Justice League Dark #0

Once upon a time, John Constantine was into punk rock and had a real attitude. But seeing as how that would now make him in his mid-fifties, that means he was probably into punk rock around the turn of the millennium. Which means he was either being ironic or he was really out of touch with the fashion world. I guess people could have still acted punk rock in the late nineties. But it just wouldn't be the same, you know? Although he is into magic! So maybe he's a lot older than he looks and this story takes place in 1977. It does take place in New York City so he was probably deep into the scene. And maybe he even helped start the New York Punk scene.

Everyone knows the best black magic could be found at CGBG in the mid-seventies. I bet Constantine is time traveling! You know, before Flashpoint because this is a Zero Issue so there are exceptions. Fuck you! Lobdell did it in his stupid ass Superman comic in the stupidest moment of the New 52 so far!

Since this probably isn't a stupid time travel story that doesn't make any sense because Lemire has yet to prove to me that he's a complete dumbass like some of the other writers working at DC, Constantine is not going to CGBG to look for magick. He's going to a different club. It's a place called The Oblivion Bar and it's where all the best black magic can be found! Just like I said in the caption except I had the place wrong!

Specifically, John has come to find the legendary Nick Necro, whoever the fuck that is.

Aha! I knew CGBG was the place to go back in the day if you wanted the Black Magicks! Fuck all you doubters!

Before John can start a conversation with Nick, Zatanna appears and begins doing her magic act. I think an act that relied on a woman speaking backwards words which described the trick she was doing would suck balls. But she did do the act in a low cut corset and a dress with a huge slit up the side. So it was probably actually quite entertaining. Plus she could says, "Boob!" and you have no idea if she's casting a spell or just showing off the goods!

At this point in Constantine's career, it looks like he can't do much magic at all. He's come to Nick Necro to learn as much as he can. This is probably why the story takes place "Some time ago..." because nobody wants to nail down a time when Constantine couldn't do magic. Constantine takes out some guy mumbling about a "Cold Flame" before he can attack Nick and Zatanna. To thank Constantine, they decide to let him tag along. And then before actually reading the next page, I notice they're getting tattoos in the lower panel of the opposing page. Which means Nick Necro must be the mysterious guy from the end of Issue #12 that's looking for the Books of Magic and taking over the House of Secrets. But don't tell anybody!

Constantine and Zatanna apprentice under Nick Necro for a year or so. That's when they all get matching tattoos. But then Nick begins to go off the deep end, jonesing for the Books of Magic, getting wilder and wilder in his attempt to find them while never quite knowing if they actually exist. And during that time, Constantine and Zatanna began to develop a relationship. And since I called it a relationship, that means they aren't fucking yet. Otherwise I would have just said they had begun to fuck.

And then they begin to fuck. And Nicky doesn't quite like it.

Or maybe he's just sort of ambivalent about it.

Except he doesn't just leave and forget about them. Nick calls them up one night asking for help. But when they come to help him, it's an ambush. He's now working with the Cold Flame morons.

Zatanna's greatest weakness is Duct Tape.

John uses some punk rock lighter flamethrower move to break free from Nick while Zatanna kicks her guy in the balls. I think that's punk rock too! And then the final guard tries to throw a knife at John but John blocks the knife with Nick's chest. Chest dies in the Runed Circle and his soul goes to hell. No wonder John doesn't suspect that Nick Necro is the guy behind retrieving the Books of Magic. In the end, John gains all of the power and gets the girl. But as has been repeated multiple times this issue (and everywhere always): "Magic has its price." And John will certainly pay many times before between the end of this issue and where he's at now in Justice League Dark #13.

Justice League Dark #0 Rating: COME SWEET DEATH ONE LAST CARESS!

Talon #0

Does this guy look like he just finished a up his show on Broadway?

Fuck me in the face. Just do it.

You know, if our country didn't act so wussy and prim and prissy and proper, I think "Fuck me in the face" would make a good slogan for some breakfast product.

Surprisingly, when you put "fuck me in the face" and cereal into Google, you just get a bunch of normal pictures that don't have anything to do with each other.

Perhaps I should explain myself. Not about my amazing new cereal slogan. Although maybe "FUCK ME IN THE FACE!" would be a great slogan for Cthu-Loops Brand Cereal.

Anyay, the explaining thing I was going to do. "Fuck me in the face" is my reaction to having to read a comic book about this Talon jerk-off. I thought DC was done with this shit months ago. Zero Month has been just as tiring as Night of the Owls Month but now it just got one point five times worse by making me read a Zero Issue about this fucking Talon. At least Guillem March is drawing him so I can be sure to get plenty of sexy pictures of this guy with his costume half unzipped. I am looking forward to that.

