Deathstroke #0

Once again, Liefeld gets the sole credit on the cover while three (THREE!) inkers are listed on the interior credits.

Is this a sad occasion or a happy occasion? Deathstroke #0 is the last comic book I'll ever read that was drawn by Rob Liefeld. Unless he ends up drawing Savage Hawkman #0 as well. Take a look at that cover? Just like the Grifter cover, Liefeld put a guard on the weapon (although this one is a sword as opposed to a gun on Grifter). And just like Grifter, he drew a shitty looking fake gun in a really awkward hand. But it's those guards on the handles of the weapons that just blow me away. Why doesn't he just practice drawing a hand holding a weapon since that's probably sixty percent of his job drawing super heroes? Across a twenty plus year career, he still would rather block the hand with a guard on the handle instead of waste time learning to draw a decent hand holding on to something. It boggles my mind.

Anyway, I'm really interested to see how Liefeld writes Deathstroke's origin. I'm sure it'll take place during Slade's Team 7 years. I have a feeling this is going to be a long read with a lot of scanning taking place.

Slade's new squadron moonlights as a boy band during times of peace.

If all of Liefeld's characters didn't stand around in the exact same action pose, I really wouldn't mind the grim, no eyes style of this picture. But every man is drawn the same. He only goes out on a limb to draw the kneeling guy and then he fucks that up. The guy is either kneeling on his toe with his knee still up in the air or his knee is in the grass with his foot on the pavement. Liefeld does tend to like Moebius strip-like appendages on his characters.

So the first page lets the reader know that Slade Wilson was a fighting prodigy. He was a legend! The best the army has ever seen!

It sounds like it's Slade Wilson's time to shine!

Apparently the new kind of war requires soldiers that have both of their legs and can run as opposed to that old kind of soldier standing still in the background, missing half of his left leg, and carrying a half-wooden gun. And how can a soldier's training be assessed without a crowd of officers standing on a cliff hundreds of feet above the action?

And how can they tell what's going on from that height when they won't open their eyes? Or don't even have any?!

Slade's future wife continues the narration with a weird molding of a diamond metaphor.

She continues, "I kept Slade close. Truth be told, he both frightened and fascinated me. I couldn't take my eyes off him. At least not when my eyes were actually drawn onto my face. It was a tough time being a drawing in those Liefeld years."

"The real secret to these techniques is that they only work if you're wearing a tight skirt and high heels."

Captain Kane teaches him how to fight by shooting all around him instead of just straight ahead. Even though they're in the army. And they should be fighting like a unit. I have a feeling that the Squadron Boy Band is going to go down in a hail of Deathstroke's circular defense gunfire.

How is she standing in that first panel? Is she already jumping and reacting to the target? She's amazing! No wonder Slade fucks her so hard she becomes pregnant with a couple of killers and a deaf mute.

Slade is so impressive that he graduates nine months later from Diamond Finding School. With honors! He's immediately put on a special ops team that the pentagon will disavow if anybody ever hears of them. The team is called The Blackhawks The Black Razors Task Force X Checkmate A.M.M.O. A.R.G.U.S. Team 7!

The members were Deadly Du Rag, Killer Kerchief, Deathpork, Black Mascara, and Deathstroke the Terminator.

Sometime between being given this first mission to Gamorra and being told what the mission was, Slade's hair turns white. Perhaps it was caused by the fluorescent lights inside the classroom.

Also, they fell in love. But that might have happened during the nine months of training.

Apparently the other guys in class learned about the mission but they didn't make the cut. Team 7 was not as cool a team as the men I named above. Instead it was composed of Slade Wilson, Cole Cash, Bronson, Dinah Drake, Amanda Waller, Alex Fairchild, and Kurt Lance. They're the best team ever assembled "capable of tilting the balance in any conflict." Apparently that's true! It's just they don't always tilt the balance in the right direction because they're immediately ambushed on their trip to Gamorra and Slade is shot in the chest by a sniper as the others hide in some nearby bushes.

