Dark Nights: Metal #5

How many teeth do people from the Dark Multiverse have?

This series is only on Issue #5 and yet it started in the fall of 1992. It's spawned thousands of tie-in issues and forced millions of people to wake up one morning thinking, "What the fuck happened to Scott Snyder? 'Black Mirror' wasn't just a wet dream, was it? Did he wake up one morning thinking, 'I can't wait to do to comics what Geoff Johns did to comics' mom!'" Sometimes when I have a thought, I think, "That must be a thing millions of people have thought previously." Then I use that thought to back-up the previous thought with thought statistics. It's most of the reason why I know I'm the sexiest comic book critic alive. Although it's not most of the reason why I know I'm the greatest comic book critic alive. You just have to go online and read all the rest of comic book criticism to learn that.

I have noticed some people think I care more about comic books than I actually do. I'm constantly being sent questions about my feelings on various comic book characters and story arcs. What these people don't understand is that I mostly don't give a shit about any of this crap. Here is a question I got recently (twice!): "Have Martian Manhunter and Green Lantern ever had sidedicks? If not why if yes how?" Even if I knew every fact about the history of the DC Universe, how am I supposed to answer "how" Martian Manhunter and Green Lantern have had sidedicks. I mean, Martian Manhunter can have as many sidedicks as he wants, being a shapechanger. So I guess the question is easier to answer than I thought. But I don't want to answer questions like that! As I mentioned in my newsletter, "I'm not writing a history of comic books; I'm writing a memoir of my bitterness and hate." What people should be asking me are questions like "How many of your strokes is Scott Lobdell responsible for?" and "How many times have you hate-masturbated to Ann Nocenti's Katana?"

Here's another question I received that I apparently forgot to answer by not really answering: "Why does Wonder Woman treat Donna like a Pariah, she shows her no affection or care, she is a shitty mentor." First off, Donna is a pariah. Second off, she never asked to be mentor to a character created out of editorial stupidity. Third off, she hates Terry Long and disowned Donna the minute she started dating that monster. Fourth off, I don't fucking care about shit like this! You want the real answer?! Wonder Woman treats Donna like a pariah because the writer of the story line which caused you to think Wonder Woman treats Donna like a pariah probably hates Donna Troy! Maybe stop wondering shit like this and try to reflect on why your mother treated you like a pariah! I know it's true because you're a comic book fan.

I should probably begin proving why I'm the best comic book reviewer in the world now.

But before I do that, I should express a concern I have. I sometimes worry that if I ever meet Greg Capullo and one of my stupid friends says, "This is that jerk from the Internet, Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea!", I'm going to get my ass kicked. So nobody tell Greg Capullo how stupid I think Metal is.

This is so true. I wake up screaming every morning.

I don't actually wake up screaming. It takes a few moments for me to recall who I am and what my life has become before I begin.

After some superhero battles meant to extend the story by making it exciting, Bat-Joker reveals a new secret. "Endings are the loudest of all!" It's so Scott Snyder to begin the comic book by saying something that seems to make sense because he gave two examples to back up his ridiculous statement ("Beginnings are loud because the Big Bang and babies! Never mind that the Big Bang wasn't loud at all because nobody was there to hear it. That's philosophy!") only to reveal that the opposite of the statement is really true! What a twist! I feel so smart having read that! He truly knows how to manipulate narratives and fangenders!

The issue ends with all of the Justice League members losing their Nth metal to the Dark Knights. All hope seems lost! Except Batman and Superman have decided to take a plunge into the Forge of Worlds' magma pit because why not? And Wonder Woman takes the narrative spine of the story (you know, the thing about noise and loudness and screams and shit) and turns it on its head! She doesn't scream at all; she yells her war cry! OH MY GOD! I just busted my comic book nut. Scott Snyder is so fucking good at this!

I think I have a long enough history writing these things that I don't have to point out sarcasm, right?

Dark Nights: Metal #5: As comic book events go, this is a big one. You can tell it's a big one because the editors get off the Snyder's metaphorical dick and allow him to pull from whatever continuity and canon he wants, and to manipulate it to whatever ends he desires. Bring in Sandman from Vertigo? Sure, why not?! Use Plastic Man in a serious manner? Oh yeah! Big events practically call for that to happen! Age Batman thirty years in an alternate dimension and then have him back to normal by the end somehow? Pretty much standard big event fare, that. Create a timeline based completely on Batman being the center of everything and also the reason everything goes wrong due to his hubris that, being the center of everything, he can stop all the bad stuff himself? Well, come on! This is DC Comics, after all! This is the kind of shit comic book fans shove up their vaginas as fast as they can possibly lube themselves up. It's 98% marketing and 2% Scott Snyder's semen. But a lot of fangenders really seem to love that stuff. The marketing, not the semen. I mean, I'm sure some like the semen. It's James Tynion IV approved!

What I'm saying is, I guess it's stupid fun. And there's almost always room for stupid fun. Unless the current president is Donald Trump and practically everybody in congress has been bought by the NRA. Then maybe we should put aside the stupid fun and do something about this shit. Not me, of course! I'm too old and Gen-Xy! The newer generations need to fix this shit. We Gen-Xers stated right out of the gate that we weren't ever getting involved. We're Walter in Get Out. We might not be much help but we know what the fuck is going on and we'll be really funny explaining it.

Dark Nights: Metal #4

No. YOU got lube on YOUR scanner.

It's been five years since Metal #3 hit the stands but thanks to great planning by way of writing a blog entry about Metal #3, I remember exactly what was happening! Well, maybe not exactly since the plot points are punctuated by a bunch of dick jokes. I can't be certain, five years later, which dick jokes were actually part of Metal #3 and which ones I just made up. But at least I have a better than vague notion of what was happening!

This issue begins with the Sandman reminding everybody how the Metal story was interrupted by some stupid tie-ins that should probably have been left unwritten, ending their lives in his library of stories that were never told. I guess Sandman is in this tie-in because Scott Snyder was all, "You know what character would bring a bit of intellectual literary seriousness to this story? Plastic Man! Ha ha! Just kidding. Dream of the Endless! Why not give Neil Gaiman's coattails some riding time! We can give Alan Moore's a break for a week or two. Oh, that reminds me. Do we own any of Warren Ellis's characters and stories? We should monetize those too! And look in on Dave Sim and Gerhard's health. Cerebus is public domain when those fogeys die and I've got a great idea for a Cerebus/Ambush Bug team-up!"

Dream's prologue gives way to Batman being freed from imprisonment in the Dark Multiverse. His escorts off the Dark Multiverse battery are dark versions of Superman (one of them is electric blue Superman. He's now a dark dream of what might have been so I guess Rebirth couldn't bring that bullshit back into canon (although it did in that Action Comics Mr. Mxyzptlk story (sort of))). One of them wears a glove full of different colored Kryptonite because he's an idiot? I was going to begin a rant that starts out with "Who carries a weapon that can be turned against them so easily?!" before I remember police use guns. Maybe I can adapt what I was going to say as "Who carries a weapon that can only destroy a small percentage of people in the universe when you, the carrier of that weapon, are part of that small percentage?!" But I won't because that sentence is unwieldy.

You've probably already figured it out by my previous paragraph: Batman wrests control of this weapon (a glove, to be exact) to turn it against Superman. This is a comic book so I shouldn't ask for realism, especially when the story is already on such insubstantial footing as having Superman wield a Kryptonite weapon but can somebody please explain to me how Batman tears a glove off of Superman?! No wait! I can tell myself! This is what happens when you wear a glove practically made out of Kryptonite, Superman! Your hand becomes as weak as a baby's so that you can't even stop somebody from pulling it from your hand! Idiot.

Anyway, the battle never takes place because Batman (who has been strapped to the Dark Multiverse battery for thirty years and really, really needs to shit) calls to Dream for rescue. It's a good thing it's the Daniel version of Dream and not the Morpheus version of Dream. Morpheus never would have helped Batman. He would have just looked on bored and been all, "Really, really. I can't get involved. When I get involved, I cause...complications. I mean, I get involved sometimes but that's only if the thing I'm manipulating will eventually lead to my death. It surprises some people when they realize the entirety of the Sandman run was just one long, convoluted suicide." Daniel is more like, "I'm chipper and upbeat! Go go Sandman Dream Powers!" And just like that, Batman and Superman are pulled from the Dark Multiverse! Now if Batman could just get Destiny and Death to intervene, this story could end in just a few more pages.

With that done, the story returns to the heroes traveling the universe looking for Nth metal to save the day.

I get that maybe "gym selfies" represents pride but what does pushing nuns down stairs represent? Oh! Lust, of course!

Wonder Woman and her gang defeat the seven sins while Aquaman and Deathstork climb into Arion's crypt seeking the Nth metal below Atlantis. Over on Thanagar Prime (a planet heretofore unknown to even Hal Jordan (as if that's supposed to be surprising to anybody but Hal Jordan. He doesn't strike me as the studious type), Hal and Mr. Terrific learn that Lord Synn has taken over the planet with help from his buddy, Starro. Starro's big reveal is that he no longer needs the little stars to take control of the populace of a planet. That's just stupid! That was the best part of Starro! Plus it allowed him to control multiple planets all across the universe and it allowed me to rationalize it! But I can't suspend my disbelief if the little stars aren't stuck to people's faces and yet they're still being controlled while Starro is a thousand light years away micro-managing one of his other holdings. Lord Synn explains that he can't help them because he already knows how to deal with Earth after the Dark Multiverse has taken it over.

He does mean razing, right? If not, I don't know what he's talking about.

Scott Snyder's Starro speaks like a character from one of Grunion Guy's novels. He ends a lot of sentences with "idiot" or "moron" or "jerko!" Well, maybe not "Jerko!" since I've trademarked that. At least I told my assistant, Pickle Boy, to put in the paperwork. I'm sure he got around to it.

Back in The Dreaming, Daniel tells Superman and Batman a story which explains what's happening. At the beginning of the universe, a couple more beings than the Monitor and Anti-Monitor were created. One was the forger and the other was his dragon, Barbatos. The Forger created every world in DC's universe and Barbatos destroyed the ones that weren't selling well. But then Barbatos killed The Forger and forgot to keep doing his job, letting terrible worlds survive. That probably explains The New 52. But now he wants to destroy the Rebirth worlds as well! And DC can't have that because they've invested quite a bit of their reputation in fixing their stupid fucking universe that they keep breaking by way of fixing it. So, eventually, this fix will be seen as the next break that must be fixed. But for now, Barbatos must be stopped before he destroys DC Comics!

