Lex Luthor: The Unauthorized Biography (July 1989)

The world was a better place when people accepted this person could be Superman's most dangerous enemy.

Once upon a time, Lex Luthor was fat and bald and had lost a hand to Krypto-cancer. He was the epitome of the greedy CEO who was shtupping his secretary, Scrooging his employees, and kicking every dog he could find. Being the worst person in the world wasn't about being athletic or having special powers or being charming or good-looking. Once upon a time, we knew who was the real enemy to truth, justice, and the American Way. Somewhere along the way, people forgot this piece of shit was the antithesis of everything good and they decided to elect him president.

I'm not talking about that time Lex Luthor was elected president of the United States of America in the DC Universe! I'm talking about Trump! But I don't want to talk about him anymore. This isn't going to be a review about that bloated, idiotic turd of a human being who's currently murdering fishermen off the coasts of Venezuela because he's the most unloved person who ever lived but the one who needs love and approval the most (which he gets from sociopaths). It's just that the use of gold for the cover font and the profile picture of an arrogant piece of shit made me think of that old fuck's dumb book from so many decades ago. But that's it! We're done with that now! No more mention of that piece of shit because we're here to have fun!

If I start a conversation with you by saying "Mister" and it's followed by anything other than "Big Dick", it means I don't want to fuck you.

Contrariwise, if I begin a conversation with you by saying, "Miss" or "Missus", it means I'm already about to jizz in my pants.

The police tape (a VHS tape because this was written in 1989, like eight generations and a billion mass shootings ago) contains a police interview with suspected murderer Clark Kent. Sure, we as readers know Clark Kent didn't actually kill anybody. But we as readers also know cops are terrible at their jobs and mostly solve cases using racism, gut instinct, and Magic 8 Balls. You'd think cops would do real investigative work when trying to solve murders because they love overtime pay so much. But they really only love overtime pay when it comes with doing basically nothing. Which is how they solve murders so, um, win-win, I guess? For cops, I mean! It's always lose-lose-lose-lose-die-lose-die-die-lose-lose-lose for the public when dealing with cops. The only way to win with a cop is not to play (I mean don't call their dumb shooting dogs loving asses. They're just going to make any situation worse. If I were being hunted by a Predator, I'd call Domino's delivery before I called a cop. And I hate Domino's pizza!).

"Your Honor, look how quiet this guy is! I rest my case!"

That bit depicted in the previous panels wasn't on the tape that Luthor received! That bit was behind the one-way mirror which the reader gets to be privy to because we're not watching the tape with Luthor; we've gone back to the original moment the tape was made. It's pretty complex story telling; you probably wouldn't understand it. Especially when the cops show Clark Kent a photograph of the guy he's supposed to have murdered and the perspective enters the picture and now we're even further back in time from the opening to when Peter wakes up after sleeping in a prophetic way (the way he'll wind up dying). This is more complicated than Memento, probably. I mean from what I've heard. I saw that in the theaters but it was like, um, hey? I think you got your reels mixed up?

Ha ha! I just lied again! This is from my Nice Alice and Death Rock Memento review from when I used to do movie reviews way back in the '00s when we actually still owned the No Apologies Press URL (thanks for existing, Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, so I could easily find this!):

"Well, I liked how he was basically a blank slate, personality-wise. He was an Everyman. He represented the way we all live our lives: in a desperate search for truth, for something solid to believe in. His life is a list of facts and categorizations. If he writes something down, it becomes the truth. We live our lives with contradictions and shifting perceptions. Black and white rarely exist for us. We have memories that we sometimes doubt. He has a line written on a photograph. Objective proof of the way his life is. At the end of the movie, his truth starts to waver, starts to become uncertain and ungrounded. The center of his life is falling apart. The center that is the fact that his wife was murdered and he is looking to avenge her death. And the end of the movie is actually the beginning of the timeline. So we see him at a weak moment, his facts betraying him, his memories unsure. At the beginning of the movie, he was completely sure of his reality. Everything was neatly stated, filed, categorized on his skin and photographs. But this certainty in his truth only comes, as we observe during the movie, by his own manipulation of facts and his own exploitation of his faulty memory. He plants so-called truths on his photographs and skin that will drive him toward a fulfilling reality: the killing of the man who killed his wife. And as we see, it doesn't really matter who that man is because Leonard has conditioned himself the way they try to condition Sammy to remember which blocks to pick up by electrocuting certain ones. Leonard is conditioned to hunt for his wife's murderer. That's all he knows how to do. He's an automaton at this point. And even when he's presented with proof that he has killed someone before that he thought was his wife's murderer (the picture of him pointing at the space on his chest where he'll tattoo the fact his job is done), he burns it and proceeds to set up Teddy as the guy he's looking for. The final proof that he's not really looking for the murderer is at the end, when he closes his eyes to see if the world goes away. He pictures himself in bed with his wife with the blank space on his chest tattooed with 'I have done it.' He doesn't want revenge. He wants his wife back. That's when he'll finally get the tattoo on his chest that lets him know his quest is over."

The guy in the photo's name is Peter Sands. He's a has-been reporter down on his luck. No job. No money. Divorced wife to whom he owes alimony. Oh, he's also a massive drunk. Exactly the sort of person Clark Kent would murder.

Desperate, Peter calls up every publisher he's ever worked with looking for an advance on any story he can make up in the moment. But nobody wants him because of that massive drunk thing I mentioned. Coincidentally, while getting turned down by every publisher he calls, one publisher who hasn't heard how drunk Peter constantly is, calls him fishing for an interesting book. On the spot, Peter decides he's going to do an unauthorized biography of Lex Luthor, not realizing it's going to get him murdered by Clark Kent later.

Please! I put a moratorium on mentioning that doddering racist, lady!

I don't know why Trump was ever famous but, as you can see, even in 1989, people knew he was the real world equivalent to Lex Luthor. I mean in the greedy and being a dick and a criminal department and not in the super genius inventor department. Definitely in the hating people who are actual heroes department because he's the most delusional narcissist in the world department and thinks all the accolades should go to him department.

Am I using "department" too much?

Back to the terrible police investigation by the usual terrible police who don't know how to do investigations, they've got some really damning evidence based on their bias and some wild speculation based on various works of fiction they've seen (not read. Cops don't read).

Oh come on! He could have written that for plenty of other reasons! Like the guy who shot him asked as Sands was dying, "Which reporter at The Daily Planet would Lois Lane never fuck?"

Back to the past, Peter Sands begins researching Lex Luthor starting with Lex's autobiography, Simply Brilliant. It's probably a good place to start if you read it carefully because no way Lex Luthor can't help bragging about any murders he did if you read between the lines and gather the subtext of things he's saying. Or he simply wrote stuff like, "I murdered X. Of course, I mean that in the metaphorical sense. Of course, I mean THAT in the metaphorical sense. Because I really did murder him. Literally double metaphorically, if you see what I'm saying. Look, I killed him and nobody can arrest me because I used to fuck young girls with them on this rich pedophile's island."

You're at an AC/DC concert?

Meanwhile, back in the present, the cops whine at Clark that he's being rude and making their jobs so fucking difficult.

"Look, you either confess now or you confess after we've held you in this room for 72 hours distorting everything you tell us and promising you that if you sign a confession, you can go home."

Clark knows he didn't kill this guy literally but may have killed him metaphorically (but not metaphorically metaphorically like how Lex killed that guy I made up). You see, Peter Sands invited Clark Kent to his house not for help on his book but for help on finding Superman. Peter explained his life was in danger from Lex Luthor and the killers on his payroll because Peter had found out too many true things about Lex. But Clark is all, "Whoa whoa whoa! Why do you think I, not Superman, would know how to get in touch with Superman, a man who is famously not me? Because if he were me, I could save your life right now but he's not me and my secret identity is super important (not Superman important! Ha ha!) so I can't just save your life right now, being that I'm not him, I mean. Let me leave you alone for a few hours while I pretend to go look for Superman because it's really difficult to get in touch with a guy who you totally aren't." So Clark leaves Peter's apartment and then Peter is murdered and begins writing, "Clark Kent is obviously not Superman or else he could have saved my life", on the floor with his own blood. But he dies after just writing Clark's full name.