Slade is immediately rushed off of the island and sent to his origin. Doctors saved his life by implanting new genes in him or something equally science-like. Whatever they did, he became Deathstroke! Super strong. Super quick. Super healable? But he still had two eyes!

Slade's near death experience pushed him further away from the military life and closer to Adeline Kane and their budding romance.

First off, he's obviously still not smiling. Second off, he hasn't smiled one time in this comic book.

Adeline and Slade were married six months later. Wintergreene, Slade's Alfred, was his best man at the wedding because he was Slade's only friend.

Adeline's bridesmaids were disgusted strangers given bouquets of moss to hold.

At some point, Wintergreene was kidnapped and about to be killed. Slade donned a mask and armor and a belt full of pouches and rescued him. Wintergreene now owed him a life debt which meant he would have to work for him for nothing for the rest of the comic book series. Hey, it's the way these things work!

Even though Adeline has become pregnant with Ravager, Slade's life has now turned into a dance of death with death dancers dealing death dances to the highest bidder. Or in less flattering terms, he became a mercenary. And people in his life still had no eyeballs.

Don't worry about reading those captions. They're simply death dancing analogies. I scanned this to show the no eyeball people.

Deathstroke continued to make money, earn reputation points, and gain enemies while his wife sat home with their two boys. Yes, their TWO boys!

The first confirmation in The New 52 that Jericho (Joseph Wilson) exists!

I know Adeline is going to die at some point. And I believe she puts out Slade's eye at some point as well. Grant grows up to be Ravager and then he dies. My theory is that Joseph is with Adeline when she dies and believed dead. But he actually survives although deaf and dumb from whatever happened. And with the power to enter people's bodies.

Years later, the Wilson family home was attacked. The west wing was destroyed by a rocket launcher and Adeline and Joseph were believed dead. But of course she isn't dead because she's narrating this story! Although that actually doesn't mean anything since more than one story in the New 52 was narrated by a corpse. And then while Slade is vengeance crazy, he gets shot in the eye by Korean Friend's Father.

Oh, and I guess Wintergreene was killed somewhere along the way as well. My mistake! It was his son Peabody that has been living as Slade's unpaid lackey.

Peabody has no eyes too!

And then the issue ends with a retarded shocker.

I'm glad Jericho is back and I'm glad Liefeld won't be around to fuck him up. I'm willing to bet he'll have his throat slit by Slade in a future issue so that he'll once again be mute. He might already be deaf from the rocket launcher attack.

Deathstroke #0 Rating:

Exactly, Anguished Fat Man. Exactly.

Demon Knights #0

Demon Knights #0 begins in Hell because it's going to be the origin of how Jason Blood and Etrigan came to be bound together. Although that story has already been told from Jason Blood's point of view. Hopefully this issue will stick to Etrigan's point of view which would probably be a lot more confusing as he goes about his hell business and suddenly gets summoned by Merlin.

Man, being a demon would suck. Going out on a date with a hot succubus when BAM! You're summoned away just as some really twisted sex is about to go down. Or worse, she's summoned away! And then she comes back after having sexed up a bunch of mortals and stolen their souls and now you've kind of lost interest because you can picture the filthy mortals hands all over her. And you begin to judge her for fucking a human when suddenly BAM! Now you've been summoned and you're trapped in a binding pentagram when you find out you're about to merge with a human in a totally different way. What in the name of all that is holy do these goddamned humans want?

Etrigan began as a small time servant for Lucifer. He was not yet of the rhyming class but he kept practicing and he kept trying because he knew that one day he would be written by Alan Grant who would make his rhyming dialogue sound natural and on meter. But for now, he's just no good at it and he disappoints Lucifer by not being able to find a rhyme for Lucifer. Oh, come on, Etrigan! He's your master! You should have a shitload of rhymes ready for his name!

And then Alan Grant's The Demon takes place.