Wonder Woman's team's plan goes off the rails when...well, I don't want to say. If you haven't read this comic book, you'll be left thinking, "Why are you always making shit up, Tess? Can't you ever just explain the plot in as straightforward and boring a way as possible? You know, the way the Weird Science Blog guys do it?" And I don't want you thinking ill of me! I'd scan the scene in but I've been known to present some pretty amazing photoshops before so you still might not believe it. But maybe...just maybe...you understand how Scott Snyder writes comic books. He understands that they're supposed to be ridiculous and the more ridiculous they are, the more people he can convince that they're good. So considering that, I guess I'll mention what happens. Kendra whips out the Anti-Monitor's brain so she can whip it into the center of the Multiverse which will destroy the Dark Multiverse (along with Batman, Superman, and Hawkman). But before she can do that, she turns into Lady Blackhawk. Not the military Lady Blackhawk that is probably a lesbian but some weird Hawk and Dove type birdlike manifestation of god-like powers. Then she's all, "All roads lead back to darkness!" which totally isn't true because some roads lead to the light bulb factory. I mean, they must, right? Anyway, after that, Black Adam appears and incinerates Doctor Fate because the other things were just too boring to hold a comic book reader's attention.

And finally, Batman and Superman arrive at the World Forge in the hopes to save the world by, I don't know, forging a new world? But they find the forge has gone out. And guarding the forge, they find Hawman spouting nonsense.

So Barbatos the dragon has a dragon of his own in Hawkman? Okay. I guess!

Metal #4 Rating: I have two ratings for this book! If you're a big stupid comic book fan that laps up every exciting tie-in that you know is exciting because the people making and selling the comic book have gone on record as saying, "I haven't felt this good reading a book since I jerked off while reading a different book!" then you'll probably love this book. Five out of five stars! But if you're a person who has realized in middle age that maybe comic books are far less intelligent than you used to give them credit for, this comic book rates as two giant hawk turds out of however many hawk turds equals a good book. Two hawk turds means it's not a good book, even in hawk turd terms.

If you managed to read your way through this entire thing and somewhat enjoyed the experience, how about signing up to my Newsletter where I talk more about the comics I read but don't feel like making huge blog posts about? I also talk about other things that are more controversial than comic books. Like what you can and can't put your dick in when people are watching. You should sign up! I publish one per week so you won't be spammed by them. Plus, I've been notified by some people, you won't be spammed by them because they go right in your spam folder anyway!

Dark Nights: Metal #3

I'm trying to be more positive so I'd like to praise John Romita Jr. for how well he draws monster teeth. If he drew them, that is!

If John Romita Jr. actually had drawn them, I'd expect them to be boxier, like the monster had a mouth full of C batteries. It wouldn't surprise me at all if somebody else drew the monster teeth on this cover for John Romita Jr. I remember a time when I thought the guitarist for Extreme, Nuno Bettencourt, was one of the greatest guitarists of all time. Right up until I read the liner notes and discovered Dweezil Zappa played the solo in Play With Me and the entire Flight of the Bumblebee bit. Although now I can't find any verification of this on the Internet except for a couple of people on a wiki discussion page asking the same question about crediting Dweezil Zappa on Extreme's first album. Now I want to track down an old copy of the tape version of the album to see exactly what the liner notes said! I think maybe Nuno Bettencourt made a deal with the devil to change history so he wouldn't feel humiliated about that first album. Um, it's also possible that I'm remembering things incorrectly. I'm not going all in on my memory being sacrosanct and declaring this an example of the Mandela Effect! Although that's what the Mandela Effect is anyway! People declaring their faulty memories are more correct than proven facts. So, um, maybe I should! Dweezil Zappa totally did all the guitar work for Extreme, except for the part in "More Than Words" when the acoustic guitar is thumped. I think Nuno could take care of that.

Last issue ended with Batman being slapped between two pieces of cheese and becoming a wagon wheel. No wait. He became an entire wagon! The wagon thing was due to his name being Wayne which meant he was the wagon that would carry Barbatos to Earth-New-Earth. But before Barbatos can joy ride in, the Bat-inspired evil Justice League need to remake Earth-Main-Earth into a hell dimension. It's kind of like when I reserve a hotel room and the staff makes sure the floors, walls, and ceiling are lined with tin foil and mayonnaise.

Superman and Wonder Woman, who were defeated by Batjoker, wake up thanks to Diana's lasso of truth (which she apparently has again? For some reason? I'm not currently reading Wonder Woman but last I read, she left it behind to help some stupid kid not die or something). Now they have to save the world! Although they really should know that this is Batman's story and it's going to be up to him to save the world. If I were Superman or Wonder Woman, I would just find a quiet place to ride this shitstorm out.

Wonder Woman seems to know what's up. That's probably explained in the issue where Doctor Fate gathers all the heroes together to tell them how to beat Barbatos. I don't know what issue that will be. Or was? I don't think I missed any issues but this beginning is a bit confusing. I guess the reader is supposed to be viewing everything through Superman's eyes since he has no clue what's been happening. He's just as surprised as I was to see Jimmy Olsen transformed into Most Definitely Not Superman's Pal, Doomsday Olsen.

Superman ditches Wonder Woman because why go into battle supported by somebody practically just as strong as you? Better to just fly into a rage and straight into a situation you know nothing about. It almost always works out anyway. Sure, sometimes you die for awhile. But that's barely a speed bump if you're Superman!

How come heroes always say shit like this? Have they never been around their friends when their friends are drunk? "Good" goes out the window pretty fucking easily.

The Flash races out of a giant ankh to rescue Superman from the Bat-inspired evil Justice League. He takes him to The Oblivion Bar where Detective Chimp reminds everybody that the DC Universe heartily sucked for a long while because Dan DiDio believed it wasn't a place for fun and whimsy. Of course, that's all being taken care of now with this Rebirth and Watchmen shit. Now all the idiots who thought Comics Shouldn't Be Fun Again are backpedaling and pretending it was the fault of everybody but the editors in charge. "It was the Watchmen! They changed it all for the worse!" "It was the fans! This is what they said they wanted!" "It wasn't Jim Lee, Geoff Johns, or Dan DiDio at all! Stop looking at us! I mean them!"

Oh! Tomorrow is Friday the 13th! I have to remember to play the Friday the 13th video game tomorrow because they have to do something special, right? Like maybe log the IP of everybody who plays and send Jason around to murder us all? How fun would that be! Seriously! Please somebody kill me. This country has gotten so terrible.

Racist! Or anti-golem? Whatever it is, it's probably gross, right? Am I doing youth correctly?

Other people hiding out in the Oblivion Bar are Steel, Mister Terrific, the Justice League, Green Arrow, Damian Wayne, and Plastic Man stuck in the form of a giant egg. But even as an egg, he's able to vibrate out a message. Wonder Woman translates it as "Oh. OH! OoOoOoHhHhHh! OH ZEUS YES!" Mister Terrific translates it as coordinates to deep space, beneath Atlantis, and the center of the multiverse. What kind of chart can graph those coordinates? An XYZZZZZZZZZZZ chart? I buy that Mister Terrific can figure them out but how the fuck did Plastic Man do the math on them? He's just a petty, clumsy crook turned accidental superhero! I don't remember him being a maths genius!

Plastic Egg also gives some negative coordinates and Mister Terrific is all, "These don't make sense! I may be a genius but I don't understand how coordinates work!" Luckily Superman is there to be all, "Nobody pay attention to this whole thing about negative numbers not being valid coordinates! He probably means the Dark Multiverse!" And everybody is all, "Whew! Good save, Superman! That certainly was a job for you!"

Deathstork arrives to help out because he has a Promethium sword. It's not Nth metal but it'll do the trick when it comes to hurting the Batjerks. Now everybody can split up and go explore all the coordinates Plastic Egg vibrated into Mister Terrific's ear. Ear? Yeah, it was probably his ear.

Steel, Flash, and Superman team up to rescue Batman from the Dark Multiverse. Mister Terrific, Green Lantern, and Plastic Egg team up to head into deep space. Doctor Fate, Green Arrow, and Wonder Woman head to the Rock of Eternity. And Aquaman and Deathstork head to the place beneath Atlantis.

Most of the teams have an easy job, following the coordinates. But Superman's team has to rely on Superman making up a theory as to how they can get to the Dark Multiverse. Luckily, it's a comic book so science that is pure speculation is usually good enough to get the job done.

Superman makes it to the Dark Multiverse but finds that it's a trap! Surprise! Batman was trying to warn Superman not to save him but Superman was too dumb to figure out Batman's genius code. So typical of Superman. He never does the smart thing. He should have listened to Nightwing. Everybody should listen to Nightwing! He's the only one that ever knows what's going on.

Not only is it a trap but it's part of Barbatos's plan. He needs Superman's body to be the battery for his gadget to turn Earth-Main-Earth into a hell dimension. It's too bad that all of the ancient texts Hawkman and Hawkwoman read didn't say something about Superman being the key to the rise of Barbatos. All the clues pointed to Batman! So once again, Hawkman fucked up. What an idiot.

Dark Nights: Metal #3 Rating: Not too bad. I mean, Mister Terrific, the world's third smartest man, made a stupid mistake. But that's to be expected when Not the World's Third Smartest Man is writing the comic book. It's hard to write a genius when you have to know things. Which sucks because writers are writers so they don't have to know stuff! You get to just make shit up! I mean, sure, you can do research. But what if you don't know you need to do research when you're writing about something like, say, coordinates?! Obviously all coordinates must be positive, right? How can negative coordinates exist in the world?! That doesn't make any sense! Which is why latitude and longitude are totally fake news. Those places in negative latitudes and longitudes either don't exist or are composed of pure evil.

Mainly I'm excited for the Aquaman/Deathstork team-up. I hope that becomes a forty-five issue maxi-series.

Dark Nights: Metal #2

I could tell this cover was by John Romita Jr. because of Batman's stupid batarang. I believe that's the specialized batarang used for attaching trees to super-villains¹.

