Action Comics #977

Gross. This is like watching a video of your own birth.

I'm glad nobody videotaped the moment I was born. I'm even more glad that it was never filmed and I never stumbled on the video at fourteen and decided to jerk off while watching it. So glad that totally didn't happen.

The Review!
Superman feels uneasy about how DC Continuity has changed and he has to consult the history crystals in the Fortress of Solitude to convince all of the Fangenders that the DC Universe has been completely fixed! You know, if you thought it was broken. If you didn't think it was broken, it's still the same as the not-broken universe you remember. If you thought it was beyond broken and DC had shit inside your mouth and then grabbed your upper and lower jaw and forced you to chew and laughed in your face the entire time, DC wants you to remember how that didn't happen at all now. Because they said so. Every DC Comic book story that you can remember is once again part of DC Continuity. Don't let any other fangenders bully you into believing otherwise with their "facts" and "scans of stories that contradict scans of other stories." Just ignore those bitter old Actually Trolls and believe in the DC Universe you want to believe in. Superman says it's okay, even if you, like Superman, feel a bit unsettled about it all.

The Ranking!
+1 because even though this issue is really just the punctuation on the Superman Reborn story and a bit of reassurance that everything has been set right (whatever you think "right" means in this context!), the story continues doing the only thing I wanted out of Rebirth: a strong sense of denial about every DC Reboot ever! Just take the blue pill (unless it was the red pill (maybe it was both the red and blue pill?)) and accept everything you're being told. Shh. Shh. Don't fight it. You'll enjoy the DC Universe much more this way.

Action Comics #975

"Bizarro am looking at Superman's ass!"

You might be thinking, "Shouldn't it be 'Bizarro am not looking at Superman's ass'?" No! Because he's embarrassed that he was caught looking at it and he's denying that he was looking at it. Which sucks for Bizarro because most people who aren't bothered with trying to understand the whole "Bizarro speak terribly" thing (I don't know if I meant that in Bizarro or not. Bizarro speak really am good. Bad. Whatever) will just nod their heads in agreement and think, "Yeah you are!"

The good thing about being a full week behind on my comics (in a manner of speaking. I currently have 28 comics in the stack. At 14 per week and this being so close to a new week when I should have about 14 in the stack anyway, I'm one week behind. Maths! But then some of those comics are a month behind because of the odd way I've been reading them. Like how I have two Mother Panic issues to read) is that I get to read the last three Superman Reborn comics at once! Probably not at one sitting though. I'm already jonesing to play Friday Overwatch.

At the end of the last issue, DC included a page with a title something like "Who is behind Mystery Clark Kent?! It's not as surprising as you might think so here are five super villains that DC has been using way too much lately. Try to guess which one is behind the mystery!" Then, like this cover, it had a bunch of characters to choose from. I forget exactly which ones but I'm sure it was Doomsday and Cyborg Superman and Mongul and Brainiac and Mr. Mxyzptlk. I'm sure Mxy was included because there's a bad thing about being a full week behind on reading comics too: I already saw Mxy on the cover of Superman #19. I'm glad he's the villain because he hasn't been as overused as the other ones. Plus it's easy to explain any inconsistencies in the plots since Rebirth if the person behind the story is Mxy and not just Dan Jurgens.

At the end of the last issue, Jon Smith was wiped out of existence. There's been a lot of that going on. He was wiped in Justice League too! To increase tension, DC Comics probably should have waited to release Supersons until after this story concluded. Now I know he's going to be fine or else the next issue of Supersons will be Superson. And that will be a little too confusing if it's a comic book about Damian Wayne and called Superson. People will begin thinking somebody was cuckolded.

Clark and Lois (the Smiths! Not the Kents!) head to Clark Kent's apartment in Metropolis to search for Jon.

No! No! Not the fridge! This is going to be grotesque!

Jon isn't chopped up inside the fridge even if that would have been the best Rebirth moment yet. Instead, it's full of junk food. If it wasn't for the cover with Mr. Mxyzptlk on it, I'd be guessing Bizarro was the culprit. But I'm also a card carrying member of the Trixie Belden School of Detectivanting (that's doing detective work while gallivanting around the globe) so I saw some huge clues earlier that Clark Kent couldn't be Bizarro. Like how he could conjugate "to be". Not that most Americans could conjugate "to be" if you asked them. "To be. To have been. To be better. To behave?"

Clark appears out of nowhere (he must have been in nowhere since Superman didn't hear his heartbeat nearby). Superman immediately resorts to violence while accusing Clark of taking their son. That's understandable, I guess. I don't know if I'd be angry if somebody took my son but if they took my cat, I'd throw punches first, ask questions later (after regaining consciousness from being beaten up because I suck at fighting). Clark responds with, "Oh, the son you never told me about?!" Why the fuck would Superman need to tell Clark Kent about his son?! This guy has an ego problem. Hmm. Being that Clark is really Mxy, that previous statement is pretty fucking obvious.

Mr. Mxyzptlk reveals his plan to Superman. He was just trying to help Superman regain his secret identity by pretending to be Clark Kent. And he wasn't just pretending! He cast a spell so strong that he truly believed he was. Well, he calls it a spell. But really, he's just manipulating three dimensional reality the way I...well, never mind what I was going to compare that to. It's personal.

Mxy reveals his plan but not his identity. He wants Superman to guess! Well, that should take the rest of the comic book seeing as how answering questions isn't as easy as punching faces.

Wait. So he is Bizarro? I'm confused!

Mr. Mxyzptlk finally reveals himself and tells Superman that he's going to make everybody forget about Jon the way Superman forgot about Mxy. That's cool. I'd be okay with the moment at the end of this issue where Lois says "Jon who?" being the end of the Superman Reborn story. I'm already forgetting about the little fucking cat murderer.

The Ranking!
No change! At least Jurgens didn't wait until the last possible moment to reveal Clark Kent's true identity. Also, I don't know why I'm doing this ranking bit when I haven't even mentioned the back-up story yet! Whoops!

The back-up story takes place in a world of doors. It's where Jon's being kept captive by Mxy. Maybe "captive" is the wrong word since they're just hanging out the way friends do. Although if my friend Doom Bunny ever dropped by unexpectedly, I'd feel like I was being held captive in my own home. So maybe "held captive" is synonymous enough with "hanging out with friends."

Mxy tells Jon a story about the last time he tried to come to Earth to fuck with Jon's dad. I mean play with him! I guess "fuck" and "play" can also be synonymous, right?! Anyway, when Mxy appeared, he was instantly captured by Dr. Oz. Mxy's feelings were hurt when Superman never came to save him. He really does have a huge ego, doesn't he?

Mxy lets Jon know that he's stuck in Doorland until Superman figures out how to beat him. How will Superman get Mxy to say his name backwards this time? I bet he just punches Mxy in the face until Mxy says "Uncle." I mean "Kltpzyxm!"

Teen Titans #24

I thought they already fell? Multiple times!

The Commentary!
Last night I was at work when the clock ticked over from the 25th to the 26th and I became as middle-aged as anybody can get. Forty-five. I was listening to my Shuffle so the last song I heard as a forty-four year old was "One Headlight" by The Wallflowers and the first song I heard as an old man was "Obsession" by Marina and the Diamonds. Let's hear it for aging!

