Batman #24

I don't mind so much that this issue costs $6.99. What I mind is that it's going to take a long ass time to write about. I hope this commentary is more coherent than last issue's. I think I was whacked out on cold medicine.

Batman came up with the idea of being a Batman last issue although he's yet to run to Alfred screaming, "Alfred! Alfred! I have the best idea! Have you ever heard of bats?!" This issue, Alfred is probably going to get roped into sewing the Batsuit. Unless Batman learned some ancient Tibetan sewing techniques while he was on the road.

The issue begins with Bruce having already made a few forays against The Red Hood Gang as the Batman because a bunch of them are worrying about him already. One of them convinces the others that he's a myth, a horror story. He says in Gotham, it's always something after which he adds "bats" and "witches" to the list of mythological terrors that also includes "owls." So when are we going to get our Coven of Witches controlling Gotham story? Anyway, Batman wants everybody to believe in him! He's no faith junkie. If they need proof of his existence, he'll Goddamned give them proof.

Come on! This is at least as good as anything Banksy has ever done!

The Red Hood doesn't seem particularly happy about The Batman although it does afford him a chance to sink the failing members of his gang to the bottom of Gotham Harbor. So, you know, always look on the bright side and all that. I suppose at this moment in the story, everybody thinks Bruce Wayne is dead. Again. So Bruce is free to spend his time with Alfred outfitting the Batcave, creating his terrifying persona, and creating the formula for Batlube. I don't know what The Riddler is up to yet.

"Why, Bruce, didn't you know? They've taken my butt cherry and my left testicle."

Well, Bruce being dead didn't last very long by comic narrative standards. But he and Alfred did get a lot done during Villains Month. They have some kind of gigantic furnace down in the Batcave. Batman has his costume. Batman has the Batmobile (or some version of it since all I've seen so far are the headlights coming out of the secret Batcave entrance). And his myth is already beginning to grow.

Currently the Batcave is composed of a rope ladder, a gigantic furnace, and a laptop with five hundred meters of extension cord. Alfred and Bruce finally figure out exactly what The Red Hood is going to do and when he's going to do it but they don't let me in on the secret because I can't be trusted. Bruce also determines that The Batman can't stop The Red Hood. It's time for Bruce Wayne to step up and take the city under his wing.

Bruce Wayne calls a press conference to discuss what he knows about The Red Hood Gang. Commissioner Loeb doesn't want to deal with it, so he sends in Detective Gordon. Isn't Gordon going to get his own Zero Year over in Detective Comics? I suppose Batman can share some of the spotlight with him here.

"Because whatever your answer is...it isn't worth it! Get out now! Get the fuck out! Flee for your lives! This place will devour your soul and fuck your rotten corpse in the throat! Run, people of Gotham! RUN!"

Bruce Wayne proceeds to deliver a passionate speech to the people of Gotham about why he thinks they put up with the horrible, mean, dirty city.

I imagine he'll finish this up with, "Also, those of you working fast food and retail and all the other shitty, minimum wage jobs...well, I suppose you're here because you simply can't afford to leave."

The Red Hood Gang showers the press conference with rocket propelled grenades but I think everybody survives thanks to the casually bored Jim Gordon who rolls his eyes at just the right time to see some Red Hood Gang members on the roof of ACE Chemicals. During the chaos, Alfred manages to hack the security gates around the plant and Bruce Wayne rushes in followed by Gordon and some police officers. Too bad Bruce is found almost immediately by The Red Hood and held at gunpoint while Gordon and the cops are locked out of the main warehouse where a bunch of vans are being loaded with radioactive explosives.

Oh, just shoot him before listening to all of his moralizing!

But just before The Red Hood can pull the trigger, Alfred hits the fucking lights on a certain-shaped portion of the city.

Maybe he's the tiniest bit obsessive.

During the blackout, Bruce makes it look like Batman saves him with some really spot on shadow puppetry and trick clothing which he learned from a Master Shadow Puppeteer on a small island off the west coast of Japan. The lights come back on as The Red Hood removes his hood so he can get a glimpse of The Batman with his uncovered, beautiful green eyes. It's love at first sight and the beginning of another tiny obsession in another crazy Gothamite.

