Green Lantern #24

Why can't Hal Jordan go more than three months at a time without a huge cosmic crisis that requires a crossover?

Green Lantern really is a stupid name for this hero and what he does. Earth 3 got it right by calling his opposite Power Ring. Sure, Power Ring is a stupid name as well. But at least it makes sense.

Victim: "Help! Help!"
Green Lantern: "Do not worry, sir! Green Lantern will save the day!"
Victim: "I hope he gets here quick! Help!"
Green Lantern: "He is here! I am here! I am Green Lantern!"
Victim: "What? Why? Help! Where's your lantern?"
Green Lantern: "It's at home. It's too bulky to carry. Anyway, look at my power! See this? Green light! I'm like a Green Lantern in the darkness!"
Victim: "Oh. I get it. Help. It's more conceptual than visual."
Green Lantern: "But my emblem looks like a stylized lantern as well!"
Victim: "I would have gone with The Imagineer!"
Green Lantern: "I kind of didn't have a choice. Otherwise I would have chosen the name Better!"
Victim: "That's just...ugh. You know what? I'm good here. I'd rather not be seen with you."

Hal Jordan has suddenly realized how serious a problem it is that the Green Lantern rings have become unreliable. First he had to fly across the vacuum of space and then nearly choke to death on the noxious atmosphere of a far off planet before he could take the problem seriously. But then he's really never been much of a thinker. He's more of a doer. Especially if that doing is destroying his home town or betraying the Corps or acting like a self-righteous prick. But now he's a leader and a leader has to lead! I just came up with that myself. Right off the top of my head. I should be a Writer!

This is why Kilowog should runs things and Hal Jordan should be dead.

Hal, John, Kilowog, and Salaak are all currently realizing that maybe Sinestro's mass murder of the Guardians wasn't such a good idea. Now, if he'd tortured them slowly so that they gave up all the secrets about how the battery and the rings actually worked before offing them, the Green Lanterns might not be in so much trouble right now. But since that didn't happen (Sinestro's slow torture of the Guardians could have been its own series that ran for years!), now they whole battery/power ring/entity system has them flummoxed and other words that mean whatever flummoxed means.

While Salaak is leaned over staring into the battery with his ass crack showing saying "Seems to be okay now!", Kyle and Carol and Saint Walker and the Bohemian Guardians SHKASSSSSHH onto the scene.

Carol, nearly unconscious, still has the presence of mind to say "He's on his way" as opposed to "He's coming" which would have just made the twelve-year old boy that lives in my brain cackle inappropriately. Then Hal would have said, "Who's coming?" And then I wouldn't be able to get out of my head the image of Relic jerking himself off and flinging his semen across the universe.

Oh stop it! It's just Relic's hypothesis! He has no experimental proof to support it!

Hal Jordan refuses to buy into Relic's belief not because Hal Jordan knows a little bit about science but because Hal Jordan refuses to believe that the Green Lantern Corps can ever do anything bad, unknowingly or not. He's such a cheerleader for them. But he only supports them because they've made him powerful enough to match his own ego.

They don't really have a lot of time to discuss the solution to a crazed gigantic scientist from a previous universe going about destroying Lantern Corps before Relic arrives to destroy the Green one.

Relic asks Hal to surrender but Hal says the Green Lanterns don't know the meaning of surrender. So Relic says that he must then teach to them the meaning of the word. But I don't think he was serious about that because he simply attacks. I think he meant to say he would teach them the definition of "defeat" or "annihilation" or "face rape by insectoid alien robot." Unless the attack is merely incentive to internalize the definition more quickly as Relic teaches it to them.

Oh yeah? Well get used to it because you're dealing with Hal Jordan now!

John and Salaak save a bunch of extra Lantern batteries because I guess they maintain some kind of charge for some period of time even after the main battery is exhausted? The rest of the group fill a few pages with some action shots of purple hammers and green bazookas as Relic's insect army drains the main battery dry.

Well, I guess the mini-batteries don't hold any kind of charge and are just portals to the energy of the main battery. So what next?! A race against time before all the rings lose charge? Green Lantern: 24?

Relic's final act before leaving is to completely destroy the battery after which Salaak delivers the good bad news to everybody. Since the battery is so closely tied to the planet, Oa will certainly be exploding soon.

Green Lantern #24 Rating: +1 Ranking. I really hope all of this Green Lantern: Extreme Makeover crap sticks because I, for one, could definitely do with a big shake-up to the normal routine of the Green Lantern Corps. They've already gotten rid of the Guardians (sort of. The Bohemians are still hanging about but I think I can get used to them). Now get rid of Oa. Get rid of the batteries. Stop having universe ending crises happening every few months. I don't mind if big problems arise but does the fate of the universe always have to hinge on every story? Is that the only way comic book writers have of creating tension anymore?

Phantom Stranger #12

The Sin Eater's secret identity is Shaggy?

The Sin Eater sounds like the kind of guy you'd want along on the weekly orgy or the emergency murdering your rival business trips. It would be a freebie if you believe in sin and expurgation of sins and a guy that can eat sins! Unless The Sin Eater eats the sins through your face area so he can chew them out of your brain. Maybe he'd better stay home. I'll take my chances with God not being real and thus not having to face any punishment in the afterlife as my reasons for committing murder and sleep crimes. Being an atheist is so much fun! Nothing to stop me from boiling kittens alive, cutting to the front of every queue, and vociferously condemning all those that don't believe the way that I do to an afterlife of my own choosing! Thank God for free will!