Here's a recap of the previous Metal episodes: Scott Snyder saw a show discussing dark matter and screamed "Eureka!" so loudly that Scott Tynion IV stopped sucking his dick long enough to ask, "What the hell?" Scott was all, "Remember that idea I had..."

"WE had!" reminded James, lovingly fingering Scott's butthole.

"Yeah, yeah! That's what I meant! Don't worry, James. You'll always get credit on almost every story you help brainstorm with me. And you know what I mean by brainstorm, right? Wink, wink. I'm winking right now but I dubbed it so that you would know what I was doing seeing as you're kind of busy down there. Anyway, that idea we had! The one about Nth Metal being the meta gene and how it got all confusing to the scientists because the file was named META.TXT instead of METAL.TXT for reasons that I decided not to linger on for too long because they don't really exist? Well guess where I just decided Nth Metal comes from?! The Upside-down! I mean, the Dark Universe! Which is the same as the Upside Down but with scientific reasons involving dark matter. And since the word 'dark' is in the term, it will be a place of evil! Just like the Upside-down!"

"That's great, Scott. But you're going to write this story yourself, right? I'm kind of busy over at Detective Comics making sure that the young heroes treat Batman like he's the Patriarchy. Because, you know, he totally is. He's the worst!"

"Sure, of course I'll...wait a second. What are you doing? Are you fucking out of your mind?"

"No way! Millennials love this take! They tweet at me and tumbl at me all the time about how they've been reading my stuff via torrent and they love what I'm doing!"

"Whatever. Finish me off already. Just try not to turn Detective Comics into Batman and Robin Eternal."

That's the end of the recap! If you wanted the money shot to be included, go write it yourself! You can say something like, "Scott groaned meaningfully while mumbling 'Geoff Johns sucks donkey balls!' under his breath. Then surprise came across Tynion's face as Scott Snyder came across it too."

This issue begins with another entry from Carter Hall's diary. It's just to remind all the Fangenders (who don't actually need reminding except when something will be integral to the plot) how Krona created the Multiverse by opening a viewing window to see God masturbating. God's jizz flew through the viewing portal and seeded the universe with dozens of baby universes (maybe even an infinite amount of dozens, depending on when you began reading DC Comics). But the entry is interrupted when Superman notices Bat Symbols all over the Earth. He calls the Justice League to hunt down and kill Batman.

The Justice League tracks a half-dozen Batman's to the Amazon. Robin is also with them driving a VW minibus through the jungle. I don't know where all the Batmen have come from. Perhaps they're paid actors from Gotham Community College getting a few credits for this excursion? Anyway, I'd just ignore the Batmen on the Bat-cycles and go for Robin. He's obviously carrying something important inside that minivan and I bet that something is the real Batman!

The alterna-Batmans turn out to be other members of the Bat Family who have nothing better to do than jump when Batman says jump rather than asking why they should jump and what is Batman up to and why is he pissing off the entire Justice League and, you know what, I don't fucking want to be a part of that, Batasshole! Not only do they fuck with the Justice League, their entire plan is to piss of Swamp Thing so he'll keep the Justice League busy!

This is just cruel. Stop manipulating Swamp Thing into doing your dirty work, Batman!

Now that I know the Batmen were all members of the Bat-family, I want to know which jerk was captured by Aquaman. So embarrassing! I bet it was Red Hood.

It turns out Batman was in Robin's VW Minivan which is what they all should have guessed because I guessed it but forgot to mention it. Now you're probably thinking, "Oh right! I bet you did! What a liar!" But you should know I'm telling the truth because I could have just as easily (and more believably!) gone back and edited the review by saying what I was going to say before I got distracted! You know what? I'm going to do it anyway! Fuck your sense of reality!

Anyway, Superman figures it out and swoops down to threaten Batman. He picks him up and flies him into the sky saying, "All I have to do is barely squeeze. You can't even imagine how little pressure I need to add to my grip before your torso just rips like wet toilet paper. I mean, it's difficult not to explode you! You realize how many mathematical calculations I'm doing every minute just so I don't destroy everything I touch?! Imagine walking around a world built out of tissue paper and trying to navigate it without destroying it completely?! To me, you Earthlings are less substantive than a jelly doughnut!" But Batman is all, "If you squash me, you'll die because I drank a gallon of Kryptonite after getting out of the shower this morning! I'm like a deadly piñata!"

Fun Fact #1: To get the "n" with the tilde on it, I looked up "jalapeno" on Google so I could copy and paste the ñ. I don't know why I didn't just look up piñata!"

Fun Fact #2: When I just went to past in the ñ in piñata in the previous sentence, instead of typing CTRL-V, I typed CTRL-N and just about shit myself when my entire review disappeared! Luckily I realized pretty quickly that I'd just opened a new browser page.

Batman finally decides to explain everything to Superman instead of being killed by him. It's a simple choice, really. But it's not a simple explanation! On no! The explanation is going to go pretty deep into Scott Snyder's previous story arcs to try to explain the most glaring errors in each of them.

This is even more convoluted than I was expecting! Perfect!

Now it's time to speculate on the fifth element! I bet it's Plasticmannium! Or maybe whatever shit the Orb of Ra is made from. Oh! Maybe it's Kryptonite and Batman doesn't realize he's already become the doorway because he drank that gallon of it earlier!

Wonder Woman arrives to make Superman doubt Batman is being honest with him. Only Superman would ever believe anything out of Batman's mouth! He's so credulous! Even Ma and Pa Kent were fond of saying, "That boy'll believe a sack of worms if they told him they were a vagina!" That is so a Midwestern saying.

Since Batman is obviously lying, Superman takes a drastic measure.

Superman didn't do this to save the world. He just did it because he's fucking sick of Batman.

Before you start sucking your own dicks (both figurative and literal ones so that all genders are included!) everybody at Marvel thinking DC has just flushed itself down the drain by killing the only one of their characters anybody really cares about, it turns out it wasn't actually Batman. Superman just killed Clayface. Although Clayface can't really die, I don't think. He's like an Oompa Loompa: immortal and weary of life.

Meanwhile in Antarctica (unless it's actually the Arctic, seeing as how DC has had some poor history with keeping the two places straight), the Legion of Doom's headquarters rises from a lava pit. The Legion of Doom is currently staffed by all of DC's immortal characters. There's Vandal Savage and The Phantom Stranger and the other immortal guy and that other one plus the one that's immortal and also Cain and Abel and Lady Blackhawk and Morgaine le Fey and Shazam's wizard and all the other ones I can't think of. Their plan is to shoot the astral brain of the Anti-Monitor through the Rock of Eternity and into the core of the Multiverse. I don't know if that will save the world or it's just something they want to do for the lulz.

Superman and Wonder Woman finally track the real Batman to the tomb of Prince Khufu. Just before they get there, Dream gives Batman a little advice about how to find his way home when this shit all goes wrong. And it all goes wrong pretty quickly. After Batman pulls Baby Darkseid out of his backpack and threatens Superman with it, I think, "Wait. What?" Um, anyway, it's all a trap! Batman knows everything except where to find the tomb of Khufu because he actually entered the tomb of Hath Set! I know, right? What an idiot! Now the Strigydae are about to mantle the fuck out of him!

It's not as confusing as I make it sound, I assure you!

I mean, sure, the Court of Owls shows up and some black squiggles take out Superman and Wonder Woman after which the Court pours a substance called Batmanium all over Batman so that the doorway can open for Barbatos. But that's not technically confusing! It's just, um, ridiculous!

Batman turns into a cosmic doorway through which steop out eight Dark Batmonsters. One is Aquabat. One is Doomsbat. One is Cybat. One is Wonder Bat. One is Flashbat. One is Green Lanterbat. One is Jokerbat. And the last one is probably BarBATos. Unless he's The Phantom Strangebat. In other words, the Earth is fucked. Because if the Justice League can't even beat one Batman, how are they going to beat however many I just said stepped through the gate? What was it? Seven? Eight?

So that's the story of Metal! I bet you all wet your pants over it like I did, right? I mean, I think I just wet my pants because I took too long writing this and didn't get up to go to the bathroom. But I probably would have from the excitement and intrigue and Batman's ultimate failure! That part was really great!

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¹I didn't just make that up. See whichever stupid issue of All Star Batman had that bit in it.

Dark Knights: Metal #1

I thought this series was going to be about how the meta gene is tied into Nth metal and not some fifteen year old metal head's idea of a cool black light poster.

In my version of how this began, Scott Snyder walks into pitch meetings at DC with a huge and obvious boner in his pants and the vestiges of vaginal fluids drying on his chin. This is just to get the heads of DC (whoever they are. DiDio? Johns? Lee? A penis in a three piece suit? two bears fucking?) frothing with excitement. He begins by throwing up his hands and belting out in his best Gene Simmons impression (Gene Simmons at the height of a Kiss performance and not Gene Simmons on Donahue discussing how many women his semen has ruined), "Imagine how much money I'm about to make you!" He then farts up a vague idea (immediately after which Geoff Johns leans over to Jim Lee and whispers, "I thought of that like two minutes ago.") that retcons something in the DC Universe in a clever enough way that the room soon fills with the smell of semen soaking into cotton. In this case, he pitched this: "What if the scientist who discovered the Meta gene only called it the meta gene because his file system was so antiquated that he could only use four letters instead of the five he needed since he really discovered the...wait for it...METAL GENE!" Then he made rock and roll guitar lick sounds with his mouth for five minutes.

"Wow!" growled one of the bears in mid-coitus. "Spuuuuuuuuuurt!" went the penis in the three-piece suit (and Dan DiDio as well). Geoff Johns suppressed a yawn while Jim Lee just kept scribbling all over some art he was working on that was already three months behind schedule. If you're wondering what the second bear thought, he was unimpressed.

"How much more do you have?" asked Geoff. "Perhaps the Green Lanterns can be in it and you can mention all of my great work on that franchise somewhere in there."

"Actually," informed Scott, "I don't have much more yet. I'm going to get James Tynion drunk this weekend and steal any ideas he comes up with. But I have figured out the cover of the first issue! Since it's called Metal, I thought the first cover should be the most metal thing you can think of. And what's more metal than Batman riding a fucking dinosaur!"

"Maybe if he were wielding a battle axe?" piped up Jim Lee.