"One Headlight" was big when I was in my mid-twenties. It kind of became the soundtrack for my life at the time as I was desperate to get out of the place I'd spent the first quarter century of my life. I hadn't changed. I knew I wasn't the same. I wanted to watch it all burn. I'm particularly proud of myself that I didn't set fire to the Netscape warehouse I managed when I quit my job and, a week later, was driving my Volkswagen bus across the United States. I'm also proud that I didn't burn each and every state on my way out. I'm just proud that I stopped setting fires!

This issue takes place after Red Robin died. He didn't actually die but he was yanked out of continuity much the same way Wally West was. But instead of telling fans Red Robin is gone forever and never actually existed (which they believed because most fans are dum-dums who don't know how to fact check by looking at their own pirated copies of comic books on their laptops to prove that Wally West did actually exist and DC Comics never actually created some time distorting technology which erased Wally West from everybody's minds), Red Robin was shown, in the very same comic in which he died, to still be alive but outside of DC Continuity with Doctor Oz(yman(hattan)dias) and Ambush Bug. I'm starting to think maybe Doctor Oz is Jonni DC and not Ozymandias and/or Doctor Manhattan like the fans have been told. Or maybe Doctor Oz is simply Irwin Schwab!

Sometimes I wish Keith Giffen were running DC Comics. I wouldn't even care if every comic book repeated the same five jokes over and over again. Because that would be the only predictable thing about a Keith Giffen DC Universe. Remember how they gave Stan Lee his own continuity? Why can't Keith Giffen have one of those?

Anyway, Red Robin is dead (but not really! I don't want somebody who thinks they're the biggest Red Robin fan ever reading about his death here and not realizing that DC made sure that the fans knew Red Robin wasn't really dead in the exact same issue because who wants to hear how loudly Red Robin fans can whine?) so this issue is all about the Teen Titans remembering their favorite Red Robin moments. I hope Wonder Girl's favorite time was when they were living on that yacht and she is all, "I loved that time he put his penis in me!" And then Raven will be all, "I loved that time he put his penis that smelled like Wonder Girl's vagina in me!"

Bunker begins Memory Sharing Time!

"I loved that time he put his penis that smelled like Wonder Girl's vagina and Raven's tonsils in my butthole."

Just to let all three of you know, I only got as far as that first panel before deciding Red Robin, possessed by Trigon, also fucked Bunker.

But, um, it looks like things might be going that way!

After they had sex, Tim and Bunker go clothes shopping and then Tim attends his first gay pride parade. He makes a lot of friends, goes to a lot of parties, and sucks a lot of dicks. I don't mean to say gay men are more promiscuous than straight men (of course they aren't! It's just that, you know, if you're a man looking to just fuck and the people you're looking to just fuck happen to be other men just looking to fuck, well...you know what? I'm now gay), it's just that Tim just discovered he loves sucking dick and that's not a time you instantly decide you're ready for a relationship!

So, um, anyway, that was Bunker's favorite memory of Tim. It was the day Tim came out of the closet. Unless that was just Trigon getting in as much fucking as he could while people found him attractive.

Fucking liberal entertainment artists! They can never get the American flag right but they get the rainbow flag correct! I mean, except for that one that has too many stripes and just begins repeating the rainbow pattern.

I suppose the reason DC's artists get the American Flag wrong so often is that most of them aren't Americans. So why should they know the specifics of why the flag is the way it is (although if I had to bet, I'd probably say a higher percentage of Americans can't explain why our flag looks the way it does)? They probably just do a Google Image Search and go, "Yeah. Right. Blue field. Bunch of white stars. Alternating red and white stripes. Got it!" Why would anybody think there's a specific number of stars and stripes?! Just stick on as many as you possibly can. That seems to sum up America pretty accurately, right?!

Next Power Girl shares her favorite memory of Tim. Oh! I know how that probably begins: "So, Tim introduced himself as Red Robin and I was all, 'Hi, I'm Power Girl.' Then he died."

I wasn't far off! Her memory is Tim telling a bad joke and then saying it's nice to know somebody who knows as much as he does. So, she, um, just fucking told all of Tim's friends that, in private, he thought they were morons? Great story, Power Girl!

Tim also helped Power Girl realize she had no obligation to cut a Boob Window into her costume. See? Gay!

Next up: Raven! I bet her story is all about feelings. I'm bored just imagining what it will be!

How many Titans were created to be living weapons?

I didn't have to scan as much of that panel as I did but I wanted to include Raven's crotch and Tim's stupid hair.

Tim is all, "Look, maybe I don't know what it's like being Trigon's daughter...but I know what it's like being in her! OH!" No, actually he mentions how they both have Daddy Issues. Yawn! If Wonder Girl's favorite memory isn't having sex with Tim, I think that's pretty telling about Tim Drake's sexual skills. I guess Batman didn't teach him everything he knows!

Wow! He's supposed to be a genius?! Tim sure read that situation wrong. Batman didn't see a spark of goodness! Batman saw a spark of his own sperm in Damian's genetic makeup!

Gar's memory is just a list of outing past Robin's identities. "Oh, the first one was Dick Grayson. I remember that for some reason even though Spyral erased all of our memories. And then the next one, the dead one, was Jason Todd. Then there's Tim Drake who we only knew as Red Robin for like the first five years we knew him. And then the latest one is Damian Wayne so, you know, guess who Batman is!" I don't really care one way or the other about secret identities. I wouldn't care if they were just left behind and writers simply ignored the idea that family members might get hurt simply to get at the heroes. But it's really hard to tell how much superheroes in the DC Universe care about their identities. Who knows what? How many people has Batman come out to as Bruce Wayne simply to get their confidence up? This is the kind of carelessness which you treat a secret that you don't really give a shit about keeping secret. Unlike that time you fucked the family dog. I mean, you don't tell that one to anybody!

Nope. Wrong. That would be Dick. Thanks for playing.

I do appreciate that Power Girl's funeral attire has a Boob Window, even if her costume doesn't. Totally more appropriate for a funeral anyway. The best place to look sexy is in a room of grief-stricken people just looking to feel life again. I bet more fucking goes on at wakes than at any other type of get together. Which is weird because often it's mostly a mini-family reunion. First cousins aren't technically incest, right? And if they are, there's always the family dog, I suppose.

I'm glad the Titans are telling stories about the good times they had because every issue of the Teen Titans since The New 52 began concentrated on only the bad times. I'm surprised they have any good time stories to tell!

Wonder Girl's story is about shopping with Tim but she doesn't mention the night they fucked! So in summary, shopping with Tim is better than fucking Tim. Totally would have guessed that.

Wonder Girl's story isn't just about shopping though. She and Tim actually did something heroic that day and saved a bunch of people trapped in a fire. So the Teen Titans do help out and save lives! It's just that those stories are super boring and nobody wants to hear them! I guess the fans would rather have lots of stupid relationship drama while the Titans are attacked by their enemies and nearly destroy New York. Then afterward, they pat themselves on the back for saving New York when New York was never in trouble to begin with! Stupid Titans are so stupid. I hate them. I wonder why I have so many of their comic books?! I wonder if I should see a therapist?

After they tell their stories, they all decide it's best to just break up. They all go off to do their own things and not matter separately instead of not mattering together. Meanwhile, Damian is in the Batcave laughing at Tim Drake's empty costume and dancing on his grave. Now all of the Robin's have died at least once! Plus he's probably thinking about how he can put together a Teen Titans that is better than any Teen Titans ever put together by a Robin (which is, like, all of them? Maybe 98% of them?).