Last issue, The Phantom Stranger was destroyed by the Angel Zauriel. So I'm a bit unclear as to why there's a new issue!

I just glanced at this advert as I opened the comic book and got excited! I thought DC was producing a Spectre television series for a second. Now I'm disappointed. Just Green Arrow.

The Phantom Stranger spends the first two pages of the comic book speaking nonsense. He mentions how he stopped existing but he wasn't aware of not existing but then became aware of being pulled back into existence. What he actually meant to say was, "One moment I was in heaven with Zauriel's flaming sword slicing me in twain and the next I was falling out of the sky and into my body. He would obviously have no awareness of the interim in which he didn't exist and, thus, not have any awareness at all that he may have, at any point in time, ceased to exist. I might as well refer to every time I fall asleep or pass out drunk or smash my head into the concrete after slipping on a banana peel as "ceasing to exist."

Me, every morning from now on for the rest of my life: "Boy! I sure had a good night's cessation of existence!"

Anyway, the comic book must go on with the title character, so The Phantom Stranger finds himself back in his old home with The Terrier. The fucking Terrier. The one that speaks just as much nonsense as The Phantom Stranger.

How the fuck are you The Knower of All Things if you don't know something? You need a new nickname. How about "The Stupidest Motherfucking Dog of All Stupid Motherfucking Dogs (and That's Saying Something)"?

Dog rewards The Phantom Stranger with the loss of two coins for somehow scoring a guest appearance by The Batman in their comic book. He then informs The Phantom Stranger that his next task is to reclaim two souls but He forgets to inform The Stranger which souls those would be. Hopefully one of them will be Damian already! And maybe the other one will be Maseo or Cleveland Brand. Although they probably won't have any relation to his recent guest stars, so maybe it'll be The Sin Eater's soul and Jesus Christ's.

Meanwhile Sin Eater and his Dog, Natas, are hanging out in The Stranger's backyard being creepy assholes. Although, technically, this was his yard first. So maybe he's just being a nostalgic creep.

If my head were constantly on fire, the last thing I would do is make jokes about it. I'd definitely murder anybody that made any to my flaming face.

Meanwhile, The Phantom Stranger's babysitter has discovered he's returned from heaven full of super powers and confusion. He already had the massive teenage angst which is what will probably fuel his move toward becoming a super-villain: The Strange Babysitter!

Chris "Hope" Esperanza decides he needs to confront The Phantom Stranger to find out some answers. Or to be paid for his job. Is a babysitter still entitled to his pay if the kids are butchered under his care? I know Doom Bunny still had to pay the vet when his dog died under anesthesia getting his teeth cleaned. I think he did get half off though.

The Phantom Stranger tries to get rid of Chris "Cousin Oliver" Esperanza but the kid has a weird ability to cling close to The Stranger's ass even when The Stranger teleports about. It looks like The Phantom Stranger has a sidekick now, whether he wanted one or not. They travel together to visit Terrance Thirteen only to find he's slit his wrists in the tub.

Why do you have to sexualize suicide, DC Comics?

Oh wait. It's not sexualized because he's not naked. Oh wait! Even if he were naked, it wouldn't mean this was sexualized. But if he were naked with an erection or naked and female, I guess those things would automatically sexualize the image. Why do Americans automatically assume a naked form is sexualization of that form? A bunch of fucking prudes all up in here. Although, to be fair to people who wanted to be instantly angry over the Draw Harley Quinn fiasco, this scene pretty much strengthens their argument, doesn't it? If the argument by DC wasn't that they were sexualizing Harley Quinn but that it just made sense that somebody killing themselves in a tub would be naked, then why isn't Terrance Thirteen naked? DC is kind of fucking up their own defense here. Although maybe they learned their lesson about sexualizing suicide and this page was, initially, supposed to have a naked Terrance Thirteen in it before The Harley Quinn Fiasco. Although who is ever going to believe that? First off, percentages are pretty low that DC would have had a man naked in a tub anyway. Don't want to titillate the young women with dead, flaccid penis! And covering his penis with his hand or bare thigh is actually more erotic (necrerotic!) than showing it because it stokes the imagination. To finish my rambling, no point paragraph: showing women naked while killing themselves while not showing men naked while killing themselves is wrong and we should endeavor to see more of all sexes naked and killing themselves.

The Strange Babysitter rushes in, grabs Terrance Thirteen by the wrists, and brings him back to life! Oh, no wonder he's not naked. I'm almost certain that if I were naked and suddenly brought back from the edge of death, I'd ejaculate all over my rescuer. Hmm. I think I just wrote a pornographic film! "The Pre-Ejaculator Re-Animator."

The Phantom Stranger and his Sidekick do some paranormal investigations and discover that The Question was behind Terrance Thirteen's murder attempt of The Phantom Stranger. They clean up Terrance and everybody sits around waiting for the Chinese to arrive.

Or not. Why don't characters in comic books eat more often?

After they all make nice, they head over to Terrance Thirteen's rich boy penthouse in New York where they notice an eclipse. Well, that's enough of a tie-in to slap that Forever Evil label on the top of the comic book, isn't it?! And while Chris and Terrance are bonding over the eclipse and paranormal stuff and Chris possibly applying to be Terrance Thirteen's sidekick, The Phantom Stranger pulls the old disappearing trick and heads back home. Only to find his house on fire and The Sin Eater and Natas sitting up on the roof gloating. The Phantom Stranger pulls a Charlton Heston at the end of Planet of the Apes and that's it for this month. Be with us next time for "Three Undeads are Better Than One" or "There's No Fireplace Like Home."

