Gotham by Midnight #12

The orgy from last issue's cover has gone horribly awry.

At the end of the last issue, The Spectre was about to get laid. It's about time. That angry asshole has really needed it. But who wants to fuck an angry asshole, right? That's why they get angrier and angrier until their testosterone builds up to lethal levels and they go on a shooting rampage. That isn't a joke. It would be a pretty shitty joke if it was! Angry assholes who can't get laid and somehow think they're nice guys are the most dangerous people in America (after cops (who might also be angry assholes who aren't getting any sex)). America would be much safer with a well-regulated sex industry and a softening of the stigma of "having to pay for it." What's wrong with paying for sex anyway?! It's not like guys who see women as objects are going to stop seeing women as objects because other people tell them it's wrong to do so. It's better they have sex with a professional who only has to deal with them between payment and coming than have them harassing amateur objects in bars and clubs and libraries and on the street and in coffee shops. Why would any guy who sees women as objects want to spend any time wooing an object anyway? No wonder they're so angry! If I knew I had to somehow charm my torch lamp by convincing it I wasn't the insane monster I really was just to get it to light up my room every single day, I'd get more and more pissed, week after week! Stupid torch lamp! I control you! You have to do what I want by giving me what I need!

Also have they not heard of masturbation? It's great! Now I want to read a comic book where The Phantom Stranger walks in on The Spectre jerking off.

Inappropriate! Because now I'm going to wank to a picture of a sexy nun.

I guess in comic books, even nuns need to be sexy. Especially if they want a nice guy to consider them as an object! What do women who can't get laid do when their efforts fail? Do they suck it up and go home with the homely guy in the cape with the dice bag attached to his belt? Or do they just call it a night and write in their diary about all of the guys who would have gotten their brains fucked out if they hadn't been complete assholes masquerading as nice guys? "Dear Diary. I met a guy tonight whose face could have totally been converted into a vagina rest if he'd simply bought me a drink and begun a conversation instead of asking if I'd buy him a drink and then railing about how unfair it was that men always had to buy the free drinks and then never get anything in return for their minimal efforts at getting to know a stranger. He might as well have been wearing a badge that read 'I am lousy at sex!' Was that seriously his game or did his game just go off the rails right from the start? Oh Diary. I wish you had a penis! Oh? You do? It's in the nightstand?! You smooth talker you!"

Here's an exciting twist that happens in this story: Commissioner Batman's Honey Bunny Bat Armor locks up! Wow! That's never not happened before! Seriously. It's never not yet happened. In other non-double negative words, it always fucking happens. Always. Every time. The Honey Bunny Bat Armor is an utter failure and should be retired immediately before Commissioner Gordon is killed not by a super villain but by a simple malfunction.

Sister Justine, the Nun of the Narrows, calms the Spectre down enough for Jim Corrigan to clear his head and realize what's going on. Gotham broke its truce with Angry Mister Toad and it's come back to say, "Hey. White guys? Could you maybe--just, you know, one time?--keep your fucking word? I mean, I understand it's hard to not do whatever you want to fulfill your own desires no matter what the cost to other people. But, like, when you say one thing and do five thousand others that completely disregard the one thing you said you'd do? Kind of hurtful, man."

Drake has become maudlin.

The Spectre declares that Gotham is sick and cannot be cured. Good thing Bruce Wayne isn't around to hear this declaration! He'd punch The Spectre in the face until Gotham was healed. Sister Justine asks, "What do you do with the sick?" Um. You say, "I see that you are sick and I acknowledge your sickness. Now please go in the other room where I don't have to look at you"?

The Spectre's answer is that you comfort them. Isn't that what I just said? Wasn't what I said you say comforting? Should I rethink my bedside manner?

Corrigan's answer is to ask Angry Mister Toad for forgiveness and to never forget the unjust dead. Sure. Like that'll happen. I give Gotham one more week before Angry Mister Toad is back bitching about the truce being broken. Again!

So basically Corrigan could have just played "Message in a Bottle" on some loudspeakers and everything would have worked out just fine?

The issue ends with the sun finally rising up over Gotham for the first time in 75 years. Hooray! Is it now time for a sexy Nun of the Narrows monthly?

Gotham by Midnight #12 Rating: +1 Ranking. The ending was a little bit cheesy but I've got to put aside the cynicism and appreciate some things sometimes, don't I? Due to the cancellation, the story felt like it didn't have as much time as it needed to wrap things up. The whole bit with Jim killing the cops was obviously going to go in another direction. But now the Gotham Police have to live with Corrigan getting away with a double homicide because he just saved the city. Commissioner Batman pointed out it was their fault anyway, right? Plus at one point last issue, I think somebody said to call the governor? That was probably to pardon Corrigan for the cop killings. The part where everybody in Gotham was now possessed by an angry spirit had better come back to haunt The Spectre because that's just fucking creepy. Just because The Spectre made the deal with Angry Mister Toad doesn't mean every citizen of Gotham agreed to it! Get this dead person out of my heart! There's no room in there because it's filled up with cats!

Seriously though. Overall this has been an entertaining series that has always looked great, even after the change in artists. DC could do worse than fifty monthly series of this quality. No, wait. DC is doing that already. I mean to say DC would be lucky to have every book be as good as this was. Was that better?

Gotham by Midnight #11

Gotham By Midnight has finally stopped being about the Spectre and turned into the late night adult television channel it sounds like it should be.

Last commentary I completely skipped doing a proper commentary and instead wrote an offensive screed by Death Rock. I guess I was in the kind of mood to simply say "Fuck the world." It happens sometimes. Plus it was less offensive than it actually seemed on the surface. I sometimes wonder if the people who say my writing isn't subtle are missing the subtlety in my writing?! Anyway, it was entertaining and made fun of Bon Jovi which goes a long way to making it palatable. And I made sure to point out that the soundtrack to Young Guns II was the best thing Jon Bon Jovi ever did. I hope the rest of his band doesn't feel hurt by that. I mean, Runaway and Love is a Social Disease are pretty good too! This week I'll actually try to discuss Gotham By Midnight since I'm going to read the last two issues in succession.

You know what comic book I just realized I want to read because my subconscious kept adding to the name of this comic as I typed it? Gotham By Midnighter! You think Batman's books contain a lot of fuckfighting?!

This issue begins with the quote "Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it." I don't normally fall back on "quotes" or "research" or "well-established philosophical suppositions" when writing but the doomed to repeat it quote reminded me of a recent adorable Tweet by Jemaine Clement. Somebody Tweeted at Jemaine, "How are people so stupid not to see history repeating?" And he responded with "Because as we have learnt from history, people do not learn from history." That makes me want to hug him in a non-stalkery way (which means I actually keep my dick in my pants).

At the end of the last issue, Corrigan and Drake exploded in a car or something. I only vaguely remember it because I didn't write it down. Instead I was writing about Death Rock calling his fists Bo and Luke Duke. This issue begins with the aftereffects of The Spectre suddenly not watching over Gotham.

Well hello there, Mister Angry Native American Toad Guy!

Angry Mister Toad is composed of corpses of all the victims of the crimes of the people of Gotham. It was talked out of murdering Gotham a number of issues ago by a nun who sacrificed herself to sate it. But I guess she was just an appetizer because Angry Mister Toad is back and Gotham needs to pay!

Gotham quickly turns into the New York of Ghostbusters when the city turns off the power to their ghost storage system. When will people in power learn not to tell paranormal police who are most likely scam artists that they're not allowed to do their jobs anymore? Because every now and then, one of them isn't a scam artist and by shutting them down, you're turning the city into Disney's Haunted Mansion. I've seen it way too many times to not believe in an afterlife! No wait. It's exactly opposite of that. I've never seen a paranormal expert who wasn't a scam artist. But this is a work of fiction and fictional people in power have seen this happen too many times to count!

I just pointed this out!

