Secret Society #1

Bill, I bet I can comment on this comic in three paragraphs!

The story, narrated by The Outsider, begins on Earth 3 men are women and children are adults and cats are mice. Your ass is in your crotch and you sit on your genitals. And worst of all, tomatoes are vegetables but everybody thinks they're fruits.

Oh! If everything is opposite, I bet Earth 3's Talon is interesting!

Owlman and Alfred "The Outsider" Pennyworth run Gotham City. I'm not exactly sure how you run a city where everybody murders everyone else and nobody can keep a television for more than a few hours and all the cars are stolen. Who does any legitimate work? Why would anybody want to when someone will just shoot you in the face to take whatever they want? It's really no surprise that Earth 3 was destroyed. It's breaking my brain just trying to comprehend how the place works! I guess Owlman says, "Hey you! Do that thing I want or Alfred will drill a hole in your abdomen and fuck your liver!" And then Hey You gets to fucking work because he's already had his liver fucked five times that week and he just can't take anymore.

Owlman has a secret about the reason he cried the day Alfred Pennyworth shot Owlman's parents. And Alfred Pennyworth has a secret about how much he loves Owlman's butt. No joke: it's better than Nightwing's. But Alfred thinks it's too early in the comic book to reveal those secrets and I have to agree for once. Because they're probably terrible and they'll just make me angry that they're secret at all. I'd rather be in a good mood for the first eighteen pages.

According to this exposition, it looks like The Godblessed Owlman does keep Gotham operating with a semblance of sanity. And bucket loads of fear and beatings. Just like Batman!

The Joker has killed Talon. Talon is dead! Hooray! But Talon was Dick Grayson. Boo! But Talon is dead! And Tim Drake too! Hooray for Earth 3! Although this Tim Drake had never been written by Scott Lobdell, so I really shouldn't celebrate his demise. Anyway, Owlman declares he's going to kill The Joker for killing Dick but we'll get to that later.

First let's talk about how this affects Owlman's feelings toward the currently captured Nightwing! No way is he going to allow the others to kill him. He'll probably slobber all over him and kiss his feet and underbelly and ask him for forgiveness. He'll probably call him Talon and then Nightwing will be all, "What the fuck?! How dare you! That guy's a boring jerk!" And Owlman will be all, "Don't you dare talk about Dick Grayson that way, Dick Grayson! Dick Grayson was a better Dick Grayson than you'll ever be, Dick Grayson!" And then he'll slap him and begin to walk away but he'll suddenly turn and fall on his knees and hug Dick Grayson around the waist (while caressing his butt because who can blame him? It's so amazing!) crying, "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry for everything!" And Nightwing will be all, "It's cool."

It's later!

With Talon dead and The Outsider convulsed in fits of laughter from The Joker's gag lapel flower, the Gotham City Police Department begin attacking Owlman. The Joker's final joke! With his death, the people of Gotham shall live!

Earth 3 finally fell apart when Darkseid attacked. Only The Outsider and Atomica escaped and that's been documented in other comic books. So I think I can stop reading now.

Except I almost forgot about Pennyworth's secret! I'm going to finish reading but he'd better tell it by the end or I'm going to rank this lower than Joker's Daughter #1!

And then the issue ends without revealing The Outsider's secret. But that's okay! I was just joking about ranking this issue lower than Ann Nocenti's crap. That was probably mean-spirited, threatening Johns and Sterling's work that way. Now I feel as guilty as Thomas Wayne AKA The Godblessed Owlman! And you know why he feels guilty? Because Dick Grayson is dead! But Dick Grayson is also alive! And Owlman wants him on his team!

Nightwing might as well join. What else is left for him?

Now that the Crime Syndicate have exposed Nightwing as Dick Grayson, every villain with even an average intelligence that is familiar with Gotham City or Bruce Wayne should jump to the conclusion that The Goddamned Batman is Bruce Wayne! Nightwing just won't be able to show his face at any of the Batfamily functions after this, especially after the way everybody treated Bruce when he almost exposed their secret identities.

Secret Society #1 Ranking: I enjoyed this one far more than a lot of the other issues this month mainly because it tied in to Forever Evil and helped flesh out some of the stuff hinted at concerning Owlman in Forever Evil #1. I also enjoyed getting a little glimpse into Earth 3. Having Dick Grayson become Talon to Thomas Wayne's The Godblessed Owlman was a nice piece of symmetry. And while some of the Villains Month comics didn't really feel like they did much, I'm sure as The New 52 continues plodding along, I'll be glad to have read them. Some of the stories might not have been very good but they at least planted some interesting seeds like Darkseid's Superman Corpse Room or Lex Luthor's experiments on Bizarro. Or they cleared up some really fucking stupid shit and added some decent enough explanations for things like H'el's abilities and origin. Although just like Scott Lobdell, he didn't stop at the explanation of H'el being a time loop. No, that fucker had to tack on all the other bullshit like H'el killing Jor-el and Zod just to have some kind of exciting ending plot point. You do know you could have just left the issue with the explanation of H'el, right? You didn't need to fuck it all up by continuing with your stupid time travel fucked up bullshit. God damn you, Scott Lobdell. You never know when to stop, do you?!

Bane #1

Bane wants you to cough, motherfucker.

Wow, I feel great! Renewed! Like I've slept for two days straight! I'm also excited that I only have two issues left for Villains Month! Let's get this shit over with!

When last we saw Bane, his plans to storm Gotham and take it over (again!) were foiled by Talon. The art was shitty and the story wound up being less than exciting and Talon is a great big disappointment. But Bane has decided that his plan to take over Gotham City is immediately back on again since Batman has disappeared!

Idiot. You're forgetting the most important part of that Thermodynamic Law! "An object in motion remains in motion until it comes up against The Goddamned Batman."

You know how when you've been a customer for a company for many years and you're paying the same rates you've always paid and then they offer a spectacular deal to incoming customers but they won't extend the deal to the customers that have been with them for years? You know how that is? That's what it must feel like to be a villain in the DC Universe! Just think! For years and years, Lex Luthor and The Joker and The Penguin and Brainiac have been trying to take down Batman and Superman. But they've never been allowed to be truly successful. So when DC decides Batman should be broken and Superman should die, do they choose from their loyal base of super villains? No! They have to go and bring in a brand new villain with the lure of a deal that's too good to be true! So in waltz Bane and Doomsday and just like that, they win! It's enough to make your hair fall out or drive you insane.

Bane gets a short origin myth where he takes the place of his father in Peña Dura Prison when his father escaped. I don't know if it's a typo of "Peña Duro" or if DC actually decided to change the name for some reason. I believe Bane's Preboot origin was that he was born in prison but here he is a child when he takes the place of his father. The origin myth doesn't really clarify if Bane was forced to take his father's place or if Bane took it willingly. It's a little bit ambiguous but either way, it is looked on by Bane's followers as an act of strength.

You know what? I'm not done with that bit about Bane and Doomsday strolling in and getting all the glory! Now, I don't mind the way Bane happened. It was a pretty epic run of comics and some fairly chaotic shit. Batman was driven to the end of his rope and, in the end, it was mostly exhaustion which caused him to fail. But Doomsday? This big shit just comes out of nowhere, punches Superman a bunch of times, and kills him? That was pretty bad but the worst part of it all was snatching the glory of Superman's defeat out of Lex Luthor's hands. It should have been Lex Luthor. I don't care how much DC wanted to surprise the fans or what kind of a bad-ass villain design they wanted to come up with. It still should have been Lex. That was poor form, DC. Really poor form.

This is the current, although interim, warden at Blackgate Prison. Something tells me her job is going to soon become the worst job on Earth. After the guy who has to sterilize the glory holes.

I don't know if Agatha is a new character or not but I already like her do to my shallow qualifications for a likable character. Does she have an eye-patch? Check! Does she have white streaks in her hair? Check! Is she doing her job reluctantly? Check! Does she swear within the confines of a Teen Rated Comic Book? She says "crappy" and that's good enough! Check! I love Warden Agatha! She also looks a bit like Lois Lane. Perhaps it's Lois in disguise! That would explain the eye-patch and the streak in her hair! But look at those shoes! Total Lois Lane shoes.

