that I just love in a comic book is — and maybe this is sexist — that it's written by a woman, Joanne Starer. I understand guys can also write entertaining and adorable women — just read all of my early Batgirl entries — but they often just don't feel realistic. Every woman written by a man is just a man's stupid idea of how women act and think. It's possible a guy would have written the following scene but, if he had, it just wouldn't feel as authentic and innocent but also sexy. It would seem lewd and manipulative and dirty! I should know because I'm picturing it that way and my dick is nodding its approval!

I should also exclaim loudly how much Natacha Bustos' art and Tamra Bonvillain's colors add to the cuteness of this comic book. Just superb. A+ stuff here.

As you can see by the cover, this story is called "Mercy". It begins like this: "THIS IS A STORY ABOUT MERCY." I had to put that in all caps like the lettering in the comic book otherwise I'd have to editorialize on whether or not the "M" in "MERCY" should be capitalized or not. The image that goes along with that caption is either Batman getting his tooth knocked out or just a shot of his testicles.

Blogger gonna try to censor this post now!

Look, Blogger. If it's good enough for the Comics Code Authority, it's good enough for the fucking Internet.

After turning the page, I discover the story is also about "revenge, justice, and fighting for yourself." So it's just like every other Batman story? At least from Batman's point of view. I guess the difference this time is that the point of view will be Mercy's and she won't let Batman fight for her.

Enter Mercy! She's going to fight for herself!


Exeunt Mercy. On a stretcher.

Mercy's partner was killed because Batman let a hotshot hot cop he was crushing on talk him out of saving the day. Also the Cossack got away to punch Batman in the testicles later on the first page.

Batman visits Mercy in the hospital and begins grooming her as a new Robin. I don't think he thinks that's what he's doing but then he's never seen a therapist (unless you count Hugo Strange which you really fucking shouldn't) so how would he know? I suppose you don't have to see a therapist to self-reflect. It's just that some people refuse to self-reflect even when 0 of their 357 friends on Facebook don't like or comment on a terrible Ayn Randian clip about how Democrats are the real racists because they didn't end slavery and also they did civil rights. It's like, um, read the room, buddy. The Republicans are invading US cities and you're trying to convince people that your party isn't the racist party? "Hey, guys! Our new authoritarian overlords aren't the racist ones! The party that isn't standing up to them are the racists!" Did you think your "Gotcha Video!" would make people who don't even fucking love the Democratic party stand up and applaud you while commenting, "You know what? You're right! I never thought of it this way! I'm a Republican now!" I think it's self-reflection time. Unless you think your 357 friends and family just, um, I don't know, unfollowed or blocked you long ago? Maybe he just targeted the video to me and I was his entire audience! If so, I'm glad I called him crazy to his face that one time when he was upset that Marvel was publishing a comic book about a Muslim character. Man, he was fucking raving about that. And then I was all, "So you don't think the Muslim writer should write a Muslim character?" And then he was all, "Oh, I didn't know the writer was Muslim." And I was all, "You're fucking crazy." And it kind of ruined the day. Can you imagine? I ruined the day for calling him crazy but the day was just fine while he spouted off with his paranoid bullshit about Marvel's anti-Christian agenda! This world sucks.

I think the main problem was that I felt bad for calling him crazy but he didn't feel bad for being crazy.

Batman trains Mercy to be the best fighter she can be. But then she betrays him by not becoming another Robin. Instead, she ghosts him to pursue her own brand of justice. And revenge. And fighting for herself. But probably not mercy because that's just her name.

She means she's going to kill him, Batman! Mercy ain't gonna show no gosh-danged mercy!

Let me guess: Batman convinces Mercy to show mercy by the end? Or maybe Batman is forced to kill Mercy and save the Cossack! Alternatively, maybe they just have sex. I mean Batman and Mercy, not Batman and the Cossack. Although, look, either way is fine with me. I just don't think DC in 1992 would have done it.

Eventually Mercy kills one of her opponents in the underground fights and she becomes depressed and lost and drunk. Batman tries to talk with her about it but what can a man who beats people for her? "You need to beat them softer"?

