Invasion! Book Three: World Without Heroes (December 1988)

Looks more like Heroes Without a World, amirite?!

The Cover
Somehow Bart Sears pulled a cover out of his ass that I appreciate. Did Bart Sears begin doing Artist Steroids in the early '90s? I don't know what they are but the symptoms are drawing all of your characters like they just took steroids and got done lifting at the gym. Here, they're all just regularly muscled and Wonder Woman isn't scaring my penis away. I think that's just because I'm old though. In 1988, I'm sure my penis was cowering inside me at the thought of a strong, independent woman who knows what she wants and what she might want is for me to satisfy for her sexually. My penis, at 17, was definitely not up to that task and it knew it. I've heard from a comic book reading friend that Bart Sears got over his '90s fixation on drawing everybody like they were burly pieces of beef jerky but I'll have to take his word for it because I'm not in any hurry to hunt down any Bart Sears comic books. I'll never get the taste of early '90s Power Girl out of my mouth. Dammit. Now I'm horny.

The Story So Far
It doesn't matter! The first two Books told a complete and coherent story of the invasion of Earth by tall toothy bastards whose foreheads looked like they never missed a Wesley Willis concert! I once had the opportunity to headbutt Wesley Willis at his merch table when I went to see him decades ago in Portland but I was too nervous. How do you prepare yourself for meeting a man who beat Batman's ass? It's impossible.

I suppose the story so far is that the nerdiest Dominator of all time has developed a bomb that will disable the Meta-Gene in Earthlings. He's so hyped to stop getting Dominator Swirlies and Dominator Wedgies that he's going to break the terms of the Dominator's Unconditional Surrender to Earth and restore the Dominators to glory! In his mind, at least. Obviously he's going to wash out and wind up stuffed back in his Dominator locker.

The Story
Before I get to my little comic book, I want to post a quote from the book I'm currently reading, John Barth's The Sot-Weed Factor (1960). I've owned this book for about 27 years and am finally getting around to reading it which is fitting if you know anything about the main character in the book. Anyway, here's the quote:

"I fear me what Father would say, did he hear of't."

"My dear fellow," Burlingame said, "we sit here on a blind rock careening through space; we are all rushing headlong to the grave. Think you the worms will care, when anon they make a meal of you, whether you spent your moment sighing wigless in your chamber, or sacked the golden towns of Montezuma? Lookee, the day's nigh spent; 'tis gone careering into time forever. Not a tale's length past we lined our bowels with dinner, and already they growl for more. We are dying men, Ebeneezer: i'faith, there's time for naught but bold resolves!"

Sure, this is sort of a standard profound thought, a bit of the old seize the day mundanity. Barth was 30 when he wrote this and there's a weird twilight zone in a young person's life where the realization that you only have the one life hits you pretty hard and you wonder what the fuck you're doing with it. But I just love the way this is expressed. The concept of how fast everything goes remains the theme throughout, that and nobody else caring what you do with your life, even the worms who will eventually eat you. It's not just about life going by fast; it's about not living for other people as well. I don't mean in an isolated, uncaring and selfish way! I mean in a don't let the authoritarian control freaks make you think twice about doing something you long to do. Look, maybe it's simpler if I just let somebody who expresses things better than me say it. Somebody like Chris Onstad:

It's fake ideas all the way down, man!

Not only is the rock careening through space: the space is careening through space! Everything is careening, faster and faster. If the planet is revolving around the sun at X speed and the sun is moving through space at Y speed and the galaxy is moving through space at Z speed and, and, and, well, it's all additive, you know? That's reality! Making sure you're home at 10 PM because your parents proclaimed that was your curfew? How the fuck does that stand up to what's really happening out past the roof, the atmosphere, the edge of the solar system?! Just fucking go for it, man!

At the moment, I may be a little drunk on misfiring brain chemicals due to reading and possibly genetics and I did drink a Monster energy drink because I hate my kidneys. Let me calm down a bit and we could get back to reading about that Nerd Dominator. I also need to process the loss of Todd McFarlane on this series. Gone too soon, especially when replaced by Bart Sears.

This is fucking page one. I guess we're just getting right into it, eh?

Okay, great, Gene Bomb deployed. What exactly does that mean? Earth will still be protected by Superman, Green Lantern, Batman, Green Arrow, Aquaman, Wonder Woman, Martian Manhunter, Starfire, Nightwing, Blue Devil, The Spectre, Jason Blood & Etrigan, Doctor Fate, Hawkman, Hawkwoman, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold, Guy Gardner, and so, so many others. The meta-gene explains maybe — and this is being generous — fifty percent of Earth's heroes? Of course I'm only on page one and I'm bringing logic to an irrational gun fight. I bet Aquaman loses his powers because the entire race of Atlanteans are based on a meta-gene. And the Amazons too. And maybe Martian's have a meta-gene being that they're part of the Sol system so J'onn will just turn into a big green powerless gumby dude. And maybe Batman's meta-gene runs his memory so he'll forget his PIN and not be able to access his money so he'll lose all of his wonderful toys?

It turns out the Gene-Bomb doesn't immediately shut down the powers of every superhero. First, it makes their powers spike so they go out of control. In Moscow, Firestorm begins transmuting everything into everything else. In Manhattan, Captain Atom almost causes a nuclear incident. At JLI Headquarters, Fire begins barfing up green flame everywhere.

In the Dibny home, Sue considers divorce on the grounds of "My husband is gross."

Most of the heroes I named earlier aren't affected and they're called in to help stop the out of control heroes. The one exception in my list is Doctor Fate. Why is he out of control? He's not even really human when he's got the helmet on, right? Is this evidence that the Lords of Order are humans super evolved from the Meta-Gene?! I suppose Kent Nelson could have a Meta-Gene that allowed him to use the helmet effectively. I guess. I might as well let comic book logic lead my thinking or else how am I going to understand any of this shit?

By the end of Chapter One, the crisis is over. The non-affected heroes didn't defeat the out-of-control super-powered heroes. The out-of-control super-powered heroes just wore themselves out and collapsed. Having them collapse immediately after their meta-genes were turned off by the Gene Bomb would have resulted in a comic book with far less than 80 pages. And probably a really boring comic book. Also, without the sudden burst of power, how could Terra have come back to life?

Far, far away, Deathstork feels a mysterious movement in his pants.

All of the downed heroes are gathered in a large Lex-Corp medical facility where they're strapped to beds, hooked up to monitors, and supplied super bedpans. But the one thing the doctors don't do is remove any of their masks. Because even if they're dying, they wouldn't want their identities exposed! Also I don't know what kind of pillow they gave Firestorm since his head is still on fire. Were we still consciously using asbestos in 1992?

That bit about asbestos reminds me: I grew up in the '70s! That's my excuse for being as stupid as I am. I was huffing lead gasoline exhaust! I should get a medal for never becoming a violent criminal with all the lead, asbestos, and nuclear fallout from weapons testing I sucked down during my youth! Fuck, why didn't my Meta-Gene ever kick in?!

Since the medical community has failed at finding a way to reverse the meta-gene meltdown taking place (even the greatest scientists in the DCU like Doc Magnus, The Chief, Lex Luthor, and Dr. Megala), Hal, Guy, J'onn, Starman, Robotman, and fucking Dmitri the Rocket Red travel across the universe to have a word with the Dominators. They're obviously the cause even though there's no evidence as to the cause. Batman probably figured it out.

Guy stole my favorite line when I'm visiting the bath houses down on Castro in San Francisco.

