Pandora #10

Giganta versus an immortal. I think being gigantic is on par with immortality.

I think Pandora is the daughter of Harbinger and Pariah. It totally makes sense if you just believe anything I say.

I think last issue, some event called Forever Evil: Blight was almost finished. The event spanned eighteen or so issues of four different comic books and eventually culminated in Constantine being kicked out of the Justice League Dark and losing his lease on The House of Mystery. That's pretty much all that happened. Also, Zauriel lost his wings. And maybe The Phantom Stranger learned a hard fought lesson. Pandora just continued to sweat in her cool outfit. God I hope this issue involves a trip to the laundromat and a few shots of Pandora in her underwear.

This issue begins with a bunch of blah blah blah look at Ray Fawkes, Wordsmith, word it up all over the page. The bottom line is that The Crime Syndicate is gone or something. We'll all find out about that whenever Forever Evil #7 hits the shelves. Probably in August.

Look at that outfit! By God, DC got something right.

And immediately after I get done admiring Pandora's outfit, she discards it for her stupid yellow, winged, Ravenesque bullshit costume of hope! I take it back! Fuck you, DC! Even when you get it right, you never realize you've gotten it right! That's why you cancelled Amethyst and The Movement and Dial H and Demon Knights and Grifter! Sure, Grifter should have been cancelled but it was so fun to mock! God that was a terrible comic book.

Pandora declares her love for her weaponsmith, Marcus Aurelius. I sure wish he'd say something wise right now so I can point out how stupid he's being! I'm sure Marcus Aurelius would have something profoundly biting to say about my need to belittle him to make me look smarter! What a jerk! He's long dead and I still can't be wiser than he is because he had the chance to say all that wise shit before I was even born! It's not fair.

Marcus (who probably isn't actually Marcus Aurelius but why not go with it, right? Random speculation has gotten me this far (this far being a website that has about 150,000 unique visitors a month but provides no revenue)!) has failed to fix Pandora's Box but he hasn't failed to fill it. That was a sex joke. I think I promised to give up equating Pandora's Box with her vagina many issues ago but I can't help falling into old habits. You can't teach an old dog how to suck dick. I bet Marcus Aurelius never said that! Ha ha!

Meanwhile Agent Kincaid of ARGUS is still hunting Pandora even though a Vampiric Agent from SHADE has told her to knock it off.

And then there's Giganta! (And then there's Giganta!) And then there's Giganta! (And then there's Giganta!) And then there's Giganta! (And then there's Giganta!) And then there's that larger than living, sneakily shivving, anything but truly forgiving, Right On Giganta!

Speaking of the theme song from Maude (I don't know why the theme song from Maude popped into my head. Who knows where most thoughts truly come from? Except those that come from the constant voices that I can't silence), how the fuck did they get a theme song on the air about a powerful, feminist woman with the lyrics "Joan of Arc was a sister that really cooked." Don't get me wrong: I love that lyric! But shit is it in awful taste!

After punching Giganta off of a roof, she curb stomps her with her massive foot. Pandora's body may be immortal but I don't think you can say the same thing for her dignity. That chick just got bested prison style!

The first thing out of Giganta's mouth is DC's statement that David Finch didn't fuck up by drawing Giganta with both eyes when she appeared in Forever Evil. Or whoever else drew her with both eyes after Pandora "out, vile jelly"'d one of them. She said it was grown back in a lab but we all know what really happened! Some artist fucked the fuck up and then DC got sick of hearing fanpersons saying, "Hey DC! You fucked up!" So They took Ray Fawkes into the back room in Torture Dungeon #3 and said, "Look Ray. Giganta lost an eye in your story. You need to bring her back and explain how come she had eyes in every other appearance after that." And Ray was all, "Fine! Whatever You say! Just let my children go!" And DC was all, "Not yet, Ray. Not yet."

I take back that sarcastic shit about being gigantic versus immortality. Holy fuck!

There's something about being a Master Comic Book Reader (of Winter) that causes one to read comic books on a level above intellect or intuition. It's like absorbing every aspect of the art and words without realizing what you're absorbing or being able to explain how you came to certain conclusions. So when I called Giganta "sneakily shivving" and later said Pandora was "bested prison style," I had no idea that Giganta was soon going to make a point of her time in prison.

I don't mean to jerk off my ego like I usually do. Ray Fawkes and Ig Guara and, I suppose, Ruy Jose should all be commended as well! Whatever subtleties they've placed in the story led me to the belief that Giganta was bringing a prison smackdown to Pandora's front yard. But let's not deny that picking up on those clues is easy! There's a reason I've given myself the title of Master Comic Book Reader and nobody else in the world has! Because nobody else is as good as I am. I think that's the reason.

There's no kind of a beatdown like a prison beatdown on an immortal.

I can't believe some anonymous yahoo asked if my account was a parody account this morning! What the fuck does that even mean? What am I parodying?! How dare you! Also, "Well I never!" And other such phrases of indignity and shock and loss of decorum! Look up the definition of the word "parody", asshole! And then message me and tell me what it means also.

Vandal Savage is also on the hunt for vengeance against Pandora because he hurt her. He's walking and stealing cars because he has to travel from the swamps of Louisiana to Baltimore, Not-in-Louisiana. He would be taking a jet or a helicopter but he loaned them all out to Swamp Thing and Capucine. He was in a good mood just one issue ago and now he's all bent out of shape and pissed off! I think Vandal might benefit from anti-depressants or anti-psychotics. Or LSD. Or maybe just a nice massage.

Pandora probably can't stop Giganta without killing her, so she tries out her new Warm Fuzzies Power. She gets inside Giganta's head and does that thing where the good guy says, "You're not really evil. You've just been let down by the world! But you can be better. You just need a great big hug!" Giganta reacts in the usual way to this approach which is grabbing her head and saying, "No no no no no!" She denies her old self because it's too painful and flees from the scene. Meanwhile, Marcus goes, "What the fuck are you doing?! If you're not going to kill bad guys, you aren't going to need my weapons, are you? Are you telling me I'm redundant?!"

Vandal Savage is my favorite DC Character. But as Mindy Kaling points out about best friends, "My Favorite Character" isn't one character; it's a tier. So my other favorite DC Characters are Jonah Hex and Etrigan the Demon and Lenny Shapiro and Kathy George and Shade the Changing Man and John Constantine and Metamorpho and Black Lightning and Katana and Halo and probably a bunch of others that aren't on the tip of my brain right now.

Pandora #10 Rating: No change. This issue was actually very good and may have been worth a few rungs up the rankings. But I'm actually surprised Pandora is ranked at #15 right now. It hasn't been that good! I think my rankings of The New 52 aren't worth shit! Except for Superman being the worst comic of them all. That's totally accurate.

Lois Lane #1

I suppose naming this comic book "Superman: Lois Lane" is marginally less insulting than naming it "Superman's Girlfriend Lois Lane."

I hope the next Superman-related comic book DC puts out is called "Superman's Bitch Jimmy Olsen."