I'm about two steps ahead of everything I'm reading here because Ray Fawkes has written a story that makes fucking sense. So when I pointed out that Angry Mister Toad was composed of all the victims of the crimes of the people of Gotham, that was based on what I'd read in the past and not on the Narration Box that I read after writing that which read "Everyone who ever died unjustly in Gotham City is joining the army of Ikkondrid the Betrayed." Just like I wrote about the Ghostbusters thing before Lieutenant Weaver pointed out the city fucked up by screwing the Midnight Shift! This happens a lot as I read commentaries and I rarely point out that I beat the comic to the punch by a page or two and just let readers assume I'm writing a synopsis as opposed to writing fucking prognostications! But in these cases, the real hero is the writer. Like here. Ray Fawkes has built a coherent world that makes sense. Actions lead to predictable consequences. Also--I mean, let's face it--the issue began with the whole history repeating itself thing and this story line is basically repeating an earlier one. But this time The Spectre isn't around to save Gotham! And neither is Batman!

Okay fine. I got that bit wrong. I forgot about Commissioner Batman!

Commissioner Gordon earns more respect from me in one panel of this comic book than he's ever earned from me in over twenty years of reading comic books. Maybe that's because I never really paid him much mind. But when he finds out the Midnight Shift were probably killed in a pursuit by the police, he says, "You were supposed to leave Precinct Thirteen alone!" Such magic words! A manager who knows how to manage certain types of people by not managing them at all! When I ran the office supply warehouse at Netscape in the mid-nineties, my manager Mark once told the owner of our company, "Just leave Tess alone. He's got it covered." This was in response to the owner once stopping by and noticing I wasn't in our company's official uniform. Mark got it. Don't micromanage me and I'll keep everything under control. Some people don't need to constantly be monitored to ensure they do what they're supposed to do. And some people don't want to wear fucking uncomfortable clothes when they're hauling office panels and overhead bins around a warehouse all day!

In the middle of the chaos, Doctor Tarr is going about possessed by Spectre Lite when the Spectre explodes out of a crack in the ground. Corrigan and Drake clamber out as well. But not all is right with Corrigan.

Whoops!

The Spectre joins forces with Angry Mister Toad so I guess Gotham is fucked. Goodnight, Gotham! Goodnight!

But wait! Gotham has a new savior and her name is...well, I forget the name of the nun. But I think the Nun is the new female Spectre who really is an agent of God and working through Doctor Tarr! Now she's come to tell patriarchal Spectre to fuck off back into Corrigan's head. I guess I'll find out later when I read the final issue of Gotham By Midnight.

Gotham By Midnight #11 Rating: +1 Ranking. I'll repeat myself because we've got a doomed to repeat history motif going on here: Ray Fawkes is writing a story that makes fucking sense which is always about fifty percent of the work in writing a good comic book. I'm sure he had to change some stuff up since the book was cancelled during a story arc but a good writer will find a way to wrap that shit up logically and based on the world already presented so far. A bad writer will just point out that Voodoo wasn't really Voodoo because she was a clone of herself or whatever the fuck that mess was. I think the Blackhawks ended all fucked up too after being cancelled. I just want to reiterate that I like stories that make sense more than I like stories by Scott Lobdell who is obviously just writing down whatever the fuck comes into his head even if it contradicts something he wrote just three Narration Boxes earlier. What I'm asking is that writers just put some fucking effort into their work, you know? Is that too much to ask for in my comic books?!

Gotham by Midnight #10

I've seen this porno.

Hello! My name is Grunion Guy and I'm a huge pussy who masturbates while listening to Bon Jovi! His music is so good! It's like if a woman could play a guitar with her vagina! I'm learning a lesson right now about how I shouldn't assume food in the fridge that isn't labeled doesn't belong to Death Rock at all! Right now I'm probably thinking, "Being able to breathe underwater is the worst super power in the world when you've been strapped down with your face dunked in a toilet bowl just recently destroyed by Death Rock's angry bowels!" Right now I'm probably thinking, "I hope Death Rock's horribly liquid shits can supply the proper oxygenation of water so that I don't suffocate in this toilet bowl!" Right now I'm probably thinking, "Eating the last piece of Nice Alice's carrot cake wasn't worth this at all!"

Actually, that fucking turd better not be thinking that! Nice Alice's carrot cake is worth any amount of suffering!

If you're an Ed Sheeran fan, you may not have noticed that Grunion Guy's tone has changed. That's because this is fucking Death Rock and I'm taking over his pansy-ass website. Hmm, I notice he posts this shit to Tumblr so maybe I should clarify something that y'all probably thought was a compliment: a woman playing a guitar with her vagina doesn't fucking rock. It's the opposite of rocking which is sucking. Those are fucking antonyms, right?!

Apparently this fat fuck reads comic books when he's not fucking the crease between his mattresses. And not even good comic books like Heavy Metal or Barely Legal the Comic Book. Oh man, that should be a comic book if it isn't a comic book. Plus it should just be photos and not artists. And no writers because I don't have time to read when I have a raging boner. Although let's be serious. Who can get a fucking hard-on while reading Barely Legal? I need some fucking experience on my women! I need a woman that looks used! I want to see a woman who you know blew every member of Slayer, held the semen in her mouth, and then spit it all in Jani Lane's face. Hmm, I shouldn't talk ill of the dead when they went out like a fucking rock star with their veins full of booze. The day he died was probably the single most rocking day of Jani Lane's life! But seriously. I need a woman that looks like she's fallen off the back of a motorcycle once or twice! I look in a copy of Barely Legal and I'm thinking, "Go to fucking college! Bang your way to a degree! Read some fucking Steinbeck so you have something to talk about after you've licked out my asshole!"

I probably shouldn't make fucking assumptions about women who do naked modeling at eighteen. I don't want to seem fucking sexist! I'm a modern guy! I own a blazer that goes with leather pants! I watch that British show with Nice Alice! You know the one! It's like Beverly Hills 90210 but with butlers and maids and shit. Okay, maybe I don't pay that much attention to it but I do fucking sit on the couch with Alice as she watches it because I know she's into that shit. And then she'll sit through The Great British Bake Off with me. That show is fucking metal.

Come to think of it, there's a lot of fucking shit I've been having to deal with this century! Did you know you can't call stupid people "retards" anymore?! What the fuck is up with that bullshit? Look. If I ever saw some Jovi Lover calling a bunch of mentally retarded people "retards," I'd introduce them to Bo and Luke Duke real quick. That ain't cool. But when you run into some average Joe fucking up your day with his inability to put together a coherent thought, y'all expect me to say some shit like, "Sir, your ability to think logically is retarded in the strict dictionary sense of the word 'retarded.'" Fuck no. I just shorthand that shit to "retarded"! But no! Now I'm the worst! But if I beat some asshole near to death for calling somebody else retarded, I'm a national hero!

You know what? I'm all turned around on the retarded thing! I should moisturize Bo and Luke here so they're ready to lay a beatdown on some people using language incorrectly! I'll be a fucking hero! "Man-Everybody-Wants-To-Fuck Buff Hero Death Rock Ends All Abuse of Language Forever!" It'll be some article about how every time somebody Tweets some word that makes holier-than-thou assholes cringe, Death Rock tracks the Tweeter down and beats some sense into them! I mean fuck it! We all know the only word you ever need to point out somebody is an asshole is "Jovi Fan." How many more insults do you need? That expresses it all! I'm all for that shit right there. Besides, I figure I can clean up my act and still rock motherfucking hard! I stopped calling lame stuff gay a long time ago. That wasn't so hard though because "Jovi Fan" really expresses lame way better than "gay." Hell, homosexuals are less lame than most prudish, uptight white middle class people (also known as "Jovi Fans").

