Kamandi Challenge #4

I guess Kamandi is younger than I thought. Is there actually an age where it becomes illegal to show a female topless? Or is it all dependent on breast development?

Once again, I should probably explain the caption. Kamandi is female. I've told you before not to believe everything you're told. Unless it comes from me. I would never lie to you.

So at the end of the last issue, Palmiotti and Conner had Kamandi and her fuck plant about to be sacrificed to the God of Jaguars (the God is just a giant Jaguar. That's pretty much the accepted truth of all gods. They're just giant sized versions of the creatures who worship them. Unless you're Hindu. Then they're multi-limbed or animal headed humanoids who can't get enough butter). I would have expected Jimmy and Amanda to come up with a sexier cliffhanger. Perhaps there's an urban dictionary definition of "sacrifice to the Jaguar God" that I'm not familiar with. According to this cover, Tynion the Fourth has come up with a simple solution to the cliffhanger. Kamandi is grabbed and then she stabs the Jaguar God with a dagger that she was hiding inside her vagina. That might sound dangerous but it's okay if you stick the sheath in there first.

I bet James Tynion the Fourth's cliffhanger will be Kamandi telling her fuck plant that while she loves to fuck robots and grandmothers and humanoid animals and mechanical appliances, she's not really into foliage.

Before I begin reading this comic book, it's probably a good time to question the question on the cover: "Can you solve it before they do?" Nobody has yet to explain what I'm trying to solve before this mysterious "they" solve whatever it is! It's not like Kamandi woke up one morning and met up with her slacker friends, took their garish van down a spooky back road, came upon a ghost town where the only living occupant was Don Knotts, and quickly realized there was a mystery to be solved when they saw the ghost. I loved the Scooby Gang. When they saw a ghost, three-fifths of them instantly thought, "It's obviously not a real ghost since there is no such thing as life after death or God. Therefore, whatever is going on is caused by a human trying to get one over on other humans for their own selfish, greedy reasons. We need to squash this bullshit right now with science and logic!" The other two-fifths usually screamed, "G-g-g-g-g-ghost!", and then shit themselves.

I suppose the mystery is just a kind of general "What the fuck is going on here?" thing. Why was Kamandi left to live a lie in a city of robots? Why did her parents abandon her? What happened to the world? That's all stuff that hardly matters since this series is really just a bunch of writers getting to play around in Jack Kirby's world. I bet before writing their parts, they all got to pick their favorite bits of Kirby's Last Girl On Earth series to write about. That way not everybody was writing the issue where Kamandi and Tuftan find themselves trapped on an island with only fucking to keep them alive. Man, I've dreamed about being trapped on that island constantly!

The story begins with Kamandi in the grip of the Jaguar God (just like on the cover!). Her fuck plant screams her name from below. "Kamandi! You haven't eaten me yet!" I bet the thought of eating her fuck planet gets Kamandi so wet, she slips from the grip of the Jaguar God and escapes! Then the Jaguar God just gives up because once your food touches the floor, it's gone, man.

Is it ... semen?! The Jaguar God is just a big fuck puppet!

Kamandi is deep throated by the Jaguar Fuck Puppet which deposits her in the creatures semen supply bunker. That's also where a couple of regular Jaguar people are controlling the fuck puppet and enjoying the previous loads of semen. It turns out it's just an automaton! The Jaguar God is a big fake created by creatures in their own image. Just like every other god! Again, except the Hindus. Which means the Hindu gods must be real because according to the most boring thing anybody can ever say yet they still say it a lot anyway, "You just can't make that shit up!"

Don't you hate when people say that? Because I can make a lot of shit up and usually the "you can't make that shit up" stuff is so boring and mundane that the expression should be "Why would you want to make that shit up?"

So the "being swallowed whole" by a giant which was my stupid guess as to how this would play out since it's a basic comic book trope and James Tynion the Fourth fucking loves basic comic book tropes turns out to be the solution to the mystery. Of course there's a twist in that the giant is a robot. I guess. Maybe that's not a twist but just another comic book trope that I wasn't really thinking about. After Kamandi is swallowed whole and survives, her fuck plant is chewed up before being swallowed. That's because she's capable of regrowing lost body parts which Kamandi hasn't quite gotten the hang of yet.

A scientist jaguar?! Ridiculous! I mean, I get having a canine scientist. But a feline?! Pshaw!

I should create some kind of rating that scores how long I was able to suspend my disbelief while reading any particular comic book. Maybe put one of those dripping blood line animations that were so popular in the Internet's wild and woolly frontier days at the point I lose my suspension of disbelief. In this one, I'd have placed it right at that spot that a jaguar was a scientist. Totally ridiculous. Jaguars are sporty creatures! Since when has a person into sports ever been able to science anything?! Ridiculous!

Since the jaguar is a scientist, he loves explaining things so Kamandi didn't have to get so threatening so quickly. To be fair, she was just gulped down by a giant fuck puppet god machine. I'd probably be a little bit crazy at that point too. I can't wait to see how Jimmy and Amanda say they would have solved this cliffhanger! I bet Kamandi and his fuck plant would have realized at the last second that it wasn't their bodies that were going to be sacrificed but their God cherries. Then they would have been, "Oh? Okay! I'm totally up for this!" Then there would have been twenty pages of fucking before the next cliffhanger where the condom broke.

Oh! This guy was just a freaky nerd offshoot of the jaguar sun cult. Disbelief re-suspended!

Kamandi forgets that she was just nearly murdered by Professor Cano the Sciencing Jaguar and is impressed by Cano's ability to fool a bunch of religious lunatics. She's all, "Oh yeah! That's what they deserve! Fuck those ignorant motherfuckers!" Then they all dance for a bit before getting back to the plot.

Cano tells Kamandi that she won't be leaving because Jaguar Scientists are a lot like Nazi Scientists. They don't mind vivisecting people who tick the wrong box on the race, religion, sexuality, and anything that kind of slightly annoys the scientist forms. So Kamandi says, "I figured that would be the case. That's why I don't just keep a knife sheathed in my vagina; I also keep a gun holstered in my butthole!" Then she pulls out the gun and threatens to shoot some of the scientist's machinery. Cano curses having not spent enough time in jaguar gym or else he could easily disarm Kamandi. Instead he's all, "Oh shit I just shit my lab coat!"

This paragraph is just for the Actually Nerds out there: I fucking know Kamandi didn't have the gun in her butthole. I know the fucking gun was Cano's and it was mixed in with the tea service or something. But what do you want me to do? Admit to the ridiculous truth of the comic book that Cano leaves his gun just lying around where any two year old jaguar can happen along and shoot itself in the face or make up my own ridiculous truth that goes along with the earlier ridiculous lie about Kamandi's knife? That ridiculous lie was told to obfuscate the ridiculous truth that the jaguars tied up Kamandi for a sacrifice without finding a huge fucking knife on her nearly naked torso. Okay. Back to the bit of commentary that's for everybody.

Instead of threatening Cano and forcing him to free her, Kamandi shoots out the view screen which is the only way the professor has of seeing where the giant robot jaguar god is going. Great job, idiot! Why did the last human on Earth have to be such an idiot?!

Kamandi and his fuck plant climb back out of the jaguar god's mouth while the jaguar king misses the perfect opportunity for a spit take.

Oh come on, James Tynion the Fourth! You don't mind stealing and using every other boring ass cliché in comics but you refuse to use the standard sitcom spit take in the most perfect spot?! Pretentious jerko!

As they're climbing down the front of the giant jaguar fuck puppet, fuck plant notices the plane hanging on a chain around the god's neck. "Do you think that is still mechanically viable and full of fuel and in proper working order after sitting unused for so long and then battered from hanging around the neck of a giant robot?" she asks. Kamandi answers, "Fuck yeah, bitch!" Then she moans orgasmically and says "Why haven't you eaten me yet, honey?" while chlorophyll drips down her inner thigh.

Even though the fuck puppet's view screen was shot out by Kamandi, it still seems to be able to see them escaping in its bling. Kamandi gets in the cockpit and says, "Hee hee! Cockpit!" Then she says, "I hope there's still fuel in this thing!" And that's it. That's the only bit that a reader has to imagine needs to be okay with the jet. It just needs fuel! Don't worry about how long the fuel has been sitting in it or any other bit of maintenance that probably needs to be done on a plane that's been hanging around a fuck puppet's neck for who knows how long! Also, the fuel probably has gotten some semen in it in the intervening years.

But no! The jet works and Kamandi and fuck puppet fly off into the sunset to live happily ever after! I solved the mystery! I think!

She's a plant, you idiot! You're going to suffocate her!

Kamandi blacks out and the jet crashes in the desert where, during his blackout, presumably, she walks away from the crash and collapses. When she wakes back up, she rushes back to the jet and realizes her fuck plant is drying out! Unless she's dead from being suffocated. I bet she just needs to be fucked really good!

Kamandi has crashed next to a gigantic wall. That must mean she's in Australia. I think this is where the Kangaroo Mafia (or whatever they're called!) are going to be used as the cliffhanger.

Before Kamandi can fuck his fuck plant back into consciousness, she's hit in the side of the head with a high tech boomerang. Remember, it's the future! So the boomerangs need to be high tech even though there isn't a lot that can be done to perfect them. Maybe put a gyroscope inside them?

Being that this cliffhanger is, once again, going to be Kamandi about to fight something to the death, she and Fuck Plant (I might as well make that her official name since I refuse to remember that her name is Vila) get to choose some weapons and a vehicle which they'll be able to use against that cliffhanger I mentioned.