The group run into Superman in orbit around Earth who claims he won't set foot back on Earth for some reason. He'll think twice when he's about to run out of oxygen. Why he needs oxygen when the yellow sun basically gives him everything he needs, I can't say. Maybe he just needs to keep some kind of gas in his lungs so they don't collapse in the vacuum of space? No wait. That's like backwards! Oh, never mind! I keep forgetting I'm reading a comic book and not a scientific journal!

While trying to find out while Superman won't go back to Earth, the Omega Men arrive in a star ship. They were headed to Earth to join the battle but it's over. So they agree to transport everybody to the Dominator's homeworld using their ship's hyperdrive.

Tigorr's an intelligent man. Err, cat. Um, man-cat?

Back on Earth, the heroes begin dying.

"Who's that?" you're probably thinking. That's Scott Fisher. "Who's that?" you're probably thinking.

It feels wrong that I used the whole "Who the fuck is that hero?" joke for two members of the Doom Patrol. But let's face it: it wasn't exactly the greatest run for those guys. And they needed to really start building up some solid wreckage so that Grant Morrison could crawl them out of it.

Apparently the person coming back to life in Markovia was Metamorpho and not Terra. That's too bad. Not that I'm not happy for Metamorpho. I just wanted more Terra. I guess I have to wait for fake Terra from the future (unless she wasn't fake?) in Team Titans! No wait. I already re-read Team Titans. I guess I'll never again have any Terra in my life!

The mission to the Dominator's home planet takes two seconds. Snapper Carr (who now has a super power because his Meta-Gene was activated by the Dominators in Book One and who is now a member of a superhero team named The Blasters) has the power of teleportation. He teleports J'onn to the surface of the planet where J'onn disguises himself as a Dominator (luckily one with a huge red spot). J'onn then infiltrates the locker where the Nerd Dominator has been stuffed, reads his mind, learns the antidote, and he leaves. That's it! They've got the cure! Story over!

Oh, right. They needed to fill 80 pages.

So all that's left is a bit of a space battle so that Superman and the Green Lanterns can have an excuse for being here (although Robotman, Starman, and Rocket Red really weren't needed in this entire plan). And we meet Frag who, I'm assuming, is one of Carr's Blaster buddies? But that's pretty much it. J'onn makes the cure, the team hyperspace back to Earth, Superman acts weird, and they explode the antidote in the atmosphere, curing everybody immediately!

Okay. Not everybody.

The Ranking!
If you don't take into account that Book Three was used as a launchpad for the whole "super powers are caused by a meta-gene" shit that DC will use to empty my pocketbooks with Bloodline a few years later, this really should have just been a two 80-page book series. This was an unnecessary third chapter! Maybe editorial also felt they needed to highlight the Earthlings that would become The Blasters since The Blasters was an new series about to hit the shelves that I'm positive absolutely nobody was interested in. Finally, the back cover proclaims, "We have no idea what we're doing! Did we need this third Book? Do we need a fourth?! Who wants more Meta-Gene stuff! DC! We're Putting the Meta-Gene Back Into Comics!"

Um. Yes?

Batman: Shadow of the Bat #6 (November 1992)

Imagine using the article "the" for this cover. As if there's only one.

The Cover
The early '90s (let's include the second half of 1989 here to make my statement valid, if you don't mind admitting facts that are completely wrong into your view of reality) were a fantastic time for Batman comic book covers. Between this series and Legends of the Dark Knight, Batman covers were slaying kids' eyes from the racks of other boring ass typical comic cover fare. Who was hired at DC in 1989 that had a flair for cover design? This shit is so sleek and cool. It demands you pick it up and buy it. And who was I to deny that demand? I'm nothing if not a yellow-bellied simp. Brian Stelfreeze's painted covers within the blue ombré border (or whatever color that month (sometimes just a solid color which seemed lazy, really)) really pop. And wait until you get a load of the gimmick for the next three issues! Hmm, I think I just oversold a gimmick that's been used a lot. Anyway, this cover design, right now, looks so fucking cool that I'll forgive the sort of Choose Your Own Adventure look of Brian's painting. It's a little bit low rent compared to the first four issues (but not compared to last issue which looked like a Which Way book cover).

As for Stelfreeze's depiction of an ugly American, well, you know, there is a fucking type. And he nails it!

The Story
The story begins with that guy on the cover behind the wheel of a massive truck choosing to drive four teenagers off of a bridge because they were driving a foreign car. A Toyola, to be precise. Not precise to reality but precise to DC's in-universe car manufacturers.

The car smashed through a steel girder without any noticeable damage? Fuck, now *I* want a Toyola!

I think Dan Jurgens drew that page after reading a bunch of old Phantom Stranger books. Why is Batman's cape suddenly some kind of oracular artifact? Maybe that's just to indicate how great a detective he is. This is like an episode of Columbo. We get to see how the crime was committed just like Columbo seems to see it in his mind's eye. Maybe Batman has always had a Bat-Sense, like Spider-man's Spidey Sense, but to remark on it would cause people to question his detective abilities and his intelligence. How smart are you really if you're solving crimes because you can "see" them with some kind of paranormal bat radar of justice? I think Bruce never told the whole truth about the bat that crashed through his window. It obviously was glowing from gamma radiation and bit his ass. Just like Columbo?

I have to assume that this guy didn't drive these kids off the bridge simply because they're driving a foreign car. I bet there's something more going on in his life! That's the kind of sharp analysis you'll find in nearly 1/3 of my comic book reviews! In the other 2/3, you'll get rampant speculation and insane ramblings because I was once bitten by a radiated schizophrenic.

Anyway, now is when I speculate on why this guy's so fucking angry. The easy answers are that his penis is tiny and/or he can't satisfy his nagging wife. But I trust Alan Grant not to go for the easy answers! He's probably got something heavy to say about the rotting effects of patriotism on the human mind (especially the less curious minds). This guy's obviously compensating for something with the big truck and the big muscles. I think with guys like this, it's most often their lack of curiosity. It's the inability to find things fun, joyful, or interesting. They're so wrapped up in what they consider makes them manly that they refuse to feel any emotion that they consider feminine. They'd rather feel no joy at all than to have somebody, for one instant, think they're gay. To them, humor is punching a weaker person in the face and making them cry, bleed, or die. They've never heard of the phrase "self-deprecating humor". God forbid anybody, ever, laughs at them. This is the kind of person who thinks pronouns and gender ideology are fake bullshit but will kick your fucking ass if you dare call them a little girl. He's a sad, pathetic creature trying to portray an image of manliness that nobody but other sad pathetic creatures give any fucks about at all.

Another theory: he's suffering from CTE caused by six years of high school football.

I feel sorry for The Ugly American simply because he's being dressed by Dan Jurgens. Can the waist of his pants be any higher? Is eating roadkill a stereotypical American pastime to be proud of? Did he swallow a brick just before entering the bar?

The bartender serves The Ugly American a Mexican beer but, luckily, isn't murdered immediately. Instead, The Ugly American lets him live because The Ugly American is hunting a woman by the name of Tina. Usually I'd say "looking for" but, come on. Look at this beefy piece of dumb. He's definitely hunting her.

While barging in on Gordon and the police investigating the accident, Batman learns that two CIA agents are snooping around Gotham for classified reasons. There's nothing Batman can do for the four drowned teenagers so he decides to follow and stake out the Agents to see what they're up to. This is probably a case of his Batty Sense tingling because they're in town to recapture The Ugly American. I guess he's DC's version of Captain America? Got a dose of the shitty alpha version of the super soldier serum and it turned him into every other white male on Facebook?

By "alpha version", I mean the first version and not the anti-beta-cuck version which I'm only explaining to every other white male on Facebook who absolutely misunderstood me.

