Green Arrow #10

I've never before noticed that leg Green Arrow has coming out of his armpit.

Today was a disaster because my comic book store did not get new comics in and also they were closed. This is because I live in Portland, Oregon. You may have heard that we are experiencing the end of the world right now due to a foot of snow falling in one day. No other city in any other nation has ever had it as bad as we had it here the last two days. From now on, whenever I hear anybody mention Aleppo, I'd better hear somebody else say, "That's nothing! What about what happened in Portland?!" Then at the mention of Portland, everybody will lower their heads in respect and think of the poor hipsters who couldn't get any new records or be seen in line at ¿Por Qué No? I can only imagine these last two days was what John the Apostle saw in his vision that caused him to write Revelations. I did mention how I couldn't get my new comics today, right?

So in the DC Universe, there exists a train which runs under the Pacific Ocean linking Seattle with Shanghai. Ollie compares it to some architectural marvels like the Great Wall of China or the Pyramid of Giza. Is he insane?! Those "architectural marvels" are no better than stacking blocks! Sure, they're big blocks! And over incredibly long distances and rugged terrain (in the case of the wall! The pyramid is like just sitting there in sand and shit). But if you want to talk about architectural marvels, how about all those fucking cathedrals and mosques and wherever Jewish people worship that sometimes took six hundred years to complete. Six hundred years! I don't start a project if I think it's going to take up my entire weekend, let alone thirty generations of my offspring! I know I mock religion incessantly on this blog but I can't begrudge it its power to compel people toward great achievements. I suppose if I believed I would have eternity to play video games after I died, I wouldn't begrudge a bit of daily housework.

Under Bear Fuck Island, Ollie, Diggle, and Dinah are preparing to catch the Trans-Pacific Railway as it speeds by without stopping. It does slow down a little bit as they're expecting a container of heroin to be dropped on board.

Oh forget the stupid fucking bow, you rich fucker. It's not like it's fucking Rosebud.

Look at the above scan. Diggle is either falling on his face or he's a champion fucking long jumper (with no technique). Diggle would have been better off just running aboard so I think he actually is tripping over his semen soaked, bear beshitted boots.

Ollie is all, "The bow is all I have left!" And Dinah is all, "You have like eighty secret hideouts all over Seattle full of trick arrows and pornography! You'll live!" Diggle falls out of the container as it drops onto the train but he's able to hang on with one hand. To a train going like six hundred miles per hour. Um, probably. I bet it's because his hands are still sticky from honey. You know, the honey he ate while cuddling with the bear he fucked on Bear Fuck Island. Oliver, on the other hand (the one not holding onto the train), misses the train completely. Except he's got one chance left! He fires a grapple arrow into the side of the train and doesn't rip both arms out of socket as he hangs on to the rope going taught at, probably, six hundred miles per hour. These are some bad-ass men! What was Dinah so fucking worried about?

Oliver boards the train through the back door and now has to walk up to the shipping container to reunite with Black Canary. Diggle is probably dead. On his way, Ollie passes through a train car full of luxury vehicles. He just happens to notice one of them had their trunk forced open even though they're all backed up against the wall and he's walking in front of them. I guess he does need a good eye for shooting arrows so accurately. He jumps to the conclusion that somebody was probably stowing away in the trunk but when he investigates, he just finds a bunch of bottles of an energy drink called "Oh!"

Oh shit. This is the maiden voyage? So no heroin has yet to reach Seattle from Bear Fuck Island? Ollie truly is better than Batman! Also, do you call train journeys voyages? I guess if they're under the ocean, right?

Black Canary shrugs her shoulders and leaves Diggle and Ollie to die. If the idiots couldn't board the carrier in time, that's their stupid problem. Instead of trying to help Diggle, she decides to crawl across the top of the train until she can find a way in. I imagine it must have been heartbreaking ignoring Diggle's screams for help.

Percy puts in a bit of Black Canary Narration Boxing so the reader knows she's confident that Ollie and Diggle are okay. I mean, there's no way she can really know that. But I guess she's just an optimist. She decides to go undercover because obviously there is something super suspicious happening on this train. It was being used to transport heroin, for Christ's sake! I mean it was going to be used for that purpose!

Of course Black Canary is right not to be worried because Diggle manages to save himself.

The Pacific Ocean isn't hot at all!

Diggle winds up in a fight with the bartender who is a mercenary that recognizes Diggle by reputation. But he'll be all right, I'm sure. Dinah certainly isn't worried as she steals a dress that conveniently has a black canary pattern on the front. As if anybody else in the world has ever heard of a black canary! Um, they're not really a thing, are they?

Dinah runs into some guy named Amin Mustafa who decides it's more important to try to get laid than to have a hot woman prove her identity to security. I totally get that!

Uh-oh! I bet I know what's going to happen!

Actually, I already knew something like that was going to happen because being a Grandmaster Comic Book Reader, I made sure to contemplate and analyze the title of the story before reading the story. The title was "Murder on the Empire Express". I didn't say they're all hard to analyze.

Mustafa recognizes Dinah Lance as the lead singer of Black Canary but it doesn't seem to worry him. He does remember how every single venue Black Canary played would wind up trashed, right? And he does remember that they're a mile or two beneath the surface of the ocean, right?! This is going to be a disaster!

Meanwhile, Ollie read the ingredients on Oh! and realized that the main ingredient is conotoxin. According to Google, I mean Ollie, it's "one of the deadliest and swiftest poisons in the world." But not only that! He also says, "If blended with phenol, you've got a toxic cocktail that would shut down your organs and jelly your brain." If it's so swift and deadly, why does it need to be made swifter and deadlier? And how come Oliver knows this stuff? Did he learn it while on The Island?

