Tangent Comics: The Atom #1 (December 1997)

This guy looks as heroic as a freshman math tutor.

Tangent Comics: The Atom #1 (October 1st, 1997)
By Dan Jurgens, Paul Ryan, Pat Garrahy, and Dave Lanphear
Cover by Dan Jurgens and Paul Ryan
Edited by Frank Berrios, Dana Kurtin, and Eddie Berganza

Some of you dimwits probably think of math tutors as heroic because you have trouble dividing things by zero but I want you to know that I meant that as an insult to The Atom. Also the dividing things by zero bit is a joke that all the math tutors reading this didn't get because they were instantly angry at me. Most of us know you can't divide things by zero because we're told that and we have to repeat it back as if we believe it but we all know that if you divide something by zero you get infinity. It's just logic, man! I didn't make the way the human brain works by refusing to learn actual things and chooses instead to believe the things it thought were right before actually being told what was right. I will go to my grave believing that dividing by zero equals infinity and Pop Rocks plus Coke will blow your stomach wide open.

Anyway, The Atom never had a chance of being good looking, hip, or cool because he was drawn and created by Dan Jurgens, an artist and writer who hasn't had an original thought since 1987. It's not his fault! That's just the last year his model received any software updates. Luckily this was written in 1997 so it's only ten years past Jurgens pop culture, fashion, and trends blind spot. But I'd be willing to bet Dan Jurgens could have written this in 2027 and not realized how spectacularly square it would be.

Do the kids still use the term "square"? I haven't had a proper software update since 1977.

"Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's . . . ah, who cares?"

I just realized that Superman bit where people looked up amazed to see him doesn't really work. It's taken me all this time to realize it, probably because I'm the sort of person who refuses to believe my math tutor. Who walks around yelling, "Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird!"? Obviously far less people than scream, "It's a plane!" Even though screaming, "It's a plane!", at the idiot who just looked up in the sky excited to see a bird when he was really looking at a plane is absolutely understandable. The only time anybody should have been shouting excitedly while looking at the sky was when they saw Superman so they should have just yelled, "Look! Up in the sky! It's Superman!" Then it would be more understandable to have people follow up with, "It's a plane!" or "It's a bird!" The whole Superman "Up in the sky!" catchphrase was simply written backwards!

"Look! Up in the sky! It's Superman!"
"NO, it's a plane!"
"You idiot! It's a bird!"

I just described this revelation to my friend Doom Bunny who tried to then explain the concept to me as if I didn't get it before I could convince him I understand the conceit but only now realized it didn't make any realistic sense. Then I also realized: "Metropolis is a massive city. Maybe seeing a bird is exciting! And then proclaiming it's a plane and then Superman are just subsequent levels of disappointment in not seeing a bird!"

Ahem. Moving on.

The President secretly watches The Atom (who looks suspiciously like Booster Gold but with dark hair and different coloring (mostly I'm talking about how you can see every muscle under his suit but somehow can't see the outline of his dick and balls) as he searches Metropolis for The Fatal Five, the criminals who killed his father! For this is The Atom III, the most human looking Atom of them all! I guess Atom II looked like a little guy with lightning bolts for ears and Atom I looked like an ant wearing clothes.

Ignore the unrecognizable Fatal Five. Check out his crotchless crotch in the upper left corner!

The Fatal Five in the Tangent Universe are more like The Fearsome Five in that they exist in the 20th Century and they also have a little guy on their team. But instead of Gizmo, the little guy on The Fatal Five is Kid Psycho which means he's based on Doctor Psycho, I guess? This universe is confusing! Instead of Doctor Light (not to be confused with Doctor Psycho who, as far as I know, isn't a total pedo), The Fatal Five have The Shadow Thief, I guess? That sort of makes sense! I guess Deathstroke replaces Mammoth or, if you were a snarky genius, you can point out that Deathstroke replaces Gizmo since this Deathstroke has whirling blades on his wrists which are the dictionary definition of a gizmo. I suppose Count Viper replaces Psimon because they're both arrogant jerks with psychic powers (again I'm prone to assumption; I don't know for sure that this "vampire" has psychic powers). And lastly, Ice replaces Shimmer because who cares.

During this battle, we learn that The Atom III has Firestorm powers except better because he can turn organic things like Count Viper's face into another organic thing like tapioca pudding. It's pretty disgusting and somehow doesn't kill Count Viper.

I guess he's immortal and now has to live with tapioca face.

The president, concerned with Shadow Thief on the loose with some kind of teleportation technology and the dangers of The Atom III tearing everything apart to hunt him down, demands his people get to the bottom of whatever the fuck is going on. He's all, "We run this country!" Mostly he says that for the perfect segue to shift scenes to Nightwing's leaders laughing uncontrollably and slightly pissing themselves as they spy on President Schwartz. Yes, that's his name. It is. I swear it is.

Somehow, the president isn't the only one spying on The Atom III. I guess his exploits are simply being televised to everybody and the President just happened to be watching along with everyone else? This is because The Atom III, no relation to Booster Gold, has a robot flying about him streaming live video and audio via a pirate signal to everybody's television sets across the country. And it must send the feed into the past because it gives everybody who knows the real identity of Atom III the chance to get their asses to the Fatal Five's hideout and confront The Atom III as he emerges from the battle.

President Schwartz is worried about teleportation technology getting into the hands of a criminal but it looks like every Tom, Dick, and the other guy already owns the technology.

Most of this will probably be explained by Jurgens in that The Atom III just happened to make his debut in the same city where he works (probably at the newspaper) and everybody knows him and also The Fatal Five live there as well because it was a convenient locale to kill his father from. But what I'm worried he won't explain is why his grandmother is Judy Garland.

So the camera was the president's spy device but that doesn't explain how the other people saw what was happening and how they knew he had a spy camera following him (supposedly they knew because they saw the video feed. But now I have to reassess that assumption and just believe those normal jerks observed the "micro-cam" before the super hero could). The President calls up the files to find out more about The Atom III since this is the first time they've every encountered him even though they had a spy camera following him around. I suppose if I want to do Jurgens' job for him, I could fill in the blanks and believe that every city in the United States is just infested with micro-cams waiting to pick up news like this. Although then why would the bystanders believe The Atom III had a micro-cam following him to record his exploits instead of understanding that they live in a surveillance state? I guess maybe they just don't know that and only see micro-cams when they're following a hero around?

Why am I doing this?! Writing this comic book isn't my job! I'll just assume anything worth explaining will be explained later. Like how The Atom, Arthur Harrison Thompson, got his super name! My guess is that it's because he received atomic powers when he was irradiated by the first atomic bomb ever tested! Right?!

Oh fuck off.

The bigger mystery now is how was Judy Garland attracted to that?!

The president watches Nightwing's history of the events of the early '60s that led to the Cuban Missile Crisis. These doctored files and movie reels suggest that the first Atom was a hero that stopped a Soviet nuclear bombing of Florida from Cuba into devolving into a full out nuclear apocalypse. But judging by what Shadow Thief said earlier, my guess is that the real event was The A. Thom. went to help, couldn't control his powers. blew up Florida himself, and The Metal Men had to save the day. Or nobody saved the day and America just never launched their nukes because they knew A. Thom. had made a huge whoopsie. But they needed people to hate the Communists and love America so they lied about what really happened. I'm so glad this is just a fictional account of American history!

At least this answers my most pressing question: he fucked Judy costume on and rotting, irradiated dick out.