Stupid Australians! They're always so violent and ignorant! Which is why it's so strange that they actually have rational gun control!

That's it! That's the cliffhanger! How will Kamandi and Fuck Plant defeat the Kanga Rat Murder Society?! I hope they use sex as their weapon. This series needs more futuristic fucking. Bill Willingham is the next writer so I'm probably not imaginative enough to figure out what he'll come up with. Remember when he was famous for drawing fantasy pics in Dungeons and Dragons supplements? What a time to be alive!

Jimmy Palmiotti writes the essay at the end describing how he would have gotten Kamandi out of the Jaguar God predicament. I bet it involves Kamandi being swallowed whole as well but with a comment from the jaguar king about deep throating. A tasteful comment, of course!

Jimmy lets slip one of the secrets that I pretty much already assumed anyway and said as much in this or the last commentary: the teams of writers and artists already knew what characters or areas of the world they would be writing about before they got their cliffhanger from the previous team. So Jimmy already knew he had giant bat people when he got the Kamandi falling off a cliff ending. Anyway, Jimmy would have solved this cliffhanger pretty much how James solved it: Kamandi gets away in the jet. Personally, I would have used the tank and had Kamandi commit genocide against the jaguar people.

The Ranking!
No change! I suppose this could have been a "+1" issue but why should I feel anything but petty after seeing what a bunch of despicable assholes are in charge of our country? Not that I didn't already know it. But watching them laugh and live it up while pissing and shitting on the people they're supposed to represent? Fuck them all. And fuck everybody who watches Fox News and doesn't understand that it's the capitalist equivalent to state controlled media. When corporations own your politicians, the corporate news channel runs the propaganda machine. But all y'all Fox viewers are all in on believing the opposite. "This one channel is the only one that tells the truth! I mean, this channel and all these weird backwater Internet sites that copy and paste bullshit from each other until you've seen the same thing in so many different places, it must be true. Also, how come nobody ever refutes Fox News and these shady sites if they're lying? I mean refutations from sites that I trust! Get that fucking Snopes bullshit out of here, idiot!"

Detective Comics #949

These kinds of grimaces always make me think of Rob Liefeld.

The Review
No change. Batwoman gets a new mission from her father hunting down terrorist organizations fighting over control of Hugo Strange's monster venom that turns corpses into Godzilla Zombie Monsters. This is a job for Batwoman because she doesn't mind using shotguns and you need to use a shotgun if you're going to kill Godzilla Zombie Monsters or if you're going to protect the Batcave from clowns. But she'll be dealing with that mission over in her own comic book so Batman isn't "TT"ing her every other page due to the gun residue all over her body. I suppose she'll still be in this series as well since she's the leader of the Bat-family Military Training School.

Oh, and the derivative Colony super assassin who bragged about being able to beat up Batman because he had studied all of Batman's moves for years? He gets his ass kicked. Embarrassed, he jabs some monster venom into his neck so that he can be Batwoman's nemesis over in her comic book. He would have been a boring nemesis if he'd remained just a regular old white dude. Now he's some kind of man-bat thing which most people who aren't me probably find more exciting than average white guys.

Doctor October doesn't appear in this issue. She'll probably be the main supporting character in Batwoman's series. Also, her name has a lot of 'O's in it.

Justice League #13

I feel like Wonder Woman should be immune from any type of mind-control while she holds her lasso.

Steve Trevor is tormented by Eclipso until he finally succumbs to the darkness.

What Did We Learn?
We learned that writers, especially comic book writers, tend to believe everybody has a dark side that they're barely keeping in check. Apparently we all want to slaughter everybody around us and drink their blood and dance in their spilled entrails. I would like to find this unbelievable because it's not something I believe. But then I see how quickly people are to anger and I think maybe there's something to it. If Eclipso were to turn me using the darkness in my own heart, he'd just have to get some piece of technology to fail me. He can just come up to me and say, "Can you print this for me using the wireless printer that's totally on the network and should only take a few clicks of the mouse?" Then I'd be all, "Sure!" Within minutes of the stupid thing telling me it can't find the printer or that the print job is spooling and spooling and fucking infinitely spooling, I'd be one of his pawns. Heck, even when I go to shut down my computer and I accidentally put it to sleep instead, I'd become Eclipsed! But I don't go around thinking I'd like to murder somebody just because they got my fast food order wrong at the drive-thru. Have you ever been to dinner with somebody who seems to be having a nice time and then some internal clock ticks past the exact second where they think they should have been served or waited on and they become inhuman monsters to the staff for the rest of the night? Those people deserve to be turned into Eclipsos and then murdered by Deadshot.

The Ranking!
-1! It's not a fucking Justice League story. It's a Steve Trevor story! And it casts him in an unsympathetic light. Oh, sure, he saves a bunch of people. But look at how he reacts to finding his niece and nephew Eclipsed:

Even if they can be cured, Trevor wants to kill them because he'll still have the memory of them being murderous little monsters! Fucking selfish bastard.

Aquaman #10

I think a jellyfish is stuck to her mouth.

Somebody named stickyshemale just began following my Tumblr account. I used to block porn accounts whenever I noticed them following me but then I had to think, "What if they're just really intelligent comic book fans who appreciate the hidden depths of my dick jokes?" And then I had to stop blocking them because I would hate it if I couldn't read the things that I wrote.

Mera is still putting up with the old lady tradition nonsense where they have to make sure she's fit to be the queen and also make sure she's a virgin, probably. Part of the tradition is to read her future to find out what kind of queen she'll be. It seems like maybe that's the only part that would matter! If they can really tell the future then what else does Mera have to learn? Just look at the seaweed leaves, makes sure the world isn't destroyed when Mera becomes queen, and then let her marry Arthur. So they look at her future and there's a hitch that makes it seem like maybe she shouldn't marry Arthur.

This story is called "Future Tide". Judging by this image and these Narration Boxes, I think I know what "tide" Abnett is talking about.

Apparently if Arthur marries Mera, he'll die and she'll go crazy and the world will end in something called The Deluge. I guess that's just the Atlantean equivalent of a Trump Presidency. I mean an apocalypse.

Mera is offended that the Widowhood think she's going to bring about the end of the world. She's all, "How can I be the bringer of destruction? Look at these fantastic tits! How could these cause any harm?!" I would also mention the full and tight ass. It's definitely not destroying anything in my pants. In fact, it's creating something!

The Widowhood decide that, based on the vision, maybe Mera isn't a good match for Arthur. That's dumb! Don't they know that prophecy always plays people for fools?! Obviously the prophecy means that because of the prophecy, the Widowhood do not allow Mera to marry Arthur, therefore he marries somebody who will wind up destroying the world. That's like Prophecy 101: Intro to Self-fulfilling Prophecies.

When she's told she can't marry Arthur, Mera wishes she were a land dweller so she could stomp her foot. Instead she has to be content with letting out a few bubbles of shock as she stares agape into her suddenly depressing and loveless future. It's also probably the future that will bring the Deluge, stupid prophets!

Mera decides to go hang out at the lighthouse in Amnesty Bay with Aquadog, a carton of Oreos, and a gallon of Earl Grey tea.

Why does she have to wring out her hair? Can't she just use her powers to remove the water?

The Prophet had a little more prophecy than the vision of the world drowning in menstrual blood. It said something about the name of the enemy being hidden in the lighthouse that howls, or something. So as Mera walks up to the lighthouse and hears Aquadog howling, she begins to feel the prophecy really did focus on her. But nobody cared about the Prophet's addendum! It was too abstruse. But I'm sure Mera will figure it out. I just hope she figures it out in this issue because I didn't buy Issue #11.

Mera finds a note from Stubbs, some woman she met in a previous story arc. She wants to meet with her so she can tell her about NEMO. Hey! They're Aquaman's real enemy! I just figured it out! Black Manta is going to disguise himself as a woman so he can marry Arthur and destroy the world! Boom. Now I don't have to worry about this story ending this issue because I guess what's going to happen. Even if I'm wrong, I'll never know because I'm not reading the next issue. And nobody reading this would be dickbag enough to destroy my delusion!

During the meeting, some NEMO operative named Broadsides tries to assassinate Mera and Stubbs. But he fails because he's terrible. Although he does get away. Afterward, Mera learns that Aquaman nearly died battling The Shaggy Man because she was off being tested to make sure she didn't pass on any sexually transmitted diseases on her wedding night with Aquaman.

The Ranking!
No change. I haven't really been interested in Aquaman since Issue #1 of The New 52 so it's off the pull list. It'll be hard to adjust to a comic book reading life of not making fun of Aquaman and sexually harassing fictional character Mera with my sexy words. I sort of hope the only Aquaman comics I ever read again are the ones by Peter David in the nineties. Mostly because I have those and I'll be rereading them at some point so I'd like to pretend that I want to.

Aquaman #9

Maybe the Shaggy Man just needs a Snickers?

Hey! That's an idea! Has anybody tried giving Donald Trump a Snickers? Maybe he's just really hungry! If somebody gives him a Snickers, maybe he'll go back to the Trump who was pro-abortion and thought universal healthcare was a right of the people!

How bored must Donald Trump already be with all of this pre-presidential shit? He's like the football player who runs for Student Body President simply for the extra adulation and pussy but then ditches every student council meeting and completely ignores every single one of his duties.

Donald Trump is missing a grand opportunity. How can he not fill every cabinet position with reality television stars and aging child celebrities?! I'm so fucking disappointed in the loss of this potential New World Order!

Shit. I just realized The Shaggy Man isn't Donald Trump! I thought I was writing about the comic book already! The Shaggy Man Aquaman is fighting was created by Professor Ivo and not by Satan's jizz squirted into a bag of Cheetos and crumpled up dollar bills.