Batman loses track of her after that. Which seems weird because doesn't Batman love keeping tabs on everybody? This is a mistake, right? I mean by Batman and not by the writers. What I mean is the writers purposefully had Batman make a mistake that could cost Mercy her life because, once again, he trusted that she'd be okay. First she nearly died while her partner did die because Batman thought she could take care of herself. Then Batman trained her to be a great fighter because he thought it would help her take care of herself. But then she grew exceedingly violent and accidentally killed a man and became super depressed. So that's when Batman stops watching out for her? He puts her trust in her two times and it doesn't work out either time. So he's going to trust that she'll be all right now that she's suicidal?! I guess that's why these stories are "legends". They're times Batman had to learn something important which serves him well in his regular title.

Look at them! Look at Batman's hairy chin balls!

I know I sort of made fun of the cover and keep pointing out how Batman's chin looks like his scrotum but I'd like to make one thing clear: I'm really enjoying Colin MacNeil's interior art. It's got a sort of style that I could see being used in a long, definitive run of Batman that would have been celebrated for decades. It just feels like Batman and Gotham and darkness and desperation. Now the cover? Did not like. At all. But the interior? Very much good like. Not bad hate.

When Batman finally does catch up to Mercy, it's by accident: he sees a live feed of the 1992 version of the Dark Web where a contest known as "The Blood Pit" airs. It's like the underground bare-knuckle fights but better because it's to the death on purpose. I say "better" because this is a comic book and I like to see people die in comic books. It's fun! If this were a real Dark Web contest, I absolutely wouldn't watch it. Mostly because I don't know how to get on the Dark Web.

Batman sees Mercy is in trouble and rushes to where the Blood Pit takes place. He knows where it takes place because it's been on his radar for a while now but he didn't give a shit. If two roided out thugs wanted to beat the life out of each other, what was that to him? Other than the fact that he hates murder and non-Batman violence. But this time, he has empathy for one of the contestants. He doesn't stop to think, "Hey, if a person I like whom I know has stumbled and her life fell apart which caused her to risk her life in The Blood Pit, maybe other innocent people whose lives just spiraled out of control might be dying in this thing. Maybe I should have stopped it much earlier!" He might think that but Abnett and Lanning don't let us see those introspective thoughts because it would derail the current narrative. The narrative currently barreling down the intended rails is that Mercy is losing a death fight to the Cossack! And Batman's got to stop it from happening!

"Alternatively, Mercy's a big girl. She knows what she was doing. Maybe let her sleep in her own medicine this time," is a thing I would be saying if I were Batman right now.

Batman, not a coward like me, throws in twenty thousand dollars he stole from the guy who runs the game earlier that night to be considered an actual combatant. Mercy crawls from the arena, I guess, as the new Death Pit match takes place: Batman vs. Cossack.

A few pages later, Batman has lost. Or he's faking losing and the fight was just to give Mercy a chance to catch her breath, right? If so, it worked perfectly! Just as the Cossack is about to kill Batman, Mercy steps back into the ring.

Oh wait. It doesn't work perfectly at all because the Cossack immediately kills Mercy.

You notice how I didn't complain about Cossack's right arm in that first panel? It's because I figured Batman dislocated it.

Batman takes advantage of the interruption to his fight much better than Mercy did. He defeats Cossack but refused to kill him. As he picks up Mercy to carry her into the sewers to bury her, the GCPD crash through the wall in a tank and arrest everybody. They saw Batman's fight on the same live feed that Batman saw Mercy on after Batman reported the location to the cops earlier. Being that they're all corrupt, they don't mind when Batman takes his winnings along with Mercy's body. Or maybe he just uses his own money at the end when he discovers that Mercy had entered the Death Pit battle not to get revenge on the Cossack but to earn some cash for the widow and children of the man she killed. Batman discovers this because Mercy left a message on the Bat Answering Machine explaining why she was going to be dead soon.

Poor Mercy. If only she'd chosen to become the next Robin, she wouldn't have had to die. And maybe Tim Drake would have been forgotten and I never would have had to read any story about Tim Drake written by James Tynion IV! I mourn the loss of that world and that happier version of me!

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #37 Rating: B+. This was a nice one-shot story. Competently told with all the nice little literary ball and cup tricks that keep the thematic line running clearly through the entire story. And the art was mostly really well done! Stupid Cossack and his wonky arm trying to make me look like a dumb jerk! Did he ever come back as a Batman nemesis?

I just did my own research like a true Internet moron (but better because I actually did it instead of seeking out confirmation bias videos on CrazyTube) and learned the Cossack never appeared again. In a world where Grant Morrison brings back every character or costume ever referenced in a Batman story, I am disappoint.