The next part is the big brawl part which I rarely talk about except when the hero pulls some Xena shit like this:

And now we reveal my obsession: people running on the tops of other people's heads.

Just after this, Red Hood gets a bead on Batman with his pistol but Red Hood 347 (Uncle Philip!) bounces a bullet off of The Red Hood's helmet to stop him. Uncle Philip is then killed almost immediately which sucks because I'm fairly certain he had a bit to say about power and responsibility. Also, Philip's bullet ricocheted into one of the explosive gas canisters, so that's going to suck.

All hell breaks loose as the canisters begin exploding. Alfred hacked the doors so the trucks can't leave. Gordon trains his gun on Batman because that's what you do to in Gotham. And the Red Hood runs up some stairs with one canister left to blow up in his face and give him a permanent smile.

Or The Goddamned Batman will stop him.

Batman also fails to keep him from falling in a vat of toxic chemicals with a great big crushy lovey smile on his face. And that's why everybody paid $6.99 for this issue. Because you got the origin of The Joker. During most of the previous Zero Year stuff, I questioned whether The Red Hood would become The Joker or not. But when he said "...Hello...there." in that earlier panel, it was confirmed (in my mind) that he was The Joker. And he is so in love with The Batman.

Although that white carnation...oh, well. No matter! Time for the back-up story where we learn why nobody will ever guess that The Batman is actually Bruce Wayne and that The Riddler has decided it's time for his shot at Gotham!

Batman #24 Rating: +1 Ranking. Insert your own reasons for liking or disliking the comic book here and pretend that I completely agree with you. Gotta go!

Worlds' Finest #16

Outside by Emanuela Lupacchino but, immeasurable sadness, not the inside.

The issue begins with The Huntress trespassing, breaking and entering, and finally vandalizing a library window. Fucking super-heroes feel so entitled to do whatever they please. Just because she saves people and their asses, she thinks she can break every law and window in New York City? Well I've got news for you, The Huntress!

Actually, I don't have any news for The Huntress. Sometimes I get caught up in cliché turns of phrase and I don't know how to end them or work my way back from them. "It goes without saying" is the worst because I always want to go on with saying instead of leaving it at that. But then who has ever looked at somebody else and said "It goes without saying" without saying the thing or responding to the thing already having been said? Being that we're creatures that enjoy, thrive on, and ultimately live and die by communication, I'm fairly certain that nothing ever goes without saying. I'd be willing to bet more deaths were caused by somebody thinking "Well, that goes without saying" and leaving it at that. The phrase actually sounds like the title to an H.P. Lovecraft story: "It Goes Without Saying."

"We heard it lurching and stumbling in the hallway above us as we huddled closely in the dark and in our fear. I had only meant to find out more about my mysterious grandfather, that grandfather I had always loved and enjoyed spending time with but whom nobody knew well. I had found the ancient stash of letters in a hidden storm cellar behind his old tool shed many years ago when I was just turned ten but had not the time to investigate them, as I already heard my father's car roaring to life and my mother calling my name. The letters, scattered atop an old, dusty, leather-bound book, faded from my mind until grandfather's death early this fall. When I heard the news, I grieved miserably for I knew not just my grandfather was lost, but a place in time, and a refuge that I'd often known, and a voice, that gravelly, calm, somewhat terrified voice, gone forever from this world. But I remembered the hidden cellar. And I remembered the letters. And that book. I had never quite forgotten that book though, it seemed, only in my dreaming mind and in my irregular, restless sleeps. But now, huddled against the slightly damp dirt walls of yet another hidden subterranean space beneath my grandfather's house, I wished those memories had kept themselves safely hidden within my sleeping mind. As I listened to it go, that thing, that awful, silent body, never speaking, just shambling with cold, white eyes, toward the trap door I'd left ajar, I quivered and I wept and I hugged my dear cousin whom I had convinced to come with me for a lark. She mumbled something incoherent but I could not tell if it was from madness or simply the volume and tone of her voice. But I knew what she meant. Horribly, awfully, I knew."

It goes without saying that I understand how the idiom works. It goes without saying that you don't have to explain it to me. It goes without saying that it goes without saying.

