Superman #17

Hooray! Three cheers for the conclusion of H'el on Earth!

The only problem with H'el on Earth ending is that Scott Lobdell will be starting a new story directly after it!

I hope this Oracle character is super interesting and makes the whole thing worth it. I can't wait to hear what sage wisdom and sugary advice it gives our heroes! Let's dive right in, shall we?

Scott Lobdell begins with an omniscient narrator instead of having a character narrate like he usually does. Perhaps Oracle himself is narrating! Or herself. Or itself. I don't think it had any distinguishing primary or secondary sexual characteristics. The narration is about Superman since he was just flung into space by H'el and was caught by Oracle. But what is Oracle, Narrator?

Aha! That's what Oracle is! He appears when a person fucks with time and says, "Shame! Shaaaaaame!" Except he must have only come into existence due to The Flash fucking with time in Flashpoint since The Oracle didn't appear to The Flash and say, "Shame. Shaaaaaaame!"

The Oracle speaks to Superman in the most confusing way possible: by showing him images of the past and the maybe past and the shouldn't be past. I think it shows Superman in Kryptonian Garb arguing with Normal Looking H'el and maybe Superman in Kryptonian Garb sucking face with his mother. Except I'm probably wrong about all of that because I'm just as confused as Superman!

I hope that wasn't the last we'll see of Oracle! He deserves his own title! It can simply be composed of twenty pages of various panels from DC's Preboot comic books.

Superman shrugs his shoulders because he needs to get back to Earth and stop H'el. Although Superman suddenly doesn't want to stop H'el! I mean, he wants to save the lives of everyone on Earth. But he's suddenly sympathetic to H'el's cause to save Krypton. What a fool! Didn't he learn anything about mucking with time from Superman the Movie? Oh, yeah. I guess he did learn something: go for it because it always works out in the end and doesn't cause anybody any harm.

Batman and the others tell Superman to go save the planet because they're pretty much useless in situations like this. They're just going to sit around the Watchtower pushing buttons and reading monitors and hoping they don't suddenly cease to exist. And while they fiddle about waiting for the end of the world, the Narrator decides to fill the readers in on H'el's plan (just in case they've forgotten after the multiple reminders in every issue of H'el on Earth).

Really? The "imminent" destruction of Krypton? I guess if you have a time machine, everything is imminent! At least Lobdell got the "arctic" part of the story correct. Perhaps the elementary school website I linked to long ago helped him sort out the differences between the Arctic and the Antarctic. Man! I should have quizzed him about that when I met him at the Portland Comic Con!

With Wonder Woman's girl-on-girl advice, Supergirl has finally realized that H'el's sexy shaved upper pubic area is no consolation for his lying, murderous, insane ways! She's decided to help Superboy and Wonder Woman shut down his time travel project.

Speaking of Time Travel, Primer is once again available on Netflix. Anybody reading this that has Netflix, I highly recommend the movie Primer. Good, good time travel stuff.

Superboy is able to destroy H'el's Star Fuel Machine with his Tactile Telekinesis which he finally has the use of again because H'el ripped off the Super Suit that was keeping him from using it. But not in time! Because H'el has a time machine! He can use it to go back in time and stop Superboy from destroying the Star Fuel Machine! Oh, but he doesn't need to. His time machine is all fueled up and ready to go. Now he's just waiting for the navigation system to align with the proper chronus-portal and he'll be off to Krypton, leaving a gaping hole in our solar system and destroying it.

Superman finally comes charging in from space to begin pummeling H'el. What he should be doing is pummeling H'el's time machine because we've seen what happens when Superman goes toe to toe with H'el! Superman can't match all of H'el's amazing powers that really make no sense if he's merely another Kryptonian. He must be something else since he has super teleporting breath and super DNA unraveling vision and super duper super strength. Maybe if Superboy isn't feeling too sick from trying to keep his DNA inside himself, he'll remember to destroy H'el's time machine now that he's destroyed the time machine's fuel source too late.

I wonder where Oracle went?

"Making this up as I go along." We know, Lobdell, we know. I mean Superboy!

The next minor thing that happens is purely idiotic and unnecessary but I think Lobdell just can't help himself at this point.

Oh look! H'el planned it all right down to this moment! Because that's all he's been doing is planning! The revelation isn't even needed. It just makes this moment worse. How about H'el just built a hardy ship that's majorly resistant to physical trauma? That's easy to accept because it only means he took care against Superman trying to stop him. But I think this is Lobdell's way to show why these idiot heroes haven't just smashed the shit out of his ship. Because H'el planned the diversion! Or something. Whatever. Fuck you, Harvest. I mean H'el.

H'el punches Superman off of him and Superboy exclaims he's never seen anything hit that hard in his life. Since Superman only flies a few dozen feet, I guess Superboy didn't see when H'el punched Superman into space.

With that amazing punch that Superman barely felt, H'el gets away and is about to enter his Time Machine when Kara asks him to forgive her and take her with him. Oh baby! How can anybody say no to that sweet face and the Kryptonite you're hiding in your underwear? Come on board!

Oh snap! Didn't plan for that, did you bitch?!