The Phantom Stranger #12 Rating: +1 Ranking. I can already see how this comic is going to play out! Eventually, the fate of the universe will be at the mercy of a dogfight. Dog versus Natas! Winner take all! If the fight isn't broken up by the cops before a winner can be determined.

Detective Comics #24

Wrath is the least metaphorical opposite of Batman out of all of Batman's metaphorical opposites like The Joker and Catwoman. Except for maybe Man-bat. That might be the most stupidly literal opposite of Batman.

I don't like this cover for a variety of reasons but the main reason is that it's not telling the ending of the tale that I want to read. In my mind, Wrath is actually E.D. Caldwell's butler and he's going to be defeated by Alfred Pennyworth wielding a highly polished silver serving tray. Alfred will then take off his white gloves, dust off his lapel and shirt front, and say, "And that, sir, is how you clean house." Then he'll look about tentatively to make sure nobody is watching, put a plastic cover over his shiny black shoe, kick Wrath in the teeth, carefully remove the cover, wad it up, and place it in his inner breast pocket of his coat.

I also don't like the fleet of Earth 2 World Army ships assaulting Gotham. Can a city full of civilians with a corrupt police force and a handful of Bat-themed heroes only be defeated by an army of laser equipped space ships? Of course I mean while Batman is distracted. If Batman weren't busy fighting Wrath, obviously an invading army would be stopped by The Goddamned Batman. He'd just have Lucius Fox rig up some ingestible explosives and then Batman would sit naked on the top of Wayne Towers jerking off at the incoming space craft until his mighty orgasm (very mighty since one of Batman's training sessions during Year Zero was how to direct his Chi by not masturbating or having sex with hot burglars so that his ejaculate would fly fast and far when he needed it to) shoots his explosive seed across the sky with impeccable aim, destroying every last invading ship and saving the city. It's Batman's favorite way to save Gotham, as we've seen multiple times so far. He just loves spraying his bodily fluids all over the populace.

As I said, least metaphorical Batman villain ever.

After The Joker nearly killed Alfred due to Bruce Wayne's growing connections to The Batman, did Batman simply decide to shrug his shoulders and say, "What the fuck?" Why is he putting not only Alfred in serious danger to infiltrate Caldwell Tech but his secret identity as well? Would Wrath simply assume that Batman uses Bruce Wayne's butler for undercover missions and Bruce Wayne has no knowledge of it? What about the fact that Bruce Wayne entered the building with Pennyworth and then disappeared once Pennyworth was discovered and suddenly Batman was on the scene? I'm getting really sick of you, Comic Books, thinking us readers will suspend not only our disbelief but our entire brains as well simply to accept the sanctity of the Secret Identity.

Because Bruce Wayne and Alfred were caught learning the secret life of E.D. Caldwell, they've kind of forced Wrath's hand. If he doesn't act now, he'll be exposed so he sets off his electrical trap incapacitating all the Gotham Police Officers wearing his protective gear. Then he climbs into his spaceship (which all really cool Super-villains have to own) and goes after Batman inside Batwing's Cockpit (that sounds like a gay Batman porn parody: Batman Inside Batwing!). Now Batman only has a mere four and one-half minutes to save 90% of the Gotham Police Force! It sounds like an impossible word problem! Also an impossible task.

Nope. Not helping to get me out of porn parody territory.

Why is Batman suddenly having a Star Wars style battle over the skies of Gotham? Did editorial demand they need a scene to reference for the next Batman video game that will include dogfighting in the Batwing? It just seems so over-the-top for Batman! He really needs to get back to his roots where he's a scary, shadowy figure in the alleys keeping the regular people safe. I'm not sure I like this high profile Batman that keeps waging war after war inside Gotham City limits.

To buy himself some time to save the police officers, Batman self-destructs the Batwing (he's calling it the Batplane again because this is The New 52 and you can't have people making Batman inside Batwing innuendos every time he flies about the city). The explosion disables Wrath's spaceship and he crash lands in Gotham Harbor or Gotham Lake or Gotham's Flooded Inner City. Batman escapes on a hang-glider with stolen Amazon invisibility technology. Between pages, he winds up in Caldwell Towers, stops the technology responsible for electrocuting the police officers, and finds his way to Alfred. And even though Alfred is just getting his concussion legs, he believes he knows why Wrath is waging this war.

Alfred is never too injured to make a jab at Batman's obsessive need for stupid Batnames.

Alfred shows Batman that Batman is not the World's Greatest Detective at all since Batman "thoroughly" researched E.D. Caldwell and came up with nothing. But that's because Caldwell, selling tech to the Gotham P.D., had access to the Police files and was able to delete and alter them at his will. Which means Batman's "thorough" detective work simply means running a search of Gotham Police Department's computer database? Am I supposed to believe that Batman didn't investigate every link to the name Caldwell that exists everywhere on this Earth and probably Earth 2 as well? Batman is getting fat and sloppy already!

Oh, the information Alfred turns up is that a man named Mallory Caldwell was killed fifteen years ago in a failed diamond heist. The diamonds were never recovered. Alfred doesn't speculate on what any of this could mean though because he knows Batman has probably already figured it all out. Mallory was probably Extreme Disappointment Caldwell's father who managed to, somehow, get the diamonds to his son who then used them to finance his corporation for killing cops. Unless it was all different somehow since I'm not as smart as The Goddamned Batman.