One thing you can say about Kenneth Rocafort's cover art is "Are they still publishing "Choose Your Own Adventure" books?" You can say some other stuff too if you want. That was just one thing. You could also have said, "What is all that purple shit in the street?" Or maybe "Why is there a gigantic Sphinx-like bust of Lois Lane in the middle of the street in downtown Metropolis?" Perhaps you might even have said, "Why the fuck would I want to buy a comic book about Courtney Cox?" But if you said that, you probably weren't looking very closely at the cover. Also why would you even say that? I would totally buy a comic book about Courtney Cox! You might have also said, looking over at your friend shuffling on the carpet of the comic book store awkwardly waiting for you to get your funny books, "DC must have had a shortage on "M"s. Get it? See down here in the corner? Ha ha."

I'm probably not the right person to be doing any kind of review on a Lois Lane comic book. I assure you, right here up front so you know what you're getting into, I will be handling it without any dignity at all. I will probably make a joke or two about things going up her ass. I will treat her career as a "journalist" with no modicum of respect. If you're looking for a thoughtful, intelligent piece on why DC should embrace this feminist icon and produce a monthly book with Lois Lane, this is not it. Although, just for the record so you know where I stand (you should email me a brief synopsis of your own thoughts so I am on equal footing with your footing), I would love a monthly Lois Lane book. Not one where she's battling monsters and hoping Superman rescues her (not that she needs it! But to get some of the good old frottage as he carries her around to place in the old spank bank for later). I want a comic book about her investigating superheroes and discovering their secret identities and ruining their lives for the sake of her own career. That would be truly the best.

Stop being so dramatic, Lola! You were in a coma for about two days and most of that time was spent flying around as an astral projection!

Even without being in a coma, sleep is irritating. I love sleeping and I love dreaming but I really wouldn't mind spending that extra time doing something while conscious. I also resent every second of my day spent acquiring and eating food. I don't mind pooping though. That's time well spent.

Lois Lane begins by speaking about the etymology of the word Nostalgia. I've seen this before in comic book form since it was used in that episode of Mad Men where Draper has to give a presentation on the Kodak Carousel. It seems we've entered a time when we're not just nostalgic for home but for the word nostalgia itself. That sentence doesn't really make any sense but you probably wouldn't have thought twice about it if I hadn't grabbed your arm, stopped you, and pointed down at it. Although now it sounds like I'm calling you stupid or imperceptive! I mean, compared to Lois Lane, I think we're all profoundly stupid and imperceptive. At least she knows the true meaning of the word nostalgia unlike that poor lost soul Don Draper.

You can tell I'm ready for the next season of Mad Men! Get on with it already!

Lois is thinking about nostalgia because she's about to have a ton of it when her sister crashes through a window into her house speaking their old childhood secret language and looking for help. Lois's sister's girlfriend has been kidnapped and she needs help. But first, it's time for more of that pain from an old wound/painful yearning to return home. I can see why Don Draper chooses to say the thing the way he says it. It's so much more poetic, especially when seen through the experiences of his own youth and military past. The current Don Draper exists only because of an old wound. He has no actual home to yearn to return to. He has only an old wound and the corpse of the original Don Draper to return to. Whatever was before that, Don had no interest in. At least back during that episode. The end of Season 6 shows that Don is beginning to finally feel the weight of nostalgia crashing down upon him.

I should probably stop talking about Don Draper and get back to Lois Lane. Or maybe I should concentrate on their similarities! No, no. I'd better just move on. This isn't college essay week here at Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea. Fuck, it's never college essay week here! That shit is hard work. Mostly because you have to present coherent ideas that make an interesting point. It's easier to just come up with that profound nonsense I mentioned earlier.

I did just learn, after asking Lord Google which was the last season of Mad Men so I could type "Season Six" instead of "the last season of Mad Men" so the sentence would retain its specificity even after a new season ends, that Season Seven of Mad Men begins April 13th. Yay!

Okay, no more Mad Men! I'm going to concentrate on Lois Lane now.

Lois has a memory about her mother and how her mother told her society can suck it big time and then she died. Maybe that's not an exact quote or an exact timeline of events but I warned you I wasn't going to take this as seriously as you might have liked! Maybe you want to hear how Lois's mom taught her to think for herself. Maybe you want to hear how Lois's mom told her that she and her sister get to define themselves, that they get to incorporate or eject any part of their lives that they wish, that they are in complete control of who they will grow up to be and how they think about that person. But I'm not going to point out any of that shit. Lois's mom died and Lucy grew up knowing only Lois as a mother figure. Which is why she's come to Lois for help now that her girlfriend has been kidnapped. Although they must not have remained as close as Lois would have liked if her sister is calling her girlfriend her "roommate." As if Lois doesn't already know her little sister is gay. Lois is the best investigative journalist in the DC Universe!

Oh my God! In those old Marvel vs DC issues, did they ever pit Jimmy Olsen against Peter Parker?! How could they have not? Now I want to read those old issues and they'd better fucking exist or I'm shooting a puppy. Hey Marvel and DC from the past? Do you want to be responsible for a dead puppy? Then hopefully you considered the consequences of your actions when you wrote those team-ups and had a photo-shoot-off with Olsen and Parker! Judged by J. Jonah Jameson and Perry White (who later in the comic book wind up marrying each other).

It's a little bit creepy that she picked a girlfriend that looks so much like her sister. And a cat that looks so much like Jimmy Olsen.

Lucy's girlfriend Amanda had been taking pills that were supposedly helping her with an illness she had. She got them from someone named Ostermann which doesn't sound anything like it's probably a long-lived Nazi doctor that enjoys experimenting on the human race. This sentence should probably be set aside to apologize for any readers named Ostermann but instead I'm going to use it to remind myself to watch that Nature show tonight on PBS about Honey Badgers. The pills were making Lucy turn into some kind of demony monster thing. And eventually, a group called The Cartel came to collect her. They call themselves The Cartel because they're boring and unimaginative and must be of the generation that thinks simple, one word names that completely express what the thing is or why it exists are the best. So a restaurant should be called Eat. An art gallery should be called Snoot. A coffee shop should be called Perk. And a group that kidnaps people and engages in smuggling, fencing, and monopolistic price gouging should be called The Cartel. Actually, I'm being too imaginative with some of these!

Lois suggests that this is a job for Superman and Lucy says, "Fuck that illegal alien." And Lois goes, "Really? REALLY?" And Lucy is all, "We can't just allow everybody to live how they like! Some people, like white male alien supermen, really should be controlled somehow." This reminds me of my mom's philosophy on why she hates Middle Easterners: "Everybody needs at least one group to hate." Good point, mom! I think I'll make my group "racist moms."

Lois hits the streets in a montage of questioning people that might know something. This group of pictures as she chases down her lead needs some music behind it. I've recently hired my iTunes to score my comic books so let's find out what music iTunes thinks should back this scene: "All the Way" by the Indigo Girls. Hmm, not bad. It sort of changes the mood of the scene from tough journalist getting answers from even the scariest of street toughs to sensitive moment as she digs around to help one of the few people in her life whom she loves through a terrible tragedy.

Once she begins getting scent of The Cartel and its location, Lois calls in Jimmy Olsen to borrow one of his cameras. And the scene between them is precious.

I hope this Lois Lane One-Shot outsells Superman (which is always crap, each and every month Lobdell's name is on it!) this month. Could a Lois Lane monthly be the book that finally gives Bennett a home?

One important thing I've learned so far from this comic book is that Lois Lane sucks at spelling. Just like the blacksmith from Smallville!

Ha ha! So embarasing!