H'el drips blood that burns like acid and reveals that he was keeping the portals open psionically which is why he needed Superboy to free the ship from the Fueling Station. But what does that reveal about H'el? There's no way he's a Kryptonian! Perhaps he was a biological experiment created by Jor-el? Wounded although most likely not mortally, H'el falls backwards through one of the chronus-portals never to be heard from again! Well, as long as Scott Lobdell doesn't keep writing Superman. If Lobdell is still writing Superman around this time next year, I figure H'el will be back around then.

And then I get to have one of those rare moments where I scan in a scene by Lobdell that I really like! Enjoy this rare moment!

Such a well-written scene!

No, no. Just kidding! Although I should have saved that shot for the "THE END OF H'EL ON EARTH" Supergirl Bum Shot! Here's the real scene:

That'll happen when you hide Kryptonite in your hoo-ha.

Afterward, The Oracle wishes it could cheer because Superman didn't do anything Superman wasn't supposed to do anyway and has always done no matter how many times The Oracle experiences it. Except apparently time has changed because Lobdell says, "The past has been changed" in the teaser box for next issue. Also because H'el did make it back to Krypton with the Kryptonite stuck in his chest and without his time machine space ship.

So basically H'el spent all those years planning a plan that he didn't even need? He didn't need to suck up our solar system's energy to fuel his ship to travel back in time and through space. He simply had to open a chronus-portal and jump the fuck through all by himself. Fuck, he's an idiot.

Superman #17 Rating: Let's do some math to figure out how I'll change the Ranking! I'll give it a +1 for the Supergirl stabbing H'el in the chest with the Kryptonite. And I'll give it another +1 for the homage to Crisis on Infinite Earths! It'll get another +1 for the leaving it up to her baby cousin line! That's +3 Rankings so far! But it'll get a -1 for the stupid ass build up to the Oracle that fucking did nothing. It gets a -1 for the stupid ass plan by H'el which completely failed and yet still delivered him to Krypton. It gets a -1 for stupid ass time travel post Flashpoint. So now it's even! Oh! It gets a -1 for Batman feeling Superman punch H'el all the way up in the satellite and Batman NOT KNOWING WHAT IT WAS! Are you trying to make Batman look stupid, Mr. Lobdell?! So that means Superman gets a -1 Ranking this month! And that's simply because I'm being fucking kind. How dare you pull that Oracle shit, Mr. Lobdell. How. Fucking. Dare. You. Build up this bullshit character for months and then have it do absolutely nothing except make Superman think, "Great. Real helpful, that."

Fuck you.

Red Lanterns #17

Krona Unleashed!

Atrocitus has traveled to the original planet of the Guardians of the Universe, Maltus. He's stumbled upon the ghost of Krona or the holographic projection of Krona or the time trapped brainwaves of Krona or some being doing a Krona Puppet Show. Somehow and someway, Atrocitus is going to speak with Krona and maybe find out some secrets about Volthoom, The First Lantern.

Oh yeah! Duh! Electric echo!

Krona's electric echo tells Atrocitus why they should be best friends forever or at least until the electrical echo degrades. Why wouldn't they be friends? They both have so much in common! They both had wives (Krona more than Atrocitus). They both had children! They both had their families wiped out by monsters! Sure, Krona was the monster that wiped out Atrocitus's family, but come on! Let bygones be bygones! That was a long time ago before Krona had become an electric echo living inside a sphincter television set. Living conditions like that change a guy!

Atrocitus is too angry to listen to the secrets I'm sure Krona was about to tell him even as Atrocitus walks away feeling pity for Krona. I think Atrocitus needs a tune-up to his hot lava blood. He just doesn't rage as much as the leader of the Red Lantern Corps should rage.

Atrocitus digs into the center of Maltus to find what he came to find: The Great Heart. I have no idea what that is. I mean, I see what it is on a big double splash page. It's a big glowing ball thing on top of a big tower in a buried city. But I have no idea why the Guardians of the Universe have something called The Great Heart and why it was abandoned on their ancient homeworld.

While Atrocitus is examining the Great Heart, Krona meets a new possible best friend forever.

I want to learn more about these Electric Echoes and the Sphincter Holes. Is this the Guardians' Afterlife?

Meanwhile on Earth, Rankorr is still trying to be human. Now he's using his construct power to try to disguise himself as the human he once was. This boy needs to let go already.

As Atrocitus nears the Great Heart, he meets some new robot friends. They guard the Great Heart which is the receptacle for all of the Guardians' emotions. But those with emotions are not allowed to approach it. The robots can help drain a person of their emotions if the person accepts. So Atrocitus considers it as his Squadron of Manhunters are free to pass. That seems like a flaw in security. Just because someone is emotionless, it doesn't mean they won't vandalize your Great Heart! Robots don't have emotions but they can be programmed to smash shit, right?

The Great Heart is leaking emotions all over the place which is why Atrocitus is displaying other emotions besides rage. But his Manhunters tessellate all over the Great Heart so that it stops affecting Atrocitus and he can get back to Plan A: Get mad and barf on stuff.