But I'm not looking forward to this hack Scott Snyder writing another book! He's turned Swamp Thing into a giant gay compost heap and his Batman comic only sells because it's about the Goddamned Batman. I wish Scott Lobdell or Rob Liefeld were writing this comic. Those guys have their fingers on the young people's idea of cool. But Snyder? *snort*

Talon begins with some small kid locked in a dog kennel in the rain for three days. I have to admit that Snyder's writing on this first page is pretty top notch. A bunch of Narration Boxes with the main character (the kid. I think it might be Talon!) describing what had happened when he was eight years old as if he's telling it to his therapist. I would have felt more included if he'd said something like, "I was scared, you know?" Or "Have you ever felt that lonely feeling? Right?" Or "As you can see, I was near death but you wouldn't believe how I escaped! I had a mad on for life and I was going to live, no matter how meta I had to get!" The scene is pretty good even if Snyder didn't quite capture the level of Lobdell's eloquence.

Three days in that kennel and no shit on the ground or in his pants? I'm not buying it!

So the boy gets away and he mentions that it's his first escape, so maybe he'll become a professional Escapobrat later in life. And when the page is turned, it's later (five years previous to the current time in The New 52). The boy that is now a man is now working on a bridge. At least I think that's what he's doing since none of the Narration Boxes explain the pictures I'm looking at. How am I supposed to know exactly what's going on when the text doesn't explain the pictures? I could easily get the wrong idea here! He's talking to some man about wrenches and beer and then he suddenly drops down the line to stop a man from jumping off of the bridge. If Snyder were any good, all of these panels would be accompanied by this man's thoughts as he tries to rescue the jumper.

This mystery man that used to be a mystery boy finds a few owl knives in the chest of the jumper. He mutters, "No...not here...". I added that last period because that final ellipsis should have had four periods but it only had three and I couldn't add one without being a total liar and I just couldn't leave the sentence without a final period to end the thought! Snyder is as awful as Mackie! They should both take lessons from Scott Lobdell. Oh, and then the man is stabbed in the side by a Talon! He blacks out and then wakes up naked and chained in the trunk of a car. But remember that part about his "first escape"? Yeah! I bet he was just moonlighting as a bridge builder from his main job as an Escapeologist.

Finally some answers! He's Calvin Rose and he's been running from a Talon for some time now. Geez, Snyder! You could have narrated this shit to the readers earlier!

As Calvin Rose sinks into the water, he thinks about how he became an Escapadeliologist. He ran into a man that worked for Haly's Circus (that sounds familiar but Lobdell hasn't written anything about it, so it's probably not really important) who taught him how to escape from any lock or straight jacket or dog kennel or trunk of a sinking car. Eventually, he found himself performing for the Court of Owls although he didn't know it at the time because the lights were out.

Calvin Rose is taken under the Court's wings. He trains and eventually passes the first test of the Talon by killing the old Talon in the labyrinth underneath Gotham. The second part of his test is to remain in the labyrinth until he goes mad. I wonder how you fail this part? Maybe if instead of going mad, he just became filled with ennui.

I guess the other way to fail is to escape. Which is what he did for some reason. I don't think Snyder explains that very well. How did he get out?! I guess it was just luck. Anyway, he hangs out in the Court of Owls' secret meeting room until they come back, surprised to see him. The Gamemaster (the head Talon) tells Calvin he is ready to become a Talon. And for once in Talon's life, he feels like he can't escape. He didn't want to be a Talon! They were trying to turn him into a monster and he just wanted to be an Escapagist. So he ran again! And he escaped again! Until five years ago when he was caught and shoved into the trunk of a car.

I'm wondering. Did anybody tell this Talon about Calvin's skills? The Talon could have killed him by slitting his throat but he declared that was too easy! So locking him in the trunk of a car was a tougher way to go? That's a really bad plan, Snyder. Too bad you can't write a good, successful villain like Lobdell does; one whose plans always come together no matter how convoluted they may appear to people not willing to overlook nonsense.

As Calvin Rose continues to make his escape from the trunk of the sinking car, he does that remembering thing again. He thinks back to his first job as a Talon. He had to end the bloodline of Securitus CEO Eric Washington who had just died and left all his stock and goodies to his daughter. Calvin, as a Talon, was prepared to kill for the Court of Owls until it stopped hurting.

Bah! Who wants to read another comic book about another goody two-shoes?! Kill the stupid baby!

Instead of killing this woman and her child, he kidnapped them and took them somewhere safe. He escaped from the Court of Owls. But now they had a new Talon and it had found him. Although it wasn't very smart and hadn't been too well informed on Calvin's abilities.

Well, I guess that's okay then. Since the Talon had it planned all along. But you seriously stole that plot from Scott Lobdell, you thieving hack!

Calvin Rose escapes and spends the next five years on the run. I suppose when Issue #1 comes about, he'll have created the fake Talon costume seen on the cover here and begun his life as just another costumed hero in Gotham City.

Talon #0 Rating: That was pretty decent considering Scott Snyder wrote it. I can only imagine Rob Liefeld would have done a much better job. Her first page probably would have said, "To be an escape artist, one must train in the art of escaping. Escape Artism has been around since the days of the Egyptians. But it was not perfected until a man named Erik Weisz came along and awed the world with his amazing escape routines. Some of you might know him better as Harry Houdini!"