"Shut the fuck up, WildCATS," blasted DiDio, which is really too bad because that was a really metal suggestion. DC really missed out on that battle axe bit.

"Maybe we can get Simon Bisley to do the cover," suggested the well-dressed phallus.

"No way. He'll stick a fucking dick on it and everybody knows dicks aren't metal." DiDio was always squashing the penis's ideas. Then again, the penis's ideas were always to get Simon Bisley to draw stuff. The penis really liked penises. He was as gay as two bears fucking in a boardroom.

That's the end of my scene. You can applaud if you aren't reading this in a library or on a bus. You know what? Fuck it. Applaud even if you're on a bus. Like that would be the worst thing happening at the moment. Although it might encourage the people doing the worse things, thinking you're giving them some kind of approval for their behavior.

According to the previous two issues of Metal (which were Forge and Casting or just two issues of Forge. Or something. I can't fucking remember. I think I wrote about one of them), the new reason for superheroes is going to be an infusion of Nth Metal into some people's systems. It was never the meta-gene at all! It was just metal in the body! Which seems like a strange mistake to make simply because one letter was left off of a file. Did nobody ever read the file? Did the scientist pass on his report saying, "Here's why people get super powers! I figured it out! It's in this file labeled "META" which for some reason I'm not going to explain any more than that right now or else it will ruin the future revelation that I couldn't actually name the file what I wanted to! Probably because I'm having a heart attack right now! Oh! Oh! I'm dead!" Then another scientist was all, "Oh shit! Don't read that file because it might give you a heart attack too!" And the other scientists all nodded and one piped up, "Yep! That's science!" Then one was all, "What do you think meta means?" And another one was all, "It probably has to do with genes or some shit. A meta gene!" And another one was all, "Can you believe how unrealistic Game of Thrones is this season? How are they all traveling everywhere so quickly?" And another one was all, "Why is that suddenly a fucking problem? It's not like time means anything in that Westeros (I'm glad I'm only speaking that so I don't have to worry about whether or not I spelled it correctly)! Winter isn't a yearly thing but then when it comes it lasts for years? What the fuck is up with the orbit of that planet?! And how the hell are those kids aging so fucking quickly when other people are only spending a few weeks doing their story arc?! And what's up with all the dire wolf ex machina?! I feel like the entire show is going to wrap up when a giant wolf marches in to devour all of the Whitewalkers!"

I guess there will also be some revelations about some kind of Dark Multiverse as well. Scott came up with that idea when Tynion slurred, "And what's up with all this fucking dark matter? Fucking dark matter. Fuck you! What are you?!"

Apparently time travel makes you vomit blood.

I thought the page after that scanned page was going to declare the new age was the Age of the Bat. But it didn't. It declared it was the Age of Metal! After reading that, you're supposed to make guitar noises with your mouth and bang your head and throw up some devil horns. You might even fuck a goat, if you're super cool.

I'm not sure when the Age of Metal began. There was the Golden Age and the Silver Age and the Modern Age (and maybe some other metallic ages I don't remember). Perhaps the Age of Metal just means the time when superhero comics began? Or did the Age of Metal start when Peter David gave Aquaman long hair and a hook for a hand?

Mongul currently has the Justice League battling for their life on his new Warworld. This takes place almost immediately after Mongul was punched into orbit by General Zod, so editorial demanded that Batman mention something about how this makes no sense, continuity-wise. He doesn't say it to help explain it! He just says it because editorial was all, "You know we're going to get buttfucked hard on this by the Fangenders¹, right? You need to get out in front of this shit." And Snyder was all, "Okay, okay. Batman will be all, 'This doesn't make sense!' But then Superman will be all, 'Stop over thinking things, you stupid fucking hypocritical moron living in your parents' basement and not adding any value to anything because all you do is destroy things with your Internet criticisms!'" And the editor was all, "Yeah, maybe that. But tone it the fuck down. You're sounding like Cullen Bunn anonymously defending his shitty Twat Lobo comics on harsh but hilarious blogs offering valid critical reviews."

The Justice League's powers have been rendered inert by...well, it doesn't really matter what by. It's the same old shit as usual. The heroes are too powerful so to create dramatic tension, you remove their powers. Snyder does offer a few ways that their powers can be dampened by invoking red suns and vibration domination technology and Gorgon pasties just so the Fangenders can nod enthusiastically and think, "Yep! Yep! They should have seen this coming! This is just like Justice League #45²! Idiots." Of course, those are the powers with fairly easy explanations for how to suppress them. He doesn't explain how he's keeping Cyborg from utilizing his Mother Box technology. Or how Green Lantern's ring isn't working (although, I mean, really? It's probably just out of charge like in 95% of Green Lantern comic books). And how did he stop Aquaman from talking to fish? Oh, you know what. Mongul probably decided Aquaman could keep his stupid power.

Oh, just so Scott Snyder doesn't feel like he was being too subtle, I got it. It's the Metal Age and the entire Justice League is being forced to wear armor by Mongul!

Some of it is super sexy titty fucking armor!

Toyman has also been captured by Mongul, probably because Scott Snyder needed enemies that the Justice League could kill without Batman getting on everybody's dick about murder. Toyman tells Mongul the name of the toys that will kill the Justice League is Fulcum Abominus. Mongul pulls out his dick and begins sucking it because he's smarter than me and that apparently means something to him. I shouldn't feel too stupid though because why should I have known what a fulcum is? I've never owned a Warworld and seemed to have missed the adolescent phase where Roman soldiers intrigued me as much as women's nipples. I suppose the name means the Justice League will be battling an abominable shield wall? A close formation made up of Yetis? Or maybe just a few transforming robots.

Judging by Mongul and the crowd's reaction, the Aegea Formation must be where the Justice League creates an illusion that they're running away. Either that or this is Greg Capullo's way of telling Snyder to fuck off because he's going to draw whatever the fuck he wants.

I'm not four years old so the crowd chanting "Do not run! Pain is fun!" doesn't amuse me. It does make me question why I've spent so much of my life reading comic books though.

It's at this point during the battle that I need to apologize to Scott Snyder. It's my first apology of the new season but it won't be my last. The problem with writing the critique as I'm experiencing the "art" is that I tend to point out flaws before the artist has a chance to finish. It's like when I'm in the middle of cleaning a floor and somebody thinks they're the next George Burns and says, "You missed a spot!"³ So, um, my apology is that I assumed Snyder couldn't think of ways to dampen the powers of the other Justice League. But he continues explaining how they've all been shut down. Green Lantern's gauntlet has a mini-black hole. And you know what they say about black holes when they're not making anus jokes, right?! Not even Green Lantern light can escape! Plus it's a mini-black hole so don't worry about how heavy and dense it is. Even though it must be even denser than a non-mini black hole if it can still capture light in its gravitational pull. And Aquaman has lost half of his strength to the vambraces made from glass forged in the heat of Apokolips!

Each creature in the Fulcum Abominus has been designed to counter one of the Justice League members. So not only do they not have their usual powers, they have to battle creatures that wouldn't care if they had those powers anyway! Wonder Woman can't even outsmart hers because it has a Cassandra Engine! And we all know what that means! Well, most of us do. Those who don't can always watch old reruns of Red Dwarf.

I hope the solution to defeating the Fulcum Abominus isn't to switch opponents because that's been done fifteen thousand times. Although it would be more original than just having Batman defeat them all after the rest of the Justice League are incapacitated. That's been done about sixteen thousand times. I can't think of any other way this conflict might end. Maybe it'll have something to do with the metal! Or maybe Toyman will have programmed the Fulcum Abominus to turn on Mongul once he's done sucking his dick. He'll be drained and distracted at that point!

Batman comes up with a plan to be eaten by Toyman's machines. He comes up with it the way Dr. House came up with solutions to his medical mysteries. You know how somebody would say just the right word and he'd sort of glaze over into a fugue state for a few seconds before snapping back and yelling, "I am a genius! You people are all idiots! And this show shits on the scientific process to pander to people who believe intuition is some magic panacea that comes out of the ether!" Anyway, Wonder Woman says "Formation" and Batman is all, "That's it! Formation! These machines were formated by Toymanster! If I reach into the gaping maw of this one, I'm sure to find a WayneTech Emergency Shutdown Switch!" Or something. I mean, there is a button in the creature's throat and it does have a bat on it and Batman does push it. But it doesn't shut the thing off at all. It just makes it eat Batman.

By pushing the buttons in the throat of the creature (which Batman realized by knowing that the command to form the fulcum formation was done by a cry from the back of the throat (because Batman knows everything (which means Toyman must know everything because you can't give subtle clues to people who know everything if you're a dumbshit like me...I mean Mongul))), the Justice League turn the machines into Voltron armor. This allows them to "form up" like the Roman formation and turn into a giant robot. Batman is the head, of course. Aquaman is the balls.

Is that why Snyder introduced the stupid rhyming chant earlier when it made no sense because the Justice League wasn't running? Just so Batman can act childish now? Eh, works for me! I mean, I'm the guy who chose to write that Aquaman was the giant robot's balls.

Instead of saying "ass" on the next page, Snyder inserts the title page and credits. Apparently the logo for Metal is a Satanic Hexagram. Can hexagrams be Satanic? They made it into a six pointed star but not so that it looks like the Star of David. It's got some bend to it. But the star is enclosed in a circle with symbols at each point. Those symbols are combinations of Justice League symbols and the bat symbol. So Wonder Wobatman and Superbatman and Aquabatman and Black Computer Batman and Green Lanterbatman and the other one. It's totally metal. Also the word metal is textured like the bumper on a pickup truck. Is that metal? I mean, it's metal, literally. But is it metal, 80's figuratively?

When the Justice League return to Earth, they find a mountain has appeared in the middle of Gotham. Apparently it didn't kill too many people because the city somehow made room for it. But Batman is still upset by it for some reason. Probably because he's thinking about how he vowed to never let anybody else be crushed by a mountain after his parents were crushed by that mountain in that alley.

The Flash finds a door inside the mountain with a pseudo-Challengers of the Unknown symbol on it. It's an hour glass with most of the sand in the bottom half. That's probably not a good sign, right?