Lois finds that The Cartel is somehow linked to a new drug being sold on the streets of Metropolis. That drug is the one Amanda, Lucy's girlfriend, was taking. As Lois tries to buy some of the drug, she and the dealer and his thugs are captured by members of The Cartel. It seems they're cleaning up the streets. Perhaps they're just taking away the people that have transformed into monsters while on their drug so that people can't see the consequences of it. Or they might be good guys and The Cartel is a drug rehabilitation group. Maybe they're like The Initiative from Buffy? Hey, that's another group with a stupid, minimalist name!

So pretty much exactly like The Initiative.

As a prisoner of The Cartel (or the agents called something else because who knows what is true because Lucy is a drug abusing liar), Lois is placed inside a cell within earshot of very important and probably secret things being said. And these people know who she is, so they must really want the story to get out. It's the third oldest trick in The Book (right after pretending your wife is your sister and tricking your father into getting drunk and having sex with you)! Kidnap the hottest reporter in journalism (by hottest I mean most efficient not best looking. Technically Cat is a reporter too), pretend you're holding her prisoner but keep her in a closet near your office, talk really loudly and slowly while enunciating very carefully, and finally allow her to escape using her wits and charms. Then she rushes off to the office and bangs out a front page news story that will win her a Pulitzer. I don't know why they'd want this story out they. It seems Ostermann's drug was supposed to be used to heal people but instead it incorporated the DNA of any creature that came in contact with the use. So kind of a win/lose/mutate kind of situation.

Oh yeah, the most important thing that Lois learns? Her sister was also taking the drug! Which I hinted at earlier when I called her a drug abusing liar.

Lois Lane escapes using her wits and charms because I said that was going to happen and it did. I haven't leveled up in a while as a Master Comic Book Reader, so even though that prediction that she escapes isn't worth very many Experience Points, it's enough to make me a Master Comic Book Reader of the West Wind.

Lois finds The Initiative has lost all control of its drug addicted captives when she breaks out. After freeing Amanda, she helps to keep people safe alongside Captain Masonic Symbols Face. Lois is not just a reporter; she's a hero! And even though she could instantly call Superman by whispering, "I'm not wearing any pants," she chooses not to because she promised her sister Lucy that she wouldn't get him involved. Besides, she can take care of herself. The only reason we always see her getting rescued is because Superman is obsessed with her and overprotective. Dude, give her some space.

And finally, Lois and Amanda escape on a gigantic mosquito flea. Okay fine. I didn't see that coming. But that doesn't cost me any experience! It's not like missing an upcoming plot point is like being touched by a Wraith.

As Lois flies away on a half human/half mosquito/half why the fuck is it so big creature, I begin thinking about Lucy Lane. Didn't she appear in an early issue of Action Comics or Superman? Didn't Lois try to set her up with Clark? Lois really doesn't know her sister is gay, does she? But Lois does say earlier in this issue that "everyone is a bit blind about family." Even the greatest investigative reporter in the world!

I'm surprised Lois hasn't quit her job yet. The era of the great investigative journalist ended a couple of decades ago. Now news programs are just filled with talking heads either regurgitating official messages received during a press conference or vomiting up their own opinions concerning everything as if it were real news. News reports are filled with people on the street interviews which I've never understood. Report events not how people on the street didn't ever think the event could happen in their neighborhood. Stop reporting on local incidents that only matter to the individual the incident happened to! Stop showing viral videos. It's not really "news" if it doesn't matter to the populace at large and also if that populace has already seen it which is why the video went viral and you stupid news flunkies heard about it. Stop interrupting network shows with local election results that can be found on every other station or online or just revealed at the normal news hours. Shut up with your breaking and exclusive news brags on every fucking story. Eat my bunghole. You know what's better than news or stories or reviews done as fast as possible so you have the glory of being the first person to respond? Quality. Fucking quality, assholes. You can probably find a definition of it online even though that definition won't tell you the importance of it. Immediacy seems to be everybody's number one concern these days. Fuck immediacy. Take some time with this shit.

Always the reporter no matter what the cost! Hell, she was going to publish Superman's secret identity if it hadn't been eaten out of her psyche by Parasite.

Apparently Captain Masonic Symbols Face is actually just called The Agent. This is where I would link to my comment earlier about these jerks not having any imagination but I hate using hashtag HREF hyperlinks. Also I'm lazy.

Lois asks Superman to go check up on the other addicts after she gets home with Amanda and the giant flea mosquito which turns out to be Lucy. Captain Masonic Symbols Face pleads with Lois to have some discretion and not report the story since his group were taking care of it and detoxing everybody addicted to the drug. And finally Lois and Lucy hug or something sappy. I wasn't really paying much attention because there were no monsters or fighting or anything. It was just some nostalgic crap about not flying and not being caught and never letting your sister something or other alone.

Superman: Lois Lane One-Shot #1 Rating: More Lois Lane comic books please. And either a back-up feature with Jimmy Olsen or make sure he guest stars a lot. Also keep Bennett in the writer's seat. And lose the "Superman:" part of the title. Lois doesn't need to piggy back on Superman's face to get readers. Although that would probably get a lot of readers. The most readers even! But she doesn't need to!

The Green Team #8

Hearing your significant other constantly playing different versions of Daft Punk's "Get Lucky" in the background of your life may cause a potential mental breakdown.

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night til the sun.

We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get some.

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night for good fun.

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky.

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

The Green Team Rating: We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky! We're up all night to get lucky!

The Green Team #7

When did this comic book become Twilight?

J.P. looks more like a weregorilla than a werewolf. Except I don't believe in weregorillas. So he must be a werewolf that just looks stupid. Maybe he got too much Pug Blood in his werewolf mix.

This is the last issue of The Green Team so I should just skip the commentary. I'm never going to reread it since I won't have an issue #8 which means no need to remember what was happening in this issue. Oh! So that would make this a good place to talk behind my future self's back! Ha ha! That guy is such a huge failure. If only he'd made better choices in his life, he might actually be not miserable. Look at how fat he's gotten drowning his tears in package after package of Oreos! It's easy to picture what a crappy month he probably had since I'll never experience that month! The person that experiences that will be a totally other person and why should I have sympathy with that pathetic loser?! I'm just going to bask in the now of an early Friday morning, work looming a couple days in the future for that poor sap.

I'm starting to confuse myself! I'm speaking as if I know what's going to happen in another month so that when my future self reads this, the voice will sound as if it's speaking to him in the correct tense. Except I'm never going to reread this! I'm an idiot! This shit is fucking depressing. I don't even know what I'm doing. Worst writer ever. Where are my Oreos?

Let's concentrate on the comic book, shall we? It looks like the Green Team's Super Power Techno Discs have the ability to change the structure of the users DNA so that they eventually don't need the stupid suits. So J.P. is now the Beast of the team. And Cecelia is the Wolverine in that she can regenerate. Her claws will have to come from her pet cat as soon as her nanites infect it. Commodore 64 still wears his suit but that's okay because one person in a suit is fine. He's the Iron Man even though Iron Man isn't on the X-men. Although I think Tony Stark's drinking problem might be a result of a mutant gene. So he has the mutant power to drink but that sucks in battle so he had to develop a super suit to compensate.

Meanwhile, Temple Bellachek continues to look scrancy. That's scruffy and fancy at the same time.