Or maybe I am! As smart as Batman. Not next.

I bet nobody else reading this comic book figured that out! At least nobody reading this comic book that also writes a blog about reading comic books to showcase his ability to guess what direction the most cliched plots in all of literature are headed! Go me! I'm a very uniquely unique individual of individuality! Much more so than everybody else who are just kind of unique in that way that makes a mockery of the very definition of unique. Also, stop saying very unique, idiots.

Batman next tells Wrath to stop being so obsessive. At least about the things that Batman isn't obsessed about!

Batman: "No more revenge!"
Wrath: "What the fuck? What do you call what you're doing?"
Batman: "Justice!"
Wrath: "I think we're getting into semantics here."
Batman: "I fight for good because my parents were killed by the bad! You're the opposite of me! Your parents were killed by the good so now you fight for the bad!"
Wrath: "But my daddy! What about my daddy?!"
Batman: "Your pain isn't as painful as my pain due to philosophical circumstances beyond your control! But now I'll show you philosophy! With my fist! I meant pain! I'll show you pain!"

Oh Batman. Everything is so black and white in your world. I don't think Batman likes gray because he's never sure if he should spell it with an "e" or an "a."

Batman holds back and lets the Gotham City Police Department take down Wrath. He says he does it because the Gotham Police need a win but I know why he's really doing it. The Gotham Police need to feel like they can take out Batman whenever they choose. So taking out Batman's doppleganger will give them the delusional belief that they have the ability to stop Batman as well. He's throwing them a Batbone. Don't think I wasn't tempted to add an "r" to the end of that!

This is why Batman hates wearing his heavy armor suits. He can't make his quick getaway when everybody turns their heads and winds up having to actually talk to people during the denouement.

Officer Wallace stops Batman so he can suck his dick and shove his tongue way up Batman's ass. "Oh Batman! I get it now! You don't cause villains! Justice causes villains! *slurp slurp suck suck wiggle wiggle lick lick lick* Mmm, yeah! We caused Wrath so we're more like you than we ever realized! *poke prod stroke stroke lickity lick lick slurp* Mmmm! Mmmm! Justice! JUSTICE! OH FUCK YES JUSTICE!" And that's the kind of uncomfortable gratitude Batman has to put up with when he can't just mysteriously disappear. No wonder he pulls that trick all the time! Nobody likes watching a grown man in a cop uniform give another grown man in a Batman costume a blow job.

Oh wait. Did I say nobody? I meant everybody.

Days later, some racist bats begin killing black guys in Gotham. Or maybe it was just an isolated incident blown out of proportion by the media. And by media, I mean me, just now, blowing it out of proportion.

Days and days later, Emperor Douchebag Caldwell meets Emperor Blackgate in Blackgate prison and they discuss a future The Brave and The Bold style team-up! Because Emperor Blackgate won't stop until he's become Emperor Gotham City.

Detective Comics #24 Rating: +3 Ranking. Wrath seems like the least amount of work ever put into a villain to make them a twisted reflection of Batman. I think John Layman sat down and said, "What if Bruce Wayne had actually been named E.D. Caldwell? And he was bad?" And editorial went, "*gasp* Intersting! Tell us more!" And John Layman said, "That's all I've got." So editorial said, "Great idea! Let's run with that!" And so they did. And even though I'm making fun of it, I really enjoyed this issue. And that moment where Wallace jerked off Batman? That was a nice touch. The nicest of touches!

Swamp Thing #24

Seeing a cover like this just makes me realize that I've really cut back on my crudity.

This cover leads me to two subjects which I could discuss: masturbation and eating salads. For the life of me, I don't have any stories that combine the two, thank The Lord. Although why would God have anything to do with me not having a masturbation with salad story? Did He somehow keep me from committing that sexy faux pas? Why do we capitalize the pronoun "I" but not "me"? Unless of course We're God (or German), then We get to capitalize Everything. When I think about it, I suppose every time somebody eats a salad, you could make a masturbation joke, depending on the dressing they use. That's why I always eat my salads without dressing. It took me nearly 25 years to realize that I didn't hate salad; I hated salad dressing! And since most adults thought the best way to convince me to eat a salad was to smother it in Man-made Goo (TM), I refused to eat that shit and got yelled at and punished many times across the years for not eating my salad. Fucking adults. If just once they set that shit in front of me without the Man-made Goo, I might have tried it.

No, no. I wouldn't have. Although if they'd put Tater Tots and cheese in it, I'd have been a fan. Although I'm not sure that really counts as a salad anymore. Tater Tot Salad. I think I'd have to forgo the lettuce though because that whole hot on top of cold thing would mess up the balance. Any food that arrives at a dead universe level of entropy before you can even get started is not food that I want sitting in front of me. So Tater Tot salad would probably consist of Tater Tots, Cheese, Chili, and, if you'd like because nothing is mandatory (except the tater tots), onions. Maybe some jalapenos since it really needs more vegetable!

This issue begins with The Seeder pouting because the Avatar of the Green did not congratulate him on his deeds. The opposite has taken place; he's been chastised (by word of mouth, even! He doesn't even get a personal meeting with Swampy). Now he refuses to help the people that Swamp Thing declared weren't deserving of The Seeder's help. Because it was not done correctly. It went against Nature. Fuck all, there are so many rules to keep in mind whenever you do anything at all in the DC Universe! It seems that everything is about balance which leads me to believe The Court of Owls are doing the greatest good!