Aquaman tries to explain The Shaggy Man to Tula.

Aquaman: "It's like Doomsday! But worse!"
Tula: "Wait. How is it worse than Doomsday? Doomsday killed Superman!"
Aquaman: "Yeah, but Doomsday has to die to become resistant to the thing that killed him. The Shaggy Man just needs to be hurt by it and he's resistant!"
Tula: "But isn't The Shaggy Man a robot? Isn't it just a machine? How does that work?!"
Aquaman: "I have no idea! You just have to accept these things and live with them! Stop questioning the logic of our universe!"
Tula: "If this Shaggy Man is a real thing, what the fuck? How are people not rioting in the streets over planned obsolescence?! Why am I continually having to buy a new iPhone...I mean, uSphere every other year? Can't Professor Ivo make one from Shaggy Man technology?"
Aquaman: "I told you to stop questioning these things! The next thing you'll want to know is how I exist when Atlanteans and Land Dwellers have evolved into such obviously different species that my parents shouldn't have been able to produce offspring!"

How is Aquaman going to defeat The Shaggy Man?! Is he going to have to research every single thing the Justice League has ever done to it so as not to waste time attacking it in that manner? Or will he just get a bunch of comedians together by offering a job to punch up a script and then have them brainstorm ways to hilariously defeat an unbeatable foe? I bet The Shaggy Man has never slipped on a banana peel before! Or been told who is on first! Cream pie to the face? What if Aquaman forges an out of date Shaggy Man warranty card and then shows it to him? Also, there's probably a whole line of ACME products that nobody has tried.

No wonder Aquaman rarely uses his fish talking powers anymore! He's still traumatized by what Swamp Thing did to the dugongs he recruited to stop him!

Instead of helping Arthur, Mera is stuck answering an old lady's questions. Apparently it's more important to establish Mera's fitness to be queen than to help save the city or Amnesty Bay from The Shaggy Man. What an apt metaphor for traditions! They simply slow down progress and positive change to appease the older generations!

Murk tries to convince Aquaman that he can't defeat The Shaggy Man without the help of the Justice League, especially since he won't summon any innocent fish to assist him. But Aquaman has a plan! It's a crazy plan but it just might work! You always have to say a plan just might work so the audience knows it's risky and exciting instead of realizing that whatever it is, no matter how lame, it'll work because that's a pretty standard comic book contrivance. The hero must win eventually! Except in the rare cases where the hero doesn't win. But they eventually do win! You just can't ever stop reading in the middle of the story.

What is Aquaman's plan, you're wondering? Oh, let me tell you! But first, remember when I said this in my Aquaman #7 review: "The Justice League Identity Card is also a key to use the Watchtower Teleport System. That’s probably an important plot point that readers should remember for later." Well, it's time to remember that plot point! Which is why I wondered if you remembered the time I reminded you to later remember that plot point! Because Aquaman takes out his stupid Justice League Blockbuster Card which was such a stupid idea that I knew it had to be important later, and he activates the Justice League Watchtower Teleportation System!

Sure, at the time, I predicted maybe Manta might steal it. But I still knew something so stupidly obvious was going to be important!

The Shaggy Man (along with Aquaman's Justice League Identity Card!) is teleported into space where I'm sure he'll eventually meet up with Brainiac. Until then, the world is saved! By Aquaman's CostCo Discount Club Card!

The Ranking!
+0! I wonder how much Batman is going to charge Aquaman to replace his Justice League Identity Card?

Catwoman: Election Night #1

Dammit. I only picked this up because I thought it said "Erection Night."

• I'm skipping ahead in my stack of comics to read this before it is no longer topical. It would be weird to read this three weeks from now when nobody wants to be reminded of the election. Not that anybody wants to be reminded of it now! Can you believe how the people voting for that one person can actually live with themselves?! It's shocking!

• That's enough of my intense, biting political commentary! I'm just going to read this comic book now about a sexy sex kitten who can't get enough bat-dick.

• For some reason, the story begins when Selina Kyle is a little girl which means she's missing her best two features!

• Selina is living in Miss Kitty's Home for Wayard Girls, an orphanage where she pretends a cat named Ali is her best friend. They hang out in the laundry room trying not to get adopted or beaten up by the ugly orphans. It doesn't work. The ugly orphans find her anyway.

• That's enough of the flashback! It's time for Tits in Tight Leather. That's my secret name for Catwoman that I never tell anybody because I don't want them to think I'm sexist. Is it sexist to view a fictional character as a sex object? I mean, she is just an object in that she's a drawing on paper! And that object is definitely sexy because my pants are suddenly too tight in the front.

• Catwoman with her two best features appears on the credits page and I'm less interested in Catwoman's best features than I am in the credits. Not because I see Meredith Finch is writing this story and now know that I'll be wasting the next hour of my life reading something she wrote. No, what really excites me is that I don't see Russell's name in the credits but his name was on the cover. And you know what else was on the cover? A Prez billboard! Which means, using my super duper sleuthing skills taught to me by my Trixie Belden's So You Want To Be The World's Greatest Detective Home Course classes, Mark Russell must have written a Prez back-up story for this Erection Day Special! I think plowing my way through an inane and probably sexist Meredith Finch story might be worth it to get to the chewy Corndog Girl center!

• In the present, Catwoman is busy beating up one of the Penguin's henchmen who was trying to steal from Miss Kitty. What a hypocrite she is!

Hey! A cat's tongue is no joke! Many times, my cat Judas licked my arm raw in his overzealous taste tests!

• The next day, Catwoman picks up her copy of the Gotham Gazette which she apparently subscribes to. She also feeds Ali the Cat who is still alive somehow. He looks pretty fucking beat up, so he's probably twenty or so. You know how you can tell a cat is old just by glancing at it because it's gotten to that point where it's all, "Fuck it. I've licked myself clean with my tongue for my entire life. What the fuck do I care what I look like now?" Also, their meow becomes the sound of rusting metal scraping across more rusting metal. Sometimes they're almost blind so you can get them to run into table legs by calling them and snapping your fingers right next to a table leg. I mean, if you were a big jerk, you could do that! Who would even think of something like that? Poor kitty!

• In the Gotham Gazette is a story by Vicki Vale where she typed "ormally" instead of "formally." I hope she got fired. Oh, the article is about The Penguin running for mayor. Didn't I already see this story on that terrible Gotham television show? Is The Penguin also super gay for The Riddler in this?

• Riddle me this, Riddler: What's black and white and sucks dick all over?!

• Catwoman comes to the conclusion that The Penguin's run for mayor has something to do with Miss Kitty because of course everything is about her. The unfortunate thing for me and my commentary is that, this being a comic book by a mediocre writer, she's probably absolutely right. I don't like stories where the main character knows what's going on at all times from the fewest clues life throws at them! Life is not this easy! It's why my favorite author is Philip K. Dick! Because his theme is usually "WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?! HOW DO I LIFE?!"

• The Penguin speaks exactly like Donald Trump and is really concerned about putting a wall up around Miss Kitty's Home for Wayward Girls. This is lazy satire. I can't wait to get to the Prez story! That one will be full of brilliant satire! And Corndog Girl!

• Back in the past, Selina learns that she's not supposed to hate jerks who cut up your face with a box cutter. You're supposed to go, "You know what? I don't know why that bitch tried to kill me, so how can I judge?"

• Fuck you, Miss Kitty.

• The Penguin's plan is apparently to build a wall around Gotham City to keep out all the Narrows riff-raff and suburbanites. But he also plans to knock down Miss Kitty's Home for Wayward Girls! Selina was right! This election really does affect her and the things she cares about! I guess now she'll vote for The Penguin's opponent and he'll lose and everybody will celebrate the democratic process! Right?

• Constance Hill is The Penguin's opponent and she vows to do whatever it takes to beat The Penguin! So, like, she's going to campaign and shit? Or is vowing to do whatever it takes in front of Catwoman her whole plan? "Hey, Catwoman! We must win because I build bridges and not walls (I totally just made that up right now myself! So clever, right?! Okay fine! Somebody else said it first! But who can tell who, so it's kind of mine, right?!) So I'll do whatever it takes to win, if you get my meaning! Do you get my meaning? You're a thief. People steal elections? Do you need more hints?!"

• My guess is that Catwoman will discover an embarrassing thing about The Penguin (like how he's really still a big fat gay criminal!) and then expose the truth which will cause everybody to vote for Constance Hill in a landslide. As if voters care about truth!

Did Catwoman just give that guard a handy to get into the casino?! He doesn't look very pleased about it!

Batman is waiting for Catwoman in an empty room of the Iceberg Casino. He's also super jealous. He's all, "What took you so long? What are those stains on your gloves I'm picking up through my Bat-Semen-Detecting Goggles?!" Actually, it kind of looks like Catwoman's suit is covered in semen stains.

What's up with this suggestive dick-sucking framing?

• At first I thought Batman and Catwoman were working together on something. Why else would Batman be waiting for her inside the casino? It's the only thing that makes sense, right?! Nope. Batman is just trying to stop Catwoman from doing things Catwoman's way. AGAIN! Doesn't this fucking jerk get it yet? He might be able to control all the little orphans he adopts but why does he keep thinking he can tell a grown-ass woman how to live her life?! Why's he always trying to Daddy her? And I don't mean in a sexy way. Wait. Is it sexy to call some guy Daddy when you fuck him? Ugh. I think I'm going to throw up.