Back to The Huntress, a fire has broken out across the street at a fashion show and, grudgingly, interrupted from her research, The Huntress decides she needs to save some lives.

It was about this point that I thought, "It goes without saying but that dismount seems like a bad idea."

It was here that I thought, "Maybe I should have said something."

The Huntress realizes this is arson almost immediately but unlike the arsonist that didn't hang around when her hideout was torched a few issues ago, this one she catches just leaving, having hung about to enjoy her handiwork. She gives chase through Central Park as the New York City Firefighters arrive to do the really heroic work of real heroes who are heroes that expect nothing in return except that we all, collectively, think of them as unselfish heroes.

Why do people not have a problem letting taxes support real heroes like firefighters and real anti-heroes like police officers but they won't stand to have taxes support doctors? Why don't we just go back to the old privatized firefighting system where firefighters just let your house burn if you weren't paying to have it protected? Why is it okay for the government to be involved in saving a life by pulling a person from a burning building but then it's not okay for the government to be involved for treating any life-threatening wounds the fire might have inflicted on the person's body? Who are these people who can't see why tax-revenue supported universal health care is a good thing? I don't know a single one. But then, I'm really choosy about my friends and I don't have time to hang around with selfish assholes. My main gripe is that you shouldn't have to choose your career or spend most of your life working a job you don't like simply so you can afford health insurance. I think people that love material possessions and want to earn a lot of money or are driven to be in powerful positions shouldn't expect that everybody else wants that as well. We should be taking care of the health of artists and family farmers and stay-at-home parents that aren't driven by profits. We just can't know how many great artists we're losing to cubicles. I also don't think pointing to people that abuse the system is much of an argument. There are always going to be people cheating the system on every level of the economic scale. I figures if somebody wants to bow out of their one and only life and take the easy way out, let them. Pity them. Because the thing of it is, most people are passionate to do something. The majority of people are passionate to do something. Some of them want to fight fires and don't give a shit about being seen as a hero. That's why so many volunteer. They love doing it. Which brings me back around to firefighters and also to my main point (and lucky to have found it in all the rambling, actually): people shouldn't be coerced into ignoring their passions simply because there is no profit in them.

I guess she's some kind of Bender.

Helena loses the arsonist in the subway, so she decides to go hang out with Karen. Karen is trying to get her business back up and on track since it was practically stolen by Desaad Industries. She has to do something with her time since her powers are currently unstable due to Desaad's power leeching backpack. While they're discussing getting Power Girl back up and flying, another explosion hits another fashion show. Time for Hel to investigate again! But this time with Karen and her unpredictable powers at her side.

As we saw earlier, Helena can manage herself in a long fall.

The Worlds' Finest put out the fire and rescue the people and give chase to the perp. Maybe things are a little more exciting than I make them sound. Like the skimming across the lake and the dodging crossbow bolts and the dragon. Of course there's a dragon. Isn't there always?

The dragon springs forth from a tattoo on the back of the Bender woman. It's an oily maelstrom that Power Girl tries to fight but winds up just falling to the ground and almost killing herself as her powers give out. And that's where the comic leaves them! The bad guy got away and Power Girl needs to take a trip into the heart of the sun.

Worlds' Finest #16 Rating: No change. What the fuck was up with that cover? Was there another story that Lupacchino was going to draw but something interfered with that plan? Delays? Contract changes? Editorial interference? Artist throwing a tantrum? Paul Levitz changed his mind? I guess the covers are done far in advance of the rest of the book, so Levitz may have switched gears on the story but that doesn't totally let editorial off the hook! Oh well. No big deal, I guess. It's not like somebody picked this up off the shelf because they desperately needed to know what all the blue bolts were about. Except for the blue bolt fetishists out there. Sorry to minimize your feelings!

Green Lantern Corps #24

I spent most of my preteen years playing with action figures too, Relic! Yes, yes, my teen years too. And college. And what do you call the period of your life between college and death? Include that time as well.

Next issue this comic book is going to be retitled "Green Lantern Corpse" and will be twenty pages of John Stewart slowly decaying.