After finishing Lex Luthor's autobiography, Peter Sands begins investigating anybody who's still alive who knew Lex when he was younger. That comes out to one person: an elementary school teacher. He doesn't get suspicious that only one person in all of Luthor's life is still alive; he waits until she explains that he probably got kids beaten up by grown men and possibly killed his parents. Then he begins investigating everybody tied to Lex's parents' life insurance policy and, hoo-boy, it sure looks like Lex murdered his parents! That's when he gets a phone call from a mysterious stranger who is all, "Stop investigating or we'll kill you. Unless you already figured out Lex killed his parents. Then we're just going to kill you anyway. Good day!"

Back at police headquarters in the present, the cops continue to act as if the first person they brought in for questioning is the murderer because, man, it's tough having to bring in more people. Also a waste of time when you can just frame whomever you first grab off the street.

Clark knows he's partly responsible for Sands' death so I hope they give him a polygraph!

Peter Sands, before he was killed by Luthor's men, decided he wasn't afraid of being killed by Luthor's men and continued his investigation. He remembered he knew a guy who worked for Luthor in the '60s who was also a Vietnam War Veteran and also a heavy drinker. So he tricks him into telling all of his secrets for a few beers while one of Luthor's men sits nearby listening. After the meeting, Luthor's guy runs down Peter's friend in the street, killing him. The police aren't investigating that murder because, I'm assuming, he was a Black guy? And probably because he was a Vietnam Vet? And, being 1989, maybe he was gay? Any reason so the police could convince themselves they don't have to care about that murder because they believe nobody else does either. Some of you are too young to remember Reagan's America but it sucked. It wasn't as bad as Trump's America, but it was full of vile, despicable people who were only governing for certain people. Yeah, sounds familiar, right? It's the kind of leadership that makes me drop friends and stop talking with family who continue to support it. Just vile people supporting other vile people for the most selfish and irrational reasons.

Only fifteen pages left so it might be time to summarize the rest of the story in the end of review bit, right? I mean, I don't want to spoil the ending where Lex Luthor heaves his horrendous form atop the woman who brought him the Clark Kent snuff film.

Gross.

Lex Luthor: The Unauthorized Biography Rating: B. Okay, fine, Clark Kent wasn't killed on-camera by cops. He was saved at the last minute by one of Lex Luthor's lawyers so that Clark would owe him a favor. I thought for sure Clark Kent would come to his own defense by pointing out that the dying man wrote Clark's name with his non-dominant hand as you can plainly see without even knowing which of Peter Sands' hands was dominant because he's wearing a watch on the hand that scrawled Clark's name. Am I a better detective than the Metropolis police detectives? Yes, of course I am. Cops are terrible detectives. Instead, we learn the murder weapon was found and the prints on the blade were from a convicted felon who had fallen out with Donald Trump. So Trump had him framed for the murder and attempted framing of Clark Kent. Plus Lex Trumpthor probably had all the people Sands interviewed killed. In the end, Lex Luthor has gotten away with everything because he's a genius and Superman's a huge pusshole who was manipulated by a Lexcorps-made earthquake in Tokyo. Luthor controlled the whole thing! See, I had to stop calling him Trump as soon as I began talking about his genius plans to manipulate everyone. Trump only manipulates dimwits and fucknuggets whom he either has serious dirt on (probably Epstein-island related) or they're just so dumb and greedy, and their dad hated them so much, that they'll pretend to believe any piece of dog vomit that drips from Trump's dog butthole of a mouth. Was that a mixed metaphor? I hope not! My credibility as a proper writer could be shattered!

Action Comics #959

This is Lex trying to be a good guy?

The Review!
I guess Dan Jurgens wasn't happy with the Death of Superman story he wrote twenty-five years ago. It's time to tell it differently. Probably with a surprise ending where Superman lives! I hope it ends soon though because the only interesting thing about Doomsday is that he once killed Superman. And--let's face it--he's not going to do it again. So what we have here is a story with no tension about a villain with no personality on a rampage with no motivation. I don't think it ticks off any boxes in the "Things That Make A Story" list of boxes to tick! Although it does leave the reader wondering, "Who is Clark Kent? What a surprise mystery! My bowels are on fire! This story is so exciting! No, wait! That's the burrito I ate doing that! So many jalapeños!" I wonder how many times during the story Dan Jurgens asked his editor, "Can we make the enemy Soviet Russia?" Only the people you know that Dan Jurgens is a robot built in 1986 whose memory has never been upgraded will understand that joke. And maybe even some of those people won't understand it!

The Commentary!
I tend to avoid saying or writing things in a straightforward manner which usually just confuses earnest and probably boring people. It also confuses the Actually Nerds because they can't wait to fucking find fault with something somebody said! And a lot of times, it seems like I might have put forward an erroneous piece of information! I probably didn't but don't try to convince an Actually Nerd that you weren't wrong! Although if you consistently write in a confusing enough manner, you can get away with saying all kinds of horrible things! Because when somebody accuses you of being pro-domestic violence (which seems a really fucking strange thing to believe somebody would believe! I mean, they might commit domestic violence or make jokes about it but you'll rarely find somebody bearing its standard! I mean, unless they're religious in a really fundamental way!), you can tell them that they read the offending piece wrong and that maybe they should try reading it again but with the understanding that I am not pro-domestic violence. That usually clears things up. Or, at the very least, it makes the person go away. And I don't feel the need to come out on top of every debate I have! I just want it to end quickly so I can go back to not being bothered by people.

This issue begins with Preboot Lois Lane remembering when Preboot Doomsday attacked Preboot Superman.

Let's be honest here: at the time, the Justice League were amateur hour.

In the previous caption, I didn't know whether to say "the Justice League were amateur hour" or "the Justice League was amateur hour." But since Lois settled on were even though she may have only used that in reference to they (which was referencing the Justice League, so...), I decided to follow suit. She is the greatest journalist ever for some reason! I think in her comic book, Lois Lane, Superman's Girlfriend, she used to write cute little articles that got some attention. You know, for a girl.

Oh! That was one of those horrible things I pretend I can get away with writing! Because while most people will read it and call me an asshole and never read anything I've written ever again, some people will read that and understand that I'm not being sexist at all! I'm pointing out how sexist it was to name Lois Lane's comic book, "Superman's Girlfriend." But some people don't like that kind of satire or parody or whatever it was. They just think I'm using it as an excuse to belittle Lois Lane's writing due to her gender. I would never do that! I always belittle her writing because it's usually horrible. Especially when Scott Lobdell is allowed to write it.

I don't think Lois meant for this to sound like it does.

Doomsday is currently killing Lex Luthor and Superman is taking his time coming to the rescue. I know Superman is supposed to save everybody but it's not like he has to save everybody immediately, you know? Sometimes learning a lesson is more important than a few broken bones.

Doomsday says "Brah!" when Superman finally tackles him off of Lex. Does that mean I should begin referring to him as Doucheday? Doomsdouche? I don't think either one of those is catchy enough. It's not like Deathstork which just rolls off the tip of my fingers (mostly on accident).

Superman has decided that this isn't the Doomsday of this Earth who was already pummeled into an airborne virus. This is the same Doomsday from his world! Or at least a nearly identical approximation of that Doomsday, probably created by all of the worlds greatest scientists and artists on a secret island who were then killed before receiving their paychecks from Doctor Oz(ymandias). If Superman can defeat Doomsday this time, he'll pass the test! I don't know what kind of test it is. I guess it's to test if Superman will actually think through a problem instead of bashing it into submission with his fits.

