Batman Beyond #1

This looks better than I expected!

These covers where you're supposed to get an artist to draw some raunchy T&A shot of an underage character are wasted on me. Not because I'm against pervy men drawing fuck fantasies on my comic book covers! Because I never go out of the house and I never meet any artists and if I did, they would probably say, "Didn't you criticize my art and say you wish time travel were an actuality so you could go back in time and sew my mother's vagina shut?" And I would be all, "Lord no! That's violence against women which I don't agree with even in theoretical situations and imaginary conversations which I've written! Although that does sound vaguely familiar!" Then I'd get thrown out of my fourth San Diego Comic Con.

I've been to San Diego Comic Con three times (many, many, many years ago! Before it was cool and popular! People probably get laid there now, right?!). One of those times, I was there with Dan Santat, the creator of The Replacements cartoon. Dan was housemates with my friend Upright and we ate breakfast at The Broken Yolk Cafe in Pacific Beach. One of his characters in The Replacements was called Dick Daring. Which seemed odd since he did art for a fanzine some friends and I were writing called The Galactic Hero Corps which featured a character named Dirk Daring. Although what's even more odd is that my friends, who created Dirk Daring, didn't realize they were stealing the name from the video game, Dragon's Lair. Dum-dums!

I so rarely meet anybody or get to name drop that I figured I'd force that one in!

Here's Dan's rendition of Carlotta Everyday, a fourth dimensional superhero who just confused everybody around her. He was the best artist I ever had! Um, figuratively!

The second caption on the first page of this first issue of Batman Beyond has the word "butit" in it. I think that's a typo but since I don't know all of the words, I might be mistaken. I mean, is it more probable that it's a word I've never heard of or more probable that everybody getting this issue to print missed a typo on the first page of the first issue? That makes it seem like nobody gives a shit about this book? If nobody getting paid can be bothered to give a shit about this comic book then why should I pay money for it? See? That's so ridiculous that it must be a word I've never heard of.

This issue is called "Escaping the Grave" without a Part Two on it. That's weird because the Rebirth issue was called "Escaping the Grave, Part One." It's almost as if DC is pretending the Rebirth book doesn't exist at this point! Which really ticks off my wallet because I paid for that book and I want the information gleaned from it acknowledged in what is supposed to be the second part of the story! I'm really starting to lose my patience here, especially after that whole butit fiasco I mentioned just ten to twenty seconds ago, depending on how quickly you can read.

This is Terminal. He really fucking loves belts. And mascara!

I'm going to assume you didn't read my commentary on Batman Beyond Rebirth #1 where I hoped that The Joker being resurrected by Terminal was actually Lobo in which case I just told you that I said that there. Now you have all the information you need for why I'm so excited when Terminal calls The Joker "my main man"! I knew he had too many muscles to be The Joker! And since I'm not going to be reading Issue #2 of this series, I hope nothing in the next eighteen pages proves me wrong so I can continue to believe that I was right!

But seriously. Why does Terminal like belts so much? He even has belts on his arms! Is his fashion sense mental hospital chic?

Terry begins the issue under a ton of rubble because a building fell on him or something. I know I wanted the events of the Rebirth issue to have some consequences in this issue but, in reality, I can't even be bothered to remember how the Rebirth issue ended! I guess Terry got his ass kicked by the Venom Sucking Jokerz Gang Banger. Oh, and then got a building knocked on him. That makes sense though! Now the title can be both figurative and literal! Although I don't know if Terry crawling out from under the rubble is the literal part or Terry returning from death is the literal part. I've been sort of confused by the word "literal" lately.

Batman frees himself and continues the fight with the Venomized Jokerz Member again. You know, in a way that causes the previous battle in Rebirth not to matter at all!

Batman's secret identity is Bugs Bunny?

Terry almost gets killed fighting this guy who doesn't know his history and has confused Bane with The Joker. Stupid kids! They keep ignoring history, some day they're going to elect a fascist for president of the United States!

Terry winds up running because there are so many Jokerz and he's forgotten how to be Batman. I'm glad I'm not planning on reading this any further because I don't want to have to read a bunch of issues where he trains to get back into fighting shape. Isn't that what the Rebirth Issues are for? To get the characters back to the place they were before The New 52 ruined them? Or, at the very least, sort of close to that? The Rebirth Issue should have been one long training montage.

Back at the Batcave, Matt has brought in their friend Max to help out since Commissioner Gordon is too busy to do Bruce's job, which needs doing because Bruce apparently died in the beginning of Brother Eye's attack on the world. Which totally means he's not dead at all and he'll eventually reappear. Jurgens can't bring back the real Joker without also bringing back the real Bruce! They have to die in a repressed homosexual suicide act!

Terry decides the way to defeat Terminal is to infiltrate them as one of the Jokerz. So it's a good thing he has a spare Jokerz costume in the Batcave bathroom! And body paint. And hair dye. And make-up.

The Review!
In a shocking turn of events, I've read my last Batman Beyond comic book ever! I think I deserve some cake! If that wasn't a good enough review for a comic book reviewer, just remember that I'm not a reviewer! I'm a critic! Which means I'm critical of things! So critical that I can't be bothered to read this crap anymore.



*Copy and Pasted Bat Person Art Credit From "Bat Licking Penis" Google Image Search: "LaCrosse man-bat by Richard Svensson."

Batman Beyond Rebirth #1

When did Todd McFarlane start doing covers for DC?

This week, DC Comics' New Talent Showcase #1 hits the shelves. While I enjoy writing about how badly other people write, do I really want to spend $7.99 to break the hearts of young writers getting their first big break? Unless this isn't their first big break at all. Or they're not young. Or they don't have any hearts to break because they're cold, calculating Scott Lobdell types who conned their way into getting a comic book gig. I probably won't buy it but it's a question mark on my list of comics to pick up on Wednesday. It's unlikely that I'll buy it because it's a talent show and none of the writers are related to me. Why should I waste my time?

Is New Talent Showcase #1 like those poetry collections that accept poems from everybody who sends one in because they know each poem published means a certain number of sales from that person's family and friends? Oh, and Harley Quinn is on the cover! So that will cover the other costs of publishing what, I'm guessing, will be, essentially, garbage.

The way Batman Beyond Rebirth #1 begins makes me thankful that I decided, before reading it, to strike it from my reading list. It begins with the caption "Several decades from now." But it's not the caption that made me cringe! It's the font and style of the caption box! It's Futures End! Is that the name of the style? Like Helvetica or Jokerman? Probably!

This story is called "Escaping the Grave, Part 1." What's wrong with Dan Jurgens? This is a Rebirth issue! It's not supposed to have more than just the one part! Unless the other parts are also in this issue, I'm going to be upset. I mean, I'm already upset because I can't help assuming that the other parts won't be in this issue! This isn't my usual, irrational anger either! I have evidence that proves Dan Jurgens doesn't know the conventions of comic book serial storytelling! The final five issues of the regular Batman Beyond comic book made up the story "Wired for Death." But it was a four part story with an epilogue. I wouldn't have a problem with that except the climactic fight took place in the epilogue! That's not how fucking epilogues work, Dan Jurgens! I suppose that evidence might not mean Dan Jurgens doesn't understand how to write stories. It could also just mean that he's terrible at planning and thought "Wired for Death" was only going to take four issues. But then editorial probably threw some mandates at him and he had to scramble to change some stuff and needed one more issue to make it all work. Which is probably why the final issue of the story has a Guest Artist and Guest Inker! Because the contracts for Bernard Chang and Marcelo Maiolo were up at the end of the original length of the story.

Why am I rationalizing this for Dan Jurgens?! He's a grown robot! He can defend himself! I'd rather just believe that Dan Jurgens can't handle the basics of writing conventions! Although, since he's a robot built in the middle of the 1980s without any extra memory or input ports to learn anything new after he was built, I should be blaming his programmer.

Also, the previous paragraphs were about Dan Jurgens and his inability to understand writing conventions! Leave me out of it!

Being that this is Rebirth, it's time for a new take on Batman Beyond! Which, of course, is the old take! I can't really blame DC Comics for ditching The New 52 to try to recapture their old universe. Mostly because DC Comics never took advantage of The New 52! It was supposed to be a time for trying new things and really changing things up! Instead, they just offered bland recyclings of the same old characters but without any history or legions of supporting characters. I won't admit to typing this and will later delete it and deny its existence but Ann Nocenti might have been the most cutting edge writer of The New 52. By not understanding any of the characters she was allowed to molest, she wrote the most drastically different versions of old characters in The New 52! I mean, could anybody recognize her Green Arrow as being DC's Green Arrow? Or Catwoman? Or Katana? Or even Klarion! Wow, was she terrible! But fuck was she fun to discuss! I'll miss her terribly!

Like the narrator of Robert Frost's "Birches", I hope I'm not misunderstood by making that statement! I don't want her back! I just want to acknowledge how much I enjoyed it when she was around!

Oh, back to the new take on Batman Beyond! This time it's Terry McGinnis battling the Jokerz in Neo-Gotham! See? Everything new is old again! Or is that statement supposed to be the other way around? Whatever!

Terry McGinnis tells his origin story right off the bat because this is Rebirth! Best to get that out of the way for all of the new readers who picked up this book because they thought it was the new issue of Venom.

Bruce Wayne was out walking Ace. Except he forgot Ace.

Somebody on my Facebook feed just posted something called the Saran Wrap Ball Christmas Game. I'm sure most people who have no life and actually have a Facebook account have seen it by now! But I just wanted to point out an idiotic alternate rule of the game. In the game, somebody rolls two dice. When they get doubles, the Saran Wrap Ball is passed to the next person who gets to begin unwrapping it. The alternate rules state that you can "maybe use just one of the dice and pick a number that has to be hit to pass the ball." If they've added this rule because they think that might make the turns go faster then they've got another think coming. It's the same odds to role doubles on two dice as to role a specific number on one die: 1 in 6. If that's not the reason for the alternate rule, why even use two dice in the first place? Just use one die because you're less apt to lose one off the table. It's much easier to control one random element than two! Especially when, I'm assuming, everybody is drunk and half-naked!