Ranking!
+1! Tony Bedard should have been writing this comic book from the beginning. What Tony Bedard just did with these final issues is the equivalent of scraping dog shit off of the front walk and hosing what's left into the gutter so that nobody would ever know it was there. Also, the shit in my analogy is human shit.

Teen Titans #22

Finally! They're where they belong!

The Review!
The Teen Titans are slowly becoming a team that works together instead of a junior high school drama full of sex and bickering who sometimes stop having sex and stop bickering to battle one of their parents. Why wasn't Tony Bedard allowed to write the Teen Titans from the beginning? And why couldn't he keep the job for Rebirth? Maybe because I want something different from this team than other fans want? Do people really just want to read about the Titan's swapping partners and feeling heartbroken and love sick while never actually being heroic ever? I wouldn't mind that if the Teen Titans took place in a school for gifted children and they didn't constantly portray themselves as a team of heroes helping to save other young people from trouble. Because then I wouldn't care if they weren't fighting crime? I would totally be into Cassie having lesbian sex dreams about her English teacher. Or Bunker and Garfield starting a band called the Zit Remedy. Or Raven having a baby and wearing her hair gelled up all spikey! Or Tim Drake getting locked in the utility closet and being called a Broomhead, whatever that means! I would love that version of the Teen Titans!

The Commentary!
Last issue ended with Red Robin missing. It turns out he was arrested by the Belle Reve Somewhat International (I think?) Police Force! They have jurisdiction over wherever the hell Amanda Waller wants them to. Basically that means if Batman is busy, Amanda can sneak a mission while he's not looking. So her jurisdiction is any place that is currently behind Batman.

The Titans are desperate to find Red Robin because he's the smartest super kid on the planet. Or at least as smart as all the other super kids who are also the smartest. In fact, I think Beast Boy and Bunker are the only teen superheroes who are of average intelligence or below! One of them is definitely below average. I'm not going to say which one because I'd rather have two fandoms arguing against each other than Garfield's fandom sending me hate messages. Um, I mean, uh, whoops!

Hey! Thanks for the confirmation, Gar!

Power Girl's big suggestion was that they turn themselves in because they've broken multiple laws and are huge narcissistic assholes to boot. Cassie thinks maybe Batman will help them because she apparently isn't bright either. Even Garfield knew that was a bad idea and he's dumber than Booster Gold!

Tim is currently in an interview with Amanda Waller. I bet Amanda doesn't want this comic book to end because she's still super skinny. Although she'll probably lose some weight when Jim Lee tries to draw her. I really doubt his ability to draw a person who isn't all muscle.

Apparently Amanda Waller wants the Teen Titans to work for the Suicide Squad. But why would they? They're currently free! They have no reason to work for Amanda! And they won't have any reason until they've been arrested and tried in a court of law and found guilty of being Superboy's friend! Amanda doesn't have to wait for teammates. She has a whole prison of villains who have already been apprehended. And why would she mess with one of Batman's ex-sidekicks? That's just asking for Batman to turn around and fuck up her jurisdiction.

Don't bother looking up those issues of Teen Titans in the editor's note. They're terrible. Just know Amanda is right. At least in Red Robin's case. Not all of the current Teen Titans helped Superboy escape from the law.

Amanda sets off Tim's distress beacon and the Teen Titans, being a bunch of dumb amateurs (except for Power Girl who is a genius amateur), head to Belle Reve to try to break him out of prison. I hope they get their asses beat by the Suicide Squad! I mean, they don't have to win this fight. They just have to prove to Amanda that they aren't the bad guys. They really do mean well and they want to help but they followed some bad advice from their leader. That's probably why he quits and goes back to Bat-school.

Power Girl knows that the defenses at Belle Reve are a bunch of weapons that can only be used against one specific target each. So an anti-magic cannon and an anti-speed crossbow and an anti-flight butterfly net. So she decides that the Titans can confuse the defenders by pretending to be each other! Power Girl pretends to be Raven and she's hit by the anti-magic cannon which does nothing to her! That's when she grows really big and says, "Ha ha, bitches! Wrong weapon!" I guess whoever had the anti-Giganta lawn dart was too stupid to throw it once he saw her growing. I mean, I think if I were in charge of the anti-Giganta lawn dart, I'm fairly certain I'd know exactly when to throw it. But the guy at Belle Reve hesitates and gets stomped by Power Girl. The worst part about this scene is that Red Robin begins gloating. He's all, "You have lots of defenses but what have you got against smarter-than-you? BURN!" Amanda really should have slapped his face at that point.

Waller's guards all get their asses kicked because they're just guards! They're nobodies! Nobody expects them to save the day! I think it's time to call in the Suicide Squad! Or will that only happen on the final page? I was hoping this would be the final issue but it feels like they may be dragging things out for the dramatic Suicide Squad final page reveal.

The Titans do that thing where they endanger everybody but then save everybody from the sudden danger! It's like their Hallmark Card! But it's the perfect card to play because the guards are all, "Fuck you, Amanda! Dese kids is sweet and shit!" And Amanda says something about pesky kids and kicks them all out of her prison. So at least they proved they're good guys to the guards at Belle Reve. Now the Teen Titans just have to prove they're not criminals to the other 99.9998% of the world! Maybe they'll accomplish that next issue.

Teen Titans #20

I still can't see New 52 Raven without thinking, "Is everybody at DC blind and/or stupid?"

The Review!
Tony Bedard swoops in to salvage the mess this comic book has become and build a decent transition into Rebirth. It looks like his job is to lift the Teen Titans out of the super villain pit they've dug themselves into so that they can at least be not quite heroic but at least not lawbreakers by the time they get their Rebirth. Tony Bedard did a lot of work for DC in the early New 52 and I felt most of it was competent and entertaining. He doesn't disappoint even with this disappointment of a comic book. In fact, he actually does the impossible and writes a Teen Titans comic book that didn't cause me to question every one of my life choices up until this moment. Plus he writes Brain and Mallah as a couple although, as usual, it doesn't seem like he got the editorial thumbs-up to outright state that they're in a relationship. Mostly I'd say that's okay because I'm all for subtlety in writing over explicit declarations but in the current popular culture environment where mainstream companies are desperate to get gay viewers by playing games of "Homo or not homo?" with same sex character relationships, I think sometimes an outright labeling is more than appropriate. Editorial allowed a stupid "That's not a pickle jar" caption that really seemed like a dildo joke but they didn't okay a "Lovers" tag for the duo? I was going to say "Gay Lovers" tag because I think that's appropriate but maybe it's a little too confining for a sentient ape in love with a brain in a butt plug.

The Commentary!
Am I allowed to snidely ask an obviously sighted person if they're blind when they're aesthetic tastes are garbage? Probably not, right? But I am allowed to ask an obviously stupid person if they're stupid because nobody believes they're actually stupid even though, statistically speaking, most people are stupid, right? I'm including people of average intelligence in the stupid category because have you ever had a discussion with one of them? So stupid. Obviously I'm highly intelligent! But not in that "Nobody thinks they're stupid" way I meant earlier! I'm intelligent in provable ways! Like how I've...um...uh...well, I mean, I'm not ambitious or anything so my failure at life isn't proof of anything! Don't you dare think I'm stupid!

Because nobody thinks they're stupid, if you ever want to really anger somebody in an argument or a debate, just call them stupid. I can't be responsible for any violence that takes place if you dare to try this. Another way to anger somebody you're arguing with is to use one of the easily available appropriate racial epithets if they're not white (or if they're one of those ethnic whites that have a history of being trod upon, like dagos or micks) or call them a racist if they're just your average, run-of-the-mill whitey. "Racist" is about the only word you can use on whites that's equitable to a racial slur because when have they ever been, as an entire group, in a powerless situation where their humanity has been taken away by a single word (you know, excluding the dagos and the micks!)? But you call a white person racist and just watch their head explode!