• Batman hands over some of The Penguin's recent real estate transactions because he somehow knows what Catwoman was after. That's disturbing. The only conclusion is that he's bugged her Catsuit or her vagina. And why did he even need to show up to hand over the documents? Couldn't Catwoman have done it herself? And if he was planning on helping her with the documents, why the fuck was he waiting for her inside the casino?! Now Penguin might be on alert because people broke into his place!

• I suppose it's possible Batman was in disguise as the guard who got the handy. That would explain the guard's sour expression. So risking meeting Catwoman inside the Iceberg was the only way to get the handy and get her the information!

• The next flashback makes it apparent that one of the horrible kids became Constance Hill. And that she also murdered another horrible kid so that she could take the girl's place in her upcoming adoption. Which would also explain why she doesn't want Miss Kitty's Home for Wayward Girls knocked down since they'll find the skeletal remains of her murder victim. So, once again, Catwoman was right because earlier she said she didn't trust Constance Hill, the perfect candidate!

• Is this story going to end with a big "VOTE FOR JILL STEIN!" banner?

• Catwoman has grown into her ability to jump to the perfect conclusion because as a kid, she was a complete fucking idiot. All of the evidence of murder were right in front of her and she couldn't put the pieces together. But when she sees one of The Penguin's henchmen fucking around outside Miss Kitty's and then sees he's running for mayor the next day, she immediately knows the two are connected!

• Now that Catwoman's an adult, she finally figures out the murder. You can't get anything past older Catwoman! Younger Catwoman though? Please. What an idiot!

• Catwoman breaks into the debates to destroy all of the candidates. She's in a hurry this time so she trades handies for kicks to the face and the tired old "cat got your tongue" line.

• Catwoman exposes Constance's decade old murder and Batman exposes The Penguin's shady real estate dealings and nobody becomes mayor. But Batman does get a good idea to make more money buying up properties!

• The story ends with Corndog Girl living in Miss Kitty's Home for Wayward Girls, for some reason. Continuity be damned! This probably works or something. Whatever, it's a segue!

• Next up is a Prez story by Mark Russell called "Trigger Warnings". Shouldn't there have been a Content Warning before using the term Trigger Warning?

• Remember when I said there would be brilliant satire in the Prez comic? I take that back! It's lacking in subtlety and the humor doesn't quite make up for the bluntness of the message. Maybe it was tweaked so that the typical voter would understand the message. What good is satire if audience bias can simply interpret the story however they want?

• So after the more guns is dangerous and confusing segment, we get the men discussing women's health issue bit.

It's still screaming to the choir but at least it's funnier.

• Juxtaposing the two issues of gun control and legislating women's bodies winds up being much smarter than I realized. Mostly because I'm stupid and stubborn. So when you write a story showing how dumb open and carry is and make it super obvious that it's dumb with a lot of dumb characters, I just want to think, "Duh! That's dumb!" But then when you sit the issue of guns and how many people die from them and how Congress will do nothing about it right up next to women's health issues like birth control and abortion, issues which Congress are stampeding to legislate, I finally see the genius of the story. Again, though, not like this isn't shit that isn't super obvious to the people who agree with it.

What?! But that sounds like a Win/Win Situation!

• After finishing the story, I'm super sorry that I ever doubted Mark Russell's ability due to the lack of subtlety in the gun nuts shooting up a burger joint scene! Everything wraps up in such a way that I'm super jealous of Mark Russell and might have to one day stalk him, kidnap him, and shove him in the well I've dug in the basement. Can people exist only on semen caught on their tongue like snowflakes?

The Ranking!
I'm not ranking this! Are you crazy?! It's a one-shot! It'll clutter up my rankings! Also, I forgot to add Nightwing to the list! I should fix that!

Aquaman #8

Dammit! I forgot to photoshop a long, stringy fish poop coming out of Aquaman's butt!

The Commentary!
This issue begins strangely enough that I had to put it down for a few seconds. Thankfully taking that momentary respite helped me clear my head and I quickly realized what was happening. See, the first page of this issue has a woman with a drop cloth on her head and huge baggy sleeves standing in front of an upside down tower called the Tower of Widowhood. Her outfit is bizarre! The drop cloth on her head with the pull ropes probably serves some function but the huge, baggy sleeves? How do those function underwater? Shouldn't they be floating all around her face and getting in the way? Oh! They're probably weighted, right? I bet a lot of Atlantean clothing is weighted in the hems. Otherwise everybody in a dress would be walking around like Marilyn Monroe in that movie where you almost get to see her vagina!

I was thinking about starting a line of motivational YOLO posters. They would all have a black border around a picture with big white block letters in the lower band of black that read YOLO. The images on the first two posters would be the picture of Marilyn Monroe found dead in her bed and the picture of James Dean's crashed car. I'm not sure how they would be motivational but then I can't be responsible for every little thing! I'm the idea person! I need somebody else to deal with the spin, the angry reaction, the fallout, and procuring the papers for my eventual change of identity!

Before headphones and reading books were invented, this was a woman's go-to universal sign for "Leave me alone."

Oh! Before I got sidetracked, I was going to point out how I realized this first page was the beginning of the ritual to determine if Mera's vagina is good enough for the King's Penis. How could it not be?! Mera manipulates water! Imagine what she could do to a man's prostate with her super powers!

So Mera has to attend a secret meeting of elderly Atlantean widows to prove her worth. I bet there aren't any rituals at all! I bet they just go into the Tower of Widowhood, where men aren't allowed, and just talk shit about all the patriarchal fuckery that takes place in the kingdom. The Widows will probably serve tea and biscuits and tell Mera if she ever has an issue with Arthur, she can go to them and they'll create trouble for the king. Not young people trouble like vandalism and violence. Old people trouble like crashing their giant seahorses into the front window of convenience stores and "accidentally" urinating in public, preferably around the King's Palace. Eventually a widow close to the King, probably some kind of adviser or seer, will point out that all of his troubles began when he refused to let Mera do something, or treated her poorly, or wasn't satisfying her needs. Then he'll change his behavior and suddenly all of the old women will revert back to being decent, continent citizens.

Meanwhile, some rough beast stomps toward Atlantis to remind people that it was once born.

Aquaman tries communicating with the monstrosity using his fish talking super powers for the first time in many, many months. The creature punches him in the face. I think either Aquaman is out of practice and said something rude, or the beast is from Krypton and is just saying hello.

The monster takes damage from the Atlantean's laser guns but only the first time. After that, it's immune to them. Then it gets stabbed by Aquaman's trident but just once before it's immune to it. Oh! Oh! I know what this disgusting brown sludge covered in seaweed is! It must be Doomsday's poo!

While Aquaman is being killed, Mera is failing her Royal Wifely Duty Classes.

The real test is whether or not Mera finds saving her husband's life more important than some stodgy old traditions. My guess is she rushes out to save Aquaman and forfeits the marriage. That way, DC Comics has a plot driven reason for keeping the two unwed. And neither one will care because they'll be all, "We really love each other and we don't have to prove that to anybody!" Too bad. I wanted Mera to have an army of widows at her command.

After all of the mud and seaweed are knocked off the monster attacking Atlantis, Aquaman realizes it's The Shaggy Man. Yep. That's one of Amazo's robots! I think. It has all the same properties as Doomsday but it doesn't need to die after every injury to overcome the method of attack. Come to think of it, The Shaggy Man may as well have killed Superman! That probably would have made a better story than some unknown alien from space who just looks cool and has an apocalyptic name.

I bet The Shaggy Man has never been defeated by a giant hand of water stroking him off after which he'd fall into a deep sleep, right? Or is that how they captured him last time? Maybe Mera can do that prostate thing I mentioned earlier?

The Shaggy Man is headed for Amnesty Bay and Atlantis just happens to be in its path. So while Aquaman was just sort of casually concerned before that it might destroy Atlantis, he's suddenly terrified when he learns it might destroy the town where his dog is living! I bet Arthur defeats it by impaling it on his lighthouse. That's not a euphemism. Unless it got you excited reading it. Then I guess it's an inadvertent euphemism and you can jerk to it if you want.

The Ranking!
+0! I think with this biweekly schedule, every so often a writer just has to present a story that's mostly a fist fight with no real plot progression. That's going to get old quick, especially when they all take place about the same time as seems to be happening the last few weeks.

Aquaman #7

When is the last time Aquaman spoke to fish? Has DC Comics told writers to move away from that because too many people were making too many fish fucking jokes?

The Commentary!
• This issue begins by introducing (or re-introducing. What am I? An Aquaman historian? I'd rather be Cullen Bunn's masturbation sock) a bunch of Atlantean politicians or bureaucrats as they request meetings with Aquaman. For some reason, they're bothering Mera with these requests and not Aquaman's royal aide. I highly doubt that's an effective use of the fiance of the king's time.

• For some reason, Jurok Byss, Keeper of the Monsters, has a Cockney accent. How does that happen in Atlantis? Is he like Aquaman? Born on land and only recently returned to the sea? What are the chances a Cockney accent developed in Atlantis as well as in Britain? Do they also have rhyming slang?! I wonder if there's a sea creature that rhymes with barn owl?

• Instead of meeting with the jerks who want to use up all of his free time, Aquaman decides to show Mera his Justice League Identity Card. Are those really necessary? This was Lex Luthor's idea, wasn't it? And I bet Batman was all, "Oh, hey! That's a great idea! Maybe we should also have a Justice League VIP Area for members worth billions of dollars!" Then he and Lex fist bumped and bro chest banged and said the secret rich man phrase which is...oh no! I'm not going to spill the beans. I've spilled enough beans in my life. Although if somebody wants to send me the secret rich man phrase in a private message, I'll send it back to you and we can be best friends!