Just kidding! The A. Thom. became so popular that even Marilyn Monroe had to be caught fucking him no matter how ugly he looked or putrid he smelled! Eventually he got Judy Garland pregnant and disappeared from the public view to raise their child together on the moon. Nobody knew this until 1969 when America faked the fake moon landing and actually landed on the moon. Nobody noticed until Armstrong was halfway through his rehearsed line when he noticed the glowing yellow mansion just dozens of feet away from him. I, for one, would like to believe that NASA looked at the moon at least once before sending a bunch of humans to it. But what do I know? I read fucking comic books.

Not realizing he's a comic book character and the exposition wasn't for him but the readers, President Schwartz complains about the intel.

The Atom III goes off to pout because he blew his big debut. He cries about how bland his life was growing up in the suburbs without a father (at least after they moved from the moon). He beats himself up for letting Shadow Thief, his father's murderer, get away. But then he meets a little girl who is all, "I like reading old shit comics instead of using computers!" And Dan Jurgens, I mean The Atom III is all, "Me too! Old stuff is where it's at! New stuff is scary and I can only hold it in my RAM for a limited amount of time!" Then he flies away thinking about how to tell young children about his family life. Just in case it comes up a second time!

No, it's a plane! No wait! It's just a bird! Darn!

The Atom III sees a news report about how The Batman (or whoever he is in this universe) has been stymied while trying to find a cure for AIDS. The Atom III is all, "Man, I'd love to help with that but right now, I've got more important things to do! Like find out what Shadow Thief meant about my family being huge failures!" I know that sounds like I'm levelling some major critical side-eye at The Atom III's decision to forgo helping cure AIDS because he has his own personal shit going on but, I mean, isn't that just life? Luckily some people's personal curiosities and desires just happen to align with making the world a better place. But not mine and not The Atom III's so I can't fault him here.

I mean, obviously I'm judging the shit out of him! He fell backwards into powers that allow him to make a man live the rest of his life with tapioca face. Of course he can take a weekend to cure AIDS!

Tangent Batman's theory is that he's so smart he should have found a cure for AIDS himself but since he hasn't, it means somebody is sabotaging his efforts! And we all know Batman, even Batmen from other dimensions, is always fucking correct.

Why does he relate Red Tornado with AIDS? Was Red Tornado a sexbot meant to spread a deadly sexually transmitted disease to all commies, peaceniks, and nonconformists?

I should point out, even if it was in one of my previous scans, that The Atom III's secret identity is Adam Thompson. So we know he took the name Atom because it's his first name, Adam. And we know the first Atom took the name because of his first initial and first half of his last name: A. Thom. But how did The Atom II get his name?! It will forever remain a mystery!

The Atom III, in need of answers to his many questions like "How do I explain my dysfunctional family to a strange child?", visits his grandfather who now lives on a yacht. That's why Nightwing could never find him! Because yachts, like, mover around and shit. Really hard to track down and pinpoint! But since Nightwing are keeping an eye on The Atom III, they now know where old Gramps has been hiding. They anonymously alert Shadow Thief to A. Thom and The Adam III's location so that he'll murder them.

After some nuclear missiles are launched at the yacht by Shadow Thief breaking into an American military installation, Adam and A. Thom. fly off to confront him and end him once and for all. Except Adam doesn't want to end him just yet. First, he wants to know what the big secret is! And while Gramps refuses to confess, Shadow Thief does it for him.

The real story: A. Thom. killed the sergent in charge of keeping him locked up on base (Shadow Thief's father, of course) and then flew to Cuba. The Cubans, thinking he was a missile, launched nukes at Florida. America launched nukes at Cuba. Everybody launched nukes at everybody else. A. Thom. stopped the long ranged missiles but couldn't stop the ones that destroyed Florida and Cuba. So the official story was close enough and the only one the Americans could tell because it made other people seem like the cause of the problem. So typical American history.

The Ranking!
Why the fuck am I still calling this part "The Ranking" when I don't even rank my comic books anymore?! I haven't done that for over eight years! It probably has something to do with my grandfather whose name was ArTHEr RANKINGSberg.

When I first purchased a few Tangent comics from the Local Comic Book Store, I skipped over this one because it was written by Dan Jurgens. I'm not anti-Dan Jurgens. But I'm also not looking to read anything more than I already own by him. He doesn't do the art in this book although he did the "art layouts". Which is why the entire book looks like Dan Jurgens drew it after four beers and a shot of tequila. The art and character design are very much Dan Jurgens but there's just something sloppy about the overall finish. And that's that I've always thought a lot of Dan Jurgens' art was a bit sloppy, especially when he tries his hand at foreshortening characters legs or arms as they take up flying poses. They often just look like people born with baby limbs rather than a body looking shorter as it moves back towards the horizon or stretches out closer to the viewer. This book is not one I would have remembered if I'd read it in 1997. Other than the whole "I'm named the Atom because some military rank and file put a plaque on my door that read A. Thom." Hilarious, Mr. Jurgens.

I've just had another look at the art and I want to apologize to Paul Ryan. Some of it does look quite finished and distinctive of a style that isn't just "I'm inking Dan Jurgens' unfinished concept art." My guess is Dan, in doing "art layouts", didn't actually sketch out every panel and many of these panels have no Dan Jurgens in them at all. But then I'm not an art guy so what the fuck do I know?!

The Atom Rebirth #1

Time for the Atom without a military rank.

I've never read a Ryan Choi comic book other than Convergence (which, as I've noted before, doesn't count. Convergence never counts. It was awful and the only part of DC's vast continuity that I completely and utterly reject). Even if I had been reading comic books when Ryan Choi emerged on the scene, I would not have read a Ryan Choi comic book. Not because I'm racist (although I probably am, being half-white and half-Spanish with the ability to pass as full white so I'm just fucking white, okay? I mean, I know some Spanish like mal niño and cállate and pedazo de mierda thanks to the things my Grandmother used to scream at me. What I should describe myself as, since it totally gets to my DNA makeup, is Californian) but because I hate the character The Atom. You might be thinking, "Didn't I just read this commentary?" No, no! That was Captain Atom! I also hate him. Maybe I just don't like science.

This issue begins with Ryan Choi moving into his dorm room in college. Just his luck, he winds up with a roommate who will be his super-villain nemesis, Adam Cray. I don't know what super-villain he will be but isn't that how these kinds of stories work? He'll probably be The Atom's opposite which is probably Elemental Jerk. That's opposite for reasons I don't have time to explain right now.

I took rugby in college. Never went to a class and was too lazy to do the paperwork to drop it. I got a B.

I say a lot of untrue and exaggerated stories for effect and for the joke so I should probably amend the above caption with "True story." Apparently the rugby coach simply gave everybody on his roster who came to the final an A and everybody else on the class roster got a B. My friend Soy Rakelson got an A, the little responsible kiss ass.

Ryan Choi's only class that matter is kinematics. That means something scientific, possibly the study of the movement of cows. Whatever. The class isn't the important bit. The important bit is that the teacher is Ray Palmer. He's normal white male heterosexual The Atom. I added the normal there to piss you off. Sorry about that.

This is a lecture class on the first day. How the fuck does Professor Palmer know Ryan Choi's name? Fucking pervo stalker, probably.

Even by the end of the semester, a professor never knows every student's name in a lecture class. Here's how they decide which students to take an interest in and whose names they'll learn. After the first big test or essay assignment, they make a note of all of the students who said intelligent things on their papers. Then the next class, they'll say, "I'd like to put a few faces to some of these names." Then they'll read out a bunch of names of the people who impressed them and remember who they are so they can call on them for intelligent discussion and ignore all the other blockheads who turned in shitty assignments. Now you know why your teacher never remembered who you were!