Superman smashes Doomsday through the street and into the sewers. The mysterious new Clark Kent falls in the hole while warning Jimmy Olsen not to fall in the hole. He's clumsy enough to be the real Clark Kent! And he breaks his arm in the fall, so he's definitely not a super person. He probably is New 52 Superman who finally lost all of his powers and somehow switched places with the Quarmer. He's going to need some tips from Steve Trevor about how to survive having sex with Wonder Woman.

Clark and Superman exchange a few words to let the reader know something fucked up is going on but doesn't reveal enough to be interesting. Why do characters always waste time talking about how there's no time to explain the stuff that the reader wants explained? Just explain the stuff in the same amount of time it takes to argue about how you don't have time to explain it!

Lex manages to evacuate all of the citizens in the area just before Superman and Doomsday blow a crater in Metropolis a mile wide. Only Doomsday emerges from the rubble which doesn't mean anything except that Doomsday can dig out of rubble faster than Superman. But it probably causes Lois to pee her pants a little bit as she watches from home with Jon.

Action Comics #958

I trust the Superman that doesn't have the glowing red devil eyes!

The Review!
"Action Comics is putting the action back into Action Comics! Also the comics! It's a really aptly named comic book!" I wonder if DC would use that blurb for the next Action Comics Trade Paperback? I wonder if Dan Jurgens is getting paid for rewriting the Death of Superman? Usually when I get something wrong at work and have to redo it, my boss just gets really angry and makes me stay until it's fixed even if I'm off the clock! I wonder if I can send my original copy of Death of Superman back to DC for a refund since it was obviously defective and needed upgrading. Not that I think Superman is going to die this time so technically it isn't a new version of The Death of Superman. It's more like The Death of Superman That Never Was Because He Didn't Die This Time by Dan Jurgens, 80s Robot. I wonder if Dan Jurgens speaks like Max Headroom? I wonder if he fucks like Max Headroom? I wonder what Max Headroom fucks like?! Anyway, if you like action and you like comics, you probably should have realized that this comic book is right up your alley.

The Commentary!
Some writers look back on their past writing and cringe. I look back on my past writing and think, "How me write well so good?" I thought getting more and more practice doing something was supposed to make you better at that something! What am I? Bizarro Writer? Every single thing I write now is shit! It's worse than shit! It's shit that ate bad shrimp and got diarrhea and shit an even worse shit! It's the kind of shit that makes that shit that shit it think, "Holy shit! I need to get my shit to a hospital!" At least I get to reward myself with masturbation after finishing a page. Or a paragraph. Or a...be right back!...sentence.

Maybe what's wrong is that I've written too much! My writing has always been purposely terrible and off-kilter. Maybe I've written 10,000 hours worth of writing and now I can't not write bad! Crap! That's my entire gimmick! Oh man. I need to think of a new gimmick! A good gimmick would be to write really smart and insightful things. But then I'd have to be smart and insightful. I wonder if I'm any good at pretending to be smart and insightful? Or I can just steal other people's insights!

Oh! I came up with a really good insight the other day while not reading the comments section of one of my commentaries! I was thinking, "Grunion?" That's what I call myself! Tess isn't my name, dum-dums! It's just the name of the blog! It makes sense if you say it out loud to your mother. You might not understand what you're saying as you say my blog's name but your mother will slap you. Anyway, I was thinking to myself, "King Beauregard...I mean, Grunion! What if New 52 Superman isn't actually dead at all? You know how he turned to dust? Maybe that was the Quarmer Superman! You know, the one made out of sand! Holy switcheroos! That would mean the real Clark Kent really is the real Clark Kent! And he probably lost all of his powers because the Quarmer took them all! So now there's a Clark Kent character that's the real Clark Kent and he's going to get to date the Superwoman Lois Lane and it'll be this whole role reversal thing where Clark gets to be in the crotchless panties and Lois gets to be on top eating deep dish pizza!" See? I'm so insightful and I didn't steal most of that insight at all!

This issue begins with Preboot Superman saying, "Hey! Remember all that stuff that happened in the previous comic books? Well you should because I just reminded you! Now let's get on with the story! Hopefully it won't be a repeat of the last time I met Doomsday or this will be the shortest run of Action Comics ever!" You might be thinking 958 issues isn't really a short run but it's the only run of Action Comics, so it's the shortest! I'm not going to complicate the issue by pointing out how Action Comics was renumbered for awhile and how we're all pretending the renumbering never happened now.

Why would you want a copyrighted image going viral?! You'll never collect royalties from all those dum-dum Facebook users! Besides, won't Lex own it? I bet he forgets to even credit Jimmy in the Daily Planet!

Clark is all, "Viral?! This could make the Special Edition of a hard copy of a newspaper that nobody reads anymore! You'll make a few bucks!" And Jimmy is all, "Yeah, but how do you expect to write it when you're a part of the story?!" Pshaw! Like that's ever stopped Clark before!

Dr. Ozymanhattan continues to watch the action on his multiple television screens. If I were smart and insightful, I'd come up with a reason his staff looks like it looks. What is it? A fermata on the end of a staff? It doesn't look enough like one but that would make sense. I bet Dr. Manhattan's atom symbol on his forehead has worn down a bit so that it now looks like a fermata. That would be a smart thing, right?!

Lois and Jon are watching the battle at home which means news cameras are filming the entire fight. So I don't know why Jimmy thinks his still photography is going to make him famous! Those stills will be yawnsville by the time he gets them developed!

I'm so smart to have read that thing you don't need to know about that caused me to figure out that Quarmer angle!

Doomsday and Superman battle for a bit. At least Jurgens remembers how boring he made the fight last time he wrote it so he intersperses it with scenes of other people. Lex is all, "Clark Kent?! But...but...but...how?!" And Lois is all, "Enough television, young man! You'll ruin your supper!" And Jon is all, "I can fly! I can fly! I can fly! I can fly!" He sings it really campy for some reason. Oh wait. That was me singing it out loud. Never mind.

The issue ends with Doomsday about to crush Lex's head. Not in a funny Kids in the Hall way either! More like in a funny while smoking pot and watching Faces of Death way! And, of course, Dr. Voyeur continues to monitor the situation. I bet he jerks it constantly under those robes.

The Darkseid War: Lex Luthor #1

Oh is the Darkseid War still happening?

How many people believe that Darkseid is truly dead forever and will never return to the DC Youniverse? Just me?

Hear me out before your rolling eyes pop out of your head from scoffing so loud! DC now has an ultimate evil in the form of the Anti-Monitor, so why do they need Darkseid too?

That was it. That was my argument! Was it convincing?! Maybe I should remind you that I'm a Grandmaster Comic Book Reader so that you'll nod your head in agreement and mutter, "That's a really good point."

Maybe instead of killing Darkseid for good, they can simply take away all of his powers forcing him to be stuck on Earth where he has to get a job at McDonalds?

This McDonalds ad ran in 1976 during the brief "Apokolips Meal" campaign which eventually morphed into the whole Happy Meal thing.

This issue begins with Lex Luthor boringly saying, "Darseid is dead. Long live Lex Luthor." It's like he's not a genius at all! He's just a bore like every other person in the world and/or on Apokolips! Have you noticed that I like using the "and/or" clause construction? Even when it's not necessary and/or doesn't make any sense to use!

As Lex Luthor turns into Lexseid, he remembers a time he fell in a well when the light was really weird and dampened all of the colors so that I thought maybe there was something wrong with the printing process that developed this comic book. It even frightened me for a brief second as I thought cataracts had suddenly descended upon me! But that only lasted for a split second before I looked around my office and noticed the bright vibrant colors of my Sailor Moon lunchbox were still bright and vibrant.