I hope Cecilia can regrow her head because it isn't attached to her body anymore. Unless that's just her helmet. That's probably just her helmet. Although this is the last issue, so who fucking cares?

And look who just became The Human Torch!

I know! I know! That's from yet another fucking not-X-Men-team!

I suppose Mo could also be Iceman since purple electricity resembles ice just as much as it resembles fire.

Also, note how Mo finally became of romantic interest to LL here? Take that as a cue, "nice guys" that hate on women that never seem to go for the nice guy. First off, women don't owe you anything simply because of how nice you are. But second off and back on point, women want more than a "nice guy." You have to show that you can, at times, act like a grown ass man. They don't want to take care of a "nice boy." It's less apt to say women go for "bad boys" than to say they're attracted to men that show they can take care of themselves. So a man that punches another man in the face isn't attractive because he's a violent asshole. He's attractive because he's confident and makes decisions. Even if those decisions are kind of shitty and probably indicate he's a real jerk. Being a pacifist and walking away from a fight might be a noble position but it probably won't tip you over the edge on the attraction scale simply because there are too many other ways that your actions can be interpreted. Like you're a cowardly man-boy running home to mom. And you should probably listen to me because I speak from next to no experience on this subject!

The Werething isn't happy seeing it's sister smooching daisies with Mo. Unless "smooching daisies" is actually a sex act because I didn't mean to imply they were doing anything untoward in public. They were just kissing! Normal-like! On the lipsies! The Werething attacks Mo but lunges right through him because he must be composed of pure Purple.

And then as the fighting is getting supposedly intense (I can't tell for sure since I'm kind of yawning through it), Cecilia reappears! Literally! I think I can use literally there because she hasn't been seen for awhile so when I say "reappears" you'd think, "Oh, she just came back into the comic after being off-panel for so long." But I can use literally because she becomes visible after having been invisible like the X-men Sue Storm! Then there's more Daisy Smooching.

She kissed the Were right out of him.

After the fight is over is when the fighting really begins. Except it doesn't because Commodore surrenders immediately to Bellachek's goons. And even though they had orders to kill everyone, they decide not to kill everyone instead. I bet their ability to think for themselves and question orders will be seen as a sign of strength to their boss, Bellachek Temple!

Whoops.

The worst part about being fired by Bellachek Temple? He commands your replacement to kill you! What a dick.

Next Temple kills the replacement for back-talking him. If I were one of the remaining guards, I have a feeling I'd put a bullet in Temple myself at this point before the shit rolled far enough downhill to get to me. This guy is a maniac! Fuck the steady paycheck and great benefits package. Working for this guy is like working for The Joker.

The Green Team show up to defeat Temple once and for all but Temple has a surprise for them! He's been working with Daddy all along!

Why is his penis hanging out of his costume? Or is that a catheter he forgot to remove?

Green Team #7 Rating: No change. Whoops! Looks like there is still one more issue left! Now my future self is going to have to read those horrible words I left for him! Oh well, they're not that bad. I gave up before I got too mean because I'm a crappy writer and will probably just get even worse in the coming month.

The Green Team #6

Did anybody at DC truly envision this comic book reaching issue #100?

Enthusiastic DC Editor: "Hey guys! I know! Let's create a comic book about a bunch of trillionaires! Trillionaires have so much money that even Spell Check can't believe it's a real word! But you know who will buy a comic book about trillionaires? TRILLIONAIRES! It's like printing money!"
Less Enthusiastic DC Editor: "I'm not sure there are any actual trillionaires."
Enthusiastic DC Editor: "Well then billionaires will buy it!"
Less Enthusiastic DC Editor: "No billionaires are going to want to be reminded that they don't have a trillion dollars."
Enthusiastic DC Editor: "Then the poverty stricken masses will buy it up by the wagon load to escape their hum drum life to live vicariously through these characters! Remember how successful Richie Rich was?! Or Silver Spoons? Or Dif'rent Strokes?! Poor people love and idolize rich people!"
Less Enthusiastic DC Editor: "Whatever. I'm going to come up with another comic book starring The Batman."

I was hoping this comic book would give me tips on how to become a Teen Trillionaire but so far I'm still old and broke. Stupid comic book.

Last issue, The Green Team had been stranded on a meteor fighting some guy named Ass Tickle. I mean Icicle. Fuck, dude. I don't believe you should be granted super powers if you can't even come up with a creative name for yourself. Even Coldsnap would be better than Icicle. Even though Icicle has "sick" and "kill" in it, this jerk couldn't be bothered to trick up his name so it plays up to either of those things.

Icicle: "I'm Icicle! EMPHASIS ON THE KILL! Unless you pronounce it properly and then the accent is on the CULL!"

I bet Bellachek Temple has a brother named Cannon in Coral City!

The fight on the meteor continues with some not-so-innocent scientist getting killed because he decided to side with The Green Team and not The Icicle and his lover Bellachek Temple. Icicle then decides to smash the meteor into pieces, destroying the only working shuttle left on the meteor and sending everybody and everything crashing down into Earth's atmosphere.

It pretty much happens just like this. Except in Japanese.

They crash land their gigantic hunk of rock just outside of Bellachek Temple's offices in Chicago.

Oh come on, Green Team creative team! If you'd introduced this guy in the first few issues, you'd have had a hit on your hands!

I wonder if everybody in the corporate offices refers to Icicle as "I Suck Bel."

Commodore 64 chastises Bellachek Temple for using his power and money to make more power and money on the backs of people that have no power and money. Bellachek points out that Commodore 64 really isn't any different except that he's young and idealistic, and youthful idealism only sees what it wants to see.

Speaking of young people, I saw a Tumblr post awhile back about some youngster saying that the young person's mother was born in 1969 and she liked to append "69" to the end of her user names online. And the youth believed it was the kid's job to point out to the mom that she can't be doing that. Kid, believe me, she knew what she was doing. She was probably fucking proud that her year of birth was a fantastic sex act. Because "old" people aren't as ignorant as you might like to think. When teenagers lie to their parents and fool them, they sometimes think they're able to fool all adults. No, no. You know why your parents believe you actually fell asleep on the couch at your date's house as opposed to all the dick sucking and vagina licking that was going on? Because parents are in denial and they'd rather believe the lie than to imagine their kid having sex. You tell that same story to your uncle and he's just going to wink and smile. Seriously, what would you rather imagine if your parents went out on a date and immediately headed into the bedroom when they got home? "Boy, they must sure be tuckered out!" Or are you going to picture the fuckfest that is happening up there? Yeah, denial is better, right?

Of course, on the other side of things and just as annoying, are when young people are portrayed as ignorant of anything that happened before the nineties. Like that Jack in the Box commercial where the ditzy social media employee thinks watches were invented back in the olden days of the eighties. Age really has nothing to do with knowledge. Obviously the longer you've been around, the more you've probably accumulated. But the accumulation of knowledge takes effort or, at least, intense curiosity. But you can imagine how tiresome it is to meet someone over forty that hasn't bothered to retain anything and how intensely interesting a younger person can appear when they've been paying attention to more than just their immediate social group's activities. When you're sixteen, it's hard to think of your parent as a sixteen year old. But you just need to remember that a person is always, at all times, every age they've ever been. Older folks don't just relate to sixteen year olds. They actively remember themselves at sixteen; they still feel themselves at sixteen and what it was like and the person they were. They're still that person mixed with the twenty five year old and the thirty six year old and the eight year old. You don't just lose the feelings of your first crush long after your third divorce. That feeling can still be as intense as ever.