But first, the continuing tale of Relic the Horrible Scientist and his attack on Family Values! I haven't really been paying very close attention.

"Oh yeah, Carol! Now it's time to fuck like you like it! Hard, fast, and unsatisfying!" "You know Hal, little oral would be nice." "OH YEAH! I'm a Green Lantern, baby!"

Hal Jordan loves science just about as much as Relic does. When Salaak informs Hal that Oa was inextricably linked to the Power Battery and it will now blow up, Hal decides not believing that fact will stop it from happening. After all, belief is all you need to work a Power Ring, so why doesn't it work on physics as well? Although maybe it's Salaak who sucks at science and has no real evidence that Oa will explode at all. He might be basing his assumption on lies told to him by the Guardians to keep wayward children from wantonly destroying the Main Power Battery.

John Stewart's plan is to distract Relic using himself and a few recruits while Hal and the rest of the Green Lantern Corps escape. Hal Jordan thinks it's a good plan because fuck the new recruits! And John Stewart! Hal Jordan nearly killed himself a few issues ago to keep from putting new recruits in danger but he's learned a few things about leadership since then. And the most important thing is this: the leader should be the last one to die! That's why I always declare myself leader whenever I'm in a large group of people. I do it silently and to myself but as long as the universe knows who's in charge, I'm perfectly safe!

Hal Jordan even left his new recruits behind! Probably because the little guy hit him in the head and my favoritest Green Lantern ever, Jenny, has a numerical name that he can't remember. To be fair, I can't remember either. But to be more fair, whenever I try to string together a bunch of numbers, they just come out as 8675309.

John and his recruits throw some punches and some rocks and a few buildings as well until Relic is completely distracted. At that point, Hal and Kyle and Carol and Kilowog and all the other Green Lanterns whose names I can never remember flee Oa. Hopefully for the last time! Goodbye, Oa! Goodbye! Don't worry! I'm sure the Green Lanterns will recreate you out of light in a future story.

Hal also gives the order to release all of the prisoners in the Sciencells including Kanjar Ro! Yay! Now we can look forward to many years of the Green Lanterns fighting all of their old enemies again! Now that's a proper Reboot!

And, of course, John and the recruits continue to battle Relic even though they know they can't win and the planet is going to explode out from under their feet. Or whatever they have where feet would be if they were humanoid.

Don't worry. It's not just you. Who can remember anybody's name ever?! It always surprises me when I come up with somebody's name instead of just saying, "You know? What's her name?"

During the fight, Jruk loses his good axe arm. And then Egann the Lizard Man (I only remembered his name because John mentioned it earlier) offers to sacrifice himself so the other, younger recruits can escape. And it actually makes me tear up a little bit. Although it also makes me happy since I said this in my last Green Lantern Corps commentary:

It turns out that Feska is okay, of course! I would have had to turn a pouty face in Van Jensen’s direction if he’d killed her. I think the only one of these new recruits he can kill, story-wise, is all of them. But I suspect that the one that he can kill if he needs to is the old lizard man. I sincerely hope that he doesn’t, of course! I love them all!

Master Comic Book Reader strikes again! Although it's a bit unfair since I practically know Van Jensen, being one friend in common away from each other on Facebook!

Ergann whispers, "Just before one of my people die, we find a young, sexy, well-muscled black humanoid to vigorously suck our dual pronged dick while going elbow deep into our rectal cavity with their non-dominant hand." The look on John Stewart's face says, "Not again."

Ergann manages to keep Relic and his ship on the exploding planet by holding the siphoning claw that Relic's ship attached to Ergann's construct. The rest of the recruits manage to get away. And Oa, well...

Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Green Lantern Corps #24 Rating: +3 Ranking simply for the destruction of Oa. How can Relic be stopped?! I think the best way is to sit him down with a real scientist to crunch some numbers and run some experiments to prove to him that his "Peak Emotion" hypothesis is faulty.

Stormwatch #24

More like "Rise of Excremax," amirite?