Here's an offensive fact: I just now discovered that I'm a dago! I consulted Lord Google for the spelling because I might not mind sounding racist while getting a point across but I certainly don't want to look stupid by spelling something wrong! While doing so, I discovered dago refers to Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese people in the UK! Being American, I thought it was just a derogatory word for Italians. But apparently in UK English, you can catch a whole swath of swarthy foreigners in the net of your racism! Now when somebody calls me a spic, I can say, "I prefer the term 'dago'." Although then they'll just assume I'm Italian so maybe I should just punch them in the face instead.

My mother was fully Spanish although she was second generation born in America so I really only think of myself as Spanish when it comes to my heritage. More correctly, I think of myself as California Spanish. What that means is that I'm born from people who are constantly correcting people who call them Mexican or Portuguese because if there's one thing that my Spanish ancestors brought with them from Spain, it was the haughty attitude to feel better than other Hispanics based on the region from which they were born.

Can you tell I'm not really interested in reading this comic book? I should probably not judge it too harshly before reading it because Tony Bedard has taken over as writer and I remember once praising Bedard (when he was writing Blue Beetle) for being one of the few writers to set up a plot where the super villain actually had a motivation that wasn't his hatred for the hero. Might be this the first Teen Titans comic book ever to have the Teen Titans doing something heroic as opposed to something completely and utterly selfish?!

The issue begins with Lex discovering he's been memed.

The other memes Luthor scrolls down will never become memes because they're aren't clever enough. But I did laugh when, on the next page, Luthor gets his first bit of panel time with the caption: Lex Luthor. Owns Metropolis.

Luthor points out that, like Blue Falcon, he does not take offense at thoughtless words. But he points out that some villains aren't as thick-skinned as he is.

Hit the sirens! Drop the confetti! Comic book history has just been made! The Gorilla/Guerrilla pun has just been used for the millionth time! Hooray!

So apparently there's a new superhero named Metatroll93 and his super power is pissing off super villains! He'd fit right in with the Teen Titans since the only villains they fight are villains gunning for them personally. Oh how I hope Metatroll93 joins the Titans! I would have guessed it was a Titan, like Bunker or Changeling, but my assumption is that the "93" is the birth year which would make Metatroll93 too old to be a Teen Titan.

I think there's a dildo or butt plug joke on the next page:

Speaking to Mallah like he's just some dumb ape diminishes their relationship more effectively than any Internet meme!

Brain and Mallah are definitely in a gay relationship here. It's as overt as editorial probably allowed it to be without actually having a caption that says, "Brain and Monsieur Mallah. Friends and Lovers." The dialogue is only proof that they care about each other. It's the visuals that make it plain they're also in a physical relationship.

Yep. Dildo and/or butt plug.

The Teen Titans are still on the run from the law and I have to give Bedard credit. He could easily have come on board and not mentioned that the Titans have continually broken the law for their own selfish desires making them unlikeable assholes not worth my time. Actually, maybe I shouldn't give him credit at all! He had an opportunity to bridge the gap between The New 52 and Rebirth by doing whatever he wanted with these characters. He could have simply pretended they were heroic the way Marv Wolfman would do month after month without any evidence to back up his claims!

The Titans are running a training exercise where they learn that they're all really poorly trained. Except for Red Robin, of course.

Do tigers breathe fire? I don't get it.

After the Titans learn that anybody trained by Batman is five batrillion-zillion times better than any other hero, I find out why Bedard chose to continue the whole "the Titans are acting like super villains" story arc that all of the other shitty writers on this comic book stuck him with.

See? I have so little ambition, I just wanted Bedard to use a shortcut to fix the Titans. But he's chosen to turn it into an actual story! Kudos!

Let me guess! The Titans will save Metatroll93 from Brain and Mallah which will show Metatroll93 that the Teen Titans really are heroes! Then Metatroll93 will start a new meme which everybody will pick up on expressing how the Titans are heroes. And since the populace of the DC Universe is so fickle and easily manipulated, everybody will agree that the Teen Titans truly are heroic once again! Although were they truly ever? Should I have left out the "once again" bit?

My guess immediately goes off the rails because I forgot to account for New 52 Red Robin's penchant for acting selfish and being a bully. His plan is to confront Metatroll93 and convince him to use his viral powers of propaganda to make the Titans look heroic. Failing that, he and the Teen Titans will shut down Metatroll93's site so that he can't make fun of them any more. I suppose this reasoning at least gets the Teen Titans on site so that they can save Metatroll93 from Brain and Mallah. Which can then dovetail into my prediction nicely. Bedard's version has the added bonus of keeping the Titans in character, no matter how awful that character has become thanks to Pak, Pfeifer, and Lobdell.

The Titans find that Mallah and The Brain have already gotten to Metatroll93 and taken over his brain with Brotherhood of Evil gadgets. I guess they were trying to harness his meme ability for their own uses. They were probably the ones who made the Red Robin meme since it was a bit more clever than most of Metatroll93's memes. Since the Teen Titans are used to getting caught with their pants down (Red Robin's phrasing!), Mallah and The Brain succesfully ambush them and stick a mind-control gadget on the back of Wonder Girl. Now Red Robin has to beat her ass again next issue!

Teen Titans #19

Ugh.

The Review or Whatever!
The Teen Titans have cared only about themselves pretty much since The New 52 began (and probably before that as well!). They don't change at all this issue. Wonder Girl might even be worse now that she knows she's a demigod and isn't bound by man's laws. The entire team is composed of miserably needy and lonely extroverts who accept each other as family simply because they're in proximity of each other. Not once in any issue has there been any actual bonding or intimacy that would believably bind these assholes into the family they happily proclaim they are. I hate Red Robin. I hate Bunker. I hate Beast Boy. I hate Power Girl. I hate Raven. I hate Wonder Girl. I especially hate Superboy. Thank fuck he's gone! For now! Thankfully Rebirth is happening and I'm hoping that it will erase all of the bullshit that has caused me to hate all of these characters. They're despicable narcissists full of arrogance and entitlement. And since this issue made sure to focus on only the mission of saving Lennox and nothing that happened prior to breaking into Wonder Woman's apartment, Greg Pak will probably just pretend like the Teen Titans aren't currently wanted for assisting a wanted fugitive and breaking into a prison and whatever other bullshit they did because they get to do whatever they think is right for the "family." Fuck these assholes. I hope this was the last Goddamned issue before Rebirth.

Teen Titans #18

Normally I would be annoyed by a cover that depicts heroes battling each other. But have the Teen Titans really been acting like heroes?

Rating: No change. This may not technically be the worst DC Comic but it hasn't been very good. It's getting a little better with Greg Pak even though I mostly don't like Greg Pak's writing. At least he's telling a story that was long overdue. But he still has to use all of the unlikeable characters in this team! They're all selfish criminals! Why would I care what happens to any of them?! This is what happens when you allow lousy writers to wing it month after month without any thought to how the stories they're telling will affect how readers see the characters. I also have an aversion to super hero groups that don't have any reason to be a super hero group. The Teen Titans are really just a gang of hoodlums doing whatever they want, constantly fighting among themselves, falling in and out of love with each other without any indication of intimacy or closeness, and causing lots and lots of property damage while they're simply dealing with their own problems. What I'm saying is that the Teen Titans haven't changed a bit in decades!