Oliver makes a Boxing Glove Arrow and fans are all, "Ugh. Really? That was cool and funny and retro like the first five thousand times it's been brought back. But this five thousandth and one time is just too much." Then he finds Diggle bleeding all over the place. Diggle warns him that there's an assassin on board! And Oliver is all, "Duh! I already figured that out. Totally way before you did. You've got no game, brother." Not long after that, Mustafa drinks some non-alcoholic champagne and drops dead. She's all, "There's an assassin on board! I just figured it out when this guy was assassinated!" She's the worst of the three!

The poison works too quickly because Mustafa dies almost immediately after taking a sip and now everybody knows the champagne is poisoned and nobody else is going to drink it. I mean, maybe a few people will because they're terribly thirsty and they don't believe bad things ever happen to them. But fuck those people. They were probably going to get hit by a car on a dark, rainy night anyway thinking, "That car has to stop for me because it's the law."

To make sure even those fuckwits don't die, Black Canary uses her Canary Cry to shatter all of the champagne flutes. And probably a bunch of ear drums too. And maybe one or two brain stems.

Green Arrow arrives as the assassin tries to flee the train car. Then he explains how his plan totally worked although he doesn't explain exactly why he wanted it to work. I guess he was just paid by somebody with an interest in keeping the Middle East and North Africa from forming some kind of peace treaty. Green Arrow figures it's the perfect time to be an annoying scold.

He's a murderer for hire! Do you think he fucking cares?!

Green Arrow is all, "You're disgusting! So gross! Problematic to the nth degree!" And the assassin is all, "Oh! I'm so ashamed now! I want people to like me and my pockets bulging with blood money!" The assassin gets away because Green Arrow wants to hear the answer to his riddle, "Ever heard of an Irish Goodbye?" Instead of saying "No" while knocking the guy out, Oliver is all, "What's that?!" Then the assassin shuts down the lights and sneaks away.

Then this happens and nobody says, "Oh no! It was this other guy who completely confessed to it and even said why he killed Amin. These two were trying to stop him!", because this is a stupid comic book and poorly written and desperate for some kind of shitty cliffhanger, no matter how fucking contrived it might be. Also, I think Black Canary may have broken her back at some point during the story.

The Rating!
-1! From now on, whenever a comic book ends like this where the heroes have just stopped the bad guy but then the everyday heroes come along and decide to arrest or beat up the good guys, I am dropping the stupid fucking comic book. It's the trope I hate the most and I'm currently incensed! I'm angrier about this than people thinking Trump is smart. How stupid do you have to be to listen to Trump speak and think, "That guy sure ain't dumb!"?

Green Arrow #5

Intimate contact with another human being is overrated.

The Review!
If you like Green Arrow, this comic book is good enough for you to keep liking Green Arrow. I don't know what else to say! This isn't the place where I discuss the themes of the series intelligently so that strangers I'll never meet think I'm some kind of comic book reading genius! I mean, I am that but I'm not going to dance like a comic book reading genius monkey for no peanuts! What is the point of comic book reviews on the Internet anyway? This site is for people who have already read the comic book and just want to check to see if they read it correctly (most likely they didn't). But I can't tell you if your tastes are as refined as my tastes! What if I said this comic book was the best Green Arrow comic book and that caused you to pick it up and you were disappointed? You might think I was a huge liar when, in fact, you just didn't read the comic book correctly! See? I don't want that happening! I don't want people thinking I had an incorrect opinion. That's practically blasphemy. Oh! I wonder how I can get God status so that having differing opinions from me would literally be blasphemy?! I want that!

The Commentary!
Black Canary has been captured by the leader of The Inferno, Captain Meltyface. His main concern is making money running his criminal banking empire but he has some other hobbyhorses that he's totally into and he really wants Black Canary to be into them too. So he explains to her how cool fire is. He's all, "Don't be afraid of it! If we didn't have the sun, everything would freeze!" Oh yeah! That's a good point! But if that was his only good point about fire, I might be skeptical. Luckily he has some more pro fire facts at his disposal!

I'm sold! Fire is the best and I shouldn't be afraid of it at all. Excuse me while I go jump in one!

I have an inkling that Captain Meltyface's Ted Talk on fire is a bit one-sided so maybe I'll hold off jumping into a fire. He's just so charismatic that I'm having trouble thinking of any counter arguments against fire. Maybe later Green Arrow will debate him so I can learn why fire isn't as great as Black Canary is learning it is.

Surprisingly (if you haven't been paying any attention at all and your knowledge of literature amounts to having read The Cave of Time three different times and wound up with the same ending twice), Captain Meltyface's real name is Dante. Luckily my knowledge of literature extends past The Cave of Time to several different endings in each of the following books: Journey Under the Sea, By Balloon to the Sahara, The Mystery of Chimney Rock, The Third Planet From Altair, The Holy Bible, Deadwood, and Who Killed Harlowe Thrombey?, so I probably would have guessed that his name was Dante if somebody had put a gun to my head and said, "Guess Captain Meltyface's real name!", and then gave me a hint.

Dante has a big corporate meeting or auction to attend to so he leaves Black Canary with Shado and Emiko. He doesn't know that's a bad idea but he'll probably realize it later when he's sitting in prison trying to figure out where he went wrong. Was it telling Black Canary his plans or trusting Oliver's sister or pissing off Green Arrow? Maybe all of those things?

Green Arrow and Diggle have captured one of the people attending the meeting and, since they all wear fantastic masks, Diggle has decided to go undercover as the CEO they've captured. While Diggle figures out what's going on with The Inferno, Green Arrow will be searching for Black Canary and Emiko.