• The Justice League Identity Card is also a key to use the Watchtower Teleport System. That's probably an important plot point that readers should remember for later. I bet somemanta steals it later!

• After getting the pertinent plot point foreshadowing out of the way, Aquaman decides to do some kingly business and meet with people of lesser stature so he can put them in their places.

Ha ha! Get out of here, you racist! Come back after you've tried being a Werewolf for a week!

• Aquaman eschews the bureaucratic nonsense in order to speak with Murk. I hope I used eschew right! If it's a sex word, I apologize to my younger readers for destroying their innocence! If it's not, I apologize to everybody else for using it incorrectly!

• Murk has returned from the scene of the Pontchartrain sinking where he discovered a whole bunch of clues as to who sank it!

Oh come on! If surface dwellers wanted it to look like Atlanteans did this, they would have "deliberately placed" helmets that weren't fitted with scuba gear! So it's obvious that rogue Atlanteans deliberately placed these modified helmets to make it look like surface dwellers were trying to make it look like Atlanteans were behind the attack! Duh!

• Unless of course that means...no, you know what? There's no reason to go spiraling into crazy logic time. In this case, it's obvious that the obvious is too obvious to be that obvious! In conclusion, it was definitely Atlanteans who attacked the ship! Unless Dan Abnett just assumed readers of Aquaman comics are complete morons. Then maybe I should take this scene at face value and believe that the attackers who planted material to make people think one thing fucked up and planted material that would reveal it was a total con job.

• Meanwhile in Venice, Black Manta lets the other members of N.E.M.O. know that he's now The Fisher King and he'll be their leader, no matter how fucking ridiculous he looks in that stupid helmet and skin tight body suit. Some people don't like the idea and Manta kills them. He should have also declared, while stabbing them in their revolting (double meaning!) faces that N.E.M.O. now stands for "Never Eschew Manta's Orders!" I guess then it would be N.E.M.O!, right?

• Aquaman, using the clues he got from Murk, decides to ask a Deluge prisoner if the Deluge were behind the attack. See?! He came to the same conclusion I came to! That it must have been disgruntled Atlanteans who staged the attack! Which is worrying because it means I'm thinking like Aquaman! Now I'm worried I might stick my dick in a fish tank.

• The Deluge prisoner is all, "I may be a murderer and a killer and a racist, but I'm not a liar!" Then he calls Aquaman a half-breed which is a lot like Republican Talking Heads calling Obama a thug. Actually, it's not quite as bad because we all know that thug is now the acceptable way to say nigger. Or at least racists think they're talking in code when they say thug. It's like stoners who still think 420 is a clever way to identify themselves as boring assholes.

• Rath, the Deluge prisoner, says everything he does is in the name of Atlantis. He refuses to follow the orders of a "half-breed" king because, I guess, he feels it weakens Atlantis. But then he's happy to hear that somebody is using the name of the Deluge to try to start a war between the surface world and Atlantis. Wouldn't that be harmful to Atlantis? If he's pro-Atlantis and not just anti-Aquaman, why would he want a war that could bring so much death and destruction to his precious city? The only reason he wants a war is so that the Deluge can blame Obamaman for doing a poor job. He and the Deluge don't give a shit for Atlantis. Some patriot!

• Rath eventually admits he would help stop a war that might hurt Atlantis but he doesn't know anything. He does admit to Aquaman that he doesn't like him because he doesn't value the traditions of Atlantis. I can see that point being that Aquaman is from the surface world. He might be half-Atlantean, but he certainly doesn't know much about Atlantean traditions. He should probably make a concerted effort to immerse himself in the lore and traditions of Atlantis before simply shrugging them all aside and declaring they're stupid because he has no connection to them. He really hasn't tried to fit in, has he?

• As you can tell from my use of the word "Obamaman", you can tell that this interaction between Rath and Arthur is heavily influenced by the way some conservatives seem to have a ready criticism for anything Obama does, especially the talking heads who make a shit ton of money from this viewpoint who then convince their audience of the same things. But in this case, Rath does have a point. He makes it poorly by calling Arthur a half-breed since that points out that possibly the only reason the Deluge hate him is because of his parentage. But the bigger point obfuscated by the racial hatred is that Aquaman doesn't really know much about the traditions of Atlantis and he doesn't seem to have much time for learning about them. He spends most of his time on the surface world with the Justice League. Arthur could make a lot of headway by showing that he's trying to fit in with their traditions. It looks like he might soon insist on Mera going through the ceremonial ritual of proving she's a worthy Xebel. Even though that seems pretty racist and misogynist. Maybe he could start with something less icky.

• Mera actually decides she wants to go through the rituals. That probably makes it less icky. Plus, I mean, when has Mera ever been defeated by anything? I just hope one of the challenges isn't the Challenge of the Clitoridectomy! Judging by Mera's casual attitude to the potential rituals, I have a feeling they might not be far off from my disgusting joke.

• N.E.M.O. is behind the attack on the Portwhatever. Why did the battleship have to have such a foreign name?! I can hardly spell "foreign"! How am I supposed to spell that other thing?! America should really stick to more American sounding battleship names. Like the USS Hotdog or the USS Loveless Marriage or the USS Dirty Sanchez. To keep Arthur from discovering their organization, Black Manta has decided to unleash a distraction! He's either going to question Aquaman's birth certificate or unleash one of Professor Ivo's robots on Atlantis.

• Aquaman continues his investigation using informants and resources he's gathered over his short New 52 career. He reaches out to Reagan and Arni, FBI Agents who are total fangenders of his. They have information about the underground world of ocean scavenging that might help lead him to whoever destroyed that battleship with the complicated French name. He's all, "This is Aquaman! I need you!" And Reagan is all, "It's true! He can cause floods!"

• N.E.M.O. unleashes some gigantic, monstrous underwater Incredible Sea-Thing. Remember that part about me not being an Aquaman scholar?! I don't know what this thing is! But apparently it used to live in Atlantis before it was buried for its own good. And by "its own good," I actually mean the good of everybody else, probably. So I don't know why I said the first thing. I should try to write more clearly.

The Ranking!
+1! Aquaman is a stupid hero but Dan Abnett is doing a good job telling the story of a stupid hero. So I don't mind reading this!

Aquaman #6

Mera is the most powerful hero in this fight because even Kryptonians get dehydrated.

The Facts!
• Aquaman and Mera have gone nuts and decided to defeat America single-handed. Or is that double-handed since there are two of them? How did I already get distracted by a digression in just the second sentence?

• It's not that Aquaman and Mera wanted to defeat the United States. It's just that the United States government didn't give them much choice. Everybody knows that if the federal government says, "You're under arrest," it's your duty as a responsible citizen to respond, "No, you're under arrest!" Then you scream about fascism and oppression as you're put in a choke-hold and wrestled to the ground. Except Mera and Aquaman were too strong to be wrestled to the ground by the entire Marine Corps. So the president got on the phone and called in Superman to rough up Aquaman and teach him a thing or two about the scam known as "resisting arrest".

• Anybody who has ever been arrested and their only charge was "resisting arrest" should be able to sue their law enforcement agency who arrested them. If I'm charged with resisting arrest, I'd better fucking be charged with something else which would be the arrest I was resisting. There's no fucking way anybody should ever be brought in simply for "resisting arrest." How about a little honesty, Law Enforcement Dickheads? Just call it what it actually is. "Arrested Because the Officer Felt Disrespected For the Slightest of Reasons."

• Superman tells Aquaman that "whatever this is, it's got to end, right here and now." Who died and made you...oh yeah! New 52 Superman died! But never mind that! Why does Superman think he's the arbiter of what can and can't happen? What if Eclipso had been all, "Whoa whoa whoa! You can't explode The Eradicator on the moon! You'll ruin the environment for my Moon Cows!" I'm sure Superman wouldn't have appreciated that since Superman didn't start the fight. Shouldn't Superman be directing his speech to the Marines? Shouldn't he be telling them that whatever this is, it ends now? They're the aggressors! Aquaman was just an innocent king trying to go home when America was all, "Just a second, sonny!" Superman does know that the person winning the fight isn't always the person responsible for the fight, right?

Holy shit. I agree with Aquaman.

• Superman responds by saying, "Oh yeah? You don't think I know what's going on? I'm Superman, bitch! I know this shit is about to escalate into World War Bore! That's what I call a land versus sea battle because who cares! What I'm trying to say here, Arthur, is that I'm talking to you because you're the only reasonable person in this conflict! The U.S. Government is already chanting 'Remember the Pontchartrain! Remember the Pontchartrain!" which, to be honest, is a pretty shitty chant. They really should give their battleships names that flow better and don't sound so foreign when used in a chant to get people's patriotic blood boiling. And I'm not talking to Mera because, frankly, she scares the kryptonite out of me. So fucking listen to me and knock this shit off before this escalation escalates!"

• And then Superman does something that Superman will live to regret until the day everybody stops laughing about how Aquaman laid him out in one punch: he puts his hand on Aquaman. When I turn the page, I hope Arthur lays out Clark in one punch or else my previous statement will be faulty.

Whew! Still a Grandmaster Comic Book Reader! Sometimes I worry I'm losing it!

• I didn't know Atlanteans were so flexible! Aquaman would be great at Butt-Boob Showcases!

• Aquaman's frustration at being the laughingstock of the Justice League comes out and he begins beating the shit out of Superman. This is like that time I finally rose up against the brutal regime of my sister when she switched the television from MTV showing Lionel Richie's video of "Hello"! Sometimes enough is more than fucking enough!