Inside the door, they find a cryogenic pod with five people inside. I bet one is a white woman, one is a white man with blond hair, one is a white man with brown hair, one is a black man, and one is white man with red hair! Nearby the pod is Red Tornado. They don't seem to recognize him even though earlier somebody mentioned Aquaman's hook hand. If they remember that, they should surely remember Red Tornado!

The Blackhawks appear, led by Lady Blackhawk, Kendra Saunders. Get it?! She's still a hawk! Oh, Scott Snyder! You're so fucking clever! I bet Geoff Johns hates the fuck out of you. It always hurts to be usurped. I imagine. Nobody has ever been able to usurp me. Or wanted to?

Lady Blackhawk tells everybody that this is the start of an invasion but she can't tell them who is doing the invading. That's called dramatic tension! It's also called bullshit writing. Just fucking say it, you resurrected nutcase! Instead of revealing cool shit, she spends a few pages taking everybody to Blackhawk Island where she has a map of Grant Morrison's Multiversity. She's all, "Nth metal is this thing that's behind all these things. It's such a crazy thing! Hawkman, the most boring hero in the Multiverse after Aquaman, has been studying it his entire lives! Yeah, you heard me right! I said lives! He decided it didn't come from anywhere in the known Multiverse through assumptions and poor science. Unless over the course of all his lives, he had time to use good science? You know what? Who cares? Just believe me when I say it must have come from somewhere else. He didn't know where until he binged Stranger Things last year and Eleven turned over the Dungeons and Dragons map. That's when he was all, 'A-ha! That's the one place on the map I didn't search! The other side of it! The dark side of it! The Dark Multiverse! And now that I've decided that the known Multiverse is much like a two dimensional representation of it, the other side of the map must exist in reality! A Dark Multiverse!'"

"I'm not the worst," mumbled Aquaman.

Ha ha! Wanting proof! How silly!

I like how Kendra wanted proof of Carter's theory which caused Carter to want to prove her wrong. What the fuck does that mean?! You don't prove somebody wrong who just wants some evidence that your theory is reality! You just prove your stupid theory. I already hate this new version of Hawkman. Yes, I'm biased because I've hated every version of Hawkman so I didn't have far to go to hate this one. But I hate him more passionately than I ever hated the other ones and I haven't even met this one yet! The other ones I just sort of hated for no real reason. This one is a scientific idiot.

Kendra isn't much for science either. She just found the word wagon over and over again because a wagon would carry a dark beast named Barbatos from the Dark Multiverse into the Non-Dark Multiverse. And then she decided that Wagon was the root of the name Wayne (you know, wainwright? Wains! Wagons!) which must mean that the Wagon was Batman and he was the bad guy. That's when the Blackhawks pull their guns on Batman. But they don't shoot him in the face for some reason. Some heroes they are!

Red Tornado begins screaming about the door being left open which probably saves Batman's life. He then flips the fuck out which means he'll be dismembered in a few pages. His stories always end in dismemberment.

Batman steals Kendra's Nth Metal and races back to the Batcave to destroy the Multiverse in the pursuit of knowledge.

The Nth Metal reveals Carter Hall's diary hidden in Wayne Manor. It's there to tell Batman he was right to pursue whatever he's been pursuing. The mysteries of the Nth Metal, I guess. And once he's been proving right, he's visited by Dream of The Endless. Well. I guess Snyder can still surprise me without me needing to make a snarky comment about how dumb his twist is. I don't know why Dream has appeared but it's pretty cool that he's been allowed back into the regular DC Universe.

I'll say this about Metal: it's entertaining and interesting. But it's also built upon the dumb shit that Scott Snyder likes to build his retcons. So far we've learned that the Meta-gene is actually the Metal Gene because Nth Metal is behind all superpowers. We also learned that Nth Metal couldn't have come from anywhere in the DC Multiverse so it must have come from the other side of a two-dimensional representation of the Multiverse. I know that's just a metaphor but I bring it up because it's a metaphor from Stranger Things. The other big twist is that Wayne means wagon. In both the meta/metal and wagon/Wayne plot elements, we see the thing Scott Snyder bases almost all of his stories on. He starts small by looking at words and their meanings to expand those observations into a bigger story. Usually I'm just annoyed by them. But this time, he gets to really fuck around with the DC Universe by making this Nth metal/meta-gene connection and I'm always up for a good buttfucking of the DC Universe.

Oh yeah! How can I mention all the word play without mentioning the Dark Nights title of the series? Oh, probably because it's been used before. But this time it's the Dark Nights bring the Dark Knights of the Dark Multiverse! It's boner and/or lubrication inducing!

_________________________________________________________
¹"Fangenders" is my inclusive term for what was once thought of as Fanboys. Being an obnoxious comic book know-it-all knows no gender boundary.
²I don't actually know what happens in Justice League #45. But if you were instantly angry at my lack of knowledge, you're a Fangender. That was the whole point, dum-dum!
³I have a floor cleaning business. This isn't just an analogy of a thing I rarely do. It happens all the time. I'm getting angry just thinking about it! I should probably footnote George Burns as well but what's the point? You have access to the fucking Internet, lazy!

Batman #51

Gotham City is analogous to Batman's bowels?

The Review! And the Commentary!
Before I say anything about this comic book, let me say a couple of things I think the television show Gotham got right last week. In it, Gordon and tiny Bruce have a brief dialogue that finally gives a glimmer of reason for having Gordon kill Galavan. I'm not going to defend the fact that the Gotham writers thought it was a good idea to have the one incorruptible person on the police force to commit cold blooded murder. But since that ship and every other ship in the entire fucking navy has already sailed, I have to accept it. Gordon, as a mentor, can now strongly sway Bruce Wayne away from going down the murder route. It saves Bruce from ever having to find that out the hard way and be tainted in the same way Gordon is now tainted. I don't know if it went a long way to helping the show but it's a fucking start. Plus Galavan has come back to life, so Gordon gets to forget he committed murder and just point to Azrael whenever anybody mentions Galavan and say, "See?! See! I didn't fucking shoot him in the face like everybody thinks I did!" Although, you know, he knows he did so whatever. The other part of the episode that gave me a good chuckle was the part about Enigma giving Strange the idea to implant stories into the bad guys. I don't know how many times I've written about how many fucking assholes in Gotham have an Alice in Wonderland fetish. And now Gotham has explained why! As well as why so many themed and costumed criminals wind up popping up in Gotham City! I just hope they run with it even bigger in the television show! Let's see somebody modeled off of Captain Ahab, or Javert, or Rick Deckard!

Okay, that's all the space I feel like giving to Gotham. It really needs to do better.

Last commentary, I wrote, "People really like to read things that let them say, “Ooh! Meta-textual commentary! Smartsies!” And Scott Snyder likes to fill his Batman comic book with that kind of thing." That continues to be a pretty accurate review of Snyder's Batman here in Issue #51. It begins pretty near as meta as it can get talking about white font on a black page in white font on a black page followed by describing Gotham as the first line of the last story you'll ever write. Not that Snyder is never going to write another Batman story (unless All-Star Batman isn't about Batman?) but it's the last story he's going to write in this 52 thematically-linked issue story. In other words, it feels like Snyder just jerked off right into my mouth. The story in this issue is called "Gotham Is", so he's bringing the whole thing around full circle. The series began with Bruce thinking about what makes Gotham Gotham. Sometime in the middle of the series, Bruce gives a big speech after the Red Hood shit goes down about what makes Gotham Gotham. And throughout the entire run, Gotham has been treated as one of the main characters, more so than I remember having ever been done in this long of a series of stories. This is Snyder's Epilogue, the Denouement to his Long Tale, writ large in blinking, sputtering neon.

Fucking hell! Getting dice wrong like this just blisters the inside of my skull!

The issue begins with some cute back and forth between Bruce and Alfred which is nice to see. I would love to see that Batman was brought back with a lot of his emotional scars and internal pain cured by the Dionesium. That's my own speculation but what has been healed is Alfred's hand, thanks to Crazy Quilt and some unnamed hand donor. Probably a murderer and it has a mind of its own! Eep! At one point in the playful exchange, Bruce says the "justice flavored" drink Alfred gives him "tastes like bananas" and Alfred says Bruce should contemplate that statement. Is Alfred suggesting Batman become Bananaman? I think he is!

I wonder how many paragraphs I can spend discussing how much the new Batmobile looks like a penis? Probably just one quite short one.

Jim Gordon is back to smoking. That may or may not be penis related as well.

On this night that Batman has returned, Gotham experiences a blackout. I bet it's metaphorical! Batman is sure it's some criminal rather than too many air conditioners running at once and he's off to investigate. First he heads to Arkham to find Jeremiah Arkham has finally installed a security system that might actually keep the inmates inside. At least for this story since the insane criminals aren't what this story is about. Next time things will be different though, I'm sure.

Batman, in drag, checks out the Court of Owls and discovers they're not behind it. But they do mention something called The Mantling! It sounds...well, not terrifying at all.

The Penguin is staying in. The Joker is still the weird guy on the park bench. Nothing out of the ordinary seems to be happening on this night in Gotham. Sometimes a blackout is a blackout is a blackout is just a blackout, you paranoid fuck!

Gotham is an after school special!

Ultimately, of course, the power outage was caused by no criminal intent. And that night in Gotham, nobody tries to take advantage of the darkness. And the people feel safer, knowing Batman watches over the city. He'll be there when the city needs him. But in this issue, he isn't needed. Boring!

Just kidding! I loved this fucking issue! I don't know if Snyder is going to have an Issue #52 but it probably wouldn't matter. This is his last story. This is the epilogue. This is the bow and the curtain call and the lights going down. And it's fucking aces.

Batman #50

These fucking variant covers have ruined my entire New 52 collection of comic books!

Rating: Remaining steady at 5 of 51 DC Comics. I certainly have problems with some of the crap happening in the current Batman story, "Superheavy" (which is ending now so I'm going to start forgetting the problems immediately), but at least this comic book is telling atypical stories. Not that a Riddler story followed by a Joker story followed by an amnesiac Bruce Wayne are atypical! But Snyder is coming at them in imaginative ways. New 52 Batman has been all about telling big stories about Batman and his most iconic villains (as well as some new ones that became even iconicker than some of his most well-known enemies!). The only problem with this comic book is that it's been too consistently good. By comparison, DC has been serving up a lot of fucking crap every month. It would be nice if the people running DC would look at the Batman title and think, "Hey look! Well-written, thoughtful stories sell! Maybe we should hire more writers who actually have something to say!" Instead they just kept on the same old thought train and said," Hey look! Batman sells well! Let's put Batman in every other fucking book we publish!" Lazy bastards.