Now, I'd like you all to prepare yourselves because I'm going to scan an image that could trigger some of you. It's Dan Jurgens version of the late '80s/early '90s Batmobile.

I'm so sorry for this!

I just made a few calls to try to book an appointment with a therapist and after being greeted with responses like "Who is Dan Jurgens?" and "What do you mean by choad Batmobile?", I was told to stop wasting everybody's time and "just fucking man up, you simp piece of shit." Christ. I didn't know therapists went so hard.

Meanwhile, The Ugly American tracks down Tina who happens to be his daughter. She's currently married to a Korean man and pregnant with his child. Working through the previous bits of plot that I read, I come to the conclusion that her eventual meeting with her father isn't going to go so well. After he kills a lady's poodle on the way into Tina and her husband's store because it's "foreign" (because it's a poodle? Because it's name is Rodrigo?), I begin to suspect it might go worse than not so well even.

See? My momma didn't raise no fool no matter how many times she called me one!

Wait. Her husband's name is Kim? That's a girl's name! Or did she mistakenly think his surname was his first name when they initially met and he just never bothered to correct her because she was so hot?

While Kim Cheung gets his ass beat for being not white (and maybe a little bit for having a girl's name), Batman follows the CIA Agents until he finds an opportunity to steal their file on The Ugly American. He learns that The Ugly American was some guy named Jon Kennedy Payne who killed a Vietnam protester for burning an American flag in the '60s. He was sentenced to life in prison while his daughter was just two years old. Eventually the CIA heard about a guy who killed somebody for "patriotic" reasons and thought, "A-ha! The perfect specimen for our shitty super-soldier project! A guy who has never shown any aptitude for anything except being an angry asshole! He's perfect for the military!" When the government took him from prison, the official story was that he died by slipping in the shower and falling directly onto his shank. I totally didn't make that up and would scan proof from the comic book but I, um, lost power while trying. Darn! You'll just have to trust me.

Once he was officially declared dead, Payne was entered into a program of propaganda, LSD, and high-level murder techniques. Once they were threw, he was the perfect patriot: a complete and utter racist piece of shit.

To think they "overdid it" and not that they got it perfectly right just proves how naïve they were.

There was definitely a period of time when I would have guessed that people in the military were less racist than the general population because everybody in the military trained, lived, and worked together as a cohesive group. They were like the Studio 54 of diversity but without the fun, music, cocaine, and sex. Well, maybe just without the fun and music. I don't know when that time might have been though. Maybe during Vietnam up until sometime in the '80s? This comic was written in 1992 when being patriotic seemed not to be an absolute red flag but was understood could easily slip into full blown racism and bigotry. Now though? In 2025 when the Coast Guard has decided that swastika and noose tattoos aren't hate symbols but merely divisive? Yeah, fuck patriots, man. They can suck my freedom loving ass. Also, they, in absolutely no way, can lay claim to the idea that they "keep me free". They're the least free people in the world, fighting for corporations, oil, and greedy old white men! Having to conform to a strict set of principles so that they're embraced by all the other assholes who signal that they're super patriots by sticking to exactly all the same sets of principles. Not one of them free to be their own person lest they show some "woke" quality that will get them ostracized from the tribe.

Luckily Payne's too stupid to make the connection that his daughter married a Korean and she's also pregnant. So the baby stays inside Tina for now instead of being ripped out and stomped into a bloody smudge on the pavement next to Rodrigo. I assume he understands what sex is and its consequences so it's lucky that Batman arrives just in time to stop a fun little comic book infanticide (she looks to be nearly nine months pregnant so I'm going to go ahead and assume that the baby can, with proper care, survive outside of her womb at this point. If she was only a few months in, I'd have said "a fun little comic book abortion" instead of "infanticide". Duh!).

Batman and Payne get into a physical confrontation and Batman decides to try to reason with him. He makes a half-hearted attempt to appeal to Payne's pain of what the government did to him. But then Payne throws a brick at Batman and Batman is all, "Fuck you, asshole! You're dead meat now!"

This is what happens when you throw a brick at the motherfucking Batman!

Actually, the CIA show up and shoot Payne in the face. Batman explains to them, while shouting, that the real Ugly Americans are the government officials who use, abuse, manipulate, and coerce common citizens into doing their imperialist bidding! Right on, Batman! But also, the other guy was a pretty ugly American, even before their manipulation of him.

Bruce Wayne ties up all the loose ends by hiring a lawyer for Tina to sue the government for what they did to her father. He says things "for all he lost" even though "all he lost" was life in prison for killing a protestor against the Vietnam War. Batman might be projecting a little too much humanity onto this Jon Kennedy Payne guy. And, yeah, sure, maybe I'm not allowing him to have as much as maybe he did. But fuck him. He killed a guy for burning the American flag. Who's the real monster?

The Ranking
This story wasn't as good as the previous two. But maybe that's just because I found Batman too sympathetic towards the guy manipulated by the government. Sure, sure. I'm against government manipulation of its citizens as well! But just because somebody's a victim of the government doesn't mean that person was any good to begin with! Come on, Batman! Maybe spend a little more time on reading comprehension and a little less time on fucking Catwoman. Don't get me wrong! I don't want to see that training in the pages of the comic book! I still only want to see when you fuck Catwoman. In 1992, I think you could call a story "The Ugly American" and everybody would totally understand what you were doing. Everybody knew one or two major assholes like this and they just sort of put up with or avoided them as best they could. But in 2025? It's a fucking race to the top of who can be the worst fucking American piece of shit in the country. Things people knew they shouldn't say in public just get spouted nonchalantly all over social media and the 24 hour news network airwaves on a constant basis. Shame has fled the country. Or, more apt, it's been murdered in the dead of the night and dumped in a backwater swamp to be eaten by scavengers.

Justice League America #27 (1989)

This must be a dream because Amanda Waller is barefoot and Morpheus is just standing there pretending he's a potted plant.

Blue Beetle was possessed last issue so the JLA has called in exorcist, um, Amanda Waller? I wouldn't trust Amanda Waller to decondition me from some freak phone call brainwashing accident because I wouldn't want a bomb surreptitiously placed inside my skull. But then I'm pretty smart! Or paranoid. Probably more one than the other. You know which one.

The cover of this issue wasn't done during one of those "All of our covers are parodies of movie posters!" months at DC Comics. The cover artist for this one just did it on a whim (probably at Giffen's suggestion (but also possibly not. Artists are pretty clever and whimsical themselves, you know! That's a free fun fact! You'll have to pay for the rest)).

Amanda might not be appearing here because Blue Beetle was phone-hypnotized by a woman cosplaying a bee. She might just be here on a Max Lord booty call. We all know those two were fucking. A lot.

This issue is called "Mindsnap" which is probably the name of a Magic the Gathering card that makes players groan in physical pain when it's played against them by some douche-bag blue control deck. That's a compliment to people who play control decks! I think I invented the control deck back when the game was still new because I remember everybody I played against hating my fucking guts.

The cover shows Amanda making a house call but the story begins in Belle Reve where Batman, Max, and Oberon have brought Blue Beetle so Amanda can fix him. Sure, he stabbed Oberon and tried to kill Max Lord. Some people might think that should be reported to the police. But no matter what you might think of Batman's violent tendencies toward the mentally ill, the police are even fucking worse. Especially the Gotham Police, the most realistic comic book example of real life police. So Batman thought, "It would be too dangerous to take Blue Beetle to the police. I'd better take him to Amanda Waller instead!"

Why is Murphy criticizing Oberon's sense of humor? Was there a joke somewhere that I missed?!