Terry walked Bruce home to his mansion where he slipped him some drugs. While he was passed out, Terry fiddled with his clock and suddenly found himself in Bruce's batcave. Charges were never pressed. Instead, Terry became the next Batman! This way of finding an apprentice is even worse than touring Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory of Death.

Bruce normally wouldn't take in an apprentice with such a normal family life so he had to rush out and murder Terry's father before Terry got home. You can't have a sidekick who discovers your secret identity and doesn't have dead parents! That would be the worst sidekick ever! So boring! So bland! So not sexy at all! So annoying! The worst! Awful! Terrible! Are the Tim Drake fans angry at me yet?

But now, years later, Batman must be dead. I mean, he's probably not dead since his death in Futures End never happened. But he's currently not in the Batcave helping Terry. So Terry has to work with Barbara Gordon and probably his brother Matt. That stuff will probably be cleared up in the next half of this comic book: "Escaping the Grave, Part 2!" I'm still assuming that will take place in this comic book! I haven't abandoned all hope for Dan Jurgens' writing ability yet!

Terry begins to believe The Joker might actually still be alive. Of course he is! And so is Batman! And this comic book will eventually stage another final fight between Bruce and The Joker! I don't think Dan Jurgens has gotten to write that story yet, unlike every other writer ever. That's probably because Dan got to write the Death of Superman! The real one and not one of those What If stories or Alternate Timeline fanfics!

Dana Tan, a social worker and most likely suspect in the taking of Terry's virginity, has ventured, unknowingly, into Jokerz Town! With a Z!

I hope The Boss is senile Bruce Wayne in face paint!

Terry decides to suit up and shut down Jokerz Town now that it's become personal! Dana is currently being kept in Terminal's club, No Laughing Matter. He reveals to her his big secret: he's trying to resurrect The Joker! OMG! WTF! BRB!

Okay, I'm back! I just couldn't get over the shock of that huge revelation! I mean, I'm going to assume it's actually The Joker who is being resurrected because that's a big deal for a Batman book. But the body in the hospital bed is pretty fucking ripped. It looks more like Lobo than The Joker! Has Ryan Sook never seen The Joker before?!

Wouldn't it be a great twist if Terminal really was resurrecting Lobo?! I'd read that comic book, even if Dan Jurgens were still writing it!

The Review!
Even if this comic book had done something super interesting as opposed to something super typical and expected, I probably wouldn't keep reading it. I just can't keep up with all of these comic books anymore now that I'm seriously working on other projects. Also, I've never been interested in Batman Beyond. And they aren't going to make me more interested by bringing back the actual Joker. Enough of that guy! I'm fairly certain he was played out years ago. Just like his moll has been played out in recent years! I'm starting a petition for no more Harley Quinn and Joker stories! Just write your name on whatever bathroom stall you're sitting in while reading this. If we get enough signatures, something will happen! Right? Politics!

Batman Beyond #16

How come no supervillain in the DC Universe has yet discovered that every hero's secret identity is given away by their shadow?

My back is still fucked up (but not as fucked up as it was two weeks ago) so it's still too uncomfortable to sit in my office chair and write. That's probably enough explanation for why I'm now about a month behind on my comics and I'm busy reading old Batman Beyond comic books that I really don't have any interest in. Maybe I should go to the doctor to get some opiate-based pain medication. It's possible that will make Tim Drake and Terry McGinnis more interesting.

I hadn't thought of it before but Tim Drake was the perfect character to take over for Terry McGinnis. Both of their names begin with T and I don't fucking care about either of them!

Not last issue but the issue before (twenty four robbers came knocking at my door! Then they went upstairs to kiss a fella but made a mistake and kissed a snake. Then the monkeys began rolling off the bed (unless they were jumping on it?) and a whole bunch of doctors had to be called in to suck the poison out of somebody or something), the creative team decided to show Rewire without his mask on as the big shock ending. Aside from the three fangenders who totally lose their shit for Terry McGinnis, nobody else understood the big reveal. You see, it was Terry who was Rewire! The Next Month Blurb sort of hinted at it being Terry but that doesn't really help when you have a surprise twist ending that nobody gets. When you just kind of think you get the surprise twist but you might be reaching and you're definitely making assumptions, it doesn't really work. But it's been confirmed since then that Terry McGinnis is back! Not because he survived Futures End (most of us didn't) but because Tim Drake is now in a new timeline where Terry McGinnis never had to go back in time to stop Brother Eye! Maybe?

You know what? It doesn't matter! Futures End was terrible and stupid and Batman Beyond, taking place in the Futures End future, is even more terrible and stupid. Also, just in case you've forgotten while reading the first few paragraphs, fucking Donald Trump is going to be the president of the United States of America. That's fucking absurd. If you don't think it's absurd, you probably don't think much of anything. Or you're just a hateful, despicable person who never moved past third grade where you disagreed with everybody you hated no matter how stupid a stance it caused you to take.

Terry McGinnis is under the thrall of Spellbinder which is why he's trying to kill Batman Beyond. Terry also has a problem with his heart which is why Tim Drake will eventually give up the Batsuit so that it can keep Terry alive. Then Tim Drake will, as the cover shows, hike across America solving problems and helping the nearly unhelpable. That's always a good premise for episodic storytelling.

Speaking of episodic storytelling, I just watched the first episode of Black Mirror and it was terrible. It was fucking horrible. I hate saying this because I generally like Charlie Brooker, the writer of the episode, on panel shows and You Have Been Watching. I suppose if I want to look past the inanity of the plot and talk about it as a parable about what politicians will do based on polls and their likability, it's less terrible than I first said and actually sort of interesting. But I can't get past the idea that a Prime Minister would fuck a pig on television to save a woman being held hostage. Governments are never supposed to negotiate with terrorists! Even if the entire population of Great Britain would look unfavorably on the Prime Minister for letting a woman die instead of fucking a pig, the guy would never fuck a pig. Nobody would allow him to fuck a pig based on terrorist demands! I mean, if he wanted to fuck a pig, they'd make sure he could fuck a pig without the media finding out. But nobody would even consider fucking the pig as one of the options! Yet in this episode, right from the beginning, everybody acts as if the Prime Minister might have to fuck a pig! They keep assuring him that it won't come to that as if he'd really be thinking that it might actually come to that! As soon as the first person said to me, if I were Prime Minister, "Sir, you know that if you don't fuck the pig, nobody will think you have blood on your hands," I'd be all, "I fucking know that, asshole! And I'm not fucking a pig to negotiate with some kidnapper, you idiot! Why would you even think I'd ponder that idea?! I know I'm not fucking a pig! If this princess is killed, it's the killer's fault! Now stop being an idiot and do something productive, like feeding my fucking turkeys in the basement! And I meant that fucking as an adjective to describe how I use the turkeys and not as an expletive!"

So, um, anyway, Terry is about to kill Tim when Matt, Terry's little brother, comes crashing through the wall inside a Batplane. That's like something Robin Beyond would do! I wonder if Matt's already thinking up his take on the costume?

Matt causes enough of a diversion to allow Tim to start slapping the shit out of people.

Tim Drake hits women!

Spellbinder gets his ass kicked by Tim Drake which doesn't seem as realistic as I think this comic book should be. I mean, it is about a Robin who jumped into another timeline to become Batman, so you'd think the limits to my disbelief would have already been reached. But I have nearly limitless capacity to believe comic book nonsense! But Tim Drake beating down the bad guy with his fists is a bit much. Although I don't know anything about Spellbinder! He's probably just a huge nerd with no fighting prowess which makes his being knocked out by Tim Drake make sense.

I'm sure a lot of people think Tim Drake is just as capable at hand-to-hand combat as any of the Robins but then we all have different head-canons, don't we? To me, Tim Drake has always been worthless when things resorted to fisticuffs. Look at how he was killed by only a couple of hundred of drones in Detective Comics! Such a terrible fighter!

After the big battle (which took place in the Epilogue! That's weird. I think that's bad planning!), everybody goes back to the Batcave where Tim Drake can retire as Batman Beyond, steal a Batcycle, and hit the road in his own futuristic version of Kung Fu. Unless he's more like The Incredible Hulk. Or maybe The Lone Ranger?

There's an epilogue to this epilogue! Tim Drake is pulled into a flash of light as he sets off on his adventure! What could it mean?! Where is he now?! Is this part of some new Crisis?! Where could...fuck me. I don't really give a shit.

The Review!
Futures End went on for far too long. This was just another piece of that huge mistake by DC Comics. They tried to create some exciting stories by looking at where their characters would be in five years and they fucked it all up. This was, I think, the last vestiges of that shitty story. And this even went on too long because it needed these last five issues to get Terry McGinnis and the Batman Beyond world back on track! I won't be reading the Rebirth Batman Beyond because I finally decided to make a lot of cuts to my monthly reading list. I do have Rebirth and the first issue though, so I'll get a taste. I hope I don't like the taste! I hope it tastes like semen!

Not that I know what semen tastes like or if I have a fondness for it!

Batman Beyond #15

Thank the grand universal consciousness that these nauseous hypno guy covers are coming to an end.

If you ever want to realize how desperately pathetic and stupid most people are, just click on any joke made by a relatively famous comedian on Twitter and read the comments. I'm not even talking about the comments where people are angry over their hot take on the tweet! I'm talking about the people who agree with the comedian and think they're adding to the joke with their lonely cries into the abyss. Take this Tweet by Patton Oswalt, for example: "Chex Mix is a vegetable, right?" I know he's asking a question but he obviously doesn't actually give a shit about your hilarious response! Just look at some of the saddoes responding to it:

Loser. It really is disgusting that the Internet has given everybody a voice!

The main problem with the Internet isn't the voice thing; it's that it hasn't given anybody ears. I suppose it wouldn't matter. What's to hear, really, when everybody is screaming at the same time? And even if most people took the time to listen, they'd be too dumb to comprehend what was being said anyway.

Does Twitter have a feature that enables Verified Users to only see Verified User responses? I'd want to be verified for simply that reason! It would certainly clean up all the nutjob responses I wind up rabbit holing into. Why are stupid people and train wrecks so hard to turn away from?