I suppose the problems with doing or not doing their jobs is more of a philosophical problem than a real "this could potentially ruin the Earth" with most Super-heroes. What are they changing by interfering in the way events transpire? Captain Atom had that philosophical problem back in Captain Atom #3, the only issue I thought worked well. But Captain Atom was also dealing with severe trauma and survivor's guilt, so his belief that he was possibly interfering instead of helping made psychological sense. But taken to the extreme, everybody would be paralyzed by indecision if we had to worry about whether or not we were fucking up the natural order or the proper way of things or the integrity of the timestream. In smaller ways, Batman and Superman actually have to deal with these kinds of issues but mostly in diplomatic ways with police or other nations or Lex Luthor. I guess Uncle Ben had it right when he said that thing about great wrestlers come with great costumes or whatever. That's Marvel. I can't be held accountable for knowing Marvel quotes! But those are fairly normal heroes dealing with fairly mundane problems. I know I just described Superman as "fairly normal" and the end of Omnithing as a "fairly mundane problem." But stay with me as I start a new paragraph!

This is Swamp Thing. And in the realm of Swamp Thing and John Constantine and Justice League Dark, how things get done can have serious consequences. We can pretend that everything has serious consequences if, as in a Scott Lobdell comic or a J.T. Krul Captain Atom story, we are allowed to follow some fantasy timeline to the far future to see how just one decision brings the world to ruin. But that, again, is philosophical. What if Hitler has been trampled by stampeding warthogs when he was a child? Sure, a lot of shit would have turned out differently. But that's just how time and space and life works! But dealing with magic changes the essential parts of the whole so that everything changes. Arcane abusing his Rot Powers. John Constantine using the Books of Magic. Madame Xanadu...no, never mind. She never does anything. The Seeder is using short cuts in The Green to help people in need and those short cuts harm other parts of The Green which cause more suffering just in different places and different ways. Magic isn't free in the DCnU unlike in our world. If I want to summon a demon, who is that harming except the transient whose blood I used in the ritual? But if John Constantine were to summon a demon, he'd have to pay a cost in the lives of four or five of his friends. You know, people he actually knew! That's not something to fuck around with.

In other words, go Court of Owls! You guys know the score!

Sometimes I wonder if I ever get around to making any kind of a coherent point at all ever.

This is an example of wasting power. Just imagine how many Loquat Trees died because The Seeder doesn't carry around a pen.

Once again, The Swamp Thing begins to deal with Cappuccino so he knows why she's here and what he's supposed to do about it. But the Swamp Thing makes like history and repeats himself by ditching her before she has a chance to explain. But he ditches her for a good reason! He has to go see The Seeder's face and find out which old colleague is fucking with him now. Alec Holland must have been a huge dick botanist. Not a botanist with a huge dick since I can't argue the veracity of that. It just seems like he made an awful lot of enemies. Is there usually a lot of drama in botanist circles?

The Seeder is a much better name than The Florionic Man but I'm not totally convinced this is Jason Woodrue. I believe he's been mentioned somewhere. Possibly just Rotworld though!

Instead of talking with The Seeder, Swamp Thing grabs him about the facial area and smashes him to the ground. It's a bit of Alec being frustrated with this guy and his Whisky Tree experiment and a bit of the Mean Green Voice trying to get him to lose control and fuck the world by filling it with grass pollen and lemon trees. The Swamp Thing luckily doesn't kill The Seeder but he does manage to knock his hood off.

Swamp Thing needs to stop shoving pieces of himself in people's mouths.

According to an Editor's Note, Jason and Alec have met before. Here's my bit about it in Swamp Thing Annual #1:

The Parliamentary Swamp Thing manages to deliver Alec to Jason Woodrue so that Woodrue can transport him back to Louisiana. In exchange for his service to The Green, Woodrue will be rewarded. I think he’ll be turned into the Floronic Man or something crazy like that.

Too bad I couldn't remember that shit when The Seeder first appeared! There's just too much to remember to make educated guesses at these plot points! The only reason I finally thought he might be Jason Woodrue was when it was revealed he was a fellow scientist that probably knew Alec. But the clues were already there! Stupid comic books and failing memory!

Jason Woodrue wants to team up with Alec Holland because the Swamp Thing needs a fucking sidekick! Jason Woodrue can wear short pants and a short cape and little booties and say things like, "Fucked up Ferns, Swamp Thing!" and "Holy Oaks!" I can't wait because I know that's what Charles Soule is going to do! Plus some horror or something scary.

No! Wait! That's the opposite of what I want!

The Parliament of Trees is the cutest parliament I've ever seen! Be on the lookout for my new web comic about them! It'll probably begin in 2021 after I catch up on my backlog of projects.

The Seeder decides to fight for his rightful place and hurls some seeds into Swamp Thing. The end result is Swamp Thing's eye pops out which probably doesn't really mean much since he's a plant and what do plants need eyes for? Luckily the Swamp Thing still has his protector, Cappuccino. In the end, the Parliament simply takes away Jason Woodrue's powers for now. When The Swamp Thing has more experience under his belt, the Parliament of Trees will return Woodrue's power to him and host a death match in the swamps. It looks like that will take place in Swamp Thing Annual #2 available on Halloweeneen.

