Talon #17

This series will continue in Lord Death Man #18 even if I have to write it myself.

I just figured out why Calvin Rose is called Talon! Because that's the part of the owl that the owl uses to kill! Which means I discovered a secret that has yet to be revealed! The Court of Owls always has two Talons ready to go at all times! Umm, I mean eight talons! And their secret weapon for when all the Talons are killed: Beak! If Beak dies, you might think The Court of Owls is fucked! Well, they aren't! Because they have one last monstrous murderer to let loose: Creepy Near-Human Face!

This issue begins with one of the grossest things I've ever read.

Gross!

I'd rather die than breathe in corpse lung air! What if the poisonous gas is still surrounding them when she uses up all of his lung air? Will he have to force air out of his sphincter as she wraps her lips around his chocolate starfish? Hmm. I hope that actually does happen next page! What is DC going to do? Cancel this comic book?

Just a second while I look up some more standard jokes to use for this commentary. Did I already do the one about Oingo Boingo, my old friend Soy Rakelson, and his agreement with the Catholic Church's dogma on not using prophylactics but didn't extend to premarital sex? I think I covered most of that last issue.

While Anya is being kept alive with corpse-tainted oxygen, she thinks, "Does Calvin's blood still flow or are we going to have to use a penis pump?" When she gets a nice lungful of air, she says, "Is that a limp noodle in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?" Calvin smiles roguishly and says, "Are your labia engorged with blood and glistening slightly from vaginal lubrication for no reason or are you just happy to see me?" And then Lord Death Man interrupts with some seriously highbrow Shakespearean shit.

I love Lord Death Man!

Everybody should rush out and buy a copy of this comic book because I don't think DC has ever before printed the word "fart" in one of their funny books! History is being made here!

Meanwhile the only other person left alive in this submarinean secret base is Dr. Darrk! I just felt like his name deserves an exclamation point. DC thought it deserved two "r"s! I'm not quite as married to that last sentence needing an exclamation point though. But as a Writer, you have to be sure the reader feels excited! And the best way to make a reader feel excitement is to tell the reader through improper and overused punctuation! Some people might use more than one exclamation point but I consider that crossing a line of trust between the Writer and the reader. If I use two exclamation points, the reader's heart might palpitate wildly. If I use three, the reader might think something in the house is on fire and run out into the street only to be hit by a passing semi truck! I'm nothing if not a responsible Writer!

Back in Gotham City, Casey keeps in touch with the team from a wi-fi connection at her local Starbucks. When they point out they just encountered "Skull Guy," Casey finds his entry on Wikipedia and discovers some facts about him.

I guess it doesn't say anything about how he was stuffed into a safe and shot into space, hunh?

Later in the previously poisonous tunnels, Lord Death Man comes alive and mentions how he was shot into space himself! He does not, though, mention how he was saved. He does mentioning conquering the Game of Life though, so now he's really my new best friend. Have I mentioned I created a Roller Playing Game named Places and Predators? I have. And the entire combat system is based on The Game of Life. That's because in the P&P Universe, every dimension is based on a different board game. So if your characters traveled to a different plane, they might have to battle monsters by spelling big words and hoping for a critical triple word score attack. A few years ago, I purchased a new copy of the game and it sucks. Seriously. If you want to get the game for your kids, find a version from the seventies at a garage sale or on eBay.

At this point, I'm beginning to think I should be getting paid for likeness rights on Lord Death Man.

These scenes with Lord Death Man are exactly what it's like living with me! Just yesterday, I got up from the couch while watching Judge Judy and, headed toward the kitchen, muttered, "Us half-fish people gotta follow laws, why ain't them humans gots to?"

Baby stuff. Although I'd be really impressed if you understand all the rules to Yu-Gi-Oh!

I don't believe Lord Death Man knows the name of every single Pokemon at all! From the way he's been talking up until now, he probably just calls them "Little Lightning Tail" and "Cat That Shits Coins" and "Big Fat Sleeping Fat Napper." I guess just because he might call the Pokemon that, it doesn't mean he doesn't know their names. I call the bad guy group from The Movement "The Gravy Factory" even though I know they're actually the Graveyard Faction.

After the Pokemon exchange, Lord Death Man eventually kills Calvin Rose. But Lord Death Man doesn't realize that he just defeated another immortal being. Once he finds out though, he'll never forget! His noggin is like a no-kill animal trap. Information gets locked in and then goes fucking nuts trying to get out.

Dr. Darrk begins flooding the tunnels where Lord Death Man and Talon have been playing. But Anya, who seems to have had a previous relationship with Dr. Darrk (not that kind, sicko pervo!) since they're both League of Assassins members, stops him before the tunnels are completely flooded. Which is a good thing because Lord Death Man and Calvin would have had a tough time resuming their conversation underwater. And their continued conversation is very important because it's about that bit I keep repeating. You know that bit! Where Lord Death Man was sent into space! But what's more important is that being trapped in that safe out in space is exactly the same fear that Calvin expressed to Anya last issue! These two guys are like brothers!

How can Calvin refuse?! Lord Death Man's confession is the same exact confession Calvin gave to Anya in the shower where they should have been fucking! Hmm, maybe this will lead to fucking?

What actually happens is that Calvin throws a shark at Lord Death Man. Not cool, man. Never cool.

Anya battles with Dr. Darrk as they discuss innocence, freedom, servitude, and murder while Lord Death Man and Talon battle underwater so that they can't have any kind of discussion at all. Anya makes a deal to save Talon from the flooded chamber. But Lord Death Man escapes. I think. It's possible he made it out of the sealed chamber before it completely sealed. It's ambiguous! Comic books love ambiguity! But even if he didn't escape, he made it back from orbiting the Earth somehow, didn't he? He'll be back because he's the best.