If your response to me calling people stupid and dumb is that I'm being ableist, you can fuck the hell right off. It's like really stupid people have decided the only way to stop people from calling out their lack of intelligence is to claim the other person is gross and disgusting. Just be thankful you're not smart because it's hell living among morons!

I'm really killing this Internet voice thing!

The Review!
Oh for fuck's sake. Terry McGinnis is alive because Tim Drake is in a different version of the future which is like Futures End's version but different because fuck you.

Batman Beyond #14

I'm not really interested in this comic book so I'm going to play some Nethack as I read it.

I usually play Nethack by letting the game randomly assign a class for me. That's because I don't care about winning. I mean, eventually I would like to win! It's just that I know that is unlikely because I have never read any spoilers. I just try to learn as much as I can, experiment, buy clues from the Oracle, and try not to die the same way twice. Unless that same way is starvation or falling down the stairs while cursed with a ball and chain and getting my head bashed in by the ball. This adventure, I'm a Barbarian! That's good because Barbarians are easy to play! At least up to a point.

And that point was the top level of the Sokoban tower where I stupidly thought I was powerful enough to fight a Winged Gargoyle after battling dozens of other monsters with my stomach full of troll! I found a Wand of Wishing almost immediately but, since I don't read spoilers, I don't know the proper way to use one! I just wished for an uncursed Amulet of Reflection because being zapped by some jerk Kobold that got its hands on a Wand of Lightning is my least favorite way to die. And it saved my life on the way to my Amulet of Life-Saving! Or another Wand of Wishes? I forget what's in the treasure room at the top of Sokoban Tower. It's been years since I've played. Anyway, a Centaur tried to lightning bolt me to death and instead lightning bolted himself to death. It left me blind but he had a Unicorn's Horn on him and I used it to cure my blindness. Which was a good thing because the next monster trying to kill me was a Cockatrice! If I'd been blind and felt his corpse, I might have turned to stone! Although I had Gloves of Power on, so that wouldn't have been a problem. Plus I had two lizards to eat although I don't know that I would have heeded the messages that I was turning to stone. Sometimes I play too quickly!

So it was a pretty decent game for my first time back in a long while. Also, Batman Beyond wasn't too exciting. I guess Rewire 2.0 (who must be Terry, right?!) is being used by the Spiral Face Hypnoguy. He's convinced Rewire that Batman wants him dead, so I guess they'll fight or something! Also, Matt McGinnis might become Robin or something.

The Review!
Nethack is a fun game! I've probably wasted about 2% of my life so far playing it! I haven't done the math on that statement but it's probably true. The amount of my life I've spent on Batman Beyond doesn't even register! I wish it registered even less than it normally did because this series is boring!

Batman Beyond #13

Somebody went overboard on the yellow ink.

This comic books has a cover date of August which means it probably came out in May or June. I'm only reading it now because I don't give more than a few shits (and probably not even that many) about Batman Beyond starring Tim Drake. It's like DC Comics decided to make a nonsense world that made no sense (thus the descriptor, "nonsense") and sell it to all of the assholes who read DC Comics. Fools! Oh, I realize I'm one of them! But not anymore. I've dropped Batman Beyond from my pull list because even though I only give a few shits about Tim Drake's Batman Beyond, I give no shits about Terry McGinnis's!

This isn't even going to be a proper review because who cares? Not that any of my reviews are proper reviews. Half the time somebody reads one of my reviews, they wind up more confused about a book than when they didn't know anything at all. This review will be even worse than that so you might want to have a doctor on hand. Is it possible for words to cause strokes? I'm pretty sure they can cause aneurysms because I once met this woman at a party who was so annoyed that I kept pronouncing Linux wrong, that I kept pronouncing Linux wrong. Less than a month later, she was dead from an aneurysm. I'm not bragging about getting away with murder by telling that story! I'm just saying people should be careful listening to me and probably reading my words. Although if you mispronounce anything I write, that's on you!

This issue begins with Tim Drake drowning. I'm tempted to just rip out the last eighteen pages because this seems like a fitting end for a character I don't like who wound up in a depressing future that makes no sense and which DC Comics has completely abandoned with Rebirth. Speaking of Rebirth, didn't Tim Drake's death in Rebirth make this comic book obsolete? Or did Rebirth simply make all of Futures End like a shrug in the fog? Did I steal that line from Edie Brickell?

Philosophy! It's the talk on a cereal box! Religion! A fly on a dog!
I'm not afraid of too many things but I can think of one: a spider with wings! Yeah!

I'm not a doctor but I'm pretty sure you shouldn't defibrillate a person to save them from drowning!

Tim survives and heads back to the Batcave where Barbara Gordon checks out the suit and says, "It's fine! Whatever happened won't happen again because it was just easy drama to end the first part of this four part story! Now do you want to know how you died in the past?!" I mean, he didn't die! He just disappeared and went into the future. Now all that needs to happen is he needs to get bitten by a vampire, steal a Time Bubble, and head back into the past to start NOWHERE. It had better happen in this comic book because this is my last fucking chance to be right about the identity of Harvest!

Babs explains how the Tim of her reality just disappeared and Batman could never find him. A-ha! So if nobody ever explains anything else about Futures End Tim Drake or where he went, I can claim that he became Harvest! I will never have been proven wrong! I fucking knew I nailed Harvest's identity! Suck on it, Tott Dedell!

Although Babs begins telling the story about how Terry McGinnis decided to solve the Mystery of the Disappearing Boring Robin. I hope he never solves it. Or, if he does, it involves vampires and time travel!

Terry heard some gossip that The Joker killed Tim Drake. So he went to investigate the place that supposedly cremated The Joker. What was he hoping to find? Some burnt, over-sized shoes? What's even more confusing is that Babs sends Tim to the same funeral home to find Rewire! Oh wait. The very next panel explains that. I should probably pay more attention to the comic I don't give more than a few shits about before criticizing it.

The two stories are told at the same time because they're practically the same story or something. It's really artsy! Especially if you're into the kind of thing a robot from the 80s would think was artsy and cutting edge! Remember, in Dan Jurgens' mind, Watchmen has only been out for about a year! Comics are smart again! Maybe not even again. Maybe it was in the eighties when comics became smart for the very first time!

Babs' story ends with the Mystery of the Disappearing Boring Robin still unsolved. That means I was right! Red Robin does become Harvest! I fucking knew it! Grandmaster Comic Book Reader! The other story ends with Rewire revealing his face while some guy in spiral pajamas bro-hugs him. Am I supposed to recognize him? I mean, the next month blurb says, "Terry, Rewired!" So I'm assuming the new Rewire is Terry McGinnis.

What's going to happen to Out of Time Tim Drake now that Terry McGinnis is back and ready to be Batman Beyond again? Maybe this one will also become a vampire named Harvest! That would explain so much if there were actually two Harvests. Or more! I bet every Tim Drake from every timeline wound up becoming Harvest and they all time traveled back to The New 52 where they weren't supposed to because time travel didn't work. So when they realized they broke the laws of the universe because the writers writing them were morons, they decided to team up and begin NOWHERE. Because that's where they belonged! NOWHERE!

The Review!
If I were to review this comic book, I would start by saying I was never interested in Batman Beyond and I've always hated Tim Drake. Then I would say "Can you do math?" and leave it at that.

Batman Beyond #12

Don't worry, DC Youniverse's horrible future! Old Man Wayne is here to fix it all!

The Review or Whatever!
This issue is called "Wired for Death" and it's part 1 of 4. Wait. What?! Goddammit! I thought all of the current DC Comics were ending immediately! I thought I was going to be buying a few less comic books per month due to DC's new economic plan of selling less titles but more biweeklies! And now I've glanced at the solicits for August and I'm really depressed! Earth 2: Society, Teen Titans, and Doctor Fate still haven't been cancelled as of August?! I hate everybody at DC Comics.

Thankfully, I really don't mind that Batman Beyond is still going. It might not be Moby Dick (although it might also be Moby Dick since I haven't read that (mostly because I kept falling asleep and dreaming about having gay sailor sex on top of drying sheets of whale penis skin)) but it's entertaining enough to make me forget about death for a few minutes. And who can put a price on that? Well, DC can. They're charging $2.99 for it! That's a bit exorbitant since I'm fairly certain I can read this comic book in five minutes if I weren't taking the extra time to pretend to review it while actually just constantly digressing into boring anecdotes like that one about how I tried to read Moby Dick.

I feel like I skipped past this bit a little too quickly: Doctor Fate is still in the August solicits! How was this stupid fucking piece of shit comic book not cancelled months ago?! Here's the entire story of every issue: Something weird and paranormal happens. Doctor Fate thinks, "I must be dreaming!" Another weird thing happens. Doctor Fate thinks, "Am I on drugs?" Doctor Fate's neighbor tries to suck his dick. Doctor Fate thinks, "I don't have time for that!"

I don't know what's happening in this story but Old Man Bruce and Old Dog Titus (probably like Titus IV or V, actually) are in it. They're not supposed to be in it, right? Is this some kind of flashback? Probably not since it's called "Wired for Death" and the last issue ended with Rewire twiddling his fingers and going, "Nyuck nyuck nyuck!" Or something more sinister than that. I mean, I guess this can be a flashback. It's probably Barbara remembering the moment Terry put Rewire into Bruce's computer. Because in the present, Tim is probably accessing Bruce's computer to read about Rewire. So maybe that is the original Titus! Dogs can live thirty years, right? If you truly love them!

Oh. It's only Ace. Now I'm sad about dead Titus. And Batcow. And Alfred Pennyworth the Cat.