And I fucking don't know why Commodore 64's speech to Bellachek Temple set me off on that diversion. I suppose I needed something more to talk about than the Green Team fighting Icicle in space and crash landing in Chicago to tell the man that built their Super Hero Disks that he's an asshole.

Temple decides to have his men kill Commodore 64 but Cecilia jumps in the way and takes all the gunfire in her back. But she already regrew her arm, so I think she'll be okay regrowing all the other parts that were just shot off. Like her liver and her left lung. J.P. flips the fuck out and turns into a werewolf.

Well, I guess the disks do different things to different people!

The Green Team #6 Rating: +1 Ranking simply for the introduction of Bellachek Temple. Long after The Green Team is gone, I'm guessing this guy will find work harassing other comic book heroes.

The Green Team #5

I hope Brother Power the Geek gets to make an actual appearance before this series is relegated to the purgatory of comic books: THE QUARTER BIN!

Between this comic book sitting at the top of my stack and Call of Duty: Ghosts coming out yesterday, this blog almost ended! Seriously, why would I want to waste my time reading this mediocre crap about characters I've never heard of before and who aren't likable in the least? Well, maybe Mo might be likable. But he's not very interesting. And that's the problem! Even Scott Lobdell's shit holds my interest because it entertains me to criticize it. So I saw it at the top of my stack and couldn't bring myself to read it and then I played some Call of Duty: Ghosts and then I played more of that and then some more and a little more and I considered never doing anything else again. But then my body said, "Hey idiot. Feed me. And get some sleep." So I did that and now I'm writing this and I'm realizing how precarious everything in our society is! Especially life and love! And chocolate bars! And YMCA centers! It's all so fragile and ephemeral! And we take it all for granted every day! But we should embrace everything and live each day as if...oh, shut the fuck up, you platitudinous bitch! You know the hardest people to be around? People who have just recently almost died. Oh, NOW you love life? Get the fuck out of here!

Speaking of things that are circling the drain, let's read The Green Team! And let's embrace it and try to make it feel loved in its short time it has left, shall we?

Look, I'm a cynical, hard-nosed son of a whore (sorry, mom, but some people embrace truth over desire! Unlike you, you tart!). But sometimes I still laugh at trite, obvious, old jokes. I'm not going to apologize for that! Although I should apologize to my mom for that previous parenthetical reference to her sexual behaviours which I wouldn't fucking judge anyway, so shut the hell up, you offended jerks with no sense of humour! Of course, you probably think you have a sense of humour but when you're offended, you just point to the person making the joke and point out how common or broad they're being instead of allowing for the grace, intellect, and subtlety of the classic "my mom is a whore" joke. Snobs.

I think traditionally the joke is supposed to be about your mom, not mine, being a whore! Whoops! Dammit!

The Green Team is currently on a space mission to a runaway meteor. What's it running away from? The profound loneliness of deep space? Good luck getting away from that! It's nearly identical to the profound loneliness of the human condition! Unless the meteor finds another meteor to fuck its brains out on a near constant daily basis, it's in for a long motherfucking life of tears and near collisions with gassy giants. Just like my mom's life!

Some place called Bellachek Temple owns the runaway meteor. I don't know how they own it! Maybe they bought it from that website that lets you buy stars and shit. Apparently they don't want it running away, so The Green Team have been hired to unrunaway it. Also, Cecilia is still missing her right arm. I bet that when they find the meteor, it attaches itself to Cecilia's right shoulder and she becomes My Right Arm is a Meteor Girl! Unless she opts for the better name, Awkward Left-handed Handjob Girl.

Poor Cecilia. She can no longer do the Hand Jive.

The best part of The Green Team is that Mo's bodyguard Abisha keeps tagging along. Get out of here, grown up! You're ruining the good times! Unless you're going to buy the alcohol, nobody wants you hanging out in your electric blue Trans-Am trying to fuck all the underage girls!

From now on, I'm going to refer to Abisha as "Sticks" because it reminds me of a story that Grunion Guy wrote a long time ago when people were on the Myspace pages. Let me recount it for you in all of its glorious glory.

HIGH SCHOOL PARTY TIME!
By Grunion Guy

"School sucks and is really boring," pandered Sticks, the skinny kid who wasn't really popular but listened to rock and roll and smoked pot so he was cool to the people who knew what cool was (cool was drinking and smoking and wearing leather and not caring about grades, in case you're one of those clueless people who wasn't cool in high school). But some of the kids thought being cool was getting good grades or thowing a football straight or scoring with the hot girls who were cool because they were hot or just being good looking even. But Sticks wasn't one of those shallow cool people with the wavy blonde hair and clean teeth. He was cool because of the things he did and not because of the way he looked.

One of the cool things he did was drive a Camaro T-Top and park it in the school parking lot while everyone else was going to class. He would lean against its hood with his legs sort of crossed and a toothpick sticking out of his mouth. Hey, that was probably why they called him Sticks! Also he wore a leather jacket and smoked a cigarette too.

"Did I mention school was boring and for borers?" he repeated to anyone who would listen to him. Sticks was 28 and hadn't gone to school for a really long time because it was really, really boring. Also he had dropped out because his grades were so bad. But nobody cared about that.

The bell rang and all the cute young girls left their classes with their books pressed up against their bosoms and their really short skirts. Sticks combed his hair with grease which was cool for some reason and the chicks all dug it. Some of the hot chicks were passing by his Camaro now! Let's watch him be cool!

"Hey, dig this hot tune, ladies!" macho'd Sticks as he leaned into the T-Top and turned up the radio. Foreigner was playing and it was cool. It was on a tape. He owned the tape because he loved being cool and listening to Foreigner. "Hey, ladies. Did you know that the T-Top was called the T-Top because of its resemblance to a T and not because it was a way of getting around Porsche's copyrighting of the term 'Targa' on their 'Targa Top' sun roof which was pretty much the same thing but different somehow?" He rubbed his knuckles on his Tank Top (not his T-top! The Tank Top is a shirt!). The girls all giggled and ran quickly away with their skirts flipping up and down because they were embarrassed at his raw sexinessality and they were young and innocent and not ready to pop some cherries and grapes in the back seat of his hot ride.

"Catch you on the other side later, hot mamas," drawled Sticks in his cool guy accent.

"Hey! It's Sticks!" yelled the young kids he hung out with who were on the way to being cool like he was. But one of them was fat and couldn't be cool until he was skinny or did some harder drugs. And one of them was still concerned about the C he was pulling in English because he messed up on his book report about Huck Twain. And the other kid was almost cool but still liked playing Football on the sports team. And none of them could really be cool until they learned that the most important part of being cool was to not care about anything. Also, smoking cigarettes too.

"What are we gonna do today, Sticks?" lisped Petey the other kid I forgot to mention who was cool because he knew how to dress and sometimes wore eye make-up on his eyelids.

"We're gonna PAR-TAY!" yelled Sticks while throwing his fist in the air and yelling! Par-tay was the cool way of saying party and not Pig Latin for Tpar like you might have thought.

"All right!" all the nearly cool kids yelled as they piled into the T-Top Camaro and peeled one out of the parking lot. Pretty soon they were at the cabin by the lake and partying like nobody's business. It certainly wasn't the Sheriff's business but there he was anyway to break up the good time!