I, Vampire #0

I've reached the saturation point with Zero Issues. I actually reached that point last week sometime but I've only just gotten to the point that I barely even want to look at them. Most of them were really good to decent for the first two weeks. Unless I'm remembering incorrectly. And then a whole shitload of them punched me in the balls and now I feel too weak to continue. I think this comic book reading pace is going to have to slow down for awhile. I should finish my commentary on Genesis and put it out as an eBook. Or maybe sell it on Lulu or something. Does anybody care if I just make up Andrew Bennett's origin? No? Okay! Here we go!

England. 1591. The first half of Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene had just been published. Andrew Bennett's lover, Mary, had been sent away by his father because she was lower class and unfit to receive his love homunculi (that's Elizabethan for sperm). He boarded a carriage to chase after Mary even though it was a dark and stormy night. Exactly the kind of night one expects to be told a poorly written story. So keep reading, my dears! Ha ha ha ha ha!

What the fuck just happened? Did I turn into the Crypt Keeper? Perhaps my mind knows better than I? Wait. I am my mind. So how could it know better when it's actually me? Although it isn't a terribly bad idea to write all of my I, Vampire commentaries in the voice of the Crypt Keeper. Or better yet: a version of the Crypt Keeper that can only tell shitty stories instead of scary ones! That seems to be what my mind, I mean, what I was getting at in that last paragraph. Maybe my plan to write every commentary in a different voice was a sound one after all? Or maybe I just need to go to sleep. It's fucking five in the morning!

Sorry, Andrew Bennett, you'll have to wait until tomorrow. Or the next day.

Who cares what the last question was since your answer made no sense anyway.

Andrew Bennett finds himself in a horrible carriage accident. Trapped beneath it and stuck in the rain, Bennett is confronted by this nonsense speaking vampire. I think his name was Cain. That's the same name as the owner of The House of Mystery and the same name as the spirit of the Unknown Soldier! Is every mysterious, paranormal person in the DC Universe going to represent Cain? Maybe a few will represent Judas. I can't wait until one of them is the embodiment of drunken Noah. Cain proves he's an evil villain by telling Bennett his whole life story which I'll repeat here.

The Story of Cain, the Sire of Them All
By Grunion Guy

It was a dark and stormy night. Cain was cursed. That makes it sound like the Biblical Cain who was also cursed. Except his curse was that no man shall hurt or kill him. That sounds more like a blessing than a curse! People in the Old Testament were so confused! Like that time Noah was pissed off at his son so he decided to curse his son's son. Or his son's grandson. How should I remember? That book is totally confusing! I think this might be the same Cain as the Biblical Cain because DC Comics seems to think that by using Biblical characters to represent current characters, it infuses their characters with history and makes DC look interesting and postmodern. Unless it just makes them look modern. Or perhaps simply post. Whatever it is, it sure is something! If that something is done and tired!

So Cain met this woman and sucked her blood so that he could survive. But he loved this woman for some reason. Cain hated himself for being a total dick. Until the woman came back to life. Cain was super happy that his curse could bring people back to life. Again, not really a curse! Hello!? Cain and his woman made lots and lots of baby vampires until Etrigan didn't want that happening anymore. So he cursed Cain with a totally new curse. This new curse cursed him with the curse that if he cursed a person innocent of curses, Cain would be cursed with a totally new curse.

The End! I think. Whatever. I'm done rewriting this dumb origin.

Apparently Bennett was this innocent because Cain bites him and becomes imprisoned inside Bennett. I guess that's also why Bennett became a good vampire instead of a cool emo douchebag.

Well, that explains that! Although I think Biblical Cain is really making the rounds in The New 52.

After this, Bennett delivers a note to Mary and Shakespeare writes a sonnet about their love. Or something. Whatever. Fucking Zero Issues. Five left!

I, Vampire #0 Rating: I really wasn't paying much attention. I think I've lost my passion for hating comic books! Thanks a lot, DC's Zero Month!

Birds of Prey #0

Just before reading Birds of Prey #0, I was checking out my stats for Places and Predators. I receive about 1000 unique visitors a day, most of them because of this Tumblr and my Blogspot. Google provides a large percentage as well. And judging by the search terms people use to find my site, I'm a depraved lunatic who loves comics and The Bible.

Simply looking at yesterday's search terms (sorry, Birds of Prey, your comic will have to wait a bit), they lead off with 14 hits for "robin origin." This is followed by half a dozen hits for innocuous things like "red hood and the outlaws," "nightwing logo," "nightwing motorcycle," and "red hoods and the outlaws starfire." It quickly begins to degenerate with entries like "teen boobs," "catwoman ass," "supergirl tentacles," "catwoman tits," and "teen titan rape." These search terms probably weren't Google'd using quotes but I'm using quotes here to differentiate them more easily from the others. There's also the ambiguous search term "dwarf lover" which could have actually been somebody looking for my webcomic, Dwarf Lover, and just as easily could have been some fetishist looking for dwarves being fucked.