Apparently Cats and Red Lanterns have the same modus operandi.

Atrocitus destroys his new robot pals and is about to head off and give the emotions back to the Guardians when Volthoom appears. I don't know what Atrocitus is going to do with the emotion-filled Great Heart now that the Third Army is dead. Maybe he can feed it to the Inversions. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Next issue, Atrocitus is going to have to take a walk down memory lane with Volthoom.

Red Lanterns #17 Rating: No change. I have a feeling this Great Heart thing has been dealt with before in the Preboot. But what about the Electric Echoes and the Sphincter Televisions that make up what is seemingly The Guardians' afterlife? Is that new?

Justice League Dark #17

Terrific cover. Except, of course, for the copy. I know the creative team on the book doesn't add the words to the covers, so who does? Who is in charge to put that fucking inane tripe on so many comic book covers?

Here is the copy from just three of the comic books from the last two weeks:

Justice League Dark: "Trapped in the lab from Hell!"
Talon: "Trapped in the depths of Gotham!"
Green Lantern: "Trapped in the land of death!"

I'm sure if it were another week, there might have been three or four "UNLEASHED" super heroes as well. Mostly that kind of thing doesn't really bother me because it isn't like a comic book cover is going to be hung on a wall as a print what with the UPC Bar Code and the cover price and the stupid flapping DC Comics logo. But I think most readers will agree the copy doesn't ever add anything to the book. Look at Batman Incorporated #8! Lose the fucking R.I.P. on the cover and I might have still been surprised by the death of Robin. But (and this really fucking pisses me off) corporations don't give a fuck about the people already handing over their money. Who fucking cares if loyal readers are surprised? We need more fucking money so put Robin's death right there on the fucking cover and in the stupid fucking 52 News Comic in the back so we can sell more fucking comic books to the people that don't really give a shit about reading Batman Incorporated. But they'll definitely want the Death of Robin in their collection! This happens all the time with television shows as well but mostly I don't watch any of those shows. I just laugh at their stupid fucking commercials that spoil the episode every week for loyal viewers simply to get other viewers interested. Fuck you, you douchebags. How about thinking up another way to sell your stupid show or book than by ruining it for the fanbase? Dicks.

I don't know how anybody trusts any major corporation at all. It always confuses me when people have brand loyalty. You realize the corporation doesn't give a fuck about you, right? If they gave a crap about anything besides the bottom line, they wouldn't try to gain your business by telling half-truths in their adverts asterisked half to death with footnotes changing the reality and meaning of the fucking lie they printed in bold print.

How many of y'all are old enough to remember Fight Back! with David Horowitz? That guy was one of my heroes as a kid. Sure, challenging the veracity of commercials was akin to tilting windmills. But at least somebody was out there sticking it to these corporations that feel the only way people will buy their products are if they lie to and manipulate buyers. David Horowitz taught me about transparency and I never forgot that lesson. If a company has to hide their business practices or massage the truth to earn a buck, they're not worth shit. Fucking David Horowitz. I wish he were here today to single-handedly roam the country like a 21st century Kwai Chang Caine kicking the asses of every member of every local news station so they'd get their act together and stop simply reporting spoon fed bullshit from press releases and start doing some fucking investigations of their own.

I wonder how much David Horowitz was paid by Orville Redenbacher Popcorn for that episode I linked to?! In my mind, it wouldn't even matter if David Horowitz had been corrupt and just a corporate shill because he didn't get me to go buy "honest" products. I was just a kid! But he did teach me valuable lessons about advertising and corporate corruption. Maybe he was simply paid by the Communists to spread anti-capitalist propaganda! If so, good job, Communists. Good job! Although I don't think Communists in the late seventies and early eighties understood the value of entertainment programming and production. If this had been Communist propaganda, he probably would have shown Orville's popcorn fail and then burned an effigy of Orville Redenbacher filled with his popcorn. "Die, capitalist pig and your bourgeois butter flavored popping treats!"

You know, I had in mind beginning this commentary discussing the things I liked about this cover and holy fuck did I take a wrong turn! What I was going to say was, "The look on Frank's face is awesomest!"

This issue of Justice League Dark begins with Madame Xanadu realizing how fucking useless she is. If your primary ability is to see the future and the future constantly turns out different than what you see, are you really helping to save the world and keep it from being destroyed or are your visions just always fucking wrong?!

Yeah, you dumb psychic fraud. I'm on to you!

Did I already mention how last issue both Faerie and Earth Prime were about to tear themselves apart because of the connection between them made by Dr. Mist's portal? Well that was happening. And it looks like the only way to stop this sudden venting of chaotic magic is to get Zatanna and Tim Hunter to cast as many spells as they possibly can and act as a kind of emergency release valve for the pressure. Dr. Peril figures this out but he's on the wrong side of the portal to let Zatanna know the plan. So Tim Hunter's dad, whose thinking is probably still a bit muddled from ejaculating on the Books of Magic, volunteers to cross over and deliver the message. Also the message might be something completely different than my speculation about the emergency release valve since the scene ended before Dr. Peril tells it to Mr. Hunter.