Swamp Thing #24 Rating: No change. The Parliament of Trees sure did get back to their old, manipulative, bastard selves quickly enough. They had to act submissive and helpful while they were tiny little saplings that needed Swamp Thing's protection, but now they're nice and teenaged which explains why they've gotten their mean streak back. As for the coming death match, my money is on the Swamp Thing because I'm a Master Comic Book Reader and I know how these things work. As long as the title isn't being cancelled, the title character will win! Unless the title character is somebody like Swamp Thing who is an avatar and can actually be anybody. It's not like the title is Alec Holland, Swamp Thing!

Green Arrow #24

This looks like the cover of a Choose Your Own Adventure book.

If I were reading a Green Arrow Choose Your Own Adventure Story, the first choice I'd make would be, "Pick up a different book and turn to page one."

I've been so thoroughly traumatized by reading J.T. Krul and Ann Nocenti's versions of Green Arrow that I can't stand to look at this book anymore. Even though Sorrentino's art is beautiful and Lemire is creating an interesting myth surrounding Green Arrow, I still picture the douchey fucker that was beating up people simply because they were getting famous pulling stupid pranks on YouTube. And isn't this asshole broke now? How the fuck is he flying all over the world in search of the fabled Gold Monkey Green Arrow? Does his Justice League of America stipend cover non-Justice League of America related travels?

Maybe the first page will explain it all to me since Lemire Lobdelled this issue!

How come he doesn't mention any history from his earlier iss...oh yeah. I wouldn't want new readers to know about that shit either.

Green Arrow's balance is all fucked up from having his ear drum blown out by Count Vertigo. But there's nothing he can do about it because he lost his health insurance when Queen Industries went under and he can't afford to pay for insurance out of pocket anyway since he has no job. And even if he could scrape together enough to pay every month, he'd still have to pay the same amount to have a doctor check out his ear as if he didn't have health insurance. But don't worry, Americans! That will all be fixed now that the government is forcing everybody to buy into the privatized health care system that is the best system in the world because they are driven by profits and everybody knows that's the best incentive there is! Universal health care is a great idea but you can't half ass it like America is trying to do and pretend that it's going to work. Either you socialize the entire thing or you leave it up to the populace to freely purchase from private companies. What you don't do is force the populace to begin doing business with profit-driven insurance companies that don't actually give a shit about keeping people healthy and actually make uninsured health care way more expensive than it needs to be. Fuck you, America. I hope you never come back online. By the way, I'm absolutely deducting every day that the government is shut down from my taxes at the end of the year. If you aren't working, you aren't getting paid, bitches.

Count Vertigo is currently fucking up downtown Seattle, so Green Arrow will have to arrange a trip to the hospital later. At least he doesn't have to pay for another international flight to hunt down Vertigo himself. For some reason, the bastard thought Shado and Arrow were important enough to make a house call.

Fyff sure has gotten fat since he first met Oliver Queen. I like it! DC needs more fat characters. Although they don't all have to be anti-social, depressed nerds like Fyff and Jent. Remember when Amanda Waller was fat and she was the only person that could intimidate The Goddamned Batman? She was my hero.

Shado and Naomi hit the streets to take care of Count Vertigo not because Green Arrow can't handle it but because Lemire needed to get the two women alone so that Shado can mention how she noticed that Naomi was in love with Green Arrow. I guess the way Naomi was vigorously rubbing her crotch and sticking her finger up her ass as she gazed longingly at Oliver's man-meat gave her away.

Before Shado can shoot her Rocket Propelled Boxing Glove EMP Arrow at Count Vertigo, she's attacked by Richard Dragon, Kung Fu Fighter! He'd like Shado to not hurt Count Vertigo and to also deliver a message to Green Arrow about how Seattle isn't big enough for the two of them. I bet Richard Dragon is the Master of the Fisting Clan! Which means he should have a mummified fist on him somewhere.

Actually, you do know you have two ears, right Ollie?

Count Vertigo wanders around the streets of Seattle saying things that make a lot of sense. But then Green Arrow appears to stop him because Count Vertigo, while making sense with the words coming out of his mouth, is also destroying everything and killing cops. So that probably needs to be stopped.

Stop saying things I agree with, Count Vertigo! And while I agree with his harsh criticisms of America, I seriously doubt living in Vlatlava is anywhere close to as enjoyable as living in America. We've got some serious problems but at least nobody shoots us in the head for disagreeing with each other. Well, at least government officials don't. Just don't disagree with your neighbor here!

Green Arrow manages to keep his vertigo legs since he's had some practice against this madman and with having a loss of balance over the last several days from his eardrum injury. He punches Vertigo in the face and rips out his vertigo inducing apparatus. I'm not sure Green Arrow's relationship with the Seattle Police (that always seems to be a touchy relationship, the one between the hometown mundane peace keepers and the home town super heroes) but one of them catches Ollie as he nearly stumbles and says, "Easy, G.A. I got you." I actually like this moment a lot just because I feel these guys out on the street would have a certain respect for even a vigilante who, when it comes right down to it, isn't very different from them. It's not like he can fly or is invulnerable or has super-strenght or has anything interesting about him at all actually. He's just an idiot with a mask and a bow and arrow trying to keep the streets safe. You've got to admire that. I guess. Maybe. I mean, I don't. But the cops probably do!

Suicide Squad, here comes Count Vertigo! You know Amanda is going to want to use his vertigo powers so she'll have the apparatus reattached for some future mission. Also, I hope Ambush Bug wasn't flying that news copter. Although I wouldn't mind if Bethany Snow had been on board.