Murphy's idea of what makes a good sense of humor here is a nice example of the "nobody can take a joke anymore" kind of assholes society is currently riddled with. A certain type of person exists who believe jokes are merely playground insults and derogatory stereotypes. They don't understand how they're the ones with an underdeveloped sense of humor. I've written thousands of comedic comic book reviews and they don't rely on belittling people for a cheap laugh. I mean, they didn't start that way! But you try to figure out the fiftieth way to complain about Scott Lobdell's lazy writing or Ann Nocenti's incoherent dialogue before you lose your mind and just start insulting their parent's genitalia for the blasphemies they let loose on the world! You'd begin insulting Cullen Bunn too if you had to read an Aquaman space adventure where Aquaman never gets to talk to even one dolphin! You were hired to write Aquaman, Cullen! So write a fucking Aquaman script instead of pulling some John Carpenter from Mars script you wrote two years previously and just did a find and replace on "John Carpenter" to stick in "Aquaman."

I don't know what my point was because my point was supposed to be how conservatives think the only jokes are the ones that shit all over somebody and then I suddenly remembered how often I shit all over people. But I like to think I do it for a good reason! I paid $3.99 expecting some high quality entertainment and instead some hack writer decides to shit in my mouth! Am I supposed to just swallow it with a smile and proclaims, "That shit you just shat into my mouth just wasn't for me"? Fuck no! I'm going to blast that asshole the way that asshole's asshole just blasted me!

Anyway, I was wrong about everybody going to Belle Reve. Just Oberon went there to drop off a file with Amanda. Batman has remained behind to interrogate Blue Beetle in his room at the JLA embassy.

Some advice from a (probably?) smart and/or paranoid person: Beetle's reply here is the only one you should ever use if you find yourself being interrogated by the police.

Blue Beetle has been put in quarantine so that he doesn't try to murder again. Fire has also been quarantined for mysterious reasons. I don't think it's been revealed that her entire body now turns into green flames after getting sick from the meta-gene bomb but that's why she's been quarantined. Mostly because J'onn is now terrified of her. Booster and Ice, having lost access to their best friends, decide to hang out at a nearby diner. Luckily it's not the diner from the "24 Hours" issue of The Sandman which was probably on shelves right about the same time (I just did a quick fact check and, yes, this issue and Issue #6 of The Sandman both have June 89 dates. Grandmaster Comic Book Reviewer!).

In 1989, Ty Templeton still needed to work on his butts on barstools drawing technique.

Ice's butt actually looks better than I first thought when looking at the small panel. Booster's is still a bit dumpy. But who cares about guy butts?! Not me! A total man who only gets semi-erect when seeing a naked man's butt and not fully erect like when I see a naked woman's butt or a butt whose gender I have yet to confirm!

Amanda Waller arrives at the embassy (as depicted on the cover!) to deprogram Blue Beetle. Batman makes sure everybody at the embassy knows he feels castrated by this move seeing as he thinks he could do the job better than Amanda. But Amanda is all, "Oh, you're so good at deprogramming, remember that time you were brainwashed and made to kill people even though you still claim you don't kill?" And Batman is all, "This conversation is over!" All Amanda had to do was mention Deacon Blackthorne and Batman broke immediately! Which is weird because the cult leader who brainwashed Batman was named Deacon Blackfire. That's some strong brainwashing!

Blue Beetle, unable to remember nearly killing Oberon and Max Lord, spirals into an existential crisis.

I get why Booster Gold lives on the ragged edge of an existential breakdown because he's constantly living in terrible alternate time lines before he and Skeets fix them but what the fuck has pushed Blue Beetle over the edge? Starbucks getting his Frappuccino wrong for the fourth straight day?

I bet the above panel was the ur-idea for Tom King's take on Booster Gold in his Batman run and his entire Heroes in Crisis series.

Guy Gardner has currently been kicked out of the embassy, probably for making cracks about how Fire burns off all her clothes and fights crime naked now. I'm not sure why her nipples don't turn into little candle flames on top of her other flames. It probably has something to do with the stupid Comics Code Authority. Fascists. Oh, speaking of fascists, I forgot I was talking about Guy Gardner when thoughts of Fire's nipples interrupted. He's taken it upon himself to assault innocent people on the street in the name of justice. You litter? You get fucking beat up. Guy Gardner thinks about justice the same way most people on the Internet do: if somebody has done something you think is terrible, you then have carte blanche to be a raging asshole at that person. Also it doesn't matter if they did the thing. It only matters that you think they did it. Also that thing might not really be terrible. But somebody else on the Internet explained how the thing they did was terrible in such a way as to give you an excuse to treat them like shit on the shoe of another shit that happens to wear shoes and accidentally stepped in shit.

Don't try to use my words against me! As if I don't know that I'm typing this on the Internet. Obviously I'm also a raging asshole.

While interrogating Beetle, Amanda discovers that he's been turned into the Bialyan Candidate.

I'm flabbergasted that Giffen and DeMatteis didn't choose "Niagara Falls" as the activation phrase.

I'm not here to explain my out-of-date references! I'm only here to explain when Giffen and DeMatteis use out-of-date references! Besides, if you're reading this on the Internet, you've got every out-of-date reference at the tip of your fingers. We are living in a time when no reference is out-of-date because they're all so easily accessible.

Blue Beetle attacks Amanda because she said the activation phrase. I'm sure she did it so that she'd have an excuse to kick Blue Beetle's ass. He might be a super hero but there's no way he's powerful enough to beat Amanda Waller in a straight fist fight.

I'm sure Amanda is only saying this out loud so that the embassy cameras can pick it up and she can't be accused of doing it simply to beat up Blue Beetle. Not that anybody would care that she just beat up Blue Beetle. I mean, Maxwell Lord eventually kills him!

That might be the first and only appearance of Amanda admitting to doing something dumb. And, as I pointed out, I'm sure she's doing it to set up a defense against accusations of her mindless violence toward somebody who is currently suffering from some kind of mental break. But then, why can't she punch Blue Beetle in the face when he's going through some shit? If Batman can do it to Guy Gardner, somebody with a history of personality disorders caused by brain damage, doesn't that mean everybody is free to beat up their coworkers, no matter their medical history!? With the exception of punching Batman, of course. That would just be dumb. You don't punch a guy whose mental illness causes him to constantly put people in the hospital (and probably the morgue when the doctors fail to save them from their extensive injuries).

And this is where Tom King got his idea for his Mister Miracle series! Is this the only issue of a comic book Tom King ever read?!

I bet if I think about it longer than I'm willing to think about it, I can come up with a link between all of this Bialyan nonsense and The Sheriff of Babylon.

Blue Beetle's mind was apparently messed with back when he and Booster and Fire and Ice and Batman were running around in Bialya causing trouble. Nobody seems to think, "What if Booster, Fire, and Ice have all been programmed to kill as well?" Nobody would think Batman was programmed to kill because he's already been programmed to kill by years and years of mental trauma brought on by seeing his parents murdered and Alfred not getting him counseling. No programming is going to override the mess inside Bruce Wayne's mind.

While Waller gets back to trying to fix Blue Beetle, there's a scene with Fire in her underwear. Ty Templeton doesn't seem to be an average comic book artist because the scene isn't lascivious. It's just Fire in a nighty talking with Oberon about her accident and how Guy Gardner saved everybody. How? I don't know either because it didn't appear in the story or my memory is terrible. He probably just contained her in a big green bubble until she passed out and nearly died. What a hero! Although he was booted from the Embassy afterward so I'm assuming that after saving her, he just stared at her naked body instead of getting help.

This scene of Beetle undergoing therapy laid out in Giffen's usual 9-panel style has not unconvinced me that Tom King's Heroes in Crisis owes a lot to this issue.