Meanwhile on Faerie, Timothy Hunter has gone all Harry Potter on everyone. Which is to say Timothy Hunter has gone all Timothy Hunter since Harry Potter was such a blatant rip-off of Timothy Hunter! Just saying!

Harry Potter and the Dragon's Dick? Harry Potter and the Army of Fairies? Harry Potter and the Woman Who Said "TNUC YM KCIL!"?

The fairies and ogres and goblins and kobolds and minotaurs and centaurs and beholders...no wait! Not beholders because they're intellectual property of Wizards of the Coast and I wouldn't want to be sued by Wizards of the Coast for fucking with their intellectual property, would I? [As an aside before I get back to my list of creatures, Lord Fondlerot (the minotaur in the previous link) is one of my favorite characters I've ever created. When he first appears in Dwarf Lover, he does the Dick in a Box thing (not an actual dick! Fondlerot's junk is actually a piece of driftwood!). But that was before the SNL video Dick in a Box. I'm not saying Andy Samberg stole the idea from Lord Fondelrot. I'm fucking typing it.] Back to my list of monsters...ah screw it! All those monsters and the ones I didn't list have finally decided to stop cowering in the woods and attack the capital city of Sciencetonia.

Meanwhile in the Science Labs, the cover turns out to be a big lie! Everybody is in the tentacular interrogation machine except Frank!

Frank's truth? "NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE!" SMASH BANG CRASH KILL!

In the interrogation room, Xanadu realizes that all her years are finally catching up to her and she's going to die. So she does one last reading for John.

So Xanadu's great power is to tell John that he's a selfish twat that will do anything to survive? She's the worst! Any one of John's companions could have given that reading!

John and his friends escape the lab to find a way out of the city while Tim Hunter and his army begin their attack on the city. I think Tim Hunter's father got lost somewhere in the portal.

Justice League Dark #17 Rating: +2 Ranking. Now that Infernal Core has left the fucking building, this comic is back on track! Stop using the better comics for ulterior purposes, DC! Can't the editors at DC distinguish between good writing and bad writing? Don't you think they'd just "UNLEASH!" the good writers instead of leaving them "TRAPPED!" in an editorial quagmire?

Talon #5

Ugh. No more Court of Owls!

If I were to give up one comic book in The New 52, it would be this one. It's not because of the quality. There are far worse comic books than this one that I'm currently reading. But I'm just so fucking sick of the Court of Owls. I'm just not interested in them anymore! And because they're supposed to be some kind of super mega-evil syndicate whose influences reach across all space and time, I don't see them going anywhere any time soon. If only Calvin Rose could defeat them and move on with his life to fight petty criminals like Night Rat or Garter Snake, maybe even Tiny Poodle. But until that happens, it's just going to be Court of Owls, Talons, Escape, Court of Owls, Talons, Escape, ad nauseum.

Before I could begin my ramblings about how Batman should have his little bat hairs in a bunch over this Talon shit going on around him, I picked up the comic to see that Batman has his little bat hairs in a bunch over this Talon shit. He's trying to get Nightwing interested too but Nightwing's not biting.

Well, not at first he isn't. I supposed Dick recognizes him from his associations with Haly's Circus.

Calvin and Casey and her daughter have settled down in Gotham City since the battle with the Gotham Butcher. It's taken two weeks for Calvin to heal but now he's ready to start his crusade again and Casey wants to help. They're ready to destroy Securitus, Casey's father's company that the Court of Owls took over. Taking over the company was the reason they wanted her and her daughter killed, so nobody would step forward claiming a right to the company. But now it's one of the Court's biggest assets and Sebastian believes it should be their next target and Casey has no problem destroying it. As long as the Court of Owls can't have it, she'll be satisfied.

The Gotham Butcher has also returned to Gotham to hunt down Calvin Rose. I thought he'd be out of the action for a few issues at least. If he fails, what will the Court of Owls do next? This was their most vile Talon of all! They've blown their load on this guy. I guess that's a good thing for me! Get rid of this asshole and maybe the Court of Owls disappears and Calvin Rose has to begin dealing with bad guys like The Owl Pellet and Feral Cat.

Or maybe the Court will piss The Butcher off themselves and he'll turn on them! If only John Constantine were here to get that ball rolling.

The Securitus building is a towering glacier-like structure located in Gotham Harbor. It's different from the squat glacier-like structure located in Gotham Harbor which is the Iceberg Casino. It's impenetrable. Electrified surfaces. Turbines under the water that drag down any ship getting too close. DNA recognition alarms. The inside layout is a complete mystery. Casey's father was about as loony as Mrs. Winchester, it seems. But Casey's father's ghosts were real. And they weren't ghosts. They were owls!

You know, since that wasn't a revelation to anyone, I think I just wasted an exclamation point.

While Casey is telling the story, she says something that Calvin picks up on which makes it sound like they aren't going to have to break in after all (well, maybe a little bit!). Her father designed the computers to complete wipe themselves if the place were bombed. So that's all Calvin needs to do! Drop a bomb!

Meanwhile The Butcher of Gotham relieves some stress.