Another way to be noticed by your teacher in a lecture hall is to go to your Children's Lit class dressed as Alice Cooper in Wonderland carrying the bloody, cut off head of the white rabbit. Again, true story. A lot of students had to ask me what the costume was. All of my teachers knew instantly. Except my Creative Writing professor. She was blind.

One year later, Ray Palmer decides to question Ryan Choi's motives for studying science. That doesn't seem like the purview of the kinematics professor but then maybe he's also a counselor or dean of something or other. Also, he might just be a pervo stalker who wants to experiment on Ryan Choi. Because who will miss the student from Hong Kong with no nearby family when the miniaturization process disintegrates him?

Ryan Choi is all, "I just want to not be asthmatic!" And Ray Palmer is all, "I think there's more to it than that! Like how you've allowed me to get all of these science awards on the back of your genius!" I'm starting to think Ray Palmer has a serious ulterior motive to his stupid question if it's that obvious why Ryan Choi is pursuing science. Because he's Goddamned fucking great at it?!

If any of my professors had ever gotten this intimate with me, I'd have dropped the class and/or slept with them.

Instead of contacting the colleges head of human resources to report Ray Palmer's stalkery attraction to him, Ryan Choi says, "I want to prove to people that small penises matter!" And Ray Palmer said, "Did you say small penises?" And Ryan said, "Things! Small things matter!" That's when Ray Palmer says, "You're ready! I told that fucking Batman that I could get a sidekick too! But he was all, 'Nooooooo waaaay! Who wants to be with Tiny Man?! Not even your stupid ex-wife who is going to kill Sue Dibny! Unless that has already happened. Or will happened. Or...you know what? Who cares? Nobody cares about you, The Atom!'"

Ray Palmer reveals himself to be The Atom. He also reveals his mission statement: to beat up those fucking butterflies before they have a chance to cause a hurricane. I knew he was a pervo stalker but I guess he's insane as well.

Even though it's totally weird and crossing a personal line between teacher and student that probably shouldn't be crossed (although not quite as bad as the line Adam Strange crossed with Alanna), Ryan Choi accepts. He'll be a sidekick! And, eventually, the main hero when Adam Cray destroys Ray Palmer! I guess Adam Cray is going to become Butterfly Guy.

A year later, Ryan and Ray go out to celebrate. They have some alcohol but Ryan points out the only drink he's not allergic to is Poire Williams. I don't know what that is but I think I have the Asian Flush. I often get intensely sick from sinus shit with just the smallest amounts of alcohol. But not always which is why I constantly tempt fate. I wonder if I should assume a whole bunch of things and now believe that drinking whatever Poire Williams is will solve my problem! I'll test it out and get back to myself!

A week after the drink with Ryan Choi, Ray Palmer disappears. Sometimes people disappear and it's nearly impossible to find them. Finding a guy who can shrink to microscopic sizes when he disappears? Super impossible to find him! Luckily, Ray Palmer left a video message for Ryan detailing exactly where he went. He found a microuniverse lying within a tear in the temporal nanostructure of the timeline. That must be where the Preboot Universe is! Or the Pre-Crisis universe! Or the other Pre-Crisis universe! Or the Post-Pre-Zero Hour universe! Or maybe it's just where Ray Palmer dies since Ryan doesn't find the message until a full week after Ray disappears. At least Ray left Ryan an Atom Belt so he can take over as The Atom after finding evidence that Ray Palmer was consumed by microscopic protozoa.

The Ranking!
It was a Rebirth issue! They're all kind of the same. But in that context, this was one of the better ones. Ryan Choi and Ray Palmer are now back in the DC Universe, even if it is only the Rebirth Universe. I'm sure it'll be all of the universes soon enough, after the Watchmen are defeated and everything coalesces back into one sort-of-cohesive-if-you-squint-funny universe.

Dark Knight Universe Presents: The Atom #1

Why is roided out Billy Batson wearing a Superman costume?

If I were The Atom, I would win every battle because I would make sure everybody knew my go-to move. I'd shrink down to microscopic size so that nobody could find me. I'd enter into the person's urethra. Then I'd explode into my normal size. I suppose that would probably kill any females so I might have to think up a different move to get them to surrender. Although I can't be sure because I don't really know how pee leaves a woman! I mean, I know it sprays out of them in such a way that it gets underneath the front of the toilet seat which they never lift so they don't realize just how disgusting they are until some guy leaves the seat up and then they see the mess and blame it on a guy. This is easily proven if you're a woman. After peeing, lift up the toilet seat and watch as your pee drips down the back of the toilet because it sprayed all over the bottom of the ring! How do you manage that?! You're sitting right there with everything practically already in the toilet! At least guys have an excuse because they have to aim about a foot away and also sometimes their urethra's opening is all gummed up from dried semen and it sprays all funky. Oh, also guys are fucking careless jerks who sometimes try to multitask while peeing and don't realize their penis isn't pointing exactly in the right direction. Although it's a lot more complicated than women realize! You try peeing with a fire hose! Especially a really small fire hose that practically points straight at the toilet tank! I mean, um, a really big fire hose that's totally too hard to control because it's so big and girthy and satisfying!

This is a tiny comic book! That means it needs a tiny review! And since changing the font size is too much work, I'll just keep this review short! Short is a synonym for tiny!

This tiny comic book begins with The Atom feeling sorry for himself in such a way that he shits all over science by showing how emotions don't obey general relativity or special relativity or any kind of relativity at all except maybe the relativity of love stinks. The great scientist J. Geils discovered that equation. J. Geils also pioneered the science of pissing on walls and freezing frames. And yet somehow, J. Geils has never earned the Nobel Prize.

Ray says a lot of things that sound like things Brian Azzarello loves to write. He likes to write...not quite puns so much but...well, I don't know. You can tell he loves words and their inherent ambiguities and double or triple meanings. He's a wordsmith in the most annoying way! Like Keith Giffen is a Dialogue Knotmaster. They don't make reading their stuff easy! I mean, this stuff by Azzarello is definitely easier to read than when Giffen is really going gangbusters at Giffening some nutty dialogue. So I guess I'm giving Azzarello a compliment? Maybe?

Lara Kent (unless she took her mother's last name which would make her Lara Woman) stops by with a jar full of miniature people and a favor to ask on their behalf.

I had to scan this page to see if the Kandorian actually had some tiny writing but it was only scribbles.

Dark Knight Universe Presents: The Atom #1 Rating: I'm not rating this! It's just supplemental to The Master Race comic book! It's totally adorable and a cute way to tell a story parallel to the main story. I said that I wasn't sure if DK III: The Master Race was worth more than $4.50 but now I have to admit that it's well worth the six dollars because it had a cute little free comic book inside of it! Everything is better when it has something inside of it that you weren't expecting! Unless that surprise is a fetus and that something is your significant other.

Convergence: The Atom #2

I said everything I had to say about Steve Dillon's artwork last commentary.

Last issue ended with Ray Palmer surprised to find that Ryan Choi has been living inside of his hand for the last year. That has to be sort of embarrassing, right? Hopefully he couldn't see out somehow and just thought Ray Palmer went on the lake in his rowboat a lot. Especially in the morning right after he woke up. Or in the shower. Or in a public bathroom stall in the middle of the day after seeing some nipples poking out of a particularly lovely sweater.