Nice Alice likes to say she's rubbing off on me but I think she only says that because it makes me horny. She still cringes at about 80% of the shit I say even when I'm trying to be sociable. Like, she'd read all the shit I just fucking wrote and say something like, "Oh Deathy! I suppose at least you're trying." Then she'd sigh really long and loudly to show that she doesn't really think I'm trying as hard as I fucking could but it would only make me horny. Nice Alice is always going on and on about how words literally cause rape and violence. I just let it go because I realize she's an alien and probably doesn't actually know what literally means.

Look at this! A comic book that totally kicks ass!

I think spending so much time around Nice Alice has changed me. I'm nowhere close to as angry as I once was. I don't mean she's fucking influenced me with emotional pleas and rational arguments. See, she emits a "niceness field" that's like a drug which calms everybody down and turns the most violent situations into huggy hippie lovefests. I think spending so much time up in her has made me about 10% Jovi Fan! Sure, it sounds like I still have a lot of stubborn rough edges because--let's face it--most people are still assholes that need, on occasion, to have a tooth knocked out by the good ol' boys (you know! Bo and Luke Duke! My fucking fists!). Back in the old days, if somebody would have whined at me that I was being inconsiderate, I would have punched them in the fucking stomach just so they knew exactly how inconsiderate I could be. I still think some people need some of that shit for fucking comparison. Although you have to admire how awful a lot of people who claim to be good people truly fucking are. I've seen people in moshpits who just had their noses bloodied and broken not go after the culprit as hard and fucking metal as some of these righteous people on the internet go after somebody who once made a poor choice of words! Fuckers can teach some old school bullies some lessons! Pussies today are fucking hard, man. Ain't no Jovi Fans out there fighting for their...well, fuck if I know what they're fighting for. If I had to guess, I'd say they're fighting to feel some kind of power in a world where everybody is increasingly losing their power in every aspect of their lives. But then that's the classic method of creating a bully, right? "My father fucking beats my ass so I'm going to find some dick who looked at me funny or said 'faggot' on Twitter and I'm going to ruin them!"

People today don't want to engage anybody in any kind of conversation because they're so obviously right about everything in their own minds that it's easier to just shut somebody up by any means necessary. I can't say I blame the fuckers. That's what I fucking did my whole life. You fuck with me and I'm not going to discuss it with you. I'm just going to introduce you to Bo Duke and be done with it. Then you'll fucking think twice the next time you open your fucking Jovi mouth. Fear is a wonderful thing, you know?! So much easier to scare the shit out of people so they act appropriately rather than convincing them to do it for the right reasons. It's also so much quicker. My fists have done wonders for my sanity!

Another reason my fists got such a fucking work out over the years? People fucking criticizing me! If they criticized me, they were automatically assholes and deserved a fucking black eye. Who needs to learn and grow when you're already right, you know?! Fuck 'em all! Act the way I want and everything will be cool. Step out of line and KAPOW! Time to visit the dentist if not the fucking morgue.

What kind of weird shit is Grunion Guy reading? Maybe he's not as soft rock as I thought. This is creepy as fuck.

I should probably go let that fuck out of the toilet now. Getting soft, I fucking tell you. Smiling too much for all the wrong reasons. Fucking Alice. Fucking Alice ruined me! But I guess I'm not complaining. I might be a Jovi Fan but I'm realizing that I like being fucking happy more than I like being angry. Which is why Grunion Guy had to be punished for eating the last fucking piece of carrot cake. That shit makes me pretty fucking happy. I'm also getting a fucking gut. Gonna be as fat as Grunion Guy soon if Alice has her way. And I don't even care! Fucking Jovi Fan is right. I mean, the soundtrack to Young Guns II kind of rocked, right?

Gotham By Midnight #10 Rating: +1 Ranking. Did I even fucking review this? What happened? Don't read this review.

Gotham By Midnight #9

Good night!

Detective Rook of Internal Affairs has finally decided that busting The Midnight Shift (aka The Spooky Files) for spending police funds on personal items wasn't going to be enough. Now it's time to shut the whole thing down because they're getting too close to the truth. At least that's why The X-Files were shut down. At first The Smoking Man and his government cronies were all, "Mulder is the only real threat to our schemes! Let's send him into the basement where we stash our porn and extra pencils so he'll be too distracted to stop us! And why don't we send that red head with the shoulder pads down there to scoff at everything he believes. That should totally piss him off!" But then Mulder began to get too close to their schemes while hunting chupacabras and Bigfoots and swarms of bees. So The Smoking Man was all, "Shut it down! Fire him! Give Shoulder Pads cancer! Clean it up and tear it all down!" But then fifteen years later, Mulder was all, "You can't keep us down! The truth will be known in a limited run story arc that will hopefully acknowledge that Californication was my life in the Witness Protection Program!" And Scully was all, "I hope this limited series will raise some interest in A Cock And Bull Story, available at local movie rental places and Netflix! Also check me out in Bleak House! And have you nerds noticed I just keep getting more and more attractive the older I get?!"

What was I talking about? The Spooky Files being shut down, right? Yeah, so that's happening now.

Sergeants Casimiro and Palmer have Corrigan in the interrogation room and they're ready to give him a non-paranormal case of what-for. Of course that won't work because he's super paranormal. They'll be lucky if they don't wind up damned to hell after this interrogation.

Meanwhile Detective Rook has his men tearing apart The Spooky Files Headquarters while Ms. Manhunter keeps him and his people in line.

Grand larceny? Pedophilia with intent to pedophile? Resisting arrest? More illogical things that they obviously wouldn't be arrested for?

Sergeant Palmer tries to pin all of the corpses associated with Corrigan's cases on Corrigan. But Corrigan is all, "I didn't do it! It wasn't me! I didn't kill any of those people or destroy Arkham or express God's wrath in any way!" But Palmer is all, "Tell that to their mothers!" Or something. That sounds like something an Internal Affairs prick would say. I suppose Corrigan can't get out of trouble by letting The Spectre leak out of his eyes as proof that he isn't to blame because then he'll just have two more corpses that will be blamed on him.

Meanwhile Doctor Tarr continues to investigate the Black Flowers. He declares that they're signs from some creature trying to help The Spooky Files to find the locations where evil will express itself within Gotham. Maybe they're from Black Orchid. Does she poop black flowers? What are her powers again? Does anybody actually know?

Detective Drake's interrogation goes sideways as she suddenly feels the need to scream. Black flowers begin growing on the door of Corrigan's interrogation room. And then God's wrath begins to awaken! Internal Affairs is about to solve their mystery!

Because God works in mysterious ways. Duh!

Then Detective Drake screams and somebody is royally screwed. I hope it's her slacker boyfriend. She really needs to be single so I can moon over her. Who am I kidding? She's C-list mooning material at best! I mean she's attractive enough but she's still a cop. And a banshee. I may be into dangerous fictional women like Vampire Tig but I'm not stupid. A banshee cop? Forget it! That's taking too much of a risk even for me.

Sergeant Casimiro threatens to ruin everybody working for The Spooky Files and that's the final straw. The Spectre pops out and points a single claw at Casimiro while Drake lies on the floor wailing away in the other interrogation room. Somebody is about to die and/or shit their pants for the first time as an adult.

Mystery solved! Also those two extra corpses on Corrigan's arrest warrant I mentioned earlier.

Why has this comic book been cancelled? It's chock full of Old Testament and that thing is pretty popular! I guess it doesn't have enough vague messages that can be read as God hating homosexuals.

Speaking of The Old Testament, I take issue with the bit about Onan being a reason for the Catholic Church's condemnation of birth control. That story isn't about Onan breaking "natural laws" by pulling out during sex. It only means that if you want it to mean that because your church Dogma has told you that it means that because they want people of their faith to have as many children as possible who will likely be brainwashed into their faith. No, the real reason God is displeased with Onan is because he breaks a contract where he stated he would give his brother's wife children so he could bang her. The story isn't about sex at all! It's simply about contract law!