The deal Anya makes with Dr. Darrk is probably this: in exchange for not blowing up a room full of babies in test tubes, Dr. Darrk provides Calvin Rose with some of Lord Death Man's Immortality Juice (you know where that comes from. Wink wink) so that he can be human again. Is that the deal? Well, later in Gotham, we'll probably find out. I mean, it has to be, right? Nobody liked Calvin when he was a zombie! It ruined his whole schtick!

Calvin is alive, Lord Death Man has been encased in cement, and Dr. Darrk has become a Talon Zombie himself! Somehow. Probably with transfusions or something.

Talon #17 Rating: +10 Ranking! Most of that is because Lord Death Man is my fake soul mate. Some of that is because Calvin Rose is back to normal. A little of that is because this series has ended. However you want to parcel out the positive points, I felt like this was the best issue of Talon so far. And just think how many stupid assholes are never going to pick it up because they're stupid assholes! Who are actually pretty smart because, seriously, this book was never really that good. It was better at ideas and possibilities than execution. Unlike Lord Death Man who is the opposite of that!

Talon #16

Unless you're a Talon. Or Alec Holland. Or Superman. Or Deadman. Or any number of comic book characters.

Last issue had nothing to do with Calvin Rose and it was the best issue of Talon in a long time. You see, Calvin has lost the thing that made him interesting when he died and became an immortal zombie. When he was alive, he needed his skill to escape death in ingenious and inventive ways. But now he doesn't need to escape death because he can't die. But that's probably the entire point of this final story arc. Calvin needs to confront death and either shuffle off this mortal coil or learn how to live again. I suppose it doesn't really matter which it is since his time as the main character of a monthly comic is up.

This issue is called "Dead Man's Party" so now I have Oingo Boingo stuck in my head. My high school friend Soy Rakelson loved Oingo Boingo. It was one of his favorite things, right up there with taking advantage of his friends, volunteering to help the Special Olympics with his fraternity so they could make fun of the athletes, feeling offended and indignant, and throwing vegetables at pedestrians as he passed by in his car. Does that make him sound like a dick? Don't worry. He was Catholic so it was okay.

Talon's escape skills have gotten rusty since he doesn't actually need to use them anymore. So he's been practicing escaping burning coffins hanging in the sky. Tonight, he fails and drowns. Or would have drowned if he were alive. Instead, the coffin plunges to the water, knocking him unconscious until he wakes up inhaling water, only to be cut from his prison by Joey and the other new Batman Incorporated employees. After coughing up a ton of water, he stands on the shore, throws up his arms, and yells, "TA-DA!"

Later in the shower with Anya the Ex-Assassin, Calvin spills his seeds. I mean beans.

These specific beans are about why he sucks at escaping now.

Meanwhile Lord Death Man escapes his imprisonment in Pakistan because he is a much better escape artist than Calvin Rose. He's also a better joker than Calvin Rose. He remembers all the punchlines correctly. And even if he does get one wrong, he just murders the person he was telling the joke to so they won't malign his reputation as a funny man. The best joke he knows is the one how he somehow returned to Earth after being shoved into a tiny safe and shot out into space. Maybe that happened in Preboot Continuity. But it definitely happened in Batman, Incorporated Continuity which somehow exists within and without all other continuities. And that's actually where Lord Death Man belongs because he's super cool and transcends limits.

These jokes didn't come off very well so he had to expunge his audience.

Anya was once a member of the League of Assassins and she heard of these pits that Ra's al Ghul sits in to remain immortal. She figures if Calvin Rose sits in one, it'll bring him back to normal life and he'll lose his zombie status. Then he can go back to facing death on unequal footing, just the way he likes it. It turns out, Calvin knows of a secret underwater lab where Ra's al Ghul currently makes the liquid in which he bathes. Coincidentally, it's the same lab where Lord Death Man just escaped his bonds and began murdering everyone! Actually, this is one of those cases where a coincidence is not a coincidence at all because it's Lord Death Man's blood that is being harvested to fill Ra's al Ghul's Lazarus Pits. But that doesn't mean that you should go around spouting the childish idea that there are no coincidences! Because there are! They happen all the time! And just because a human being comes along and says, "Ayuh. Everything happens for a reason," it doesn't mean things have been planned! Yes, coincidences happen for a reason! And that reason is random, dumb chance. If an infinite number of monkeys roll enough infinite sided dice an infinite number of times, one of those monkeys is eventually going to roll the same number twice in a row! And at that point, that fucking monkey is going to create religion and be the most powerful of all the infinite monkeys!

Inside the lab is also some guy named Dr. Dark. He wears some kind of atmospheric suit filled with blood or cherry soda. He kind of freaks out a little bit that Lord Death Man is on the loose. Whatever happens between Lord Death Man, Talon, Dr. Dark, and Anya the Ex-Assassin will have to wait until the final issue.

Talon #16 Rating: +1 Ranking. Lord Death Man is just off-kilter enough for me to want him deep inside me. Not in a sexual way! Although I'm not sure what other way there might be that's medically sound and not too gay. I can handle a procedure that's a little bit gay, even up to 49% gay. But that's where I draw the line! I can't give my high school friends and every guy on Xbox Live the satisfaction of being right about my sexual identity! Although I suppose Lord Death Man could be a woman! Sure, two of the words in her name might lead you to the opposite conclusion but that doesn't actually prove anything. Maybe I should just desire to be deep inside her and then I get to keep the illusion of my heterosexuality intact! I mean the reality of my heterosexuality! Whew. That was a close one!