Once Talon's plan is set in motion, it makes me think he might have to set the bomb off from inside. He manages to swim through the undertow creating turbines while they're off by hitching an underwater tow ride underneath a Securitus Boat headed toward the island.

I wish I had a story about how I once infiltrated a high security building with my elite Escaperotomy Skills but the closest I've ever come to that is drunkenly sneaking past trucks picking up grain at a factory in Los Banos one night, sneaking up the side of the building to enter the factory on the catwalks above the darkness, and running off with a fire extinguisher. Ocean's 11 it was not. I guess I also climbed over the wrought-iron spiked fence of the Carmelite Monastery in Santa Clara (which I grew up directly across the street from) and padded about their library. That, also, was a drunken escapade. Go figure.

Anyway, things don't work out so great for Calvin Rose.

I'm glad the Carmelites didn't have this kind of security.

Talon #5 Rating: No change. I keep hoping something will ignite my interest in this comic. But until then, I can't really judge it one way or the other. It isn't bad, so I won't drop it in ranks. And it might be good, but I just don't care.

I, Vampire #17

Isn't Constantine's ego already big enough? Do you have to declare him Earth's last, best hope as well?

Why do you suppose DC changed the title of I...Vampire in the Preboot era to I, Vampire in the Reboot era? Not that I care. Both of them suck. Maybe I, Vampire and my Blog were mixed up in this timeline. I think it should be "Eee! Vampire!" and "I, Tess Ate Chai Tea." Except then my blog name loses all of its attitude and charm and hidden swearing. Although "Eee! Vampire!" sounds like a fun book.

At the end of last issue, Andrew Bennett had taken over The House of Mystery and evicted John Constantine. That might be a problem for most of this issue but I have a feeling the real owner of The House of Mystery might show up to set things right. You know? Cain the Original Vampire? Now, he's not the Preboot Cain, obviously. But he very well may have the same relationship to The House of Mystery that that Cain had. Not that Cain is really much of a solution to anything unless it serves his own interests. So until John Constantine can do that thing he always does where he convinces his enemy that serving John is in his enemy's best interests, John is going to have to figure out on his own how to boot the squatters from his house.

I think these were my downstairs neighbors a few years ago. At one point I had a housemate I called "The Troll" and at another point, there was "Dead Boy."

John has enough magic power to drive the wolf vampire squatters back inside the House of Mystery. John's companions charge after them while John finishes his cigarette. Then he heads in too. But now that they've all entered the House of Mystery at slightly different moments, they're going to find themselves in all sorts of weird rooms and situations all by themselves! Remember Frank and Amy and Orchy and their run through the House? I think this will be a lot like that! Except with Wolfy Vampire Squatters!

Professor John runs into his lesbian grandmother. Virgin Bloody Mary winds up in a room full of the animated corpses of all of her previous meals. Deborah Dancer finds herself with zombified Mishkin (her lover the dog was named after). And John finds himself alone with Tig with his first opportunity to convince an enemy that serving John is in his enemy's best interests!

Constantine continues on the next page, "Well, kid...I suppose you should do something about that." These are my favorite moments when doing these commentaries. When something I mentioned earlier about a character actually proves out a few pages later. Although it can only be done when a writer knows his craft and allows the characters to be themselves. You'll never see me correctly guessing how one of Scott Lobdell's characters is going to act!

While the good guys are involved in their little House of Mystery detours, Puppy Mishkin and the two lesser members of Andrew Bennett's team, the magic vampire and the Van Helsing's artifact librarian, are busy doing some magic rituals involving the brick from the Tower of Babel. The librarian says something in Runespeak but he fucks it up so I don't know if his spell is going to work. He says, "Sere's the damn Runespeak again." Pretty sure he meant to say "here's" instead of "sere's". Dumb dumb!

During the ritual, guess who appears easily enough inside the House of Mystery? Oh, you don't have to guess. You know I always make the right call!

I forget what Constantine told Cain last issue but whatever it was, he may have already convinced Cain to help out.

The ritual being performed is one which will open a gateway to Hell. Cain is here to use the portal himself and bring his bride Lilith back to Earth. And he's more than powerful enough to get through these newly vampired yahoos.

Meanwhile, Professor John's grandmother has turned into a lesbian octopus flailing on the floor. She's just a distraction anyway. Andrew Bennett is John's real problem.

Holy shit! Is that how gay sex always ends?!

Constantine must have convinced Tig that he didn't kill her father because instead of being dead when he next appears, he's wandering in on Virgin Bloody Mary covered in writhing corpses. He saves her and then binds Andrew Bennett to the wall before heading off to close the portal to Hell.

This comic book might as well be the first issue of Constantine. Or the last issue of Hellblazer. Maybe it's the bridging story.

By the final page, it seems like Constantine fails to close the portal before Lilith comes through. None of that is shown though so it may not be too late. It could be Cain merely jumping the gun. But that's secondary news. The real ending is when Virgin Bloody Mary kisses Andrew Bennett and he bites her lip to begin sucking her blood to change her back to normal Bloody Mary! But he doesn't get to finish the process before my sweet baby Tig comes back into the story.