In Barbara's memory, she talks about Tim Drake with Terry McGinnis. She points out that Tim was so fucking smart that he realized Batman and Bruce Wayne were the same person. Please! The only thing that proves is that the rest of the DC Youniverse is so stupid they couldn't figure it out. I don't mind believing that nobody can figure out Bruce is Batman or Clark is Superman for some reason. Fine! But don't go and blow the whole illusion by pretending that if somebody figures it out, they're somehow a genius! That's just bringing attention to the whole stupid barely secret secret identity thing! Also, just for the record, Tim didn't figure it out in The New 52. Oh, sure, Scott Lobdell rewrote the story so that Tim was only pretending not to have guessed so he wouldn't hurt Bruce's feelings. But that was just Lobdell doing that thing Lobdell does where he writes a story that gets criticism and then shouts, "Wait! Wait! You can't have an adverse opinion until you see the end of the story!" Then he pretends he didn't end the story and goes back to revisit the thing he did poorly and changes it so that he can say, "See, you dumb dumb idiot morons?! I was totally doing the thing you wanted but you were just too impatient! So stupid."

The story returns to the present (future? Whichever one has old Babs with grey hair) where Tim is investigating a break-in at STAR Labs! I bet it's Rewire! Rewire is almost a palindrome if you hit your head against the wall five times fast and then look at it.

Commissioner Babs is Batman Beyond's Penny-One and Jim Gordon. Hmm. I wonder which one Batman was fucking? Oh wait! Tim isn't fucking Babs yet! Or maybe ever. She is kind of old. Not that there's anything wrong with an old woman fucking a young buck like Tim Drake! But there probably is something wrong with Tim Drake fucking an old mare like Babs! If that was sexist, strike and reverse it! Or just let them fuck like I first fantasized, you judgmental asshole!

Batman Beyond catches Rewire stealing from STAR Labs and accuses him of a murder from Issue #7. Rewire is all, "I'm not going down for something I didn't do!" Well then, how about you just go down for breaking into STAR Labs? Is that good enough?

Rewire kicks Batman Beyond's ass while using lots of future slang. I now know I hate future slang even worse than present slang. Probably because it's made up by adults trying to envision slang of the future rather than organically made up by the youth. Not that the youth come up with stuff that's much better. I wish we'd just go back to saying "Bee's knees" and "Cat's pajamas!"

Tim drowns at the end of the battle although I doubt it's for keepsies since this story is Part 1 of 4. The final page doesn't reveal the bad guy behind Rewire but it does show that Rewire will die if he doesn't keep getting boosts of energy. That's why he can't go to Blackgate! They don't have any outlets.

I don't know why but I don't totally hate this comic book. I feel like I should hate it but I don't. Maybe I have the flu.

Batman Beyond #11

Batman Beyond Thunderdome.

Rating: I don't know why I read superhero comic books anymore because they rarely ever tell stories that touch me in any meaningful way. And it's not like I get excited about the adventure of it all. I suppose most of the entertainment I consume is like that though. There's a lot of shallow shit out there. Don't get me wrong. A lot of it is entertaining. But I like to read stuff that means something every now and then. Batman Beyond isn't that. But it's also not bad. It does what it's supposed to do which is present a comic book adventure in the future DC Universe. It's not a great future but it's, at least, a lot more interesting than Futures End was making it.

It's been eleven issues of this and forty-eight issues of Futures End and I still don't know why Batman Beyond had to become Tim Drake. Poor Terry McGinnis. Let's pour one out for Terry! Oh shit. I just spilled my tea on my carpet. I got too into the moment! I don't know why since I never cared about Terry McGinnis. Come to think of it, I never cared about Tim Drake either! So it doesn't really matter to me as long as everybody just keeps calling him Batman.

Neo-Gotham has survived the machinations of Brother Eye. But now they have to weather their next crisis: a flood of refugees! The refugees were angry that they weren't getting immediate relief from the meager stocks of food and medicine within Neo-Gotham's walls so they've stormed the city and declared everything theirs. That seems like a solution that's only going to cause more problems. Now that the outside refugees have stormed their way in and taken over, how are they themselves going to split up the food and medicine? If the informal leader doesn't give as much to the next asshole as that asshole believes he deserves, who's to say he's wrong for rising up and taking as much as he needs from the new refugee leader? People really should think through the logic of their decisions instead of letting fear, greed, and desire rule their choices. Because now they have no moral ground to stand upon when somebody with more weapons comes along and demands they're given all that they want. How has civilization even survived this long when it seems there are two main rules: fight for what you want and fight to keep what you have. What a fucking hassle. I'd rather be dead.

I mean, I don't want to be dead! But the push and pull of need and desire isn't quite strong enough to be upsetting in my current life. Although last night I had some really weird anxiety dreams about not feeling safe enough within my own home. Eventually that dream led to a huge party with a dessert buffet and me trying to convince some friend I didn't recognize that I wasn't stealing pages from his prescription pad. Then Jason Priestley almost hit me as he drove through the room in a blue convertible. I wasn't wondering what had become of Jason Priestley but apparently his agent has now booked him for brief appearances in people's dreams.

Meanwhile in Metropolis (not Neo-Metropolis because I don't know why), Batman Beyond has seemingly been killed by a mind-controlled Justice League: Z-Listers. That's probably not true though. It's just a plot device to ratchet up the tension to an unbearable level. I'm so fucking worried I can't even pucker my ass.

Oh thank God*! I have full control of my ass again! *Use of the term "God" does not constitute belief in said being.

Terry's brother Matt shows Tim the secret weapon he's found in a stasis tube: Superman! Boy, I sure hope releasing him doesn't turn into a whole Batman Beyond v Superman Beyond: Future Dawn of Justice thing!

Batman Beyond (whom I really should learn to simply refer to as Batman) goes right back out to continue battling the Justice League: Z-Listers because they've decided to keep destroying Metropolis. That seems like a good idea since Tim just got his ass handed back to him by them. I suppose now that he had a brief respite, he's ready to get back into the action! Plus that whole cliffhanger with his death was resolved so no reason to not get back to the action now.

The Animal-man hybrids rebel against Doctor Evilguy and smash his Techno-manipulation device. But who cares about how the Justice League: Z-Listers plus Superman have now gotten their own minds back! There's a big double-page advert for a Hanna-Barbera comic called FutureQuest by Jeff Parker and Evan Shaner! It stars the Herculoids as well as some others you may have heard of but I don't care about as much as The Herculoids. Blue Falcon and Dynomutt aren't in this advertisement but I'm hoping they eventually join the crew. Maybe I should send Jeff Parker a Tweet to remind him about their existence and how I'll keep reminding him every day until they show up.

Batman introduces himself to Superman as Tim Drake and Superman introduces himself as Jon. I hope I like him better as an adult than as that little rascal from Lois and Clark.

I wonder if I should read the new Scooby Doo book as well. It's by Giffen and DeMatteis so I might just purchase it to turn into a drinking game.

Superman heads over to Neo-Gotham to lecture everybody about how to live their lives. What a fucking Douchéstork. He disappears for the entire Brother Eye war and now he thinks he can return to tell everybody how to live their lives? I hope everybody still hates him!

Nope, they all must love him because the riots stop even though not everybody has the food they need. I guess they trust Superman to get around to feeding them after he's done celebrating with the Justice League. Meanwhile, that Rewire guy is all, "Fucking fuck. Fucking League fuckers. Fuck them fuckers." But he's got a boss who is all, "Don't sweat it, bro! We got this!"

Batman Beyond #10

Good thing DC keeps reminding me about the Batman Loves Superman: Dawn of Just Us movie or I'd probably forget it was out in theaters on March 25th! I hope they remind me when it's in second run though because that's when I'll probably see it. If, you know, I don't forget about it.

I'm not sure if this comic book is meant to be a story about Tim Drake in the future or a delivery vehicle for Batman Loves Superman ads! Here's the inside cover:

The sexual tension is palpable! They should have made this advert with that 3-D effect so you could see their boners grow when you moved the page.

So Rebirth is on the horizon which might refresh some of my enthusiasm for writing about DC Comics. I just ran out of stuff to say about them after four years! How many times can I point out that the Teen Titans are jerk-offs and Green Arrow's comic book may as well have been replaced by the clerk at your Local Comic Book store slapping you in the face after handing them $2.99? Plus I'll be able to increase my word count because I'm certain to constantly write "REBIRTH!" after every two or three sentences.

This issue begins with Tim Drake battling a Tigerman and an Apeboy and a Womangirl. Unless the female is some kind of otter. But she only seems to have two breasts so I'm guessing she's a human or a bird. I don't think normal birds have boobs because they feed their babies vomit but I'm fairly certain that all human-bird hybrids have perky tits. Except for Big Bird.

Who made you, Tim Drake, arbiter of personal decisions? Maybe Apeboy likes having a huge gorilla cock even if he ejaculates almost immediately every time he rubs on anything. That's what gorillas do, right? Hmm. I'm beginning to suspect that Planet of the Rapes wasn't a documentary on gorilla culture.

While Tim Drake battles beastpeople and argues "philosophy" with a mad scientist, Matt McGinnis discovers the Justice League trapped in stasis tubes. I guess they weren't turned into Eyeborgs after all. Because that was Futures End bullshit that kind of painted this future's possibilities into a corner. But revealing that the Justice League survived means more variety for the DC Youniverse's bleak and awful future that came about because DC likes the idea that its heroes just aren't good enough to, ultimately, save the world. The members still alive are a Green Lantern, Big Barda, Warhawk, and Aquagirl. So, you know, the C-Team.

You know what the "C" stands for.

Over in Gotham, the refugees storm the city just before an ad for a new Superman trade featuring the "Before Truth" story arc. They decided to go with an IGN review blurb rather than use one of mine. I knew I used the word "shit" too many times!

Tim Drake is speciesist. What would be wrong with a half-giraffe girl or a sexy ladybug?

The Justice League is hypnotized by an elephant man because you know how that is. You go to the zoo and you can't stop staring at the elephant waiting to see it pop a boner or take a huge piss. It's mesmerizing! The Justice League now think that Batman Beyond is a cyborg. It's as good an excuse as any to get good guys to battle each other! It's also a good time for Tuftan the Tiger to learn that his mad scientist creator has been lying to him. And if there is one thing felines can't stand, it's being lied to and/or string. Cuvier, the mad scientist, also mentions how the Justice League Cyborgs weren't actually the Justice League, probably for those reasons I mentioned earlier about how shitty and boring this world would be if all of the heroes from just a few decades earlier had been murdered and turned into weaponized toaster ovens.