I should interrupt myself to point out that talking about these search terms is only going to increase the hits for searches of these items. But that doesn't matter. My site is a dead end for what most of these people are searching for. Learn to use quote marks in your searches, people! Oh, I guess that won't help after that last paragraph though. Sorry!

Randomly interspersed between entries for "beast fuck girls comic" and "girl using dildo," I find entries like "bible tv show guy draws a picture," "abilmelech sarah god kept," "which line of noah did abimelech come from," "what city did abraham ask god not to destroy," "isaac makes peace," "god makes a deal with abraham to save sodom & gomorrah," "why did noah get mad at ham when he was naked in the tent?" and "cum swallowing." These are all because of my Literal Reading of The Bible Commentary on the P&P site. Oh, except maybe that last one. I think.

And then there are, of course, the search terms from the truly disturbed. "Fucking kids." Although that could be ambiguous and it's no wonder they find my site searching for it! I'm pretty sure I mutter, "Fucking kids!" at least once a day when I'm out in public. "does anybody want to have sex with their daughter" That's not a surprise they find my site either. That happens in The Bible and everyone's pretty much okay with it because dad was drunk and what could he do? "weird stuff in her ass" Hmm, maybe not truly disturbed since now I'm curious about this. "really ugly fucking babies" Now that's just not right! That's utterly and totally...oh, wait. I don't think they meant fucking as a verb. "how to fuck a man brains out" Angry ex? "pics of when your best friend hurts you" Okay, now that's just making me really sad.

And of course, the hilariously random. "king trident boner" Disney porn? "if you get bitten by a demon" Pee on the bite, right? "scarecrow penis" Sir. Sir, I don't even want to know. "but a real batarang" Noble career choice, internet searcher! "how to make your brother shut up" I don't think I have an advice column on the site? "sex wonder woman and batman" Oh, this fan is going to be so disappointed when he finally sees the cover of Justice League #12. "chest tattoos to celebrate fatherhood" Might I suggest RAD DAD HAD LAD! in bright pink ink? "i have a pussy i make the rules bane" Was this a line in the new Dark Knight movie? "basketballspillere aliens" Um, what? "gargoyle sex scene" Fuck. Now I'm curious. And last on the list (although I skipped dozens of entries): "hot sex hot pussy and hot tits" Uh oh! Looks like someone's ready to masturbate!

Now that everyone that just wanted to read a review of Birds of Prey have stopped reading, it's time for me to review Birds of Prey! Actually, it's time for me to comment on Birds of Prey as I read it. Some people may have noticed that my reviews are really just comments vomited directly from my brain and onto the internet. Just like 99% of the rest of the internet!

Birds of Prey says it takes place one year ago. But one year ago is when this comic book started. And that began with flashbacks about how it got to where it was. So I immediately don't know what the fuck is going on.

Dinah Lance has broken into the Iceberg Casino (or lounge as it's being called here) looking to score a job for Penguin. She wants him to notice her so she can get hired so she can watch for Basilisk from the inside of Penguin's headquarters. She calls Basilisk "meta-terrorists" and Penguin's bodyguards "meta-muscle." I have no idea what that means.

Once she beats them all up and shows off her sonic scream, Penguin hires her. Everybody gets a bird name so she takes the name Black Canary. It's here working security for the casino that she meets Starling. And then weeks later, Dinah finally catches a glimpse of the guy selling the crap that Basilisk is buying. Or maybe it's the other way around? Anyway, she spots the guy and then someone crashes through the skylight. Typical fucking Gotham.

Holy crap, Batgirl had big boobs one year ago!

Black Canary and Starling fight Batgirl for awhile before Canary can whisper to Batgirl that she's undercover. Batgirl has arrived for the same reason: to stop Basilisk from buy the bomb. But Batgirl has a little more information. She knows it's a Mutation Bomb for sale.

Aha. That must be what happened to Black Canary to give her the Sonic Scream.

While Black Canary captures the Buyer, Batgirl nabs the Seller. A short confrontation with Starling takes place but they all end up on the same side. They walk out on The Penguin and Black Canary heads home to contemplate life with associates again.

The Birds of Prey will be an adequate replacement for Kurt.

And then the big surprise twist happens. Starling is actually working for Amanda Waller who has Kurt Lance in stasis. Now Starling probably doesn't know Amanda has Kurt. But this being a year ago, Kurt apparently gets pulled out of stasis at some point to investigate the Teen Titans and Solstice destroying the battleship in New York. But even if Starling did know that Amanda had Kurt, she wouldn't know it next issue. And then she'd know it again the issue after that. But then she'd forget for a few issues before she finds herself needing to Narration Box it to catch the readers up on the action.

