Static Shock #4

All the super villains want a piece of Static's ass.

Last issue, Piranha and Paleman (the Joker like-a-look) bought some drugs called 'Q-Juice'. It's supposed to give normal people super powers. But so far, it's only managed to kill five of Piranha's men. So the dealer decides to show Piranha the Q-Juice Demo Model to prove that it works: Guillotina from the cover.

Her hair is razor wire!

The demonstration convinces Piranha to buy more of the Juice to make more super villains. This Q-Juice was used in Dakota during some past DC historical event (or Cartoon Network event) called the Big Bang. It seems to be where Static got his powers. And a number of other people. Probably every goofy villain that Static had to fight each week on the cartoon.

Also, it turns out Paleman is working undercover to infiltrate this crime ring that Piranha is involved in. I don't know who he's working for exactly. Just another shadowy government organization, I guess.

This time Piranha's Q-Juice works and creates a whole bunch of wacky critters for his criminal super army. And even though they're just criminal punks whose powers manifested randomly (those that didn't die from the Juice), they seem to have come around all set up with a name and an understanding of how to use their powers!

In the 15 seconds this guy has had his powers, he's named himself a stupid name, learned how to use his powers, and defeated Static Shock. That's some gooooood Q-Juice!

Static Shock is captured but not killed. Piranha thinks he owes him an honorable death at sea. But he should have been killed for using lines like this:

What business? The business of transforming into super villains?

I let Static Shock off the hook for too long. It is going to drop one ranking after this issue. The only real story going on here involves his sister and what happened to her. The other half of the story is a criminal syndicate that wants Static dead. So issue after issue, Static is fighting gangsters and super villains while he spouts stupid lines in every other panel. The comic needs more meat! It needs something to care about. Perhaps it's relying too much on pre-DCnU history? I wouldn't know since I never watched the cartoon or read any other comic books with Static in them. Thankfully, I only have four more issues of Static Shock to go before it's over. I hope its replacement comic is more interesting and not written by JT Krul.

Static Shock #3

Does Virule have Triforce kneepads because his name rhymes with Hyrule?

Since the comic book repeated this panel from Issue 2, I will too!

Remember this was happening? Well then this started happening.

Does electricity cause Chia Pets to sprout faster?

Coming in to contact with Static gets Virule pregnant. That thought box of Static's is because he's turning off the Yellow Power Ranger's Magnet Jet Ski and timing it so that the Jet Ski crashes into Virule and knocks him away. It also causes a Virule to have a miscarriage. OF JUSTICE!

That baby isn't any uglier than all the other newborns I've seen.

Oh! I wonder if Virule began replicating due to Static's healing power which might have kicked in again because Virule smashed him in the previously severed arm which was still a little bit messed up. Maybe Static can transfer his healing power! And maybe Static made his sister's Doppelganger by kissing her boo-boo when she fell down roller skating! Or, you know, some other plausible scenario.

The Green and Blue Power Ranger have gotten their Jet Skis working again and join in the fight, as does the NYPD in a helicopter. And some typical comic action happens that gets everybody nowhere so Static goes home as the Power Rangers escape and the po-po mope about because they couldn't catch the flying black kid.

Static's sisters are still up and they both try to convince Static that the other one is the clone. It's sort of a silly argument to be having. I don't know how this extra Sharon was created but if she's somehow an exact copy, right down to all of her memories, then it doesn't matter which one is the 'real' Sharon. But if she's a clone that only has the memories since when it was created, then it should be real easy to figure out which one is the clone. Maybe there's some kind of carbon dating or radiation reading to tell which one has been around longer. How long has she been a part of the family? I wonder if we'll find out at all since Static Shock is only going for eight issues.

Back at school, Virgil finds out more about where the Power Rangers hang out because of the blabbiest new recruit ever. So later that night, Virgil heads on over to a club with this gossip gangbanger to see where the Power Rangers hang out.

I think Gossip Gangbanger should be a television show.

Let's go clubbin' and sit around with our weapons out!