Diggle wants to blow up The Inferno's battle cruiser but Oliver wants to liberate their funds. Judging by the cover, he's going to have to make a choice between love and money. Again judging by the cover, he's going to make the wrong decision.

Green Arrow finds the vault while Diggle tries to guess the most inconspicuous seat at the big banker table. Oliver's first thought when he sees the riches hoarded by The Inferno is that he can use it to fund his little Green Arrow playtime thing. I knew he cares more about running around playing hero than helping the needy.

Green Arrow eventually finds Black Canary already loose from her bonds with Emiko's help and Shado unconscious from a Canary Cry. Emiko explains how she's been working for Ollie the entire time (well, most of the entire time) and then Black Canary slaps Oliver for not telling her that he was alive. Green Arrow is all, "What the fuck?! I'm reporting to you now?! I almost fucking died! You know whose life I think of first in times of trouble? Mine, you selfish crow!"

Oh, I see how it is. Their relationship is just a game to Black Canary. I was working on the assumption that "I need space so don't come after me" means "I need space so don't come after me."

Diggle leads the bad guys right to Oliver so they can have the big fight scene. Although the big fight scene really only consists of Black Canary pushing Dante into the face-melter and Shado tranquilizing and kidnapping her daughter. The odds are overwhelming so Oliver makes the tough decision to blow up and sink all of the money to save their lives. What a dum-dum!

Everybody makes it off of The Inferno's battleship except for Oliver because he needs to be knocked unconscious, dropped into the sea, and washed away to that stupid fucking deserted island. Again.

Green Arrow #4

Black Canary's thigh is bigger than her midsection. So sexy!

The Review!
Sometime Green Arrow needs to learn the lesson that he can't do it all by himself. Usually he needs to learn this lesson about once a year. Then he needs to drive everybody out of his life sometime after that so that he can fail by himself and learn the lesson again. This is one of those times! But he learns the lesson rather quickly this time, so that's the good news. The bad news is I don't really have any bad news. Oliver seems to be a bit more lighthearted than usual (or he just likes making fun of fat nerds) and he's made a new old friend in John Diggle. Black Canary is back in his life and he has Emiko to watch his back (when she's not stabbing him in it). Everything is smelling like posies for old Oliver Queen! Except that he's lost all of his money and everybody thinks he's dead. But, you know, he's been through that before too! What I'm saying is this is the kind of Green Arrow story you've come to expect. Not that it's boring and tired. I think it's got a great villain and just the kind of villain you'd expect the modern day Robin Hood to topple. I'm a bit in shock that I've read five issues of Green Arrow in a row now and they haven't just been not terrible but actually pretty good!

The Commentary!
Green Arrow is currently in the fight of his life against an evil bank. No, not Wells Fargo. I can see how you might make that mistake, being that Wells Fargo is run by sociopaths who seem to believe there are no other banking opportunities out there for people and so can treat their customers worse than burning dog shit suddenly appearing on their front porch. It's almost as if the employees of Wells Fargo truly believe that you love non-consensual figurative anal rape and it's for that perk alone you chose to bank with them! They think they're doing you a favor when they put a hold on your money and cause you to miss some payments, presenting you with a hefty fine as if it were an Oscar. They're the street magicians of the banking industry and they think you can't wait to see their best trick: fining you for not having enough money in your account until you have negative amounts of money in your account and owe them! Ta-da!

What I'm trying to say is Wells Fargo is ass. And I don't mean clean, tasty, fresh-out-of-the-shower ass waiting to be rimmed! I mean the worst kind of ass that I won't even try to describe because it might make you sick to have to read it, and it still won't be gross enough to capture the full assness of Wells Fargo. How are people still voluntarily giving them their money?! It's the cute little stagecoach, isn't it? I would prefer my bank's logo to be something more secure though.

They let Aquaman in their club! At least you've got arrows!

I know, humorless Aquaman lovers, I know! Aquaman is strong! Aquaman can make sharknados! Aquaman is a bad-ass! We Aquaman Detractors have heard all of your arguments many times already. We just don't care about them! If you can't understand why we find so much joy in making fun of Aquaman, perhaps you own a mirror which you can look into?

Batman is probably a better example of a useless member of the Justice League in this example. Green Arrow is basically Batman without the Bat theme. He's actually a better Batman because he cares more about social justice than Batman does. Batman is just all, "Throw some money and punches at the symptoms of the problem!" But Green Arrow is all, "Fix the actual problem and the crime will take care of itself!" Okay, maybe Green Arrow isn't totally like that. But he once was, I think. I don't know. I actually do find him more boring than Aquaman.

Green Arrow has been trapped by the Seattle police and is about to be arrested for blowing up Queen Industries. Instead of lowering his hoodie and saying, "Surprise! It's me! Playboy Oliver Queen! I was just throwing a party that got a little out of hand. Everything's fine here, officers!", Green Arrow decides to beat up the police. That'll show them that he's not a menace to Seattle!

Just before Green Arrow is shot in the back, Diggle arrives to save the day. I'm not sure why he saves the day though. I can't tell if he hates Green Arrow or loves him. Maybe both! Wonder Woman recently said during a fuck-fight with Cheetah, "Love and hate are samesies!" Greg Rucka nailed that one.

Meanwhile, Black Canary doesn't sneak on board The Inferno as sneakily as she thought she sneaked.

I hope Emi didn't hit an artery with that tranq!

Digg begins Diggling Oliver Queen about somebody he loved and how Queen did her wrong. My guess is that Oliver Queen was supposed to take care of Diggle's cat while Diggle was away on a mission and Green Arrow wound up getting sucked into space by a Zeta-Beam before he could feed the cat and she died. That's a sadder story than the story people are expecting because most people feel bad when bad shit happens to people. But the best of us only feel horrible if animals are hurt.