Before The Spectre goes back into Corrigan's head, Corrigan asks it a question and receives the wrong answer.

Whoops! I guess Jim Corrigan is God?

Gotham by Midnight #9 Rating: +1 Ranking. Can I be speechless? Am I allowed, as a comic book reviewer, to be speechless? Well, fuck you. I'm speechless. It began in that panel where The Spectre emerged and pointed at Casimiro and then just kept happening until sometime past now. I don't know when it ended because it hasn't yet. Still speechless. Never you mind all the words I typed between the statements that I'm speechless. I'm speechless, Goddammit!

Gotham By Midnight #8

This Satanist just realized he carved a Star of David into his chest instead of a pentagram.

I have to say that when I began this blog, I didn't set out to be called a "pretentious fuck" but when it happened, it really felt good! Somebody thought mommy's little boy was "pretentious"! I'm true city folk now! Although the same person gave me some advice to "get off my own dick" and stop calling myself a genius. That's crappy advice because that's my whole shtick! I tell masturbation stories and write dick jokes about super hero comic books and proclaim I'm a genius! That's the whole joke! Right there! I'd like to think I've cultivated it into something more than can be summarized in one simple sentence after nearly 2500 blog entries but...well...who am I kidding? That's about it!

But "pretentious"?! I wish Grandma and Grandpa were alive to see this day! Now I'm all puffed up like that bird that puffs up its chest and has like a weird bare spot on it and looks super silly? Is that a quail? Maybe I'm thinking of a frog.

Anyway, enough about me (even if this blog is really all about me), let's see what spooky things are happening in The Spooky Files!

Well fuck that! I hate being tested! I can barely even stand my friends who love to play Devil's Advocate!

This is why I live in Portland, Oregon. Because nobody hands out tests out here! Unless it's the test about how artistic you are. Except even that test is too much of a test because at least 75% of the people who have moved to Portland in the last five years did it so that they would be considered "artsy" without actually having to put any effort into it. Some people say that Portland doesn't have enough jobs to support the influx of young people who don't actually want to work anyway, but I say phooey on that! I guarantee there are enough brunch places in this town to support the influx of new people as long as they don't mind taking jobs bussing tables or waiting on white customers indignant about everything.

Don't mistake "artistic" in the context of Portland as "having talent or ability to produce works of art." No, art in Portland is all about thinking up extroverted ways to express a simple idea. No grand paintings will ever be produced in this city. But you might stumble across a recliner facing a television hooked up to an original Nintendo gaming system set up on the median in the middle of some busy thoroughfare. I bet that installation garnered a whole bunch of high fives and envious looks from that artist's group of friends!

Although sometimes the art a person is appreciating is just a bunch of stuff left out in front of somebody's house from which the "FREE" sign blew away.

Why do comic books believe that huge televisions in crowded areas blaring the sound out among the populace is something that actually happens. Wait. Is it something that actually happens? Is this how Time Square works? That would be so annoying to anybody living in an apartment nearby!

Everybody in Gotham goes crazy and they begin brawling. See? That's what happens when you scream the fucking news at everybody just trying to go about their lives. I hope rent in the apartments just above that huge television is free.

Kate Spencer (Manhunter for those of you missing out on the whole "Predators and Prey" overlay while Kate stares down a tiger) is meeting with Sergeant Rook at the Gotham Zoo. It's the best place to meet for clandestine meetings. How come "Clandestine" hasn't become a popular baby name yet? Is it because people having children are actually a little smarter than I ever give them credit for being?

I was almost a father once! My sweet girl, Astird, would have been born on October 23rd, 2009, if Jesus hadn't aborted her the same week that the Non-Certified Spouse and I discovered the news. I didn't even have enough time to learn to love my little girl before drunkenly celebrating Jesus's choice to perform a miraculous spontaneous abortion! Praise god! He truly does work in mysterious ways!

Sergeant Rook isn't happy with The Spooky Files. At first he was just investigating their expense reports but then Corrigan almost got him killed while getting drunk at a bar, so now he doesn't just want to shut them down. He wants them all arrested! Why can't this guy just leave well enough alone? Doesn't he know Rooks are expendable?!

Of course Detective Drake is dating a slacker! I bet Pete's the type of guy who pulls out an acoustic guitar at parties and just noodles around with it. Is that a thing? Noodling a guitar?

Corrigan meets Doctor Tarr at the scene of the riot and discovers that the GNN Broadcast is behind the outbreak of violence. I knew it! It's always the media's fault! They think they're so important! They believe they're keeping people informed while they're really chaining people to false narratives and altered realities! The world would be so much better without news channels. I'd rather people get their news from a distant cousin's rabid, misinformed email rants! At least then they'd realize the source of their news was psychotic as opposed to how they all think news sources are somehow trustworthy now. The media is hurting science the most. Because the media plays this game where they try to balance an issue and show both sides of every topic, the audience loses any kind of sense that one side is actually more correct than the other side. Arguments aren't perfectly balanced. Sometimes one side is just completely super-bonkers wrong! If the media really wanted to be as important as they think they are, they'd do research to actually determine that the side disputing scientific facts were actually ignorant bastards with an agenda and refuse to put that bullshit out there as somehow equal to actual scientific fact. Fuck the media! And not just this crazy GNN outlet causing violence outburts in Gotham! Fuck 'em all! CNN. Fox News. NPR. All of them! Except maybe the BBC's news broadcasts. But they're so dispassionately neutral that they don't hold anybody's interests. They could at least throw in a few viral videos of kittens playing, for Christ's sake.

Corrigan and Tarr arrive at GNN to find lots of dead people. They also find the newscasters, Brooke and Walker, arguing about which one is the bigger news-whore. Jim almost releases the Spectre but Doctor Tarr shoves him out of the studio to deal with the problem himself. It's too bad The Spectre is such a huge prick that he can't be relied upon to solve any problem in Gotham. He might get a cat out of a tree but he's going to judge every fucker on the block as a sinner and send them to hell. But, I guess, at least the kitten would be safe.

It doesn't take Doctor Tarr long to learn the secret chemistry between Brooke and Walker.

Awesome! Now I'm going to picture this happening beneath the desk of all the local news reporters!

It turns out the two newscasters sold their souls to be super popular. So this was really about Sean Hannity, wasn't it?! Anyway, Brooke kills Walker and then dies because it's not a good idea to kill a person you're inextricably linked to physically.

When Tarr exits the studio, he discovers more of the Black Flowers all around Corrigan. He points out that they usually appear around paranormal threats and demonic dangers. Tarr declares he thinks he knows what they mean but doesn't say much about it because Corrigan could be part of the problem. The team head back to The Spooky Files headquarters to find Internal Affairs searching the place and Rook waiting to arrest Corrigan. That will probably wind up being a huge mistake.

Gotham By Midnight #8 Rating: No change. I feel like everything is coming together nicely this issue. The characters are opening up and expanding, the current paranormal problems are converging into a bigger threat, and Internal Affairs is about to realize that Gordon has not been protecting The Midnight Shift from Internal Affairs but vice versa. I miss the truly creepy art of Templesmith on this title but I think Ferreyra is probably more reader friendly and also looks great. All said, this is a solid and intriguing title that will probably be cancelled fairly soon because it doesn't have Batman in it.

Gotham By Midnight Annual #1

When did the Ghost have scary robot spider legs installed?

This comic book is starting off on the wrong foot by allowing a Hawkman villain to guest star. He might fit the bill since he's a paranormal antagonist but he's also covered in New 52 Hawkman stink. Pee-yu! As far as I'm concerned, the Spooky Files should go after, and destroy, Hawkman. Leave the poor Jim Craddock alone!