They haven't given Agatha's last name yet but I'm sure it's something like Montoya or something. She probably has a sister in the police force or whatever. Pretty solid guesses, hunh?! Those are the kind of amazing insights that keep the readers coming back for more! The other reason is because I scream "FUCK YOU!" a lot.

And then on the next page we get her last name: Zorbatos. I'm fairly certain that's Greek which explains the eye-patch.

And then on the page after that, there's trouble!

I don't think The White Rabbit was ever captured and I'm certain that she wouldn't be allowed to prance around in that suit in prison, so she must have set everybody free.

The White Rabbit is still working with Bane for some reason. Although I don't know if she was working for him during that horribly awful piece of shit David Finch initial Batman: The Dark Knight story and zipping about filling everybody with Venom or if she was just being a general nuisance while giving Finch some cheesecake to draw each month. From the looks of this, she and Bane are pretty tight. I hope Warden Agatha shoots her in her stupid fucking face.

The issue ends with Bane and his army off the coast of Gotham, ready to shoot up Venom and take the city in the name of Bane. That story will be told in Forever Evil: Arkham War. And I hope Warden Agatha kicks a ton of ass in it.

Bane #1 Rating: I'm not much of a fan of Bane, probably because I've never read Secret Six. But this issue was better than a good chunk of Villains Month issues. So there's that, at least.

Doomsday #1

We are sick with time and this one struggles so. We did not realize corporeal, time-based beings have such an abundance of leaky orifices. We did not realize the maintenance involved. Nor did we realize the attachment this one, any one, all of the ones, would have to their fleshy encasement which only functions to drive them steadily to an eternity of nonexistence. But we shall persevere, for this one must be shown that not all things should be expressed and not all things should be known and one should be cautious not to express that which should not be known. But still, we are driven, compelled, to express our thoughts regarding this Doomsday, for we are now he and he is now us and we cannot see the ends nor the beginnings of us or the one.

The monster came for them. Many years ago, it came. It was a monster because it was of the other, not like them, unlike them, in purpose and in form. Perhaps it was ugly, perhaps it was not. It only mattered that it was the other and it had come, in their limited perception, in their ignorant opinion of its purpose, simply to destroy.

But destruction is not, in and of itself, a bad thing. Change is destruction and, for time-based beings, it happens continuously, constantly. For time-based beings, destruction is necessary for growth, death necessary for evolution. Permanency is stagnancy, failure. Among all the Kryptonian scientists, all of their geniuses, not one of them saw this truth. It was the military mind of Colonel Zod that perceived the beautiful truth of the monster.

The other.

Krypton was peaceful, stagnant, unmoving. The monster was not a curse. It was incentive. It was fury, yes, but it was also passion. The monster was a reminder that living was not simply getting on. It was fighting. It was surviving. Adversity and struggle were missing from Krypton and the monster showed them how much more they could be when challenged. Zod reveled in it. But in the end, Zod, and the monster, were deposited in a place where they could do no harm. They were phantoms in an unchanging, static world, much like the one from which they had been exiled. But now Krypton was changing, moving forward, dying. Zod and his monster could only watch, envious, unchanging.

There is more to the story, more for the monster and the future generations of the House of El, but why they are told here remains unknown. They are unnecessary to the story. They simply confuse, distract, make less of the story by engaging in prophecy and speaking of that which should be unknown. We shall ignore it for it is nothing but a lie to a child, a lie that change always results in the fantasy which we have been raised to believe. Good shall overcome. But good is not only events turning out the way we wished they would turn out. Good is subjective. Good is not necessary to evolution. Good is not desired by change. We especially know this for we grow weaker, sicker from time, although we would wish it were not so. But it is so, and so we must accept it. Unlike a little girl declaring reality a dream, we shall accept that we cannot exist within the confines of time. We shall vacate this organic shell. We shall return to the shadows.

Doomsday #1 Rating: But first we must participate in the Tradition of the List. We shall take this tradition back to ourself and share it. We will agree on all items on the list for there is no disagreement when we all share what we think at once. We will rank this permanent thought at #44.

Ocean Master #1

We are aggrieved by this assault on our vitreous, light decoding organs by this doubled image which taunts us of a fleshy, wet birth which we are sure to have never known. At least not yet.

The man sits within the womb of the kingdom he commands. His kingdom is a womb. He issues an edict to those he commands: they must flee the womb to destroy those that have left it behind many thousands of cycles ago. His issues ripple forward slowly. So slowly. Slowly through the encasing, comforting, enfolding liquid in which his kingdom resides. Some his subjects hear and act upon those. Some his subjects do not hear and do not act upon those although the unspoken issues remain a current fueling and propelling the issues which are heard and acted upon.

The man is alone in his anger, in his hatred. He has forgotten how to be. He has lost the thread of his story. Now he is only a single thread in the weft and warp of his brother's life. He cannot be happy. He cannot forgive those that have long since forgotten, or have never even known, that they have hurt him in some particular way. They would not even recognize the particulars if he carefully tried to remind them. He does not understand how they could have forgotten such a travesty of justice perpetrated upon him. He does not see how they cannot remember. No, he thinks. It is only that they will not remember.

His story can be your story as well. Pay heed as he seeks revenge. Pay close attention as he kills. And he kills. And he convinces those around him to kill still more. For in the end, he garners no reward, no happiness, no apologies, and, certainly, no affection. For in the end, he chooses the armor of loneliness which leads him to an empty, stone, dead womb. But he must now be careful, this man. For now that he is captive outside his womb, his tears will not mix secretly with his surroundings but show, stark and glinting, upon his cheeks.

The man within the stone womb.

We are intrigued by the method which thoughts are passed on, one from the other, when a populace has not the power of telepathy to share thoughts with the whole. While we think the thoughts of ourselves and others, we do not know from whence each thought comes, and thus we cannot know from where the thought originated. But this material form of passing thoughts are labeled with the names of the beings who created the thoughts. These thoughts are not shared freely. These thoughts are owned, traded, sold. But they are also capable of wracking our chest with paroxysms, leading to violent exhalations of breath which result in stark and oft-repeated cracks of sound. We are used to thoughts being ephemeral as they are needed just once for all to share. We are used to thoughts being infinite as they are kept by us all and be each of us together. But we see the potential for communications to exist outside of ourselves, for our thoughts and ideas to be placed within time, so that others that are not us may share, others that are not us may care for those things which we care for. Perhaps the limitations of separation imposed on these beings has advantages that we can make use of.

The man, once more, experiences a birth of sorts, a rebirth, another chance. He will return to his womb. He will return and he will sit and he will hide his tears from those that pretend not to notice. But he will not have learned anything from his short life in the Over World.

The man nearly speaking his unspoken issues.

The man almost goes back to the...

We. We are. Lost. Lost in. Where are we? Help. We need. Lost. We. We? Where am? Why we? We. What are we? Who am....

ocean but he remains to help a boy, a young boy, a helpless boy. A boy that, this time, will not be abandoned. At least not by this man. This man will prove better than the man and the woman that came before him. This man, no, not a man...this Atlantean will prove a thing. The thing does not matter. He must simply prove because he cannot forgive and he cannot forget. His life has become a proof to those that ceased hearing him many years ago. His life is a proof unheard. His life is a waste.

We were perplexed at this attempt at levity at the end of this story, so we worried it as a dog does a hare until it gave up its secrets in a screeching, pitiful, painful wail: "Movement is life."

Ocean Master #1 Rating: What use do we have for an arbitrary list of permanent thoughts applied to dead organic matter arranged by subjective, seemingly random qualities? Qualities that are weighted differently by every individual being as opposed to understood perfectly, reasonably, objectively by the all-encompassing totality of ourself? What do we have to offer but a number that will be disputed for reasons that merely assert individuality and personal qualities so that one being can prove themselves smarter and greater and more insightful than other beings? We do not understand the need but we shall participate in the tradition of list making. We shall give this permanent thought an 18.

First Born #1

First Born is a DC rip-off of Marvel characters Rhino, Wolverine, and Morpheus combined into one creature. It's totally obvious because DC can't think of anything original ever. Just look at Jimmy Olsen! Total Peter Parker rip.