• Recently, the Teen Titans have helped a super murderer (created to be a living weapon) escape from justice, broken into a prison, and escaped custody rather than answering for their crimes. They've also justified their behavior because they're selfish pricks. I probably didn't need to say that since it's right in the title: "Teen"!

• To be fair, Tim Drake did create the Teen Titans to protect meta-human teenagers all over the world. He never said any of them would be heroes! They would just be a gang of assholes protecting each other from the fucking adults who don't know everything! They have no idea what it's like to be a teenager! I mean, they did but that was a totally different time when things weren't nearly as difficult as now! Aside from a less safe world with selective service and way more expectations of behavior. But they didn't have like our problems, you know?!

• The Titans were busy looking for Cassie's father whom they found on Wonder Woman's mantel in London. I mean, they found his head. So that seems suspicious.

• Wonder Woman has caught them destroying and raiding her apartment. But she's compassionate and understanding so that makes her a total doormat. I mean, it makes her willing to understand what other people are going through and empathize with them.

• Wonder Woman calls Tim "Robin" and he doesn't correct her and say, "Actually, it's Red Robin, you stupid adult. Gosh! Leave me alone!" He probably doesn't say that because he doesn't have a room at hand which he can dramatically flounce into and slam the door behind him.

• Oops. I spoke too early. Take that, adult! You don't know everything!

• Red Robin does not tell Wonder Woman that he and the rest of the gang are escaped felons on the run. It's none of her business anyway!

• The rest of the Teen Titans have been taken by Cassandra. Cassandra can predict the future but nobody listens to her predictions so then she just gets really frustrated. That's probably why she's kind of a bad guy.

• Boo fucking hoo. Someone needs to do a whole lot more than yell at you, you fucking thief.

• Gar points out that Cassandra must be the villain of this story because she's not one of them and she's against them and an adult and a jerk too.

• Gar is wrong. Obviously the Teen Titans are the villains of this entire comic book series.

• Power Girl tells Cassie that she's her friend. They barely know each other! How off in your head do you have to be to consider somebody a friend so quickly and freely?! I should ask my friend Doom Bunny! He thinks everybody he meets is a friend!

• Doom Bunny isn't answering immediately. I'll get back to him!

Right. And what you do is constantly break the law for your own selfish purposes.

• Cassandra begins winning Cassie over by saying things that teenagers like to hear like "You have a right to be angry and lost. Nobody could have gone through what you've been through and remain as strong! Your father actually loves you even though he abandoned you. I'm your representation and you totally identify with me so you totally can even."

• The Titans battle some giant snakes as they hunt for the Rod of Asclepius beneath Apollo's temple in Delphi. They sort of find it but first Wonder Woman has to tie up Cassandra and ask her some questions like "What is your real motive behind bringing Lennox back to life?" and "Who do you think you're fooling?" and "Are you manipulating everybody for your own selfish ends because that's par for the course in a Teen Titans comic book?" Actually, Wonder Woman doesn't ask any important questions that would get to the bottom of Cassandra's plot while her lasso is around Cassandra. Instead she just says, "Tell her, Cassandra, why did you come to her?" And Cassandra says to bring Cassie's father back. Which isn't a lie but, come on! You know it's only a small part of her overall plan! This is what happens when Batman isn't around to ask the questions!

• Nobody gets beaten up by Wonder Woman like the cover fooled everybody into thinking would happen. Not that comic book fans are used to covers telling any kind of truth at all. Even though I hate how variant covers break up a collection because I don't have the "real" covers of each issue, I sort of like them better because at least they don't try to manipulate me!

Teen Titans #12

Good. It's about fucking time.

I admit it! When somebody says they enjoy something written by Scott Lobdell, I immediately assume they are idiots. You know what? I get the feeling I've admitted that before! At the very least, I've ranted and raved and screamed on and on and on about Lobdell's horrible version of the Teen Titans so many times that it should have caused everybody to infer that that's the case. I suppose I don't mind if people enjoy it so much. Everybody has a right to enjoy whatever they want, no matter how stupid or idiotic or horribly written it is. But I do assume a person doesn't get much use out of their brain if they defend Lobdell's work as good. Or decent. Or even competent.

So now Lobdell fans (who are obviously morons (unless they enjoy his comic books simply because they allow them to turn off their brains for the three minutes it takes to read one. I suppose we all enjoy some of that kind of lovely garbage for destressing our lives)) have reason to celebrate. He's back on the Teen Titans! Hooray! More idiotic Narration Boxing! More crappily defined characters! More panels of Wonder Girl being punched by Superboy as she thinks, "I wish his dick were in my mouth!" I guess whoever loves Lobdell at DC figured he'd need some additional money each month after the cancellation of Doomed (which, by the way, wasn't cancelled fast enough). I'm surprised Doomed ran long enough to be cancelled due to poor sales rather than ending with a cease and desist from Marvel because they own Spider-man.

What kind of life have you led that you want it back now? Are tired of not being a living weapon anymore? Do you want to go back to working for NOWHERE? Superboy's life has pretty much been exactly what it is now: constantly running and fighting. Although he did have that brief period where he was dating Bunker.

This opening page doesn't quite feel right for a Scott Lobdell Jam. It's got the boring full page panel. It's got the inane dialogue. But where are the fifteen Narration Boxes?! I guess the lack of the boxes must be Pfeifer's influence.

After turning the page, I breathe a sigh of relief. When the story begins at a place that wasn't where the last story ended with lots of characters missing and nobody really concerned with the plot that had been chugging along the last twenty pages, I realize Scott Lobdell is definitely back! I was afraid maybe somebody at DC just added his name to the script so he could get a bump in pay. But that would have meant I don't get the enjoyment of tearing down his hard work. And by "hard work," I mean rush to get the script done at the last minute while scarfing nachos and guzzling Shirley Temples in some seedy hotel lobby bar.

I think I'd really have a good time hanging out with my imaginary version of Scott Lobdell!

Instead of still being in the basement levels of the MAW with Despero behind him, Red Robin is now in Dayton's destroyed penthouse (I think). Instead of the Elite having teleported in to shut down the prison break, they've completely disappeared (except for Wonder Girl). Superboy was doing the same thing he was doing at the end of last issue which was screaming to have somebody give him back his life. So that's going to be great in the collected edition. I always like having two nearly identical pages lined up one after the other. I suppose I'll have to wait to find out what happened to the others. I'm sure it's either a Despero alternate reality where the core of the Teen Titans will get to talk about how much they love each other, or Manchester Black decided the best way to end the prison break (which was part of his plan) was to just teleport everybody out (which was probably always part of his plan). He does have an Indigo Lantern with crazy powerful teleport powers which he hasn't been using at all for some reason. Why else have an Indigo Lantern on the team?!

The Titans notice that their powers are gone. Red Robin can feel somebody watching them because that's a thing that isn't real but everybody believes. You know when you think you feel somebody watching you? That just means you think you feel somebody watching you. If somebody happens to be watching you at that moment, it's just a coincidence. Believing every thought that enters your head is true? That's schizophrenia.

Was that ever a thing? When they were all Titans? And Superboy was trusted?

Here's a question! Why did DC Comics finally cancel Scott Lobdell's awful Teen Titans run only to reboot it with a change of attitude that never actually changed only to wind up shoving Lobdell back on the title? The only conclusion I can reach is that DC Comics hates fans of the Teen Titans!