• Bruce Wayne has regained his memory via a method that we're just not going to talk about anymore. I've boxed it up and put it in the attic behind the spooky full length mirror with the musty sheet over it. Now we can simply move on and when anybody asks, "What did you think of that story where Batman and the Joker died and then Bruce forgot he was Batman while Alfred gathered the children of Gotham so he could put them all in danger?", we can stab them in the throat and stuff them in a box and put it behind the mirror too.

• People really like to read things that let them say, "Ooh! Meta-textual commentary! Smartsies!" And Scott Snyder likes to fill his Batman comic book with that kind of thing. But you know what is also smart? Writing a story about Batman that's just a fucking story about Batman that says something about Batman and doesn't have to also be a story about how the fans have been desperate for Batman to return. Subtext doesn't have to be meta-textual. John Steinbeck's books are chock full of subtext and not once will you catch him winking slyly at the reader. Well, maybe Chapter Thirteen in East of Eden. But that's it!

• The narration in the previous scan is Jim Gordon speaking to himself and not Bruce. So that's clever, right? Except, you know, he's still talking about the reader! It's just the reader gets to be fucking disappointed all over again! "What?! Jim Gordon still! Fuck this shit! Hurry up and get dressed, Bruce!"

• Bloom vented Gordon's spleen so Gordon needs to calm down or he'll die. In the meantime, The Batman Brigade has entered the fight to stop Bloom.

• Bloom gains control of the Robot Batman's and everything is going to shit and Jim Gordon is going to die and Superman is going to say, "Ha ha! I told somebody so! About something. Or whatever. Metropolis is still standing! I win!"

• And then Batman returns! Sorry! I didn't mean to remind anybody of the movie Batman Returns! Although I'm sure some of you still think of it fondly because you haven't seen it in twenty five years.

• Bruce's Deus Ex Machina was obviously defective because Batman came back with a sense of humor.

• That last caption was a joke. I actually think Batman has a great sense of humor. And not just DC Animated Universe Batman who is one droll motherfucker. Batman is like me! His jokes are mostly just things that make him laugh while everybody else looks around confused or offended.

• Batman allows Alfred Pennyworth to resume his job as Penny One even though Alfred was a total dick and tried to keep Bruce from being truly fulfilled. He may have been happy at the community center and fucking Julie Madison but that's not what Bruce would have chosen if he'd been given the choice. So even though he was happy, Bruce was still in prison. Hopefully Bruce will make Alfred feel bad about it later. Or maybe he'll just hug him for the first time since Martha and Thomas died and Alfred will collapse into a lanky ball of tears.

• Jim Gordon kind of sort of quotes "The Second Coming" before Batman cuffs him to the inside of a helicopter where he'll probably bleed out while Batman saves the day. I suppose Batman expects Jim to fly the helicopter to the hospital to get his spleen stitched up. Or Batman is pissed that Gordon stole his job for so long and he's hoping Jim will pass out and crash the helicopter and die.

• Gordon decides he doesn't mind if he dies because he's embarrassed of his role in Fox's Gotham. At first I thought that show was going to be about one incorruptible man standing up against a city of corruption and making a difference. But apparently it's a story about a totally corruptible man without the will to stick to his beliefs who paves the way for a desperately needed and actually incorruptible hero to save the city.

• Duke's cousin Daryl explains how this whole mess came about because he's actually the genius behind the seeds. He just fucked up and created a monster named Bloom.

• Batman embarrasses himself with a line way, way beneath his level of intelligence.

• Batman's plan is to suddenly have access to a fifty foot tall Batman Robot so that he can kick Bloom's fifty foot tall ass.

• Bloom's philosophy about how gardeners are not necessary and yards should be allowed to grow wild and free mirrors my own. Except I think his is metaphorical while I mean it literally. Fuck gardens and proper lawn care. Give me overgrown bushes, ivy, ankle-high grass! That's the yard I like to lounge in.

• With the help of Bruce and Jim and all the citizens of Gotham who were part of the problem but then decided to remove their seeds, Duke defeats Bloom. I'm not sure if he kills him or not but would that matter? Bloom's body was originally on the way to Potter's Field to be buried anyway! And Duke hasn't been told by Batman not to kill yet! Loophole!

• Jim Gordon gives a speech that's pretty much the same speech Bruce Wayne gave back in the Red Hood story and the same article that Karen Page wrote at the end of Daredevil Season 2. It's the same speech about how the people without powers living day to day are the real heroes that comic books keep trying to pretend they're about when they really couldn't care any less than they do about real people. But I suppose I'm supposed to feel uplifted now so I'll pretend I am.

• Gordon gets his job back just like Batman got his job back! And Duke gets a job offer from Bruce Wayne! I hope it's not as a personal assistant.

• Julie Madison realizes she has to die because she's now one of Bruce's lovers who knows his secret. It never ends well for someone in that category.

Batman #47

Will Batman ever learn that roughing up The Joker merely results in a clown erection?

I haven't quite figured out this Mister Bloom story yet. Mister Bloom must be Commissioner Gordon's nemesis in much the same way that the Court of Owls were Batman's nemesis. Snyder went all in with Gotham City itself being one of the major character's in this comic book rather than just the setting. Batman's main nemesis was The Joker for more decades than I can count (without a calculator, of course! I'm great at counting with a calculator!). But when The Court of Owls came along, I believe they easily replaced him. I'm not going to debate the matter with anybody who disagrees with me because they'll win the debate so fuck them. They'll never outdo The Joker on personality and likeability and stupidly insane Bat-traps. But they struck at an aspect of Batman that has rarely been touched on: his absolute love affair with Gotham. It's no wonder Catwoman can barely crack the surface on this guy when he's got such a hard-on for the city. The Court of Owls provoked jealousy from Batman because he realized that he might actually be Gotham's extra-marital affair and not its spouse. To find out that not only did he not know something about Gotham but to learn that the thing he didn't know knew Gotham better than he ever knew it fucked him up. I'll always love the Court of Owls for that reason alone. They'll always have a piece of Gotham's heart that Batman will never have access to and it drives him fucking crazy. But what can he do? They're basically an entity that has existed alongside Gotham for its entire existence while he's just a thirty-something year old man. I suppose he can over-identify with his Wayne family roots the way that fucking Dumas guy has over-identified with his family on Gotham but Batman has too many other things to obsess about on his calendar.

What I'm trying to get at is how does Mister Bloom relate to Commissioner Gordon in the same sort of way that The Court of Owls related to Batman?

I'm just not sure. I don't know enough about Commissioner Gordon to truly understand his conflict with Mister Bloom. It must have to do with "growing" ideas for helping the city. Gordon wants to make Gotham a better, safer place to live as much as Batman does but he wants to do it by the book. He believes in people doing their jobs to the best of their ability which feeds the best interests of the city. What does Mister Bloom want? A more chaotic city? Planting seeds in people so that they grow wild and rise up against the best interests of Gotham? I just can't catch the thread of thought that lead Snyder down this path. It must be an issue that doesn't matter to me so I just can't see it. Now if Commissioner Gordon were battling Mister Piñata, I'd totally understand what was going on because it would be about hidden candy and how a person beats the crap out of something to get at that candy!

Stupid name for a card game, Harvey, but I get the sentiment. Gotham will always be a major factor in Snyder's stories!

Commissioner Batman is currently battling the Honey Bunny Bat Armor because it's always a treat for fans to see superheroes fighting each other. Fighting themselves? Although who's really worried about Gordon losing this fight? The Honey Bunny Bat Armor has become immobilized within a page or two of every appearance it's ever made in a comic book. So this battle should be over fairly quickly so Gordon can deal with Mister Bloom. Except Mister Bloom will have probably fled because this story can't resolve for a few more issues.

Or not. Mister Bloom actually sticks around to finish Gordon off. Not keep him alive to humiliate him. Or to tell him his entire plan.

Well, maybe he could tell him just a little bit?

Is this it? Does Mister Bloom represent the inevitable changes of any city? And Gordon represents the longtime resident weathering the change and minimizing its negative effects on a city he's loved for so long? In that way, Mister Bloom isn't evil at all. He's natural and quite flexible. He represents the evolution of a space over time. Growth. But he's growth out of control. He's apartment buildings with no parking rising up in every place a contractor is able to knock down a hundred year old home that used to house only a small handful of people so that now the streets are overflowing with parked cars. He's failing infrastructure ignored for superficial improvements to attract an influx of new residents to fight for limited job opportunities. He's gentrification lauded for improving poorer areas while really just spreading the problems about to different parts of the city while young, upwardly mobile slackers learn how to DJ. Gordon is simply fighting for the livability of his city. Mister Bloom and his seeds give no thought to Gotham. It's a plan that doesn't give a fuck about Gotham. It's a plan that no Batman can abide.

Commissioner Batman's blocker kicks in at just this moment to cancel out Mister Bloom's powers. His seeds are destroyed. His powers are gone. It might be time for Commissioner Gordon to do a little gardening.

Meanwhile Bruce Wayne shows up outside the Iceberg Casino to help Duke escape from The Penguin. I guess he's pretty serious about helping these wayward youths. And we learn that Duke didn't just figure out Dick Grayson's identity. He's figured out Batman's as well.

I was hoping Damian would have this moment but I'll take Duke's version. Fuck yeah, I will.

Alfred is going to be pissed.

Mister Bloom has been caught but not for long. Gordon can't do it all himself (even if he has Daryl and Julia Perrywonth helping). He needs Bruce. So Mister Bloom escapes with the help of dozens of other Mister Blooms. And Bruce is forced to acknowledge the secret he's been denying so he could keep banging Julie Madison without interruptions. But just before he says it out loud. Just before he says it--that line which my best friend once uttered after nearly drowning because he suffered a concussion while jumping off a railroad trestle into a river and I asked him if he knew who he was and he answered, "I'm Batman"--an old friend appears.

So what's The Joker been up to? Did the Dionesium fuck with his brain too? Has he been doing open mic nights at the Iceberg Lounge?