During that year, Ryan was able to communicate with Ray in such a way that Ray thought he was going crazy. Apparently Ryan was able to say everything except "Hello, Ray! This is Ryan Choi! I seem to be lodged in your right hand! Could you please masturbate with your left one until we can puzzle out this dilemma?"

Ray and Ryan don't have much time to figure out how this insanity happened because Ray's foe, Barracuda, isn't as dead or knocked out as he seemed to be at the end of last issue. Barracuda is back up on his flippity floppity feet and trying to kill Ray.

No, I'm looking through you and Ray finds you intangible. You are, indeed, a ghost, sir.

Ryan says that when he was murdered, he made a connection to "that other place." Ray guesses Ryan means heaven but Ryan says, "Ray. Physics." I don't know what that means! Does Ryan mean he's in the Anti-Matter Universe and the portal is in the palm of Ray Palmer's hand? See? Palmer? It's a clue!

Ryan only needs a tiny of a fraction of his brain power to beat up Barracuda, so while he does that, he's also thinking about Ryan's riddle.

I guess it's not the Anti-Matter Universe so much as the Extra-Matter Universe.

Ray decides that Ryan deserves a chance to live again. Ryan is all, "No! No! I've enjoyed living my life in the shadow of a white man!" And Ray is all, "No! I will not be a party to this injustice! I've been so gross and problematic this last year! You will be more than just an extension of me! You will be more than my right hand Asian sidekick!" Ray then tells Ryan to get ready because he's about to have a body!

Whoops! Ryan has been living in the other hand! You should have told him the plan was to get inside the hand he hasn't been getting into for the last year! Idiot!

Hopefully Ryan can reform Ray's hand into the shape of a man because life is going to be really awkward as a disembodied hand.

Ryan can and does! It's impressive! No, wait. I meant it's gross and disgusting. Ray's thumb becomes Ryan's head! I hope Deathstroke kills him again because I'll never be able to take Ryan Choi seriously. Ray probably used him to wipe his ass! Ryan's head has probably been inside Jean Loring's asshole!

What's wrong with being a cynic?!

Ryan enters one of Barracuda's pores and does something medical to him so that he can't polish his trident anymore. That's enough for the Atoms to declare victory and be teleported back to Gotham where their real opponent awaits: Deathstroke!

Ray wakes up in the hospital to find there's been no sign of Ryan Choi. But his hand is still missing which means that Ryan is still out there somewhere! Unless it was all a psychotic delusion and Ray sacrificed his hand for a hallucination. Although that's just what Tom Peyer wants us readers to think, the tricksy devil! Ryan has probably been down at the YMCA showering nonstop trying to get the smell of Ray's cock and balls off of himself.

Later, Deathstroke decides sneaking into a hospital room and murdering Ray Palmer in a backless gown is the fairest fight he'd like to get into at his age.

Get it?! Unarmed man?! Ha ha! Good one, Ray!

Ryan hops out of Ray's Shrinking Belt because he was lying in wait all this time! He knew Deathstroke would try to kill Ray! Somehow! Probably because he read the script beforehand. Hee hee. Before"hand"!

Speaking of hands, Ryan uses his new control over the Extra-Matter Universe to redistribute some of Deathstroke's mass to Ray Palmer. Ray gets his hand back and Deathstroke becomes...well, probably the biggest laughingstock at the Mercenary Ball.

His cock is going to look huuuuuuuge!

I suppose Deathstroke is placed in Arkham Asylum after this encounter because he's probably insane now and he probably has a new, wackier name like Tiny-Hand-Stroke. Ryan and Ray go off to start a Chuck E. Cheese. And that's it!

Convergence: The Atom #2 Rating: Surprise! Ryan Choi is alive again! Of course he's alive in a universe that no longer exists, so does it really matter? I still think seven of the worlds in this tournament are going to be moved to the seven question mark planets in The Multiversity Guidebook. So DC will once more have the Pre-crisis universe of Earths One and Two, the Post Zero Hour Universe, and the Pre-Flashpoint Universe. That leaves three extra worlds plus Telos. Maybe they'll save those for the next crisis that kills The New 52.

Divergence: Green Lantern
"'Renegade'! Beginning a new chapter in Hal Jordan's life as he becomes the universe's most wanted outlaw."

Just because Hal beat the shit out of Kilowog and stole one of the most powerful weapons in the universe, he's got to be labeled a bad guy? That doesn't seem cool. I suppose I'm going to have to buy into the conceit that Hal has turned himself into a martyr to preserve the Green Lantern Corps dignity and the respect the rest of the universe has for them. Or once had for them. Or will once again have had again.

That space cop from a recent Green Lantern, the one that totally disrespected Hal, has found Hal loitering in the orbit of his planet once again. This time he's bound to teach Hal a lesson and arrest him. He'll be a huge big shot in at least one, maybe two billionths of a sector. Hal turns it around on the guy and kidnaps him to Hal's ship, the Darlene. I bet he was a huge fan of Roseanne.

Be here next month for Green Lantern: Wiseguy!

Hal dumps the Chief in space and takes off. But he does leave the Chief with a beacon and a space suit so he can be rescued as soon as Hal is out of the Sector. And then Hal is off to continue his undercover work across the universe in his spaceship named Darlene! Yeee-haw!

Convergence: The Atom #1

"You had an Atom on you but I killed it."

As I picked this comic book up to scan it, I got my first real look at it and thought, "Ugh. Steve Dillon!" Then I checked the artists and didn't see Dillon and thought, "Oh, guess not." But then I pulled the comic out of the scanner to get a good look at it and saw Steve's name under the hand. I'm glad he's just the cover artist!

My guess when they began casting for AMC's Preacher was that they were going to match actors with Glen Fabry's covers. If they went by Dillon's art, they could just hire a bunch of clones and put different wigs on them. But then I decided to do a search to see if they've cast anybody yet and found that they have cast Jesse Custer and Tulip O'Hare.

Elizabeth Perkins has the exact shape of the one face Steve Dillon can draw!

Compare Elizabeth Perkins to the shape of the face on the cover of The Atom! Flatten the bottom of Perkins' chin a bit and they're nearly identical! Then when I saw a picture of Dominic Cooper, my mind was blown!

It's like I'm reading the comic book all over again!

My biggest regret when I'm on my death bed will probably be how there won't be enough time to list all of my regrets. All those people who die with the words, "I have no regrets!", on their lips are lying, soon-to-be-dead assholes! Even if I only had a few regrets to mention before death, nobody would be able to understand them through my incessant scream-weeping.

This is my last issue of the first week of Convergence! Soon I'll be able to read about the next Multiversal Thunderdome Match-up! Then I can grow steadily more and more bored with that one!

According to some nobody on the streets of Gotham during Speed Force #1, The Atom has gone crazy. Probably because he couldn't impress the ladies with that trick he does with his penis and his growing powers.

The issue begins with some kids trapped in a collapsed warehouse and The Atom arriving on the scene to save them.

They're less than thrilled about it.

The kids hope The Atom can help by going to get somebody who can help. But The Atom has a trick up his sleeve! Or in his glove! Not in his pants, asshole! He seems to have retained the power to make his hand grow! He digs the kids out with his elephant masturbating hand and then creeps them all out by trying to touch them with it. They take off while The Atom continues to speak with a voice in his head. Since this is the Ray Palmer Atom and I know Ryan Choi is supposed to be in this too, my guess is Ryan Choi is stuck as a teeny, tiny person inside Ray's brain. As for why just his hand grows? I don't know. I'm sure it's symbolic of some issue. Probably an onanistic issue. Not the real definition of "onanistic" which is pulling out during sexual intercourse which I'm surprised is in the dictionary judging by the way people have come to use it to mean having to do with masturbation which is the second dictionary definition and the way I just used it! Thanks, dogma, for making shit up that isn't actually in The Bible but which everybody now believes. Ignorant fucking priests just trying to control everybody through lies and misrepresentations of The Bible's text.