Static heads up to the top floor of this club where the other two Power Rangers are stealing secrets from some company and trying to figure out Static's identity by checking the names of everyone who just moved from Dakota into New York City. As they're doing that, Static sneaks in and takes one of them out by frying her brain. I'm sure it's just a temporary outage.

Meanwhile, back at the Criminal Cartel's headquarters, Virule professes his love for Static.

I've been feeling that need since 12 years old!

Static forces the Power Rangers to meet up with him by kidnapping the Red Power Ranger whose brain he fried. At the meet, the Rangers realize Static doesn't know anything and then order Virule to shoot Static in the head. But Virule's lust keeps him from killing Static. Instead he barges in and attempts to rape Static while the other Power Rangers get away.

True love!

But Static has very strict dating policies.

Does he chop off the hands of all of his suitors who try to take him further than he's willing to go?

Static apparently doesn't understand the mating rituals of the Virule people because Static ends up blasting Virule with all of the power he's able to siphon from a nearby power plant. Which seems to reduce Virule to a fine green paste. But it actually impregnated him with the force of 1000 invading barbarian tribes.

This issue still wasn't great but it was far less boring than the first two issues. And it had a love story! I think I just don't like the character of Static Shock. Most of his dialogue consists of trash talk or aggrandizing his own abilities. I heard enough of that bullshit in junior high. I guess Static is in high school though, so it fits the character. At least it fits better than Green Arrow saying the same bullshit! But even if it fits, I just don't care about Static. No change in the ranking.

Static Shock #2

I'm guessing everyone can escape Virule and the Slate Gang.

When Static Shock's arm is cut off (at the end of last issue and relived again at the beginning of this issue! In case everyone forgot), it causes a massive electrical explosion or some kind of intense feedback. The buildings surrounding Static Shock lose power but his arm snaps back into place. It looked like he was pure electricity instead of blood and bone. He complains that his arm burns and makes a magnetic cast for it but I'm guessing it's just find and the electricity and magnetism he creates with his powers simply prevents him from losing limbs. Not sure if it would work for his head though!

Static's arm is barely even hurt when he runs a diagnostic on it. So he's got some kind of super healing power and the ability to keep his limbs from falling off. That should come in handy.

This is Piranha and some Joker wannabe.

The criminal cartel trying to kill Static think the Slate Gang and Virule suck because they couldn't kill Static. I think they suck because they ride flying jet skis and shoot compact discs. Also, they're multicolored like the Power Rangers. That's never cool.

If they were cooler, maybe I would have compared them to Voltron.

The thing that's wrong about Static's sister that was alluded to last issue is that there is too much of her. 100% too much of her! It seems she has a doppelganger living with the family and nobody knows which one is the real Sharon. So they just let both of them live with them and treat them both as family. In this issue, they both share the same dream about the other one crawling out of their mouths. So far, this is the most interesting part of the comic book!

Static ends up chasing some of the Power Rangers around and easily takes out two of their jet skis since they levitate via magnetism. He then chases the Yellow Power Ranger up the side of a building where he ends up face to face with Virule. They fight for a few pages and then the comic ends with Static about to be filleted.

Whoops!

Nothing really exciting is happening in this comic and it has no hook. The most interesting thing so far has to do with Static's sister and that's just barely mentioned. But there also wasn't anything horrible about the story either. It's just bland and fairly boring. I'll leave it at the same rank for now but if the next issue is the same, it'll drop a rank for wasting my time.

Men of War #4

Naked? With his dick in something?

Private Korba's big explosion took out the helicopters coming for Rock and his group and also knocked all of the other combatants unconscious. Rock and his men were spared. They regroup and head inland. Private Perez wants to know what the hell Korba just did but Rock doesn't seem to be curious about it. Maybe that's how we've never seen Rock before? Not curious?

And since Rock isn't curious, Korba just decides to tell him his secret origin anyway. But his secret origin is so boring that I'm not going to repeat it. He wants to ditch Rock and the company because he's a freak but Rock won't let him go. Rock says that if you declare you're a freak, you aren't a freak. So you can't get out of Rock's unit that way! Except he doesn't say it like that Heller would say it. He doesn't even say Korba isn't a freak! He just tells Korba, "You're infantry." Oh! OH MY! That's so powerful!