Amanda Waller regresses Beetle until he remembers being programmed. The Queen Bee and Jack O'Lantern put the hypnotic suggestions in him while some other people in the same room were getting it done too. Probably UN officials! But somebody else she names? Booster Gold! Well duh! It was one of the first things I thought of! How stupid is Batman not to think that if Beetle was compromised, the other members of the League in Bialya may have been also! I guess I'm just smarter than Batman! Or more paranoid.

Blue Beetle falls into a coma due to Waller's intruding on his mind and Batman feels the only way to now help him is to go after Doctor Fate. But Doctor Fate is now a man and a woman or something. So Batman just grabs up Kent Nelson sans helmet and godly possession and figures, "Enh. Good enough." Plus he has a puppy!

Letters this month from George Gustines of New York, New York; Bill Thiessen of Port Coquitlam, British Columbia; Josh Stecker of Rancho Santa Margarita, California; Charlie Harris of Tucson, Arizona; Todd Hitchcock of Pulaski, New York; Patrick Scottman of Durham, New Hampshire; Gary Brda of Dearborn Heights, Michigan; and Jody Hamby of Tennessee. None of them praise the lettering of Bob Lappan.

Justice League America #27 Rating: B+. Nobody fought any bad guys (aside from Guy Gardner assaulting a litter bug but I think that might be vigilantism gone mad) so I considered giving this issue an F. But I'm pretty sure we have every single thing Tom King wrote to thank for this single issue so I've got to up the grade to a B+ at least! Hell if it only gave us the following three panels, I'd up the grade that high!

I'll admit that maybe Tom King got his ideas from other places but you'd have to be more convincing in your arguments than most people on the Internet are capable.

Black Canary: New Wings #4

Black Canary on the future site of the EMP. Sorry, EMP Museum. Sorry MoPOP.

The covers of this series scream, "Seattle is a major character in this comic book!" But the story whispers, "Do you know where I take place? Shh, shh. Don't worry about it, baby. We took care of that on the cover."

You know how when a movie takes place 20 or 30 years ago, the writer and director have to make sure to pepper it with tons of nostalgic references from that time? What if they did the same thing with movies that take place in the present?

Father: "Holy baloney! A dinosaur made from fire that spits tornadoes is ravaging the Museum of Pop Culture! We have to skip seeing The Rise of Skywalker and get out of town!"
Daughter: "Just let me finish my Fruity Pebbles that turn the milk blue!"
Father:: "Hurry up! And don't forget to grab your Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle action figures!"
Daughter:: "Okay Boomer."

Hmm. I just realized that maybe current movies already do that just to seem current and I just don't notice because why would I notice people mentioning mundane things I hear about every day? I suppose if I watched a movie that was current in 2000, I'd probably roll my eyes at all the stuff they packed in their to remind me of what the year 2000 was like, like meeting people at the gate in airports and being able to keep your shoes on at airports and being able to arrive at an airport five minutes before your plane departed and leaving my machete in my carry on bag at the airport.

For some reason, the airport experience was super different in 2000.

This issue begins with an advertisement for Hercules Luggage.

That elephant is coming its brains out.

The issue begins like this because the suitcases play an important role in the way the drug smugglers offload the cocaine from the ships. I suppose the reader doesn't need to have this much information about the suitcases being used though so I have a different theory. You know how David Finch's contract says that he will only draw a comic book if the writer puts at least one scene with a woman in a towel fresh out of the shower? I bet Trevor Von Eeden had the same kind of stipulation in his contract but with elephant orgasms.

While the suitcases filled with cocaine float three feet under the surface of the ocean (as you would expect being that they were Hercules Luggage!), Black Canary and Gan Nguyen are being threatened by racists. I bet some readers in 1992 wished they could log onto a popular social media platform, find a bunch of other lonely and pathetic assholes, and complain that this comic book is a social justice piece of shit. But instead, they actually had to pull out their letter writing paraphernalia, sit down at their writing desk, and place a pen in their mouth while looking up at the ceiling to decide how to compose their letter. Do they begin stating that they're totally against racism but maybe comic books aren't a good place to shove this stuff down their throat? Maybe they could point out how they're so not racist that they think portraying a bunch of white guys as racist is the real racism? Or maybe they could point out how, not being racist, they already know not to be racist but they think this comic book's nagging about racism might be the real cause of racism? Whatever their letters wound up being about, I bet editor Mike Gold told them to fuck right off, just like he did with all the racist letters sent in reaction to Teen Titans Spotlight on Starfire!

Black Canary and her new sidekick escape the racists and run off into the wilds surrounding Seattle. Meanwhile, the racist assassin's son decides to fuck off and run away from his racist home because he knows racism is bad. I don't know how he figured it out though. I bet he read a comic book about Green Arrow battling werewolves or something.

Black Canary discovers the sheriff is in on the racism by finding his racist stationary he keeps right out in the open.

Not having found the cocaine, Black Canary heads back to the wharf in the morning to stake it out. She discovers the racist assassin going out in a fishing boat with the Senator's son and some semi-automatic rifles. Some people might call them assault rifles but if there's one thing I've learned from Twitter, it's that calling them assault rifles really pisses off the idiots who have no other argument against gun control than to scream, "The AR in AR-15 stands for Armalite!" Oh, also, the racists are using M-16s so none of that matters. It's probably okay to call those assault rifles since the "M" stands for "My assault rifle."

To catch the racists, Black Canary tarts herself off and follows them in a speed boat.

Instead of finishing the quote with "What the fuck," she flips the bird. That must be why this comic book isn't approved by the Comic Code Authority!

I wonder how many super cool valedictorians in the 80s gave speeches that ended with them putting on sunglasses and saying the Risky Business quote? I bet it was like 90% of them.

While Gan and Chad, the racist assassin's son, get help from the Quinault Indians whose backyard the cocaine-filled suitcases are floating, Black Canary rams her speed boat into the drug smuggler's boat. She pretends to be unconscious while they pull her aboard to save her life.

"Aww, she can't feel nothin'!" is the title of my sex tape. Aww, I Can't Feel Nothin'!" is the title of my memoir.

If there's one thing I've learned about empathy, it's that you can't feel any for any creature that isn't comparable to a creature you love. I don't love any dogs so I go around killing dogs all the time. But I have cats so I love cats and would die for them. I also don't have children so fuck children. Not like that! You must not know any children to have acquired empathy for them if you thought I meant that kind of fucking!

Speaking of the cats I love, look who came to visit as soon as I typed that!

It's Gravy!

Maybe Gravy just visited because she heard there was a canary somewhere. Speaking of Canaries with nice asses, Black Canary captures the drug lords and saves the day. Everybody exclaims, "Yay Black Canary! You knew what was going on all along! Next time we'll believe you instead of thinking, 'This woman is hysterical!' At least, that's what it feels like in the moment. But, you know how it is! Tomorrow is another patriarchal, misogynist day and it won't be our faults when we think you're crying wolf again simply because we've learned to take women's words less seriously than men's for no real reason and, I mean, your tits are right there under that shirt and jacket, you lascivious vixen you!"

Oh yeah, also Chad kills his dad to save Black Canary's life. And his dad was finally proud of him! Is that toxic masculinity?

Black Canary: New Wings #4 Rating: A. A well written book that mostly looks good too. Sometimes people look weird and I wonder if somebody was slacking on the pencils or inks because they were doing a load of cocaine at the time. And other times, Black Canary's ass was totally hanging out there which didn't make me think about the male gaze at all. It just made me think, "Look at that fine ass!" But then, 90% of my thoughts any given day are simply "Look at that fine ass!" Except when I'm near a schoolyard, you perv. Then most of my thoughts are, "Please don't make fun of my clothes, you delinquents!" The only complaint I have about this comic book is that it didn't have enough Seattle in it.