It's a good thing the colors are as muted as they are or else I wouldn't have realized it was a memory of Lex's since the young person that is presumably Lex has a lot of hair and was dumb enough to fall in a well.

This scene is a metaphor for DC Comics going back to their Daddy Issues well.

Lex Luthor's clothes were burnt off during the Omeganing so now he has to climb a mountain in Apokolips with his dick flopping out. Unless his dick is the kind of dick that just kind of pokes out of the pubic hair like a barnacle waiting for some boobies to turn it into a majestic Rod of Showmanship +3. He is a Caucasian and Caucasians tend to be growers because if they were showers (SHOW-ers and not showers like the water falling) then their ancestors' dicks would have gotten frostbite and been useless. So showers never procreated in the cold climates of the north because their dicks fell off leaving only generations of growers. Meanwhile Africans were swinging their dicks around naked because they didn't have to worry about dickfreeze. And obviously a naked shower is much more enticing than a naked grower so they created generations of showers. It's totally obvious and almost certainly true biological history of the evolution of wieners. I stand by my research (conducted mostly in the locker room at the local Planet Fitness).

Lexseid decides he doesn't need his Apokoliptian Yoda and tries to kill her. But instead of killing her, he explodes, leaving him hanging off of a cliff which is the perfect time to have another memory!

The time Perry White snowballed him is a weird memory to have while nearly dying.

While hanging from the cliff, we get a pretty good shot of Lex's cock.

Well, Mr. Luthor, I apologize for assuming you were a grower.

Ardora, Lex's Yoda, offers to help pull him up from the ledge just like Lex's father didn't do when he was in the well. This is the moment when a character's heart would usually grow three sizes. But those characters aren't usually full of low self-esteem and not Omega Energy. Lex is also full of memories so he decides to remember when he first met Superman and Superman also attempted to help save his life (even though Superman was going to give him up to the authorities afterward). That time, Lex decided not to take Superman's help because he remembered how his father told him asking for help was for pussy baby whiny dum-dums. And Superman wasn't going to make a pussy baby whiny dum-dum out of Lex Luthor! Luthor would rather die than rely on charity! Or at least he'd rather die than have anybody find out that he once relied on charity because that would destroy his entire philosophy about how charity makes people weak and they might realize his two greatest books were written by a selfish charlatan who was merely embracing any philosophy that justified his greed! Oh, sorry. I was thinking of Ayn Rand.

Ardora's efforts to save Lex with little thought to her own safety cause Lex's Omega Energy to grow three sizes instead of his heart. Or maybe both grew. Along with something else, if you get my sneaky innuendo!

Lexseid and the Omega Energy become bosom pals which leads to Lex Luthor becoming the new ruler of Apokolips. Which means he now has an army of parademons to help achieve his goals. Which probably means he's going to use them for stupid shit like destroying The Daily Planet out of petty revenge and trying to convince everybody that Superman is an asshole. Oh wait, he doesn't have to do that latter one since Lois took care of it months ago.

The Darkseid War: Lex Luthor #1 Rating: Compared to most of the other Darkseid War tie-ins, this one was really good. Like the other one I liked (Green Lantern, I think? It's been so long since I read it!), this story was really driven by the character of Lex Luthor and less by the awesome spectacle of the event transforming the character into a god. I could have done with less Luthor ass and cock though.

Justice League #42

"Only one chance to save Lex! Must...fellate...out...the...bullets!"

In the first part of The Darkseid War, The Justice League were defeated by Grail because they pulled that classic boner where they didn't fight as a team but as individual heroes taking turns. That's always how the bad guy wins in the first round! Now Batman will have to round them all up and give them a speech about how they must work together. An alternative could have been that they all disagreed on how to defeat Grail and approached the battle with different tactics. Then they would have to agree to put aside their differences for round two. "Putting aside their differences" means "listening to Batman."

This issue starts off just like my caption on the cover promised!

Superman's blow job eye contact is intense.

Superman and Lex Luthor are currently on Apokolips because Lena Luthor shot them and sent them there via BOOM Tube. She works for Darkseid now. Soon everybody will work for Darkseid. Or the Anti-Monitor who is currently on Earth-Main-Earth having been summoned by Power Ring and Grail. I might not be very clear on the particulars of the plot but I think Darkseid and the Anti-Monitor want to destroy Earth-Main-Earth simply because it's there. Somehow it's an affront to their greatness.

Oh look! Steppenwolf is as confused as I am! Now we'll get an answer straight from the Geoff Johns' mouth via Darkseid's!

Except Darkseid doesn't answer. Desaad just says, "For him. For Darkseid." Which then leaves me with the only possible reason for this war no matter how cynical: spectacle. It's all just a great big spectacle to have the Justice League battle two of the biggest, baddest villains in the entire DC Youniverse. Although after the Justice League win the war, where do they go from there? Any battle after this one will seem like a delicious piece of cake by comparison. Unless the Justice League loses! That's a possibility because then it will seem normal if they go back to fighting villains sent up from the minors. Darkseid and the Anti-Monitor can defeat each other while the Justice League lie around the battlefield unconscious and nearly dead. Except for Wonder Woman who will be lying about unconscious and nearly dead and in a super sexy position. Mark my words!

Back on Earth, Wonder Woman meets the Anti-Monitor. But she doesn't get much more than an "I am desperate" out of him before Metron arrives to BOOM Tube the Justice League to safety. Well, good thing they're safe! Just leave the Earth to the Anti-Monitor and Grail though. I'm sure it's in good hands.

Grail and Mobius the Anti-Monitor have their own discussion about the reasons for this war!

That didn't clear up anything either.

I must have just forgotten the reason for the war which was probably in the Free Comic Book Day comic, Divergence #1. So I should probably reread that so I can be reminded that Myrina Black is the Amazon mother of Grail who wanted a war to destroy the father of her child. I guess to protect her child? And why does she want to protect such an evil monster? Just because it's her child? I've heard that the bond between parent and child is usually pretty strong and nonsensical. Maybe I'm not supposed to care why everybody is fighting this war. I think I'm just supposed to be excited about it. For some reason.

Mister Miracle pays a visit to Myrina Black to get the final answer on why this war is happening. It's like this! Myrina Black knew that someday Darkseid would enslave Earth. How she knew who Darkseid was, I don't know! But her plan was to seduce Darkseid, have his child, convince his child to find somebody in the universe who could kill Darkseid, bring that somebody to Earth, lure Darkseid to Earth, and destroy most of the Earth in the ensuing battle that will kill Darkseid so that he can't enslave the Earth. Seems like a great plan!

Metron rescued the Justice League to tell them that they can't save the Earth and that they should flee from it if they want to live. I suppose Metron just likes watching the Justice League in action because why else would he bother to save them? Nobody in the Justice League believes that they can't stop the destruction of the Earth, so Wonder Woman pulls Metron out of his chair so that Batman can sit in it. Once Batman realizes that the chair knows everything, he asks it a question to calibrate it and then asks it the most important question he can think of!

Jesus Christ, you clown obsessed freak! Ask about the cure for cancer! How about a way to stop aging?! Ask it for a foolproof way to keep everybody safe from random violence! At the very least, ask it how to win Selina Kyle's heart without, you know, being sweet and kind and loving to her. Ugh! Too difficult!

After he learns The Joker's secret identity (which we'll probably never see him deal with after this war is over!), Batman declares that he's a god. Well, at least the chair gave him the confidence to vocalize what he already believed.

Justice League #42 Rating: No change. I'd probably enjoy this comic book more if I just sat back and shut up. Who cares why this is all happening? I should just be thankful that Earth is in so much trouble so that I can see the Justice League rise to the challenge! Maybe I'll get really drunk before reading the next issue. That usually helps me to enjoy broad entertainment.