Meanwhile in Camelot, Jason Blood is rebelling against Merlin because Merlin wants him to transcribe 100 copies of a stupid note. Isn't that what monasteries were for? You can't do 100 copies in house with one employee?! You've got to outsource that shit. And now that Jason Blood is acting up, the only way to get him back in line is to stick a demon inside of him? Is that HR's answer to everything?

Merlin decides to discuss his employee problems with King Arthur for some advice on how to deal with underlings who won't do what they're told or try to fuck your wife.

I didn't scan these panels for the Stormwatch reference. Cornell has made nearly that exact reference months ago. I scanned these to show what a badass King Arthur is. He doesn't even flinch at the explosion and blast that blows his hair back. Just a minor squint of annoyance.

The blast that explodes the wizard's tower was caused by Jason Blood trying to use Merlin's magic to duplicate Merlin's TPS reports.

Although Etrigan's birth placed him in the rhyming class of Demons, he hates to rhyme. He decides to overthrow the lord of the Prose Demons and use their armies to take over Hell. And on Earth, Jason Blood wants to write verse and poetry but signs and portents at the time of his birth have carried him into Camelot to copy documents at the feet of Merlin. He wants to rhyme but is not allowed. Neither character wants to put in the time and effort to apprentice their way to a point in their lives where they're free to do what they want. And this rebellious nature will only get them merged together, never to be free again. Tragedy is forthcoming.

Merlin consults with Morgan le Fey seeking a vision of Jason's future. It's not good. He'll become a wife beater and murderer if something doesn't change and refocus his rage. I know! Maybe if you let him write a little poetry by outsourcing some of your transcription work, maybe he wouldn't be so angry? Or you could, you know, stick a fucking demon in him so his mind is occupied on other things.

Since Merlin has a problem and Lucifer has a problem, the two guys get together. That's not the only reason these two have to meet. Lucifer calls Merlin his son. Which would mean Lucifer created mankind before God could get around to doing it since Merlin was born the moment the universe was created. Which also means not just God existed before the universe was created but heaven and its angels as well. And it's entirely possible that Lucifer had already fallen and Hell also existed before the universe was created. And technically Merlin isn't a man since he ages backwards and can exist in the vacuum of space and was created with the knowledge of lager and English grammar, he's still pretty much the first man. Lucifer should have applied for an intellectual copyright before God stole his design. Unless Lucifer stole the design by basing Merlin on God's image? I bet this whole thing would give the Lawyer Angel Class a gigantic headache.

Etrigan's army makes it to the gates of Lucifer's inner circle before Lucifer appears to deal with Etrigan himself.

I guess in the Reboot, Hell is not ruled by a Triumvirate.

Lucifer sends Etrigan into a portal to wind up in Merlin's tower so that Merlin can shove him into Jason Blood thus ruining both of their lives. Or saving them. One of those. And all of this happens while Camelot is attacked by a Daemonite Millennium Falcon.

Or a Rob Liefeld gun.

Once merged, Etrigan and Jason quickly realize that they will need to learn to trust each other, somehow, if they are to have any kind of freedom at all.

Although if Jason wanted to, he could just live a nice, peaceful life in seclusion somewhere and never ever utter the rhyme to release Etrigan. Which he occasionally does for centuries at a time.

Demon Knights #0 Rating: There were some new twists thrown in here (like Merlin being Lucifer's son (unless that's an old Preboot idea!)) but most of it was still already told. I would have rather seen Vandal Savage's Reboot Origin.

Legion Lost #0

This is the first cover to create their own original tear in the comic book cover.

Is it possible Tom DeFalco was waiting for the Zero Issue before revealing each of the team member's secrets? My guess is no. Well, maybe he'll reveal Chameleon Girl's secret that they were all sent back in time by The Echo Police. But that'll be it.

The introduction to the comic book sounds like it won't even reveal that much. It looks like it's going to focus on the origin of Timber Wolf. I guess it could have seven short three story pages detailing each character's origin.

Here's a new favorite character of mine: Don't Go Fish Guy.