Justice League of America Wedding Special #1 (November 2007)

Take one look at this cover and you can instantly guess why I bought it. Yep! Dwayne McDuffie!

When I first found this issue at a garage sale a few weeks back, I first thought this was a wedding between Wonder Woman and Black Canary. Okay, maybe "thought" is the wrong word; "hoped" is more like it. But then I was wondering, "Why is Superman the only guy on the cover?" But now I've just noticed the cake and am assuming this is the Hen Do (or as my boring country call it: a bachelorette party) and Superman is the stripper. Wonder Woman's almost certainly not getting married so this must be a big Green Arrow/Black Canary affair. Or maybe Babs is marrying Dick? I have no idea who was fucking whom in the DC Universe in 2007.

This issue is also marked as "Countdown 33" along the UPC symbol so I guess it's part of the lead up to, um, something? Infinite Crisis? 52? Oh wait. Final Crisis, right? What happened in that one? Did Geoff Johns appear on panel and say, "I think we've had enough of these crises. Let's never do anything like this again." And then the final page was a close up of his face as he's winking.

The issue begins at some kind of anti-wedding where The Joker has a definite in-canon boner.

We can't see it but if a heterosexual man is staring at a large feline's tits with the possibility that it could lead to getting his throat slashed, he's got a boner.

Sometimes I make sweeping generalizations about men because I assume we all think alike. I probably shouldn't do that because it makes me sound like a fucking Men's Right Activist who thinks just because he has the most horrible misogynistic thoughts that every male has them. Although I think I'll stand by the assumption I made in that caption. No way does it just describe me and my boners!

I wonder which Joker this is? It's important to my concept of the stupid fucking idea that there have always been three Jokers and the small things that differentiate them. Which one uses the term "funbags" when referring to women?

Yes, I understand that when this was written, only one Joker existed. But if DC wants me to be a huge continuity nerd, they need to allow me to retcon all of their retcons into every single thing I read by them. Also, I don't know about all of their retcons so is there only one Joker now? Maybe six Jokers? I don't know! I'm working with limited knowledge here, funbags!

Dwayne McDuffie may be dead but he still has the power to get me slapped when I go out into the world tomorrow and start liberally calling women "funbags". Does The Joker consider women "funbags" because they're just flesh bags of blood and guts waiting for him to slice up? Or is it because they're "fun" in sleeping "bags"? Oh no! I just realized he meant Cheetah's tits!

Lex, The Joker, and Cheetah are discussing members for a new Injustice League. Lex suggests Dr. Light and Cheetah responds with "He's a rapist and a murderer." Also a pedophile, no? But Lex has a rejoinder to that:

This is why he's the smartest man on Earth.

Cheetah is so won over by Lex's argument that she excitedly adds Dr. Light's photo to the recruitment folder.

I know I just scanned in a pic but she looks so adorable when she's excited about letting a child murdering rapist on the team!

I just noticed something else so forgive another scan so soon. Or does this many scans with far less of my rambling bullshit make for a better review? No, no! Don't tell me!

Lex has an Infinity Gauntlet?

Well now that I've scanned nearly every bit of art from the first three pages, I should turn the page and maybe scan all the other pages in? Would you want that? Just have me shut up and just pirate the entire comic? Hmm. I bet you would.

Cheetah adds Dr. Light's picture to a pile of villains that I'm assuming they're going to try to recruit: Prankster, Eclipso, Atrocitus or the Anti-Monitor or, um, fuck if I know. Some guy with a big red angry face.

Fuck it. Fine! Here's page four as well without any lewd commentary from me since Dwayne and Mike have done all the lewd commentary themselves by making the strippers Marvel characters.

Who's the broke-ass guy unable to pay the strippers? Blue Beetle?

The guy who thought Ollie would love a bunch of Marvel strippers only to learn at the last second that Ollie is super gay is Hal Jordan. The other guy helping to prepare the party is Speedy so you know it's going to get fucking wild. Or is everybody fucked up on heroin in a hotel room the opposite of wild? Everyone just sort of passes out blissfully and then can't shit for eight days, right?