Recently I've made some comments about how stupid the phrase "Be careful what you wish for" is because I felt it was challenging the grandeur of dreams come true. But now I know the true meaning of that phrase, for I have often wished that I had more more time to read comic books and I suddenly find that to be true. At least, as I sit here and stare at the quiet desperate doppleganger staring at me from across the room, I certainly have more of me within the confines of the normal amount of time. As yet I am unsure as to its purpose but I will leave you with this warning before I begin reading First Born #1: light your house brightly, readers. Beware the darkened corners for you never know which are birthing strange, ineffectual, staring creatures intent on usurping your life. For now the beast merely sits and breathes and waits. I have given it some comic books and a glass of sake but, for now, it remains unmoving.

The issue begins with Apollo consulting the Oracle about his brother, First Born.

This image reminds me of the panel from the first issue of Wonder Woman in which I got my first header!

Oh the bitter pang of nostalgia! Such a simpler time when walking away from this project still remained within the reach of my innocent grasp.

Apollo needs to know if First Born is a threat to him since Apollo just recently took the Throne of Olympus for his own. And his nipple deep in prophecies about babies killing kings. It's got him a bit shaken, to say words that you probably understand. One of those prophecies was about Zola's baby killing the ruler of Olympus. And First Born's prophecy was that he'd rule Olympus alone. So it's totally obvious what's going to happen. Apollo will either abdicate and let First Born rule, or First Born will defeat Apollo and take the throne for himself. That will fulfill the first prophecy. After that happens, Zola's baby will grow up, revealing himself to be Zeus's child, Zeus, and he'll fulfill the second prophecy where he kills the ruler of Olympus (First Born!) and takes back the throne.

So you see, Zeus has neatly managed a successful end-around around the prophecies. As they say, if you can't kill the new born when a witch tells you it's going to kill you, join him.

First Born was left in the wild to die but was raised by Hyenas. As he grew, he mated with the Hyenas and created Gnolls. So that's how he became a great naked Gnoll Leader. I don't think there's anything more to learn! Oh, except how he wound up under the ice in Antarctica. But does that really matter? Or am I just reading another book that's killing time due to DC's decision to do a Villains Month?

Just look at how clever Zeus is. What a master manipulator and avoider of prophecies!

And one last prophetic vision from the 100 Bullets oracles: a war will consume both Apollo and First Born, leaving one standing and one fallen. And Wonder Woman will be there too. And naked!

First Born #1: I heard it groan before it ever moved. A sound filled with unloved moments and desperate heartache, countless rejections and thousands of harsh words. And as it shifted slightly, it's head lolling over its shoulder, its gaze fixing on the stack of comics I set beside it, I felt my first true terror. Shock and recognition had dulled my innate instinct telling me to run. I now know that was a mistake. But, as of yet, I do not know what it will cost me.

Sinestro #1 (Let's try this again, shall we?)

Something about Hal Jordan's asshole and Spirograph.

I hope nobody reblogged my last attempt at this Sinestro commentary because I've been getting mysterious, threatening calls all morning telling me to take it down. And I will! As soon as I can get my niece over here to show me how to delete posts from Tumblr. In the meantime, on to Sinestro #1!

The issue begins with Alyssa Dark or something talking about Sinestro or someone. What was that?

I think I just heard somebody, sounding very close to the back of my ear, whisper, "Betrayer." Maybe I just didn't get enough sleep. Anyway, Sinestro! Let's see how he became a Professional Villain!

If he's such a great archaeologist, why is he spray painting those ruins? Jerko.

Sinestro got into archaeology for all the wrong reasons! If he wanted to learn about the future, he should have studied Postarchaeology! But I suppose that's the moral of this tale. Sinestro has always done things for the wrong reasons. So he joined the Green Lantern Corps to gain great power instead of to stop every creature in the universe from masturbating.

Speaking of masturbating, I'd like to apologize for any of my recent comments in previous posts that may not have yet been deleted from my feed as they were filled with stereotypes and outright lies. And if I ever again

What the fuck was that?! I did not type that last paragraph! And I can't delete it nor highlight the text with my cursor. I suppose I could start over but I feel a vague sensation in the vicinity of my left kidney warning me to just ignore it all. And I've never argued with that region of my body before, so I'm not going to begin now.

Sinestro doesn't find anything interesting in the dirt because who ever does? It's always, "Look at this broken bit of jug!" or "Check out this bird bone next to some charcoal!" And then they make up stories about how those things could have gotten there and what it all means. But it's all nonsense because scientists never base anything on ancient religious texts. And how can you prove anything without a religious text backing up your theory? Arrogant jerks. They'll learn. Yes, one day, soon enough. They'll all learn.

But Sinestro does find a fancy new Green Lantern Power Ring on a dying alien in a crashed spaceship. His archaeology degree does not come in handy during that significant find. What a waste of five million Korugarian Bleckchits.

Though he does manage to get choked by a penis with a guantlet on. His degree did help him there.

The gigantic, throbbing penis that is making me crave a bowl of cereal right now belongs to a Weaponer of Qward. It was trying to get the Green Lantern Ring for itself, probably so it could learn how to make bootleg copies of them and sell them all across the Universe as Grean Lentern Power Rings. But Sinestro quickly learns how to make the ring and creates a device that kills the Weaponer instantly.

I'm not sure if the double cock ring is essential to the device's workings or that's just Sinestro not quite knowing what thoughts to suppress as he wills the light into form.

Sinestro became the greatest Green Lantern to ever steal a ring from a dying Green Lantern Corps Member that was actually just allowing Sinestro to borrow it so he could whip up some light construct life support machines. But Sinestro invoked Archaeologist's Rights and said, "Finders keepers and fuck the culture I'm stealing this from!" It was the smart thing to do because it allowed him to make friends with Abin Sur and, as far as I'm concerned, anything is worth gaining a new friend with a head like a penis.

Sinestro must not have cared that much about his friendship though because the first thing he did was fuck Abin Sur's sister and, brother, you just don't do that shit. I have a friend that had sex with my sister and guess what happened to him? He was maimed in an explosion in Iraq. Serves you right, Bobby Henline! That's what God does to sister fuckers!

Eventually Sinestro corrupts from the absolution of corruptification that absolute power potentiates. I think there might be a better way to say that but fuck if I can figure it out. He becomes Supreme Ultimate Master Ruler of Korugar and the rest of the citizens, potential criminals! It's the only way for a populace to feel safe! Just treat the populace like rotten kids just waiting for a parent or teacher to turn their backs. When you get right down to it, we're all just no-good note-passers and secret-whisperers. Governments can't have that shit in their classworld!

This is why leaders shouldn't have spouses! Don't just half-ass it when it comes to somebody else's life. Actually, forget leaders! Nobody should rely this much on one other person! I think I learned that lesson from my favorite Christmas Movie, About A Boy!

The narrator, Alyssa Milano, narrates the story from the point of view that Sinestro was a hero and could do no wrong. So Sinestro's wife was a weak jerko holding him back and Hal Jordan was a traitorous piece of filth with which Sinestro should have never become friends. Eventually Hal Jordan brought Sinestro's career as the greatest Green Lantern to ever live crashing down around him. Oh what could have been if the Green Lanterns had only followed Sinestro's lead and become universal tyrants! Oh wait. That's exactly what the Guardians kept trying to do. Now I'm confused! Why didn't the Guardians think Sinestro was the best Green Lantern ever?!

Alyssa mentions some other stuff about a Yellow Lantern Corps or something and then declares that not all of the Korugarians are dead! They apparently had a colony somewhere else in space and she must find Sinestro and let him know that his people still need him.

Sinestro #1 Rating: You know the shadows in the corners of your room? Are they always there? Do yours grow bigger with each passing second? I was sure the light of this lamp was enough to illuminate this entire room. Wasn't it? Wasn't that how it was yesterday? Even earlier this morning? Before I posted secrets. Before I...well, that's all in the past now, isn't it. I haven't said too much. The shadows whisper differently but I know. I'll be okay. I'll be alright. A nap. That's all I need now. Just a short, restful nap.