Timber Wolf's father created another variant on the super soldier serum. But this one was invented in the 31st Century so it's probably better than any of the others that were invented in the past. Timber Wolf's father's patron wants the serum for himself and his family but the serum isn't quite ready to be used on humans. So the patron, Lord Vykor, decides to provide some incentive for Timber Wolf's dad to work faster. The incentive isn't more money or a time dependent bonus or a nice firm pat on the back. The incentive is killing Timber Wolf's mom. I think the process of mourning is supposed to get the scientist to concentrate better or something.

Timber Wolf's dad is given one more month to have the product ready. When it is ready, he injects it into himself and his son so that they'll be super powered and can destroy Lord Vykor when he arrives for the finished product. The results of this meeting show that even Lord Vykor realized that his "motivation" probably wasn't the best way to get what he wanted.

And nobody lived happily ever after.

Timber Wolf drops from the ceiling and bites Lord Vykor's ear off. Then Timber Wolf jumps out of a window as the lab explodes. But Lord Vykor and his men get away, of course. And now the only way Lord Vykor can get his hands on the super soldier serum is by getting a sample of Timber Wolf's blood.

This origin story is boring the fuck out of me. Wait, what does that mean? Does that mean I'm so bored that I've lost all desire to copulate? I don't think I got quite that bored. But it did get boring enough that I asked Doom Bunny for advice.

Me: "Legion Lost #0 is BORING."
Me: "The commentary is turning into a synopsis! I need something funny to talk about!"
Doom Bunny: "Not dumb, just boring?"
Me: "Yes."
Doom Bunny: "What would happen if they'd never been lost?"
Me: "It's the Origin Story of Timber Wolf."
Doom Bunny: "Ew. Write something about Judas!"
Me: "Judas was one of Christ's disciples. He was a man. He wanted to help the poor but Jesus was all, 'Fuck the poor! Give Caeser whatever Caeser wants because getting into heaven is where it's at, man!' And Judas was all, 'What?! No way! What about our home? What about the hypocritical pharisees? What about driving these fucking Romans out of our land?!' And Jesus was all, 'Pshaw! Getting through the eye of a needle is the goal so chill out, baby!'"
Doom Bunny: "lol"
Doom Bunny: "I was trying to find Jennifer's ridiculous food post from today."
Doom Bunny: "Timeline sucks. Oh, here it is! 'Range free eggs'"
Me: "Ha!"
Doom Bunny: "Dumb ass. It's cage-free eggs and free-range chicken."
Me: "I like my eggs laid by prison chickens!"
Doom Bunny: "Yeah!"

Doom Bunny also mentions how I called Jennifer a narcissist but I censored that out so he wouldn't be implicated in it! I also think Doom Bunny wanted me to write something about my cat, Judas. Whoops! Anyway, that didn't have anything to do with Legion Lost but if Legion Lost were holding my attention better, that interlude never would have happened. So it's Legion Lost's fault for being the first really boring comic book of the Zero Issues so far. I won't go so far as to say Grifter #0 was good but at least it had something to say about the ongoing title. I guess if I were paying closer attention to this comic, I would be gaining some really good insight into Timber Wolf's character! But why should I have to work so hard when Tom DeFalco spells out all of Timber Wolf's trials and travails in page!

Half of Timber Wolf's training took place in a cardboard box. I'm surprised he's not Urban Raccoon.

Timber Wolf dedicated his life to hunting down Lord Vykor! But Lord Vykor was hanging out with "the politically elite and legally challenged." What the fuck? Should writers be held responsible for making art that is understandable? Oh! Oh! Here's a story about Soy Rakelson, my high school friend whose name has been changed to protect Ann Nocenti.

Soy and I were discussing David Lynch's Lost Highway one night. And while my friend Upright and I had discussed the movie after seeing it and pretty much figured out what was going on, Soy wondered if Lynch had more of a responsibility to make the point of his movie clearer. I asked him how clear an auteur needs to make their work. Should he blatantly state what his intent is? Should a work be entirely free of ambiguity so that every member of the audience walk away with the same experience so there's no need to discuss the work? Soy just seemed to think Lynch's vision was too muddled and thus failed. So we went on to talk about other things.