Roy points out that the hotel is surrounded by paparazzi who have been tipped off about Oliver Queen's bachelor party. Probably by Lex Luthor. Nobody can attend without risking their secret identities being exposed so they move the party to the Hall of Justice where Batman and John Stewart are already preparing the spiked punch and sex-toy-filled piñata. Because Batman already knew this was going to happen. Hal's annoyed that Batman's so smart and he's so stupid but then again Hal's always fucking annoyed with something. That's probably why Parallax was able to make a nice cushy home in his head for so long.

Later at the party, Ollie's a dick and John's stupid.

John's stupid because even though he did do the decorations, Ollie's compliment has to be sarcastic being that the only fucking decoration is a banner that reads, "Congratulations Ollie You Gay Bro Where Are The Strippers?"

Sorry, I take back everything I said. There seem to be a smattering of green and white balloons. About seven in total across the entire fucking Hall of Justice. Maybe Ollie really loves a minimalist look. He does shoot arrows, after all. How much more minimalist can a hero get?

As the party really gets rocking with exciting stuff like Red Tornado listening to Guy Gardner brag about who the fuck knows what and Oberon trying to avoid Plastic Man, Oliver Queen gets called gay by somebody other than me.

Try to ignore that the letterer fucked up and made Ollie say Roy's dialogue. Just pay attention to 2007's Connor Hawke's '80s insult using a scale from the '40s.

Pretty sure if McDuffie had wanted to write Connor's dialogue more realistically and less hilariously and academically and intelligently, he should have had him just say, "You gay, bro." Like on the banner!

For some reason there's a "meanwhile" that doesn't concern Black Canary or Green Arrow's party. Instead it's about Firestorm walking into a trap set by Killer Frost.

Killer Frost is all, "Fuck the funbags window. I'm going for an outer thigh window! And maybe a large hunk of my ass to boot!"

This comic came out in 2007. At that time, it's been four years since I'd read a DC comic book. So I have no idea why Jason Rusch is Firestorm with a woman named Gehenna in his head. Lex Luthor, The Joker, and Cheetah interrupt Firestorm and Killer Frost's fight. They do this by killing Firestorm. I'll assume he's actually dead because I don't have any comics after this to prove me wrong even though he's got Gehenna in his head and she's probably alive and she can probably still use Jason's powers when he's dead. The Injustice League recruit Killer Frost and head back to their Darth Vader head in the swamp where their other recent recruits await.

They've been busy!

How good can this Legion of Doom be without Lobo? I'm not even interested in them anymore.

And then the comic book finally moves on to the reason I bought it: Dinah Lance's hen do! Oh! Maybe that's where Lobo is! Can you think of a better stripper?

I'm going to assume that's Lobo on the dance floor dancing with Vixen.

One of the strippers informs Wonder Woman that his sister's a nurse and just let him know that Firestorm showed up in the ER and is about to die. Wonder Woman ignores him and paws at his loin cloth and saying, "Show me your mortal organ, Dance Boy!" No, wait. Wonder Woman is more responsible than that. As a reviewer, I should learn to concentrate on what's in the story and stop wishing for what I want it to be. Instead, Wonder Woman alerts Batman and hopes he doesn't show up to the ER covered in glitter and lubricant from the genitals of a sexy woman smeared all over his cowl.

Batman takes Speedy with him to investigate the scene of the crime. But this was all in Lex's plan! They know Batman will go investigate. They know Wonder Woman will go to the hospital to check on Firestorm. So they send attack squads to both places to ambush the heroes. The Joker and Fatality arrive to defeat Batman and Speedy (also Geoforce who, I guess, got there before Batman somehow. Maybe in a different comic?). Cheetah, Killer Frost, and Doctor Light arrive at the hospital to defeat Wonder Woman and Hawkwoman. But they let Hawkwoman get away to go lure the rest of the League in to battle. Hawkwoman crashes Ollie's bachelor party and says, "Lex and Cheetah and The Joker and Killer Frost and Doctor Light are all working together. And where are the strippers? You gay, bro?"

Justice League of America Wedding Special #1 Rating: A. This was a lot of fun with a lot of heroes and villains (my weakness!). Is this how much fun DC Comics were as a whole in the Two Thousand Oughts? I missed out on the best stuff DC was doing in the last forty years, didn't I? Should I go back and buy all of the comics that I missed?! Who wants to loan my a few million dollars?

Justice League #26

I hope we get Power Ring's origin story this issue! I want to see the Moth Monk Volthoom!

I've just been singing, to the tune of "Brand New Key," "I've got a great big bag of candy, you've got a bag of poo."

