Phantom Stranger #12

The Sin Eater's secret identity is Shaggy?

The Sin Eater sounds like the kind of guy you'd want along on the weekly orgy or the emergency murdering your rival business trips. It would be a freebie if you believe in sin and expurgation of sins and a guy that can eat sins! Unless The Sin Eater eats the sins through your face area so he can chew them out of your brain. Maybe he'd better stay home. I'll take my chances with God not being real and thus not having to face any punishment in the afterlife as my reasons for committing murder and sleep crimes. Being an atheist is so much fun! Nothing to stop me from boiling kittens alive, cutting to the front of every queue, and vociferously condemning all those that don't believe the way that I do to an afterlife of my own choosing! Thank God for free will!

Last issue, The Phantom Stranger was destroyed by the Angel Zauriel. So I'm a bit unclear as to why there's a new issue!

I just glanced at this advert as I opened the comic book and got excited! I thought DC was producing a Spectre television series for a second. Now I'm disappointed. Just Green Arrow.

The Phantom Stranger spends the first two pages of the comic book speaking nonsense. He mentions how he stopped existing but he wasn't aware of not existing but then became aware of being pulled back into existence. What he actually meant to say was, "One moment I was in heaven with Zauriel's flaming sword slicing me in twain and the next I was falling out of the sky and into my body. He would obviously have no awareness of the interim in which he didn't exist and, thus, not have any awareness at all that he may have, at any point in time, ceased to exist. I might as well refer to every time I fall asleep or pass out drunk or smash my head into the concrete after slipping on a banana peel as "ceasing to exist."

Me, every morning from now on for the rest of my life: "Boy! I sure had a good night's cessation of existence!"

Anyway, the comic book must go on with the title character, so The Phantom Stranger finds himself back in his old home with The Terrier. The fucking Terrier. The one that speaks just as much nonsense as The Phantom Stranger.

How the fuck are you The Knower of All Things if you don't know something? You need a new nickname. How about "The Stupidest Motherfucking Dog of All Stupid Motherfucking Dogs (and That's Saying Something)"?

Dog rewards The Phantom Stranger with the loss of two coins for somehow scoring a guest appearance by The Batman in their comic book. He then informs The Phantom Stranger that his next task is to reclaim two souls but He forgets to inform The Stranger which souls those would be. Hopefully one of them will be Damian already! And maybe the other one will be Maseo or Cleveland Brand. Although they probably won't have any relation to his recent guest stars, so maybe it'll be The Sin Eater's soul and Jesus Christ's.

Meanwhile Sin Eater and his Dog, Natas, are hanging out in The Stranger's backyard being creepy assholes. Although, technically, this was his yard first. So maybe he's just being a nostalgic creep.

If my head were constantly on fire, the last thing I would do is make jokes about it. I'd definitely murder anybody that made any to my flaming face.

Meanwhile, The Phantom Stranger's babysitter has discovered he's returned from heaven full of super powers and confusion. He already had the massive teenage angst which is what will probably fuel his move toward becoming a super-villain: The Strange Babysitter!

Chris "Hope" Esperanza decides he needs to confront The Phantom Stranger to find out some answers. Or to be paid for his job. Is a babysitter still entitled to his pay if the kids are butchered under his care? I know Doom Bunny still had to pay the vet when his dog died under anesthesia getting his teeth cleaned. I think he did get half off though.

The Phantom Stranger tries to get rid of Chris "Cousin Oliver" Esperanza but the kid has a weird ability to cling close to The Stranger's ass even when The Stranger teleports about. It looks like The Phantom Stranger has a sidekick now, whether he wanted one or not. They travel together to visit Terrance Thirteen only to find he's slit his wrists in the tub.

Why do you have to sexualize suicide, DC Comics?

Oh wait. It's not sexualized because he's not naked. Oh wait! Even if he were naked, it wouldn't mean this was sexualized. But if he were naked with an erection or naked and female, I guess those things would automatically sexualize the image. Why do Americans automatically assume a naked form is sexualization of that form? A bunch of fucking prudes all up in here. Although, to be fair to people who wanted to be instantly angry over the Draw Harley Quinn fiasco, this scene pretty much strengthens their argument, doesn't it? If the argument by DC wasn't that they were sexualizing Harley Quinn but that it just made sense that somebody killing themselves in a tub would be naked, then why isn't Terrance Thirteen naked? DC is kind of fucking up their own defense here. Although maybe they learned their lesson about sexualizing suicide and this page was, initially, supposed to have a naked Terrance Thirteen in it before The Harley Quinn Fiasco. Although who is ever going to believe that? First off, percentages are pretty low that DC would have had a man naked in a tub anyway. Don't want to titillate the young women with dead, flaccid penis! And covering his penis with his hand or bare thigh is actually more erotic (necrerotic!) than showing it because it stokes the imagination. To finish my rambling, no point paragraph: showing women naked while killing themselves while not showing men naked while killing themselves is wrong and we should endeavor to see more of all sexes naked and killing themselves.