Batman #47 Rating: +1 Ranking. This is why you continue to trust writers that have always rewarded your trust. Even if you weren't into Commissioner Batman, you can't just drop a book that Snyder and Capullo have been killing it on since The New 52 began. I mean, sure, you can! But then you just have to pick it up again when somebody tells you fucking hard the story rocked them a few months later! Granted, the least interesting parts of this book were about Commissioner Batman! The real story that everybody has been interested in has been taking place in the background. But holy fuck is that story compelling! This is the kind of shit I was eager for at the end of last issue! Revelations that leave me wanting more rather than trying to leave me wanting more by continuing to not tell me anything! This fucking book right here is the way to keep people coming back! Can writers make revelations like this every issue or will they spontaneously combust from the sheer awesomeness of it all?!

Batman #46

This cover shits all over the gravitas I expect from my Batman comic books.

When are we going to get an issue focused entirely on Bruce Wayne puttering around the rec center until he realizes how terribly boring his life has become? That would be more exciting than following Commissioner Batman around. I'm sick of that guy! Hey DC! Remember how nobody was clamoring for a Commissioner Gordon comic book?! Remember how disappointed everybody was when the first Heroclix set came out and one of the unique slots was used up on Commissioner Gordon (as well as Desaad and Parasite. Man, you guys fucked up that first set!). With a day in the life of Bruce, we can get a nine panel page of him washing dishes. The point of view would be from behind him and halfway through the page, Julie Madison can walk up and slip her hand down the back of his pants and begins to finger his asshole.

I'm probably being too hard on Commissioner Gordon. But if you've been watching Gotham, you really wouldn't want any more Jim Gordon in your life either. That show made one huge error from the beginning and then kept repeating it over and over again until the entire premise of the show made no sense. It had Jim Gordon betray his belief in the law. For reasons of lazy writing and instant drama, Jim Gordon acts like a corrupt cop over and over again. But the show keeps telling us that he's the only good cop so apparently his reasons for acting outside of the law are valid. Except then the show continues to show us that they're not valid because the things he's done can get him into trouble with the law so now he's indebted to bad people which is the problem with being a corrupt cop and the reason Jim Gordon wanted to stop corruption in the first place. Other mistakes they're making? Doctor Leslie "Lee" Thompkins' character simply being the psychiatrist to her relationship with Jim Gordon. This show is called Gotham and not Jim Gordon, Holier Than Thou Gotham Cop. Give her an episode where she solves the mystery and saves the day. Give Bullock an episode where he conveniently avoids all of the horrible stuff going on throughout the episode which the viewer only pieces together through bits and pieces of conversation and scenes happening in the background as Bullock shoves five hot dogs in his face. Allow the Penguin to become so scary that other criminals finally fucking respect him and stop treating him as a punching bag. Let Bruce and Selina have fun together because we all know that's not going to last once Bruce develops his on point lecturing skills. Have the real Alfred Pennyworth arrive from London and kick the ass of the jerk-off impostor currently residing at Wayne Manor!

Although how crazily good did casting do their job with that kid playing Bruce Wayne? The writers aren't doing a great job on the obsession front. I don't believe this kid would become Batman at this point. But he definitely looks like Bruce Wayne! And since the show is so superficial, they nailed this part! Selina is also super cute and accurate. Although if I were writing the show, I'd already show her constantly having trouble zipping up her clothes correctly.

So the last issue of Batman ended with Mister Bloom attacking a Powers Company press conference. This is probably a good thing because Geri Powers has been trying to oust Jim Gordon from the Batman role. That's because there's more money in offering the city private security via Bat-Robots than in working with the police and selling them her technology. While you might think from the previous paragraphs that I'd think ousting Jim Gordon would be a good thing, I certainly don't want to see him replaced by a private security firm maintaining law in Gotham. Because that story is worse and also old and also also tired.

Mister Bloom is just another "solider" trying to save another city in his own way!

When did "saving cities" become the main focus of DC's super heroes? Instead of just stopping crime, they're constantly battling for control of the city. But it's always some sort of battle against violent crime or corruption or against somebody else who is trying to "save the city" but in the wrong way. It's never about actually helping to make the city a better place. Although that's kind of what Bruce Wayne is finally getting around to doing now that he's not obsessed with Batman's idea of justice. He's helping at a community level to make things better for kids whose families don't have many resources. It might be the first truly heroic thing Batman has ever done to try to save his city! Sure, he gentrifies neighborhoods but that's just shoving problems around to other parts of the city and not actually fixing anything. So is that what this Commissioner Gordon story is about? Is it about Bruce finally embracing real ways to help Gotham? But what's Jim's story? What's he learning? Is he learning that corporations shouldn't be given as much power as governments tend to give them? Maybe he's figuring out that gardening is bad and nature is a big jerk?

Commissioner Batman arrives and unloads a bunch of Bat-bullets into the back of Mister Bloom's head, execution style! It doesn't do anything. Also, Commissioner Batman has now decided to work outside of the Honey Bunny Bat Armor because it was too restricting. Now the armor fights alongside him by voice commands. I'd probably fight outside of it as well at this point since it instantly gets put out of commission in every fight. This fight is no different as it goes down after just three of Mister Bloom's stick fingers pierce its shell.

I might be siding with the bad guy on this one.

I might agree with Mister Bloom on his dislike of Jim Gordon's job performance but I can't side with a guy named Mister Bloom. How about Blister Moom? Is that better? I like that better!

M-O-O-N! That spells Blister Moom!

Julia Perrywonth turns on the Bat-blimp's Bat-magnet (tuned to a new magnetic frequency which must be a thing since it's happening and not all the metal in the room is sticking to it and I should probably have taken more science classes in college and less classes about religion) and Mister Bloom sticks to it! He seems helpless although you'd think since he can grow his fingers super long, he'd still be able to attack Gordon. Maybe he just can't point them in the right direction now. And even if you can grow your fingers out to huge lengths, let's not be ridiculous about it. You can't just make them bend any way you want!

Oh Mister Bloom! Backpedaling so quickly? You lost my respect more quickly than any woman who would actually let me touch them!

Don't let your initial reaction to the previous caption get the better of you! That statement has nothing to do with the women in the statement and everything to do with how I view myself as a disgusting monster. I can barely look myself in the mirror after I've satisfied my pretty much entirely satiable lusts.

It's just a gross kind of purple goo, Geri. I've overstretched one or two in my life. Never mind how. Disgusting monster, remember?

Mister Bloom smashes the electromagnet he's stuck to with his stretchy elbows and is able to get away. Everybody says, "Oh darn! We'll get him next time!" Then the scene shifts to Bruce Wayne showering because he must have just got done doing the dishes with Julie.

Goddammit, Madison! You make a better door than a window!

Wasn't there a Batman villain with a hole straight through her head? What was her name? Glory Hole? She'd be an awesome date!

Meanwhile, Duke "Yet Another Robin" Thomas has decided to break into the New Iceberg Lounge looking for clues to the whereabouts of his missing parents. He finds something that makes him spit up his lockpicks. It's either information about The Penguin's relationship with Mister Bloom, information about his parents, or The Penguin's sex diary. Please, please, please let it be that last one.

The new plan to capture Mister Bloom (whom Geri has tracked down with help from something Gordon did a few issues ago) is to send an army of Batman robots into his warehouse. The Powers Company has decided that what cities need to save themselves are men in high-tech battle suits and not superheroes. That's because superheroes constantly want to do their own thing while men in battle suits are on payrolls and can be fired if they don't follow orders! Also the suits cost a lot of money and will make Geri and the investors in The Power Company rich beyond imagining!

Commissioner Gordon convinces everybody to let Batman go in after Mister Bloom all alone. Everybody agrees because they don't care if Commissioner Batman dies. It would actually solve a lot of problems. And it would leave a vacuum open that Bruce Wayne would just have to fill because nobody is going to keep buying this comic book if Batman is suddenly taken over by yet another non-Bruce Wayne idiot!

Back at the Iceberg Lounge, Robin is caught by Dollfucker, The Gimp, Cave Fish, and Father Who Got Up For A Midnight Snack And Forgot To Close His Robe Guy.

Commissioner Batman rides his improbable Batmobile to Mister Bloom's warehouse. He has a plan that doesn't make a lot of sense but it should allow him to block Mister Bloom's stretchy powers long enough to subdue him. Then he'll unmask him and discover that it's a character that was introduced for a short time during one of the previous issues. I don't remember all of them (okay fine. I don't remember any of them) so I can't guess as to Mister Bloom's identity. But Duke Thomas might already know it based on what he read in The Penguin's sex diary. Maybe it's Julie Madison's brother! No, that would be stupid. Maybe it's Julie Madison!

Commissioner Batman confronts Mister Bloom and his plan fails, of course. Rather than going off without a hitch like nobody expected, the Honey Bunny Bat Armor turns on Commissioner Gordon and grabs him around the throat! It looks like the end for the Uncaped Crusader!

Batman #46 Rating: No change. I'm enjoying the Mister Bloom story and don't mind that it's taking its time to get from point beginning to point whatever the fucking conclusion will bring Bruce Wayne back. But I would like for it to give me a little something more each month! Answer some secrets, dammit! Hey Scott! You do know how fucking long a month is, right?! Give me a little something to keep me going here! Just a little! I'll do whatever you want if you just give me a clue to Mister Bloom's identity! Anything! You want a little suck? Maybe a short rim job? No wait. That's a lie. Once I get my tongue going there won't be anything short about it. Um, how about maybe not leaving everybody in sticky situations?! Reveal what Duke found instead of leaving him nearly caught by The Penguin! Don't tease me with exactly one panel of Alfred taking an axe to the Bat Cloning Machine and never get back to that! Let Mister Bloom reveal something about his (or her!) past! Jesus Christ, Snyder. I'm sick from expectations! I need more, you asshole! MORE!

Batman #45

Gotham Dance Party!

It's been so long since Commissioner Batman was trapped inside that industrial furnace that I forgot Commissioner Batman became trapped inside an industrial furnace! And Julia Perrywonth was kidnapped while helping him! I think they were after some pig devils or something. How do people who don't take notes on the comic books they read remember what's happening in any of the comics they read?! I created this entire blog simply to remind myself what was happening from month to month. The only problem with that idea was I forgot how much I lie and make things up, so often even after rereading one of my critiques, I don't actually remember what was happening. Take Blackhawks #8, for instance! I'll never remember what actually happened at the end of that series! Thanks, asshole me from three years ago!