Sinestro #1

And ever after, Hal Jordan's stools came out like Spirographs.

Because Sinestro is the manliest villain in the DC Universe, I thought I would walk everybody through a typical day of every man on the planet. If you're female and you ask a male in your life if the following scenario is true, don't expect him to acknowledge the facts although you might see the corner of his mouth turn up in a repressed smile of brotherly acquiescence. Don't mistake that acquiescence with agreement with you! He's just awash in the recognition of a routine he's known since puberty which he will always deny as truth in the face of a female he loves dearly, lest he lose her completely, for who can love another after looking deep into their heart and soul and seeing nothing but facile juvenility scented of fart jokes and stale semen? The mind of a man is not an easy thing to confront, and few are those that walk away with any respect left for it.

The first decision of every man's day is an important one because it sets up the tone for the rest of it: to orgasm or to walk around the entire day as a gigantic, incompetent, drooling boner? Unless you want to be mistaken for a professional sports player or a member of a college fraternity, most will choose to orgasm. The next great question is how to go about it? Masturbation is the obvious answer and, for most guys and for most of their sorry, pathetic, video game, elf role playing lives, it's the only answer. But if you have a partner, that's cool too. I suppose it's easiest if you have a male partner because I imagine you just wink at each other cartoonishly and then grab each other's dicks and begin wanking each other off. But I wouldn't know since I've never copulated with another male no matter how many eyewitnesses you can find that are willing to attest to the opposite. It just so happens that there was a guy that looked almost exactly like me during college.

If your preferred partner is female, that presents some other problems, or so I figure from watching thirty years of television sitcoms about the relationships between men and women. I believe if you want to have sex with your female partner, you poke her in the back with your erection, she slaps it away, she calls you a pig, she stomps off with her hot self that's probably two hundred pounds less than your overweight form (but still sexy in its way! Especially with the raging, throbbing sexual organ you're waving about the room), and storms off to call her friends and call you a childish man child with no sense at all. I think in the history of all television situational comedies, only two women actually enjoyed sex: Peg Bundy and, when she wasn't busy proving her superiority, Claire Huxtable.

But since I have no idea how to get a woman to sleep with me more than the first time before she's quickly disappointed with nearly the entire package, I can only rely on my television viewing experience to summarize how to achieve orgasm with a female partner in the morning. I don't even know how to get them to stay after the inadequate sex, the stifled tears, and the spontaneous three A.M. confession where I account every single fault in the relationship between me and my mother. So masturbation is probably the best bet anyway.

Occasionally I've fucked the cat but you know how hard it is to get dried semen out of cat fur? The cat just licks and licks and licks like it's never coming out. And then I always declare never again when, later, it greets me with a cute little headbump and meows in my face, expelling a nice, steamy cloud of semen scented cat breath. Ugh!

So masturbation it is! It's probably best even if you have a partner because who wants to deal with the fragile bonds of intimate contact with another human being first thing in the morning? The desperate need for acceptance. The fear of rejection. The denial that your love for the other person only exists because you couldn't live another day without knowing that somebody fake loves you just as much. It's all just too overwhelming. So, once again, you do what you've been doing since you looked down at that mysterious erection and wonder why it's suddenly doing that? And then you think, "Well, what would happen if I do this?" And you suddenly know how you'll be spending at least a little bit of every day of the rest of your life.

Men know this. They all know that the first act of the day of every other man was probably spent masturbating and yet they all still insist on shaking each other's hands. It's disgusting!

Next on the man's list of decisions to make is where to masturbate! The shower is obviously the easiest choice but sometimes you just don't want to get out of bed! And even if you don't have a partner, one never really feels entirely comfortable just ejaculating right there onto the sheets you're going to have to sleep on again that night. And what man has ever washed a sheet in his life? So you either lie on your back and just see how high up your chest your ejaculate shoots, or you grab the crusty hand-towel you leave stuffed under the bed behind the Trivial Pursuit game that you haven't played in years, or you just yank the one sock that didn't fall off during the night from your foot and shove your penis in that. It's like a wool condom for cleanliness! And cleanliness is next to Godliness!

I just had a thought. Being that I'm an Atheist (and as all Atheist's know, there are no strictures against masturbation in The Secret Atheist Handbook, or How To Ruin Everybody's Fantasies of Immortality), I don't struggle with the act. Like every other animal, I just do it, get it done, and allow my natural instincts to guide me through the rest of the day. But if you believe in the afterlife and spirits and ghosts of dead ancestors, how do you masturbate?! I have often heard people say things like, "Dear Grandpa Joe is always looking down on me." Gross! What kind of a sicko pervert was Grandpa Joe?! Do religious people have "masturbation shields" which spirits can't look through which they hurriedly climb into when the feeling comes over them? You know, that actually sounds exactly like something a Mormon would have. Anyway, it doesn't really matter. As a man (Atheist, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, or any of the other religions that are even less believable than the Religions of The Book), we find a way to masturbate whether it's through denial or just the pure love of the act.

If a man chooses not to orgasm in the morning, he has no more choices to make for the rest of the day. He just wanders around leering at those members of society he finds sexually attractive while he constantly readjusts the front of his jeans. This readjusting or "grabbing of one's crotch" serves two purposes. The first is to just shift the erection around so that it's most camouflaged in whatever the man is wearing. Depending on the type of pants and the curve of his manhood, he can put it up so it's stuck in his waistband or shove it down one leg of his loose slacks while walking slightly hunched over with a strange gait. The second is just the decision that he should have orgasmed earlier and now he's just going to touch himself as often as possible until he jizzes in his pants. This is why I never associate with men that touch their crotches. Take care of that before you leave the house, you filthy, crunchy-underweared monsters!

After a man has cleared his mind, he must now, if he's managed to hold onto a job being that he spends over half of his waking hours playing video games or sports and trying to copulate with partners sexually attractive to him, he must get ready for work. The most efficient men have already taken a shower. And the moster efficient men than that will also shave in the shower, being that that is the next major decision in a man's day. All men hate to shave. This is one area where the sexes can come together (which happens rarely, am I right ladies (Winky face (if only there were an easier way to show I were winking because of my sexual subtext in the preceding parenthetical reference))? Men have spent many long hours in deep philosophical thought coming up with ways to allow us not to shave. I have to admire the new generation, and particularly in the areas of the (pardon my nomenclature as I mean no judgment but one will readily identify what I mean when you read it) hipster sub-groups, for their ability to really turn not shaving into some kind of fashionable statement. I always thought "I'm just lazy" was an adequate reply to those who would wonder why I sported the beard. I never thought to pretend that I just love facial hair so much! Maybe that's because I don't. Beards are uncomfortable and annoying. But shaving is as well! The struggle between shaving off the irritating beard and being too lazy to shave is right up there with a Jedi's constant struggle between the light and the dark sides of The Force.

I could claim that the man's next big decision is what to wear but that mostly just involves sniffing the armpits of some shirts lying around and the crotches of some underpants before throwing on the least smelly outfit he can find. And then he heads out majestically into the day to pretend that he is the most confident and beautiful of all this world's creatures, not so that he can become a rich and powerful man, but because who wants to sleep with an ugly asshole full of self-loathing?

The next part of a man's day is so secret that I can't share it with anyone that identifies female. But I'd like to mention it because it's so much fun and it's so exciting and, well, it's what men talk about when we sneak off to use the restroom in groups. You might not notice since men don't sneak off to pee with other men that they're currently hanging out with. Generally if we're at dinner or some kind of function, we make eye contact with a number of men we admire by the stoutness of their masculinity and, sometimes, by the cute dimples when they smile as you casually make eye contact with them, you know, one man to another, neither one trying to prove anything with a handshake, and a little voice reminding you how carefree those college days were. We make eye contact with them and maybe nod (you've all seen this nod, I'm sure). We'll watch and eventually one male stranger will get up to piss and several others in the restaurant, no relation to each other at all, will get up and head to the bathroom together. It is then that we talk about what I'm going to write about next. So I'll need you to enter your Man Password of Approval in the box after the input screen.

Input Password?