The Strange Babysitter rushes in, grabs Terrance Thirteen by the wrists, and brings him back to life! Oh, no wonder he's not naked. I'm almost certain that if I were naked and suddenly brought back from the edge of death, I'd ejaculate all over my rescuer. Hmm. I think I just wrote a pornographic film! "The Pre-Ejaculator Re-Animator."

The Phantom Stranger and his Sidekick do some paranormal investigations and discover that The Question was behind Terrance Thirteen's murder attempt of The Phantom Stranger. They clean up Terrance and everybody sits around waiting for the Chinese to arrive.

Or not. Why don't characters in comic books eat more often?

After they all make nice, they head over to Terrance Thirteen's rich boy penthouse in New York where they notice an eclipse. Well, that's enough of a tie-in to slap that Forever Evil label on the top of the comic book, isn't it?! And while Chris and Terrance are bonding over the eclipse and paranormal stuff and Chris possibly applying to be Terrance Thirteen's sidekick, The Phantom Stranger pulls the old disappearing trick and heads back home. Only to find his house on fire and The Sin Eater and Natas sitting up on the roof gloating. The Phantom Stranger pulls a Charlton Heston at the end of Planet of the Apes and that's it for this month. Be with us next time for "Three Undeads are Better Than One" or "There's No Fireplace Like Home."

The Phantom Stranger #12 Rating: +1 Ranking. I can already see how this comic is going to play out! Eventually, the fate of the universe will be at the mercy of a dogfight. Dog versus Natas! Winner take all! If the fight isn't broken up by the cops before a winner can be determined.

The Phantom Stranger #10

My version of Heaven: All the Oreo cookies I can eat. And every time I eat one, I orgasm. And my seed falls from Heaven like rain, turning into manna to feed the entire world.

If I were following people around saying these kinds of things, I'd be promptly kicked in the nuts and shoved faced first to the ground, handcuffed, beaten some more, and taken away. In my later years, I'd have to voluntarily introduce myself to everybody that lived in my neighborhood and tell them they're not allowed to have children. But instead of any of that happening, YOU FOLLOW ME! What the fuck is wrong with you people? Were you raised by schizophrenic ferrets? That may be redundant.

Usually before just jumping right into reading the comic, I like to say a few words about another subject, usually related to the cover. Often though, I just write about stuff that I was thinking about the previous hour. Anything I was thinking about the previous hour before the previous hour is subsumed and forgotten by whatever random thoughts percolate through my brain in the previous hour. I sometimes think I should hire a scribe just to write down all of the stupid crap I think up. But then I'd have to hire another monkey to go through those ideas and organize them by quality, from "Having Potential" to "Never Show This To Anyone." Luckily the heaven bit got me on a different tangent altogether because I was prepared to talk about my bowel movements.

When we last left the Stranger, he was acting weird. Oh! That would be a good team-up! The Stranger and The Weird! Maybe they could encounter Power Pack or The Teen Titans. And then when the kids need therapy later, they can show The Ventriloquist where they were touched on her Ferdie doll! I think that plot could run at least ten issues! I wonder if I should apply for an editorial job with DC Comics!

Me: "Sorry, Azzarello. You're going to have to rewrite these Wonder Woman scripts. There isn't enough ambiguous sexual encounters between Gods and everything else. If you could get Cliff Chiang to draw Zeus rubbing up against a young man in the park, that'd be great. And have Hera fuck a tree! Just, you know, have her squat over a Redwood or something."
Brian Azzarello: "Could I maybe switch Zeus and Hera about for those bits?"
Me: "Genius! That's why you're the writer and I'm the guy who tells you if you need to rewrite what you've written!"