At one point, Soy picked up my John Barth book, "Lost in the Funhouse." He flipped through it and said, "Oh man, this first story about the Swimmers is great." And I said, "Oh, the story about the sperm." And he looked up quizzically and said, "You know, the swimmers." And I said, "Yes, the story about the sperm." And I saw him cock his head to the side and then the light go on in his eyes and his jaw dropped halfway open. And I said, "Do you think John Barth should have been more clear about that? Do you think he failed?"

That's the end of that story. I apologize that it didn't contain more explosions and future technology.

So back to Legion Lost, who are the legally challenged that Lord Vykor is hanging out with? Is that a euphemism for bad types? Or is he hanging out with people being sued by other people? Perhaps they're just people who don't understand the concept of loitering and jaywalking.

Eventually Timber Wolf makes his way to Lord Vykor.

Just like a typical DeFalco plot. Lord Vykor's plan was for Timber Wolf to find him. If you wanted to meet with him, why didn't you just have your thugs pull him off the street?

Since this moment was entirely to be expected, Lord Vykor spent years preparing for it. He probably even had a candy glass window placed in the loft so that Timber Wolf wouldn't hurt himself when he smashed through it. Because Lord Vykor's son Tor wouldn't want any unfair advantages due to severe lacerations from a plate glass window.

Why didn't he use some of the serum in the vial for his scientists to backwards engineer it? That makes much more sense than waiting years for Timber Wolf to appear and then killing him and then hoping that somehow the formula's footprints can still be found inside his corpse.

The fight begins with Timber Wolf holding back and still getting the better of Vykor and his son. But Timber Wolf chooses not to kill anybody because that would cause him to lose his humanity. And he can't do that when they're calling him an animal! That would prove them right! So he jumps around and nothing much happens.

Seriously? You had the fucking serum, you stupid sprok!

By the way, it is stupid that Vykor had any of the serum at all. Timber Wolf's father really would have used the serum on himself and his son and destroyed any that was left. Now that would make sense if Vykor's last chance was the slight possibility that Timber Wolf's blood could give them the formula. But having had the formula in his hands and he didn't have his scientists work with that? He deserves whatever he gets. Probably mindswiped by the Echo Police and sent back to the past to encounter Timber Wolf in a future issue of Legion Lost.

In the end, Timber Wolf calls the Science Police to pick up these yahoos. The Science Police offer to send the Legion of Super-heroes a letter of recommendation if Timber Wolf would like to apply. As this comic ends, he seems to have no interest. Probably because that's a story that's already been told somewhere in the Preboot which still holds true for this Reboot.

Legion Lost #0 Rating: What about the origins for the rest of the team? Why is Timber Wolf so special? Is he the really, really, really poor and unhealthy man's Wolverine?

Frankenstein Agent of SHADE #0

Doesn't everyone already know Frankenstein's monster's origin? A crazy doctor sends his disfigured assistant to get body parts. The doctor sews them together while a bunch of zany things happen. Then he puts the body on ice for awhile while he tends to his second job as a candy maker. Then he returns to zap the body with lightning and his creation comes to life. Then his creation meets these two buffoons and more wacky hijinks ensue. There might also be something about Niagara Falls and some poorly named baseball players at this point in the story. Then the monster kills a little girl out of kindness and he's chased by a mob into the arms of Elvira. And right around there he's approached by some three month old named Father Time that recruits him into S.H.A.D.E. which stands for Some Hackneyed Acronym, Disappointing Everyone.

Frank is partially made from Bunny Rabbits just like Resurrection Man. Is this a trend in comics today?

Frankenstein's monster was brought to life by something called the Soulgrinder. Dr. Frankenstein kidnapped inmates from an asylum and threw them in the Soulgrinder which powered the machine that would bring his monster to life by consuming their very souls!