"What's all this?!" screamed the Sheriff as he shot his gun into the air. "Keep it down, you ruffians!"

"We'll keep it down when we're done partaying, old man!" muttered Sticks as he turned down the radio and waited for the Sheriff to turn around. The Sheriff narrowed his eyes and put a toothpick in his mouth also and then he turned around. When he did, Sticks threw an empty beer can at his head! But he missed since he never played the High School Baseball. The Sheriff turned around really quickly and narrowed his eyes even more.

"I'm watching you, Bosley Michaels!" he warned. He knew Sticks's real name because he used to date Sticks's mother in High School and the secret surprise is that he is really Sticks's father!

"Watch this!" shouted Sticks and raised up his middle finger high over his head. But this was after the Sheriff was gone so that he wouldn't be arrested. Then the fat kid turned up the radio and they drank more beer and partayed until school started again on Monday. Sticks probably did it with a couple of high school chicks too after they did some skinny dipping.

THE END!

Sticks is going to score.

After some drama, The Green Team lands on the meteor to start exploring. Commodore 64 wanted to check out the meteor because his father had connections with the Temple that owns the meteor. So I guess they're on this mission on their own as Kid Space Detectives and not as Independent Contractors working for Bellachek Temple. Anyway, I guess they're going to fight some aliens now!

Or super villains!

Also, I guess Bellachek Temple is a person and not a Jewish organization.

The super villain's name is Icicle and he immediately wants to show The Green Team some party tricks. It's an odd place and an odd time but I guess first impressions are pretty important, so if he wants to show off, who am I to rain on his frozen parade?

My biggest question regarding this whole meteor strip-mining ramming it into Earth with an Icicle super villain steering it is this: why is Icicle wearing pants?

Icicle. What a dumb name! At least 90s Image it up and call yourself ICIKILL! Ice Sickle would have worked as well but then he'd probably have to star in Katana and that would actually be worse than appearing in this book.

Commodore 64 suits up in his Green Power Ranger gear to battle Isickill while the others save the world from impending meteor doom! Hopefully none of them get Space Madness! I also hope Aerosmith doesn't write a smarmy song about this!

Things begin to go tits up which means things are going bad which is weird because it sounds like things are just starting to get awesome. But Icy Dead People begins freezing the fuck out of everything by creating ice out of non-existent water vapor or something. I don't know how it works! There doesn't have to be a scientific explanation for everything, does there?! I wonder how many people snort in derision when they read something like this and then wander off to pray to God? But I guess praying to God and snorting in derision is easier than actually learning shit.

"I don't want to close my eyes! I don't want to ever...." Oh no! Put away your fucking guitars, Aerosmith! Stop it! We're not going there! Shut it down, Stephen!

And then Icitickle destroys The Green Team's ride home! Oh well. Living on a meteor probably isn't so bad. I think next issue might be the last issue of this comic.

The Green Team #5 Rating: +2 Ranks. This comic might actually have had a chance from this point onward. Initial storylines can really fucking suck and drag on and hurt a fucking comic book. But now they're a team and they can go on fun missions where they have fun like swimming in a zero-G swimming pool and cuckolding each other in zero-G and fighting bad guys in zero-G! Everything is so much more exciting in zero-G! I don't even know if I'm writing that correctly! Is there a hyphen? Is Zero capitalized? Is the "g" not capitalized? I might know if I were actually intelligent and didn't simply rely on Lord Google for all of my knowledge, wisdom, and personality. Also my jokes.

The Green Team #4

Big deal. It'll grow right back. And if it doesn't, she's rich enough to buy a new one.

Speaking of Ernest Hemingway, I've got a degree in literature and I've never read a single one of his books. I'm only interested in reading one of his books because I've never read one of his books. I was assigned A Farewell to Arms in one of my college classes but since the final essay was only going to require discussion of two out of three books, I skipped reading it because I'm an efficient motherfucker. I also missed reading a lot of standard books assigned in Junior High or High School because I was always in the Advanced Classes or the Classes Where All We Did Was Study Various Versions of Romeo and Juliet. I will hate you until the day I die, Mr. Souza! So while I was reading Samson Agonistes, everybody else was enjoying Where the Red Fern Grows and Animal Farm.

Okay, that's enough banter. I have a lot of comic books to get through before I can read Forever Evil! So hold on tight, bitches! I'm turning these commentaries up to whatever the metric of eleven is! Probably ten!

Don't worry if that didn't make any fucking sense. We don't have time to stop every few sentences and think, "Hunh? What the fuck?" Just go with it! Sheesh!

Last issue, J.P. and Commodore 64 unmasked Riot and were super shocked to discover he was...well, I don't know who the fuck he was because the comic book decided to go all anti-dramatic irony on me. What did I decide that was? Undramatic Irony? You know, where the characters learn something on-panel but the reader isn't privy to the revelation? I suppose I could call it bullshit as well but there are children reading this.

A lot of shit has happened between issues. On page two, they're already confronting Big Daddy Riot.

I'm going to be in Las Vegas in October and I'm going to try running around the casinos in this kind of get-up! Minus the gun! Although I have a feeling with or without the gun, I'd be in for a shitty evening.

Before a nice, leisurely conversation can begin, Cecilia flips the fuck out and begins throwing Blackjack tables. I can't say I'm surprised that talking didn't happen before violence. But I am surprised that Cecilia gets her arm ripped out right at the top of page four. Just like the cover! And over so quickly! That's impressive since most covers usually spoil the big surprise moment that comes at the end of the issue.

Pick your caption: "Like the way you were born was any better?" or "Mo's obviously not the brains of this team."

Mob Rule Riot simply wants Commodore 64's suit since he believes it should have been sold to him. Although I don't know why he'd want a stupid mecha-suit when he has his multiplying powers. Unless the suit can multiply as well! That might be the case since Riot's clones don't all pop out of him naked.

Commodore 64 is captured and dragged away while Riot's clones continue to battle Mo and J.P. and Cecilia and Abisha. That gives time for Big Daddy Riot to reveal his secret identity!

Surprise! He actually is Big Daddy!

The revelation that Riot is Commodore 64's daddy isn't as exciting as it would be if I knew more about these characters. But it is exciting since I believe that Daddy Issues make the world go around!

Even though it was established last issue that the suits would only work for the person who first uses them, J.P. is able to use Cecilia's disc (which was originally his!) to become the Gold Green Team Power Ranger. It might be because his DNA was inside of Cecilia when she used the disc and the disc is kind of confused. Or it could just be that editorial thought it would be weird to have the big macho guy in the Pink Power Ranger Suit. Let me state, for the record, that I disagree. Anyway, J.P. fries all the clones left to battle the Green Team.

Meanwhile Commodore 64 is taken to his father's Secret Lair in Nice, France, where he can reveal his nefarious plot like a good maniacal villain!

Oh man! I don't have an heir! That means I need to discover the secret of immortality too! And how am I going to help the world grow without providing an offspring with severe Daddy Issues!

Do I need to say "needless to say" before I say J.P. and Cecilia and Mo and J.P.'s sister whateverthefuckhernamewas show up just in time to save Commodore 64's life? They were led there by pieces of Cecilia's mangled arm! But they're just the distraction to help Commodore 64 end his Daddy Issue's once and for all.