Anyway, Diggle wants to beat the shit out of Queen for the thing Queen did to the female Diggle loved. Queen apologizes profusely but, for some reason, won't let Diggle break a few bones. I don't think Oliver is sorry at all!

That was an easy dispute to resolve. But they never clarified what it was about! I still think it's about Digg's cat.

Oliver shows Diggle the computer he stole from his CFO, Broderick, and says loudly, "I do not know computer stuff! Der! If only some computer stuff person were in this comic book! Dur!" Diggle is all, "I'm sure we'll find one! Just don't fuck whomever we find, okay? Because that is some stupid shit that don't make know sense at all and lots and lots of idiotic fans will be all, 'Yes! Best relationship ever! Feliver Forever!' Why can't they see a badly judged plot point doesn't make a forever romance?!" Hopefully Oliver just takes a computer class and continues to fuck Black Canary.

The person Ollie gets to do computer stuff is, thankfully, Henry Fyff. I'm almost certain he won't begin fucking Fyff. Although it would be nice if Oliver Queen could have a relationship with a female he isn't related to that doesn't wind up in bed. Every woman on the Arrow television show should just be played by a talking vagina.

Fyff manages to hack the laptop so that Oliver can learn a little more about the Ninth Circle. But what he really needs to learn is that they have Black Canary! And he does learn that when the CEO of the Ninth Circle Skypes them over the laptop. CEO Meltyface offers a trade but he really just wants to kill Green Arrow. Green Arrow accepts the trade but he really only wants to completely and utterly destroy the Ninth Circle. So Green Arrow and Diggle hop in a dinghy and row out to attack the Ninth Circle's floating headquarters. Two guys against the biggest battleship to enter Seattle since The Black Curate! That was in Grifter! Also, I'm sorry for reminding you of Grifter. Oh boy, that was a terrible series!

Green Arrow #3

I predicted this is how Green Arrow would die.

The Review!
How did Benjamin Percy finally find a way to make a readable Green Arrow comic book? Especially when he seemed so intent on making the worst Green Arrow comic book? Okay, so maybe that was a bit hyperbolic. It's hard to write the worst Green Arrow comic book when Ann Nocenti wrote it for awhile. It's not like this book doesn't have some issues. But why would I concentrate on the problems when everybody is constantly concentrating on the minute, insignificant problems of everything always? Would I do that because I know people are used to me doing that?! No way! This is Rebirth! I'm way more positive now because the DC PR Machine has told me to be! Things are turning around! Things are getting better! Legacy characters and love are back! I guess. I don't know. I'm not a big picture kind of person! Maybe that's why I usually concentrate on the minute, insignificant problems that even pop up in comic books I like. Anyway, DC Comics is finally delivering a Green Arrow comic book that fits the character and is being handled adeptly and has even introduced a villainous organization that makes fucking sense. Although I'm still weary about this book because Benjamin Percy is the writer who wrote a number of Green Arrow stories during The New 52 to help remind everybody that racism was bad and that no white people can understand that until they've become a werewolf for a week or two.

The Commentary!
Recently, Green Arrow had lost all of his money and been declared dead¹. It seems like writers believe Oliver's money and standing are too much of a safety net so they find a way to remove them. Or maybe it's just too much of a hassle to have to deal with both halves of Ollie's life, although he normally just ignores the business half of his life so I don't think that's the problem. Maybe it's thematic but who has the time or intelligence to delve into themes?! I'm too busy trying to seem busy and too dumb to understand the different between theme and plot. I think it's the spelling!

Green Arrow is currently breaking into Queen Industries corporate headquarters because he knows the CFO² is somehow involved with the Moloid Slave Trade in Seattle. The best way to break into Queen Industries is to buy a ticket to ride up the Space Needle, evade all of the guards on the lookout for terrorists who would love to blow up the only recognizable landmark in Seattle, somehow get outside of the revolving restaurant to stand on top of the Space Needle, shoot an arrow with a rope to Queen Industries, and then laser through the glass! After that, it's just a matter of evading the guards until he finds whatever it is he's looking for! Or if he can't evade the guards, he can knock them out with the harshest, scariest sounding drug he could develop.

That assault rifle looks an awful lot like a flashlight!

Queen Industries has the craziest technology to keep the building safe. Probably because they need to protect stuff from the Green Arrow who keeps breaking into their offices for some reason.

Green Arrow eventually gets to the office of his CFO³ where he runs into demon-faced demons with flame throwers and untied boots⁴. I hope Green Arrow has some Exorcism Arrows or else he's in trouble! I mean, he's already in trouble and will probably be in even bigger trouble even if he has Exorcism Arrows because how many can he shoot before ten flamethrowers turn him to ashes? Maybe he'll do a back flip over the flames or something!

Meanwhile in Italy, John Diggle is diggling things up! That's his new catchphrase, probably. "I'm here to Diggle you up!" He can use it when killing somebody and when fucking somebody! I'm giving that one to Benjamin Percy for free because he seems to be having trouble finding a good voice for Diggle. I think it's because Percy's White Guilt can't allow him to presume to speak for an African-American character. At least I think Diggle is African-American. He just looks like a bald white man looking for a disco in this comic book.