Green Arrow #40

Why is Felicity even in this scene? I'm already upset that Batman and Lex Luthor are here. At least replace Felicity with Emiko and this cover makes a little bit more sense.

Seattle! American setting!
But the city don't know what the city is getting.
The crème de la crème of the hero world
In a show with everything but Blue Beetle.

Arrows fly--doesn't seem a minute
Since the giant Space Needle had a bat guy in it.
Deranged. Don't you know that when you
Fight at this level there's no ordinary venue.

It's Gotham or Metropolis or Coast City.
Or...or this place!

One night in Seattle and you're soon on mushrooms,
Staring for hours at the EMP.
Lock the door on every public restroom
Unless you're not really there to pee.
I can feel a stranger sidling up to me.

One town's very like another
When you're kicking some thug in the testes, brother.

It's a drag, it's a bore, it's really such a pity
To have a guy with a bow keeping watch on your city.

Whattya mean?
You'd rather have some stinking, crazy man in a bat suit?

Batgirls, Supergirls
There's never been an Arrowgirl on any Seattle street.

That's right! You're talking to a hero
Who's a chauvinist pig. Let me be clear though:
I still let women work beneath me, sunshine.

One night in Seattle makes a bad guy wonder,
"Why did I stay in Gotham for so long?"
One night in Seattle and a bad guy blunders
Into an Arrow Net. It's all so wrong.
How could you be caught by such a fucking dong?

Goddamn. Attack from up above
Gonna knock a guy out with a flying Boxing Glove.
That's no worse than a fucking batarang or an emerald light ring.

Thank God Seattle's criminals don't have super powers or invulnerability.

I don't see you guys complaining
While I fight crime where it's constantly raining.
This time I need help so I had to invite you,
Are the Queen and his bow not enough to excite you.

Then go back to your LexCorps, your Arkhams, your Ann Nocenti titles.

One night in Seattle and your ratings are falling.
Nobody cares about a guy with a bow.
One night in Seattle and the death knell's calling.
Sales keep on hitting a new all time low.
Maybe you'd do better on a TV show.

"One Night in Bangkok" might be the best song ever. Unless the best song ever is actually "Jessie's Girl." Unless it's "Invincible." Yeah, you know what? I think it's "Invincible" by Benatar.

Well that one panel straightens out why Roy Harper would deign to help out Oliver. Now we just need one more panel to clear up why Batman and Lex Luthor give a shit. And I just mean one panel. I'm sure they're both helping out for the same reason and it probably involves stocks.

Felicity is on the front lines of the raid because she needs to hack into King's computer system. So instead of running around trying to hack in from a tablet, she's carrying a laptop open in front of her as she hacks away by pecking at it with one hand and dodging bullets. Shouldn't Batman have stopped this and mentioned that he knows somebody just as good with computers who can actually handle being in a battle like this without needing Diggle for protection? Batman's no help at all. I bet he already lectured everybody about no killing before they even began the mission. And then Katana was all, "Well then why the fuck am I here?!" And Batman was all, "I know, right? Hey! Remember when I ran a super hero team with you on it for some reason? Oh, I remember the reason! I needed a mother figure for Halo!"

Cupid. One dimensional and she uses a bow! I'm so far from interested I'm practically brain dead!

That was the panel that establishes that Cupid is obsessed with Oliver to the point that she sees children as a threat to her sexual relationships. Sorry, her "fantasy sexual relationships."

Naomi has also returned as the new Red Dart. I don't know where Henry Fyff is. I guess he didn't get the invite. Ollie probably thought he'd hamper the mission by stuffing pizza into his face willy nilly. That's what fat characters do in television, movie, and comic book scripts, right? You always have to show how they love to eat because that's totally accurate. Whenever some fat person helps me in the real world, it always takes longer than normal because they're busy shoving doughnut topped pizzas in their mouth and wiping grease on everything.

It's actually not that bad anymore. But I guarantee if you watch a movie or a television show from the eighties and one of the characters is overweight, there will be jokes made about their eating and they will almost always have some kind of food in their hands or all over their shirts or coming out of their face-holes.

Meanwhile Batman is threatening a cop or a lawyer or somebody. He informs the guy that his friends will be sending some evidence indicating John King's guilt in some nefarious activities and when it arrives, this guy needs to press charges. And if he doesn't, Batman will break something. And the room doesn't contain anything breakable! The most unbelievable part of this scene is that Batman calls Green Arrow and Lex Luthor his "friends."

Oh look! She took my advice and ditched the laptop for a tablet! Screw continuity because this makes more sense.

According to the above scan, Felicity must be dead now. Green Arrow can probably survive the blast because he's a super hero and even without invulnerability, they seem to weather explosions fairly well.

Being that I'm reading a comic book and not a biography of Oliver Queen, Green Arrow and Felicity survive being at the center of an explosion. They wind up, through grappling arrow technology, safe and sound on the floor beneath the explosion. Luckily Felicity still has her iPad which she must have shoved down her pants as she was flying through the air. Or maybe this is just her backup pad that she keeps tucked into her bra. Time to put the King in checkmate! Do you think Oliver will use that line when they finally bring him down?

Oliver's ex-girlfriend arrives with King on speaker phone. He tells them they have twenty minutes to bring Felicity's hard drive to him or Mia will die. Does he not know how technology works? First off, her iPad doesn't have a "hard drive." It just kind of is a hard drive with a screen! And twenty minutes? His life is going to be ruined in thirty seconds thanks to email! He's just giving them nineteen and a half extra minutes to kick his ass and save Mia while still ruining his life. Also, Oliver should be saying "Checkmate" in about nineteen and a half minutes!

Oliver battles King and has the upper hand. King is all but defeated when Mia decides to shoot him in the back. She doesn't shoot her father King which is what you'd have expected if you already knew that she just wanted the gun so that she could kill her father. No, she shoots Oliver first which only makes sense if she knows she's in a comic book and she's trying to string the readers along or shock them with Oliver's death. When the gun doesn't have a second bullet in it because King knew better than to completely trust his daughter, she reveals that she knew Oliver wears Kevlar and then Ollie rolls over and shoots King. It all makes perfect sense if you don't actually give a shit about what you're writing, Kreisberg and Sokolowski! Queen had defeated King so why did Mia shoot Oliver if she just wanted her father caught? If she wanted her father dead, why not just shoot him instead of shooting Queen? If King thought his daughter might still betray him, why give her a gun with even one bullet in it? What kind of evil genius is he to assume she's going to betray him but not after she kills Oliver Queen?

Nobody ever says checkmate. How do you write such a shitty story and not tag it with the "Checkmate!" line?! I'm so disappointed in these guys.

Green Arrow #40 Rating: -2 Ranking. Green Arrow's army was a bullshit wasted gimmick and I'm pissed off that they even bothered with it. Arsenal appeared in two panels. He shouldn't have been there in the first place and then he wasn't even utilized. Why the fuck even bring him in? Lex Luthor does nothing but shoot a bolt or two out of his super suit. Batman simply threatens a guy. Katana does nothing. Emiko appears simply to make Cupid jealous so that she can say her one line. This entire finale could have been pulled off with just the usual characters. Diggle could have threatened the district attorney while Felicity and Oliver break into King's offices. Nobody else was needed. It was all fucking bullshit! Who let Kreisberg and Sokolowski near this comic book?! It had a vibe going that was kind of working and now it's CW's Arrow-lite! I'm not surprised though. This is the sixth(?) iteration of Oliver Queen since the Reboot. All of them have been vastly different characters, so why not keep trying new versions of Oliver Queen? What's really stupid about his oscillating personality is that he had a perfectly good one that everybody already identified with him! You know, the chauvinist liberal who was always pissing off Black Canary and Hawkman?! Can we just have that Oliver Queen back in June? Give that one a try! He seemed to work for years!