I wish this war comic were more anti-military and anti-god! That would make it more interesting! Enough with the strong follow order types who keep praying to God. I wish Circe would come back to ask them about their bad decisions that led them into the military!

This comic is more of the confusing shit hits the fan. There's nothing going on here except a guy and his team reacting to problem after problem. His thoughts or narration boxes only slightly modify the panel. They don't add a new dimension or express any interior struggles. They wander the salt plains. Some enemy turns the salt to hydrochloric acid. I'm sure that was on Mythbusters seeing as how every other little science factoid the DC writers are using have been lifted from that show. Checking it out on the internet, I discover hydrochloric acid is made by combining salt with sulfuric acid. So the 'genius' plan (as Rock describes it) is that the enemy just sprayed Sulfuric Acid all over the ground to make hydrochloric acid? Or maybe the enemy has a Firestorm as well!

So after the acid, a truck comes out of nowhere to run over Rock who clings to it and throws a grenade under it and they end up in the salt lake. Rock pops up and gets lassoed around the neck. He's then dragged out to the feet of this guy:

Who cares?

The back-up story is just a little joke about military funding. I'm not sure if it's meant to be amusing or infuriating! Yet again, Men of War bites it big time! It drops two full ranks yet again for having a really crappy story that never needed to be told since the reader learns nothing about Rock and his company. And the back-up story was a joke that played like an episode of a sitcom where maybe one member of the regular cast appears but in a new situation that is obviously just a pilot for another show. Luckily, I only have four more issues of this helicopter crash of a comic to go!

Men of War #3

What the fuck is the sniper shooting at birds?

Third issue and third story to start off with two or three pages of the middle of the story while then reverting back to the beginning of the story to just tell it in a linear fashion from there.

Seriously. No, seriously. See how serious I am, starting a new paragraph and all that shit? Okay, okay, fuck you. Yeah, I start new paragraphs pretty fucking randomly sometimes. But this time. I'm serious.

Enough with the fucking pseudo starting in the middle bullshit when you're not really starting in the middle! This is not your fucking 'in media res', you got it? This is just bullshit. It doesn't draw me in. It just annoys me. Now if you'd continue the story from where you've started and the rest all falls in to place as the tale is told, that's 'in media res'. So just stop it. Every comic in this fucking company does it and just fucking stop it. Was this a demand handed down from Dan DiDio? I'm going to start knocking fucking heads if this keeps up!

How am I supposed to react?

"Oh man! They're really in the thick of things! Hmm, he's starting a music analogy. Okay, let's see where this goes."

"Hmm, well, he kind of loses the thread a bit here. Drops the music thing altogether. Weird. But they really seem to be in the shit here!"

"What? 'This would be the wrong place to die. This will be.' That's awkward and idiotic. Anyway, last clip! Let's see how they get out of this! Kind of curious as to what's happening but they have those narration thought boxes that should explain everything as they're pinned down in the thick of the fight!"

"Oh fuck me in my pee hole! We're gonna start the story now?! After wasting three pages just to make me realize where they're going to end up? What is that supposed to do? Elevate the tension? Or just waste three pages of my fucking $4.00!? Moronic."

Maybe I ate too much! Now I'm all cranky crazy spastic because my blood sugar is too high! Right now my rankings for the New 52 are pretty flexible and, well, bullshit. But these kinds of things are making me think I should create some kind of point system to help categorize how well written and entertaining each comic is. Does the Issue begin by changing events from last issue? Minus points! Does the issue begin with an excerpt from the middle only to tell the story from the beginning anyway? Big minus points! Or maybe that will just take more time than it's worth and I should just keep ranking the comics haphazardly!

When did Rock and his men become Navy Seals?

Holy fuck. I'm absolutely not surprised this comic was cancelled after reading this issue. I'm not quite done yet but I just read ten more pages. From page three where the soldier says, "Last clip," to the bottom of page 14 where the soldier once again says, "Last clip," catching the narrative back up to the beginning, the story makes absolutely no fucking sense. They might as well have just continued the story from page three with narrative boxes saying simply, "We were on a mission to blow up a battleship keeping food shipments from getting through. But things turned bugfuck and we had to find shelter as the whole town turned on us." There we go! Two sentences in a narration box to replace 11 pages of bullshit and confusion. Now what that means is we can spend 11 pages of the soldiers trapped and cornered. We could get some dialogue where we learn who all of these soldiers are. We can hear them being afraid. Oh, excuse me, they "don't know anymore how to be afraid."