See? I could do it! I just got along perfectly well with Brian Azzarello in my fantasy and he's the hardest writer to get along with in my fantasies! I have no idea what he's like in person. He might really be Warren Ellis or Alan Moore. What's with all that fucking facial hair? Are they the reason Grant Morrison's entire body is completely shaved? To differentiate between them at conventions? It would help me because as soon as I hear an accent, I'm like, "Peter Milligan? Is that you!" And then they have to explain who they are.

I know Azzarello is from Cleveland! That's the thickest accent of them all!

Shit! I can't believe I derailed myself after one fucking sentence about the comic book! Maybe if I begin with a scan!

I think I use too many exclamation points. I'm glad they're free.

Heaven has no wheelchair access. You're in a wheelchair? You go to hell!

That last line in the caption was, of course, stolen from Bill Cosby when he's telling the story about dying while trying to drive a stick shift in San Francisco.

Bill Cosby: "Me and a Volkswagen drifted backwards into the bay."
Saint Peter: "You go to hell!"

I never could figure out why that was such a major sin. I think Saint Peter was just a fucking dick. But maybe I was just a stupid kid since I didn't understand the double entendre but still always giggled madly at Steve Martin saying, "My girlfriend has the best pussy!"

The Phantom Stranger reaches Heaven which simply looks like somebody built some condominiums right up to the edge of Golden Gate Park. He notices a door for every person who arrives which makes sense because if Heaven is like Hell, then everyone has their own version of it. But that whole idea is actually pretty creepy. Because a mother may want to be reunited with her child but the child might not want to be reunited with the mother! So the child's heaven won't have her in it nor should he be forced to be in hers. But her heaven has the child in it, so that's fucking weird. Because that kid is a simulacrum! It's not really the real essence of her child! Unless it is! I mean, if we're going to begin believing metaphysical bullshit, then I guess we get to believe whatever we want. Because as soon as somebody says they believe something by faith, then you have to shut the fuck up and stop arguing with them or else you're being an insensitive twat and there is nothing worse in the Modern Age than being accused of being an insensitive twat. Well, maybe a pedophile. That's pretty bad. Or a liberal.

The Phantom Stranger finally puts two and two together which you wouldn't think would take that long being that two plus two is practically the easiest addition equation you can get!

Here we see The Phantom Stranger quoting his character from Jesus Christ Superstar. "God, I'll never know why! You have murdered me! Murdered me! MURDERED ME!"

Dog gets a bit pissed off when The Stranger questions his motives and actions. Fucking Dog. He gives everybody free will and then gets super pissed off and churlish whenever one of his creations doesn't act appropriately. Why does anybody worship Him?

Dog: "You are free to do anything you want except eat this fruit!"
Adam and Eve: "We're going to eat this fruit!"
Dog: "Not that! Didn't I just mention anything but that? Well, if you won't follow My rules, you'll have to leave My house. Get out. And don't think about coming back because I've set up this baby with this flaming sword to keep you out!"
Cain: "I think I'll kill my brother!"
Dog: "You know what? You're really pushing the boundaries of my free will clause, right?"
Everybody but Noah: "Let's get drunk and fuck angels!"
Dog: "That's it! Everybody into the pool! Drown, angel fuckers! Drown!"
Noah: "I'm going to get drunk and take off my pants!"
Dog: "Sheesh. And you were the best of the bunch?"

Later Dog just gave up and sent His only begotten Puppy to die for mankind's sins because mankind was sinning all over the fucking place and they didn't seem to give a shit about repenting those sins. So now Dog somehow accepts that, through His Puppy, all people are saved. But they have to actually state that they accept Dog's Puppy as their Lord and Saviour, or else the sin transfer won't take.

Dog lets The Stranger know that he can only bring back one soul from Heaven and I bet I know which soul he's going to choose. Jesus's! Ha ha. That's what I'd do! No, no. He's probably going to bring back the babysitter. Because his family should have been dead many years ago and the babysitter is the only one that died directly because of The Stranger's actions.

Dog has other Questions to attend to, so he leaves The Stranger in Zauriel's hands. Zauriel is an angel, just in case you couldn't tell by the name. At least he's a full grown angel and not one of those creepy Cherubim.

Is that why the Demons are always trying to advance in rank through rhyme? To emulate the Heavenly Host? Or are they...GASP...one and the same!

That guy is the babysitter. He's going to be Zauriel's sidekick on the hunt for The Phantom Stranger's family. During that time, he'll probably guilt The Stranger into bringing him back. Also, The Stranger's family will probably be very happy where they're at. So The Stranger's decision to bring back the Babysitter will end up being the only logical choice.