Justice League #39

Superman's thumb is jacked up.

Once again, the Justice League faces a possible world ending crisis. And the person behind it all? Lex Luthor. And he's still on the team? Yeah, probably. Sure, he claims it was an accident but the Amazo Virus is still his fault. Batman once knocked out Guy Gardner with far less reason; I think it's time Bats gave Lex a shot too.

The Virus has pretty much infected everybody except Wonder Woman, Superman, and Lex Luthor. Maybe a few other billion humans haven't been affected either but when have they mattered? I'm only discussing characters that will get a few lines in this comic book. Now they have to battle the other members of the Justice League who have turned into a bunch of zombies controlled by some kind of virus hive mind. I expect about ten pages at least to be wasted on another good guy on good guy battle before Lex Luthor points out that Superman's body is full of antibodies so he needs to start pissing in the eyes of the infected to cure them. If that doesn't happen, I'm going to be severely disappointed.

You also battled her more recently in the pages of Batwoman! Remember?! Or is that story, like the Killer Croc story from Batwoman, not canon anymore?! It had one of the top ten emotional moments for me in The New 52 when Diana put Pegasus out of his misery!

While Lex Luthor runs off to fix up a cure by taking a sample of Superman's blood, Wonder Woman remains behind to stall the League. They're slowly getting their powers back which could be trouble. Especially when Aquaman is once again able to communicate with fish. *snicker*

The best part about getting to fight her mind controlled teammates is that Wonder Woman gets to take out all of her frustrations on them without paying any kind of cost. Batman was a condescending prick? Break his nose! Once caught Shazam trying to peak down your top? Kick him in the balls. Flash made too many corny jokes? Break his...oh wait. I was thinking of Wally. Flash bored you over and over and over again? Break Barry's ankle.

Captain Cold joins the battle to fight by Wonder Woman's side.

Hmm. This seems oddly familiar!

This is Doom Bunny as Wonder Woman and me as Captain Cold! Just in case half of you internet denizens can't tell, my outfit is blue and gold, not white and black!

While they battle, Lex Luthor lectures Superman on diseases. But for some reason, he includes hemophilia in his list of diseases that have killed leaders and dynasties. Probably because he couldn't think of very many examples so he padded his list with genetic disorders. After Geoff Johns' bit about bats being blind and bullets freezing in mid-air if the temperature of the air were reduced to absolute zero, I'm beginning to think I might have to evict Ann Nocenti from the Knowledge Fun Farm and replace her with Geoff Johns. And let's not forget his bad math in Justice League #7 where the team explain how often Cyborg's BOOM Tubes yank them off to Apokolips!

Which means you're going to have to piss in everybody's eyes! Get the Gatorade ready! Stat!

Captain Cold winds up saving the day by confusing Patient Zero with his freeze gun. That gives Superman the go ahead to use his freeze breath which he was worried about using because he didn't want Patient Zero stealing his copyright. Apparently the virus can't deal with the cold, so Superman freezes him into solid ice and all the other infected zombies drop to the ground and slide back into comas. Hurray! I think.

Lex Luthor pouts because he didn't get to save the day his way. Although the day is far from saved! I'm sure a big twist is about to happen! Like Patient Zero escaping with his heat vision!

Except that doesn't happen. Everybody gets vaccinated except for those few families that don't understand science so I guess they die instead. Or The Flash just inoculates them when they aren't looking and then throws a dead bee on the ground near them so they're none the wiser. But three percent of the infected get to retain their super powers! It's like Bloodlines all over again! A whole bunch of new heroes waiting for Work For Hire writers to create them so DC can cash in on the ones that become popular! Three cheers for corporate greed!

Plus some guy named Amos Fortune eats a candy cigarette as he watches the sunset and thinks about how none of the assassins he sent out managed to kill Lex Luthor.

And what of Patient Zero?!

Surprise twist! He's the new Amazo!

And finally, Hal Jordan comes back to Earth to teach Power Ring how to control her symbiotic alien ring. I'm sure it works almost exactly like a Green Lantern ring. Except exactly the opposite.

Justice League #39 Rating: +2 Ranking because Captain Cold was pretty much the hero. Everybody should start kissing his ass now. This is probably a better version of Amazo simply because I like him being an incubator for a sentient virus more than I like him being a robot. And I guess we're not done with Darkseid since next issue is the prelude to something called The Darkseid War. Fucking Christ. After World's End, I really don't care if I never read another Darkseid or Apokolips story in my life! I might have to kill myself before Justice League #41. Not #40 because I think I can handle a prelude! Plus I don't want to miss the big Conversion Event!

Justice League #38

The ability to turn his clothing into peanut brittle?

I'm going to become as great a detective as Batman! It shouldn't take too long because I don't mean to become the greatest martial artist or the greatest thrower of boomerangs or the greatest gravelly voiced, self-righteous asshole. I'm just going to be learn how to detectivate! And to get started, I'm going to read this:

It looks like Trixie Belden's first step in solving any mystery is to drop acid.

I don't currently have any acid so I'll have to learn to solve mysteries straight-edge style! Anyway, if I did drop some acid, the recursion on this cover would fuck me up. "But the girl on the book is reading this book! And it has a picture of herself reading the book that she's on the cover on! How have I not needed to pee for the thirteen straight weeks I've been looking at this cover?"

The inside cover blurb says, "So sharpen your pencils and your wits and join America's favorite girl detective for mystery, adventure—and fun!" Is Trixie Belden really America's favorite girl detective? What about Nancy Drew? Or Velma? Or the gayer Hardy Boy?

Lesson One is about Fingerprints! It's introduced with a cute little scene:

Trixie's "friend" Honey slips comfortably into the chair beside Trixie and hands her a book on fingerprints as she casually strokes Trixie's inner thigh. "Chick this shit out, bitch." Trixie picked up the book and casually, so as not to offend her friend, moved Honey's hand away from her sweetest of spots. "Hey, Honey! Did you know this fact I just learned about identical twins?!" Honey grinned mischievously and said, "You know it, Darling."

Then there's a ten question quiz to see how much you know about fingerprints! I'm no Batman but I want to learn to be like him, and if you do as well, take the test with me!

Answer True or False.
1. Fingerprint patterns are formed before birth. I say that's true! God thinks them up and then stamps them on the baby before he shoves it up the mother's vagina while she's sleeping.
2. Only on the fingertips can we find the ridge designs that make prints. False! Notice the quiz didn't end that sentence with "fingerprints"! It's kind of a trick question! Because my toes make prints too! I'm looking at them right now as I chew off this huge, yellow toenail!
3. Although no two fingerprints are alike, they all follow a few basic patterns of whorls, loops, and arches. False! Are those the technical terms used by detectives? What about rings and spirals, fairy bladders and duck spunk?
4. Identical twins have identical fingerprints. False! Their fingerprints are mirror images of each other! And the one whose fingerprint whorls go counter-clockwise is the evil twin!
5. A print on the left forefinger is the same as the print on the right forefinger of an individual. False! I'm looking at my own fingerprints and they're mirror images of each other! Like with twins! My left hand is evil! I hope it's not cheating looking at your fingerprints during the quiz.
6. If an injury to a fingertip causes a scab to form and fall off, the print always grows back in the same pattern. True! Law enforcement wouldn't even bother taking fingerprints if this were false! And criminals would constantly have bleeding fingertips. If it were true, you could just catalog all of the people that purchased belt sanders!
7. If one finger on a hand has a loop pattern, the other fingers all have loop patterns. False! My index has loops but my middle finger has arches and my third finger has whorls! I guess my pinky has duck spunk.
8. Some persons, unable to write, have "signed" wills and contracts with their fingerprints. Who cares? Why is this question in the quiz? It doesn't help me become a better detective! Unless, I guess, it shows that fingerprints are unique and can easily identify individuals. So, um, true! Don't be mad at me, Trixie Belden!
9. Ridge designs that make the prints have remained on fingers months after the person has died—and they have been used as clues. True! So don't try robbing my house, you dumb zombies.
10. A criminal who has had skin grafted to his fingertips to make them absolutely smooth need never worry again about being arrested on the basis of fingerprint evidence. True! As long as they don't spend hours in the bathtub where they'll get their fingerprints back.