These eleven pages are filled with narration boxes that describe the panels. It's like commentary from local news anchormen when they roll tape. "Here you'll see this car heading down the street. Then watch this as it hits a patch of ice! You'll notice it loses control and spins into the barrier!" And what do Rock and his guys do when the mission goes tits up? They kill everyone in town! I guess it's an evil town of evils since the people just swarm Rock's group with weapons.

Really? I paid money for this bullshit? Fuck. I'm an idiot.

After the last clip and the Americans run out of ammunition in the middle of the firefight, all of the combatants stop firing. Just, you know, because. Why kill them when they're not shooting back even though they've been shooting at them the whole time? So everyone takes a break until some apparent leader steps up, sighs, speaks a foreign language and then has all of the enemy combatants raise their weapons to, FINALLY, finish off Rock and his crew (at least I think it's Rock. He gets called Sarge twice and he has that scar that I'm pretty sure identifies him as Joe Rock (not to be confused with his totally kick-ass grandfather Frank)). And just before they all get killed, this happens:

Is he a Firestorm?!

And then the main story is over. And I'm not holding up too much hope for the back-up story to have an incredible finish.

Yeah, it was pretty lousy. "That family was just as scared of us as they were of the bad guys!" "Yeah, but we're the good guys and we saved them!" "Yeah! Go America!" "Anyway, best not to think too much!" The end.

Minus the pregnant lady, I've been in this situation hundreds of times in Call of Duty! Stupid rocket guys!

This issue of Men of War had a really, really horrible main story. And the back-up was as bad as it's always been. The comic told almost no story. "Rock and his team fuck up a mission and almost die. Private Korba explodes." This issue is causing Men of War to drop three full ranks! Good job, creative team!

Men of War #2

That's a pretty virulent strain of herpes.

Men of War continues with Rock and his company taking shelter in the house of a man who doesn't really want them there. In his house. In his city. In his country. Rock and his men are just as confused as the owner of their new shelter. The super being was an unknown factor. Nobody knows what it was or where it came from or why it appeared as they began the mission. But whatever it was, it seemed to be taken down by some "black muck" and it crashed into the ocean. But not before setting the entire city on fire, killing the group's Sergeant, and severely wounding Rock's right arm.

The team makes its way to the building where the senator is being kept hostage. They toss in a flash grenade and a stunner to take out the guards. And the senator! Even after they save his life, I bet he gets all angry and uppity about that. Except that would be unpatriotic and an unreelectable thing to do! So even if his hearing and vision is damaged, he'll still be patriotically pleased with the rescue.

As the team is cleaning up, the super powered being enters.

That's a pretty complicated question, miss. The answer probably isn't 'Patriotism' even though most flag loving Americans love to believe that's the main reason for everyone in the service.

This lady rockets up into the sky taking Rock with her. The woman calls herself Circe. I have no idea if she's meant to be Wonder Woman's Circe or not. She looks exactly like Batwoman though! She tells Rock that he and his people are not wanted here and to tell his leaders to not return.

Is this how Sgt. Rock becomes a protestor for peace?

Then she drops him out of the sky and he burns up but then he wakes up in a helicopter with the senator sitting in front of him and then it's a week later and one of Rock's team is telling him everything is gone, the helo, the black box... What the fuck? Is that how you end this thing? Sure, sure. The overall storyline is going to continue next month. But that's how you this thing ends? Is Rock just having lapses in memory and consciousness now? Does he only get to remember bits and pieces? I blame changing the format to 20 page stories for this bullshit! Gotta pack it all in!