The next advert is for Wonder Woman Year One by Grant Morrison. Since it hasn't come out yet, DC has decided not to use any quotes by IGN or Comic Book Resources, even though I'm sure they already have some raving reviews ready to go. "'The most dramatic version of Wonder Woman I've seen since the first five minutes of the Wonder Woman porn parody!' -- Chris Sims." Instead, they went with a Grant Morrison quote about his own work.

Did Grant Morrison okay the punctuation in this quote?

Big Barda eventually believes she kills Batman but she doesn't realize that before she could kill him, Matt McGinnis sank his battleship which, um, helped Tim escape somehow or something.

Batman Beyond #10 Rating: +1 Ranking. This comic book is a lot better than it should be. What it should be is forgotten by everybody who read Futures End all the way through. I'm not denying that Futures End had some interesting parts or that it actually made me like Grifter for a few seconds but, overall, it was mediocre with an ending that had DC shitting all over the future of its characters. But Dan Jurgens is slowly changing the future by pretending a lot of the stuff that happened actually happened in a way that wasn't so stupid. I mean, it was just stupid in a different way that could lead to more interesting future stories! So hopefully it gets to some of those before REBIRTH!

Batman Beyond #9

I'm still pretending this is Terry McGinnis.

Rating: No change.

Sometimes it feels like an issue is really light on plot because it's just moving the characters to some big reveal. That's what happened in this issue! Except the big reveal was just some guy I don't recognize because I was never into Batman Beyond! So I got to the last page and thought, "It's Sinestro! But why are they calling him Doctor Cuvier?!"

This book has been better than the initial finishing off Brother Eye story arc. But it really needs to keep pushing the envelope because another issue like this and I'm going to be completely bored of it again! Come on, Dan Jurgens! Don't you know any plots from Knight Rider or The A-Team or Riptide?!

It is kind of weird that DC Comics is making Robot Dan Jurgens whose memory cards haven't been updated since 1986 write the comic book about the DC You's future!

Batman Beyond #8

Just think of this as Batman Beyond #2 and forget about the first six issues which were really just the end of Futures End!

Rating: +1 Ranking. Now that the Futures End story is behind us and Brother Eye is dead, this comic book room to become interesting. It's like an Elseworlds version of Kamandi except with a lot more non-animal humanoids living in the world. Matt McGinnis gets to be the new Kamandi unless he's actually going to meet the old Kamandi in Metropolis-That-Was. Although Kamandi lived further in the future so just forget all of that crap since Matt is going to become the new Green Lantern instead. I'm still not a fan of Tim Drake but since I don't have to look at him because he's always in the Batman Beyond mask, I'm just pretending he's Irwin Schwab.

Batman Beyond #7

I was completely betrayed by the "The End" at the end of last issue. Because this doesn't look like "The End" at all!

"A New Dawn" sounds like the kind of thing people say when they awaken to hope. But who are the dolts living in this shithole of a future DC Youniverse suddenly excited to carpe diem the hell out of their lives? Most of the world is dead and Gotham will be soon! I don't know how it isn't already! Somehow Gotham has continued to exist for thirty years without any outside assistance. Am I supposed to believe that Gotham has always been a self-sufficient community without any kind of commerce with the outside world? Okay, fine! I believe it! Why do I ever question comic books on any kind of reality when their first and most important premise is that super-powered people exist? I think I'm the dolt!

The issue begins with Tim Drake dramatically proclaiming that Batman is dead. That would be a good place to end this series! I could just close the cover, put the comic book back in the mylar, and pretend that the series is over. They're giving me an out! All I need to do is crush my overwhelming need to finish reading this book and walk away! It's just that I also have this powerful belief that aneurysms are caused by denying yourself those things your brain is screaming at you to do. So for my own health, I'm going to have to finish reading this. At least it can't be as boring as Cyborg, right?

Tim is failing to rebuild the Batman Beyond suit with Batman's notes and schematics. It's only when he remembers Batman was a paranoid asshole that he discovers the secret to reading Batman's notes.

You have to be smart to work with Batman! How else can you run every sentence he says through this code while also trying to keep the Cluemaster Code straight in case he's using that and I'm sure he has an anti-Superman code he uses when that fucker is around. I usually can't even follow the explicit thing he's saying let alone try to decode it all at the same time! He must have some kind of visual cue for the Batfamily so they know when he's slipping into a code. Like staring angrily or staring angrily in a different way.

While Tim fixes the Batsuit, Matt McGinnis is scouring the Neo-Gotham underground for information. He's trying to find out where the cyborg arm of Green Lantern was created. Maybe he's trying to figure out where the battery for the Green Lantern ring is because it probably still needs to charge every 24 hours. And he can't become McGreen Lantern without a battery for the ring he stole. He learns it came from Metropolis but doesn't get any specific details. That's fine because who wants the story to move at a decent pace? I prefer to have 80% of my comic book wasted on characters asking questions that are never answered.

Tim rebuilds the Batsuit but he still hasn't gotten A.L.F.R.E.D. up and running. Has the comic book ever said what that stands for? The ALF part is easy: Artificial Life Form! But the RED has me stymied! Probably because I keep reading the ED as erectile dysfunction. Anyway, since the Alfred AI is still offline, Barbara Gordon is going to be his Penny One.

The new Batsuit works and Barbara is suitably impressed enough to ask Tim to live with her.

No wonder Gotham was such an awful place! The villains ruined everything fun about life: cats, jokes, riddles, puppets. Okay, maybe not puppets.

Tim tests out the combat capabilities of the new suit by finding some Jokerz to beat up. Everything goes well and the Joker he knocks off a motorcycle at full speed doesn't die because he's Batman! He doesn't kill, remember? And knocking people off motorcycles isn't that dangerous if you know exactly where in the head to concuss them with a batarang! Duh!

Tim moves in with Barbara and her cats, Dick and Not Dick. That must be their names, right? It's awkward because Barbara has gotten old while Tim gets to remain young. That has to be annoying. I bet most people wouldn't mind if a virus suddenly destroyed everybody younger than the age they currently are so they wouldn't have to be reminded that the world goes on without them. Especially the babies. Not that I really wish all babies would catch a virus and die! That's a disgusting thought that only disgusting people think! *Wink!*

Later Tim discovers that Matt has disappeared. We know he's gone off to Metropolis to find a Green Lantern Battery! But Tim doesn't know that yet. Hopefully he'll have figured it out by the beginning of the next issue so I don't have to read five pages of him doing detective work. Why do people always want to see Batman do more detective work and less punching people?! How about a compromise! A little more detective work, a little less punching people, and a whole lot more sex with Catwoman. Deal?

Batman Beyond #7 Rating: No change. I wasn't bored by this issue! It wasn't super exciting but I'll take "not being bored" over "Futures End Still Isn't Fucking Over Yet?!" any day! Hopefully the visit to Metropolis will be uncover new bad guys that have nothing to do with cyborgs or robots. I guess I'll accept mutants because what else is there in dystopian future fiction?!

Batman Beyond #6

Shoulder mounted missiles are the couture of the haute in the future.

I haven't watched any movies lately so I'm not going to review a movie. But if my niece's book which she told me about tonight eventually gets made into a movie, I'll review it here. The working title of her book is "Tess Makes Me Barf." It sounds fascinating!

I wonder what other people make my niece do since I make her barf and she's explicitly stated that I'm her favorite person. She must really be hard to please!

Currently in Batman Beyond, Tim Drake has decided it's time to go to the moon and kick Brother Eye in the robot balls. The only way to get to the moon now is to take a ship built by The Court of Owls. Unless it's some other way since I'm really only guessing. I should probably just read the comic book instead of guessing to get it over with since this is now the 54th issue of Futures End which I was completely bored of by around issue sixteen. I'd much rather be playing the new Call of Duty or creating a new board game called "Alleyways and Gangsigns." I don't yet know how the game will be played but I dreamt the name so I should probably create it.

I don't know why I guessed Tim would fly a ship to the moon. That's such an archaic from of travel! It turns out Bruce used the Court of Owls building for Teleporter storage. And since Brother Eye's headquarters is the Justice League satellite crashed on the moon, Tim now has instant access to Brother Eye's balls!

As long as you've got the Bat-lube, Tim.

The rest of the comic book is the final battle with Brother Eye. Inque drips inside of him and shorts him out and, for some terrible reason, his entire consciousness/program is housed inside the body he made for himself with no way out. So Inque sacrifices herself to make sure the entire headquarters on the moon explodes while Tim teleports back to Earth with her daughter. Basically Brother Eye could have been defeated at any time over the last thirty years had somebody just thought to throw a glass of water on him. Which means this series was just a retelling of The Wizard of Oz. Tim winds up in a strange land terrorized by a wicked robot and his flying cyborgs only to defeat them all by throwing water on the bad guy. I suppose this was also the ending of Signs too! From now on, I'm always keeping a glass of water by my bedside table in case an intruder ever breaks in and then SPLASHO! Water right in the face! Apparently it's the greatest weapon in the world.

The final page of the comic book has Tim forgetting to tap his heels together and say that thing about no place being like home (because home is usually way shittier than every other place a person can be). Instead he's all, "I guess this is home! Boring!" And Babs is all, "I can make it less boring for you. Meaning sex. I will have sex with you. Constantly." He doesn't throw a glass of water on her so I guess he's into it. And then the issue ends with a fairly definitive "The End." Does that mean what I think it means?! Is this really the final issue of this series?! I don't see anything online about the series being cancelled although I did find a bit about Lost Army being cancelled which has me thrilled! I wonder if I can get Sinestro cancelled too?

Batman Beyond #6 Rating: -2 Ranking. What a major let down! What a boring bummer of an ending! DC Comics basically just published fifty-four issues of Futures End where Brother Eye completely took over everything and beat all of the world's greatest heroes and destroyed the world! Nobody could defeat him because he was so powerful! And then he's defeated because his inner working got some liquid on them. Why did nobody think to spray him with a hose earlier? It's not like I was expecting an incredible ending to this story since the story itself has been just a little bit better than completely boring. Here's a suggestion to comic book writers: come up with your story before taking on the job of writing a monthly title. I'm sick of writers having no clue what they're doing so that their stories meander from plot point to plot point with no direction. As writers, stop thinking that you're good enough to figure out the story as you go along because it isn't working at all. Most of you are not that good at writing to just wing it. Come up with a fucking plan and write your ass off. I blame the editors too. Stop being lazy assholes and force writers to actually have stories they want to tell.