Metallo #1

Being that I don't know what a robot penis looks like (all the checkout registers at the grocery store are female), I'm just going to assume that's a kneecap at the bottom of the page. Too bad you can't see it in three dimensions, popping and throbbing right in my face.

Sterling Gates dropped me a message on Twitter thanking me for pointing out the typo in Black Adam #1. I'm almost certain that the his acknowledgment of my editorial job constitutes work for hire for DC and that I should be expecting a paycheck in the mail. At the very least, I'm adding "Assistant Editor for DC Comics" on my resume.

This issue begins eighteen months ago with Corben still in a coma. He's been in that coma since The Collector of Worlds (also known as the Brainiac A.I.) came to Metropolis and had its ass severely handed to it by The Metropolitan Masculine Marvel of Mightiness! And that was a long time ago, so he's been stuck in his big metal coma for quite a few years. I wonder what Steel has been up to all this time?

Thirty-one months, to be precise, thanks to the private on the next page moaning about having to do follow stupid orders.

These panels explain more of the story than I can coherently regurgitate for all you parasites that didn't pay for this book. But the main reason I scanned it was to show where my cat drooled on the speech bubble with "Brizuela?" in it.

Even though all Corben's vital signs seem good, he still hasn't awakened from his coma. The scientists and doctors don't believe there is anything more they can do for him. But wait! The General has an idea! What if...now listen closely...what if he...JAMS A PIECE OF KRYPTONITE IN CORBEN'S CHEST?! The doctors and scientists shrug there shoulders and figure they let Colonel Poskoff stick his dick in Corben's mouth, so why not try General Lane's Kryptonite thing? At this point none of them really know what they're doing anyway if they're taking medical and scientific advice from General Lane.

Oh, I don't know. Pray to God? Kick him in the groin? Shove spiders down his throat? Put a finger in his ass? Put two fingers in his ass? Black magic? Douse him in gasoline? Give him a fantastic blow job while somebody else rims him out? Call up Doctor Veritas for help? Immerse him in liquid nitrogen? Stuff him full of Pop Rocks? Put three fingers up his ass?

Military Scientist: "Will this work, General Lane?"
General Lane: "No way to know but what else can we do?"
Military Scientist: "Whoa, wait a second. You have no evidence that this will do anything? We just took out the fuel core keeping this man alive so you could randomly shove a rock into his chest and 'hope for the fucking best?'"
General Lane: "Have you got any better ideas?!"
Military Scientist: "Better than killing the patient and filling him with stones? Fuck yes I have better ideas!"
General Lane: "Who's the general here? Now shut the fuck up and attach Corben's system to this kryptonite!"
Military Scientist: "How?! There's nothing to connect any of these wires to? Do you want me to just wind them around the rock? Perhaps just lying them next to it would work, right? What else can we do?!"
General Lane: "Are you getting smart with me, son?! Just fucking do it or else!"

Of course with all my ranting and raving, the Kryptonite works. General Lane is a genius. Once again, three cheers for non-scientific gut instincts and intuition! And probably God. I'm sure he helped out somehow.

John "Metal-Zero" Corben is sent into action overseas. He becomes a one man army with no concern for collateral damage. He goes in and gets the job done and nobody else has to feel guilty over innocent lives lost. It's the greatest weapon the military has ever devised! An autonomous killing machine with no sense of guilt that understands the sly winks and elbow nudges of the higher ranking officers as they give him his orders and tell him to keep civilian casualties at a minimum. Pesky innocent lives will never get in the way of an American mission ever again! And everybody's hands are clean except the robot man that must have assessed the situation and taken care of the job with minimum casualties, no matter how many there were. It had to be the minimum amount because they gave him orders!

Hmm. I guess General Lane is into the dental work of gift horses.

Eighteen months after General Lane blew up Metallo over the ocean, Metallo climbs up onto a beach in Metropolis. His new goal: murder General Lane. And probably Lois too.

See? What an asshole. To be fair, he does have a reason to hate her. I mean, he did want to sleep with her and she didn't want to sleep with him. Who is she to make that decision for him? The nerve.

Metal-2.0 flies in to stop Metal-Zero. But Metal-2.0 suffers from Good Guy Syndrome. That's where he'll allow the fight to go on and on as he tries to subdue the bad guy while the bad guy only has to fight long enough to kill the good guy. That allows the Bad Guy to bring everything he has to the battle while the Good Guy is holding back. Unless the Good Guy is The Goddamned Batman. That fucker can fight for as long as it takes.

But Metal-2.0 is no The Goddamned Batman, so he dies fairly quickly. Or at least gets a pole through his heart. Since Metallo survived not having a heart, I'm sure Metal-2.0 can too! Just have a doctor shove a lump of coal in his chest! Or a ruby! He'll be okay.

Except there's not time for that since Metal-2.0 hits the self-destruct and blows both of them to pieces. Does that mean there will be a Roger Corben in The New 52 as well? No. Turns out The Secret Society of Super-Villains teleported him away before he was blown up. Now he only has to worry about keeping Ultraman from snorting his heart.

Metallo #1 Rating: Metallo is kind of a boring villain. Just a military guy with a heart of Kryptonite! It sounds like it could turn into a sitcom though! Maybe Metallo and Superman could be roommates and they'd both be in love with the neighbor across the hall, Lois Lane. But every time one of them tries to make a move on her in her apartment, her military father busts in and begins busting heads. The season finale would have both Superman and Metallo making out with Lois. But since Metallo makes out with her first, Superman, like somebody with a peanut allergy kissing somebody after fucking a guy with peanut butter for a heart, goes into anaphylactic shock and everybody rushes to the hospital and the lousy sitcom ends on a sad and bitter note as Superman lays dying. I hate when sitcoms try to be deep. I hate my new sitcom.

Black Adam #1

Totally makes sense that Black Adam takes over Justice League of America. If we were on Earth 7!

The top five selling DC Comic books in August all had one of two things in common: Batman and Superman. Which tells me something nobody else needed to have told to them: comic book fans aren't interested in interesting or well-told stories. They're only interested in their favorite characters. But how do you get fans interested in other characters when they're spending all of their Comic Book money on all of the Batman and Superman titles flooding the stands? Oh, that's right. You don't. You just keep publishing comic books without Batman and Superman just to watch them slowly fail as comic book stores order less and less copies every month because they're not all selling which means less copies on the shelves for new fans to find which means the comic quickly begins circling the drain. I'm just a stupid fan of comic books that tell entertaining stories (like books not written by Ann Nocenti), so I don't know how to fix the problem so that book sales reflect quality. Perhaps it would help if comic book reviewing sites were honest about the quality of every comic instead of trying to get free advertising by being quoted by the comic book company for the trade paperback advertisements. Every comic book reviewing site that had an "It fucking rocks!" blurb associated with The Red Hood and the Outlaws collected trades should be labeled. I just have to determine what the labels say!

"We Will Suck DC's Cock for Page Views!"
"Shittiest Review Site on the Web Web Ring Member!"
"We Tongue Kiss Our Mothers With Mouths That Praised Red Hood and the Outlaws!"
"Sometimes Our Local Comic Book Shop Puts Dog Turds in Our Pull Boxes and We Don't Even Notice!"
"We Write Ambiguous Reviews That Fool Consumers Just to Get Free Advertising!"
"We Are Truly, Truly Sorry That You Can't Trust Anything We Say."

Maybe review sites don't help sales anyway. I'm not saying that I'm a review site but I do know I sang the praises of Demon Knights for pretty much its entire run and it didn't fucking help. And now All Star Western is nearly at the bottom of the sales charts. And The Movement is barely higher than Katana. Are you fucking kidding me?! If there's any proof that sales aren't linked to quality, it's that. Katana is the worst written comic currently in The New 52. And The Movement is exciting and full of interesting characters. But they're selling equally as well. It's all just so depressing. Why did I ever get back into reading comic books? The fans are a bunch of illiterate heathen Batman groupies!

Maybe DC could license Wolverine and they could have him star in comic books with low sales and grab up all the Wolverine groupie money! Holy shit! That would be a bonanza! Get your lawyers on that, DC!