Commissioner Batman escapes the furnace using a batarang which is totally what everybody expected. Although he really should look into purchasing a Bat-Grapple for the next time he finds himself at the bottom of a burning pit. Once Commissioner Batman is out of the pit, he still finds he has a dozen thugs to beat up. He fails to beat all of them up. See, his Batsuit can keep him safe when temperatures around him soar to 1000 degrees. But a thug's knife tears straight through that shit. Luckily the Honey Bunny Bat Armor has a seek and destroy mode which Daryl has activated. Also Julia is hanging out with Daryl. I guess she's immune to being kidnapped.

What I'm saying without bothering to scan in any pictures is Jim Gordon gets lucky and survives. And now that we've gotten that out of the way, it's time for Bruce Wayne!

Stop being so middle class, Bruce!

I just realized that I hate Alfred Pennyworth! He's being so selfish by keeping Batman away from everybody. So what if Bruce is finally happy! That's not the real Bruce! When Bruce gets his memory back, he's going to be so pissed off that Alfred didn't bring him around sooner. Because Bruce is Batman and Bruce loves being Batman and Bruce doesn't actually know how to do anything but be Batman. Sure, this guy who thinks he's in love with Madison likes the life he's living. But he and Alfred are the only two! Everybody else wants Batman back! Dick Grayson. Clark Kent. The whole Justice League. The readers. DC Comics' bank account. Everybody! Fuckin' Alfred, man. What a selfish bastard! Give us back Batman! Don't make me wait a full year of Batman and Robin Eternal to get Bruce Wayne back in the batsuit!

Bruce is going to continue to live a boring life for awhile yet, so I guess it's up to Commissioner Batman to entertain me. Except now he's being fired because Geri Powers wants something bigger than just a guy in Batman armor. Her company has developed four new elements that are massive yet stable. I guess Element 206 is named Batmanium. And I suppose Geri wants to make an army of Bat Robots out of it? I'm sure nothing will go wrong and the Powers Company won't wind up nearly destroying the entire city. I trust Scott Snyder to think up stories that can't be guessed by nincompoops on blogs who have, on occasion, put their finger in their butt while showering. Probably special occasions only though!

Later we learn that Daryl knows Duke Thomas somehow. Maybe because they're both black?

It looks like the Robins are going to have access to even better, more dangerous technology now!

Meanwhile back at the rec center, Bruce Wayne turns all of the Batcave trophies brought out into the light by The Joker into a bunch of playground equipment. That guy has really lost his edge!

And then it's time for Geri Powers city meeting on Batman. It's time to announce Batmanium! Or whatever. Maybe she's going to announce her candidacy for Ruler of Gotham. She starts talking like Bruce used to talk about how Batman needs to be a constant in Gotham and how he's bigger than just one man or one generation. But before she can get to the programmable robots stalking the city streets, the Bat Blimp crashes through the window behind her and Mister Bloom steps out. Oh! Maybe he's announcing his candidacy for Ruler of Gotham!

Batman #45 Rating: No change. Where are all the smart people to tell me what the fuck is going on in this comic book?! Why Mister Bloom? What does he represent? Why is he the current archenemy of this story? Is he a foil for Commissioner Gordon? Or is he just representative of evil planting its seeds across the city? I think I've been far too facetious since Commissioner Gordon took over the role of Batman and I've lost the thread of why Gordon is the Batman that Gotham needs right now. Or is all of this what Gordon needs right now? Who's been paying close enough attention to explain to me why this story matters?! Somebody else do the work for once! Anybody?!

Batman #43

Catwoman #43 was on top of Batman #43 in my comic book stack and now I'm super turned on.

After that initial caption, you might be wondering why I'm reading a comic book instead of masturbating. You also might be wondering why I'm reading Batman before Catwoman if Catwoman was on top. Well, it's because I wanted to read Batman. You also might not be wondering anything at all except whether this was a good comic book and you're waiting for me to tell you if you should like it or not. You also might be wondering how many typos I'll make this time since my commentary on Batman #42 was riddled with them. Holy shit. I thank everybody reading for not jumping all over me and my incompetence!

Bruce Wayne continues to live the life he never could before by working at the children's center in the narrows and engaging in a romantic relationship with a woman named Madison (MADISON!). He should probably thank The Joker for allowing him to have a real life. I suppose he'll get back to being Batman when Madison winds up dumping his ass because he's emotionally withdrawn and constantly asks her to wear clown make-up in the bedroom. But until Madison comes to her senses and/or winds up next to the lettuce in the crisper, Bruce refuses to participate in the Robo-Batman Project. Gordon stops by to see him and ask for help but Bruce is all, "What?! Why are you coming to me? How did you connect me to The Batman? I'm totally not that guy! I'm just trying to live a broke-ass life! Leave me alone!" But Jim Gordon is all, "Wink! Wink! Okay, Bruce! Wink, wink! I'll leave you alone! Wink, wink! But here's some evidence from a new villain in town, just in case you feel like helping save the city. Wink, wink! Do you get why I'm winking, Bruce?!"

Outside the community center where Jim is hassling Bruce, Alfred and Clark Kent sit in a car discussing what happened to Bruce.

I knew it! Batman is the second coming of Christ!

Alfred explains to Clark how Bruce was dead but the dionesium brought him back to life. But it changed him. It took away the Batman and left only Bruce. So Alfred had to help Bruce remember his life again. Didn't this already happen? Wasn't there a story about Bruce losing his memory and needing to be reminded about his parents' death and how he became an obsessive monster? And in it he was told about the death of his parents but he had no emotional connection to them so it didn't really mean anything? Wasn't that a story and why can't I remember what it was from?

Alfred tells Bruce everything right up until becoming Batman when Bruce stops him and asks, "Are you trying to seduce me, old man?" Then thirty-three year old Bruce leaves for two days but rises again on the third to tell Alfred that he understands they once had a relationship and parents and lots of money but that he doesn't feel connected to any of it anymore. And that's when Julie Madison stops by to give Bruce a couple of jobs (helping kids, and hand, not necessarily in that order).

Superman hears Alfred's story and says, "Alfred, if you won't ruin Bruce Wayne's new chance at a happy life, I will! Because if you haven't heard lately, I'm a total idiot and dick in my own comic book. It super sucks and I'm glad you invited me to be in a good comic book for awhile but I plan on ruining this one too because everybody loves Batman so fucking much! Why don't they love me that much, hunh?! Can you answer me that?!" But Alfred pulls out Bruce's kryptonite cockring and says, "Tsk tsk. I wouldn't do that if I were your ass." Alfred points out that the Dionesium healed Bruce so completely that it healed the trauma which created Batman. Everything Bruce learned to be The Batman is gone. Although I'm sure that one instant of trauma will bring him back! So who's going to do it to save the city? Who's going to shoot Julie Madison in the face right in front of Bruce's eyes, hunh? Will it be Clark? Alfred? Damian?!

Alfred shows Clark the final Bat-Invention which proves that Batman was an insane monster. It's a machine that, if ever finished and perfected, would grow a twenty-seven year old human from Bruce Wayne's DNA and fill the new clone with all of Bruce's memories so that it would willingly become the next Batman. It's the fetus of the Eternal Batman story seen in earlier stories. I guess somebody is going to have to perfect the memory part of it and trick Bruce into sitting in it if nobody has the guts to murder Julie Madison.

It's all kind of sweet. But I'm sure Alfred will eventually realize he's acting selfishly and he'll have to give his boy back to the city.

But that's enough with old Batman. Now that everybody knows what happened and what will eventually need to happen to set everything back to normal, we can just sit back and follow the adventures of Commissioner Batman until he completely fucks it all up.

Commissioner Batman has currently left the Honey Bunny Bat Armor behind because he's doing some stealthy investigative work. He's infiltrated the lair of the Devil Pigs to find any information he can on Mr. Bloom, the flower faced monster. The mission is being run with Julia Perrywonth and without the knowledge of the Powers Company, so Commissioner Batman can't use any of the suit's tricks without alerting his corporate overlords. And that means it all gets to fall apart because nobody knows where these two are now. Well, Commissioner Batman winds up trapped in an industrial furnace being cooked to death while Julia is attacked by a Devil Pig while leaving the communications van to help Gordon. It looks like curtains for Commissioner Batman!

Elsewhere, Duke Thomas breaks into the Youth Center's files and steals the inactive Mr. Bloom seed Jim gave to Bruce to investigate. This looks like a job for We Are Robin! Duh duh dun dun duh duh dun!

And finally, The Penguin meets Mr. Bloom. The Penguin tries to kill Mr. Bloom. The Penguin learns that not all problems can be solved with a single bullet. The Penguin learns that he's not as important as he thought because The Riddler has had a nice long story in Batman and The Joker has had a nice long story in Batman and even Clayface has had a bit of a story in Batman. But all The Penguin gets is stabbed in the stomach by Mr. Bloom after only two pages of a guest appearance. Sorry, The Penguin! You're just not worthy of a story in the main Batman book. Sad penguin emoji. Winking Killer Whale emoji.

Batman #43 Rating: +1 Ranking. Snyder must have found a great deal at the cliffhanger store because this issue was jam packed with them! Oh god. I'm starting to sound like an actual reviewer! I came up with a stupid fucking tag about non-existent stores that sell things that are never actually for sale because I don't actually have anything intelligent to say about this comic book! Anything I say would be just pointing out the things Snyder already wrote much more eloquently and with less swears than I could ever write! Like the bit about the Dionesium healing The Batman out of Bruce Wayne's head because The Batman was created from scars and trauma and things that can be healed! And that bit about how Bruce's new life with no knowledge of The Batman is like a peaceful afterlife that Batman has earned for his long sacrifice! Or how Julie Madison has a flower tattoo on her arm that seems an awful lot like Mr. Bloom's flower print! Oh wait, that was something that Greg Capullo drew and not something Scott Snyder wrote. See? I can't even write better than Capullo draws! Jesus, I don't even know if I can write better than Rob Liefeld draws! I think my writing is more on par with Marat Mychaels' art! I'm going to go cry now. Um, read Batman! It's good!