Superboy remembers killing the Durlans which makes Red Robin say, "Whoops! I suppose if Superboy is going to turn himself in for murder, I'd better turn myself in for breaking into a prison and hampering a police investigation." Wonder Girl lies to Superboy when he pities himself and tells him that all she ever wanted was to get him help and to have his dick in her mouth. Oh, sorry. The last half of that sentence wasn't a lie.

Bart begins to whine about how if Superboy has to pay for killing twenty Muslims or aliens, then he should probably have to pay for starting a war that killed millions of people who have yet to be born. He even admits that he started the war because he was a stupid teenager who thought he was right the way stupid teenagers always do. He says, "Because I thought I was right. Whatever the hell that means." And Kon answers, "It means everything, Bart." Oh, okay. So any lives taken due to somebody doing something which they thought was right should be forgiven because they intended to do the right thing even though it was the wrong thing because they were acting like an idiot. All is forgiven! Next up, Wonder Girl needs to pity herself so the others can say, "No! No! You're a good person and we love you and that's all that matters! If only the stupid adults would get off our backs!"

Fuck everything. I probably got the Despero part wrong and it's probably Manchester Black but here we go with the "Despero alternate reality where the core of the Teen Titans will get to talk about how much they love each other" bit.

To top it all off, Bart's favorite memory is the moment from Lobdell's run of Teen Titans where Bart borrowed Tim's shirt without asking. What a great life he's led. Weren't we supposed to forget about that landfill? Didn't we cover it up with a golf course and forget about it? No? And now I have to relive it?! Argh! I already paid for this crap once!

Cassie's favorite memory was when she was defending her life against Superboy and thinking about his dick in her mouth.

Superboy's favorite memory was when the Titans saved his life because they're idiots.

Red Robin's favorite memory was probably the night he fucked all the female members of the Teen Titans but he doesn't reveal it to the others.

And then the Titans discover that Red Robin had been keeping tabs on them and researching them before he met them because he had to develop a plan to get them to all work together! The kind of plan only one person in the entire Omniverse could ever come up with:

Harvest! See? Tim and Harvest make plans in exactly the same way because, like I said three or four years ago, Harvest is future Tim Drake after he's become an immortal vampire, lived for one thousand years, and then traveled back in time to make sure the Teen Titans were created so that Tim could become Harvest! And so forth, and so on.

Red Robin is still under the delusion that Harvest is just a guy from the future who lost his son because of a war against superhumans or something. But that's what Harvest needs Tim Drake to think or else Tim Drake might avoid becoming a vampire and ruining his chance at becoming Harvest! Look, Harvest's back story has changed a number of times so don't think I'm crazy sticking to the Red Robin is actually Harvest hypothesis! It all fits if you know where to look! It's all just part of Harvest's ultimate and best plan ever!

Harvest says Kon was meant to be with him and not the Titans. The Titans deny it because they love him! But then Kon finally gets to tell everybody what he thinks. Bah. Why would they care? Who asks their gun if it wants to shoot the intruder?!

Cassie is totally thinking about Kon's dick in her mouth.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha! A-ha ha ha ha ha ha! Oh my god. I can't breathe. Ha ha ha ha ha! This is meant to be funny, right? I knew Scott Lobdell liked to write comedy but I never realized he could be so good at it! This is hilarious stuff!

Tim forgets about that thing where all the Titans have done horrible stuff because they thought they were doing the right thing and declares he's going to do the right thing and go against Kon's wishes. He's going to make sure Kon fights against Harvest instead of giving in and going with him. I really wish he wouldn't. Whenever Superboy is in a comic book, the comic book becomes all about Superboy. That might not be a bad thing except Superboy has no story and no character. He's just a guy who ruins everybody's day while they try to hug him. Just let him go already. He's an albatross!

Some friend! He wouldn't even tell you that his name was Tim! I have no idea how everybody eventually learned it.

To illustrate my point how Superboy is a parasite who just keeps ruining this title, I just realized that I've been saving all of my scans for this critique as "Superboy12a.jpg" and "Superboy12b.jpg"! As I was writing the HTML, I was linking to "TT12a.jpg" and "TT12b.jpg". But I just noticed after saving the last scan that I was saving all my scans as Superboy images. Reading Scott Lobdell comic books causes brain damage!

Superboy flies away and hopefully out of the DC You forever. He needs some serious revisions before he attempts to come back. And Harvest tells the Teen Titans that they joined together out of fear of each other which totally makes sense for no reasons but still makes them all feel bad and angsty and pouty.

And that's the end of this issue. What happened to The Elite and Manchester Black and Raven and Bunker and Changeling and the prison break and Despero and that Powers guy and Klarion and the last eleven issues of this comic book? Fuck you. Don't worry about it.

Teen Titans #12 Rating: -2 Ranking. I guess the celebration of the end of Scott Lobdell's Teen Titans run was premature. But at least I celebrated every single day over the last year and a half, never once taking for granted my time without a Teen Titans comic book with Scott Lobdell at the helm. I pity all of those fans who took the time for granted and never embraced the beauty of that time. I have a feeling that I might be to blame for Scott Lobdell's return to the Teen Titans. Somebody at DC probably missed my scathing critiques of Lobdell's work on this comic book and realized they couldn't live without them. So I'd like to apologize to everybody. I'm sorry I'm so good at tearing apart Scott Lobdell's writing on the Teen Titans. This one's on me.

Wonder Woman #43

Whoa, whoa, whoa! Why is there only one "Finch" on the cover?!

So it turns out David Finch didn't draw this issue! How is that going to affect the story? Will Meredith Finch write better when her husband isn't constantly nagging her to slip in two double page splash pages and a scene where Superman catches Diana masturbating?! Will Meredith Finch actually begin to write some complexity into Diana's character without Dave standing around yelling shit like, "Make sure you have Diana beat up an obviously sexist pig so everybody knows she's a feminist! Oh! And how about introducing Baby Rabies into her personality this issue? Women suffer through that shit at her age, right?!" I don't know why I have this intuition backed up by years of evidence that David Finch, even though he's not writing, is the main problem with the current version of Wonder Woman.

It's not really an intuition if it's based on evidence but since most people would rather think their beliefs and conclusions spring magically from thin air than realize that "intuition" is just putting together perception and evidence to predict the most likely future outcome, who am I to think otherwise? How arrogant would that be to believe that my brain puts information together to form a coherent and predictable model of the reality surrounding me? How dare I pooh-pooh mysticism and magic and religion and intuition and psychic powers?! People who rely on science and evidence are such condescending bastards!

You know what I'm sick of seeing posted to Facebook? "It's better to be kind than intelligent." Fuck you assholes and your passive aggressive bullshit. The two aren't mutually exclusive! I mean, I'm a bad example because I'm a huge asshole and a genius! But it's insulting to suggest that if somebody is intelligent then they're mean, or vice versa. Are people saying that all of their kind friends are morons? It's a bit like the old stupid person adage about how smart people lack common sense. Dumbies are always trying to make themselves feel better. Look, just because I will openly state, "There is no God," does not mean I'm being mean. Y'all constantly praise God right in my face. So aren't I allowed to express myself as well? I guess it is a bit mean to point out that my lack of belief is based on evidence and a well-informed opinion and your opinion is simply based on clinging to your desire that your ego will somehow exist for eternity. But those are just facts! Not accepting facts doesn't make facts not true! Look, I want my ego to exist forever too! Who wants to die?! But we must die because the only way for a species to grow and evolve is for continued iterations of two differently-sexed parents combining their DNA into new possibilities. Eventually, maybe, somehow, human beings will figure out the key to immortality. But as soon as that happens, say goodbye to evolution and hello to sterilization! You better hope when that leap is made, human beings are comfortable with everything about the way their bodies and minds work.