The issue ends with Diggle (I believe this guy was created in the Arrow television show) dropping in on Clock King with a proposition that they band together to help stop whatever bullshit is going down in Seattle (you know that bullshit! Richard Dragon killing everybody!). But since Diggle really isn't known for anything except his role in a television show, next issue will be about how he fits in to The New 52 in a Zero Year issue! Great. Is Batman's Zero Year crap going to affect all the comic books?!

Green Arrow #24 Rating: +3 Ranking. Out of the three dragons, have only Shado and Richard Dragon been exposed? Will the third dragon be the one released from Katana's sword?! Ha ha! Like Jeff Lemire would allow any more of Nocenti's taint on this comic book. Why is that sentence providing me with sexy images in the mind area? And you just know Vertigo will end up in Belle Reve where he'll get excellent health care at no cost out of pocket! Lucky bastard.

Earth 2 #16

How long is a populace going to obey a Trickster God when every command is just going to end in somebody sitting on a whoopee cushion? Although it's yet to be proven in clinical trials, fart noises do eventually stop being funny.

Remember when there were comic books that were about ongoing stories and were not about villains that had hardly been showcased yet in The New 52? Those times are back again! At least for a month before everything goes Year Zero on us. So enjoy it while it lasts! I'll enjoy it later when I read a good comic book. Until then, I'll read the mediocre comic book that is Earth 2!

This is how the issue begins:

Aww. It looks like somebody was all ready to pose for a lenticular cover and didn't get a callback.

The next two pages show the World Army assaulting Dherain and Steppenwolf too! Which, if you're keeping track with a calculator (I don't expect you to do math in your head), that makes two panels in three pages. I suddenly have a tremendous pain in my wallet and a burning hatred and resentment for DC Comics and James Robinson. Don't take your quarrel out on me by giving me less story! I want to see lots and lots of words! And also lots and lots of Nicola Scott's artwork. And having her copy and paste a bunch of World Army ships across two pages isn't what I paid for! Well, I guess it is what I paid for. But it's not what I would have paid for if I had any dignity! Although she did draw all the little tiny individual people that just look like crucified rocketeers. That's cute.

Well trepan me and fuck me directly in the nucleus accumbens! Page four and five are ANOTHER double page spread! So that's three panels across five pages! Everything in this story so far could have played out in one page. A single page! Hell, a single page by Keith Giffen would have three times as many panels as have been in the first five pages of this comic book so far! If anybody is out there...if anybody is reading these words, I convey this warning: do not purchase Earth 2 #16 at cover price! Haggle it down to at least 50% off! The first seven pages with ten panels amount to five words: Steppenwolf defeats the World Army. Whoever said a picture is worth a thousand words was 9,995 words off the mark.

So, you know, Steppenwolf and his Hunger Dogs (Beguiler, Bedlam, and Brutaal) defeat the World Army. I guess that means The Wonders need to buck up and try again! Although Steppenwolf could have defeated everybody on Earth 2 if he'd just killed the Wonders after defeating them the first time. Oh, I guess two other people survived the massacre.

Commander Khan and Mister Terrific.

Meanwhile the Wonders are busy picking their asses up off the ground and scraping together the shredded remains of their dignity. They're also, like me, wondering why they were left to live. I'm sure Steppenwolf has plans for them although Steppenwolf really should have grown up reading more comic books. Then he'd know that leaving the heroes alive is always a huge mistake. I suppose they didn't have many comic books on Apokolips, so he couldn't learn that lesson. But you know what they did have on Apokolips? A woman named Kaiyo! And since she's on the cover and she wants to see Darkseid's defeat, perhaps it was one of her tricks or pranks that caused The Hunger Dogs to think that the Wonders had been killed.

The Justice Society is coming along nicely! Except for that second Sandman wannabe jerk. I suppose this team needs at least one Red Shirt to keep things exciting with his horrible death when they face The Hunger Dogs again.

Wesley Sandman Dodds gets a radio communication from Commander Khan asking that they help save and evacuate any survivors. The not quite the Justice Society head into Dherain and most do just that. Except for Alan Scott who decides it would be best if he faced Steppenwolf one on one. Except Steppenwolf doesn't exactly like the one on one math, so Brutaal comes in to help double team Alan Scott, and not in a pleasant, ecstasy-induced encounter in the quiet room at a rave kind of double team. No, this is more like a bunch of frat guys that desperately need to be liked by anyone at all and, smelling weakness on all of themselves, join together for some male bonding by beating the shit out of whichever one of them they all somehow instinctively decide to beat the shit out of. That comparison was as tortured as a frat guy's declaration of his heterosexuality.

Come on, Mister Terrific! Show Steppenwolf your balls!

Mister Terrific isn't the man to finally stop Steppenwolf. And why should he be? He hasn't done shit since he's come to Earth 2! DC makes a big fucking deal that Mister Terrific was going to wind up on Earth 2 after his comic book was canceled and then he just hung around in Sloan's basement for a dozen issues. Which is fitting, I guess, since Terry Sloan was the original Mister Terrific. Maybe they were comparing notes. Or balls. Or something.

No, no. Instead of Mister Terrific (or any of the not-quite-yet Justice Society members, for that matter) ending Steppenwolf's reign, it's Brutaal that strikes. You know why?

Remember the fucking cover, assholes? It's Kaiyo!

Or, um, Superman? No, no. I saw the cover! It's just Kaiyo playing a trickster trick!