*CRACK OF LIGHTNING! MANIACAL LAUGHTER!*

It took fifty inmates to bring Frankenstein's monster to life which means Frankenstein's monster has the crazy memories of fifty asylum inmates rattling around in his corpse brain. I think the rest of Frankenstein's monster was created in the old fashioned way with Igor digging up corpses and sewing them together into a big, green monster that retained only a nagging sense of its own humanity. And maybe the monster retains the memory of the corpses he's made out of instead of the inmates but I doubt that after seeing the crazy memories that have been plaguing him lately.

SHADE had been monitoring Dr. Frankenstein for potential recruitment into SHADE. But they noticed that anybody willing to throw living people into a fiery pit to use their souls as fuel to bring a corpse back to life was probably a little bit too insane even for their Machiavellian machinations. But they did see potential in the reanimated corpse!

If that top panel were narrower, I'd turn it into the new banner for EEE! Tess Ate Chai Tea!

Frankenstein's monster had escaped into the world. Where he went and what he did next remain a mystery. Well, they're a mystery to me since the comic book doesn't depict any of it. But it does show what Dr. Victor Frankenstein did next! He became a Pirate Bounty Hunter and Leader of an Army of Corpses!

Why can't the Doctor be happy with these monstrosities? Have they only been fueled by one or two souls each and rendered permanently mentally handicapped?

Since leaving his home, Frankenstein's monster had walked across the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean and arrived in the Amazon rainforest where he met a group of natives living in the vicinity of a baby-stealing Great Old One. The natives appealed to Frankenstein's monster for help and he granted it, proving to SHADE that Frankenstein's monster was not a monster at all. He was simply Frankenstein and he had indeed retained his humanity.

Frank learns a valuable lesson in self-sacrifice and helping others. This message brought to you by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Soon after Frankenstein's celebration with the natives, Dr. Frankenstein catches up with him. His steampunk corpse pirates destroy the village and kill everyone within it. Except Frankenstein. Frankenstein they have a little bit of trouble with. Both physically and philosophically.

Just another guy with severe daddy issues trying to prove himself to the world. Could you be more cliche, Frank? If you'd been female, you'd have been a stripper.

Frank and the Doctor have a good old fashioned knock down drag out fight over a cliff and down a raging river and over a waterfall before they have their final confrontation. I think it's probably done perfectly but I might be biased since I just called out the whole daddy issue thing.

I like how the confrontation is built up by Victor as this grand God versus creation thing when it's really just father versus son. And Frank brings it right back down to that level with the simplicity of striking out and a tantrum-like "Shut up." This is how anti-climactic can be done excellently.

After this fight, the final scene that I'm going to scan plays out. After that scene are a couple of pages of Frank fighting enemies across the years and those pages are pretty great. Seriously, this comic book has style. And if this is the kind of story that Matt Kindt can write, I'm all aboard for his future stories of Frankenstein. And I hope Alberto Ponticelli continues to do art for it. His style matches perfectly with the feel of this book. So, finally, here's that last scene.

When is Father Time going to be a kitten?

Frankenstein Agent of SHADE #0 Rating: Literally epic.

Green Lantern Corps #0

Many, many years ago when Guy Gardner had a raggedy haircut instead of the close cropped buzz cut he normally wears, the universe was on the brink of disaster. At least I think it was. If the universe wasn't, at least the Green Lantern Training Planet was in pretty big trouble. Every recruit but Guy Gardner was killed by this cosmic threat. It was a time of great upheaval.

That's Guy Gardner in this guy's right hand. I don't know who that guy is in his left hand.

Just a few months previous to this long ago time, Guy Gardner was back on Earth feuding with his dad and attending his sister's police academy graduation. His hair is still all long and in his face and he's wearing a leather jacket and riding a motorcycle. Is this a Guy Gardner reboot? Wasn't he a total military man in the Preboot Universe? Anyway, he's just some punk kid that his father thinks can't be counted on. But his sister loves him a lot and his brother seems to be the peacekeeper.

I think this shot screams, "Impending disaster!"