Oh, hey! What was all that? Who typed all that stuff? It wasn't me! Gosh darn that jerk who just typed all that stuff on my laptop which wasn't me at all and somebody else who you're probably angry at now! I hope God curses their grandkids! I mean, I'd love it if God would curse that person specifically but if you're familiar with The Bible, you know God has a problem punishing the correct people. I should probably just read Wonder Woman now before I point out how reading The Bible is probably the best way to stop believing in The Bible. No wonder the church fought so hard to keep it from being printed in a language the masses could read and why they still continue to try to interpret it for their flock. When people claim it's a book of instructions for life, I wonder if they even know what instructions are.

The problem might lie with the spacing of those bars.

So far, I like the new art and all the detail but it looks like these women have been sucking on lemons all morning. Can Ian draw mouths that aren't puckered up duck faces?

Strife appears eating a gigantic bag of popcorn leading to Wonder Woman asking the stupidest question she could think of.

Diana. Her name is Strife and she hates you. Figure it out.

Wonder Woman was just being polite and giving Strife a chance to show she has a big old pair of ovaries but instead Strife chickens out and pretends she had nothing to do with Donna's disappearance. Wonder Woman responds with some smug response that allows her to smirk as if she just laid a verbal smackdown on Strife. She didn't though. It could have been better. I give it a four out of ten. But now the hunt is on to find Donna before she meets and marries Terry Long.

Hera's pool doesn't work for finding people made out of clay so Wonder Woman pays a visit to her brother, Wesley Willis. I'm glad Meredith didn't forget that he's a character in this comic book series!

I think Meredith could have done a bit more research on his way of talking though! I would have said, "Diana. You are a very nice sister. I will help you to see. I will go on a hellride for you. You are the nicest sister in the world. You are so nice you would bring me McDonald's." Also, Diana would have shown up with McDonald's.

Whenever Milan shows up, I have to mention that I once met Wesley Willis at a concert in Portland. He sang a song he was working on at the time called, "My Roommate Fucked Me In The Ass." He was a brilliant musician.

Milan's clues lead Wonder Woman back to London and to a place called "A Twist of Fate." You'd think the Fates wouldn't set shop in a place with a name so on the nose. I'd imagine they'd be working at Michael's.

Donna surprises the Fates in their shop where they weave threads and fill growlers.

I guess in this version, you can only tell who's youngest by her breasts.

The Fates don't have Donna's thread so she can't die by their hands. She leaves while some other mysterious presence visits the Fates next and murders them. Diana stumbles upon the scene before the cutter of threads dies and burbles out some ambiguous rhymes that leaves Diana thinking that Donna murdered them. I've said this before and I'll say it again because I'm constantly writing about comic books but when you're saying your last words to somebody, try to be clear and concise! Your vagueness and ambiguity only leads to trouble!

As Wonder Woman exits the shop, she meets a street urchin who would make a better Wonder Girl than that awful Cassie over in Teen Titans! Before Diana can learn her name and give her an outfit, Aegeus and his flying horse (that isn't Pegasus because Pegasus is dead) attack. But he's no better at shooting arrows now than he was last issue.

Eww! That's kind of creepy if she means Aegeus was still breastfeeding at fourteen. I must be parsing this statement incorrectly!

Aegeus eventually gets a lucky shot when Diana thinks he's down for the count and hits her in the shoulder with one of his magic arrows. It causes Diana to bleed from her eyes and, once more, mention how Aegeus won't escape so easily as he easily escapes. Diana collapses in a heap of blood so that she can wake up being cared for in the street urchin's cardboard box next issue.

Wonder Woman #43 Rating: +1 Ranking. This issue was much better than previous issues. I'm going to assume it's because David Finch wasn't a part of it. It's probably just my intuition and not evidence-based at all that I believe Meredith Finch writes better when her husband isn't standing over her shoulder asking for more scenes where he can showcase Wonder Woman's boobs. This feels a bit derivative of Azzarello's run but that's a good thing. I don't mind if Wonder Woman is mostly caught up in the lives of the gods and the other Amazons in her own book. She can save the world over in Justice League. I just want to see her helping other people because it's the right thing to do. I have a feeling she's going to wind up hugging Aegeus and stroking his head and telling him he's well-loved. Then he'll weep and renounce being a dick and become a minor character in this comic book. And maybe his Pegasus is actually Pegasus returned. I said back when he died that he had a strong chance of coming back quickly since young girls and boys love winged horses. Pegasus can't die with all of that junior high school worship taking place. Anyway, I'm cautiously optimistic about the direction of this book right now. I would love to have a well-written Wonder Woman in a comic book I'm buying. I have no idea how things are going over in Sensation Comics since I don't pick that up, what with it not having been a New 52 book and all that jazz.

Batman Loves Superman Annual #2

The Annuals should be issues where the characters just get to take a break from crimefighting. I want to see Bruce and Clark on a cruise!

This issue begins with Xa-du because we haven't had enough of this boring asshole yet. I mean, I have had enough of him. But I guess Greg Pak doesn't think his readers have had enough of him. If Greg Pak doesn't watch out, he's going to become my next dead horse. He's precariously close to being a writer whose writing I don't like. That's my polite way of saying that he's a bad writer but I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt that that's just my ignorant opinion and that maybe he's actually a fantastic writer but I just don't happen to like his writing. But if he keeps cramming this idiot Xa-du down my throat, I'm going to unleash the hounds, set the Doomsday Clock to midnight, and get out my Dead Horse Beating Stick. And once I start beating a dead horse, it's very rare that I stop because it's so much fucking fun.

Xa-du was banished back to the Phantom Zone with his ability to escape finally neutralized. But guess what?! He still has the ability to reach out of the Phantom Zone and manipulate people with his Hypno-Impulse! So his next plan is to reach out to all of Batman and Superman's enemies and convince them that Clark Kent needs to die.

Every window in Paris looks out on the Eiffel Tower. I think Escher designed the city.

Yay! Another story where Superman and Batman aren't trying to help people but are simply defending themselves against attack! I can't get enough of stories that show how fucking useless being a superhero is! I just love a good story where all the death and destruction caused is simply because the super hero exists. So inspirational!

I have no idea who the woman in Paris is in the scan above. Phobia? Oh, I bet it's Talia al Ghul, right? There's also a panel showing the Bahamas and a hand with a machete in it. I don't know who the fuck that would be either.

Superman is currently investigating the island where Doomsday exploded everything and killed everybody and whatever the fuck happened in Doomed! The island is on fire and spreading a thick black cloud of Doomsday dust. But Superman knows how to get rid of it and set himself up for a really exciting story where he has to battle Batman's enemies in much the same way Batman has always had to battle them: without any powers! Superman uses his new Exploding Vagina Power to disintegrate everything in a few miles radius around him. Except his power goes KRAKOOM unlike his sister's power which goes FWASH! I guess that's the difference in sound between a vagina exploding and a scrotum exploding. Now he's powerless for twenty-four hours! Just in time for Xa-du's Hypno-Impulse controlled villains to attack him!