Apparently Tig is a huge nerd.

I, Vampire #17 Rating: +1 Ranking. Two of the supporting characters were killed in this one? Feels like they're closing up shop! I just hope Tig survives and winds up in Green Arrow where she can once again be drawn by Sorrentino and I can continue to crush hard on her.

Batman: The Dark Knight #17

I wonder if that hat makes Batman feel like a little, curious girl?

Grunion Guy has been bugging me all month to publish the next chapter in his story he assures me is a loving homage to Alice in Wonderland instead of just a sordid rewriting of it to titillate the more lascivious amongst my readers. I told him he'd better make it a lot fucking shorter than his last chapter if he wants me to keep publishing his story. I also warned him that this Mad Hatter story probably isn't going to last long enough for him to complete his chapter by chapter "homage" and that he'd better wrap it up quickly. I think he took some of my advice. Or he's already bored with this story since his books tend to only run one or two pages at most. Anyway, "enjoy".

Temperance Goes Down
Chapter Two
Pool Party!

I think the end of the last Chapter was where Temperance was suddenly real tall for some reason I can't remember having been a whole month ago. But anyway, she grew so tall that her boobs were as big as my head!

"Oh whatever shall I do?" Temperance sighed as she bumped her head into the ceiling. Also I think her clothes probably tore right off of her body and only her underwear didn't break because I think there is a limit to how much nudity you can show even in a Rated-R movie. You should also probably be reminded that Temperance was at least eighteen years old so it was okay to look at her in her underwear and sexualize her body. Unless this movie were being filmed in France or Canada and then I think she could probably be sixteen. But now she was too tall to get into the door so instead she kicked down the door to the garden with her giant foot!

"Here I come, Garden that was behind the door that I should have mentioned but might not have!" Instead of a garden behind the door, there was a Werewolf in a scary castle in a shower cap. The werewolf was wearing the shower cap, not the castle.

"Awww!" it screamed and dropped its white gloves and fan it was holding for some reason. And then it put a hip record on the turntable and turned on some rainbow lights.

"What a groovy party!" shouted Temperance over the noise as somebody served her a chocolate coin and some french fried onions. And then she remembered that eating things made her feel funny and she shrunk again! Plus she was drunk this time because of the rum in the chocolate coin. You see, it was French.

"I'm super small again! And I've fallen into the Werewolf's pool! But look, here comes a Gerbil! Hi Gerbil! Do you like cats?" Temperance was mean and stupid and really didn't know that a Gerbil was just a glorified gay mouse.

"Jerk!" screamed the Gerbil as it drowned from fear.

"Whoops! I guess I should get out of this pool since it is filled with animals all of a sudden and I might get Hepatitis C!" She remembered this from a film strip in school she saw last week. So she climbed out of the pool and into Chapter Three!

End of Chapter Two!

Um. So. The Goddamned Batman. Where were we?

The Mad Hatter's plan seems to be franchising his Hypnotic Hat Stands across Gotham and selling them right out in the open for every Batman to see. But seeing that Batman needed The Penguin's help to figure out The Mad Hatter was behind all of the kidnappings, it's likely Batman won't figure this out either. Currently The Mad Hatter has just sold a Hypno-hat to some jerk kid that pointed out all of The Mad Hatter's horribly wonky facial features.

Is it weird that this moment endeared me to The Mad Hatter?

And look at how much The Mad Hatter is enjoying making and watching that kid punch himself in the face?

Are we sure Batman is the hero and not The Mad Hatter?

Meanwhile in The Batcave, Batman is desperately searching for recent traces of Jervis Tetch (The Mad Hatter! Don't be upset that I pointed that out, nerds! I know you knew that! But there are some non-nerds that read these commentaries! (not to mention the super sexy and smart non-nerd that writes them!)). So the first page made me chuckle. And then Gregg Hurwitz nails some dialogue between Batman and Alfred.

See? One of the reasons Alfred is so enjoyable to read (and, I assume, to write!) is because he plays the part of us. He sees Batman's ridiculous aspects, his faults, and his foibles, and he gets to comment on them and say what the author knows the reader must be thinking. I believe The Joker called himself Batman's Jester in Death of the Family but he was wrong. Alfred is the court jester, and, at times, the Fool to Batman's King Lear.

Obviously the "bata-mining" term by Batman is fairly ridiculous, a term more apt to appear in the sixty's sitcom. Without Alfred commenting on it, the term would just grate and seem like a horrible Batpun. But Batman seems so obsessed at times that he doesn't even realize he's making horrible puns. I think Bruce Wayne is simply thinking of trademarking proprietary software with his copyrighted Bat names!

By page five, I have to wonder what the fuck Gregg Hurwitz is doing to The Dark Knight! This comic book is called the Dark Knight because it's supposed to be the grim and bloody and dark and scary version of Batman. Isn't it? Instead, Gregg Hurwitz has made me chuckle on four of the five pages so far. Stop making Batman funny, you idiot! What is he to you? A joke?!

Okay, so it's Jim that being funny here. I think Batman is still serious when he makes the boot comment!