Diggle is searching for The Ninth Circle to avenge the death of his Fremesis, Green Arrow. He's followed some leads to find the guy who can lead him to The Ninth Circle, a guy named Virgil. Okay, Percy. I fucking get it. You read The Inferno and you decided you would cheapen the entire thing by using it as a motif in your lousy comic book! Why does everybody love to reference the Inferno part of The Divine Comedy but nobody ever bases their criminal organizations or names their superheroes after Purgatorio or Paradiso! Maybe that's Dante's fault for making those parts so boring. Perhaps if he'd put more people head down in burning shit in the latter two parts, more people would remember them.

Before Diggle can have a proper conversation with Virgil about The Ninth Circle, the scene shifts back to Green Arrow who is already battling the demons in the foyer of the office of his CFO⁵. Since he has yet to be burned to ashes, I'm going to assume he did a back flip to get out of the elevator. Grandmaster Comic Book Reader!

Oh wait! Apparently the conversation between Diggle and Virgil takes place in the text overlying the visuals of Green Arrow battling the demons. I probably should have read a bit of the page after turning to it instead of just jumping right back into my commentary so that I could call myself a Grandmaster Comic Book Reader. Not that any of this was any kind of a mistake! Just call it youthful enthusiasm! Or immature enthusiasm since the "youthful" is long fucking gone.

Oliver should do this with Boxing Glove Arrows and then punch three guys at once!

Diggle learns from Virgil that The Ninth Circle is a bank! Of course it is! Benjamin Percy, you sly devil! I knew you had a message hidden behind the demons, masks, and lousy Inferno references! I knew you were still fighting the social justice fight! Fuck the banks! Fuck them right in their ATMs!

But seriously! This is a good idea not just on a "The Man is the biggest bad guy of all!" level. Because Percy grows this idea out of that question that all good and loyal comic book readers ask on a near constant basis: if super villains have the kinds of funds available to them to build death stars and power draining ray guns, why the fuck do they need to rob banks?! Apparently to pay back the loans they took out from The Ninth Circle to fund their technology and research! And who better to run an evil bank than the CFO⁶ of Queen Industries!

Percy sets up this scenario to make it seem like The Ninth Circle is the most powerful behind-the-scenes organization in supervillaindom. But I know of a business that probably makes even more money than they or the Court of Owls make!

Supervillain Mask Makers!

Broderick doesn't actually run The Ninth Circle. He's just a board member! That's good because Broderick would be a boring choice for leader of The Ninth Circle. The only superpower he has is knowing how to use a slide rule.

Before Green Arrow can kill Broderick, Shado arrives to rekill Green Arrow. Emiko is probably going to be in serious trouble after this battle. The battle is taken through the window and outside the office because Green Arrow blows up the office. Only he and Shado make it out before the explosion. Broderick may or may not have lived. It doesn't really matter since he wasn't the CEO⁷ of The Ninth Circle.

While reading this comic book, did you also find yourself wondering, "Where are Black Canary's gams?!" Well, they eventually show up roughing up the dock worker on Green Arrow's payroll so that she can stowaway with the Moloids' kidnapping victims. That means she'll soon be on the most ostentatious ship ever sailed into the Puget Sound! And that's pretty ostentatious because Bill Gates lives up there. I think.

I guess Broderick did survive. And if this guy's the leader of the Ninth Circle, I'm not any more impressed than if it had been Broderick. But I'm even more impressed by whoever makes their masks!

While trying to escape from Shado, Green Arrow winds up arrested by the police for bombing Queen Industries. Can't he just reveal his identity and be all, "I own that place! I can bomb it if I want to!"?

The CEO⁸ of the Ninth Circle decides to declare Shado his enemy because he's an idiot. So now Shado can just go join up with Green Arrow and help destroy the Ninth Circle. She used to be honor-bound to serve them but now she has no loyalty to them at all. Even though Emiko is still honor-bound to them, I think that just gives Shado added incentive to destroy them. Emiko, trying to keep everybody calm so she can eventually help destroy the Ninth Circle from the inside, points out that they can trap Green Arrow because they have her and Black Canary as bait. They don't have Black Canary yet! But she's on the way to their crazy big ship that nobody seems to notice. I guess because fog or something?

_____________________________________________________
¹Again!
²I don't know what that stands for! Crazy For Oral?
³I don't know what that stands for! Cozily Fondling Orphans?
⁴I guess flaming demon fingers make it hard to tie your shoes.
⁵I don't know what that stands for! Cockblocking Foreign Oligarchs?
⁶I don't know what that stands for! Cheap Fucking Organizer?
⁷I don't know what that stands for! Cookies Equal Oreos?
⁸Fine! I admit it! I actually know what this stands for! Chief Evil Officer!

New Suicide Squad #21

Deadshot fisting Harley isn't the most disturbing thing about this cover. The fact that El Diablo just finished is. HashtagHarleyHadJalapeñoPizzaWithLinguiçaLastNight

The Review!
I'm sad that Tim Seeley wasn't given the Suicide Squad in Rebirth. Rob Williams might do the Squad justice but I already know that Tim Seeley definitely can do them justice! He even convinced me that Harley Quinn can be a proper member of the team as opposed to just being a reason for people to buy the comic book! I suppose Ostrander had Punch and Jewelee on the team and it could be argued that that isn't a whole lot different than having Harley Quinn. Although Harley Quinn will never be killed and Punch and Jewelee were the definition of members who could die any issue. I'm also glad Tim Seeley finally pulled the trigger on El Diablo. I've been waiting for him to die for years! Not that his death isn't as ambiguous as every other comic book character death. He'll be back! At the very least, I'm glad to have had these months with Seeley's Squad. They finally felt like the Squad I know and love. Sean Ryan (who it looks like is doing the next issue) had some moments as well. But I think Seeley came even closer with his style and humor. Please don't fuck up the Suicide Squad for five years again, DC Comics!