Batman Beyond #5 And A Movie

Why is this a Gods and Monsters Batman cover?

Glancing through my Netflix recently watched scrollbar, I see I've watched quite a few movies since my last Batman Beyond Critique (is "critique" better than "review"? Because I don't really review the comic books I read and saying "reviews" always makes me feel like a slimy bastard). Let me comment briefly on all of them.

Would You Rather: This probably would have been more enjoyable with a more diverse set of Would You Rather Games instead of the whole "Would you rather hurt X with Y, or Z with I Messed Up Because There Is No Letter After Z But If There Were I Would Place It Here?" Maybe I would have liked it better if I wasn't distracted by screaming, "It's Crab Man!" and "That's Bob from Walking Dead!" and "It's The Penguin as a Douchebro!" and "Oh! Who is that guy? I fucking know that guy! He kind of looks like the weasel faced Upright Citizen's Brigade guy but it's not him! Oh! Oh! WHO THE FUCK IS THAT? It's right on the...OH! It's Peggy's journalist boyfriend from Mad Men!" Also I guessed the super twisty surprise ending somewhere around the time The Penguin was trying to rape the Pitch Perfect girl.

V/H/S: Viral: The least scary and interesting of the V/H/S movies so far. Although it did feature an alternate dimension where people had carnivorous genitals.

The Nightmare: A testimonial of sorts featuring people with sleep paralysis. Only one of the sufferers seems to view it in scientific terms while the others are wrapped up in the paranormal or religious mystery of their Sleep Paralysis Waking Dreams. It's interesting to compare them to schizophrenics in that they seem to (or feel the desire to?) believe that they're experiencing real phenomena that opens up the world to a more mysterious reality. But really they're just people who develop a kind of momentary schizophrenia while falling asleep or waking. The stories are fascinating. The need for meaning is not.

Monster Squad: I guess I saw this a long time ago when it first came out but I didn't remember it until watching the movie. It suffers from the fat kid trope where the fat kid is constantly eating. Plus everybody just calls him "fat kid." At one point, he staves off Dracula because he has a piece of garlic pizza stuffed inside his jacket in the way that all fat people always have a slice of pizza crammed into one of their pockets. I think characters say "fag" and "gay" a lot. At one point, Frankenstein takes a picture of the neighbor girl disrobing. One of the kids flashes the picture to her in order to blackmail her to tell them if she is a virgin or not (surprise twist ending: she isn't). I paused the Netflix to see the picture and it's a picture of her standing in front of a house fully clothed. Stupid PG movie.

Mad Ron's Prevues From Hell: This is a cheesy VHS movie from the late eighties that just strings together a bunch of sixties and seventies horror movie trailers. One trailer was for a movie called Africa: Blood and Guts. After all the fake, cheesy violence, it was disturbing that they'd throw in a trailer showing actual footage of wild animals and people being shot, as well as clips of real severed body parts and corpses. The tag line was "Every scene looks you straight in the eye...and spits!" It really wrecked my boner from the preview that was for a 3-D porn film.

Anyway. Batman Beyond, kids!

The entire future is a shit sundae not worth saving but Tim Drake is going to save it in a dusty suit of Honey Bunny Batman Armor anyway!

As Tim climbs into the Honey Bunny Batman Armor so that he can pretend he cares about saving this godawful future, he has a short conversation about Dick Grayson with Barbara Gordon. Most of it amounts to Dick and Babs liked each other but never got together (as far as Drake knows!). And some of it is actually nice dialogue by Dan Jurgens. I guess he's not too old to write something interesting or relevant on occasion.

Just imagine how Bruce felt when he realized Dick was also the perfect Batman.

Tim's plan is to take the fight out of Gotham and to the moon. If I were Tim, my plan would be to get bit by a vampire already, survive until the end of time gathering knowledge, take a time bubble back to the past, start an organization called NOWHERE which will gather up the best young super heroes in the world, and train them to defeat Brother Eye when he comes around. It should work out perfectly as long as his own young self and his team of teen misfits don't stop him!

But first Tim has to save Gotham and destroy Superman so that Superman doesn't grab his ankle to keep Tim from flying to the moon.

In the past, the Honey Bunny Bat Armor couldn't battle anybody without being shut down in five seconds or having its knee joints shot out. But now in the future, it's practically undefeatable against impossible to beat odds! I guess Batman made some improvements which the Powers Company didn't think of. During the battle, Matt McGinniss steals John Stewart's power ring.

Tim lures out Cyborg Superman (not that one) to distract him from the Moon Plan. But he also winds up attracting Cyborg Wonder Woman's attention as well. But then she attracts Micron's attention because he's a man, isn't he? I think he is. I don't know. Whatever. Cyborg Wonder Woman is so hot that everybody wants a piece of her.

Oh yeah, Micron! Wreck her!

Micron makes himself as large as possible and Wonder Woman's head blows off. He probably should have taken out Superman this way but maybe he felt awkward entering Superman through the only orifice Superman wouldn't have noticed.

Tim pops out of the Honey Bunny Bat Armor while Cyborg Superman is distracted, hops on Superman's back, and shoves Bruce's faithful kryptonite ring down Superman's throat. The only person able to dislodge it from Superman's throat via the Super Heimlich Maneuver is Superman! And now he's not so super because he has a kryptonite ring stuck in his throat! That's like ironic or a catch-22 or something. Maybe it's just a notably interesting conundrum?

Micron smashes Superman and it's over. With Cyborgs Wonder Woman, Superman, and Green Lantern taken out, there really aren't any DC super heroes left who can challenge Batman (even if it is only Tim Drake Batman in Jim Gordon's armor). Time to take the battle to the moon! But first they have to stop at an old Court of Owls property bought up by Bruce sometime in the last thirty years. Because hidden inside is the secret Macguffin that will help them destroy Brother Eye next issue! What is it?! I don't know! It's a secret until you pay another three dollars next month!

Where are all the magic using super heroes? They haven't all succumbed to cyborgism, have they? Did they all flee to hell in the House of Secrets and/or Mystery?

Batman Beyond #5 Rating: No change. Lately (and by "lately" I might mean since The New 52), a lot of DC's future or elseworld stories have been all idea and no story. I get the idea of coming up with the story about how Brother Eye takes over the future and how everybody reacts to it and battles against it in a pitch meeting, and how a lot of people would be excited for it. But without an interesting story to develop the idea, it's just a big letdown. Futures End was mostly that. It didn't even provide the satisfaction of having the heroes save the world! They failed. So now this comic book is about how the world deals with their failure. Great. Remember when superheroes were meant to be a shining beacon of what was possible? They represented humanity's optimism and never-say-die attitude? Remember how your life sucked but you could read a comic book and you realized you could also find the power within yourself to battle your problems and succeed? Well forget them! All the heroes eventually fail and die just like us! The future is a great big pit of suck and the only thing we all have to be thankful for is that we'll be too dead to experience it! Thanks for the uplifting message, DC Comics! Yeehaw.

Batman Beyond #4

Stop eating yourself, Batman!

I knew Batman Beyond was on the top of my stack so I took a break from "writing" last night to watch a movie. I really should start titling these Batman Beyond reviews as "Batman Beyond And A Movie." Unfortunately, I watched Upstream Color last night which gives me precious little to rant, rave, or wax pseudo-intellectually about. It does have some really cute pigs though. I watched it because I loved Shane Carruth's first movie Primer more than I love my mother. Maybe I should think of a better way to describe my love for the movie since I'm fairly certain I also loved Ghostbusters II more than my mother. Anyway, Upstream Color is more of an experience than a story. A bunch of people have a traumatic experience at the hands of a greedy asshole which they can't actually remember. But they do have a hole in their life which cost them everything, so that's something. Two of these people find each other and enjoy a romantic love story where they occasionally freak out for reasons unknown to them. The reason they feel something suddenly missing, or intense separation anxiety, or sudden, uncontrollable anger is because the pigs that now contain their hypnotic tapeworms are going through some really tough shit. Eventually they realize that they can recite Walden like a pretentious college sophomore believing they're the first to ever truly understand Thoreau, naturalism, and civil disobedience, and that nobody before them ever has realized that you can actually ignore people in authority to live your own life and help raise your psychically-linked pig's offspring as if they were your own. In one stunning and innovative scene, Carruth uses a swimming pool as a metaphor for the subconscious as Kris begins to regain some of her memories which later allow her to kill the farming DJ who's been killing her pig children. Anyway, I enjoyed it but the next Shane Carruth movie I watch will be Primer. Unless he figures out a way to finance that Topiary movie.

So last issue, Brother Eye hacked into A.L.F.R.E.D. and discovered the location of Neo-Gotham. That's probably bad news since Brother Eye has already destroyed and/or conquered every place else on Earth. Hopefully Tim Drake destroys him this issue because I'm sick to death of Brother Eye as the ultimate antagonist.

This issue begins with Neo-Gotham being invaded by hundreds of Brother Eye's cyborgs. So it's basically Futures End #52.

I'd say Gotham needs the "whole lot more" more than it really needs Batman.

Batman smashes A.L.F.R.E.D.'s hard drive because Brother Eye is using it against him. He gets distracted and is captured by a cyborg. But then Micron, the Ray Palmer equivalent of this time, smashes the cyborg and says, "Experience this." If I weren't reading all of DC's comic books, I would make it a rule to drop any book where a character uses the "[VERB] this!" line.

Inque, the villain with the ridiculously spelled name, decides to fight on the side of the good guys even though Brother Eye still has her daughter on the moon. Batman promised to help rescue her daughter and I guess she believes Batman is capable of it. That's because she doesn't realize Dan Jurgens is writing this story and Dan Jurgens' protagonists have a way of failing spectacularly at everything they do. Remember Justice League International and how depressing it was?! I need a Xanax just thinking about it.