Birds of Prey #0 Rating: Another quick Zero read that doesn't feel like a lot of effort was put into it. It's like Duane was told to fit Black Canary into Team 7 and that's when he decided Starling would be Amanda Waller's mole. It's more believable than some of the other shit I've been asked to swallow during this comic book's run.

Voodoo #0

The only reason I can see Voodoo needing a Zero Issue is to show how she meets up with Grifter at the end of it. Otherwise we've got the story. Pris captured by Daemonites. Her DNA is stolen and she's cloned. But she's also injected with Daemonite DNA so she gains their powers. Then Voodoo is sent to Earth to gain information on super heroes. And Pris ends up in the clutches of the Black Razors somehow. Maybe they raid a Daemonite lab and take her hostage.

Pris was abducted by Daemonites while giving handjobs in the park.

No wait. Maybe she was doing the Hand Jive in the park.

Whatever disgusting thing she was doing, the Daemonites took her. And the experimented on her and threw her in one of those Empire Strikes Back healing tanks. But she's a wily one and she escapes from the tank to learn that she and dozens of other humans have been abducted.

Why do these Daemonites have so many faces?

Voodoo gets caught and when she fights back, she transforms. She grows claws and wings and realizes that she can read the Daemonites' minds and they can read hers. It's that hivemind space she talks about in Issue #12 with Voodoo. Although I thought Voodoo was telling Pris about this moment when it was actually the other way around. Unless this is actually Voodoo escaping? Who knows?

To escape, Pris crashes through a window and begins falling through the air. Luckily they were in Earth's atmosphere. And luckily she's now strong enough to break through glass that needs to be strong enough to hold back the high pressures inside the ship pushing against it when the ship enters a vacuum.

As she's falling, the Black Razors appear. The Daemonites call for a retreat when they recognize them because the Daemonites apparently have no confidence in themselves. I thought they were only supposed to be afraid of Grifter's mask. The Black Razors drive the Daemonites away and "save" Pris. I put the word "save" in quotation marks because after saving her they taze her and take her captive themselves.

You two will pay for this! Really! They will!

Back on board the Daemonite ship, the Daemonites reveal that they have a clone of Voodoo ready to go. It's just a baby but it must grow super fast in the Empire Strikes Back Healing Tube. It grows up to be another Voodoo but this one is taught to love the Daemonites, hate the humans, and how to shake her ass on a pole.

And then the story moves to the "Now" part where Voodoo gets to meet Grifter so he can rescue her from her failing comic book.

Why do you always Narration Box like you've just smoked five bowls of killer hashish?

Grifter runs out of bullets before he can even wound this Daemonite. The Chosen One is about to die and be less chosen than ever! But then Pris shoots it in the head and saves his life. I suppose Pris is going to be called Voodoo now. That could get a little bit confusing.

Before reading this comic, I felt it was unnecessary. After reading it, I know it was unnecessary. It was simply boring. So it was just like her regular series! Oh shit!

Voodoo #0 Rating: To be continued in Grifter. Oh fucking joy.

Batman: The Dark Knight #0

Time once again for an early story from Batman's career! When we last saw Bruce Wayne, he had set up his crime fighting headquarters in Crime Alley. Alfred warned him that people were going to quickly guess that Bruce Wayne was the new vigilante on the scene. Gordon paid Bruce a visit which proved Alfred was correct. Gordon was way too close to figuring it all out. Perhaps this story will be about Bruce remembering the scary caves beneath Wayne Manor and moving his headquarters back there. Also a bat might get caught in his hair and inspire his new vigilante name.

Except this comic isn't about that at all. This story takes place not long after Bruce's parents are killed. Bruce is just a young child going through his parents' things and thinking sad thoughts about not having gotten to know them or them having gotten to know who he'll become. Who would Batman have become if his parents had lived? I guess that's a question that could drive anyone crazy, considering who you would be had one very major life event not have changed you in the significant way it did.

Young Bruce remembers that his father said there was a reason for everything and that the search for meaning separated people from animals. I think that's why I like animals so much better than people. They don't run around making shit up so that the random chaos surrounding them was meant to be their. No, no. It's not. That's what we get: random chaos. That doesn't mean I don't think people should find something that means something to them. Or to live in a way meaningful to the here and now without attaching some grander universal or spiritual theme to it. Anyway, Bruce remembers his father's words and heads back to Crime Alley to find the reason behind his parents' murder. Because there's no way it could have been a random piece of universal bullshit, could it?

Or maybe it could have! Perhaps Bruce will learn it was completely random. Which will drive him even harder to protect the people of Gotham from as much of this random shit as possible.

Because you were afraid and wanted to leave the movie early, you little shit!

Bruce gives this guy his dad's watch to tell him what he saw and the jerk just shoves Bruce in the garbage and takes off. He didn't see anything.