I suppose I could have misinterpreted the cover even though I am a Master Comic Book Reader. Look, Superman doesn't even have his spit curl here! I'm pretty sure he has that spit curl on every Earth. He even has it on the cover! Which, you know, isn't even him! Although I was wondering how Kaiyo could have been here and trapped in the Omega Room on Earth Prime at the same time. Although she did escape in the last issue of Vibe. And Boom Tubing is tricky when it comes to time and what is the correlation between Earth 2 and Earth Prime's times anyway? Why am I even debating if it's actually Superman or Kaiyo when I could just turn the page and find out!

Superman (Kaiyo!) blasts a huge rift in the Earth with his Omega Beam Heat Vision Eyeballs as the Wonders and the last of the survivors retreat to safety. And this issue had two extra pages in it, so I forgive DC and James Robinson for the slow start! So if you ran out and didn't buy this comic book based on my earlier recommendation, I'm changing that and suggesting that if you like reading Earth 2, maybe it's okay to go out and buy this issue.

Earth 2 #16 Rating: +2 Ranking. Okay, fuck it. I enjoyed this issue. And I suppose that Superman isn't Kaiyo at all even though the cover is awfully deceiving in that it looks quite a bit like Kaiyo. This Superman could be whatever Darkseid had been working on in his Superman Corpse Lab on Apokolips. It might be a mutated version of Earth 2's Superman with some parts stuck on it from the Supermen of many other Earths!

Or it could, you know, be Kaiyo.

Batwing #24

We're not off to a good start here, Batwing.

I know, I know! A lot of you are ruining your underwear about this cover. I'm sure you're turning to your friends and saying, "I LOVE THIS SO MUCH! I CAN'T EVEN!" simply to show your appreciation for advertising images from the Art Deco Period which, I think, was around the Civil War era when air travel really became popular. Just look at the clean lines and the limited palette! All that's missing is big block letters saying VISIT.

Oh fuck you. It's actually a pretty nice cover. But this comic book has been so boring lately, it needs something to really draw me in! Like a marine in plate armor battling dragons during a lightning storm on a high cliff surrounded by lava and spewing fire demons!

At the end of last issue, Batwing had been thrown from the top of a building by Lady Vic. Normally this wouldn't be a problem because his name is Batwing which fucking implies that he has the mechanisms and the capability to save himself. But his system shorted out and he's fucking useless without the suit. Every other fucking super hero in Gotham City would be fine because they all carry Batgrapples. But Batwing? Nope. Why would he need that old fashioned technology? He's got a super suit!

This is a good lesson to be learned. For the next Batwing!

Batwing manages to survive with minimal injury to his dignity. Maybe when all of the embarrassing footage winds up on YouTube, it'll be mislabeled as "Batman." Batwing gets his shit together and goes home to lick his wounds while Lady Vic decides to stay in town for a week to hunt him down.

For some reason, Batwing referred to Lady Vic as "Mary Psycho Poppins." She doesn't remind me of Mary Poppins at all! She must have the same accent. Or smell.

Luke's ex Zena is waiting for him when he finally gets home in the morning because her dad died and she's horny. I think that's one of those good news/bad news situations television and movies continue to insist actually happen. Usually it's just bad news and worse news. Although I guess bad news and worse news can be thought of as bad news and better news, if you flip them around! Although if your parents died in a house fire, "your childhood home burned to the ground" just doesn't quite come off as "better news." Maybe you can spin the destroyed house into good news by saying, "Look at it this way. At least you and your siblings won't fight over the house leading to a falling out that causes bitterness and resentment and writing each other out of your lives until the day you die, regretful and ashamed with no loving family at your side!"

The next day, Luke contacts Batman because he needs to get into the lab to fix his suit. Batman asks him what happens and Luke mentions he had his ass handed to him by a blonde from East London. That's all the Great Detective needs to know to peg her as Lady Vic! He's such a genius. Even though he's being written to be a genius, I'm still suitably impressed. Mostly because I don't know how fiction works.

Luke manages to retool the Batwing Armor because he's also a genius. Or he took "Advanced Batwing Suit Engineering" in college. Maybe it's just in his DNA. Hopefully he remembered to add a manual Batgrapple.

Well shit. I guess he did take "Advanced Batwing Suit Engineering."

After Luke makes nice with his mom, he goes after Lady Vic (as evidenced in that scan above!). He finds her lounging about in her underwear and unloads his batspunk all over her face. No, seriously.

Oh yeah! Now I see the resemblance to Mary Poppins!

Batwing's batspunk is loaded with fear toxins and truth serum. It incapacitates Lady Vic and she blabs everything she knows. Turns out "Charlie" was the gangster known as Caligula, the one behind the Marabunta and the man that tried to kidnap Lion's Mane and the boss of Atticus Fontaine who tried to convince Bruce Wayne to sell the diamond mine. In other words, he's the guy behind everything that has happened so far since Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti took over writing duties. And, of course, Batman knows the jerk.

And now Batwing gets to go to Rome! As they say in Rome, "Ha cha cha cha cha!" But first, next month is Zero Year. Which seems like a total waste since it's probably going to be about David Zavimbe and who cares about that quitting chump anymore?

Batwing #24 Rating: No change although I enjoyed this issue much more! Maybe Luke is growing on me or maybe I'm delirious. Or maybe it actually was better! It's hard to tell when you're dealing with art which details are objective and which are subjective. I suppose I should, like every other American, simply trust that my opinion is absolutely objective and move on!