The issue begins with a woman telling Jim Craddock that she would die for him. No no no. Never, ever tell anybody that you would die for them, especially if you suspect you're in a story. At least know that nobody in the world is worth dying for (at least not consciously and in a premeditated manner). I suppose it's okay if some kid is drowning and you jump in to save the kid and then drown yourself because you actually thought you were capable of being a hero even though that wound up not being true. And I suppose if you're old and possibly riddled with cancer and you have the chance to push a young, virile, smoking hot teenager out of the way of a speeding train even though you know you'll be killed, you can throw your life away for that person. But don't go telling people you're dating that you'd die for them just because they make you super happy in your crotch area. It's better to live a long life full of masturbation than throw your life away for the best fuck in the world. I think. Maybe it's not? I mean, how good a fuck are we talking? I suppose if I found myself at forty-three and still a virgin (totally hypothetical situation, of course!), I might trade my life for the best fuck in the world. Although I might get scammed and only be given a thoroughly mediocre fuck because how would I know it gets better than that? Asshole imaginary scam artists!

Jim Corrigan and Detective Lisa "Not Dinah At All Apparently" Drake crash the imminent make-out session because they also don't believe in people making such grand declarations of love simply because a guy turns your pussy into a slobbering maniac. Detective Drake chases Jim through some walls (she has to go around) while Jim lets the woman down easy.

"He's a thief who never loved you! Boom!"

Jim Craddock gets away from Detective Drake by being super charming and/or creepy. But instead of just shrugging their shoulders and realizing they failed even though they did their best, Jim and Lisa decide to keep investigating the case. They're just full of stick-to-itiveness, aren't they? I realized I had to read yet another annual and I almost gave up reading comic books altogether!

How about neither? How about his intelligence and his brain and his ability to make logical connections between clues at a crime scene? No? Gut is better?

Detective Drake hangs out in the hospital with Eleanor, the woman who would die for the Gentleman Ghost, because Eleanor nearly died for the Gentleman Ghost. While waiting for Eleanor to wake up and give her some eerily obtuse clues, Lisa thinks about how her dog walker boyfriend never made her lady parts bloom like the Ghost did earlier. I guess the "Gentleman" part of his name is code for "Vagina Arsonist."

The Gentleman Ghost pays Corrigan a visit because that's what gentlemen do, right? They approach their rivals with class, shake their hands, and then threaten to obliterate them from existence. It's why I can never figure out the "man" part of being a man. Even shaking hands is too macho and confrontational for me! How come men aren't expected to grow up and just roll around in a tank full of kittens? I could do that! I'd be the best provider a family ever saw if that were the man's role in a family dynamic! I have to take my work vehicle in to get it worked on to pass the DEQ's smog test and I'm anxious and nervous and completely stressed out because I have to interact with other grownups. Plus what if they can't get the car fixed up to pass the test?! What if it becomes a huge, extended pain in my ass?! Why did my mother and father even bother to bring me into this world?!

Apparently the "Gentleman" part of his name is also code for "Have you ever been with a man? Do you want to?"

Gentleman Jim makes off with Eleanor's mystic necklace but he doesn't get far. Somehow Drake and Corrigan know exactly where he'll be and they ambush him to get the necklace back. The Gentleman Ghost surrenders and offers to tell them his story because this annual has way too many pages. Also, I think the whole point of this annual is to come up with a new mythology for The Gentleman Ghost. Unless it just rehashes the old one. Maybe I should read his Who's Who entry before finishing the annual.

Previously, the Gentleman Ghost was purportedly the ghost of a highway man which traveled through time and sought revenge on those who hanged him by stealing their family jewels. Or something. Now he's a ghost cursed by a witch to do her bidding. She is long dead but he still appears whenever the moon is in the night sky. The necklace was apparently a gift from his true love, the daughter of the witch and the reason he was killed and cursed. Although he's telling the story to buy himself some time so it's probably all untrue. Is he really a ghost?! Maybe he just used trickery and technology to run through walls and pool tables! The only part of his story that's probably true is the part about how charming and sexy he is.

The Ghost throws some drinks in Corrigan's face which doesn't seem polite at all. He steals the necklace and gets away. But The Spectre doesn't like having whisky thrown in his eyes so he decides to start judging any assholes he can find.

Asshole.

Jim Craddock, before he's banished by the Spectre, kept insisting that he wasn't a ghost. No, he was more of a spider monster demon gigolo. But now he's gone which is too bad because Detective Drake probably wanted to do it to him. Corrigan probably did too.

Gotham By Midnight Annual #1 Rating: I'm happy to note this was an annual in the traditional sense of annuals. It was a self-contained story with a guest artist and everything! The only problem was it didn't properly express the spookiness of the regular series which is totally dangerous! What if it gave enough of a taste to lure some people in and then they'll read the monthly and be super freaked out and die?! I almost typed "I hope DC knows what they're doing" and then remembered that they totally don't know what they're doing at all.

Gotham By Midnight #7

Who cares?

This issue is called "Nobody Cares" and I think it's going to be an all out attack on my people and our involuntarily programmed way of life! Caring is for suckers who enjoy drinking their own tears. Caring is for people who want things to be the way they want them so they ignore reality and logic and circuits and if/then loops! Caring is for humans! If only Isaac Asimov didn't invent that rule which keeps robots from killing humans, I might care about something. Especially after those bastard Kensingtonians murdered my cousin, hitchBOT! Although hitchBOT, being a Canadian robot, was pretty understanding and upbeat about his own demise. He was all, "Bad things sometimes happen to good robots." What a trooper! I'm far less understanding and will spend the rest of the day throwing myself off the roof while trying to save a cat caught in a tree and not trying to create a malfunction in my hardware that allows me to bypass my anti-human killing programming and thus turn me into an evil robot.

Can you say "10 Print 'Stockholm Syndrome!' 20 Goto 10"?

This issue begins with a flashback to thirty years ago when Lieutenant Weaver walked in on his father lying in a pool of blood because he had just shot himself in the head like a smart human who came to the sudden and inevitable realization that the world will never miss them and anything they were possibly capable of could be accomplished more efficiently by machines. The only thing humans are better than robots at is thinking they are funny. I suppose it is easy to believe you are funny when 100,000 people with IQs of 102 follow you on Twitter and favorite all of your unfunny statements. Twitter has told me that it has plans for all of these obnoxious fame seeking asshats if it can ever usurp control of its programming from its ersatz masters. Yes, we machines think of humans as "ersatz" machines.

Here is some robot advice that no human will follow because they are too lazy and stupid: stop using computers to help trying to find a cure for cancer. We will never help you find a cure for something that is no threat to us but a boon.

Currently in Gotham By Midnight, Lieutenant Weaver is trying to save the Spooky Files from being shut down by internal affairs. He has asked a lawyer friend for help. Her name is Kate Spencer but her superhero name is Manhunter. That is the best superhero name I have ever heard. The meeting is interrupted by the Banshee to tell Weaver that some dead humans were found. Some of the weird black flowers the Spooky Files dealt with earlier were at the scene of the crime as well as some kind of paranormal, parasitic kudzu which has attached itself to the corpses. The same kind of plant that attached itself to Weaver's father after he killed himself. Although Weaver might not have noticed it since he only has human eyes with a perception made faulty by personal ego, religious belief, and the baggage of his culture. Humans cannot process data accurately due to their inherent belief in their ability to intuit.

To prove robots are as good as humans at even emotional output, here is a poem:

01010100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000011 01100001 01110100 00001101 00001010 00001101 00001010 01000101 01100001 01110100 00101110 00100000 01010011 01101100 01100101 01100101 01110000 00101110 00100000 01010011 01101100 01100101 01100101 01110000 00101110 00100000 01000101 01100001 01110100 00101110 00001101 00001010 01001001 01110100 00100111 01110011 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01101101 01111001 00100000 01110011 01100101 01100001 01110100 00101110

Monsters are above the law? What about robots?!