I actually like my Batman comic books to have more humor in them. I don't know why people feel silliness should be relegated to The Batman Adventures and other "kid" comics. Adult comics aren't about sex and violence. They're about mature themes and profound and complex ideas. There is plenty of room for whimsy and humor in stories like those. So I appreciate any sense of levity that comes through in a Batman book. Maybe Gregg Hurwitz will turn this comic into the "funny Batman book"! I hope so!

Do I have to apologize for calling Hurwitz an idiot when it was so obviously done sarcastically and in fun? Is that question a good enough apology?

I imagine this joke has been done multiple times over the years but I really like the timing and the way Batman actually waits for Jim to acknowledge the end of the discussion before he takes his leave.

From the very beginning of Hurwitz run on The Dark Knight, it seemed apparent that he was going to be focusing strongly on the antagonist of each story. So he presented a lot of The Scarecrow's history through flashbacks to flesh out the experiences that drove him to be the insane creature he had become. I mentioned how that would really differentiate this title from the other Batman titles and justify its inclusion in The New 52. Thankfully, he's continuing that trend with The Mad Hatter.

This is a pleasant twist on the high school bully scene. But why are they his friends? None of them are wearing hats!

Jervis spends time with his father making and selling hats. Their store is called Tetch and Son Haberdashery which could cause some confusion for men looking for clothing and not just hats. Perhaps they should have went with "Hattery" or "Hat Barn" or "A Place to Buy Hats"? Tetch's father is teaching him how to make hats without using the mercurous nitrate so that he won't go crazy. Hmm. I guess he goes crazy for a different reason later! Probably a reason that has to do with that girl Alice he really likes. During this scene, Hurwitz takes a moment to teach Scott Lobdell how to write characters.

Wait, what?! You mean it's cheating to have Kid Flash and Solstice begin kissing while mentioning how close they've been getting since they met without actually ever have shown them interacting at all? Isn't their explanation good enough for readers?!

Jervis invites Alice to a new Wonderland theme park that's opened up. It's this memory of his time there with her that he's trying to recreate by building sets and kidnapping people that will fill all the roles. I imagine this trip to the theme park did not end as Jervis was hoping. Or perhaps it was perfect and he's restaging the entire thing so that he can manipulate the ending and Alice will fall in love with him.

Or perhaps, and I'm beginning to suspect most probably, Alice actually declined to go with him and he's finally staging the fantasy he's had of what that day could have been like so many years ago.

Later Batman stops some of The Mad Hatter's thugs from kidnapping a boy that was probably destined to play Jervis's role. Batman sticks a tracer on the thugs' van and lets them go. But when he follows the van to its location, he finds no trace of anyone because The Mad Hatter's operation is beneath hundreds of feet of reinforced concrete in an old abandoned missile silo. So Batman heads back to the Batcave to search through all of his Bata on the case while The Mad Hatter relaxes with a nice cup of hallucinogenic tea.

I would hang a print of this on my wall.

Batman: The Dark Knight #17 Rating: +3 Ranking. There is just so much to like about this issue, I've got to give it a bigger bump than I might normally simply to balance out the bad taste of the early Finch months. Remember when Venomized Deathstroke dropped out of the sky to land on the Batplane? What the fuck was that about? And when Two-Face declared himself "One-Face"? Ugh. This comic book was so incredibly awful early on. Gregg Hurwitz has actually developed it into a worthy Batman title.

The Savage Hawkman #17

I was wondering where DC was going to stick DeFalco after kicking him off of Superboy. This seems appropriate. What harm can he do here? I actually think he'll make it better!

Hey! Did you see that caption?! I think I actually sort of gave Tom DeFalco a compliment! I haven't liked anything he's done on Superboy (every issue is basically the same issue anyway) and his Legion Lost was horrible. But he did a middling job on his guest stint on Nightwing although he turned Batgirl into a raving lunatic. And I think a bad writer that can sometimes do a mediocre job is just what The Savage Hawkman needs!

Plus I hope it's funny! Why does Hawkman have to be all savage and angry all the time?

The first page is some nonsense about a bunch of thieves that don't understand gambling who blow themselves up. I'm sure it's tied into the Shadow Thief somehow. Like maybe he gave them the bomb to crack the safe knowing it would kill them and then he slips in and steals the money as a shadow. But it's the second page that really gets things moving! Because look at this! It's lighthearted with Emma's dad joking around with her!

Oh ha ha! He didn't even notice they were gone! What a joker!

And then Tom DeFalco makes me feel bad.

Fuck me! Way to kill the lighthearted aspect!

If the Professor has Alzheimer's, does that mean he has no idea why this hot woman is rubbing her tits all over him? Do you think he's pressing an erection against his daughter's thigh here? Not only does this disease rob a person of their humanity, it also has to embarrass the fuck out of them too? At least he's still mostly himself and wants to talk about evidence he's found that the Sumerians were actually an advanced civilization. Or more advanced. I have a feeling he means with alien technology and cosmic doohickeys.

But then it's Hawkman that begins to exhibit signs of mental degradation.