Later, Bruce is a bit older and he's still looking into the death of his parents. He's still asking questions because he's positive there must have been a reason. He learns that his father made a lot of enemies not because he was a ruthless businessman but because he was a good man that wouldn't pay off the mobsters. So a lot of criminal businessmen felt that Wayne took advantage of them and cost them their businesses.
 
Still later in college, Bruce continues to research what happened. Perhaps he'd find something on the gun or the person that bought the gun. Anything. Something. Somewhere. But he doesn't really get past anything except "a lot of people might have done it."

He's definitely not getting his degree in Detectivology!

Eventually Wayne heads back to Crime Alley and finds the same man that took his father's watch from him. The man tells him the murderer was a guy named Joe Chill. Bruce also gets his watch back.

Bruce begins his investigation anew since the name Joe Chill appears nowhere in any documents or histories he's found. He scours Gotham for this man and eventually finds him. And while he wants Joe Chill to be punished for the murder of his parents, what he mostly wants is the people behind Joe Chill. He wants the people that will give meaning to his parents' murder; the people that will provide a reason for it and all he's suffered.

If this were a Scott Lobdell comic, Harvest would have planned the whole thing simply to create Batman so that Batman would eventually train Tim Drake so that Tim Drake would eventually be bitten by a vampire and live forever and become Harvest so that Harvest could come back in time (ignoring Flashpoint) to make sure that Batman became Batman so that he could train Tim Drake so that... You get the point. I don't like Lobdell's writing!

And here it is. Joe Chill. Bruce demands to know who was behind his parents' murder. Who told you to pull the trigger? What was the reasoning behind the murder plan?

This comic is like the Anti-Lobdell story!

I really like how Bruce doesn't lose any faith in his father's advice when his search for meaning didn't turn up any meaning at all. He simply continues to remember the things his father told him that still apply to the situation. Bruce, as Batman, continues to search for meaning in his detective work. But he also faces off against the most insane and chaotic monsters in Gotham because he now truly understands that not everything is part of a well-organized plan. And of course he retains his empathy, his compassion. And those traits, more than any other, really make Batman who he is. Eventually we see he doesn't kill because he must separate himself from these other monsters. But why does he continue to help the people of the city? Well, to increase the values of all of his properties, of course! But, you know, also his empathy. He suffers when the people of his city suffer.

Finally! A good issue of The Dark Knight! Yeah, probably because it's philosophically on the same wavelength as me. But that's what makes it so good!

Batman: The Dark Knight #0 Rating: If Scott Lobdell had written this, Batman would have been on the rooftop above Crime Alley: "How do I know what happened? Because I was there! I mean, I was there again as Batman and not just as little Bruce! And maybe I can save my parents!"

The Savage Hawkman #0

This weekend I spent no time reading comic books. No, wait, I did read the first six issues of Runaways. But most of the time spent in Seattle with friends was spent on not reading comic books. On Sunday, we ate at the Unicorn and then went downstairs to the Narwhal to hang out and play Tron and Ms. Pacman. I decided to play Ms. Pacman. Here's a pic from the Narwhal's opening night of the machine I played:

You can't even see where the ghosts are when you play like that!

Needless to say, I destroyed these ladies' high score.

I also ended up eating a meat corndog because I often turn retarded when I have to engage in social customs like "ordering food" and "speaking to humans." Ordering at the Unicorn takes place at the bar. As I stepped up to the bar, the bartender was taking the order from a couple near me. As soon as she completed that order, she turned to me to ask for my order. I hesitated and panicked because I couldn't believe she was going to remember their order and my order simultaneously! "Are you kidding?" my mind screamed. "Is she a fucking robot? How can this be happening?!" And then I ordered and forgot to ask for the veggie corndog. Which actually isn't a big deal.

Technically, I'm a vegetarian. But I don't really care if I eat meat. I'm not trying to set some impressive record so I can declare, "I haven't eaten meat in 13 years!" And my experience of being a vegetarian makes me suspect most of those claims are bullshit anyways! Maybe it's that I'm such an apathetic bastard but I've accidentally eaten meat many times (why does this entire commentary so far sound so gay so often?). Even when I'm really trying not to, it happens! Like jerks that insist on putting chicken stock in every soup they make including the obviously vegetarian options!

Then there are the times when someone invites me to dinner and they serve something with meat in it. Who am I to act like an uppity snob and refuse to eat what they've generously offered in their company? Although usually I take care of the veggie option myself, like bringing veggie patties to a barbeque and annoying crap like that. But if I'm visiting friends while traveling, I just eat what I'm served. And next time I travel abroad, I'll definitely eat everything I can (meat and no meat) simply for the experience. So I guess what I'm trying to say is, "I'm really not a vegetarian!"