Is this the Scientific Version of "from dust to dust"? "From sperm to sperm!"

My favorite part about this moment is how the father in the podcast "Kids on Comics" is going to have to discuss this with his ten year old. I listened to their podcast on Green Team #1 and the son seemed super excited to continue reading this comic book. Now he's going to wonder why a son killed his father. Hey, Kids on Comics Dad? Might I suggest an Ancient Greek Play you might want to talk to him about? Although he may be weird around your wife after that.

Oh Mo. You're still young! You'll learn!

My main Daddy Issue? I didn't give a fuck what that drunken sot thought. So I have no ambition and am a complete failure!

Green Team #4 Rating: No change. Cecilia's arm will be okay when somebody sticks another dick in her. Disc! I meant disc! Sheesh. I can't wait until they figure out why J.P's disc worked on both Cecilia and J.P.! My bet is on the sperms!

The Green Team #3

Well Green Team! I'd like to say it was nice knowing you but fuck you rich, spoiled rotten bastards. I hope Deathstroke eats your rectums!

I cannot stand when a character in a story I'm consuming (this includes characters on reality television as well!) blames another character's actions on jealousy. It's not even Psychology 101. It's Psychology Pre-School After Nap Time Fun-Fun Activity Fun. But that caption I just wrote up there under the title? Purely based on jealousy. Who wouldn't want to be born with a silver spoon up their nose? And that's me saying that with the understanding that my personality and my strength of character would probably be diminished by about 65% (I did the maths!) due to easy living in a rich person's bubble and not totally understanding how hard the world can be. I'm willing to give up 65% of what makes me me just to have an easier life! I am such a shallow piece of shit. Ugh! That's another benefit! If I were rich, I would never even have considered that what I just considered makes me a shallow piece of shit! It's not fair!

Oh! Back to the "You're just jealous!" thing! Whenever a character says that, I instantly hate that character forever with no chance at redemption! I usually scream out something clever at the movie screen like, "Well, you're just stupid!" And then I try to get the person sitting in front of me to high five me. Unless the person in front of me is five or under, I'm usually left hanging. Screw you, adults! When someone offers up a high five, it's your job to awkwardly and embarrassingly and half-heartedly return that fucker! Unless you're at a sports game and then that shit becomes ritualistic. I bet the high five is the single biggest thing to blame for me hating sports. Also the way fans speak of their team in the first person plural. I didn't realize cracking peanuts and swigging beer was such an important part of the team dynamic! Congratulations on taking care of your part! High five?

Meanwhile in the comic book where there is less anger but more turning into robots, Celia was having issues with the cut on her arm. It seems to be infected and getting worse. Except first...DEATHSTORK! Shit. I mean...DEATHSTROKE!

All of Deathstroke's business meetings are working meetings.

I'm still pretty bitter about Deathstroke's comic book being so shitty. I'd like to know why Higgins was taken off of it to give to Rob Liefeld? Who buys a comic simply because it has Liefeld's name on it? This is how I know DC Comics doesn't know how to run a comic book company: they fucking hired Rob Liefeld. Look, assholes. Stop dreaming about the masturbation-filled halcyon days of the nineties where fans must have been fucked up continuously on ecstasy and whippits! He and his Image buddies may have become rockstars for who knows what the fuck reasons (seriously, I'm pretty sure I was the only sane person reading comic books in the 90s) but think it through a little bit. Those were the days when comic book companies began believing that the job of Writer was redundant. "Who needs a fucking writer when an artist can draw panel after panel of grim faced people from the future?" I don't know what the phrase "the tail wagging the dog" means but I think it might possibly describe the 90s comic business model. Maybe the phrase I'm actually looking for is "like a dog eating his own shit." Is that a phrase?

Wow. I'm not sure that paragraph actually went anywhere or had a coherent point but, fuck, I forgot how good it felt to blast Rob Liefeld and "90s style" comic books! I think "90s style" describes men drawn with lots of lines on their faces, women in poses only people that didn't learn to draw nude models in college would think were realistic, pouches, Rob Liefeld and 1000 characters with one eye because drawing symmetry is fucking hard, guns, grit, and Wall Street style speculation. There may have been barrels full of cash involved as well. And since all those went to Image, I can proudly say that not one dollar of mine was added to any of those fucking barrels. I know some people actually take pride in their accomplishments but I have to be proud of myself in whatever minor ways I can find since most of my memories are filled with disappointment, failure, and buckets of my own semen.

Masturbation was one thing I was good at! Don't take that away from me!

You know what amazes me more than people reading the comic books of Image in the 90s (Image has published a lot of terrific shit. So you don't have to email me defending them now!)? People reading my fucking commentaries. Y'all are weird.

Director's Cut Technical Commentary: "I've read one page of The Green Team #3 so far. And look at that TL;DR mess! Now keep your eyes open at the end of this commentary because you won't want to miss how I write one tiny paragraph to summarize the last ten pages!"

Some time in-between Issue #2 and Issue #3, Commodore 64 and Mo drove down to Miami in the Batmobile to meet with Deathstroke and see if he'd be willing to kill Riot for them. Even though these kids can pay some major money, Deathstroke seems adverse to killing Riot and would actually like to kill the rich kids instead. I'm not sure who Deathstroke is shooting at during this meeting. Probably like I said earlier: he just takes his business meetings during work hours.

Back in New York, J.P. and Cecilia have been besieged by Paparazzi. They're trapped in the hotel because Cecilia can't be seen in public with her new pink robot arm. Although it seems to me that people will see it and just think she's setting trends. Nobody would think it's a real cyborg arm! They'd just buy it as some new fashion trend and then all the teeny boppers will suddenly be roaming the malls with robot arms. And then Cliff Steele will be trying to get an interview on Old Fogey Radio to claim that he was wearing robot arms way back before it was cool! But before they can make any decisions on what to do, J.P. notices Riot watching them from a roof across the street.

I was so worried about Bubbles!

Apparently everybody knows where J.P. and Cecilia are hiding out because Cecilia sent the concierge to pick up Bubbles across town. Totally worth it.

Back in Miami, Commodore 64 speaks to Deathstroke as if Commodore 64 doesn't give a shit about what the weather will be like tomorrow. Luckily Mo's bodyguard, Abisha, seems to have a relationship with Deathstroke (not that kind! (well, maybe that kind! I shouldn't jump to conclusions!)) so Deathstroke is willing to keep from killing these kids and possibly take the job to kill Riot. Maybe. Possibly. Depending on how much money he can earn.

In the few pages he's appeared, Deathstroke has really redeemed himself! I'm beginning to respect the character again!

Mo and Commodore tag along with Deathstroke as he chases down Manfredi, the man he's been paid to capture.

This is the best issue of Deathstroke yet!

I should mention now that we're way past the error I'm going to discuss about Mo wearing one of Robin's old capes from out of the Batmobile. But while Deathstroke was asking about it, the colorist was smoking some really awesome hashish and just decided to make the cape suit colored. So between the messed up color and the sudden location change to Miami and Deathstroke shooting at who the fuck knew?, I was a little bit confused. And because I'm an established Writer (with a Big "W"! The biggest!), I can punctuate shit however the fuck I please.

Hmm, maybe after typing that last sentence, I should send a written apology to Howard Mackie. No, no. He was a shitty writer with a little, teeny, tiny "w". He did make a lot of money though! So if money is the proof of a great writer, he fucking wins that round!