Anyway, on to Black Adam, the greatest comic book you'll read this year! If you haven't been reading Geoff Johns Shazam, you've been missing out on the greatest serialized story since Tristram Shandy! Or maybe something by Dickens like Bleak House. Was that one serialized? Probably. It's so fucking long! I'm fairly confident the art in this comic book will blow your mind! I haven't actually looked at it yet but when DC uses my quote, they can just ellipses off the beginning of that last sentence!

Here's another blurb for the Villains Month Omnibus: "The art and story combined create bodily juices you never knew you could secrete! Although why the editor's didn't notice that Kahndaq is spelled wrong, I don't know. Perhaps they were distracted by their new bodily fluids!"

Kahndaq has this legend, see? About this superman? With a lightning bolt on his chest? Have you ever noticed how many seemingly literate and competent people type "lightening" when they mean "lightning?" They should stop doing that. I don't even consider it a typo. It's just plain ignorance. Man, I wish I had the guts to have typed "plane ignorance" there and leave it. But then I'd be the only one to get the joke and everybody would simply go straight to the comments section to correct me and point out what a fucking hypocritical moron I am. But I just don't have the strength of character to pull off a joke like that without feeling judged by everybody on the internet. How come everybody on the internet is so judgmental? Am I the only earnest, sweet, lovable, kind person left on the internet?

Speaking of earnest, sweet, lovable, kind people, Black Adam is not one of them. He is the mythical champion of Kahndaq but he's also a vicious bastard. But he's only an asshole to people that would harm Kahndaq. And to Shazam, of course! But Black Adam was turned into a pile of ashes when Billy Batson tricked him into returning to his mortal form that couldn't keep its shit together being that it was thousands of years old. But he might not be completely dead because he's on the cover of this issue! A terrorist group has an ancient scroll and they're ready to figure out what it says because it's probably a spell to bring back Black Adam. And by terrorist group, I mean oppressed people in trouble with the law who are just trying to make their way the only way they know how.

Every ancient scroll either comes from The Book of the Dead or the Necronomicon, depending on if the author is going for realism or complete insanity. Since this spell is about resurrection, I would have chosen the Necronomicon. Or the Necronomicomicon.

In the comic book world, nothing happens in secret. Somebody always knows something no matter how super secret something is supposed to be. And the Sons of Adam know that Shazam turned Black Adam to dust and that he collected the ashes and that he dumped the ashes in Kahndaq. And now they're at that exact location to cast the spell. I suppose the Sons of Adam have an ever-present news broadcast running in the background of their headquarters so they can keep up with everything that happens no matter how many people weren't there to see it. If people know that Shazam turned Black Adam to dust then they know that Billy Batson is Shazam since he was Billy Batson when he convinced Black Adam to say "Shazam" and transform into skin and bones (mostly bones. Very brittle bones).

If I want to be less cynical, I suppose if I were living in a country that believed in a great mythical champion with a lightning bolt on his chest and I saw a superhuman with a lightning bolt on his chest smash an urn full of ashes over Kahndaq, I might begin suggesting it has something to do with Black Adam. But that's only if I wanted to be less cynical. And I don't really want to be since I'm still pissed off that Task Force X is a super secret government organization that everybody fucking knows about.

Anyhow, it doesn't matter what kind of vitriolic pablum I spew onto the internet in a narcissistic need to make my ridiculous opinions known (which I'm not very good at anyway because who can tell when I'm serious or when I'm just making a joke? Maybe I need two blogs!). Black Adam is resurrected and all is now right with the world.

I think what I meant to say was "Black Adam is resurrected and all is now right with Black Adam."

Black Adam overthrows the current leader of Kahndaq and declares the people free. He shall protect and watch over them. But doesn't he feel the need to get vengeance on Billy Batson? What happened to his passionate hatred for Shazam? I suppose he'd rather just forget about that unfortunate incident in his life. Why would he want to repeat that encounter and get his ass kicked all over again, right?

And that's when Black Adam reads a message that appears on a tablet nearby that says, "This World is Ours." He completely flips the fuck out. Calm down, asshole. How do you know the tablet's owner hadn't just been playing a video game before you crushed him with a statue? Why am I always questioning comic book characters on their actions? They obviously have better instincts than I do because they always jump to the right conclusion and very rarely waste any time.

Black Adam #1 Rating: Aren't you all just loving the Reboot? The longer it goes, the more things return to the old universe! Here go again with Black Adam protecting Kahndaq! Just like it was before The New 52. My guess is everything will be absolutely back to how it was three years ago in five years time. But DC will have probably made more money than they would have otherwise and everybody else will just feel like nearly a decade of stories were lost as everything needed to be retold to get to where everything was when it was thrown away. Other than that, it wasn't too bad!

Man-Bat #1

How come there was never a Boy-Robin?

I'm not sure when I really began to hate Man-Bat. It might have been yesterday after reading his Who's Who entry. He can transform into a bat and control it! But not he can't control it and he's insane! But now Batman gave him the antidote! Now he can control his bat transformations! Oh no but he went insane again! Now he wants to fuck his wife as a bat! Now she's gone insane! Now they're both sane! But their child is dying and it drives them insane! I think they also went insane from a vampire bat bite at one time.

Or my hatred for Man-Bat may have started earlier. It could have been when every fucking package of Heroclix had a useless Man-Bat figure inside of it so I had to field three Gotham City Cops, two Checkmate Agents, six Man-Bats and Desaad. Stupid useless garbage game.

Why must DC keep every character some jerk created and then keep them around for decades? You guys realize you can kill the shitty ones, right? Just because some writer was up against a deadline for a Batman story, threw a bunch of Batman comics on the floor in anger so they lined up and said "ManBatmanmanBatBatBatman," and was suddenly inspired to write a shitty story about a man that wants to have sonar for some idiotic reason, it doesn't make that a go-to story for future Batman epics. I'm sure somebody can point out a good Man-Bat story somewhere in DC's history and all I have to say to that someone is, "Go fuck yourself."

Man this story better suck ass or I'm going to be eating crow stuffed with my words in an hour or two.

The issue begins with a 3rd Grade Oral Report on bats and I'm suddenly thinking, "Rob Liefeld? Are you back, Rob?! Is that you!?" Alas, it is not. It happens to be Frank Tieri who co-wrote some of the crappiest New 52 books so far with Mr. Liefeld! It's good to see some of Liefeld's ability rubbed off on Mr. Tieri.

It begins, "Bats are like most animals. They prey on the weak. The vulnerable." Yeah! Fucking cows and deers and giraffes and shit! Preying on all the weak leaves and grasses! Fucking turds. And bats are the worst! Total fucking bullies, going after insects and fruit! Why don't you eat something your own size, you jerko bats!? How dare you eat those poor, weak loquats! And preying on the elderly and the wise! Animals are the worst!

Small children are probably the opposite of venerable, so they must be wea...oh! Vulnerable! Never mind.

It's okay for Woman-Bat to be around children because she doesn't have nipples. Although she does enjoy killing and eating them, so that's a bit of a downer. At least the parents don't have to explain titties to the kids. They'd probably get it all wrong anyway and point out that boobies are sex objects and should be covered all of the time instead of saying, "Boobies? You mean the things that were in your mouth for most of your childhood but now I'm teaching you to sexualize? Yeah, you can't see those fucking awesome things, kids."

Woman-Bat is completely insane which is a problem as I pointed out earlier. But Man-Bat is currently sane so it's his job to stop her from eating the children. It's also his job to constantly lament the fact that she used him and never loved him and their marriage was a sham and poor, poor fucking Kirk Langstrom! Abused by life! Treated shabbily! Without worth! The worst character in the DC Universe!

Man-Bat battles Woman-Bat until she transforms into a sexy topless woman.

Sure! Now the panels are just face shots! Stupid Teen Ratings. I should be doing a blog about Heavy Metal! Weren't you just listening to me when I said boobies aren't sex objects?! Now show them to me!

The cops arrive on the scene because I don't know when the fuck this takes place. I guess Batman is busy or dead or napping or something. But this doesn't appear to be Gotham City after the Crime Syndicate appeared unless the criminals have all declared the kid's parks off-limits. Except for feeding, of course. So Man-Bat flies off before he's accused of man-bat-handling a lady.