I'm also really just avoiding the elephant turd in the room: Rob Liefeld's final comic book for DC. I'm a little bit sad. Rob claims he'll never write for DC again. And he even seems to have burned his bridges with Marvel in his DC breakup. And I know I'll never buy a creator owned book by Liefeld. So I think this is the last time I'll get to hang out with my delusional buddy who's done so much for the world of comics that he can never be thanked enough. The guy who decided to retire from comics at the height of his popularity only to be dragged back in because people on the internet started noticing how much Liefeld's career paralleled this obscure story about an emperor and his wardrobe. And Liefeld couldn't have these assholes rewriting history! The true history where Liefeld handed down Creator Owned Characters from down on high and blessed the world with his malformed X-men.

Which has all led to this moment where I'm holding Savage Hawkman in my hand. Strange. The cover isn't done by Rob. He must have really been finished with DC not to do the cover a comic written by himself. Anyway, I guess I've blathered and bullshitted long enough. Time to crack this thing open and see what kind of elementary school report Liefeld and Poulton grace me with to start the ending off right.

They changed it up a little. Just a little.

I know I shouldn't care. I know I should just keep reading and try to enjoy the experience as a whole. But...can't...stop...myself...AAARRRRGGHHHH! How can a world you are living on be "once fabled"? Is he being literal here? Was Thanagar created out of somebody's dream space? Because that's the only way this works. And if that statement is literal, then I apologize for my utter and complete hatred of it. I could also buy into the planet being fabled if the narrator were an off-worlder who had only heard vague rumors of it. But, as we can all see by the following Narration Boxes, that isn't the case. These are members of the "high-flying aristocracy" that refer to their world as "once fabled."

The story is being told by Katar Hol's lover and the princess of Thanagar, Shayera. Shayera also has a brother named Corsar who is the exact opposite of Katar's humble and kind and heroic manner.

Hey look! A scar and a fucked up eye. Do you think Rob Liefeld designed this guy? "Let me give you a little super expert advice, Joe," stated Liefeld as he rubbed his ornamented sceptre and fingered his golden crown. He leaned down from his throne so that Joe Bennett could hear his conspiratorial whisper: "Create characters with just one eye. They're much easier to draw."

The "exact opposite" was my assumption but the next page declares they were "complete opposites" but "were like brothers."

Rob Liefeld: "Remember, my worthy subjects and children, creating conflict through carefully structured characterization is the simplest of things! Create two characters that believe totally different things but force them into a relationship where they love each other anyway! Ah! I see the less stupid of you are already seeing where I am going with this! Now, insert a woman between them! Or an entire planet, if you want. Sometimes that's an easier way to go because writing believable women is tough."

The scene: the night of the Annual Respecatron Ball! Unless that's the time? Or the place! Whatever it is, many different races of Thanagar visit the Emperor to pay respect to his great ability and his glorious wings. Unless these different races are from other planets in the solar system. It's hard to say since whenever I read "Thanagarian" I think "Hawk Person" and these people are definitely not Hawkpeople. They also pay their respects to the Thanagarian Emperor seated at a table that seems to symbolize other worlds surrounding the seat of power, Thanagar.

Since it's not explained, I'll just assume it doesn't matter.

The Thanagarians have recently won a war against the Daemonites and the Czarnians. Apparently a peace treaty has brought the Daemonites and Czarnians to sit at the Respect Table along with the Thanagarians and the other races of Thanagar. I'm making a lot of assumptions here because these Narration Boxes aren't very clear. Here's one of them that's going to force me to make up what it's fucking talking about:

My guess is that Katar suggested the peace treaty as opposed to wiping out every last Czarnian and Daemonite.

After the dinner, a plague ravaged Thanagar. It was brought by the Daemonites invited to the Annual Respectatron Ball. The Plague destroyed the wings of the Thanagarians and killed many. But the Emperor still believed that Katar's peace was the way to go. Really? That seems pretty delusional at this point. Perhaps you should just destroy every single Daemonite ship in the region and leave it at that? Why make a peace treaty with a bunch of assholes spreading disease on your planet? They don't actually live there. So signing a peace treaty doesn't actually matter. If they invade, you kill them. You did try the peace thing to let them visit your once fabled planet and that didn't work out very well with the whole disease thing. So forget peace and just kill them if they enter your fucking system. Don't continue believing peace is for the best of everyone. Maybe if they were a race living on your planet, I could see continuing to try so the world isn't ravaged by war. But it isn't really your choice when they're fucking invading your world, is it?

A few days after the King's death and Thanagar isn't somehow invaded by the Daemonites now that the Thanagarians can't fly and their ability to fly is the only reason they won the war, Corsar has discovered a new way to protect his people.

Katar Hol is annoying.

I find this bears repeating immediately after saying it: Katar Hol is annoying.