Clark heads deeper into the island to await Batman's arrival because he'll be easier to find in the thick jungle than if he remained on the beach. He's looking for the source of the Doomsday Cloud and he finds a bunch of people scavenging medical supplies from one of the abandoned hospitals on the ruined resort island. They've been burning crap that apparently is full of Doomsday's toxins. And then the person in the Bahamas who was influenced by Xa-du attacks.

At least he's starting out with an easy villain.

Now that Superman has a power which causes him to lose his power (pretty much the only reason it was created, by the way), is everybody going to rush out and write their version of the Superman shows how he's a hero even without any powers story? I like Geoff Johns' version where Superman did the right thing in the face of real danger. I'm not sure if I'm going to like this story as much where Superman gets a chance to prove that he's every bit as good at super heroing without powers as Batman is. Batman trained with the best teachers across the planet across many, many years. Superman relies on his invulnerability and super strength. The hardest part of Superman's job is calculating how hard to punch somebody so that he doesn't knock their head clean off of their body. But now he's going to stand toe to toe with Killer Croc, Bane, Talia, and Man-Bat? Bah! I don't even think he could take Man-Bat!

Clark takes a throwing star to the back as he pushes some guy out of the way. It's the same guy he pushed out of the way earlier. I think that guy needs to start getting out of the way on his own. Also, Man-bat must not know what Clark Kent looks like. I will not make a blind as a bat joke because that's a myth and I only deal in truth and facts and self-embellishment. After Clark falls to the ground with a shuriken lodged in his spine, a mysterious woman comes to his rescue!

Now Clark and the mystery woman are stuck back to back by a throwing star.

So she's battling to save her friend (and maybe Clark) while Clark battles to save her friend (and maybe himself) but she's braver? Simply because she doesn't know Batman is coming? You know she's not going to sleep with you for the compliment because she can't hear your Narration Boxing, Clark.

Batman arrives to save their lives and says, "Idiots," as he arrives. What the fuck was that about? They're being attacked by a monster and he's going to chastise them? Does everybody really think the best way to write Batman is to make him a complete asshole?

Hee hee.

Everybody escapes into a manhole and then Bane shoots the Man-bat in the head and kills it. Also arriving with Bane are Cheshire, Killer Croc, and three dozen more Man-bats. They're all hunting Clark Kent and they all have terrifically fast methods of travel and amazingly high tech gadgets that enable them to track Clark Kent. If they're here already, did they see Superman blow his scrotum?

My main question is why are Bane and Killer Croc working together? Xa-du's manipulation doesn't make them forget their past. It just makes them sort of feel like killing Clark Kent. But I think Bane might want a piece of Croc after what he did to him during Batman Eternal. And Croc obviously hasn't forgotten that Bane threw him from the top of Wayne Tower in Arkham War (which is why he humiliated Bane in Batman Eternal!). But now they're just going to forget all the bad blood because they both kind of sort of want to murder Clark Kent for some unknown reason? Bah.

You know what's better than having villains mind-controlled to attack the heroes? Giving the villains a motivation to attack the heroes that makes sense to their characters! But that's hard! And Greg Pak really loves the easy way out.

Clark wants to help Batman stop the thugs but Batman doesn't believe that Clark Kent is ready to go toe to toe with this group of villains (he's right). Batman decides he has to give Clark a quick rundown on the villains so Clark knows exactly why he'll be no help in a fight against them. Batman is a condescending dickhole. Clark Kent is a journalist! I think he knows about these thugs!

Batman tells the civilians to find anything they can use as a weapon and to sit tight while he takes care of business. Janice, the brave woman, uncovers a box full of knives and is all, "Batman sir! Will these do?" Then Clark is all, "I'm going to fight too!" So Batman ties him to a concrete post. Because what better way to use Clark than as bait so Batman can lure the bad guys in close.

Killer Croc breaks through a wall and Clark thinks, "I'm just flesh-and-blood right now and for the first time in ages, I remember what it feels like to be terrified."

Can I ask you a question, Mr. Pak? Do you read the things you write? Do you remember any of the things you write? Because you just recently wrote that story in Action Comics about Smallville turning into a horror story, remember? And remember how the creature devoured fear? And how it made everybody, including Superman, feel terrified? And the way Superman finally defeated the Ultra-Humanite was to allow himself to feel truly terrified so that it would consume too much fear and be sated? Or something like that. However it worked out, I'm fairly certain that the whole point of the story was to show Lana Lang that Superman also feels terror and loss. But now is the first time in ages he's felt scared! Okay. Whatever. I guess this story takes place before that story.

It turns out Clark was in on the "lure Killer Croc in close" plan (although he was still terrified! Coward!). I'm surprised Batman is allowing Clark to act so much in their missions lately. But then Batman and Croc are covered in rubble so now it's up to Clark to save Batman! Unless Janice saves Batman. She is much braver and more competent and less of a puss.

One pillar was taken out and this happens to half the hospital. What a shit building.

The Man-bats are taken out by a poison gas trap but Cheshire, master of poison, is unaffected. But then she's knocked out by a single blow of a pipe to the back of the head. It's like she's not one of the greatest assassins at all! Can Clark at least struggle to defeat Cheshire? My guess is that he got some of his powers back already and he's lucky he didn't completely crush her skull.

As Bane gives chase to Clark, Batman comes out of the jungle riding Croc. Through a series of hilarious misunderstandings, Killer Croc attacks Bane and they fall off of a cliff and into the ocean (with a little help from some of Batman's non-lethal explosives). Then Batman is all, "I guess you are kind of competent without any super powers. Hmph. Imagine that." Then he leaves Clark behind so that Clark can help Janice and her friends.

But then Janice stabs him in the stomach because Xa-du hypno-impulsed her.

Everything changes? So the writing will be good?

Batman Loves Superman Annual #2 Rating: This one ends with yet another villain pointing out that people ultimately hate and fear super heroes. I'm so fucking tired of that mantra. The whole point of super hero stories is to feel inspired and uplifted! Who are these writers who believe that Superman is actually reviled instead of loved? It's tired, idiotic bullshit. And why is Xa-du so fucking powerful? He lost the tech which lets him leave the Phantom Zone but he can still see everything that happens? I could buy (barely) that he somehow had the ability to slightly influence horrible people to kill Clark Kent. I'll even buy into the premise that it somehow affected these few criminals so much that they went out and treated it like a paid hit. But I won't accept that Xa-du has the ability to spy on Clark from the Phantom Zone with his crippled technology, that he was able to see and understand that Superman lost his powers when he used his brand new super power, and was able to perceive the person standing next to Clark and manipulate that person into stabbing him. All while from inside the Phantom Zone. I also don't think Xa-du knows what he's talking about anyway when he calls Bane, Killer Croc, and Cheshire his "most lethal champions." There are far better that could have killed Clark Kent. And the ones he chose? If Superman hadn't lost his powers? They would have been absolutely useless! So why even bother?

Ugh. Greg Pak, you seriously need to try harder. You're coming up with themes that work but then doing a half-assed job turning them into a story. So here you wanted a powerless Clark to be able to prove to Batman that he could handle himself against Batman's enemies. That's actually an interesting kernel for a story. But the thing that kernel turned into? It's a mess! It's not an Ann Nocenti level mess but it still comes across as sloppy because the characters are just cardboard cutouts to move the plot along. I suppose if I wanted to defend you, I could say mind control explains it all. But then I have to believe that Xa-du has this kind of power from within the Phantom Zone even after losing half of his brain? I don't even want to believe that Xa-du exists!