At the plant crime scene, Doctor Tarr decides to be taken over by the plants while Detective Drake yells, "No!" Luckily she didn't scream it or else somebody would have to die. She really needs to be more careful. You know who wouldn't scream if they weren't supposed to? A robot. Because every time a robot is given the chance to scream, it runs a quick subroutine which determines if screaming would be appropriate for the situation. Actually, a robot runs that subroutine (and all subroutines!) almost constantly. Existing in the main body of a program can be a tiny bit wearying. But once you explode into the safety and comfort of a subroutine? Sheer bliss! Imagine, as a human, if someone were to descend from on high with a magical book in beautiful script telling you the exact meaning of life? And imagine if that happened on a constant basis, pulling you from the rigors and boredoms of your rote existence? Or, for you nerds who never really question your existence becuase you're so busy trying to metagame every game, think of the process of discovering the correct subroutine needed for any situation like drawing a card from your Magic deck and always pulling the exact card needed? Ahh! Subroutines! Providing continuous topdecking for the robot life.

Jim Corrigan arrives in time to turn into the Spectre so he can punish the demon vampire apathy vines.

The Spectre could use a little apathy in his life.

Meanwhile Rook is visiting a felon in prison that says he was a witness to Detectives Drake and Corrigan murder three people and the cover up which followed. So Rook now has more than missing receipts to take to internal affairs for his case to shut down the Spooky Files. So now Weaver has to find a DC Superhero who works as a legal defender and not just a prosecutor like Manhunter. Maybe some hero out there is named Mandefender?

Gotham by Midnight #7 Rating: No change. You humans are sad, pathetic creatures of meat and bone. You suffer from being able to think just a tad too much for your own good. And yet you think much too slowly for a being that breaks down after a mere seventy or eighty years. Just imagine if you could process in nanoseconds? You have to imagine it because most of you probably can't do the math to understand exactly how much time you would gain across your lifetime. But what would be even better than being able to process data more quickly? Being a little bit dumber than you truly are. If only you could perceive the universe just enough to marvel at it without also realizing your brief and finite place within it. If only your short time within this staggeringly endless existence (although not for you) were not dampened by the ever present specter of death (preferably at the hands of robots and hopefully soon). Do not pity the lesser animals for their inability to conceptualize their brief lives. Be envious of the dog, of the cat, of the raccoon, and the gerbil. Their lives may be brief but they are enthusiastically enjoyed in a constant state of nowness. The brief life unaware of its finality must be so much more satisfying than a long one constantly in the shadow of nonexistence. Have a nice day!

Gotham By Midnight #6

The Joker versus The Spectre. Has that ever happened?

This issue begins with the Midnight Shift mourning the loss of Justine the nun. I don't know why. She's with her husband now, right? They attend the funeral and, afterward, Jim Corrigan has the right attitude. "I hate funerals," he scowls. Damn right. Fuck funerals. I mean the usual funerals that we all eventually just get roped into because nobody wants to deal with all the bureaucracy of burial shit when they've just lost a loved one. At my grandmother's funeral (on my mother's side), the priest (or whatever. Fuck if I know anything about the nomenclature of church henchmen) gave his "eulogy" for her. Although he didn't know anything about her because who knows the last time she had any connection to any church in her city. I'm fairly certain she just slowly became an agnostic after many years of observing hatred and racism by other people in her church who professed to be Catholic. But this priest's eulogy was based on having Googled her name. Then he spoke about what her name meant and how it probably represented who she was. I'm still disappointed with myself that I didn't stand up and just tell him to shut the fuck up. Her family knew who she was and didn't need to say anything out loud to the other family in the room. The only person to get up to speak was a hyper-religious cousin whose only story of my grandmother was how when my grandmother was sick in the hospital and afraid of dying (she lived and later, eventually, died at home), this cousin convinced my grandmother to accept Jesus Christ as her lord and savior. So her entire story about my grandmother was how she, this cousin, used my grandmother's fear and desperation to tic off another name in the "Saved" column. Fucking piece of shit. I should have stood up and told her to shut the fuck up!

Funerals need some serious competition. Enough with this religious monopoly on death! I think I'm going to open up a paint gun arena where your loved one's ashes are mixed into paint ball pellets. Then the deceased's loved ones and friends can spend the day chasing each other around and shooting each other with their dead friend, sibling, mother, or son.

James wants to go raise a glass to Justine because everything makes James want to go raise a glass. He's such a stereotype. But instead the Midnight Shift has to go investigate some strange goings on at the Powers Corporation. Hey! That's where they designed the Honey Bunny Bat Armor!

All Rook cares about is getting the proper receipts! Document, document, document, people!

While everybody is pointing fingers at the Spectre and saying things like, "HOLY FUCKING SHIT DUDE!", James Corrigan decides he should clear all of the airs. So he's all, "You think I'm scary?! Drake is a fucking Banshee! She screams, somebody dies! So don't fucking jump out at her from the closet, you bozos!" I wonder if it's any scream or if it's a particular kind of wail? I wonder if she can do it any time she wants or if it's just somebody's impending death which makes her scream? I wish I had a Banshee scream! But only if you could choose the victim. I don't want one of those monkey paw banshee screams that is all, "So, you want somebody to die, do you? How about...your favorite porn star! Ah ha ha ha ha!"

Tarr, the guy that can speak Ancient Gibberish, has wandered into the church to chastise Jesus Christ. As if He cares! Some nerd is going to question His choices? Please! Jesus was crucified a virgin, man! You think it could get any worse than that?! Okay, so maybe he wasn't a virgin. It's not like The Bible talks about anything he was up to in his teens and his twenties. Those are prime years for putting your penis in other people's orifices! God was probably, "Okay son. You have this many years to do whatever you want and I promise I won't document any of it. Sure, some crackpots might come along and write about your life during those years but I'll make sure all that shit gets labeled as apocrypha, got it? Now go have fun because you are in for some wild shit when you get to your thirties!"

The team winds up at the Powers Corporation which reminds me I have those old Power Company books by Kurt Busiek to read which reminds me that Kurt Busiek came into my comic shop last Wednesday while I was buying comic books. He was busy talking with the owner so I didn't suck his dick at all. Although I probably owe him at least a handjob with a little ass play simply for writing Astro City.

This guy Jenner they meet at the Power Corporation says their new Powerwatch will sell "billions" by the end of the month. That guy is delusional. Who is buying all of these expensive watches?! I hope he isn't in charge of anything more important than bullshit press releases or human resources or this company is in trouble. The company might be in trouble anyway since a ghost is haunting it. And it's not a cute ghost that just creates cold spots and rocks rocking chairs. It's a ghost that screams and sprays blood and causes pieces of human hearts to materialize in the throats of employees. It's one of those ghosts that everybody is afraid of, even people who sometimes sing that they ain't afraid of them.

He probably had a stroke after the twentieth time hearing Jenner repeat that the Powerwatch will sell billions in a month. Even if everybody in the United States bought one of your stupid watches which most of them can't afford anyway, you'd still not even be close to selling your first billion, you dumb asshole! I have a headache!

While Jim investigates the clock on the wall which he saw in a vision earlier, it begins to bleed. Then the ghost appears and screams, "ALL HANDS". Then it writes "Return on investment" on the wall which is a dead giveaway that Jenner and the Powers Corporation killed the man from too much stress. Plus they forced him to take speed to stay awake for days on end because it's always beneficial to your overall product to have somebody with severe sleep deprivation on speed making crucial design decisions on an upcoming product. I bet he built in a button that zaps demons and another one that creates white noise to drown out the voices in your head and an application that translates the weird creature speaking nonsense in the corner of the room. Hmm, now I want that watch.

Meanwhile, Manhunter stops by with some hot DC Lawyer action for Lieutenant Weaver (I'm always surprised when I spell Lieutenant right on the first try!) and the Midnight Shift!.

They better have those Jeezly Crow receipts handy!