Tim Drake and Micron are being overwhelmed by the first wave of cyborgs attacking the city. Just over the river, the second wave of cyborgs, full of old super heroes, stands waiting to join the fight. But before that happens, Tim Drake has to Narration Box some thoughts that make it sound like he's giving up only to turn it around at the last moment and declare he doesn't believe any of what he was just thinking at all. It's really fucking annoying. I often go about thinking things like, "You can't cross a busy street without risking life and limb. It's so dangerous that it should never be attempted, no matter how much delicious food is on the other side. If you want to live, you're stuck never crossing the street. Or so I once thought! Until I was taught about crosswalks and street lights and pedestrian overpasses! Thank you, city planners!"

After Tim decides not to lose because Bruce taught him not to lose, Barbara Gordon picks him up in a Batplane. They ditch Micron and head on over to the Batcave to find some helpful weapons and maybe a backup hard drive of A.L.F.R.E.D. Apparently the current Batman Beyond suit is the newest technology and Tim has destroyed it. So now the only thing left to use is some old bat armor that's going to make him look fat when he wears it.

Batman Beyond #4 Rating: No change. Hey Dan! Remember last year when Futures End came out every week? Remember how after 48 weeks, it sort of ended in unsatisfying failure? The part of it that I really liked was the part where it ended. I'd had enough of Brother Eye dominating the world. I'd grown sick of a DC Universe's future where all of the heroes had ultimately failed to stop a computer in space. So I kind of resent that the story is continuing. This is the future DC comics wants to maintain as the "real" future of the DC Youniverse? If so, it sucks. In thirty five years, everybody will have failed and it's up to Tim Drake and Barbara Gordon and a handful of other heroes to save what's left of the world. Is what's left really worth saving? Maybe they should try going back in time again and keeping this shitty ruined future from ever happening. Although it says a lot about how DC Comics views their universe and its heroes. Apparently they have no confidence in any of them except for Batman. And they want the readers to know it by introducing this future into continuity. "Hey look! Superman and Cyborg and Wonder Woman suck! Ultimately they're not the heroes you thought they were! But Batman survived! Sort of! He's the greatest!" This is the worst version of the future DC could come up with and it's the one they choose for their timeline. Idiots.

Batman Beyond #3

Something's happening!

This is apparently the comic book review where I begin by talking about a movie I just recently watched. But the only movie I recently watched that didn't star Albert Ingalls and Willis Drummond pretending to be autistic was Apartment 1303 and that movie isn't worth talking about at all. I guess it's worth saying things like, "I have no idea why this movie was made or what it was supposed to be about." And I suppose I could say something like, "Everybody in it was a horrible actor except maybe the decaying corpse in the hammock." Most people aren't going to even recognize the movie by the title which gives away the whole movie anyway! If there is a thirteenth floor in your apartment building, it's probably an imaginary space full of ghosts and dead people! Which this floor is! It was so surprising! The main problem with the movie after all of the other problems with the movie that are essentially the entire movie is that it has no theme and barely any plot. Perhaps the theme is the fear of growing up? Maybe it has something to do with madness? Dysfunctional families? If one is willing to severely contort logic, one might come up with a theory that would at least be more interesting than the movie. As far as I could tell, the movie was about a haunted apartment where a ghost that loves to throw people off of balconies lives. It does it to one woman so the woman's sister moves into the apartment for reasons that the writers decided not to spend much time on. Then she convinces her dead sister's boyfriend to spend the night with her two nights in a row when her sister could hardly even get her boyfriend to answer the phone. Then the ghost decides it wants to change its plan of attack which it's loved for at least three or four other victims. This time instead of throwing the woman off of the balcony, it decides to frame her for the murder of her sister's boyfriend and her mother. The end!

What I really think is the movie is a poorly constructed story about a woman who murders her sister and her sister's boyfriend and her mother because she's mentally ill and sick to death of everybody's faces. But the only real clue there is that one time the mother asks her daughter if she stopped taking her medication and one other scene where the woman has a nightmare about suffocating her mom. I don't know why there is a ghost girl except that there always has to be a ghost girl. The rapey ghost landlord only makes an appearance for shits and giggles, I guess. The convenience store located in the lobby of the apartment building was the biggest unexplained mystery of all! I think it was an Asian grocery!

I guess I got what I deserved for watching a movie on Netflix with a one and a half star rating. I have to assume I'm at least four or five times smarter than everybody watching movies on Netflix, so if they can tell they're watching a turd instead of a movie then the movie must be really fucking awful.

Now that I've vented about it, I'll ask Lord Google about the movie. And--no surprise although I'm surprised!--it's based on a Japanese horror movie. Now I want to watch the original! That totally fucking explains why the ghost crawls up the wall one time. Also unsurprisingly, the movie was completely rewritten in a way which would make it completely incomprehensible. I suppose it's still about an apartment and a ghost and people falling off of a balcony. Nailed it!

Reading the plot summary of the 2012 version causes me to wonder what movie the person writing the plot summary was discussing! Did the American release cut a bunch of scenes from the European release because it explains a bunch of stuff that was simply not in the version I watched on Netflix, like who the landlord and the little girl actually were, and how the decaying corpse in the closet became a prostitute (before becoming a corpse!). It is possible I fell asleep at several different points while watching the movie.

The issue begins with Brother Eye recounting Tim Drake's history for Tim Drake. Or the readers.

Or maybe just to remind readers that DC Comics thought it over and decided that Tim Drake discovering Batman's identity was really the way to go even if the whole "Batman being impressed" thing never actually happened in Scott Lobdell's revision of his own story about how Tim and Batman got together.

Remember how Lobdell's first version pissed everybody off because Tim Drake almost figured out Batman's identity but he guessed the wrong person? And then remember how Lobdell rewrote that scene so Tim Drake was only pretending to think Batman was the wrong person to allow Batman to preserve some dignity? So either way, Batman could never have been impressed enough with Tim Drake's detective skills to bring him on as a sidekick. No, the real reason Batman took him on as a sidekick was because Tim hacked into The Penguin's bank account and stole all of The Penguin's money and The Penguin found out. So Tim's parents had to go into hiding while Tim was allowed to live in Batman's mansion before going on to be a completely boring idiot in Teen Titans.

Brother Eye has decided to turn Batman Beyond into a cyborg like all of the other superheroes. But Alfred the A.I. has other plans. Like telling Tim not to become a cyborg. Luckily Tim listens to him and breaks free! Now he has to battle Inque while trying not to giggle too much over her stupid name. Although he's only heard it so far so he probably doesn't realize that it's spelled stupidly.

Meanwhile on the moon, Brother Eye stops looking.

Of course he foresaw this! I hate supervillains who are never surprised by anything! Brother Eye might as well be Harvest. Except Tim Drake is Harvest, so that would wind up just being needlessly complicated. Like the X-Titles in the nineties.

The child on Brother Eye's moon belongs to Inque and is the reason why Inque is not a cyborg and yet still doing what Brother Eye says. I bet Brother Eye has a whole moon full of children! They're probably forced to make candy all day long. How long is a day on the moon?

Tim tells Inque that he'll go to the moon to save her daughter if she helps him destroy Camp Happiness. Or, at the very least, if she simply doesn't interfere. That allows Tim Drake to beat up all of the cyborgs and save Barbara Gordon and Max while Brother Eye shakes his fists in the air and yells, "DDDDOOOOOOOOOM!" I mean, "NOOOOOOO!"

Batman returns Happy Max and Barbara Gordon to Neo-Gotham and everybody lives happily ever after. Or at least they will once Tim Drake deals with Brother Eye who infected his suit which allowed him to shut down Alfred and learn the location of Neo-Gotham. So that happily ever after will probably have to wait for several more issues. Hopefully it can happen before this comic book is cancelled.

Batman Beyond #3 Rating: No change. After forty-eight issues of Futures End, I figured everybody had had enough of it. But this is just more of Futures End. And I was bored of Futures End after about twenty issues of it. If I had the confidence to tell my comic book store to stop putting this comic book in my pull box, I'd do it. But the way I know Peter would look at me when he discovered I was no longer going to read every DC Comic book gives me pause. I guess I'll plod through it every month and just spend most of the commentary talking about a stupid movie I'll have recently seen!

Batman Beyond #2

Ambushed by The Flocked Assassin!

At times I want to do nothing more than lie on the couch in the wee early hours of the ending night and watch a horror movie or a stupid comedy on Netflix. Which is why I watched Andy Samberg in Hot Rod last night. Ignoring the clichéd plot of the underdog saving the whatever and winning the good looking something (which is actually asking a viewer to ignore the whole movie but, you know, whatever), it really works! But it only works for two reasons! You take out these two bits and the movie is utter garbage and not worth watching. The two aspects of this film which lift it into heavenly glory are Al Swearengen and the use of the worst (best! (worst! (no, no! Best!))) songs from Europe's album The Final Countdown. If you aren't familiar with the album, the movie might not have worked as well for you. But the movie had me hooked from the start by using "Danger on the Tracks" as the opening song. And I'm impressed that they had the willpower to leave "The Final Countdown" out of the movie. I guess it might have been confusing since Gob Bluth was one of the cast.

I'm only sad they didn't find a way to use the song "Ninja" in the movie. Jesus Christ, Joey Tempest and Europe! What were you guys thinking?! Every song on that album could have won the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest for 1986!

On second thought, maybe Hot Rod had a little more going for it than Swearengen and Europe. Bill Hader deserves credit for playing himself perfectly and Isla Fisher should be acknowledged for wearing the crap out of clothing. I mean, the way she turned up in that sun dress? Stunning! And the Hiking shirt alone was Oscar worthy.

I just realized I began my commentary on the first issue of Batman Beyond rambling on about Ghost World. I think that might say something about how interested I am in reading this comic book. Although Tim did meet elderly Barbara Gordon at the end of the last issue and that was kind of interesting, right?