• Superman suddenly wants to show that the members of the Justice League don't believe they're above the law by helping detain Aquaman via the quite suspect Patriot Act. That's funny, Superman. I don't seem to recall you interfering with Batman while he constantly breaks the law in Gotham City with his vigilante justice. I'm starting to see who's getting their dick sucked in the oval office this term. And who's doing the super sucking.

• Tula and the Atlantean army arrive to help rescue their king. But they don't attack immediately because they're not Americans. I mean violent animals. Was that redundant? Superman mostly decides that Atlantis not attacking might be good enough for now. But he still decides to be a dick about it.

Or else what?! Fuck off, Superman! This is why Lawful Good people suck. Because they're just as prone to commit violence as a Chaotic Evil person. It's just they feel justified by their righteousness.

• Meanwhile, Black Manta kills The Fisherman and takes over NEMO. So I guess NEMO is no longer interested in world conquest. It's Aquaman killing time!

• Aquaman swims back to Atlantis while the United States sits and fumes. Now they're probably pissed at Superman too! How dare he stand in the way of America when they're spending billions of dollars and risking thousands of lives to get revenge over what amounts to a negligible slight in the glint in the eye of history! How is America supposed to feel catharsis if they can't throw a huge tantrum which results in the death of hundreds of thousands of people?! It's not fair, Superman! It's just not fair!

• Apparently Aquaman now has to fix relations with America or else!

My Super Secret Opinions!
I wish Superman and Aquaman would just fuck already.

Ranking: +1!

Suicide Squad Special: War Crimes #1

Hopefully this image is literal.

The Things!
• I know I rave about Ostrander's run on the Suicide Squad from nearly thirty years ago but I'm not ready for this. I'm not ready to be disappointed by Ostrander's new interpretation of the team. I didn't mind being disappointed by The Others when it was written by Ostrander because The Others were terrible. Hmm. Maybe that's how I can get around not feeling disappointed! Since most of The Suicide Squad's since Ostrander's run have been terrible (or interesting but a bit confusing and cut short, like Giffen's run), I can just read this as if it were another disappointing attempt at making the team work again. And then if it isn't disappointing, I can be surprised and relieved! Although then I'll just be disappointed that Ostrander isn't writing the Squad regularly anymore. Either way, it seems like this is going to leave me feeling terrible.

• One thing I might be able to count on, especially since this is called "War Crimes", is an actual story and sensible plot. Ostrander always seemed to be able to come up with a plot that would work on its own without involving the team. He didn't begin the story from the point of view that he was writing a Suicide Squad story. He would come up with an actual plot that could be an international incident and then explode that plot by having a bunch of chaotic jackasses in charge of solving it.

• The story begins with a guy named Mr. Secretary being kidnapped by Suicide Squad Europe. That's a weird name: Mr. Secretary! I wonder if that's Greek?

• The European version of the Suicide Squad is called Strikeforce Europa which proves Europeans aren't too smart. You're supposed to be secret so that other governments can't tie you to them! It's not like America created Task Force America! The "X" variable is the important part of the name! You should be Strikeforce Zed! Of course, Strikeforce Europa might want everybody to know exactly on whose behalf they're committing international crimes. Besides, who is behind some organization named Europa anyway?! The European Union itself? Just one or two European countries? The organizers of Eurovision?

• Strikeforce Europa is kidnapping Mr. Secretary because they want to try him for war crimes. That's well and good but don't you think, Strikeforce Europa, that maybe you're going to be in a little bit of hot water for killing all of Mr. Secretary's bodyguards and press secretaries? It's going to be hard to get other people to side with your righteousness when they realize you've killed several innocent people just doing their jobs. Sure, this Mr. Secretary may have committed some war crimes which you'd like to see him brought to justice for on an international stage. But at this point, it would have been better just to shoot him in the head as opposed to letting the only guy you suspect of war crimes live while killing everybody around him.

• Amanda Waller lets the Suicide Squad know that they'll be off to deal with this situation. Amanda points out Mr. Secretary is definitely guilty so it's kind of a problem for the United States that he'll be put on public trial for his crimes. And since the government can't invade The Netherlands where he's been taken, it's up to the Suicide Squad to sneak in and rescue him. Or, more probably, just kill him.

• So far this story is just an excuse to have the Suicide Squad battle Strikeforce Europa. The rest of the story is pretty flimsy!

"To Barney" in Australian means to discuss Franz Kafka's longer works over coffee and doughnuts.

• Amanda explains that the leader of Strikeforce Europa, Angel, kidnapped Mr. Secretary on her own initiative and that her superiors are upset. That sounds like just the kind of thing superiors say to distance themselves from some underling's terrible and murderous actions!

• Amanda also explains that Mr. Secretary's crew who were killed were all ex-military guys working for a private security company operating in the Gulf. Which means none of them were probably innocent so I retract my complaint about them being killed. They probably deserved it!

• I'm sorry! Nobody deserves to be killed in a random terrorist attack! I mean, some people might deserve it a little more than other people, but nobody really deserves it! That blood-lust was just my Liberal Hate Rage showing.

• Strikeforce Europa has five members and the Suicide Squad has six. So maybe Strikeforce Europa has a secret member to make the match-up even? Or maybe Mad Dog is planning on betraying the Squad?

• Here's the probably match-ups: Angel versus Harley; Lionheart versus Deadshot; Guerrieroa versus Captain Boomerang; Kavga versus Diablo; and Rick Flag versus Schatten. Unless Mad Dog will battle Schatten and Rick Flag will battle the mysterious sixth member of Strikeforce Europa!

• The Squad have a three minute window to grab Mr. Secretary while he's being transported from his cell to his trial. Amanda has a plan but Plan A always goes tits up. So mostly the Squad will probably just be winging it. I mean, they have to battle Strikeforce Europa before securing Mr. Secretary and that should take longer than three minutes.

• At least they got right to the meat of the book! Although Floyd and Flag are missing. I smell Plan A in action!

• Lawton and Rick have managed to get jobs as security escorting Mr. Secretary. So while the rest of the Squad distract Strikeforce Europa, they begin murdering all of the security personnel escorting Mr. Secretary. Now can I complain about innocent people just doing their jobs getting killed for this prick Mr. Secretary? Or am I supposed to believe that the Hague has hired Mr. Secretary's security force to transport him from prison and that they can all speak Dutch and that Mr. Secretary doesn't recognize any of them?

• After Mr. Secretary is secure, the rest of the Squad are told to scarper. That's Australian for "go by the store and grab a gallon of milk, a stick of butter, and a loaf of bread."

I'm so used to nobody dying in this comic book I forgot about this option for Mad Dog!

• According to the staples, I am exactly halfway through the comic book and it's told the story I was expecting it to tell. So it looks like it's one of those spy thrillers where the initial problem is solved early so that a new problem can crop up and make a headache for everybody. I suppose the new issue will be Strikeforce Europa attacking the Suicide Squad in the United States. I don't really care what happens to Mr. Secretary at this point. The Squad may as well kill him since they really only needed to keep him from embarrassing the United States government.

• Oh. I should have turned the page before assuming that the Squad escaped after Mad Dog's head blew off. Apparently it's just gone into the chase scene part of the thriller.

• But the secret sixth member appears: Shado! Although now that means Strikeforce Europa has too many members for a fair fight! Unless Guerrieroa was killed by Mad Dog's neck bomb. That would be acceptable.

• "Hey, John? I see you want me to draw a car flipping over from an arrow in the front tire? I don't know if that would really...." "I'm fucking John Ostrander, bitch! You draw what I write, you piece of fucking shit amateur!"

• Shado is actually an independent mercenary working for Black Mountain. I guess Mr. Secretary hadn't signed the checks yet for the last month. Otherwise why would they care if he was killed? I'm sure Mr. Secretary's secretary could run the company.

• Shado escapes with Mr. Secretary by helicopter as the Squad's diversion team follow after. Flag and Lawson (who is unconscious and probably dead because--Remember!--motorcycles are for organ donors, kids!

• Strikefore Europa all arrive at the scene in their own cars. I think that's...adorable? Also, um, a waste of gas, of course!

• Captain Boomerang mentions how the whole mission is "right in the crapper--right on schedule." Just like I said! As if I held some spectacular title or something?

• Captain Boomerang knocks the helicopter out of the sky in a way that I don't feel I need to complain about because did you see the way the car flipped? What the hell kind of physics class were being given in the seventies? Unless Ostrander took physics in the sixties! I don't know how old he is! Plus, I mean, the helicopter thing is totally what would happen! Maybe the boomerang remaining in control and on trajectory under the downward thrust of the rotors might not be correct. But that's really being picky and I'm not smart enough to be that picky! I'm just smart enough to know that blowing a front tire on a moving car will not cause it to flip directly over like a bike with a broom handle stuck in the spokes.

• My initial match-ups are all screwed up because the line-ups have changed drastically. Harley Quinn is even battling Shado who wasn't even an option at the beginning! So basically it's just a huge melee now.

• Somehow Mr. Secretary survives the helicopter crash. I guess people just survive helicopter crashes in Suicide Squad stories. It's becoming their thing!

• The Suicide Squad manage to escape leaving Strikeforce Europa chomping at the bitch for a rematch.

• Wait. Did I get that saying right?

• When the Squad returns to U.S. soil, Amanda shoots Mr. Secretary in the back. The Squad is all, "WTF?!" And Amanda is all, "Reasons!" And that's it!