After rescuing the kids, Ray Palmer jumps in front of a news microphone to remind everybody that Slade Wilson is a dick. Slade Wilson just happens to be at home watching the local news which really causes me to lose respect for him. Watching the local news is the worst sin he's every committed.

Slade Wilson in his "disguise."

Wilson throws on his old costume so that people on the street will recognize him and stay clear as opposed to how he's pretty sure that out of his costume with his shaved head, they don't recognize him at all even though they all stay clear of him anyway. He hunts down The Atom and tries to blow him up. I bet Slade Wilson has a heart attack during this fight. Isn't he just an old man without his regeneration?

The Atom's imminent death is interrupted by Planet Brainiac's poem about how there can be only one city. And then The Atom is teleported out of the city to face Barracuda, one of the Extremists. I guess the editors at DC didn't really care how each writer got their chosen hero into battle with their chosen antagonist because the story reasons have been all over the place. Some were chosen. Some just happened to be attacked. Some have been transferred to a different location to fight. Some have just blundered into battle. At least according to Batgirl and Harley Quinn, lists of champions were provided to the city. I bet more of the process will be explained in the weekly Convergence title.

The Atom takes a moment before getting swept up into battle to see if Barracuda wants to join forces to take on Planet Brainiac. But since Barracuda is a bad guy, and a stupid one at that being that he's one of The Extremists (they aren't very smart, for the most part), he'd rather just kill The Atom. After that, he can just sit back and wait for the rest of The Extremists to win their battles.

Ray Palmer defeats his villain before the second issue even begins! I bet because the real battle will be with Deathstroke! Also, he's got to spend a lot of time finding out why Ryan Choi was living inside of his hand all of this time.

Ryan must have felt really awkward when Ray would masturbate.

Convergence: The Atom #1 Rating: Just because The Atom's hand can enlarge, why does it automatically make me think about masturbation? I might have a problem! I think you know when you've matured and become a real adult when you're not constantly snickering about masturbation. Not that I don't think masturbation isn't a serious subject! Masturbation itself isn't funny. It's an activity that everybody should engage in. If you want to please your future life partner (not to mention the dozens of sexual partners you'll have before you find your future partner), you really should know what pleases you. That advice might be more towards women since strong breezes will please most men. Some people think that masturbating steals your chi and destroys your creative energies. But I think masturbation clears your mind! Do it in the morning and you'll have several free hours where you won't be constantly thinking about sex. Unless a super hot person bends over in front of you while in the office or while getting your morning coffee. Then, of course, you'll have to go masturbate surreptitiously in a public bathroom. Just to, you know, get your mind right again.

It's after a summary like that when I get the most people asking me what I really thought of the comic book. But the thing is, you don't really care what I think about any of these comic books. What does my opinion matter? I'm just a big dope that spends an inordinate amount of time reading funny books that I barely even care about! My opinion is worthless! Better I just talk about self-pleasure.

Futures End #32

When did Galactus enter this story?

Are we at the big surprise reveal where we find out that there is a Brainiac above the normal Collector of Worlds Brainiac that is a Collector of Universes Brainiac? No? Okay. I guess we'll just read some more filler until then.

Five years in the Futures End future, people still wear puffy jackets and handlebar mustaches. I find that hard to swallow! Shouldn't everybody be wearing invisible skin warming plasticine which shows off every nook and cranny because in five years we'll all be above such bourgeois notions of nakedness, and everyone has stopped tittering relentlessly when they see other people's ding-dongs and doo-dads? That's how I see the future! A relentless onslaught of penises and vaginas passing by and nobody is turned on in the least, thanks to a daily Governmental cocktail composed of lithium, birth control, and diabetic medications. Oh yeah, we're all super fat and unhealthy in five years as well!

See? Fat and unhealthy! And Coke rules with an iron, yet mouth puckeringly sweet, fist.

This is the kind of dialogue that brings a comic book to life and helps the reader to feel they're sneaking a glimpse at a story that could possibly be taking place just on the other side of some wispy veil separating realities. It's not magical dialogue. It's not intellectual dialogue on profound themes. It's just an unimportant side character stating an opinion contrary to Plastique's opinion. I think, too often, a writer will want to put forth their own opinions of the world through the mouths of the characters instead of building characters with their own perspectives, perspectives that often differ with one another. And while some people might focus on the fact that a grown man has never had a slice of pizza, this pizza guy doesn't bat an eye at that and just points out, from his experience, she's giving a newbie the wrong slice. It's really just a throw away moment that many people might skim past while wondering when the action will start. But moments like this are important. Mundane moments with characters actually interacting with one another instead of being mouthpieces for the writer's opinions. This helps me to connect with the story and the characters. Now maybe when Plastique finally faces her demise, I might actually remember her excited face from this scene as she introduces pizza to a new friend, and her interaction with this working guy that makes sense, and I might fucking care a little bit.

Maybe. It's also possible I'll completely forget this scene in the next twenty minutes.

Terry McBatman is lucky she didn't make his face explode.

Judging by the above scene, I don't think Future-Brother-Eye-Infected Plastique was attacking Terry McBatman in Futures End issues zero and one. She was just trying to give him a kiss.

Cole Cash is busy trying to get his Earth-Main-Earth Registration Card so people will stop thinking he's a Twofer. Or so they stop thinking he's Lana Lang's husband. That could get him in trouble with Superman! Except this is Twofer Lana Lang and I don't think Superman gives a shit about Twofer Lana Lang. If only Cole's brother wasn't a gigantic corpse, they could use him as a character witness. Cole's only choice now is to deal with being thought of as the Earth-2 version of himself (even though he's from the Wildstorm Earth already! Right? The one that merged with the Vertigo and the Main Earth!) or spend six months in lockup as he waits for an inquiry into his origins.

My recommendation to Grifter is that he doesn't go to court. He doesn't want his history dredged up because does he really want to be reminded that he starred in the worst comic of the initial batch of New 52 comics?

The whole toilet seat up or down thing is Sexist Comedy 101 that I could rant about for hours. But since this repartee is adorable, I think I can let it slide this time.

Meanwhile, Fifty Sue becomes Mini-Deathstroke With Pigtails. And by "pigtails," I mean "two unbraided bunches of hair on opposite sides of Fifty Sue's head." Pigtails is easier to say.

The guy on the cover turns out to be what Dr. Yamazake has become. He's an incorporeal being with the power to control magnetism. So he built himself the Different-Enough-From-Galactus-To-Not-Be-Sued suit and begins plotting his revenge against The Justice League. Although can he really call it revenge when they've done nothing to him at all and every slight he believes they've committed against him is entirely made up in his own mind? Isn't that something other than revenge?

And finally, Ray Palmer's Stormwatch has arrived back at Earth. Or at least "an Earth." I'm sure it's not the Earth they think it is. I bet it's...PREBOOT EARTH! But before they can investigate it, Hawkman and The Engineer need to fuck.

The Engineer must be infected by a self-hating, low self-esteem causing virus because ick.