This issue begins with Tim Drake being recruited into Barbara Gordon's Secret Prisoners Who Have Retained Their Faces Club. She lives in The Lodge (that's the name of Brother Eye's Death Happiness Camp) with her friends because Brother Eye crushed their souls. But he only crushed their souls after greed, apathy, and corruption crushed their spirits. What's the difference between a spirit and a soul? No wait! I know! Spirit is like cheering for your high school football team while soul is like making other people feel sexy with your dancing and singing. So they're more different than I thought they were after I thought about them a little bit.

As if any gathering is authorized!

I bet the first mandatory class you have to take in the Joe Kubert School of Drawing Comic Books is "Window Breaking/Wall Smashing 101." I wonder if artists ever even learn how to draw a door being opened? I do know one artist that can draw a door being opened! Brian Bolland!

The Flocked Assassin from the cover seems to be running The Lodge along with her sidekick, Deathstrobot. He looks less formidable as a robot than he does as a Tony S. Daniel drawing. I wonder if he got to keep his youthful testicles? The Flocked Assassin has noticed that one of the men escaped the batch of new prisoners and was replaced by a woman. This could be trouble which means this woman must be questioned in an ethical manner to find out what she knows or The Lodge could lose their insurance.

Brother Eye and Tim Drake sitting in a tree!

I hope Brother Eye's Nemesis is a huge sheep so that when they meet, Brother Eye will say "It is Eye!" and his nemesis will say "No! Not Ewe!"

Ouch. I think I strained my pun muscle.

Barbara Gordon and Tim Drake can't hide underground for long before they're discovered by Inque and Deathblow! I bet Deathblow loves hanging around with Inque so that his name isn't the worst in the group for once. Although I'm sure Deathblow was probably a pretty creative name among the heroes he hung out with.

Also I'm just guessing that it's Deathblow. I know with my comic book reading skills, there's only a sliver of a chance that I'm wrong. But sometimes slivers can be pretty big! Although big slivers are always better than small slivers because they're easier to pull out with my huge manly hands full of muscles and chest hair.

Can we hold a summit where we agree to retire the phrase "I've got your [thing referenced earlier] right here"?

Tim Drake pulls out his Audio/Visual cables and plugs himself into the back of Deathblow's neck. His suit fires up and Alfred is back to talk Tim through everything that doesn't involve body functions. Alfred tells Tim Drake about Inque because, like me, he never watched the Batman Beyond cartoon. I bet the best way to deal with her is either to freeze her solid or to dip a quill in her and quickly write the Great American Novel. I'm sure Alfred will know how to best her in battle.

Alfred informs Tim that water is a good weapon against Inque. Not really. Unless you also include tons of soap and harsh chemical cleaners and some seriously rough scrubbing pads, Inque is really tricky to defeat. Tim Drake learns that the hard way and winds up a prisoner of Brother Eye. Next issue, he's going to be processed while Brother Eye watches from his base on the moon. And Brother Eye isn't just a big bank of computers or a satellite or WOPR! Nope! He's a humanoid automaton! Or, more probably, a cyborg! My guess is that it's Harvest! I mean Michael Holt! I mean Jason Todd!

Batman Beyond #2 Rating: No change. I wonder how well this comic book is doing so far. This comic book must be for Tim Drake fans, right? Because it seems like they're alienating the Terry McGinnis fans. If you're a fan of the cartoon (or the comics based on the cartoon), why read Batman Beyond if the main character isn't Terry McGinnis? I guess for the same reason many fans stuck around for the reboot? Plus I guess having Tim go up against Inque might be exciting for fans familiar with Inque. I like her when she looks like flocked wallpaper. Anyway, I'm not recommending this comic book to anybody because I don't know who would like this comic book?! Maybe fans of an older Barbara Gordon?

Batman Beyond #1

I should probably sit down and watch this cartoon sometime. Even though the cartoon has nothing to do with this comic book.

I just rewatched Ghost World so bear with me as I recover. I've mentioned before how all of my favorite novels aren't about good people overcoming their problems or defeating the bad people or making the world a better place. No, all of my favorite novels are about the protagonist finding their only choice is to escape from the insanity of a world they were never asked to be a part of. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Catch-22. The Grapes of Wrath. Some other books I'm probably forgetting. All of those (maybe!) pale in comparison to how I feel about Ghost World (the movie and the comic book). My heart breaks so hard for Enid and yet I feel intense and overwhelming joy when she chooses freedom. It's not easy, and she probably hurts a lot of people in the process. But she was dying trying to find a life which her best friend and family would fit into. I love how she and Becky's hand holding lingers in their final scene together, and I'm happy that Becky seems to understand. I like to imagine that they still sometimes speak, or visit, and that when they do, they pick up exactly where they left off, as old, first friends are wont to do after long absences.

Fifteen years later, Ghost World takes on a more poignant tone knowing that Thora Birch kind of disappeared from the big screen (not entirely but, really, you have to be looking to find her. I suggest you don't go looking down the Dungeons and Dragons path) while Scarlett Johansson was accepted by Hollywood and fit right in.

Anyway. If Ghost World means anything special to you, we would probably understand each other although it would be awkward and we probably wouldn't really care about hanging out. If you hated the movie and didn't identify with it at all, lucky you.

Now let's see how Tim Drake goes from Batman Beyond to Harvest in twelve easy steps!

This issue begins with a decapitation and other dismemberments! That'll keep the kids busy in a non-offensive way on a long road trip. Imagine if the issue began with tea and cupcakes?! No modern kid would turn the page!

The people doing the dismemberment are painted up like clowns because they're bad guys and bad guys in Gotham tend toward looking silly and being utterly ridiculous and teetering on the verge of absolutely moronic. I think Joker Gangs of the Future are also a standard part of the old Batman Beyond world, so we should all have expected them (even if this world is supposed to be covered in Brother Eye Cyborg Super Monsters).

Special Chase Foil Paragraph of Ultimate Rarity: I'm super excited that Bernard Chang is doing all of the penciling and inking himself. See? Sometimes I do mention the art. Especially when I'm prepared to say a lot of horrible things about the writing. Sorry, Dan Jurgens! I don't hate your writings! But I'm preparing myself for not really thoroughly enjoying it very much?

That last sentence of the previous paragraph wasn't a question but I felt the question mark softened the sentiment enough so that if Dan Jurgens' family were to read this, they wouldn't cry.

The map and remembering where Brother Eye was built bit was clever enough for me to think this book could be going in the right direction. It's the kind of question I'd ask! But saying it's the kind of question I'd ask doesn't exactly bring it up to Oscar Wilde levels of wit. But it's at least on the comparative scale (because I'm on the comparative scale!).

This Veil Technology that Wayne Enterprises has invented helps to make the Neo-Gotham of Batman Beyond believable after a full year of being told that the future was just cyborgs, cyborgs, and more cyborgs. This allows for a city hidden from Brother Eye's gaze which has developed free from monster super robots. That's good because I was going to get bored really quickly of Tim Drake battling robots with familiar looking heads on them.

The Joker Gang want to steal the Veil Technology so that Brother Eye will notice Neo-Gotham and destroy it just like the rest of the world was destroyed. Tim Drake is against that for possibly obvious reasons. I say "possibly" because if you don't know why, I don't want to sound patronizing or insulting to your limited intelligence by assuming everybody can figure it out.

Tim and A.L.F.R.E.D. (henceforth to be known simply as Alfred) are still trying to work out how this future is different from the future Terry McGinnis came from. In that future, it seemed the entire world was a wasteland. Batman was also grafted to The Joker in that future and sent back in time. But since Gotham is hidden from Brother Eye in this future, I'm sure Tim will be dealing with him soon enough. Dan Jurgens has also left room for the survival of other cities as well since Alfred doesn't know everything about this timeline yet.

Tim decides to go ask Nora Boxer some questions. She's...oh, I can't remember who she is! Read the Sneak Peek, or the final issue of Futures End, or watch the television show if you really need to know! I do know that she lives with Terry McGinnis's younger brother though. The scene helps to inform those readers who missed the Sneak Peek of some of the information gleaned from the eight pager.

See? They don't know he's from the past!

Nora explains how Matt was now an orphan and looking for a sidekick job. But Tim probably feels it's too early in the run to throw a kid in a suit and into dangerous situations. Better to wait for Matt to wind up kidnapped where he'll have to show his pluck and determination which will prove he's just as capable as any other Robin ever was.

Tim asks about the Justice League and Nora says they're all dead or have been turned. So Tim is all they have! His first job is to rescue some human prisoners being held by Brother Eye for their knowledge. Tim heads out as Matt looks on envious of the suit. He's already dreaming of being the hero and he hasn't even done his time as Robin Beyond!

Once Tim arrives at the POW Camp known as The Lodge, he encounters his first Brother Eyenemy. Get it?!

First issue and he's already going to die?

Tim blows his load (the electric kind) and shorts out Superman. He also shorts out his own costume and Alfred as well. While he's in mufti (thanks Larry Hama!), Tim decides to sneak into the prisoner of war camp and pretend to be a prisoner. Once thrown into the general population, he's assaulted and shaken down for any tech he might have on him by some guy named Max and his pink haired friend. But a familiar face is able to set him free before any punches are thrown.

Oh shit! His cover is blown!

Batman Beyond #1 Rating: 7.5 Harvests out of 10. Okay, Dan Jurgens, I'm in! Let's see where this goes. The best part about this comic book being Futures End Lite is that it doesn't have to represent the future of The New 52 Universe. Maybe some fans will demand that it has some sort of relationship with The New 52 Universe or else they just won't feel a connection to the story. But for me, I just like that it's an Elseworlds book about one possible future of the DC Universe where Bruce Wayne and Michael Holt completely fucked up and destroyed the world. How are people dealing with that? How are Mike and Bruce dealing with it?! I'm sure they'll play an integral part in the future of this title. As far as Tim Drake now being Batman Beyond? That's a bit weird. I don't really care since I've never even watched the cartoon so I'm not invested in Terry McGinnis. But the fact that Batman Beyond was so popular and that Terry McGinnis won over everybody who watched the show and is thought of as Batman, it seems wrong to just kill him and throw Tim Drake in the suit. On the other hand, it's time for Tim Drake to prove he can be Batman as well! So you know. One half dozen dildos in one hand, six vibrating cockmonsters in the other.