Black Canary: New Wings #3

I'm suddenly hungry for cheesecake.

A friend of mine on Twitter has been retweeting #PitMad tweets and I'm losing my mind. If you don't know what Pitch Wars is, it's a thing that takes place on Twitter. Specific days are set aside for up and coming writers to Tweet out short synopses of their novel ideas in the hopes that an agent will love their unique vision and turn them into the next...well, I don't know anybody that ever became a famous writer thanks to Pitch Wars. I'm sure it's happened because there's no way agents could pass up some of these terrific pitches! Especially the ones that begin with two pop culture media hits, implying a wacky mash-up of the two ideas! "PULP FICTION X 101 DALMATIANS! Can Jules convince Vinnie that dog's have personality before he decimates the local Dalmatian population? 'What do I look like, motherfucker? Dead motherfucking dog motherfucking storage?!'" How come the agents aren't knocking down my door after that pitch?!

It seems the majority of pitches my friend has retweeted have been of the "Teenager discovers magic secret about their family!" variety. "Bartlett doesn't find themselves fitting in at school so they go online to discover a magic tumble blog where everybody's wishes come true. But when porn is banned from the site, are the granted wishes even worth bothering with?!" Here's my other young adult novel pitch: "Randall, a syphilitic werewolf, doesn't believe in science. But when an asteroid heading toward Earth threatens to destroy everything, he teams up with eleven year old science fair winner, Bethany Hateswolves, and a box of raccoons to save humanity." I know that was a joke pitch but I kind of want to write it now.

I probably shouldn't be tweeting joke pitches with the #PitMad hashtag because how will prospective agents be able to tell the real ones from my totally awesome ones?

I wonder what this Black Canary pitch might have looked like? "Black Canary ditches Ollie to fight side-by-side with Vietnamese radio jock Gan Nguyen against white supremacists infiltrating the U.S. government. If that's too on the nose, maybe make the white supremacists werewolves!"

This is some absolutely beautiful and insightful writing. I can't wait to read the letters of butthurt 90s readers!

These panels finally got me to Google Sarah Byam and it turns out she wrote some stories for Elfquest and, at the moment I read that, I thought, "Oh! I felt like the name was familiar." Even though before that moment, I hadn't really thought that the name was that familiar! I think my brain is gaslighting me. She also wrote something called Billi 99 (the tag line for the 4 issue series: "It's 1999... Do You Know Where Your Civil Rights Are?") which I'm almost certainly going to have to dig up, even if Tim Sale was the artist on it. I don't have anything bad to say about Tim Sale! It's just his style (which he has in abundance and which is a good thing to have!) isn't up my back alley.

Last issue, I said the guy running the crack house was the Senator's son. That was my mistake. It looks like he's just some renegade dealer whose going to fuck up the Senator's plan to destroy minorities with crack cocaine. Somehow. I'm not sure how. You'd realize I'm too dumb to understand the plot if you'd remember that thing I said earlier about not comprehending what I was reading last issue. I blame all the acid I took in my twenties even though I don't mean that. I can't be mad at you, acid trips in my twenties. You were the best!

Also, I think the guy I've been calling Senator Garrenger is actually Senator Garrenger's son. Now it makes sense why he looks like a child in a man's suit! That was probably a clue as were the narration and dialogue use to explain the plot which I'm fairly certain I read but who knows? Maybe I was having a flashback.

Black Canary explains the plot to the Seattle Chief of Police which helps my brain go, "Oh! Okay! I'm following this now!" Maybe my complaint that it's hard to follow comic books when there's a full month between each chapter has been wrong this entire time. Because I've just read two issues of a comic book in two days and I'm still confused by the third issue! Has it been my stupid brain all this time? Fucking idiot. You're making me look like a jerk, brain! If only you were as smart as I tell people you are!

I want to make clear: my inability to follow the plot is not a fault with the writing. It's totally me and whatever distractions and inherent biases kept me from comprehending the story. Maybe I shouldn't be reading political twitter posts between every page of the comic book. Hell, sometimes I even put the book down for an hour or so while I play a little bit of the super cheap computer role playing game, The Quest, that I bought on GOG. It's so terrible in so many ways but not in any way that makes playing it not enjoyable. Do you understand what I mean?!

A lot of superhero books purport to be about how you don't have to have super powers to be a hero. They inspire us and we inspire them. But few have ever done it as well as this scene from Black Canary:

How much has been written about super heroes as gatekeepers? Maybe all the Green Lanterns where Hal Jordan is all, "Fuck you, Guy Gardner! You're my shitty back-up!"

All these reviews on this series aren't my usual style. I feel like I'm edging into actual reviewer territory.

With that ass, she can keep my gate any time!

Ah, I feel much better now! Welcome back to the front, acid-brain-damaged me!

I would have only scanned her ass so y'all could get a nice, close-up view of it but then I thought I'd be doing this panel a disservice. Notice how Black Canary's entire body is drawn, exploding outside of the panel lines? It's like this panel is declaring, "Black Canary is more than just her ass! I know! That's quite a claim to make but look! She is also a head and feet, you sexist pigs!"

Man, I'm really getting political!

Here's another take about the panel above that proves I'm an actual reviewer and not just a dumb online jerk who doesn't mind people thinking he jerks off to comic book pictures: Black Canary's ass looks like it was drawn by Chris Ware.

Black Canary hunts down the drug dealer, Drake, whom I thought was the Senator's son while also thinking the Senator's son was the Senator! He almost kills both Black Canary and Gan but his gun runs out of ammunition due to shooting rats in the sewers. That was a scene from earlier that I didn't think was important and now I know why it was important! To show that Drake is a fool who doesn't do the smart gun owner thing: always reload!

While Drake is being taken to the police chief by Black Canary, he gets shot in the head by the white supremacist assassin. He escapes but Black Canary and Gan find clues that link the drug operation to a Neo-Nazi camp outside of Seattle. They go to investigate in hopes of finding a link to the Senator. But before Black Canary can find one, she and Gan are caught by the racists! And no Green Arrow in sight (or on site!) to save the day!

Black Canary: New Wings #3 Rating: A. For a comic book that I could barely get excited about reading because the covers are so uninspiring, it's really surprised me! Hopefully there will be some letters from a bunch of "I'm not a racist but" racists soon!

Not the exact letter I was looking for but good enough! "Too much talk about things that matter!"

Black Canary: New Wings #2

"How about a photo-realistic view of Downtown Seattle and then I'll just scribble in some mountains up top?" -- Dick. "Please add some Black Canary Colorforms too." -- Editorial.

Even after giving Issue #1 an "A" rating, I still can't believe this issue is going to be anything but boring. Just look at this fucking cover! This is the kind of image a D-list publishing house puts on the cover of a biographical comic book about David Faustino. Did editors at DC think highlighting the city of Seattle in 1991 was going to move units? It's not even recognizable as Seattle! Okay, okay, you fucking Seattlites. Great, you recognized your city instantly! I guess this fucking comic book was for you then, you know-it-all twats. For the rest of us, we need the Space Needle front and center, not washed out in the pink morass over Black Canary's shoulder! You never see an artist for DC drawing an image of Paris without the Eiffel Tower. I mean, maybe not never, exactly. Sometimes they'll throw in the Arc de Triomphe or the Louvre or Notre Dame. But that's kind of the point! All Seattle has is the Space Needle! I'm not shitting on Seattle for that. I live in Portland and what the fuck do we have? A big pink corporate office building?! Oh, sure, we have some spectacular bridges! I forgot about those! Portland is better than Seattle when it comes to recognizable architecture. Although we don't have a troll sucking off a VW Bug under any of our bridges or a huge black cock jutting out of downtown (Big Pink is the best we can muster).