I bet Jim Starlin thought up Extremax back in the nineties but then couldn't figure out how to write him into whatever the fuck Jim Starlin was writing in the nineties. And then the wave of really stupid fucking names that had to show how bloody and deathy and extreme all the characters were ended. Jim Starlin spent the next fifteen years punching himself in the balls and crying out, "Why God? Why?! When will I ever be able to introduce Extremax to the comic book adoring public?!" Finally one day when he was punching himself in the genitalia a few extra times for good measure, he got the call from DC Comics. "How would you like to be the new writer on Stormwatch?!" And just like that, Jim Starlin flipped off God for never coming through and leaving Jim Starlin to work out how to receive a call from DC to write a comic book with ties to the era in which a character as extreme as Extremax could be introduced! And now, comic book lovers everywhere, rejoice in the appearance of...I don't know, some time-manipulating Galactus character thing.

Last issue, The Engineer was possessed by some creature named A-I to bring Stormwatch the good word. So once again, The Engineer becomes possessed. You'd think she'd have some kind of super nano-firewall to stop this kind of shit from happening. Even though A-I said her message was one that would help save the Earth, Midnighter does the right thing and tries to kill her. That's when she knocks him out so he can become unconscious and remember how he met Apollo aboard the Daemonite (or Owl) spaceship where they were both experimented on and given their powers.

EXTREMAX THE OMEGA! Even better!

It turns out that Angie is okay and she doesn't mind being used as a mouthpiece for A-I. Excremax the Ohmergerd is a super powerful omnipotent deity with technology greater than that of the Shadowlords. What an omnipotent deity needs with technology is beyond me but what do I know? I'm still trying to figure out what color timeline we're all really living in. I think we're in the Chartreuse Timeline. A-I decides to tell the Origin Story of Excremax the Ohmergerd because he wasn't always the "astral dynamo he is today." I suppose I shouldn't have taken her "omnipotent deity" so strictly since she was just using them as comparatives to Stormwatch's power. I should probably not have skipped every class discussion on metaphor or simile during my educational career. But who could resist saying "It's like I'm there!" while drinking in the morning on some beach instead of sitting in a class learning what the fuck similes and metaphors are used for. I think I do just fine taking every word everybody utters literally.

A-I tells of a self-made man that pulled himself up by his bootstraps through his own intelligence, hard work, and talents. But now that I know not to take every word people say literally, I think this is an analogy if not an outright lie! She might as well be quoting a bullshit Horatio Alger novel. At one point, a child that began doing the most dangerous work in the company somehow comes to own that company. Yes, that's usually what happens. If you work your way up the corporate ladder, you eventually simply become owner of the corporation! Anything can happen if you just keep working hard and never give up! What pluck and determination! What stick-to-itiveness! What self-motivation! Excremax the Ohmergerd truly is an example for all Americans! And since Americans are the great example of everybody else on Earth, Excremax is an example to us all. Every one of us! You can pull yourself up by your own bootstraps without anybody else's help! Everybody in a position of power, everybody with any wealth, everybody living a life of even minor luxuries: they all did it themselves!

Hey, nobody said you had to do it while being a morally chaste stick in the mud! Lesson #1 on being successful: "You've got to break the rules to make the rules!" It also helps if Crayola Timelords fuck with the time stream to bring about the timeline in which you strike it rich.

Excremax the Ohmergerd has been growing in power for fifty thousand years. He has replaced his body countless times. And he flies about the universe on the greatest battle cruiser ever developed! Warworld!

Oops. I mean, Alcazar Astral! I was thinking of Jim Starlin's DC Comics Presents story about the universe's most powerful ship which also goes about robbing planets of their resources to fuel its journey. You know, the one he repurposed for Mongul #1 and isn't anything like the Alcazar Astral. Sorry about the confusion!

A-I estimates that sixty billion people have died due to Excremax's lifestyle. Across 50,000 years? That's not so bad! That's a mere 1.2 million people per year! That's practically nothing! I say, "Leave him be!"

After a minor break where Apollo punches Lobo through the wall because all of this explication wasn't resulting in any kind of comic book violence whatsoever, A-I mentions that Excremax the Ohmergerd was doing quite well until three hundred years ago when he met The Crayola Timelords.

So the Crayola Timelords are Luddites that can change time? Why don't they just change time to eliminate this guy if he's such a thorn in their fiery heads?