When The Stranger finds his family, he sees Philip J. Stark sitting with them. And The Stranger flips the fuck out. Because The Stranger still can't add two plus two! I already explained it earlier about the simulacrums! Why wasn't he listening to me? It's like I'm farting in a jar of piss! Is that the saying? The one about people not listening to you? I bet it's a saying in the South! In the South, you can string just about any words together you want and it becomes an exclamation of surprise or approval.

Meanwhile The Question is trying to get Terrence Thirteen to ask the ultimate question. You know the one. Hamlet asked it. Which is appropriate since The Stranger is up in heaven Othelloing it up because he loved too well.

See? Too well!

The Stranger decides to cheat and goes Full Kaiju on Zauriel's ass. He decides to take them all back and let no Dog stop him!

And no Dog does stop him.

It's an old story told by a jerko, full of love and redemption, signifying whatever I fucking tell you it signifies. Anyway, it was an old enough tale that I knew where it was going from the beginning. Remember?! Go reread that part where I said that stuff about how the story was going to go! Oh, you knew it too, hunh? Yeah, well, you didn't write a blog about it!

The Phantom Stranger also realizes that his whole life has been a charade which is something else I told him way back in Issue #1. I think. Anyway, he's finally learning to add! He chooses the babysitter just like the Dog (and I!) knew he would! For all the same reasons I said earlier so I don't need to repeat them here just to confirm it. It was pretty obvious! It was especially obvious when the Babysitter made his first appearance but I'd already guessed it before then. I guessed it before I read Phantom Stranger #0 even! Which is pretty good since J.M. DeMatteis wasn't even writing the comic yet!

The issue ends with the Babysitter trying to comfort The Stranger back in The Stranger's old home on Earth. It's all touching and crap.

The Phantom Stranger #10 Rating: +3 Ranking. I'm ranking it that highly because it agreed with me. Kudos, comic book! You are so smart!

The Phantom Stranger #5

When did the Phantom Stranger's right eye become a vagina?

Is it wrong of me to hope that The Spectre killed The Phantom Stranger's family? It's not like I'd grown to care about them or anything? I mean, at first I thought it would be interesting but I'm kind of sick of them and their never ending soccer games. Soccer is one of those sports that I think of as stupid. But wait! You haven't heard my reasons! In other sports, you can set up a keg nearby and drink while playing. Sure, football can be a little rough if you're playing tackle, but it's still playable while drunk! But you can't drink while playing soccer! There's too much running in soccer! I guess if you don't mind everybody constantly throwing up and accidentally kicking each other in the face, you might give it a go. But I don't think you'd be too successful at it. If anybody out there does play soccer drunk, let me know! And send pictures!

This issue begins with The Phantom Stranger kicking down the door to Jim Corrigan's place of business. You know, the Gotham Police Department? The GoPo are used to this kind of nonsense so they just go, "Oh! Looking for Jim? Yeah, just down the hallway." Once The Phantom Stranger barges in on Jim Corrigan, they prepare to have a battle. Preferably Pokemon but I wouldn't mind a Yu-gi-oh style card game.

How can either of them win when God is on both of their sides?!

The battle between these two semi-supreme beings is simply one of words. No making up the rules as they go like in Yu-gi-oh. No holier than thou righteous bullshit like Ash flings at his Pokemon rivals. Well, maybe there is some holier than thou bullshit between these two. But it's different than Ash's my shit don't stink mantra. Their philosophical sniping might interest some readers so I'll paraphrase their conversation.

The Spectre: "You gave birth to me!"
The Phantom: "John Stuart Mills!"
The Spectre: "You killed me!"
The Phantom: "I'm a tool!"
The Spectre: "World War II!"
The Phantom: "I'm on a mission from God!"
The Spectre: "I'm the Spirit of Vengeance!"
The Phantom: "I did it all for love!"
The Spectre: "Liar!"
The Phantom: "Am not!"
The Spectre: "Christ killer!"
The Phantom: "You don't know me!"
The Spectre: "You don't know yourself!"
The Phantom: "NOOOOOOOOOO! Oh God!"

I think The Spectre wins.

Meanwhile Doctor Thirteen is visited by The Question! And I've decided to become a superhero too! You can call me "The Exclamation"! The Question turns declarative statements into questions! What a superb power! And he does it without a mouth! Holy heck! That's incredible! It's literally the most amazing thing I've ever seen! The Question believes he can get Doctor Thirteen to betray The Phantom Stranger! No way! I bet it doesn't happen!