The answers are:

1. True. I knew it!
2. False. Ha ha! Easy peasy!
3. True. I guess I was wrong about the fairy bladders and the duck spunk designs.
4. False. Bingo!
5. False. I got it right by detective work and not cheating!
6. True. Move over Robin!
7. False. Once again, correct by using deduction! Or seduction, maybe?
8. True. Winner, winner, vegan dinner!
9. True. I knew zombies were real!
10. False. What?! No way! The answers have a bogus story about a cop noticing a guy with no fingerprints and investigating him due to his suspicions which uncovered the man's criminal history. Bah! That's not being arrested due to fingerprint evidence! That's due to being arrested because of a cop that is breaking the fucking law and harassing somebody just because he didn't like the cut of his jib!

I'll take another lesson the next time I'm reminded that I want to be like Batman. I got 8 out of 10 right which is like 90%! With that score and an IQ of 28, I'm practically Sherlock Holmes already.

Now that I'm a Detective in Training, I have found a clue that tells me Geoff Johns doesn't know the definition of the word "conversely."

Batman has become infected with the Amazo Virus and can now unleash a Sonic Bat Scream. He uses it to defeat Patient Zero and humiliate Superman and Wonder Woman who were getting nowhere trying to subdue the monster.

Batman now has all the powers that a person would expect from somebody named "Batman" like echo-location. Batman decides that the Amazo Virus must base the super powers on the psychology of the person infected which is why Batman can now echo-locate like a bat. But Batman also says he's now blind so either Batman is dumb or Geoff Johns is because bats aren't blind at all! This is the kind of hooey I'd expect from an Ann Nocenti book! Batman does know bats fly, right? So he should be able to fly! Unless he only gets the one power which we'll call "Bat-Sense" since it seems to include blindness and echo-location which seem like two things to me but what do I know? Also, how did Batman not go deaf when he knocked out Patient Zero with his echo-location blast? Shouldn't it have come back at him?

Oh, maybe that's what's going on in this panel! He's being hit by his bounced back sound waves. Or he drank too much Bat-gin.

On the opposite page is the advertisement for Constantine's season premiere. You know what would have been better than constantly running ads for a show from October 24th, DC? How about running ads of when Constantine was going to return from its mid-season break the way you ran ads for The Flash and Arrow? I just happened to catch Constantine last Friday already on at 8:10 PM because I was getting ready to set up the Channelmaster to record it at 10:00 PM. And it wasn't the second half of the story that ended the season finale, so I guess I missed an episode the week before! You know what that tells me? No advertising for its return and changing the time when it did return? The show isn't getting another season. Fuckers. Just as it seems to be finding its groove! Felix Faust as villain with the Chaz back-story stuff was a good episode!

Batman collapses so Superman and Wonder Woman fly him and Patient Zero back to Luthor so he can save everybody. But speaking of Luthor, he was shot in the head at the end of last issue. But off-panel, of course, which means he wasn't actually dead. My guess was that Captain Cold protected him with an ice shield.

Yawn. Of course.

Just because I guessed that and every other major plot point in The New 52 since it began (probably! I wouldn't bother fact checking that statement because you'd just waste your time realizing it's true. Plus, just because it hasn't yet been revealed that Harvest is actually Vampire Tim Drake from the future, it doesn't mean he isn't), that doesn't mean I still guess everything that will happen in a comic book. Especially silly bullshit like this:

One winter it was so cold in Nebraska, I ran outside my front door and broke my nose on the air. True story!

Luthor needs to find out why people are trying to assassinate him, once over in Batman Loves Superman and twice in Justice League. So he wakes Neutron, the assassin that knocked over the vial containing the Amazo Virus and started this whole mess, from his coma to ask him some questions like, "Why did you try to kill me?" and "Why doesn't anybody love me?"

Before he can get any answers, Superman and Wonder Woman arrive with Patient Zero and Infected Batman. Luthor quickly wipes away his tears and begins working on the cure.

It takes Lex about thirty seconds to admit he can't cure anybody with this guy's blood and that he needs Superman's blood because Superman has already developed antibodies to the virus. He developed them four years ago when Luthor used it against him like a big jerk. Superman wastes more time being upset that Luthor wasted so much time before admitting to his subterfuge.

Who cares if Lex is lying, Superman? He has a completely valid excuse to try to protect the world against Phantom Zone escapees. Why should anybody trust you to take care of it? Especially when we've already seen how well that works out. It's like other countries having to rely on America to defend them as America gives them a big old shit-eating grin and says, "Trust us."

And then everybody comes out of their comas and begins talking like they are Legion because they're all now controlled by the Virus which is apparently some kind of hive mind single entity thing.

Justice League #38 Rating: No change. Oh! I've seen this kind of thing before in Detective Comics where Batman had the antibodies inside him that could save everybody in Gotham so he had to fly above them and pee all over everybody. So that's how Superman can save the world! He can drink a whole bunch of lemonade and then fly super fast all around the world with his cock hanging out and spraying his super urine into everybody's mouths! You probably don't even need to read Issue #39 since my track record of guessing plots is 100%.

Batman Loves Superman #17

These two spent so much time fucking, the bomb almost went off!

Last issue, a whale exploded and a man in a Superman costume who was entertaining some children was shot in the chest by a bug. The inevitable conclusion that must be drawn from these two events is that Superman has a Joker! Well, that's the conclusion Batman came up with. And if any of the Batkids had been in the Batcave when Batman was revealing this to Superman, they would have been able to tell Superman, after Batman went up to get some hot milk, that that's always Batman's first hypothesis. Then they would have told him about that time when the tidal wave devastated Malaysia when Batman had Aquaman convinced it was the work of Aquaman's Joker. Or the time Gotham City seemed to be completely out of Earl Grey and Batman shook his head slowly and said, "Looks like you've got yourself a Joker, Alfred." Batman's perspective on most situations might be a little bit wonky.

Just before last issue ended, Superman's Joker lashed out at three different areas of the world: South Korea, Khandaq, and Metropolis. Guess which one Superman thinks needs him most! Wrong, not the two volatile areas that can erupt into an instant World War! He goes to Metropolis! And it's to save...um...hmm...this can't be right.

I hope Lex Luthor's list of suspects is better than Batman's.

Lex Luthor's list is just as dumb as Batman's and it's composed of only one person and that person is the joke suspect that I was going to say and then thought, "Why would he blame Superman himself?" And yet, he does! He says Superman has the knowledge and power to be doing the things Superman's Joker is doing.

So basically, whoever Superman asks, they're not going to put any thought into the problem at all. They're just going to think, "Who would I blame?" and then use that as their answer. Great. Perfect. Everybody in Greg Pak's DC Universe is a narcissistic buttplug.

Oh Lex! None of that would happen. Maybe, in the short term, people would panic and LexCorps stocks would drop. But once your sister took over and she began sharing LexCorps knowledge with Bruce Wayne and Ted Kord, and all of your secret knowledge is used to help the world instead of simply focused on killing Superman, LexCorps stocks will triple in value! And all the risk-takers who hung onto their LexCorps stock will be incredibly wealthy! Although going by what Lex said would happen to America and Southeast Asia, it's possible LexCorps is just a front for sex trafficking.