Perhaps we'll soon find out that the Crayola Timelords changed time to bring about the perfect version of Stormwatch to defeat Excremax! I wonder if Twat Lobo will arrive on the scene or if he's in the normal colored timeline where the other New 52 books are located.

A-I continues her blah blah blah because Jim Starlin has apparently figured out his next story but he needed a full issue worth of set-up to tie everything together. What it essentially comes down to is everybody is after the final piece of a powerful and ancient artifact which is located on Earth. Excremax has a piece. The Kollective have a piece. And now A-I wants a piece so that she has some leverage between the two asshole cosmic forces.

Meanwhile, Lobo doesn't seem to mind that he was thrown through a wall earlier. Why should he? He's just a raving lunatic asshole that likes nothing better than to throw punches, drink, swear, and kill. I guess sometimes he likes to lie low and listen to lectures as well.

This issue is almost over and Stormwatch has not quite fallen yet. Actually, they've done nothing but listen to the story of Excrmax the Ohmergerd. Although Excremax finally does appear in his ship, Alcazar Astral which is bigger than Earth's moon. But nobody on Earth notices and the physical laws of gravity are being defied because Excremax is traveling in STEALTH MODE!

After telling her long story, A-I tells Stormwatch that Excremax isn't the problem. The Crayola Timelords are. They're going to destroy Earth to get the artifact and Stormwatch's only hope is joining with Excremax. But those negotiations will have to happen next issue because A-I talked the fuck out of this one. And not in an entertaining way! More like a second grade teacher boringly telling his students lies about the pilgrims first meeting with the Native Americans. Although this issue did result in the best drawing of Aquaman ever!

You know what? It's not quite as derpy when seen this large. Whatever.

Stormwatch #24 Rating: -2 Ranking. This issue was simply boring. It felt like Jim Starlin changed direction on his Crayola Timelord's motivations and then decided he wanted to add Warworld to The Ebony Timeline. Well, mission accomplished! But it wasn't executed very successfully.

Arkham War #1

My guess is The Mad Hatter is picked last. Even after Mr. Combustible with the light bulb head.

My picks (and reasons) for my army from the characters on the cover (excluding Bane since he's the other captain!):

Deadshot. He's good at killing and, aside from a minor death wish, not insane.
Poison Ivy. With her on the team, you'd have control of every battlefield. Also less insane than the others.
Ferdie. I think even insane people are unmanned by a ventriloquist's puppet running around drilling out people's eyes. I'd only pick Shauna the Ventriloquist as well if I had to pick them together. She's fucking nuts!
Scarecrow. He's going to cause fear and chaos no matter what, so I might as well pretend that he's working toward my ends. I'd have Deadshot ready to pull the trigger on him at the first sign of him turning on his own.
The Prankster. It's modern warfare! You definitely need a techie on your team.
Man-bat. Even though I can't stand him, I'll need an air force. I'd only take the more psychotic Woman-bat to maintain air superiority.
The White Rabbit. If I need anything scouted that can't be seen by air, she'd be the best of this bunch. Not a whole lot of real super powers in this bunch, so I think she'd be uncatchable. Although she'd probably turn on me.
Killer Croc. I'd need some muscle to go against Bane's venom crazed Blackgate crew. Croc is more reliable than what we've seen lately from Clayface.
Mr. Freeze. Simply for his technology. His brand of insanity probably wouldn't really hamper the war effort either.
Talon. I suppose having an undying death dealer would be good to have. Although I might need The Court of Owls to keep him under control. And who wants them in the war room? They won't try to win the war. They'll drive it toward a stalemate! Jerks.

I think everyone else is too crazy or useless for my tastes. Who needs The Riddler leaving clues to each of your offensives? The Penguin and Emperor Blackgate are going to be more concerned with wresting control from me. The Joker's Daughter is written by Nocenti so I'm not going to want to hear her awkward, stilted dialogue. Two-Face won't take orders from anybody but his coin. The Mad Hatter has a bit of a low self-esteem problem and I think he'd resent being an underling. Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum are idiotic characters. Having a serial killer amongst the troops is sure to bring down morale, so Zsasz is out. Dollmaker is out for pretty much the same reason. The others I either don't recognize or I just don't know enough about, like Black Mask or Professor Pyg or The Reaper.