It looks like this issue takes place immediately after Forever Evil #4 when Sinestro decided to crash the party. You can't see Batman and Catwoman here but they're around someplace. Unless Batman got what he needed and has already Mother Boxed the fuck out of here.

Instead of getting Power Ring's origin, we get a brief synopsis of Grid's origin. It's just as boring as you'd expect an origin about a robot would be. He was like a spark or something and then he wanted to be a real boy and then he learned he wasn't and never could be and now he's angry. The end!

It turns out Grid has been downloading files about the Crime Syndicate via the mobile servers in Owlman's outfit. He's already learned about Ultraman and Owlman's origins (the last two issues!) and now he hopes to learn more about another being! Oh boy! I hope it's Power Ring! Please let it be Power Ring. He's got to be on the cover for some reason, right? And he's the most connected to feelings!

At first I thought the "sktch sktch sktch" sound effects were Jordan masturbating.

Yay! Power Ring! And it looks like he's being tapped to bomb the shit out of Nanda Parbat for Boston Brand. Which means he'll probably crash there and be taken in by the Moth Monk Volthoom who will trick him into wearing the cursed ring in retaliation for bombing Volthoom's country. Or maybe some other things might happen differently. Or something.

Yep, yep. It's the "or something." Harold Jordan has been spying on Ferris and selling their secrets. He's about to get his ass kicked by Carol's dad when the Ring chooses him because he's the easiest being on the planet to control and the biggest sucker to boot.

Um, no. I think I'll pass. Thanks for the opportunity though, melty alien dude!

Jordan can't resist the ring for long and allows it to graft itself to his finger. Then it insists that he charge it which consists of opening a pocket dimension with a Lovecraftian beast that fucks Jordan's arm until the ring is fully charged. The creature is probably what moths actually look like but we can only see a limited amount of them due to our being stuck in the third dimension. That's probably why moths look, to us, as if they're fluttering around chaotically. We can only see a small aspect of them. If we could see in the number of dimensions that moths exist within, their movement would make sense and we would become gibbering sacks of tears and moans, covered in our newly released fecal matter. Fucking moths.

Grid decides that story didn't give him a chubby, so he moves on to learn the origin of Johnny Quick and Atomica.

Even on Earth 3, all interactions with Speedsters result in speed-related puns! Except they're not called "puns" on Earth 3. They're called "witticisms."

Atomica saves Johnny from these rogue cops by smashing a truck into the police van. I bet Johnny will kill and then urinate on them. And while he's urinating on them, he'll be struck by lightning resulting in Speed Force Powers! Or maybe some other things might happen differently. Or something.

Once again, it's the "or something." The struck by lightning part is still the same but no urination. And it happens atop STAR Labs so they both get different powers due to being affected by different STAR Labs experiments. But they still love each other and Grid somehow begins to believe that love is important and that maybe he can learn it. No, no. Grid, it's not important at all. It's really just a time sink! You won't be able to work on any of your World Destroying Projects once you get in a relationship. And you can't be completely honest anymore! You have to hide the horrible, awful, disgusting person you really are or else the person you love will throw up and leave you!

The next to last Crime Syndicate member Grid needs to learn about is Professor Martin Stein, Deathstorm.

So Stein was working for The Hostage, was he? I still think it's Lex Luthor since he's trying to save the world.

Stein eventually merges himself with a corpse because that somehow seemed like a good idea. So that's where the "death" part of his name comes from. But why the "storm" part? Because he rains down death upon the living?

Superwoman's files were deleted so we don't get to learn how Lois Lane became Superwoman. My guess (and you've seen how good my guesses have been so far!) is that she gained her powers by a steady diet of Kryptonian Semen. That's probably right on. No need to find those lost files, Grid!

Meanwhile, somebody says "Soon." to The Hostage and he smiles through his sack. And over in STAR Labs, Silas Stone has somehow performed a second miracle in his short life! Although it's the same miracle where he saved his son from certain death. But I think the second miracle took better than the first one because his son seems far more optimistic this time.

I wonder if Cyborg will request a horse penis since his father has to totally rebuild him anyway.

Justice League #26 Rating: +3 Ranking. That's one ranking for every origin. Johnny Quick and Atomica's origin counts as one! And I didn't count Grid's because he's a robot and I'm against all forms of Artificial Intelligence. If God had wanted robots to think, he would have given them that ability when he created the world. Also, he would have created robots.