The Review!
You know what? I'm not disappointed at all! This story isn't going to change the face of comic books but it took a standard Suicide Squad story and mixed it up a little bit. Ultimately, it all went as any Suicide Squad fan would have expected. I guess Waller shooting the guy who we all knew had to be killed anyway was a twist. Or was it? I mean, Waller loves to shoot dicks when she gets a chance. The characterizations were familiar and I like a Squad that ultimately understands that they need to work as a team, no matter how insecure the writer feels about the audience buying it. This was like a glimpse into Ostrander's old days. Deadshot and Flag in control and taking the mission seriously. A loose cannon clown (previously it was two clowns, Punch and Jewelee). And Boomerang being a dick and getting somebody killed on purpose for the lolz. I thought I would be disappointed either way this turned out but I forgot it could turn out this way: good enough to be enjoyed but nothing revolutionary that made me think, "Why the fuck isn't Ostrander the permanent writer on this thing?!"

Aquaman #5

At first I thought the soldiers were named after various whiskies but then I saw "Eltaeb" and I thought, "Oh! These must be soldiers who graduated from the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley!"

The Review!
In this issue, Aquaman and Mera prove to the United States government that they shouldn't go to war with Atlantis. Two Atlanteans (well, one and a Xenian or whatever) basically dismantle the entire marine corps during their escape from the detention cell where Arthur was being held for resisting arrest or terrorism or looking at the president side-eyed. Events have completely spiraled out of control to a point well past my usual limits of credulity (even for a comic book!). But for some reason, I don't really mind. Aquaman is finding out how America tends to go crazy when too many people say the word terrorism. And Atlantis isn't really known for their patience or reluctance to mobilize for war. So every event is doubling down on the initial misunderstanding and it all stemmed from Black Manta's attack on the Atlantean Embassy. He must be pretty damn proud! What I'm trying to say is Dan Abnett's telling an enjoyable Aquaman story that could maybe use less troops attacking Aquaman and less Mera going directly to the belief that her marriage is over before it begun. This isn't about your future nuptials, Mera! This is an international incident!

The Commentary!
Sometimes when I complain about a comic book, I complain about the writer's decisions. And other times, I complain as if the character were making stupid mistakes and completely ignore the writer's involvement. I like myself best when I'm pretending to be unaware of the artists behind the art. I like to get so wrapped up in a comic book that I scream at Aquaman when he does something stupid (almost always) rather than let Aquaman off the hook and blame the writer behind his actions. Plus I probably shouldn't be so mean to people just trying to earn a living when they're obviously struggling so hard to be competent at their work. I'm not naming any specific Cullen Bunns here! I mean names! This revelation is more about me anyway. I should be a kinder person! It's okay to mock Aquaman as much as I like (which is really, really, really, really a lot!) but I probably shouldn't enjoy mocking the struggling artists giving about 30% of their all to entertain the masses. Seriously though! Why should I expect them to give 100%?! I can hardly ever muster 100% even for things I'm enthusiastic about!

Last issue, Aquaman was trying to solve problems by diplomacy. But his main problem with solving this problem diplomatically is that he's trying to use diplomacy with the United States of America. Their entire playbook for diplomacy involves making power plays. The number one rule when America goes into a diplomatic situation is to make sure the other person knows who is in charge! Aquaman was playing by their rules for the most part, allowing them to prove they're in charge by locking him up so they can exhibit the only other part of their diplomatic plan: control! First you show people who is in charge! Then you control the entire situation and shit all over the word compromise! It might not make you the most likeable or seemingly intelligent country on the block but it definitely lines your pockets with the lunch money of all those other nerd countries.

Aquaman was playing the part like a great king does. He bent over at all the right times and he spread his ass cheeks at just the right time and he made sure to keep saying America's name in pleasurable moans. The American government was confused by his willingness to submit because that screws up most of their power play. When they bump against some Atlantean squirt at the bar, they hope the Atlantean squirt will say something like "Excuse me!" or "Oh, sorry I was standing here!" that will give America a reason to bust their chops. Hell, even just looking annoyed that America bumped them and caused them to spill their drink is reason enough to invade the fuck out somebody. So when Aquaman just kept taking it without giving America a reason to get violent, they weren't sure what to do next. Luckily they had a plan! Bump into Mera!

Mera, of course, is no Aquaman. She does not bend over. She does not spread her ass cheeks. What she does do is immediately being buckling the strap on because she's about to do some good old fashion pegging on America! She immediately flips the fuck out and breaks Aquaman out of prison. America breathes a sigh of relief because they know how to handle this kind of terrorist uprising! They send the entire military to meet Aquaman and Mera as they try to escape the detention center to kill the fuck out Aquaman and Mera. Yay America. Yay. Ya...oh god. I'm so sorry, the rest of the world! I'm so fucking sorry! Most of us can't apologize enough for the twats running the show and their obsequious lackeys coming in their pants at the thought of dropping bombs or long, protracted invasions.

Mera is strapped on and ready to teach the Marines a new tactic.

Mera throws a tank at a helicopter and half the marines shit themselves. But Aquaman makes sure to save everybody who should be dead due to Mera's wrath. Luckily for the marines, he believes in non-violent solutions. Or, at least, non-lethal solutions! It's not like he's going to try to stop Mera from punching every single one of them in their stupid faces. I mean, he eventually drags her away but he seems to take his time.

It would be nice to imagine this as a fictional, hyperbolic attitude of the government of the United States, wouldn't it?

I realize I'm being too hard on these fictional government entities (and by extension, the non-fictional ones) when the Chief of Staff points out that Aquaman is the least important member of the Justice League and just the fish guy. This guy is actually all right and I'm beginning to see his point that Aquaman needs to be killed.

Although I think I'm being way too lenient on the marines! Who are these guys who just unthinkingly follow orders?! Man, it must be such a sweet life! You never have to worry about your own ethics or desires! You never have to worry about being responsible for anything (until somebody higher up needs a patsy, of course!). You can just sit back, shoot whomever you're told to shoot, and collect that sweet, sweet government paycheck! And now you don't even need to worry so much about horrible civilian attitudes coming back from war like in the Vietnam days! People are wearing shirts that say shit like "Home of the Free Because of the Brave" and think of every soldier as a hero and sing songs like "Freedom isn't free!" And nobody ever argues how those attitudes are harmful because you can't have a thoughtful conversation about patriotism and imperialism and warmongering without coming off as unsympathetic of the plight of the soldier in this day and age. I will say this though about that stupid fucking t-shirt I mentioned: if you think America is free due to our overseas violence, you're probably a moron.

On minor disagreement and Mera goes straight to the wedding being off!

I realize calling people who believe something other than I do a moron isn't ever helpful. But sometimes a person just becomes exhausted with everybody who thinks they're smart or hold well-considered opinions but they just aren't and they just don't. And anything I say will just produce the exact result from the other side, where I'm called a moron because I might think that doing nothing after 9/11 would have been better for the world than demanding more blood from any country we could paint as the source of the problem. Just looking at it from the American side alone and ignoring any casualties from other countries, we would have had far less American deaths from 9/11 had we reacted less violently. Rushing out and murdering other people because some of us were murdered is gangland tactics. Protecting citizens from another catastrophe like this? That's what governments are supposed to do.

I've said enough! This is about that fish guy and not about pissing off my dumb-dumb conservative readership!

Meanwhile in Atlantis, Tula, the current regent while Arthur is above water, decides de-escalation is what is called for in this trying time! But then she gets a report that the United States military is trying to kill their King and his fiance and Tula decides maybe de-de-escalation is the better way to go!

I think this situation is properly fubared. Which is probably why the president calls in Superman to handle the situation. Although, judging from Superman's past, this encounter isn't exactly going to break out in an intelligent conversation.

Aquaman #4

Poseidon loves to cup a good ball sack.

The Review!
So Dan Abnett is writing a decent Aquaman comic book. It's even better than decent if you can stomach reading about Aquaman and even better than better than decent if you love international diplomacy stories! And if you enjoy the corpses of American servicemen being eaten by sharks, well have I got a fucking cherry on top for you! Seriously though. I don't think I made fun of Aquaman once during this commentary! I mean, I probably did. But I didn't thoroughly enjoy it like I usually do. I was probably thinking, "Why am I being so mean when Aquaman is just trying to do the right thing?" No wait. I was thinking, "I hope Aquaman spanks Mera's naked bottom next issue for being so naughty!"

The Commentary!
Every day I think, "This is the day I'm going to sit down and really take a good whack at the comic book stack! I can get on a roll and write five or six reviews, maybe read a few old New Titans, call Deathstroke 'Douchéstork' a few times, and answer one or two asks as sarcastically as possible!" Then I sit down, check Twitter, get annoyed by the morons I know on Facebook, sigh, and go play the Xbox for six hours. Partially that's because I had a stressful work week. Owning your own business sometimes comes with having to do work things during times not allocated for work! I know. It's fucking ridiculous. You'd think that by owning your own business, you could just goof around all day telling other people to get to work. I suppose I need more employees than just me for that to happen though. But then, who wants to work with other people? They're all fucking ridiculous!

On the plus side, I got to meet Old Man Roger on Wednesday. He retired from the floor cleaning supplies retail business twenty years ago. He sold me a used floor buffer for three hundred dollars which is far less than I thought I was going to have to pay when my old one broke down on Sunday night. He also tried to sell me a scrubber, another buffer, a broom, his garage, and I think his granddaughter. If I had known he had so many things and people to sell, I would have made some room in the work van before driving out to where he lived at Bumfuck Farms. I will say one of those things he offered me really made my dick hard. But for $1700, I just couldn't justify buying another floor scrubber.