The Commentary!
At the end of last issue, Deadshot was shot in the face by GunGuns. Or Gunfire. Or DeathPistol. Or was it BulletLadenEjaculate? I don't suppose it matters what his name was because he probably didn't actually have time to pull the trigger before Captain Boomerang blew his hand off with a Boomagrenade. That actually sounds pretty dangerous. Who would cross a boomerang with a grenade?! I guess a suicidal aborigine?

Oh. That's where Captain Boomerang got off to. I should have known better than to expect him to save the day. Deadshot better have worn the heavy face armor today.

Elsewhere in Fleischhaus, Cheetah and Rose Tattoo continue their battle to the death (probably El Diablo's death) while Harley Quinn and El Diablo (soon to be El Muerto) hide around the corner. El Diablo is all, "I accidentally killed a woman and her child with fire!" And Harley is all, "I'm wearing hot pants!" Neither of these interactions is explaining how Deadshot survived being shot in the face! I guess I should turn the page!

On the next page, I remember that the guy who makes guns out whatever is lying around is named Deathtrap. No wonder I couldn't remember it! It's so incredibly stupid! For some reason, he thinks he's the man who killed Deadshot even though Deadshot is lying on the ground and none of the church pews around them have been decorated with Floyd's blood or brains. Adam, the guy vying for the position of Shepherd of the Fist of Cain, stabs Deathtrap in the throat so that Deathtrap can die thinking he's killed Deadshot. That's sweet! I hope somebody does that for me the next time I'm out disc golfing and my disc disappears around the trees and I hear the chink of the chains on the basket and I believe I've gotten a hole in one! I mean, if I didn't actually get one, that is! If I really got one, I want to know for sure and not be dead afterward. But if I just thought I got one, I wouldn't mind dying immediately! Or maybe right after having celebratory sex with whoever is standing around and willing to have unsatisfying sex in nature with the possibility of stumbling into blackberry bushes.

I guess Adam can now become the Shepherd of the Fist of Cain even though none of the Suicide Squad have been killed. Oh, sure, Hunky Punk died. But he wasn't technically part of the Squad. In fact, all the people who died so far in this story were potential members of a Suicide Squad UK that I think I would have fucking loved. What a waste!

Adam prepares his Shepherd acceptance speech and it sounds like it was cribbed from Fight Club. "You never know how to live until you're about to die!" Was that the message of that movie? Or was it something about material goods making people way more happy than punching yourself in the face and being addicted to recovery meetings?

While Adam talks about killing Amanda Waller instead of just doing it (always a bad choice!), El Diablo has a stupid revelation. He believes that Rose Tattoo came for him, so he's going to challenge her while Cheetah and Harley make a run for it. Poor, stupid El Diablo. Never play the hero when you're the most disposable member of the Suicide Squad!

If Voltaic can come back from the dead with Resurrection Man Semen, Yo-Yo can come from being eaten by King Shark, and Reverse-Flash will eventually come back from traveling through time, I suppose it's only fair to leave El Diablo the possibility of coming back from Hell because he prays hard.

It turns out Deadshot was shot in the head with a flower and Deathtrap can regenerate. I think Deadshot might be the only character with "dead" or "death" in their name who doesn't have any super healing powers. Although he got some of that Resurrection Man Semen one time too! Deadshot and Deathtrap save Waller and become big heroes and probably Power Shower buddies.

Ha! Apparently Harley agrees with me! Extreme Washing, here we come! Literally!

Harley chooses the OTP name of "Trapshot" which is terrible. It would obviously be "Deaddeath".

Also, Deathtrap may not regenerate. He just may take a long time to bleed out. However he's still alive, he doesn't accept the ride home when Captain Boomerang arrives to save the day and oversee the evacuation. Instead, he decides to stay behind and turn Fleischhaus into a giant gun. I guess the remaining members of The Fist of Cain will be the bullets?

Deadshot also tries to stay behind so he can die in the arms of his new lover but Captain Boomerang rescues him against his will. That's so gross! Non-consensual life-saving. Ugh.

Back at Belle Reve, everything ends happily ever after as Floyd shits while making up love letters for Harley. That's about as good an ending as Ostrander ever came up with! Can I just pretend this is the last issue of New Suicide Squad until the Rebirth Squad? Why, yes, I can, me! Thanks!

New Suicide Squad #20

I probably wouldn't pay to go see this action thriller, German Castle Thrill Climb III.

The Review or Whatever!
Currently, the Suicide Squad...excuse me...the new Suicide Squad is trapped in a room in a German castle called the Fleischhaus as dozens of psychotic game-players are hunting them down for points. But they have nothing to fear because Amanda Waller with her new friend, The Hunky Punk, is coming to save them! Also they have nothing to fear because members of the Suicide Squad don't die anymore. Only Amanda Waller's assistants die.

If you read the book, Floyd Lawton summarizes the book in one panel the way that I just summarized the book. Sometimes that doesn't happen as clearly or concisely in DC comics which is why I like to remind myself what was going on. Otherwise, I spend five to six pages reading the comic book like my aunt watches movies. "Who is that character? Why is he hurting that person? What are they even trying to do?" Why DC doesn't just take the hit and rip-off Marvel's First Page Synopsis idea, I don't know. Who cares how many Marvel Zombies are going to thrill at pointing out how DC is once again stealing from Marvel! Think of the older fans you're hurting by not reminding us of the story we read a whole fucking month ago! Plus, you'd be helping my blood pressure because writers inevitably spend way more than one page reminding readers what was happening previously. Oh! And think about how much better the collected editions would read if the Synopsis Page were dumped and the story just kept going without these weird bits where characters remind each other what was going on in the previous few pages!