Back to The Phantom Stranger and The Spectre, their verbal disagreement ends in cannibalism. The Spectre swallows The Phantom Stranger. But these two guys are way too powerful to defeat each other. So after a few more tricks back and forth and a few more insults tossed around, The Font in the Sky finally breaks it up.

I was wondering when this Font was going to show up again.

The Font turns into the Terrier and berates the two biggest cosmic babies in the DCnU. "Play nice," he barks and that's that. Except The Stranger still doesn't know where his family have gotten to. Until the phone rings and Dr. Thirteen is on the other end of the line telling The Stranger that someone named The Question might have had something to do with the kidnappings.

The Phantom Stranger #5 Rating: No change. A lot of bluster and speculation about who The Stranger and The Spectre are and what their roles are. The Dog in the Sky clears up The Spectre's role: he's the the Dog in the Sky's instrument for justice. But The Stranger is still just some jerk that fucks people over. I guess the Dog in the Font doesn't care to explain why he wants to completely screw some people. Better off to keep the uglier pieces of Cosmic Business a secret.

Phantom Stranger #0

I don't imagine this is going to be a proper Origin story. He's got STRANGER right in his name! I don't think we're supposed to know much about him. We're supposed to read a story where he appears and he interacts with someone and then the story is over and the reader goes, "Hmm. That was odd. I mean strange!"

The comic begins with the man that would become The Phantom Stranger having hanged himself because he couldn't come to grips with the guilt he felt from a terrible crime he committed. If he wasn't such a white guy that was going on about disagreeing with Hell in the scripture, I'd say he was Judas. But since he looks way too modern and has a concept of Hell, I suppose he merely has a Judas Complex.

He's found himself in some sort of afterlife with two other people. They're all being judged by a Council of Wizards.

I suppose that's Pandora but I don't know who the shirtless guy is. Maybe it's Barry Allen after causing Crisis on Infinite Earths. And the Council of Wizards is DC's editors.

They're really trying to make it seem as if it's Judas!

Nah. He probably screwed over his business partner in his law firm.

And then they throw silver coins at him and they form a necklace for him to bear as witness to his crime for all eternity. So fuck. They win. I guess he's Judas. Now I'm going to make a little purple hat and cape for my cat, Judas, and call him Phantom Stranger.

The Phantom Stranger is sentenced and he wakes up back where he accepted the blood money. A glowing font in the sky instructs him to wear the purple robe nearby. And then the glowing font has one more message for him:

Okay, so he shouldn't be walking for too long. He only did God's work by betraying Jesus. He had the hardest, most important job of all and he's being punished for it? If he'd refused to betray Jesus, where the fuck would Christianity be? Oh, wait! He should be punished for helping spead it.

After a couple thousand years wandering, the font in the sky speaks to the Phantom Stranger again. It tells him to seek out Jim Corrigan. Is Corrigan somehow linked to the third person being punished? Or was the third person the Specter and he's soon to be linked to Corrigan? Because that's all this comic needs is two weird, wandering, no-point, mystical losers looking for some kind of redemption! The issue should end like an after-school special: "The power of forgiveness was there all along within your own heart!"

Corrigan's dame has been kidnapped and the Phantom Stranger assures him that he can help rescue her. But since The Phantom Stranger really did know much more than Jack Shit, he really shouldn't have made Corrigan any promises.

I bet that font in the sky told The Phantom Stranger to betray Jesus too!

After The Specter is created, the Font in the Sky (I better start capitalizing that!) sends it away to begin judging other people. The Phantom Stranger was once again used just like when he was used to put Jesus on the cross. Once this betrayal is complete, one of his coins drops from his necklace. Just 29 more missions to go! And the Next Month box says Trigon! I hope Raven makes a guest appearance.

The Phantom Stranger #0 Rating: Manipulaty!

Edit for those ready to barrage me with answers to the Trinity of Sin: I checked out the Free Comic Book to get the low-down on that whole shebang. So the third guy is The Question. Kind of weird but okay. I actually walked right past my comic book store on Free Comic Book day this year and thought, "Bah, I don't need a free comic weighing me down on my walk downtown!" What a dumb jerk I am! If anybody has an extra copy and wants to send it to me, I'll be waiting!