Ray Palmer's Stormwatch is intercepted by Father Time and taken aboard The Ant Farm, SHADE headquarters. They want The Engineer to help them defeat Brainiac and Father Time is willing to release every monster in The Zoo to get her. I guess next issue will be Godzilla versus Frankenstein! How come that was never a Universal Picture?

Futures End #32 Rating: +1 Ranking. Terry McBatman had better stop flirting with Plastique and get on with the Case of the Mister Terrific's Murderer (Hint: It will be Terry McBatman!). Mister Terrific is about to release his uSpheres into New York city and then that will be that. Lois Lane will get her hands on one and then she'll sync up her Brother Eye infected phone to her Brainiac infested uSphere and everybody can kiss the world goodbye. Then Lois will be all, "uSphere, find me the most authentic Indian cuisine in the area that delivers at one in the morning." And her uSphere will be all, "UNH UNH UNH TAKE IT, BROTHER EYE! TAKE MY FULL DATA STREAM!" And her phone will be all, "I HOPE YOU'RE USING WPA2 BECAUSE I DON'T WANT TO WIND UP WITH A SELF-REPLICATING EXECUTABLE!" And Lois will be, "I'm starving!"

Futures End #19

Power Girl making Slade Wilson Jelly™.

It's kind of nice to take a break from my Goggles Novella with these weekly comics where I can get back to using my other fake voice. That's this one, dumb dumbs! I'm so sick of you readers not paying attention. Take some more Ritalin, jerkos! Also, you heard me correctly. Those Futures End commentaries are a novella. That's probably why you won't find a lot of discussion about the comic books nor will you find a lot of discussion about Tom DeFalco's mother's vagina. Although you probably weren't aware there was a lot of discussion about that in my usual commentaries either. But that's because Tom DeFalco has moved on to who the fuck knows where and who the fuck cares. I certainly don't.

Oh god, I hope he didn't die! If he is dead, I'm sorry for being so cruel in my facetiousness, Tom DeFalco's mother's vagina.

Hey! Did you know that DC Comics was doing this big Futures End event?! It's really raising a lot of money for Dan DiDio's dick transplant. You see, he hasn't been using his brain so he decided to stick a dick in his skull instead. I wonder if he'll pop an eye out when that dick gets an erection?

Hey! Should I have added "guys" to my "heys"? That would make me fit in with all the other cool Tumbld kids, right? I wish they'd let me sit at their Recommended Blogs table. Fucking stuck up assbutts.

Hey! I like that. I'm going to do that in my real life too! Every time I have something to say, I'm going to shout, "Hey!"

Hey! Have you ever heard a kid whining in a grocery store and then begun to whine just like the kid but at an adult volume? I love doing that. I think it annoys people because adults should know better but fuck them. If they don't like it, stay out of public spaces! I didn't want your ears hearing my whines anyway. Stop leeching my soundwaves, you fucking parasites.

Hey! Can you believe The Key and his crew are finally inside Terrifitech? That only took like sixty years or something.

Hey! Don't you hate how people sometimes use extreme exaggeration in place of a joke? It's like, "Ha ha! He said 'sixty years'! As if the comic has been going so long! If only I could make the tears stop! Ha ha!"

Hey! I'm tired of typing "Hey!" so I'm going to stop now.

Hey! One more! For old times sake!

Hey! That was the one more. You didn't think the last one was the one more, did you? That would be stupid because I said, "One more" after saying that other "Hey!" which meant I needed one more from that point on. Dumb dumbs.

Oy! I probably shouldn't call people reading this blog "dumb dumbs," should I? That's rude. I won't apologize for it though because you didn't have to read the words "dumb dumbs." In fact, if you did read those words, you basically called yourself a dumb dumb. You should apologize to yourself.

Now that I feel more like myself, I can point out how Plastique was not doing what she was supposed to be doing. Instead, she was off looking for her cybernetic self from the future. I wonder if Plastique will become Harvest? I'm almost positive that when Plastique finds the cybernetic parts of her future self, they will fuse to her body and create the cybernetic version of herself from the future. That might seem impossible because that would mean that her cybernetic parts exist in a loop of time having never been created. But with a little more intelligent thought than the average dumb dumb has the capacity for, you'd realize that at some point in the future, Plastique's parts need replacing due to their age. One of the scientists who replace the parts will be all, "Why are these parts so run down?" And the other one will be, "Oh, probably because they've been forward and back through time. Kind of like John Locke's compass from Lost. But don't worry. We're going to replace every single part and throw these parts in the incinerator. That way, her parts begin and end here even though it looks like they're caught in an infinite loop of time." "Hunh?" says the third scientist who never understands anything they do but his parents had a lot of influence and got him this job. Basically he wears a lab coat and cashes his checks and stands around looking dumbfounded.

You call your cybernetic future self by whatever pronoun your cybernetic future self wants to go by even if you don't know what that is. But be careful! If you get the pronoun wrong, it is a viable excuse for others to end your career! Or at the very least, to regurgitate that stupid bullshit about apologies and accidentally stepping on toes.

That first scene with Batwing betraying The Key and Coil but not Plastique because he felt sorry for her took up seven whole pages! That might be a record for the length of one scene so far in Futures End.

Meanwhile, Lois Lane is still pondering publishing the secret identity of the new Superman because it's news and you can't sit on news! Plus her advertisers apparently expect major revelations. No, no they don't. They just expect lots and lots of clickthrus!

You know who are the worst people in the world? Those that clickthru ads! Stop encouraging them, you big dumb dumbs! Animated advertisements, pop up ads, ads that move all over the fucking place, ads that pop up on touch screens just when they know you're going to tap the screen...these things are all ruining the fucking internet! Forget the FCC giving companies the right to create a slow lane! Advertisers have already bogged down the entire fucking place!

I don't know. I think the world needs a Batman. But the world can give or take a Superman.

Meanwhile in space, Doctor Raymond Palmer receives a visit from a member of Planetary the Shadow Cabinet. Everybody remember those guys? They're the secret cabal behind Stormwatch. I don't know what they do or why they're needed. I suppose every group needs some kind of secret group that secretly runs their secret group and are secretly run by a secret, secret group themselves. That's just how things go when you're living in a comic book.

Oh! I forgot to mention this: Ray Palmer is being tapped to lead the next incarnation of Stormwatch. Seems like an odd choice since members of Stormwatch are usually really powerful and can do far more than just look smaller.

Later, Deathstroke doesn't die because Fifty Sue saves his life. Whatever deal she struck with Brother Eye keeps him and his machinations (machine nations?) away from her people. Her people are Deathstroke, Grifter, and Twofer Lana Lang. Some more people that might soon become her people are Voodoo and Grifter's sidekick, the Customer. I call him the Customer because he looks like the kind of guy that plays Dungeons and Dragons or Magic the Gathering. I have a friend that used to work for Wizards of the Coast and she always referred to guys who you can tell purchased WotC products as Customers.

Lois's article is terrible journalism. "In fact, there is no evidence whatsoever to suggest he's even alive." Ugh. Such poorly written, irresponsible twaddle! She might as well be writing for TMZ or Comicsverse.

Futures End #19 Rating: No change. Why don't those Shadow Lords do more with their super powerful selves? Instead, they have one job: to remind the new members of Stormwatch, when a Stormwatch team is wiped out, that Stormwatch was put together to watch for storms. Especially the Brainiac storm! When does the Fifty Sue One Shot come out so we can learn all about her? Why didn't she get her own Futures End issue? Why is Lois Lane such a money grubbing jerk? I mean, I don't care that she publishes the news that Shazam is actually Superman. But to write a sentence that begins "in fact"? That's the kind of lazy bullshit I would pull! Hey! Maybe I can be the greatest journalist in the world!