Then I turn the page and see that fucking advert for the Annuals again. I really wish DC would just give me the fifth Wednesday of the month off!

And then the meeting ends successfully on a number of accounts!

That bugs the shit out of me when the comic book lies unevenly on the scanner! Look at that tilt! Look at it! Despise it! UGH!

Oh, and I seem to have forgotten to mention that Cecilia and J.P. escape when the entire hotel is airlifted away by Commodore's helicopters. And since the entire thing involved an actress at the center of it, everybody just shrugs it off as a publicity stunt. Hopefully, since Commodore had purchased the hotel earlier in the day, the Green Team didn't just kidnap a bunch of tourists.

The next day, everybody meets up in Monaco to battle Riot! That's because Riot's boss (who is probably the main Riot) lives there! I don't know how they figured it out. Maybe Deathstroke did the research. But when Riot attacks and J.P. tries to use Commodore's disc, he finds out that the discs attune themselves to the first person who uses them. So Commodore will always be Green. And Cecilia must always use J.P.'s disc now which is Gold. I bet that means J.P. will be the Pink Green Team Ranger #3! Mo winds up being the Powder Blue Green Team Ranger That Might Actually Be A Slightly Tinted White.

But Deathstroke arrives and does all the work capturing the various Riots anyway. Which is good because he's the only one getting paid.

Riot arrived in Harley Quinn's vagina?

Deathstroke is the one that traced the head Riot to Monaco but after capturing one for The Green Team to question, he takes his money and leaves. So Commodore unmasks Riot. He and J.P. are shocked to recognize the person under the mask as somebody they believed was dead. The reader never gets to see Riot's face though. And I don't remember them talking about a dead friend in one of the earlier issues but that doesn't mean they didn't. That just means I can't remember anything. Maybe it's Damian Wayne!

The Green Team #3 Rating: +1 Ranking. This was a terrific issue of Deathstroke. I wish the character I just read had been the one that starred in his own series! Then it might actually been entertaining and made some kind of sense.

The Green Team #2

The images in the camera lenses shouldn't be of her face. I'm pretty sure we all know what the Pappies would be focusing on in this shot.

Cecelia didn't have a pink robot arm last issue! She must be Pink Green Team Ranger #2! Why are they going to make the girl the Pink Ranger? They should make Mo the Pink Ranger so the comic book can be full of insensitive gay jokes! I don't see why the woman always gets to wear the pink suit.

To punch up my work uniform (which is not really a uniform. Just jeans and a shirt with the logo on it), I put pink shoelaces in my boots. One of the clerks at a store whose floor I clean asked, "Did your daughter get you those?" Really, kid? I keep thinking generations after mine are going to drop all the gender roles shit and I keep being disappointed. I also have a pink Nano and a pink Superman symbol keychain. When my hair was long, I had the bottom layer in the back dyed pink. I have issues with the color pink having been co-opted by the Breast Cancer Awareness Campaign although it is nice to be able to buy nearly any item ever invented in pink now.

This is my hair about seven years ago.

Anyway, when we last saw The Green Team, they weren't much of a team yet but that didn't stop Riot Act from attacking them. But then Riot Act is a bit more sensible than The Secret Society of Super Villains and their main goal isn't to just taunt super hero groups. Riot Act wants to torment rich kids! And probably kidnap them for a large ransom so that Riot Act's kids can be rich too. Commodore 64, the leader of The Green Team, stuck a disc on his chest and he became an armored Super Hero like Iron Man! But he was green instead of red and gold. Commodore 64 had a bunch of other discs in his pocket as well, so those will probably got to J.P. and Cecilia and Mo and maybe L.L. And possibly Bubbles.

Last issue was narrated by Mo. This time, we get Cecilia's viewpoint on the action.

Currently her viewpoint sucks.

It looks like Riot Act is a bit derivative of Mob Rule in power and name. They should form a Super Villain Team and call it Crowd Control. They could get Multiplex to join them! And maybe an evil, time traveling Duplicate Damsel! That team would be a confusing mess.

To save Cecilia, J.P. slaps Disc #2 on her hand and she transforms into Gold Green Team Ranger #2! I could say I was wrong about her getting the Pink Armor but I have a feeling that #2 was meant for J.P. and he simply slapped his disc on her because it was the only way he could think to save her life. She's actually slightly cut by the knife but the disc seems to have self-repairing Nanobot technology which instantly heals the cut. She has no idea how to control the suit so she ends up firing the feet rockets and shooting up through the skylight with J.P. and one of Riot Act's rioters hanging from her. Commodore 64's rockets fail but he's still got an escape plan ready to go!

Can this be considered a crossover? Or just grand theft auto?

Cecilia finally manages to work the weapons on her suit (after dropping J.P. Whoops!) and electrocutes the Riot Actors hanging from her. And apparently when one Riot Actonian is electrocuted, they're all electrocuted! Even their leader and/or original vacationing in Monaco.

Commodore 64 and J.P. have a bit of a text conversation now that all the Riot Actors have been ditched or turned into goo. I'm amazed that I understood everything they texted back and forth except for "hxc". Commodore tells them to lay low for a bit and they'll meet up later once they figure out what to do next. Here's my translated transcript of the phone conversation:

Commodore: "What's carrot? Walrus?"
J.P.: "Out by heads up display, Rhinovirus."
Commodore: "You okay?"
J.P.: "Got rid of psychedelics...hard time crashing."
Commodore: "Grate!!!! United States Two."
J.P.: "Why?"
J.P.: "WALRUS? We damaged heating and air conditioning - Did your walrus think mine understood Swahili?"
Commodore: "No. Hide. Find a hotel."
J.P.: "How long?"
Commodore: "Call you when we get two guns."
J.P.: "Cool."
J.P.: "Big time walrus. Carbon copy want to kill walrus. How to get Armor Off?"
Commodore: "Ring for good reasons. REALLY HARD."
J.P.: "THX!"

While J.P. and Cecilia go walrus hunting for some reason, Commodore and Mo and L.L. and Abisha take refuge in one of Mo's New York apartments with all of his items he purchased on eBay. Or meBay since this is a comic book and you can't seem to mention actual real companies or products in a comic book.

Mo owns Brother Power the Geek?

At the apartment, Commodore 64 gives his big speech about how he wants to use his money to change the world for the better instead of using his money to change the world by exploiting the masses and hoarding wealth. He wants to get weapons off the street and he's ready to form a super team to do so. But he's not sure his friends are willing to risk everything like he is. Abisha knows somebody who might be able to help out though. I don't know who it is because the scene ends so that we can see J.P. and Cecilia make out. I don't know how she can think about sex when who the fuck knows where Bubbles is. Doesn't she care? Oh, I guess when you see your pet as an accessory and not a friend, you can misplace it for days and not really worry too much.

I guess having Nanobots restructure your arm might make you forget about your poor little Ocelot also. Although she didn't have this excuse earlier!

The Green Team #2 Rating: +1 Ranking. I hope Brother Power the Geek gets some life zapped into him so he can hang around with the Green Team and tell them how awful they all are. Or he can join the team because it seems like Mo and the Commodore aren't just spoiled rich kids. Maybe he can be their hippie moral compass, cooking lentils and calling everything a drag.