The inevitable mix-up between the Narration Box voice and the Thought Bubble voice!

Emma kicks Carter out so she can spend some time alone with her father. Also so she can spend some time away from Hawkman.

Meanwhile in the slums of Manhattan, The Shadow Thief is extracting information from some drunk nobody. I guess she wasn't involved in the heist gone wrong but she's trying to find out who was behind it. So maybe one of her family members or a love interest was killed in the explosion and she wants revenge. Revenge is a big theme in The Savage Hawkman!

The man behind the explosive was...Xerxes! Oh whew! I was hoping we hadn't seen the last of him!

Xerxes' men were all killed by Hawkman in Issue #10. Or maybe killed. It's hard to tell sometimes and Liefeld didn't name any of them. So Ironsides might be a new character or he might be Tic Tac Foe (trademark E!TACT!). I don't think he's Nipslip but I'd love for Nipslip to return as well!

Having been ditched by Emma, Carter wanders back to his old apartment. He finds everything has been repaired and his neighbor, the guy that looked like Ekuar from Elfquest but with a mohawk, has been holding his keys for him! The landlord assumed his lack of maintenance caused a gas leak which caused an explosion and he fixed the place up in the hopes that Carter wouldn't sue. So Tom DeFalco figured out a way to return the comic book to a place right around before Liefeld and Tieri shat all over it. Of course it was hard to differentiate their shit from Tony Daniels' shit. But if I were forced to make a choice, I'd probably do what DeFalco is doing here and try to move things back to where they were in Tony Daniels' run. This is no longer The Savage Hawkman! It's Tom DeFalco's The Salvaged Hawkman!

Next DeFalco spends a page on introducing the Shadow Thief.

Well that doesn't clear up anything! She must be tearing the shadow skin from her vagina in that final panel.

Hawkman's Nth metal now reacts to Thanagarian devices being activated within his vicinity. It changes him into Hawkman and a seemingly (somewhat) different personality. Perhaps DeFalco is going to try to make sense of the seventeen issues of sticky mess that came before this? I know this is issue #17! I can do math! There was a Zero Issue, remember!?

Hmm. This actually gives Issue #1 some context.

If Carter Hall's personality is affected by the change into Hawkman, he may have been trying to destroy the armor because he was afraid of what he was becoming. Perhaps when he first escaped to Earth, he took on a human persona to try to escape paying for his "crimes" on Thanagar. It's possible he even used some kind of technology to forget his real identity of Katar Hol. But the Nth metal was slowly drawing out his real identity every time he wore it, possibly making him angrier and angrier. Perhaps he killed someone the night before he tried to burn the suit! Desperate and afraid, he drove out to the forest, drunk and scared. He burned the suit hoping to be rid of the confusion it engendered in him. Instead he and the suit became one! Ever since then, his memories were beginning to come back. He began investigating the Nth metal to try and combine the disparate wisps of memory floating to the surface of his mind. While doing so, he must have dropped clues at libraries and research centers that were picked up on by mercenaries like Xerxes who were searching for the mysterious Nth metal. His encounter with Xerxes alerted even more people like Pike who was searching for him because of his crimes on Thanagar. And then when he encountered Shayera, his memories completely came back and he realized how he had been living a false life. It kind of falls apart after that when he lets Shayera go and then begins hunting her again. But maybe he didn't realize he had a bunch of questions he wanted to ask until after he sent her off into space. L'esprit de l'escalier, sort of. In a way.

Now that The Savage Hawkman makes sense, maybe it'll be entertaining! And if Tom DeFalco didn't mean for all the stuff in that last paragraph to be true, I'm giving it to him for free so that he can use it to make it all true, no questions asked!

The Nth metal leads Hawkman to the deal going bad between Xerxes and the gang leader. Shadow Thief is also there for an as yet unknown reason. But when Hawkman begins battling Ironsides, I learn his true identity!

Yes! It is Tic Tac Foe! See the X and O on his back?! I think the best Tic Tac Foe can hope for is a Cat's Game.

During the fight, Shadow Thief reveals that she fights extraterrestrial threats. While Hawkman was alone and flying to the fight, he also declared to himself that he has sworn to protect his adopted world from all threats terrestrial and galactic. So I think he and Shadow Thief are going to get along and hunt monsters and no-goodniks just like Amanda Waller reported to Steve Trevor in Justice League of America. Boom! Hawkman rebooted!

Because Xerxes primed one of the Thanagarian bombs, he tosses it amidst some others and escapes with Tic Tac Foe. Shadow Thief and Hawkman disappear into whatever Shadow Realm Shadow Thief utilizes to move about secretly as the gang member's yacht explodes.

The Savage Hawkman #17 Rating: +1 Ranking. This comic book still wasn't very good. But it's so much better than it was! And it actually reboots Hawkman logically where I can Fanboy Rationalize the rest of the series into fitting into this new version of Hawkman. Plus raising it one Rank isn't going to do anything because that raises it to Spot #51 with no comic book beneath it. That slot will be filled by Constantine this month and I really don't think it's going to debut at #52! So, enjoy a non #52 Ranking for as long as it lasts, Hawkman!