Guy's brother convinces Guy to be the bigger man and try to patch things up with their father. It seems Guy was kicked off the police force for somehow being responsible for innocents being killed. Guy insists the report was a mistake but his father doesn't believe it. They have the kind of fight that ends up resulting in rough things being said that can't be taken back because one of them dies before the other one can apologize.

While Guy begins smashing old pictures of previous generations of Gardners in uniform, his father passes out and a report of an officer down comes over his father's police scanner. Guy either suspects or knows that it's his brother Gerard. I'm not proficient in police lingo so whatever was said might have indicated that Gerard's partner was sending the message or the badge number or some other clue. Anyway, the incident is only a few blocks away and Guy heads off to help out and prove to his father that he's not a complete screw up. He's a hero.

Gardner arrives on the scene where his brother is wounded and his brother's partner has been killed. He beats the crap out of a bunch of gun-wielding thugs with nothing more than a tire iron. This act might not catch the attention of his drunk and angry father but something in the universe notices.

Okay but how did John Stewart get his ring?

Back to the beginning of the story, the bad guy calls Guy Gardner "second-rate" which causes Guy Gardner to kick his fucking ass. Because Hal Jordan is the second rate Green Lantern! And nobody compares Gardner to that whiny asshole Jordan. Guy puts this guy Xar in a Green Lantern Science Cell. Xar threatens Guy in the way a villain threatens a guy that means he'll be back in a future issue after the Guardians have been defeated and all of the prisoners on Oa end up free. And then Gardner becomes a full-fledged Green Lantern.

After this he meets Hal Jordan but that isn't very important or exciting. It's just stupid Hal Jordan.

Green Lantern Corps #0 Rating: Where the fuck was John Stewart's origin?!

Grifter #0

Can this poorly sketched cover be blamed on editorial as well, Liefeld?

Besides Liefeld's guns barely looking like guns, his guns (and swords!) are the only weapons in the New 52 that have grips like the one above in Grifter's right hand. "Fuck drawing fingers! Look at how badly I fucked them up in the left hand! I'll just draw a grip to cover the right hand!" At least Liefeld didn't have to spend time on Grifter's face. He just drew a tube with hair coming out of it.

And to have something nice to say about Liefeld's art here, if it wasn't for the awful depiction of the hands and the weapons, I would chalk everything else up to being stylized. And I wouldn't have a problem with it! But that's the difference between stylized art and the art of someone who really just can't draw very well. Also, if this were drawn on the book cover of a classmate's algebra book during a class instead of commissioned art appearing on the cover of a professional comic book, I might say, "Fuck, dude. That's pretty good! With some serious practice, you could become a pro!"

Oh, and this issue of Grifter is drawn by an artist that Liefeld thinks does horrible work! Holy fuck, what is Rob trying to do? Tear a hole in reality? But I think because Liefeld tweeted how he felt about Scott Clark's art (and then subsequently deleted that tweet), Scott Clark isn't really trying very hard this issue.

Okay, so Grifter had that stupid mask a full year before he actually had that stupid mask? Or was I completely mistaken about how he got it? Was he wearing it regularly before he was infused with Daemonite DNA? Why? The mask was supposed to be a symbol of the face that the Daemonites should fear. Should I just chalk this up to Liefeld not giving a shit about the history of any character he writes? And by history, I mean New 52 new history and not the Preboot history of Grifter.

The next two pages are simply one full panel shot of this same scene but in profile. Fuck, Clark really, really doesn't care about this story.

Apparently Grifter is on Team 7 business right now. Because two years ago he was a member of Team 7 and not a con man. I have a feeling Cole Cash's history is going to just be a pile of random bullshit now. Good thing I don't give a fuck about him.

Grifter is also confused by this scene since his brother Max and some guy named Lynch shouldn't be the ones with him.

I don't know where I read it now but someone suggested to Liefeld his Hawkman story (in Issue #0?) should be a dream and he said he believed the fans deserved better than a story like that. But he's going to go the dream route in Grifter? Do Grifter fans not deserve any better? Maybe I'm jumping to conclusions here.