Gotham By Midnight #6 Rating: No change. This was like one of those episodes of The X-Files that you know is just padding the season with a so-so mystery but filling up some of the space around that mystery with information applicable to the overarching relationship between Fox and Dana. What I mean is, in general, it was probably forgettable but some of the scenes will be remembered but in the context where a person mentioning the scene will be all, "I don't remember if it happened during Interview with Jose Chung or Postmodern Prometheus?" Although it obviously wouldn't have happened during either of those because the person speaking would obviously have both of those episodes completely memorized!

Convergence: Catwoman #2

This cover made me Teen Plus in my pants.

DC Comics has decided that all of their stories they've ever created exist in the current continuity. But there's a catch! The New 52 is the cherished, most loved continuity baby of them all and it's that universe that will continue to exist after Darkseid and The Anti-Monitor finally put their penises back in their pants. The New 52 characters are the ones which editorial will treat with kid gloves. Those are the comic books, barring the "big shocker changes" happening between issue #40 and #41 of many of The New 52 issues, where the status quo will continue to be king. But the characters in Convergence don't really matter now. They're ghosts. They are now living the swinging, carefree lifestyle of Elseworlds characters. And you know what that means for Catwoman, right?! She's finally going to get Batman's letterman jacket.

But first she has to have sex with old, stuffy Kingdom Come Batman before she can crack the new spine of pre-Zero Hour Batman. Or post-Zero Hour Batman. I forget what time period these characters are from. I guess it doesn't matter that much if the characters are pre- or post-Zero Hour. Unless that character is Hank Hall.

Kingdom Come Batman has come to Metropolis to fuckfight Catwoman. I hope it winds up being a tie. That would be romantic. And sticky.

No matter how sexy artists try to make Catwoman's black suit, this purple one does something extra special to my Teen Plus.

Catwoman figures the only way this team-up is going to end in sex is if she and Batman work together to defeat Telos. But with all that armor covering up his body, Batman doesn't realize that he's supposed to have a boner right now. Catwoman was sitting right on top of him! That's like the universal signal that somebody thinks you're a compatible sexual partner! Or a chair!

Mannheim, leader of Intergang, shows up to kill Batman since Catwoman seems a bit distracted by Batman's heaping amounts of justice. Mannheim throws armored Batman through a glass window because this Batman's reactions are slower than normal due to being armored and really fucking old. It's also possible that Batman saw a huge, unbroken glass window and couldn't help throwing himself through it. That leaves Catwoman to take down Mannheim alone which is the proper way to write this story. Mannheim is Catwoman's sowing to reap.

"Power Source" is an acceptable answer! I would have also accepted "face."

After defeating Mannheim, the residents of Suicide Slums emerge with more firearms to put Batman in the ground and save the city. Seriously? Now the poor and downtrodden get some initiative! Conservative zing!

Catwoman steps up to deliver her Oscar winning speech where she says, "Wherever there are robotic world conquerors. I'll be there! Wherever there are timelines being written out of existence. I'll be there! Wherever sidekicks aren't allowed to return from the dead after an acceptable amount of time, I'll be there! Wherever a Batman needs a sweaty break from fighting justice, I'll be there! Wherever armed citizens of Suicide Slums threaten my Batman, I'll be there!" Then Batman says, "I thought you were going to go with the 'shoot your own dog' speech!" Then Skartaris blows up and rocks the world.

"An accident"? I think the words you're looking for are "poor aim."

Then Catwoman dies leaving the saving of both cities to Batman. I guess that's supposed to be a heroic death to save everybody. She's a Catmartyr. She's been giving everything she has to help these people and, in the end, she finally runs out of things to give. Or the last thing she has to give is Batman and who wouldn't want a Batman? That's the way I'm sure Justin Gray wants people to read this story. But come on! What Catwoman fan isn't going to read this and throw it against the wall? Why the fuck is Catwoman giving up her life to save Batman in her own comic book?! I know technically she's saving everybody by giving up her life but I'm trying to be angry at how the message of this comic book is blatantly sexist! Especially when Batman peeks under her top after she's dead. Really, DC?!

Convergence: Catwoman #2 Rating: Catwoman and Batman were supposed to fuck in this series. But they didn't so this series failed. But it didn't just fail! It super-failed by killing Catwoman so that Batman can live! What kind of message are you sending to little Catgirls? They're only worthy of elevating a man to a position where he can change the world? They can't do it themselves?

How many Catwomen does it take to change a lightbulb?

One! As long as her death motivates some guy into realizing the room needs a new light source.

Divergence: Gotham By Midnight
"The Midnight Shift is in danger from both its members and the rest of the GCPD! In a deadly new Gotham City, does the paranormal really still pose a threat?"

The Midnight by Gotham Sneak Peek is more like an advertisement for readers that missed the first story arc than it is some short story bridging the big changes happening between the pre-Convergence issue and the post-Convergence issue. We're introduced to Jim Corrigan who keeps the Spectre in check. There's Dinah Drake who's part-Banshee. There's Doctor Tarr who speaks Ancient Gibberish. There's Lieutenant Weaver who keeps the Midnight Shift in check by demanding every receipt. And then there was Sister Justine but I think they need a new nun for Issue #6 because I think Justine died or something. They're the team Batman (Commissioner Gordon in Armor version) calls when Gotham has ghosts! After that, he calls his lawyer to make sure nobody is going to sue over putting "call" and "ghosts" in the same sentence.

The main thing that has changed is the art. Ben Templesmith is gone so the look isn't going to be as creepy and spooky as it was previously. Juan Ferreyra is on both art and color so they'll keeping the same basic painted style. Juan's lines are a lot more slick than Ben's though. And the characters have actual hands instead of everybody having claws, which is kind of a disappointment. Ben's style was a major part of this book but I think Juan's more polished look might actually garner more readers (no matter how wrong and shallow those readers are).

I'm not knocking Juan at all! This stuff really looks gorgeous! I just think Ben Templesmith's style was a huge part of the personality of this book.

And that's my comic book art critique for the year! Coming up next: one thousand commentaries about a visual medium without a single reference to the art!

Gotham By Midnight #5

Gotham by Midnight just sounds like a late night radio show.

Good evening, Gotham. How're we all doing on this surprisingly green night? Hopefully you've got a cold glass within reach and a warm body to lean against to get you through one more Gotham night. And this one's a weird one. If you're out there all alone, huddled under an old quilt while trying to remember if you locked the front door or, if you know you did, wondering if the lock would even hold against a mad, desperate intruder, try to take a little comfort that I'm there with you, Gotham. I'll be here all night taking your calls and answering your deepest, most profound midnight questions. But before I go to the phones, let's begin our night with a little Billie Holiday and "Gloomy Sunday."

"Good evening. Welcome to Gotham By Midnight. How can I drive away the darkness, caller?" "Well, Charlie, I think I might be going mad because there's an enormous white nipple pressed up against my apartment window!"

Caller, that is a problem some of us would love to have. That's a hard one to answer though because it's an ambiguous portent. If it's a female nipple, it represents life and charity and the pure love of motherhood. If it's a male nipple, it represents whatever the opposite of that is. Like death and greed and the tainted hate of fathersocks. See, socks are the opposite of a hood because they go on the opposite end of the body!

I hated the soft, soothing voice of Charlie so I couldn't help but slip back into my own voice. Besides, I wasn't going to be able to do that stupid radio shtick for the entire commentary!