Batman Loves Superman #10

I already find this story unbelievable. Bruce only allows two things to enter his body: microscopic Alfred Pennyworth and Catwoman's strap-on.

I see Jeff Lemire has taken over the writing duties on this comic book, at least for one issue. Who does Jeff Lemire think he is? Charles Soule?! How many comic books can he write each month? I mean good comic books! Obviously you can write a lot of comic books each month if you don't give a shit about the quality of your stories. Right, Scott Lobdell?

I've written a lot of commentaries (how many comic books has The New 52 released? That's how many! Plus some Marvel books) over the last two years and gained a lot of bias toward certain writers. Right, Scott Lobdell? So I think it might be time for an Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea Reboot! Forget everything I've ever written previous to this point (except the stuff I've written for Green Lantern. Green Lantern is impervious to rebooting for some reason)! Forget how many times I cursed Tom Defalco's mother's vagina or Scott Lobdell's father's fertility! From now on, I will forget all of DC's past sins! I'm dying on the cross for these bastards and muttering, "Forgive them, DC Fans. They know not what they've done." Or something. Whatever the quote is. How should I know? I've forgotten everything that happened right up until this period! I mean exclamation point!

My reboot was called by Fleshpoint! That's where I masturbated so fervently that I whacked my head on a coffee table and forgot everything I knew prior to Fleshpoint. Although I somehow retained my memories of everything that has happened in The New 52 so far, I've conveniently forgotten how various writers and artists tried to ruin my experience of it.

The first page of this issue is an advertisement for Jeff Lemire's past and current DC work.

Let's see...this comic is called Batman Loves Superman and Lemire's trying to make me think Superman is on the scene. That means it must be Batman!

Actually, it is Superman. I guess Jeff Lemire is one of those hack writers that depends on comic book cliches! And there's no bigger cliche than saying something about a bird and then something about a plane and then something about Superman. That was already old when my mom was giving blow jobs in her junior high school boy's bathroom.

1960s Junior High School Boy: "Look in my pants, Tess's mom!"
Tess's Mom: "Is it a bird?"
1960s Junior High School Boy: "Nope! It's not a plane either! It's my Superman!"
Tess's Mom: "Ew. Looks like your Superman choked on some yogurt, Barry Allen. Who's next?"

Superman needs Dr. Ray Palmer's help because Batman picked up some deadly something while visiting the Chinese Space Station. That'll teach Batman not to drink the water aboard a foreign space station. You'd think Batman would not have picked up some kind of bug while in space because he was probably wearing a closed system spacesuit. He probably had to take his shoes off before entering the space station. Wait, is that a Japanese thing? It's not that I'm racist and think all Asians are the same! I can tell the difference between Koreans and Indians! It's just that I've forgotten so much due to Fleshpoint!

I forgot to elaborate on why Superman needs Ray Palmer to help Batman get better. Although do I really have to? You've seen the cover! It's time for an Incredible Journey! Superman used his ridiculous sounding "microscopic vision" to scan Batman for Chinese Space Parasites when Batman collapsed into a coma after returning from Chinese Space.

Isn't this how Sue Dibney died?

Dr. Palmer outfits himself in his Shrink Gear and Superman doesn't show any symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder when he sees how much he looks like Atomica. Superman also tries to force Ray Palmer to think up a superhero name right on the spot! Why the fuck can't Ray Palmer just be Ray Palmer, scientist? Why does he have to be a weirdo freakazoid like Superman? Not everybody likes to dress up in skin tight outfits and parade their jiggly bits around town for everyone to gawk at while asking to be called some crazy name like Superjunk or Batmeat.

Ray and Clark shrink down and head into Batman's brain to explore Batman's new Brain City. You know, I've been to China! I wonder if I have a brain city in my brain now! Batman's was erected in the part of the brain that controls sleep which is why he's in a coma. Mine may have been erected in the part of the brain that controls inhibition which is why I write such personal stuff on the internet! Like how I whacked my head while masturbating and how my mother charged two Hostess Cupcakes a pop for blow jobs in the bathroom in junior high!

Once inside Batman's head, Superman loses his Shrink Helmet because nobody wants to read about Superman without being able to look at his masculine jawline and super cute hair curl. Ray Palmer believes the city is actually a spaceship that just looks like a city surrounded by an alien jungle. That makes sense if you live in a comic book, I guess. Who am I to judge what makes sense at this point when I've already bought into the journey into Batman's brain part of the story?!

Once inside the Batman's Brain City, Superman and Ray meet one of the natives.

Such Western propaganda! The white alien always has to solve the problems of the blue, jungle aliens!

And just to prove my point that I'm not overreacting like most people but reacting just right like I always do, the next page confirms that it's all about race!

And since Ray Palmer's universal translator isn't quite translating properly, I'm sure "pink-skin" was really a very nasty word! One so nasty that even grown ass, oversensitive adults can't bear to say it out loud when simply having a normal discussion on the word.

The microscopic super villains attacking Superman are called Dr. Smashammer and Titan Super Gladiator! I think Ray Palmer's translator is only able to translate alien languages into Japanese first and then into other languages.

As Titan Super Gladiator rips the Shrink Belt from Superman's waist, I realize that Karl Kerschl must not have been reading the script as he was doing the art earlier. Superman was looking at a helmet when he was asking Ray Palmer about the shrink technology and Ray explained it was called a Shrink Belt. So I think Superman was never supposed to wear a helmet at all! The Shrink Belt was all he needed. Anyway, when Titan Super Gladiator tears the belt from Superman, it ejects Gladiator from Batman's brain and causes him to grow to regular Earth proportions. It does not cause Superman to do the same though which seems like a fault in the equipment somehow. Now how is Superman supposed to grow big again?! I would expect not wearing the Shrink Belt to cause him to not be shrunk?

Superman takes out Dr. Smashammer after uttering another cliche Superman phrase, "That actually hurt." Is this Lemire guy a total hack or what?!

Anyway, now that the action scene is over, Ray Palmer sets up his P.R.I.M.P. because S.H.A.D.E. loves acronyms. That's why S.H.A.D.E. stands for Super Hero Acronym Definition Entities. I don't know exactly what the P.R.I.M.P. does because Ray is going to explain it as he tells Superman what it stands for. And I want to guess at what it stands for before I read what it stands for! But that's going to be hard since I don't know what it does! It must be something that makes small things larger and extracts them from brains! So it's probably a Portable Restorative Inverse Matter Projector.

I guess inducing reductions can be thought of as primping? At least I got the "portable" part correct!

The P.R.I.M.P. shrinks down the city and places it inside an empty Ant Farm. Superman puts that helmet on that he was wearing previously so that they can speak via radio. Also so Superman doesn't suck down any of Batman's blood which is probably just chock full of Fear Toxin. Batman might be immune to this stuff by now but to Superman, it would be like receiving shitty gifts from the white man.

Meanwhile, Batman wakes up just in time to be called the P-Word.

Reacting violently to a verbal insult is not responding "appropriately." Although reacting violently to the creature violently attacking Batman probably is. I guess I should cut Batman some slack since he did just awaken from a coma.