So, Rock falls to earth and comes to on the Helicopter with everyone else. Less pages and less care being taken to fill the pages with enough story, so it's easier to just skip forward and make Rock miss out on all the in-between as well. And then we need a lead-in to the next part of the story line! So we'll cram it all confusingly into the last page where Rock's buddy tells him how the Senator disappeared in a helicopter somewhere between New York and Washington, DC. I had to read these last three pages about five times to figure out that the Senator [probably!?] disappeared on a different helicopter than the one they show Rock on with his men. It's just all crammed in so haphazardly. I think the editor just looked at it and went, "What the fuck?" Then Ivan Brandon, the writer, explained to the editor what was going on in a way that should have been explained in the comic. And then the editor went, oh, okay, that makes sense when YOU FUCKING TELL ME ABOUT IT! The editor should have said, "Hey, why don't you write it so you don't have to fucking explain it, you stupid hack?" I bet the editor didn't say that because the editor didn't want to look stupid. The editor probably didn't even mention anything. He just read it and thought, "I don't get it. But I'm not telling that arrogant bastard of a writer that I don't get it or he'll think I'm just a stupid editor!"

Hmm. Maybe I should get something to eat! I think my low blood sugar is making me crazy!

The back-up story is the second part to the Navy Seals thing called 'Human Shields'! It's probably another eight pages of dumb. I guess I should read it to give it a chance.

Fuck, why did I read that.

The haphazard craptastic way the main story ended forces me to drop this title by one rank. And the back-up story is just boring bullshit yet it tacks another dollar onto the price of the comic. So that means Men of War is dropping two ranks this month! Losers!

Blackhawks #4

For a covert team, they sure love to display their branding.

TItus has stolen a rod from the Blackhawks nuclear reactor core and The Eyrie is going to experience some pretty hard times if someone doesn't come up with a plan. Kunoichi had better come up with a plan since she's now some kind of super techno computer God thing and is plugged into the entire base. She'll probably figure out to shut it down safely before the Blackhawks are completely destroyed in just four issues.

Oh, so this is finally happening? Stupid spoiler on Issue #3's cover!

While taking a tour of Mother Machine's city of Bespoke, Canada and Wildman notice one of their jets. Or space jets. Or Veritechs. The Blackhawks deal with alien technologies, so Canada smashes Mother Machine in the face with some stairs believing he can handle flying this thing so they can escape. Which is kind of rude, seeing as how she's been nothing but sweet and kind in her I'm going to take over the world and make it a better place fascist way.

Back at The Eyrie, the whole place is filling up with radiation and the team is evacuating. Laszlo might be able to save them but he's off in Deathstroke #4! I don't actually know what Laszlo does with the Blackhawks. He's probably just a nobody red shirt nothing. As everyone begins abandoning the base, Irishman gives Kunoichi a knife since she's staying behind to fight Titus. Titus has his big ass blades and a Uranium Rod and she gets a little pig sticking knife!

*snort* I highly doubt that!

Kunoichi puts up a pretty good fight against Titus but only because his Nanocites are just barely keeping him alive while he's flooded with radiation. But even nearly dead, he gets the better of her as the radiation begins to take its toll on her as well. But Kunoichi knows The Eyrie's systems and has complete remote control of the base. So as Titus is going in for the kill, she rams a Blackhawk jet up his ass and blows up the hangar.

Nice improvised nuclear blast. The Eyrie's hangar is going to be unsafe for generations!

Titus staggers away from the blast and then falls off the edge of the mountain, probably only to be seen again the next time the Blackhawks get a comic book series. Kunoichi also survives. Those Nanocites are pretty powerful. But why are they such a bad thing that will cause the end of the world? My guess is that anybody infected with Nanocites can also be controlled by Mother Machine. Just a matter of issues before Kunoichi turns on the Blackhawks.

Meanwhile back at Bespoke, Canada easily figures out how to fly a piece of alien technology that he's never seen before. Although he isn't actually flying it. He just, somehow, got it started. Perhaps all it needs is a pilot to sit in the seat and the ship decides, "Okay! Time to go!" and then it follows a preset course. This ship's preset course is taking Wildman and Canada into space. But since they don't actually know where they've been taken, going into space could mean they're returning to Earth. Or they're headed to Mother Machine's home planet! If her home planet is different than Earth.