Kirk's next journal entry (Day 7!) states that Woman-Bat was charged with a bunch of murders so I guess the police recognized her in her hot topless form since, well, let's be honest. She was pretty fucking sexy as a Bat as well.

Oh, but by Day 7, Batman is gone and Gotham has gone crazy. Man-Bat believes it's up to him to fight crime in Batman's absence. But I read the same Who's Who Entry that I bet Frank Tieri did! Man-Bat was in control but now he's going to lose control before Batman has to return to put him back in control! It's about the only thing you can do with this character, I guess.

Oh, you naive Bat-Bastard.

I bet Frank Tieri didn't even want the job of writing Man-Bat. I bet he pulled the shortest straw in the office! Although if he'd given DiDio a hand job, he probably wouldn't be stuck with this task! That was a "pulling a small penis" joke! And the penis was Dan DiDio's! Not that there is anything wrong with small penises! I don't think. How should I know? I'm not a doctor of small penises?!

Man-Bat goes out to protect Gotham and massacres a bunch of street thugs in front of a child and his parents. So cool! Now that kid has an awesome story for Show and Tell! And it'll be the best story if he brings one of the thugs severed limbs or detached heads!

Eventually Kirk loses total control and goes insane. Fucking waste of time. Why did I even read this thing?! Man-Bat is crazy then he's not crazy then he's crazy then he's not crazy. I don't know whether he's crazy or not but I do know he fucking sucks.

Yep. I guess the playgrounds are off-limits to hoodlums. Unless they're hungry.

Man-Bat #1: Has this story just not been told enough? Is it a morality tale that still rings true? Is it about drug abuse? Loss of self-control? Arrogance? Bitter marriages? I know one thing it isn't about: entertainment! Thanks for being just as stupid as you've always been, Man-Bat! Now instead of crow stuffed with my own words, I'm going to go eat pancakes stuffed with victory!

Parasite #1

This just looks like an advert for a Mexican candy called, "For, yes, you!"

I wrote a script for Parasite for Villains Month but DC rejected it. So I'm going to publish the first two pages here. I have no idea why DC rejected it! Jerkos!

Page One, One Panel
The Parasite is naked in a bathtub clipping his toenails with hedge clippers.
Narration Box #1: My name is The Parasite.
Narration Box #2: I was created from the burning worry of millions of apoplectic American citizens concerned about the sanctity of marriage.
Narration Box #3: Religious marriage, of course, although it didn't hurt my power levels that the idiots fucking thought that a religious definition of marriage should be upheld by the laws of the land.
Narration Box #4: Especially a land built upon a strong foundation of keeping religion out of the law books and the law books out of religion. Unless your religion called for the sacrificing of young children to your loving God by means of not giving them medicine that could easily cure fatal fungal foot infections.
Narration Box #5: That's just how I was conceived, though. There's much more to me than that.
Narration Box #6: As I said: My name is The Parasite.

Page Two, Four Panels
Panel One
A tiny purple cloud hovering over the head of picketers with signs like, "There's no 'gay' in Monogamy!," and "A penis's place is in the vagina!"
Narration Box #1: Consciousness! So sudden and beautiful! To be aware! To be bathed in self-knowledge! To be happy that I had yet to grow aural organs and have to listen to the inane chanting that brought me into this world!

Panel Two
A small, bald purple toddler with a big round mouth full of teeth wandering a suburban cul-de-sac.
Narration Box #1: Born from withholding, I grew up quickly in the sprawl around cities, feeding off the hatred of the desperate and the poor.

Panel Three
A bald, purple teen obviously wanking in the bushes as a man and woman pass by in conversation.
Man: "We need more government spy programs to keep foreigners from blowing up our children's daycares!"
Woman: "But where will the money come from when the poor are taking it all in government handouts for food and shelter?"

Panel Four
A bald, purple man lighting a cigar with a fat wad of cash.
Narration Box #1: I grew might on America's fear and hatred of the Other, those they blamed on the decline of family values; the poor and sick they saw were to blame for bankrupting our country; pacifists that dared point out that their heroes were dying in vain in corporate wars; anybody different from them for any reason, they called a Parasite, and I fed and my cock grew large and powerful.

Pretty fucking good, hunh?! I filled it with Narration Boxes because DC loves those! And I couldn't help but begin it with an homage to Scott Lobdell since DC loves him! I think I probably should have edited Page Fifteen before sending it in though since I portrayed DC Comics' editors as deformed, inbred miscreants that fucked stacks of money all day long while reading Marvel Comic books. Oh well. I wanted to keep my artistic integrity intact more than I needed fat money from DC.

Well, let's see what script they decided to go with since they didn't seem to like mine for some reason.

Great! They chose an artist's script over mine! And an artist I've met so now I'm going to feel bad when I point out how awful it is out of bitterness, envy, and jealousy!

Three weeks previous to The Parasite diving head first off of the roof of a building in Suicide Slums in Metropolis, he was the greatest character in the history of characters created in Villains Month!

I just can't put my finger on why I like him so much.

I'm fairly certain that Aaron Kuder based this character on Puck from Real World San Francisco. Why? Because he's an Artist and not a Writer! No way an Artist could come up with this character straight out of his head! Maybe he could draw a guy on a bike but then when it came time to turn him into an actual character, he'd be all, "DUH! How make good character ization? Is that two words? Probably should be three words! Char actor ization. That make lot more sense. Tired now. Words hard." I'm almost positive that's how Artists write because I know that's the word version of how I, a Writer, draw! And no way in hell anybody is good at both! The chances of that happening are like 2 to 1 or even worse odds probably.

The Parasite is the worst bike delivery person of all time. I guess he isn't based on Puck because Puck was a messenger between businesses and massage parlors and bookies and shit instead of a guy that delivers packages. Editorial probably forced that change so that Puck wouldn't show up out of the blue demanding compensation for likeness rights like how Bill and Silent Ted did to Daredevil and Banksy in that Chasing Amelie movie.

Eventually The Parasite is hit by a car because that's what happens when you ride a bike like you own the road and are immortal instead of riding a bike as if you could die at any second. I'm not putting the blame on either the car or the bike in any given situation! All I know is that when I used to ride the Santa Cruz Hills, I didn't give a fuck about who had right of way! All I knew was that if a car and I tussled, I was probably going to be too dead to claim the driver was at fault.

Oh. Apparently there was no car. And Giant Booger Monsters always have right of way.

The Parasite gets lucky and defeats the Booger Monster by zapping it with a downed electrical wire. Which, luckily, doesn't kill him; he just winds up with a broken leg. Meaning he loses his job. Which leads to his girlfriend dumping him. In other words, he loses everything because he was a big jerk that called Metropolis "Jerk-o-opolis." He really should have just called it "Jerkopolis." That's where he went wrong in this time line. His life would have been amazing if he'd just gotten his derogatory name right.

His girlfriend calls him a Parasite when she walks out the door which, if you've been reading the Who's Who entries I've been posting, you know was a bad idea. Whenever anybody is dehumanized and called a name, they always rise up to claim that name as their evil moniker as they claim their revenge on a world that treated them a little bit shabbily.

Now that he's out of a job, he'll probably (like the original Parasite!) have to get a job with a research lab where he'll try to steal toxic waste and become a super-villain!

Joshua Michael Alan (that's his name for some reason! Probably because the original Parasite had three names) goes in to STAR Labs for testing (and because they're going to pay him) because of the contact he had with the Giant Booger Monster. They're not calling it that though. They call it the Humongous Mass of Alien Smegma. Anyway, the tests go about as expected and he turns into The Parasite!

After the Origin Story is complete, the comic book returns to The Parasite plunging to his death. But Superman doesn't respect people's choices and decides to save The Parasite's life because Superman obviously knows better. At least Batman would have stayed out of it. Of course when Superman catches him, The Parasite feeds a bit too much.

Oh! I get it! He's a parasite!

No wonder The Parasite wants to infect Superman. Parasites have the best life when they can find a host that they don't kill while sucking up its energy. Although this also seems a bit like the food chain where Superman is the plant getting energy from the sun and The Parasite is the meat eater taking the energy from Superman's meat. Loads and loads of it! Except in my analogy Superman was a plant so if The Parasite is going to feed off of Superman, that makes him an herbivore. Stupid analogies. Why can't I ever get them right?!