Using Harley's knowledge of psyches, Deadshot formulates a plan that makes sense. The dialogue is entertaining and the characters of Deadshot and Harley have seldom shined through as much in this book. It also gives a quite valid reason for having Harley on the team. Actually, two reasons. First, she knows how criminals think, both the demented and non-demented kind. Second, as Floyd states, she's a wild card that makes the non-demented kind of criminal uneasy. This opening scene and discussion (which leads to the first big battle of the book) is reminiscent of Ostrander's 80's version of the team. Why Rob Williams was tapped to write the new team instead of Tim Seeley, I don't know. I'm sure Rob Williams won't make it as boring as he wound up making Martian Manhunter.

Apparently you can take a character a long way with just two major points of characterization. Hmm. Maybe the mustache isn't major.

While the Squad fights to save their lives, Rose Tattoo, the spirit of murder, rises and begins stalking the Fist of Cain. The name Rose Tattoo makes me think of Justin Long. You figure out the connection yourself. I'm busy.

Amanda, Hunky Punk, and Captain Boomerang are headed in to save the Squad. Hunky Punk should be worried that he's the only one of the group with a fake Who's Who entry! Although El Diablo doesn't actually have an entry either. I mean, there's an entry for El Diablo but it isn't this guy. Which is why he's always sort of the one that might possibly be killed! Although I still think he'll be killed in the movie.

During the flight, they have a discussion about being heroes. Or the possibility of having been heroes instead of dumb jerks.

If I were a villain, I would be Captain Boomerang. I know I chose to be Captain Cold when I hosted my first gaming convention but that's mostly because I'm a lot like him as well and I didn't have to speak in an Australian accent all night.

The New Suicide Squad discover evidence of Rose Tattoo having manifested inside the castle. Deathtrap invoked her name earlier so she's probably going to kill him. That would be too bad because he and Hunky Punk really need to start a Suicide Squad United Kingdom. Once the Rose Tattoo panic sets in, everything goes to shit. That's when Waller's squad arrives! Just in time to save Harley's life! Too bad for Hunky Punk though.

He really should have considered the consequences of joining a Suicide Squad full of death-immune characters.

Waller and the group rescue the others but Adam, the guy running the show, winds up knocking Waller out and convincing Deathtrap to shoot Deadshot in the face. He'll be okay though because Waller, a few panels earlier, made sure to mention how heavy he was in all of his armor. The issue ends with Cheetah attacking Rose Tattoo while El Diablo and Harley make a run for it. Captain Boomerang is unaccounted for so he's probably about to save the day! Unless he already did save the day?

This panel might be Deathtrap shooting Deadshot in the face. It could also be a boomerang blowing up Deathtrap's gun!

New Suicide Squad #19

Get it? Fists of Cain!

The Review
Tim Seeley is making this book readable. It was always sort of readable but now it's even more readable than before! I have a feeling I'm using "readable" too much, especially since it's one of those words that doesn't really fucking say anything. I mean, legible graffiti in a truck stop restroom is readable. Maybe I should say something like, "This is the version of the Suicide Squad I've been not-so-patiently waiting for!" Sure, it still has the problem of being full of members who DC won't kill off (although the possibility of killing off Diablo remains high. Especially since he's probably going to be one of the members that dies in the movie). But it's getting better by introducing stupid characters like The Hunky Punk and Deathtrap! Characters that are so fucking ridiculous that I love them immediately and feel attached to them and don't want them to die! Also I don't have a crush on them like you're probably thinking. If I did, I would say so in the same way I called Crush Dibs on Vampire Tig, Maps, Alysiah Yeoh, and Supergirl's Bum. I'd also like to say to anybody at DC Comics who might be reading this: give Seeley a Great Britain Suicide Squad comic book! Maybe make it a Young Animals imprint (which I just learned about today and now I can't shake this boner!).

The Commentary
I enjoyed the Internet when it was truly the Wild West. That was when it actually took some effort to have a presence on the web. Now everything is done for you! Stalking people is easy thanks to Facebook. Trolling people is easy thanks to Twitter. Acting like a self-righteous twat who knows everything is easy thanks to Tumblr. Bitterly pointing out how awful comic book writers and artists are is easy thanks to Blogger. Nothing is as fulfilling as it used to be when you actually had to do some research and learn some coding. You even had to be a lot more careful about who you hassled and how you did it because your only email account was either your college email with your real name or the one attached to your parents' AOL account! And if you were banned from AOL, how the fuck were you going to Player Kill innocents in Neverwinter Nights?!

After thousands of these commentaries, maybe it's time I should be honest about some of the stuff I write. I can't say I have ever been a trollish dick on the Internet. I suppose sometimes I'd go into random chat rooms on my Aunt's AOL account while drunk and act like a smart ass. I like to think it was performance art! Oh, and I suppose my cousins and I would sometimes get on the CB radios my uncle got us and troll random truckers. Although I'm sure everybody talking on CBs in Santa Clara, California in the late seventies were all other kids pretending to be truckers too.

You know what? I don't like the whole honesty angle. I think it's better if nobody knows whether something I've said is true or false. That way, I can always deny the truth of anything really embarrassing I reveal. Like that time I admitted to masturbating in the bathroom sink. That was so obviously a joke and not something I do on a nearly regular basis.

See? That was a joke again! Probably!

When we last left the Suicide Squad, they were fighting for their lives in a murder game devised by The Fist of Cain in a German castle called the Fleischhaus. Luckily the title of this issue is a translation of that word, "The House of Meat." Because nobody would have figured that out at all ever. Although I knew it easily because I tend to make up stupid German words like Ziegentasche or Steinschlampe or Totenmeerschweinchen.