I don't really care which city has better architecture! I can't stand people who feel pride for living in a specific city and then try to emulate the stereotypical person who lives in that city. If you're wondering who the fuck would do that, just watch any local newscaster in any city and watch how they try so fucking hard to be representative of the stereotypes of people who live there. Local news stations should stop airing promos that say shit like "First. Live. Local." Instead, they should just say, "We have no dignity. But we have the news! Although, to be fair, half of it is composed of viral videos everybody but our oldest of olds audience has seen."

Another reason this cover sucks is that it declares the title of this chapter is "Home is Where Ya' Live." Is that some sage Midwestern non-wisdom that people spout in reply to some other person moaning about some problem? Like how when somebody in Lincoln, Nebraska is all, "I was shot in the leg on my way to Runza's!" And then somebody else is all, "It builds character." In California, we didn't have sayings like that. If somebody said, "I was shot in the leg on my way to Taco Bravo!", you would reply, "Dude! That's gnarly!" And they'd go, "I know, right?!" And then you'd be all, "Like, is this going to affect our, like, trip to the beach?" And they'd be all, "Nah brah! I'mma go, like, run some water on it! Good as new, dude!" And you'd say, "Tubular! Gonna go get my board! Catch ya later!" This is because nothing in California builds character. You just start off as a goofy, one-dimensional caricature of a human being and stick with it until you, like, die.

No white male has ever been called uppity and we all know why.

"Uppity" is a great word by which to judge somebody's character. I mean to say, if somebody actually calls somebody else "uppity," you now know way more than that person wanted you to know about what kind of person they are. Especially telling is if somebody doesn't understand why you're judging them for calling somebody "uppity." I stopped associating with way more people than I would have thought possible when they sided against Colin Kaepernick. Maybe they didn't use the word "uppity" exactly but they sure weren't hiding their feeling that some people should keep in a specific place and be grateful for what they've been allowed to have, so to speak. Unfortunately for them, my sister and my dad fell into that camp.

Obviously they thought they claimed their dislike for Kaepernick was that he wasn't supporting the troops. But we all know how flimsy that bit of moral legerdemain really is. It takes an awful lot of mental contortion to simply disregard Kaepernick's stated protest of police violence against the black community and decide to believe right wing media that has a vested interest in a continued police state backed by corporate money. The whole "I'm a patriot so I find unpatriotic acts disgusting!" is the worst shell game every invented. All those fuckers who constantly thank members of the military for protecting their freedoms support Trump and Republicans who are fucking our freedoms in the ass (non-consensually! I support somebody fucking my freedom in the ass if my freedom feels like getting fucked in the ass tonight). I would thank a member of the military for protecting my freedom if they were ever fucking used to actually protect our freedoms. As a democracy (Don't you fucking representative republic me, you asshole), it's up to us to protect our freedoms and a good percentage of us are failing spectacularly at that job.

Gan isn't just battling the small time crack dealers in his neighborhood. He's got his sights on Senator Garrenger as well.

Gan doesn't realize the opposite is also true.

Senator Garrenger is a white supremacist working with white supremacists to do white supremacy. Some of us have been fighting this shit for a long time. The problem is far more of us have been pretending it wasn't a real thing for even longer. "White supremacist Neo-Nazis infiltrating our police forces? Get out of here! You sound ridiculous!" was probably a thing said a lot in the last forty years. And yet even now that conservatives have found that they don't need to resort to dog whistles because saying the thing out loud that used to cause political backlash doesn't even cause a ripple of concern now. We have learned that a large percentage of our country doesn't give a shit if you're a racist, misogynist asshole as long as you say three things over and over again: "God Bless America," "Owning a gun is a God-given right," and "Abortions are evil." Tick off those boxes and you can dispense with all the dog whistling and just say the racist shit on national television.

Dinah begins to dig up dirt on Senator Garrenger so that Black Canary has an iron clad excuse to punch him in the face. Her and Gan decide to work together to stop him and clean up the California drugs in their neighborhood. Not that they believe the two problems are actually the same problem! Not yet anyway! Dinah suspects it but Gan thinks she's seeing conspiracy where there isn't any. Dinah has more experience with how comic books work which is why she sees the entire forest already and it's only the beginning of Issue #2.

Gan takes his show to the streets in front of a crack house to shame them out of the neighborhood. He doesn't realize it's run by the Senator's son who murders three of his "coworkers" to make his escape when the cops show. Gan is shot in the shoulder by the white supremacist assassin while Black Canary rushes in to help. A crack addict is blamed for the murders but Black Canary listens to his chaotic rambling, leading her to discover a shell left by the Neo-Nazi assassin.

Black Canary: New Wings #2 Rating: B+. All the action is basically the last half of the comic book as a seasoned reader of comic books might expect. If a writer front loads the story with people discussing actual issues, the reader is going to get antsy for some mindless violence! Too bad for some readers the violence in this was't mindless but caused by truly awful people. People think the attitude of Comicsgate is a new thing but if you read the letters pages from the past, you'll see they existed back then as well. A lot of readers didn't want to be reminded that maybe the way they think and the things they believe put them in the realm of the "bad guy." So a comic book where the villain robs the bank or attacks Batman for the hell of it is okay because that reader would never rob a bank or attack Batman. But if you make the bad guy a senator who believes foreigners are stealing the jobs of good white Americans and maybe flooding their neighborhoods with drugs as a good way to fight against their "intrusion" into "white America," some of your readers are going to look up from the comic book and say aloud to nobody, "Hey!" And since most of them aren't in touch with their feelings or have ever really done a good, close examination of their self, they don't know how to deal with hurt feelings in any way but to be angry. It's easier to be angry at the person calling some white people racist than to have a good long think about why you might be upset about somebody pointing out racism.

Black Canary: New Wings #1

Nothing says Seattle more than a fishnetted woman in a blond wig and bustier preparing to kick your ass.

I remember being excited about this series when it came out but I can't remember why I felt excited about it. Is that a metaphor for life? Why can't I feel the joy in the remembrance? I look at it now and just think, "This looks fucking boring." And that's me being boring! Usually I'd say something like, "If this comic book were an imaginary genetic disorder, it would be reverse Prader-Willi Syndrome because I don't want more of it ever." Holy shit that was terrible. Especially since "reverse Prader-Willi Syndrome" is probably Angelman syndrome. And this comic book isn't that at all because it doesn't make me happy or thirsty.

I never actually said I was funny! The words, "I have a great sense of humor named Marcus," never passed my keyboard. That's what you chose to believe! But that other thing you believed, the one where I'm a terrible person who would make light of serious genetic disorders for the sake of a truly terrible metaphor? Yeah, that's true. I own that one.

"Black Canary" is an anagram for "Crack by anal." I'm suddenly more interested in this comic book because it must secretly be about doing crack through your butthole or else why would that anagram exist?

I just realized what I've been doing wrong my entire life. It's more fun to live by Coast to Coast AM midnight caller logic where you believe every thought that enters your head must be true rather than have to live within the confines of reality!

The issue begins with the host of a Seattle radio station asking callers this question: "Does migrating gang activity threaten Seattle's Asian neighborhoods?" Probably! I bet it's all that anal crack coming up from Southern California! If you're not a American, I added that so you understand where all the gangs migrate from in the United States. Seattle is too overcast and wet to come up with its own gang activity. Nobody would be threatened by The Puddle-Jumpers or The Caffeine Splashettes or Pike's Place Bass Solos or The Ardent Un-Umbrellaists or We Love Trees, Bitch. At first I was going to be upset about the "migrating gangs" comment because I'm the stereotypical Californian who wound up living in the Pacific Northwest. But it's not totally my fault since my divorced dad moved up here and I spent a lot of time up here and I fell in love with it up here. So I guess that's one thing I can think my father for!