Fuck analogies anyway. Anybody who has ever used an analogy in a serious discussion is an asshole that's just trying to avoid the actual topic.

Superman should allow The Parasite to live in his bathtub back at the Fortress of Solitude. The Parasite wouldn't be hurting anybody and Superman has lots and lots of excess energy. He could just visit from time to time and let the Parasite suck him off a bit. No harm done! Of course it might be a bit embarrassing if Superman ever lets Batman use his bathroom.

Batman: "Hey Clark. There's a naked purple guy in your bathtub. You know what he tried to do to me while I was in there?"
Superman: "Oh yeah. Um. Sorry about that. That's just Josh. He's my, um, uhh...Alfred!"
Batman: "Hmm. I'm going to have to have a talk with Alfred if he's attempting to blow guests when they come over."

The Parasite learns he can steal Superman's powers.

The power doesn't last long when Parasite uses it though and he's quickly back down to skinny purple guy. Superman freezes him with his Cold Breath (why is his breath cold? Mine isn't cold! He's a freak!) and The Parasite winds up in Belle Reve. But we all know what happened to Belle Reve this month! Break out! After the breakout, The Parasite was last seen hitching a ride into Metropolis to find Superman to feast on again. He must not have heard that Superman is dead.

The Parasite #1 Rating: I don't fucking know what I want anymore! My favorite comic books are being written by Artists lately! This is a confusing and complex situation! I love well-written comic books. I can't get enough of those (which makes one wonder why I'm reading so many of The New 52!). But I also love comicky comic books! I enjoy something that's silly and whimsical and just fucking entertaining. Which this was, possibly because I liked the Bike Messenger so much. But this book reminds me quite a bit of Chris Burnham's stories when he was writing Batman of Japan. They're funny and whimsical and full of comic book goodness. I think some Writers are just trying too hard. Dark and disastrous and dramatic don't necessarily make for good story. Whatever Aaron Kuder put into this issue of The Parasite, he needs to share that amongst his fellow creators. Especially how even though it was rather goofy origin story, it actually ends on a page of pure malevolence as The Parasite threatens to kill a woman's child so she'll give him a lift back to Metropolis.

This wouldn't make my "favorite comic" list but it was light and entertaining and I liked it. I often mention how possibly the funniest movie I've ever seen in a theater was Jackass. But I'd never claim it was one of the best comedies ever made. I can only attest to the fact that it had me crying in laughter throughout. Comic books like this one are a rare find and I miss them.

Killer Croc #1

I'm pretty sure Waylon is vomiting those bones into the air. And I can just hear the sound he made. You know that sound? The one you make when you vomit and the vomit catches you by surprise and comes exploding out of your mouth with a kind of ratchety raspy croak?

I wish I could remember a time I looked forward to reading comic books. Now it's just work. Especially since I've run out of funny things to say. Oh well. Back to the coal mine with Killer Croc. *sigh*

Killer Croc begins by defining a word as if I were some dumb bloke that didn't know what "atavastacism" meant! When did Waylon Jones get so smart that he thought he would act better than me using big words. I know better! He's just a big dumb thug! He probably received that word in his email today from Merriam-Webster.com's Word of the Day email self-improvement program. The Word of Today is "lucubration." That's an abrasion you get when you stumble after cheering because you won some money in the lottery.

When did Waylon Jones become better at languaging than me?!

If a great big stupid drop out like Waylon Jones is beginning to sound like a Modern Day Mickey Dolenz compared to me, I've got a problem! I'd better bone up on the books! I think reading nothing but comical books is rotting my think organ. Just a second while I sign up for the Merriam-Webster Sound Pretentious One Word at a Time Email Course. I don't really have time to read every email they send me though so I'll probably just read the word and guess at what it must mean. Then I'll use it all day with my made up meaning and see if anybody notices. Okay! I signed up via Twitter. Wow! Education is easy! I can't believe so many young people are whining about their enormous debts from college. I just signed up for a daily class for free! Ha ha! Who's the stupid person now?!

I can't believe DC is sexualizing this little boy. See? He's naked in a tub which automatically means he's being sexualized. Disgusting.

I don't know about how sexy the boy is in the previous panel because I'm not a weirdo pedophile that likes lizard boys. But man is his aunt sexy! I'd let her scrub me with a gigantic piece of coral! Or pink kryptonite! Or her vagina! I haven't declared a new favorite character in quite some time so I'm going to do that now! Auntie Flowers is the best character DC has created so far! I can't wait until Birds of Prey gets a new roster with Auntie Flowers, Tig the Vampire, Alysia Yeoh, Sleen (Captain K'rot's Raccoon/Kitten friend) and Ferdie. Holy shit that comic book would give me a lucubration!

Too bad that scene was from twenty-six years ago. That probably would put Auntie Flowers in her forties which might not make her a very popular hero according to DC's stupid managing editors that make stupid decisions all of the time and really don't know what sells. If they knew what would sell, they'd call themselves Marvel Comics with Batman! I think a black woman in her mid-forties would make for an awesome team leader. She could probably kick Black Canary's ass.

This issue is written by Tim Seeley and I'm not sure he's every read a Killer Croc story in his entire life! Why else would Killer Croc sound like he just walked out of a college course on not speaking like a drop out thug flunky? Killer Croc is really pissin' me off with his eloquence and his not droppin' letters! Fuck you, Killer Croc! You can't fool me! You're a stupid sewer poop face that doesn't know words and things. You probably found a dictionary floating in some feces and now you're trying to better yourself. Well stop it. Everybody knows better. You're just a dumb monster!

Back to Killer Croc's time spent not learning anything, he wrestled Alligators (I can tell it's an alligator he's wrestling because it's name is "Al!") during a sideshow rock festival. But that ended when he didn't get paid enough. So he decided to rob jewelry stores in Gotham. But that didn't pay off because of The Goddamned Batman. And his annoying sidekick!

Jason Todd should really be worrying about his own flaws!

Some Gotham City Police Guys have been wandering the sewers looking for something that they lost that will get them in big trouble if they can't find it. But they're in Killer Croc's home now and he makes them pay for trespassing. Killer Croc kills all but two of them and then his followers show up. It looks like Killer Croc has an Underworld Kingdom just like all the assholes in Ann Nocenti's comic books! But at least Killer Croc's tribe lives in actual sewers and not some fantasy kingdom. And they look like people living off the street instead of High-tech Survivalists or Baron von Flamehead Cultists and Goat Ranchers.

Killer Croc was leading other were-creatures down in the sewers so I'm going to just pretend that these followers of his are more of them. I wouldn't want the Killer Croc stories from Batwoman to be erased from Canon. I'm not saying they are although I've read different! I just know I'm going to believe them for as long as I'm able and the comic books actually tell me something different.

The last two dirty cops find what they've been looking for: a key on a good cop they killed a few days earlier. But it's a little bit of a trap.

And I'm glad it was because it set up this panel which I simply adore!

It turns out Waylon is busy killing all of these crooked cops because of the man they killed. The man was a caring adult friend of Waylon's when he was a young child. And he was always there with ice cream when that fucking spooky ass Shauna would make fun of him because shit rolls downhill and she had to find the only person that was being teased more than she was. It's also interesting to think that the Ventriloquist is in her thirties.

Hey! Your Auntie Flowers wanted nothing but the best for you! You should respect her word instead of this weirdo pedophile that likes lizard boys!

Killer Croc holds a funeral for his dead one-armed friend and says some words that are probably inspiring but I'm not listening to him anymore! I'm bitter and angry that Killer Croc is being portrayed as smarter than I am! First Clayface proves he's smarter than me! And now this? It's untolerable!

Killer Croc #1 Rating: This was a pretty good story although Killer Croc's voice was nothing like Killer Croc's voice in Batwoman because his character was much better over in Batwoman. He was more vulnerable in his desperation and his average intelligence. And he didn't make me feel stupid! I wonder if maybe it's not him that's making me feel stupid but my being stupid that's making me feel stupid? OH SNAPS!