Last issue, Aquaman was arrested by the US Government for being a boring idiot. Mera tried to get him to argue but he was all, "Shh, Mera. You know they're right." He then went quietly to jail. I'm surprised he didn't keep yelling, "Diplomatic immunity!" Maybe that doesn't work anymore now that anybody can be held for any reason, as long as a white person thinks they're a terrorist.

Maybe if you tightened up your material. I mean, seriously, a turbot? Nobody is laughing at the mention of a turbot. Maybe if it were a sight gag, sure! But you're just confusing land dwellers with the word.

Aquaman wants the relationship between Atlantis and the United States of America to work out so badly that he makes a huge mistake. He allows the government to detain him without any proper procedure at all! A battleship is sunk by people who are probably of the Atlantean race and it's automatically an act of war and a reason to detain the leader of the foreign power? We all see how ridiculous that is, right? I mean, it makes for a good story in that it allows Aquaman to play the stoic, righteous man trying to retain his dignity in the face of incompetence and paranoia! But it's still stupid.

Mera gets on her shell phone (I stole that joke from a ceramic mermaid in a toilet paper commercial! Unless the commercial is for an Audi or cat food. I'm terrible at remembering the brands attached to advertisements!) to call Atlantis and bitch about how the US is fucking Aquaman. I was going to say she's on the phone "bitching," but I realized that's totally...oh wait! I did say "bitch". Never mind.

Tula is on the other end of the shell trying to calm Mera down. You know Tula! It's Aquagirl! Her Rebirth outfit is yellow and green because Aquaman must have ordered her to look more ridiculous than he does. Tula is currently regent of Atlantis which means she's in charge but people totally roll their eyes when she gives a command. So many magistrates and officials under her are making jerk-off hand motions whenever she gives an order that they've created a tsunami that will probably wipe out the Canary Islands. That could probably be an apocalyptic coal mine joke if you wanted it to be.

Tula is having trouble with the people of Atlantis because they're demanding Tula do something about Aquaman's captivity. How do they know about it already?! These things need to be handled discreetly, Tula! No wonder you'll never be more than a regent! While discussing the situation with Mera, Tula says, about being on land, "I remember cotton candy, the best thing ever." Dan Abnett included that because it's the kind of stupid cute shit the young people like. "Oh my god! Tula loves cotton candy! It's totally canon! I'm screaming!" I'm just saddened by the thought because she can never enjoy cotton candy under the sea.

Murk and the Drift investigate the scene of the sunken American battleship. It's pretty cool because there are dead soldiers everywhere and sharks swimming around eating their dicks. That was a reference to a previous commentary. Try to keep up! I do that sometimes because I only ever read the things I write. You won't get any tired Biblical allegories out of me! No way! It's all self-referential masturbatory bullshit up in here!

While Murk is investigating, he waits around too long because that adds to the drama.

It would be a boring comic book if Murk and the Drift hadn't been sighted by the military!

Murk engages in combat with the military while saying incriminating things like, "We are discovered!" and "Americans can suck my nuts!" He really isn't a very good diplomat. Although who hasn't yelled "Americans can suck my nuts!" one or two times in their life? Per week, I mean.

Meanwhile, Black Manta is flying around in a NEMO airplane called an Albatross. It's called that because that's a sea bird and it glides for long stretches of time without having to land. That's the totality of my knowledge of albatrosses unless you want me to start singing Iron Maiden. Black Manta learns that NEMO stands for "Nautical Enforcement of Macrocosmic Order" which is stupid because all comic book acronyms are ultimately stupid. That's because they're made up after the fact. You want an organization that revolves around conquest of the oceans? How about NEMO! You want an organization that has eyes everywhere? ARGUS! You want an organization the you're too stupid to think up words to fit the acronym? NOWHERE! You want an organization that both hides in the shadows and casts its shadow across the world? SHADE! You want an organization for a science and research lab that's actually a pretty fucking good one and not surprising DC has used it for so long? STAR Labs!

Black Jack lets Black Manta know that she isn't appropriating the term "black" at all because she's probably got some African ancestors five or six generations back. She also lets him know that NEMO has been controlling the oceans since 1983. So Pre-crisis! I think she also almost reveals that their leader is Ocean Master. She calls him the Fisher King so it's either him or Jesus. Or maybe a third person I haven't thought of yet. Like maybe Fisherman? I could see why they might want to update his super villain name to Fisher King! I mean, Fisherman? Somebody pulled a paycheck thinking up that one?

Back at the White House, some high-minded official decides to threaten to arrest Mera which is exactly the wrong move if you want things to go peacefully but totally the right move if this is a comic book. And it is a comic book, so good writing, Dan Abnett! More drama is about to ensue as Mera breaks Arthur out of his holding cell just as he's about to talk his way out diplomatically. Oh Mera! You're such a red-headed female! I mean, you're passionate! I don't know why I said those other stereotypical things. I just meant she's a total individual and she could have been meek or passionate even with red hair but she wound up being passionate!

See? Like I said! Passionate!

Aquaman and Mera break out of the holding facility to find themselves surrounded by a good percentage of the United States military. Well, it was a good attempt, Mera. It's just that usually when people attempt something and fail, it doesn't wind up starting a war.

Aquaman #3

Who the hell is this? Black Womanta?!

The Review!
Black Manta is still relevant to this story which is a shame. I liked how it ended between him and Aquaman in Issue #2. I thought Dan Abnett was just getting the Black Manta shit out of the way and putting it up in the attic until somebody with a serious lack of imagination began writing this comic book. But I think Black Manta either became part of the B Plot, or N.E.M.O. is working with the Deluge to fuck up Atlantis's relationship with the surface world. It's probably all part of the same attack to discredit Aquaman and to have more conservative thinking Atlanteans take control of Atlantis. They'll close the borders and probably start destroying every ship sailing on every ocean. At least if that happens, Aquaman will no longer be a laughingstock. He'll simply be hated and despised by everybody! I think that's a step up, right?

The Commentary!
Aquaman finally dealt with Black Manta in a way that eventually won't fucking matter anyway because they're mortal enemies! Right now, Black Manta may have calmed down because Aquaman showed himself to be the bigger man. But eventually, he's going to sit and stew in his resentment and anger until his head is ready to explode! Then he'll put on his stupid fucking helmet and get back on his Aquaman killing hobbyhorse. It might actually happen even sooner because Black Manta never made it to prison last issue. Plus he's on the cover this issue. Unless that's Black Womanta on the cover. I can't tell and I guess it's really none of my business anyway! It's not like I'm trying to fuck him! Or her!

This issue is called "Capitol Crimes" which is completely confusing. Is it a pun that I don't understand? Perhaps Black Manta is going to attack Congress? I assume the enemy of this story will still be Black Manta because I saw the cover and because this is Part Three of "The Drowning". I don't think embassies are included in the definition of a capitol building, are they? If so, that would totally make sense and everybody is probably calling me a piece of shit dumbass right now! Also they might be calling me that because I'm just too stupid to understand why this story is called "Capitol Crimes"! Maybe it'll make sense when I read it!

Currently Commander Murk and the other Atlanteans have been locked out of Spindrift Station. I guess their diplomatic immunity doesn't allow them access to sites of terrorist attacks, even if that site is officially Atlantean territory.

You know what I'm realizing? I probably shouldn't have skipped every day in Civics in 12th Grade except for the day my teacher showed Soylent Green!

I dare any one of these soldiers to snicker at Aquaman now! I mean, they have good reason! Look at that stupid orange and green suit! Did he get fashion advice from a Clown Fish?!

Mera feels the same way about Aquaman's outfit. You can tell because she called her Aquawoman costume "humiliating". But even after telling her fiance that he looks foolish, she still expects him to fuck her! Who does she think she is? Some gorgeous mermaid who can probably manipulate the water molecules in the prostate to make a man come like he's never come before? Oh, right! That is who she is!

Aquaman plans on taking a trip to Washington, DC, with Mera so they can get their embassy back online. But the woman who kidnapped Black Manta has other plans! I bet one of those plans is revealing that her name is Black Womanta!

Black Jack?! So not clever!

Black Jack wants Black Manta to work for N.E.M.O. It must stand for Now Employing Murderers Only! Or maybe something about underwater work. Black Jack wants to hire Black Manta to kick ass. During the interview, she even lets him kill two of her current employees. That's poor negotiating tactics because now she just needs him more! Black Jack mentions that Black Manta is wasting his life and he's all, "Dammit! That's what Aquaman said too!" Then he pouts and considers working for N.E.M.O. The only thing he knows so far is that they hate Atlantis, their name is an acronym without any meaning, and Black Jack isn't the boss. I hope it isn't The Scavenger! He's a worse Aquaman villain than Aquaman is a hero!

In Washington, Aquaman finds everybody takes him seriously. That's a new one! I suppose everybody knows he's a king and you don't fuck around when a king comes to visit even if he has a reputation for porking dolphins. Plus Mera is with him and she's almost a queen and everybody loves a visit from a queen! But the government doesn't really feel like getting the embassy back up and running. So Aquaman mentions the Justice League. He makes it seem like he's giving a reference but I think it's an understated threat!

During the meeting, The Deluge attacks an American battleship. And since American foreign diplomacy amounts to "some jerk from a country attacked the US so that means all the people from that country must be jerks," Aquaman and Mera are accused of being complicit in the attack. So they arrest him while Mera gets ready to tear everybody apart by their inner water molecules. Aquaman tells her to relax because he's serious about keeping up good relations with the US, no matter how shitty the US treats him or his people.

I'd rather things went Mera's way!