Here's the dream conversation which I decided to actually look up:

Ann Nocenti, God bless her, read my Hawkman #0 and suggested that it be a dream, uncertain, something we could drag out… I said NO, the readers deserve clarity and certainty, a reward for their investment of the last 6 months.

So technically, Grifter fans don't deserve clarity and certainty if this issue ends up being a dream.

If I never read another Liefeld written comic book, I'll never read another Liefeld comic book. Ha ha! Surprise tautology!

So Grifter was a member of Team 7. Does that mean the Team 7 comic will be telling stories from the past since all the members have moved on to other assignments? And what happened to Grifter after he left Team 7? Why did he become a conman? Why did the government want him killed after the plane incident from issue #1? If I didn't hate this comic book so much, I'd probably reread it to point out that Cole Cash as a member of Team 7 two years ago doesn't make any sense. I think that's what DC's editors are relying on.

Oh, I forgot to talk about the panel above! Really, Liefeld? A New Coke joke? I think his pop culture knowledge stopped developing at the same age as his drawing ability stopped developing. I only wish that a super hero or covert team went on missions that meant nothing more than corporate espionage. The main problem is that every fucking story arc does revolve around the world about to end. It's as if comics escalated to a point where every story has to be the next Crisis on Infinite Earths and the writers have no idea how to deescalate this shit and still provide tension in a story. Tension in comics now is only derived from the knowledge that the Earth will explode if the hero doesn't do his job.

Having lived through it, I can actually see the importance and feel the tension of a story that revolved around a black ops team trying to steal the formula for new Coke so that it never happens. Not that I cared much being a Dr. Pepper fan. But my dad fucking stockpiled cases of the old formula. Shades of his reaction to Y2K, I guess!

Okay. It turns out it's a simulation and not a dream. I was really worried about that Team 7 nonsense that made no sense!

And maybe Liefeld was paying attention to the earlier story and he's actually trying to make it make sense since it didn't make any!

Although just mentioning the seventeen days Grifter was missing doesn't automatically clear anything up. What reset? What programming? What's going on? Good thing the comic book isn't over yet.

So these humans are not humans at all. They are Daemonites trying to program him, splice his DNA, and build him into a weapon against Helspont. So this entire comic book is about the seventeen days he went missing as he was turned into a Super Hero. The Team 7 memories must be from many years previous to Grifter being caught by the Daemonites though. I guess the Team 7 comic book is going to be stories from The New 52's past.

Inside Grifter's mind, a hooded man named Warwick keeps appearing to help him fight the Daemonite programming. This must be why Grifter becomes such a loose cannon and doesn't actually end up fighting for the Daemonites but against them. Although it all ends up in the same place anyway with Grifter butting heads with Helspont. But this Warwick guy isn't just in Cole's head. He's also outside on the street about to break in to the Daemonite's lab.

Warwick manages to escape with Cole Cash but they're followed by one of the Daemonite guards. This gives Cole a chance to demonstrate his new-found abilities!

Perhaps they should have spent a little more time on the "one-liners" and "retorts" modules.

Warwick takes Cole and dumps him in a room that's probably supposed to be the warehouse that he woke up in at the beginning of Grifter #1 but now is a hotel room. Or maybe it's just a different place because this seems to happen to Grifter on a regular basis if this Warwick guy is to be believed.

I suppose his mask was left in the bag and wearing that stupid mask is one of the few things he tends to remember about his Team 7 training. So now it looks like maybe Team 7 will just be the team getting called back together occasionally for missions of world shattering importance. Like if Nike were going to change their logo.

Grifter awakens and finds a short note from W to "See you soon." He remembers this happening before a few other times and he remembers his Team 7 days. So the beginning of Grifter #1 is either this same thing happening to him again and he loses 17 days fighting the reprogramming again but doesn't remember even this much when he awakens or this is just a slight variation on the beginning of Issue #1. And since I can't invest any more time in worrying about this shit character, I'll end it here.

Grifter #0 Rarting: Warwickapediastic!