Batman pounds the shit out of Titan Super Gladiator while insulting his intelligence, his fighting techniques, and his looks. I would say Batman is a huge asshole committing a hate crime except this creature did just try to kill him. I think it's probably acceptable to spew derogatory comments at somebody that's trying to kill you. Of course, that's just what I think! Don't think anybody else in this humorless, reactionary society we live in is going to let a victim off the hook for being mean.

That's Titan Super Gladiator to you, Superdick.

After everything is wrapped up somewhat messily, Superman feels optimistic about Ray Palmer and his possible new super hero name of The Atom and all of his shrinking technology. Batman, on the other hand, feels paranoid and grumpy about it. He also has the nerve to "humph" all over Ray Palmer's choice of the name The Atom when he calls himself The Jeezly Crow Batman. Although the "humph" might be directed more toward the fact that somebody named "Atomica" fucked with Superman's brain using the same kinds of powers. He also might remember, just a little bit, how Sue Dibny died.

Also, Batman is right to be paranoid. He's always right! It's so Goddamned tiresome!

Well there go all the secret identities!

Batman Loves Superman #10 Rating: +2 Ranking. See how this can be done? See, DC? A story that takes place in a single issue of a single comic book series! I didn't think y'all had the technology to do it but this hack writer, Jeff Lemire (whoever he is!), was capable of it! Perhaps he just didn't know that it was impossible and so he was able to do it. Plus, this single issue, self-contained story opens up possibilities for future stories and problems further down the line. Also, it dealt with S.H.A.D.E. because Frankentstein, Agent of S.H.A.D.E., should never have been cancelled. Dumb dumb comic book readers that don't know how to purchase and read the correct comic books!

Earth 2 #16

How long is a populace going to obey a Trickster God when every command is just going to end in somebody sitting on a whoopee cushion? Although it's yet to be proven in clinical trials, fart noises do eventually stop being funny.

Remember when there were comic books that were about ongoing stories and were not about villains that had hardly been showcased yet in The New 52? Those times are back again! At least for a month before everything goes Year Zero on us. So enjoy it while it lasts! I'll enjoy it later when I read a good comic book. Until then, I'll read the mediocre comic book that is Earth 2!

This is how the issue begins:

Aww. It looks like somebody was all ready to pose for a lenticular cover and didn't get a callback.

The next two pages show the World Army assaulting Dherain and Steppenwolf too! Which, if you're keeping track with a calculator (I don't expect you to do math in your head), that makes two panels in three pages. I suddenly have a tremendous pain in my wallet and a burning hatred and resentment for DC Comics and James Robinson. Don't take your quarrel out on me by giving me less story! I want to see lots and lots of words! And also lots and lots of Nicola Scott's artwork. And having her copy and paste a bunch of World Army ships across two pages isn't what I paid for! Well, I guess it is what I paid for. But it's not what I would have paid for if I had any dignity! Although she did draw all the little tiny individual people that just look like crucified rocketeers. That's cute.

Well trepan me and fuck me directly in the nucleus accumbens! Page four and five are ANOTHER double page spread! So that's three panels across five pages! Everything in this story so far could have played out in one page. A single page! Hell, a single page by Keith Giffen would have three times as many panels as have been in the first five pages of this comic book so far! If anybody is out there...if anybody is reading these words, I convey this warning: do not purchase Earth 2 #16 at cover price! Haggle it down to at least 50% off! The first seven pages with ten panels amount to five words: Steppenwolf defeats the World Army. Whoever said a picture is worth a thousand words was 9,995 words off the mark.

So, you know, Steppenwolf and his Hunger Dogs (Beguiler, Bedlam, and Brutaal) defeat the World Army. I guess that means The Wonders need to buck up and try again! Although Steppenwolf could have defeated everybody on Earth 2 if he'd just killed the Wonders after defeating them the first time. Oh, I guess two other people survived the massacre.

Commander Khan and Mister Terrific.

Meanwhile the Wonders are busy picking their asses up off the ground and scraping together the shredded remains of their dignity. They're also, like me, wondering why they were left to live. I'm sure Steppenwolf has plans for them although Steppenwolf really should have grown up reading more comic books. Then he'd know that leaving the heroes alive is always a huge mistake. I suppose they didn't have many comic books on Apokolips, so he couldn't learn that lesson. But you know what they did have on Apokolips? A woman named Kaiyo! And since she's on the cover and she wants to see Darkseid's defeat, perhaps it was one of her tricks or pranks that caused The Hunger Dogs to think that the Wonders had been killed.

The Justice Society is coming along nicely! Except for that second Sandman wannabe jerk. I suppose this team needs at least one Red Shirt to keep things exciting with his horrible death when they face The Hunger Dogs again.

Wesley Sandman Dodds gets a radio communication from Commander Khan asking that they help save and evacuate any survivors. The not quite the Justice Society head into Dherain and most do just that. Except for Alan Scott who decides it would be best if he faced Steppenwolf one on one. Except Steppenwolf doesn't exactly like the one on one math, so Brutaal comes in to help double team Alan Scott, and not in a pleasant, ecstasy-induced encounter in the quiet room at a rave kind of double team. No, this is more like a bunch of frat guys that desperately need to be liked by anyone at all and, smelling weakness on all of themselves, join together for some male bonding by beating the shit out of whichever one of them they all somehow instinctively decide to beat the shit out of. That comparison was as tortured as a frat guy's declaration of his heterosexuality.

Come on, Mister Terrific! Show Steppenwolf your balls!

Mister Terrific isn't the man to finally stop Steppenwolf. And why should he be? He hasn't done shit since he's come to Earth 2! DC makes a big fucking deal that Mister Terrific was going to wind up on Earth 2 after his comic book was canceled and then he just hung around in Sloan's basement for a dozen issues. Which is fitting, I guess, since Terry Sloan was the original Mister Terrific. Maybe they were comparing notes. Or balls. Or something.

No, no. Instead of Mister Terrific (or any of the not-quite-yet Justice Society members, for that matter) ending Steppenwolf's reign, it's Brutaal that strikes. You know why?

Remember the fucking cover, assholes? It's Kaiyo!

Or, um, Superman? No, no. I saw the cover! It's just Kaiyo playing a trickster trick!

I suppose I could have misinterpreted the cover even though I am a Master Comic Book Reader. Look, Superman doesn't even have his spit curl here! I'm pretty sure he has that spit curl on every Earth. He even has it on the cover! Which, you know, isn't even him! Although I was wondering how Kaiyo could have been here and trapped in the Omega Room on Earth Prime at the same time. Although she did escape in the last issue of Vibe. And Boom Tubing is tricky when it comes to time and what is the correlation between Earth 2 and Earth Prime's times anyway? Why am I even debating if it's actually Superman or Kaiyo when I could just turn the page and find out!

Superman (Kaiyo!) blasts a huge rift in the Earth with his Omega Beam Heat Vision Eyeballs as the Wonders and the last of the survivors retreat to safety. And this issue had two extra pages in it, so I forgive DC and James Robinson for the slow start! So if you ran out and didn't buy this comic book based on my earlier recommendation, I'm changing that and suggesting that if you like reading Earth 2, maybe it's okay to go out and buy this issue.

Earth 2 #16 Rating: +2 Ranking. Okay, fuck it. I enjoyed this issue. And I suppose that Superman isn't Kaiyo at all even though the cover is awfully deceiving in that it looks quite a bit like Kaiyo. This Superman could be whatever Darkseid had been working on in his Superman Corpse Lab on Apokolips. It might be a mutated version of Earth 2's Superman with some parts stuck on it from the Supermen of many other Earths!

Or it could, you know, be Kaiyo.