Lex goes on to not just speculate but confidently forecast exactly what his near assassination will do to the global economy, as well as the global effects of the assassinations of a general in Khandaq and a South Korean Pop Star. I don't know why, but the entire thing makes me hate Greg Pak just a little bit more than I was already hating him for all the memory wipe stories. I guess some people equate genius with mere prognostication. "He's so smart that he knows everything that will happen before it happens simply by observing the world around him!" I wonder if this kind of thinking about intelligence formed from early readings of Asimov's Foundation series in which the far flung future is predicted by a man who worked out equations based on social, cultural, economic, and political variables. I'm sure it made some young, impressionable teens think that all you needed to work out the future were enough numbers to plug into enough variables.

In reality, the best reaction you can predict is that when something bad happens with a company, the stock price will drop because people are out there thinking, "Shit! I better sell because this is going to cause the stock price to drop!" Self-fulfilling market crash!

Superman realizes his Joker (or his Superman?) is killing targets that Superman has saved in the past. But they're people nobody should know he saved. So who could know Superman's own thoughts? Let's see...Krypto! I'm sure Superman tells Krypto everything. And while he's talking to Krypto, the Phantom Zone prisoners are probably listening in. And isn't The Bottled City of Kandor still missing? Maybe one of them got out, driven mad by Superman's hairy sack swinging by the bottle every time he got out of bed to take a whiz. Also, Zombie Lana Lang that lives in his head. But everybody has probably forgotten about her. Queen Bee and Hector Hammond who both possessed Superman's mind and probably know everything about him. And if that's true, then they could have sold the information to the entire criminal underworld! So, I think everybody knows Superman's thoughts?

Hey! I actually thought like the World's Greatest Detective because they go to visit Hector Hammond in a secure STAR Labs facility under the ocean!

Really Batman? He's already been in Superman's head! Don't give him access to yours too!

Batman gives Hector a memory of the Joker laughing. Boring! I wanted some salacious Catwoman stuff!

Hector helps Batman and Superman track down the most deranged mind on the planet but also capable of the assassinations that have been taking place. And the mind he comes up with is Twat Lobo's mind! Who is currently in Metropolis. I think when last we saw Twat Lobo, he was about to head to Metropolis to hunt down one of the assassins of the Earth who was hunting down some super-weapon. Possibly the same weapon used to in all the killings. Twat Lobo's obviously not the killer but I guess it'll be a bit of a distraction so Greg Pak can keep everybody guessing as to who the real Superman's Joker is.

Superman deals patiently with Twat Lobo.

Poor Twat Lobo! Already getting his ass kicked by other heroes to show they can defeat the deadliest assassin in the DC Universe!

Superman continues to be taunted by the voice of his Joker. He's no closer to figuring out who it is. So Batman's next plan is to dangle Lois Lane on the end of a stick to lure the villain into the open. Lois seems okay with this plan.

Batman Loves Superman #17 Rating: No change. Everybody's memories are still intact (mostly!), so that's a good sign. Although the pay off on this villain had better be pretty damned clever or I'm going to find a picture of Greg Pak's face on the internet, print up a full color, life-sized version of it, cut out the eyes and mouth, put it on myself, look in a mirror, and say, "I'm so sorry for wasting your time, Texx. I'll do better next time." Then I'll remove the mask and say, "It's Tess! Not Texx!" And then I'll quickly put the mask back on and say, "Oh! Sorry, sorry! Tess! I'm sorry, Tess!" Then I'll wink and lick my lips and say, "I love you, baby."

Justice League #37

Is Superman saving Lex from whatever is trying to kill him?

What if the Amazo Virus gave you immortality? That would trump the part of the virus that causes your blood to turn black and your brain to boil, right? What if it just gave you immunity to viruses? Would you then just lose the virus and then lose your immunity to viruses and then die from the flu?

Batman begins this issue with a Seventh Grade Report on the worst diseases mankind has ever faced. It's a Seventh Grade Report because he leaves out the Spanish Flu and doesn't really flesh out the two diseases he does mention. I give him a C+, partly because the entire presentation was wanting and, since I'm grading on a curve, I have to say Hawkman often gave more entertaining oral reports to start off his comic books.

At the end of last issue, Batman and Superman had confronted Patient Zero. It turns out it isn't Jimmy Olsen like I had hoped. It's just some guy named Ikarus that was working at LexCorps. Lex Luthor needs a sample of his blood if he's going to create a cure for the Amazo Virus. I'm still not sure how this guy contracted it if the virus wasn't airborne. I think maybe Lex Luthor is lying and he absolutely created it to be airborne because he's a dickhole.

Other Robin ideas: Bat-Lube (Dick Grayson), Bat-Crowbar (Jason Todd), Bat-Bat (Tim Drake), Batling Gun (Damian Wayne).

Patient Zero's super power is if he can see it, he can do it. The power might actually be "if he can think it, he can do it," but this guy isn't very imaginative. He's the kind of asshole that gets movies, books, and games in trouble because the writers think of the crazy shit to due in a fictional world and then unimaginative assholes like this guy glom onto the idea and enact it in real life. This causes big stupid dumb-dumb journalists to ask probing questions like "Is the auteur to blame for other people's idiocy?" Then all the fearful mothers send letters to Mtv and force Beavis to stop saying "Fire! Fire!"

Apparently the Amazo Virus can survive indefinitely outside of a host so the world is doomed. Also, why does the fucking virus need a host if it can survive outside of the host body indefinitely? Maybe the world isn't as doomed as Superman first thought! It's mutated beyond the need for a host and can now live freely and peacefully alongside humans! Yay! This story is over!

Lex's sister Lena asks Luthor why he invented the Amazo Virus because she must be a big dumb dumb head. Why does Lex do anything?! Because he's obsessed with ridding the world of Superman. And since his crappy Amazo Virus only affects humans, he locked it away in storage until he could figure out a way for it to infect Kryptonians. But now it's too late and everybody but Superman is going to die.

How could you be so cynical, Captain Cold?! Come on now!

And then some idiot named "Bullet" explodes onto the scene and tells Lex he's going to kill Lex for money. Shouldn't he just kill him and go? Why waste time explaining why you're suddenly in the comic book? Just fucking do what you're being paid to do, asshole.

Bullet does shoot Lex's off-panel head on one of the next couple of pages. But since it isn't shown then it didn't happen! I'm sure Captain Cold created an ice shield or something before Bullet's bullet could meet Lex's brain.

And finally, Batman's Haz-Bat Suit gives up the ghost, leaving Batman exposed to the Amazo Virus. Batman's new power will probably be to emit pheromones. Look out, ladies! And gents too, I guess.

Justice League #37 Rating: No change. This cover was silly! I guess it represents Superman's most secret fantasy that he can never tell anybody or else they'll know he's a monster capable of horrible evils. Although everybody likes Superman and hates Lex Luthor. I think they'd forgive him for killing Luthor. The judge at his trial would probably be all, "Do we even need to do this? I mean, Lex was kind of a dick. Who can blame you, Supes? By the way, why isn't Clark Kent covering this trial? I was really hoping for an autograph from the guy that exposed Morgan Glenmorgan-Morgan Glennglenn Glennmorgan!" And the jury foreman will be all, "Not guilty, right guys?" And everybody will be all, "Yeah! Yeah! Not guilty!" Except that one guy in the back that just moved to Metropolis who says, "Not so fast. Maybe we should really think this over first." And one of the other jurors will be all, "Oh, come on Malone! Nobody here's going to find any reason to convict that boy scout for killing a monster like Lex!" And Malone will strike a match and say, "I've got reasons. Oh boy, do I have reasons. Let's go to the deliberating room and Twelve Angry Men this bitch!"