Corsar: "We must fly again! The non-H.P. Lovecraft Great Old Ones have told me that Nth Metal will restore our ability to fly!"
Katar: "The Great Old Ones? They're violent and dangerous. Perhaps you should not be consulting them."
Corsar: "Yeah, yeah. Concerns noted. Now let's find this Nth Metal in the Ruins of Kolamoran!"
Katar: "Hmm, that's a really dangerous place to mine. Are you sure you should bother?"
Corsar: "I hear you, brother! But his is necessary for my people!"
Katar: "Hey, now that we've begun mining and the whole dangerous operation has been set-up and it's all been chugging along for weeks now, I thought I might bring up another concern of mine: The Nth Metal is simply a fairy tale!"
Corsar: "Oh, Katar! Don't you know all Fairy Tales derived from true stories! It's true!"
Katar: "Hmm. I don't know about that. Are you sure? Where did you read that? That doesn't seem logical. I'm pretty sure that's not true at all."
Corsar: "Aha! Look what I have found, Katar! It is Nth Metal! I told you so!"
Katar: "Yes, I see that. But I also told you it would be dangerous and look at what just happened as you were handed that Nth Metal sample! The mines collapses and killed everyone but us!"
Corsar: "Oh, Katar! What are a few lives when we now have the power to fly once more a our fingertips!"
Katar: "Yeah but you really can't experiment with that Nth Metal until you get all of the impurities out of it. It could be really dangerous and I don't think you should mess with it."
Corsar: "You know what, Katar? Fuck you. Why can't you just support me? Just once? Why weren't you named Contrar? I'm beginning to suspect you don't actually have any beliefs of your own. You're just stating the exact opposite of everything you hear. You're the most annoying fucking person I've ever met in my life. I disown you!"
Katar: "Actually, you can't disown me. That's not how it...."
Corsar: "Guards! Execute this asshole!"

Later that night, Katar decides to go tattle to Corsar's sister.

She's so content while listening to her man denounce her brother's plans in that last panel. "Oh, Katar! I could listen to you disparage my brother all night long. *sigh*"

All the bickering and arguing ends up being a moot point anyway as a giant Kolamoran Slug destroys the mines and all of their drilling equipment. I suppose Kolamoran Slugs were named because their fossils were only found in the Kolamoran area. When the giant Sand Worm, believed to be extinct for "centuries" while being referred to as "prehistoric," does appear, Katar says, "Obviously, reports of their death have been greatly exaggerated." After fixing the hole I punched in the wall in my office and piecing together the shredded pieces of this stupid comic book because of the rage it just sent me into, I continued reading.

Katar and Corsar and Shayera sit around in the lab wondering what comes next. Katar, knowing how dangerous the Nth Metal is in its unprocessed form, never-the-less decides to touch the raw material. It bonds with his body and he becomes Hawkman. Corsar now believes that the Nth Metal will make the Thanagarians powerful enough to conquer all the remaining realms from the air. Fuck peace anyway!

The statement about destroying all the remaining realms from the air makes me believe that not only was the war against the Czarnian and Daemonites from other planets but also against other races on Thanagar. I guess the peace treaty with the races on Thanagar is probably what the Emperor was talking about. Maybe. Who the fuck knows? Apparantly Thanagar and Czarnia and Daem are all planets in the same solar system? At the very least, I suppose they're all neighbors in the same arm of the same galaxy. I don't have any notes showing the Sectors that all of these planets are supposed to be in but my guess is that they'll all turn out to be vastly different areas of space.

Researching their old locations, I could only come up with Thanagar's sector which I just completely forgot. Czarnia's sector wasn't listed and the Daemonite homeworld would not have had a sector in the Preboot Universe. But I did find out that the Thanagarians conquered many worlds! So I believe the Annual Respectatron Ball brought together members of the races of all of these planets which had been conquered by the Thanagarians but then were, due to Katar, treated peacefully and like an empire of self-governing nations as opposed to sub-states of an empire raping them of their resources and giving them little in return except harsh laws and boot heels. But that's me assuming again!

Anyway, Katar will not allow Corsar to once again bring the planets to war. They fight and Corsar suddenly explodes in a blast of electricity when he tries to attack Katar with his Nth Metal Arm and instead hits a computer panel. And that's all it takes to kill him because the Nth Metal didn't bond to him very well. Katar is accused of murder by Shayera and the guards so he escapes in a ship. The ship is blasted, Katar loses consciousness, and then the story leaves me to assume a bunch of other stuff.

Like this: If the Nth Metal had already bonded to Katar Hol, how come when he burned it back in issue one, it was separate from him and it had to rebond with him? How did he become Carter Hall? How was his new identity set up? Did he just appear as an amnesiac in New York one day with the Nth Metal ejected from him in a Hawkman-shaped suit in his bag? Did he take the name Carter Hall because he could just barely remember the name Katar Hol? How did he become the greatest historian in the short time he's been on Earth without any documents that could identify who he was? Did he go to college since he came to Earth?

I know now that I will never get the answer to my question as to why he was burning the Nth Metal in Issue #1. I suppose the years between his leaving Thanagar and the day he burned the Nth Metal (which should have been bonded to him but wasn't until he burned it) will never be answered because they can never make any sense. Good luck to whatever writer takes over for Liefeld on this piece of shit comic book.

The Savage Hawkman #0 Rating: Liefelded.