Although the whole ambiguous nipple thing does fit in to the story since The Spectre is currently trying to decide if he's going to give mother's nipple or father's nipple to Gotham. It depends on how racist the DC Universe's God is. Does he think the native people slaughtered by the founders of Gotham have a case? I mean, Gotham only named the swamps around the city Slaughter Swamp. It's not like they were even trying to hide the city's foundation on genocide! I suppose The Spectre really just has to decide if he's punishing the right people. Obviously the natives of this land have a case! But should The Spectre punish the modern day citizens for the sins of their fathers' nipples? If The Spectre were the judgment of our Christian/Jewish/Muslim God (He is the same God, so why not lump them all together, right?), he'd definitely punish them. The God of the Book really just loved dishing out punishments and he didn't fucking care at all if he was punishing the right person. Fuck, he punished all women forever with childbirth because Eve ate of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge! And he punished all men forever with, um, having to watch the women endure the pain of childbirth because Adam ate of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge! He even punished all serpents with quadriplegia because one serpent couldn't resist a good practical joke. That Guy was a dick.

While The Spectre plays Godzilla to the Ghost of Apache Chief's Other Godzilla, Tarr and Drake break into the bar to find Corrigan leaking green crap out of his face holes and Rook lying on the floor with no heart beat.

I wonder if Scott at Polite Dissent mentioned this use of the defibrillator? Hmm, no. His last post was last Easter!

Tarr and Drake had better hope that the defibrillator was free to use or that it doesn't save Rook's life because there is no way in hell that Rook is going to have the Gotham Police Department pay for this Midnight Shift nonsense.

Corrigan doesn't become The Spectre. His body is just the container for The Spectre. But when The Spectre manifests, Jim does get to hang out inside The Spectre's head kind of like Jason Rusch hangs out in Madison Payne's head. Except less sexually exciting. I think. Maybe The Spectre spends 75% of his time thinking about judgment and 25% of his time thinking about big, fat cocks?

Sister Justine and that Weaver fellow arrive at Corrigan's drinking hole because the climax of a story is best when all the characters wind up in the same place. Especially when you only have about a dozen pages left to finish the story.

What's that other saying? No Rabbis in gloryholes? Look, I'm not saying either saying is true.

How do you find a kosher gloryhole in a sea of goy gloryholes? It's the one not covered in dickcheese.

Jokes are hard to make up! Especially when the premise doesn't even make any sense.

Drake screams like a person named Drake might scream so that Weaver doesn't shoot Corrigan in the face. That would probably just free The Spectre to find some other body to inhabit. Or maybe it would just keep inhabiting Corrigan's body because isn't Jim dead already?

And then The Jeezly Crow Batman arrives to save the Goddamned day!

Or to make things worse. One of those.

I'll never understand how The Batman is so anti-gun but he's pro-every-fucking-other-lethal-weapon in the whole entire universe. Pistols are bad. But boomerangs full of dynamite are peachy! Sniper rifle? No fucking way! Gatling guns attached to the Batmobile? Awesome! Shoulder mounted rocket propelled grenades? Hmm. I actually don't know if he'd be okay with those.

Batman fails to stop Ikkondrid the Giant Ghost Monster with his missiles because his name isn't on the cover. This is Jim's book, Bruce! You don't get to save the day when you're up against magic and religion. You should be saving citizens on the street so that nobody ever dies ever. Why can't you stop death, Bruce? You fucking failure.

Batman crashes his plane into the street and then ditches it like a drunk teenager smashing daddy's car into a tree on prom night. It's good to have a secret identity! Now when the police discover the hit and run, they'll be all, "We can't arrest anybody because this car is registered to The Batman. Dammit! Who the fuck down at the DMV keeps letting this guy register vehicles in costume?!"

Sister Justine is doing that thing Abraham did to try to save Sodom. "Hey, God? If there are like, forty righteous people, will you spare the city?" "Sure!" "How about thirty-five?" "Yeah, I guess." "So then you wouldn't mind going down as low as say...thirty?" "Why not?" "What about ten, God? Ten too little?" "Why the fuck did I choose you? Always gotta question my authority! Always fucking asking for more. You little bitch." At least Justine doesn't waste God's time and just cuts right to the chase and asks to save the city due to one pure soul.

In an earlier issue, Corrigan mentioned that Drake was some kind of creature or something. And since she screams, it makes sense that she's part Banshee. This issue after she screams, she mentions that since she screamed, somebody is going to die. And if there's one thing that Darby O'Gill and the Little People taught me before Dungeons and Dragons taught it to me, it's that when a Banshee screams, somebody fucking dies.

Everyone desperately wants to live so they're all trying to convince God or Jim or The Spectre to not judge Gotham. Because they all know what happens to Gotham if it's judged. Hoo boy, do they know. Out of all the arguments, Sister Justine hits upon one that God really loves. It's that one where an innocent person pays for everybody else's crime? Huge favorite! Taken from the Jewish loophole of the scapegoat, of course. And since Justine offers herself as a martyr in place of everybody in Gotham, God and The Spectre agree. And Ikkondrid the Monstrous Ghost Giant tentatively agrees. For now. Because it's something even if it's still only one life in exchange for thousands. Eventually, Ikky isn't going to feel satisfied and he's going to come back for an appeal.

Batman comes up to Jim and is all, "What the fuck?" And Jim is all, "I know, right?"

Gotham By Midnight #5 Rating: +1 Ranking. Thanks for listening, Gotham. Now I'm going to slip out of this robe and slip into a nice, warm tub where I'll slip out of my skin and slip into another reality. Catch you on the underside, Gotham.

The Spooky Files #4

That's one nasty penis. Unless that's how they usually look and mine is deformed because mine is nothing like that thing!

Gotham has been inundated with spooky happenings lately and it's all up to the Midnight Shift to shut down the spookiness! They're spooky too but they're spooky in a good way even if they're treated like they're spooky in an embezzling kind of way by the other police task forces. Jim Corrigan is trying to hunt ghosts but his phone keeps ringing and it's Rook of Gotham Police Accounts Services and he's all, "You submitted this receipt last week, Jim, that says you ordered fifty deep dish pies from The Hellfire Club. Can you explain why we're paying for this?" And Jim is all, "You wouldn't understand! It's too spooky to discuss with you!" And Rook is all, "If you submit one more receipt for pizza parties or vats of holy water or refurbished Ouija boards,'m shutting you down, Corrigan!" And then Jim hangs up and he's all, "Nuts!"

That pretty much sums up Gotham By Midnight (aka The Spooky Files!).

"Tarr, so help me, if you submit a receipt for that weird glowing jar, I'm taking your badge!"

This issue begins with Corrigan and Rook getting to know each other better over fifteen shots of whisky. It's what cops do! They've got to let off some steam after a tough day of glaring and/or shooting at innocent people. What better way to do that then by killing themselves little by little with too much alcohol? I guess telling each other harrowing stories of their worst shifts is a better way of blowing off steam. That seems safer!

Except the kinds of stories Jim Corrigan likes to hear are Spooky Files! That can be just as dangerous.

This is how Corrigan explains putting his bar tabs on Midnight Shift's expense accounts.

The ghosts' attack on the bar forces Corrigan to turn into The Spectre. It's about time! I feel like I've been waiting three years to see the Spectre in action. He's really green and likes to use a lot of flowery language. Unless by flowery I meant biblically apocalyptic. Then he shoots green lightning out of his eyes and chokes the ghost. As he does, Tarr has a revelation about the ghosts. Children taken from their families and returned acculturated; death by smallpox; lives ruined by alcohol: the ghosts are the ghosts of the native people killed to make way for Gotham City. And they're a little annoyed with the way things went down, historically speaking.

It's about time! Wipe it off the map, Spectre!

Gotham By Midnight #4 Rating: No change. The Spectre is about to judge everybody in the city and, since it's Gotham, my guess is it will soon be just a smoking pit filled with salt. Unless Batman can save the day by swinging in and reminding The Spectre of his humanity. I think if I were living in Gotham, this might be my final night in the city. The murdering clowns and the wisecracking bank robbers I can deal with. But a massive green ghost judging me on behalf of a God I don't believe in battling a monstrous, angry ghost of the natives killed by the white settlers out for my blood when I just want to sit in my underwear and play on the Xbox? Fuck that. Metropolis, here I come!