The radio host calls for the people in the Asian community to rise up and kick gang ass to help make their streets safer. And he doesn't just talk the talk! He kicks the ass the kicks the ass! Why doesn't that work like "talk the talk"?!

I don't know how the drug dealer managed to give his money to the buyer and get his ass kicked to boot. What a lousy businessman.

Even though I don't recognize her name, I'm glad to see a woman is writing this comic book. That probably means we won't have more than two scenes where Black Canary is wearing a towel or kicking ass in her underwear. Oh wait! I'm a male infused with male gaze! I meant to say, "I'm sad to see a woman is writing this comic book. That probably means we won't have more than two scenes where Black Canary is wearing a towel or kicking ass in her underwear." Whew! I almost betrayed my gender for a second! I must be low on testosterone! I'd better go out on the street and "accidentally" bump into a guy smaller than me so I can start some shit!

Okay, I'm back! Did you know small guys are pretty tough? Also, do you think I need to make an appointment with a dentist if several of my teeth feel lose? Do they just naturally stiffen back up if I stop wiggling them with my tongue?!

I sit staring at the page following the one I scanned for several minutes. I don't know if it's just too confusing with all that's happening or the kick of testosterone my body just received from the fight. It could also be head trauma from totally winning the fight.

The terrible business man drug dealer is a black guy working for a white supremacist Neo-Nazi. He calls the radio host a China Doll which seems weird although kudos to him for not being gendered in his racial slurs, I guess? According to the footprint patterns on the ground, they were also practicing a dance while wrestling over drug money. The drug dealer admits to having lost his money in a drug deal for the third time this week because I don't even know how that happens. He hands the money to the buyer to let the buyer make the change? Nearby, Dinah can't sleep because the birds outside of her window are too loud and maybe the dancing going on under her window but she looks to the sky when she sticks her head out of the window so what am I supposed to believe? She decides to read some relaxing literature about the feminist politics of housework and then gives up to go practice her judo. That's a fucking lot going on in one page!

Later, Dinah does her budget for the month and discovers Green Arrow is spending too much money on boxing glove arrows. Apparently being a Seattle vigilante doesn't bring in much cash and Dinah has been paying all the bills with her Sherwood Florist flower shop. I guess Oliver Queen didn't have any money in 1991? Maybe Crisis on Infinite Earths wiped out his bank account and he wouldn't get it back until Zero Hour? Anyway, Dinah is pretty pissed with Oliver's spending habits.

I know Dinah is chastising Ollie for being a brutish pig here but technically he wins the argument because she describes his sexing as hot.

Dinah heads up to the Quinault Indian Reservation to get some mystic wisdom from Aunty Wren, an elderly Native American woman. Her advice is "Ask the douchebag for help." It comes across as a critique of Black Canary being too prideful to ask for help because she's a strong woman who doesn't need anybody. But I like to think the point of the advice is this: if Oliver isn't helping out, ask him to help. If he doesn't help out after asking him to, you now know he's a useless piece of unforgivable shit that needs to be thrown in a dumpster. If I don't think that then I have to think this: Oh, sure! Blame the woman for needing to be too strong! How about blaming the man for being a grown ass man child that won't take responsibility without being told to take it after which he'll only grouse about how much he's being nagged. But then again, I don't need any more reasons to dislike Green Arrow than this one: he's a fucking Robin Hood cosplayer with stupid facial hair who fights against modern weapons with a bow and arrows.

Aunty Wren introduces Dinah to Gan Nguyen, the radio show host vigilante. He's also an Asian translator for the Quinault. Gan and Dinah flirt a bit while getting to know each other before heading back to Seattle on the ferry. While Dinah is in the toilet, Gan gets jumped by some gang members who have been looking for him. Dinah changes into Black Canary, kicks some ass, and saves the day. Later, Gan is all, "I know it was you who saved me but I won't say that explicitly! Just so you know you can tell me if you want to tell me and I won't say anything but I know and you know I know!" Dinah is all, "Yeah, yeah. Whatever."

And that's almost the end except for an epilogue that's some pretty damn fine and insightful writing about our country and what the fuck has been going wrong (and gone wrong) with it.

Fucking hell that's good stuff.

Black Canary: New Wings #1 Rating: A. This is why I'm sad comic books are no longer really affordable. In 1991, this comic book was $1.75 which was easily cheap enough to pick it up and see what it was about. Doing so let me read a really great story with a point of view and something to say. If this were on the shelves today at $4.00, the only people giving it a chance would be Black Canary fans. That's a fucking shame and the main problem with print comics today. They're just too fucking expensive to take a chance on anything that isn't already in your fandom alley (or by a writer or artist you love). Not to mention how the cover didn't excite me at all! But I still picked it up to see what was going on with Black Canary and apparently past me liked it as much as current me because I got the whole mini-series and at least a few issues of the series that followed it. Well done, Sarah Byam!

Count Vertigo! (as seen in Green Arrow)

PERSONAL DATA
Alter Ego: Count Werner Vertigo
Occupation: Professional Criminal
Marital Status: Single
Known Relatives: None
Group Affiliation: None
Base of Operations: Star City
First Appearance: WORLD'S FINEST COMICS #251
Height: 5'11" Weight: 189 lbs.
Eyes: Blue Hair: Blond

HISTORY
Last descendant of the royal family that ruled the small Balkan country of Vlatava until the end of World War II when it was absorbed into the Soviet Union, Count Vertigo first appeared upon the scene in Star City, attempting to steal back the family jewels his parents had sold when they escaped to England after the war [I'm getting a bit of a Pale Fire vibe from this history. I'm not sure it's reliable.]. Victim of a hereditary inner ear defect that affected his sense of balance, Vertigo had a small electronic device implanted in his right temple that enabled him to compensate for his problem. By making certain adjustments in the device, Vertigo learned he was able to affect other people's balance as well, distorting their perceptions so that they literally [Drink!] could not tell up from down.

Thus armed, Vertigo crossed the path of the Black Canary (see Black Canary II), who thwarted Vertigo's crime spree by using her ultrasonic cry to overload his implant.

Vertigo has escaped from prison several times since then, attempting to gain revenge on the Canary and her boyfriend, the Green Arrow (see Green Arrow II). At one point Vertigo even returned to Vlatava and threatened the Soviet Union with nuclear blackmail unless they freed his tiny country. Defeated again by the Green Arrow, Vertigo was turned over to the Soviets for punishment. Instead they sent him back to he U.S. to assassinate a prominent industrialist. Once more outwitted by Green Arrow, Vertigo was turned over to the authorities and is currently serving a long prison term.

POWERS & WEAPONS
An Olympic-level athlete [There's a higher than average penchant for crime amongst people who could compete in the Olympics!] but average hand-to-hand combatant, Count Vertigo prefers to rely on the electronic mechanism implanted in his right temple. Designed to correct an inner ear defect, this mechanism can also be used to distort the perceptions of those around Vertigo, completely destroying their sense of balance [Wasn't this already covered?]. This implant, combined with magnetic boots that enable Vertigo to walk on ceilings and walls, makes Vertigo the living embodiment of his name.

During his return to Vlatava, Vertigo supplemented his electronic mechanism with another device of Nazi origin that enabled him to turn his topsy-turvy illusions into reality, but it is not known at this writing if that device, which was short-circuited by Green Arrow, is still operable and still in Vertigo's possession.