Since the Squad is essentially trapped in a building full of murderers, you might be thinking, "Yes! Finally one of them will die!" Also you may have looked at the cover where it seems like maybe Diablo is dead (I would bet my mother's life that he isn't). But hold your ponies, ladies! Another group of super-powered misfits who admire the Squad have also been locked in the castle! So I have a strange feeling that they'll be taking the brunt of the dying.

First nobody down!

Deadshot, crawling around in the air ducts, is lucky he knows German because he comes to a grate that says "FRISCHE LUFT" over it. Fucking hell, Seeley! I was really into this story about a murder cult tricking a government murder squad and a team of murder squad groupies into a long standing German castle called the Fleischhaus and then you had to go and pull me out of it by trying to convince me that a grate leading to outside the castle would be labeled on the inside with the phrase "FRISCHE LUFT"?! I'm seriously thinking about forgetting all of the good shit you've written for DC Comics because of this one mistake on your part! Of course, maybe this wasn't your fault at all. Maybe in your script, you just wanted Deadshot to say "frische Luft" when he felt fresh air blowing in from a grate to the outside and then Juan Ferreyra took it upon himself (or, more likely, was told by an editor!) to write the words on the grate! That seems more likely, especially the part about the editor being the one who thought the comic book needed more explanation. Why can't editors leave well enough alone? Except for those times when they should be getting more involved, like when they're reading Scott Lobdell scripts! I suppose I'm just never really happy, as evidenced by taking up a paragraph to rant about a grate with FRISCHE LUFT carved into it.

The duct that Deadshot is in collapses just as he's about to escape the castle (which, according to Adam the Gamemaster, would just wind up with Deadshot's head being blown off) and falls into a shower where Kilgore, another nobody groupie, is being hacked to pieces by the Fist of Cain. Of course they all decide to fight over Deadshot when he appears because he's practically a seven letter word on a triple word score.

Actually Deadshot's only worth fifteen points. I apologize to all of the Scrabble players about my hyperbole, especially since there's no possible way to create a seven letter word on a triple word score for a measly fifteen points. The bonus alone would shoot you right past fifteen!

Meanwhile Amanda Waller is trying to figure out how to save her Squad. But first she has to humiliate the man who came to visit her for some reason that I can't quite remember. His name is Dorian Ashemore and he's got a fake Who's Who entry!

I know it's fake because it's silly. Also I have my Who's Who right here beside me and there is no entry between Human Target and Hunter's Hellcats.

The Hunky Punk might have the best origin story in the history of the DC Youniverse. Too bad he's not real! I mean, I guess he is real now! Real in a comic book way, of course! I'm not insane! I wonder if I should tear out this page and stick it in my Who's Who?

The whole Hunky Punk plotline just seems to have come out of left field. It's like Seeley decided to write an Elseworlds story in the middle of his Suicide Squad book. That isn't a criticism. I think the Hunky Punk story should be Plot A and the Fist of Cain story should be Plot B! Luckily for me, Amanda wants to lure Hunky Punk to her team of villains. Unluckily for me, he probably won't survive Rebirth.

Back inside Fleischhaus, Deadshot is saved by Deathtrap! Deathtrap is the groupie's real name and not the name I made up for him, in case anybody was confused by the name's stupidity. Remember, he's a parody of the 90s!

Fucking DC! You finally got the right writer on the job to create a Suicide Squad full of nobodies I'm interested in learning about and you're going to Rebirth him! Deathtrap and Hunky Punk are perfect for the Squad! Ridiculous characters that I already like enough to hope that they might survive the next mission while knowing that there's a large chance they won't!

Deathtrap reminds me of Gunfire from Bloodlines. But in that way where you remember something stupid simply because somebody made a version that was better because it didn't take itself seriously and also just because it was better. I wonder if Len Wein has a script for a Gunfire movie gathering dust shoved behind some shoe boxes on the upper shelf of his closet?

Deadshot uses his new Bathroom Tile Gun which--I'm just guessing here--must fire grout bullets as he and Deathtrap make their escape.

Getting back to Tim Seeley's vision of this book, could this be one of those internal pilots? Is Tim Seeley pitching another Suicide Squad which works out of Great Britain? I would read that book with all new villains who, instead of saying "should have," say "should have done"? It already sounds hilariously exciting!

Deadshot and Deathtrap manage to locate Diablo, Cheetah, and Harley Quinn. Now they can make their last stand together! And Deathtrap can make guns for all of them out of whatever's handy! I wonder if he can make guns out of dead bodies? Probably! Why would Tim Seeley limit his power?!

Back at Belle Reve, Amanda puts on some body armor because she's always way too eager to go on missions herself these days. I know back in Ostrander's day she once picked up a huge fucking gun and went toe to toe with Granny Goodness (unless I'm remembering it wrong and then never mind), but that was because she didn't have a choice. Amanda is currently in Belle Reve with lots of bad guys to choose from and she chooses to go on a mission with Captain Boomerang and The Hunky Punk! Although I could be wrong and the body armor is just because she's leading the mission and she won't actually be putting herself in any danger. Although what are the chances of that? She was once a member of Team 7!

Gotham by Midnight #12

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Drake has become maudlin.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Gotham by Midnight #11

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

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

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

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

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

Well hello there, Mister Angry Native American Toad Guy!

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

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

I just pointed this out!

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

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

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

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

Whoops!

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

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

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

Gotham by Midnight #10

I've seen this porno.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Gotham By Midnight #9

Good night!

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Because God works in mysterious ways. Duh!

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

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

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

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

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

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

Whoops! I guess Jim Corrigan is God?

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

Gotham By Midnight #8

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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