I'm almost certain my entire army would be wiped out almost immediately by Bane's thousands of venomized prisoners out of Blackgate along with The White Rabbit already working for him and telling Bane all of my movements. Why did I pick her?!

Anyway, Bane wants Gotham. Gotham has currently been parceled out amongst the nutcases of Arkham by The Penguin. That means Turf War! Let's go!

Bane's first stop was Blackgate to pick up more soldiers. Gee, I hope Warden Agatha is okay!

Commissioner Gordon and Detective Pierce (who just made detective last year, so I don't think I should be familiar with her. I also don't know if she's an old Preboot character either) watch the chaos from the rooftop of Police Headquarters without bothering to turn on the Bat Signal. It'd probably just seem like a mockery at this point since they've lost all hope that Batman or the other Justice League members are alive. They know Bane has taken Blackgate and he's got a small army invading from the sea. And Gotham is no longer in GCPD's control because the inmates are running the outside of the asylum. Gotham is pretty much down for the count.

You know things are bad when the title of the comic is a pun on a horrible moment in history! Why not name this "The Hollow Cost" or "The Trail of Fears"? Maybe those will be the titles of future issues!

I can tell I'm really getting into a comic book when I already want to scan my third image and I'm only on page five. I suppose scanning the title doesn't really count. But page five takes place in Gotham Memorial Hospital, so I'm already a little bit creeped out. If you want to tap into my ancestral instinct for scary places, empty hospitals usually do the trick. Which sucks for me because it's a trope that's constantly being used! Also, I don't know why my ancestors were so scared of empty hospitals that it seeped into our DNA and now I'm paying the price. But since I'm rational and science-minded, I have to believe there is a logical explanation for the thing I just made up.

Another ancestral fear: small people that all look the same. Although if they dance and sing morality tales, it mostly mitigates the fear. It's still creepy though.

Professor Pyg has been given the section of Gotham with the hospital and I'm glad he's the first psychotic to be highlighted since I know little about him. He has just finished a major transplant on a professional violinist and he's just chasing him down to examine the surgery and make sure the violinist's body isn't rejecting the donor foot.

Seems okay! I don't think he'll be very good at violin anymore. But I do sense a huge soccer contract coming his way!

The Scarecrow drops by as part of his journey across Gotham to warn everybody that the Banecoats are coming. But Professor Pyg isn't buying it. He's got the injured to heal and the sick to kill.

Pyg's hospital looks like any Grand Theft Auto game ten minutes into playing.

At this point, I'm more interested in Scarecrow's encounters with all of Gotham's insane residents than I am interested in the big war that's going to take place! It's got a nice Alice in Wonderland feel going. But pretty soon somebody is going to get punched in the face and that never happened in Wonderland. Decapitations galore. But no face punchings.

Ha! Speaking of Wonderland. But then, Gotham has always been fixated on the works of Carroll.

So what are all the normal citizens of Gotham doing during this time? Do they all have "When Gotham Falls Apart" bunkers to hide away inside? You'd definitely get your moneys worth out of one of those things. Although the money would probably be better used renting a U-haul and getting the fuck out of that city.

Meanwhile in Blackgate Prison, Bane has killed or recruited all of the inmates. Now it's time for him to fall in love with Agatha!

I sense some John McClane Die Hard shit about to go down in this prison!

The Warden doesn't give up secrets and shit because she has a fucking eye-patch. So one of the top security guards points the way to a sealed wing of the basement that houses unknown weapons. Bane breaks in and finds a half-dozen Talons in cold storage. Don't do it, Bane! Don't start another Night of the Owls crossover! Please! Although this might actually be good. It'll be a way for Tomasi to deal with all of these dangerous zombie assassins that even Batman doesn't know what to do with. They can all be killed in the Arkham War by Mr. Freeze or maybe the Gotham Butcher will feel upstaged and eat most of them.

Meanwhile the Scarecrow holds a meeting with the new Mayor Cobblepot about the impending threat looming on their Neighborhood Collective. Oswald tells Jonathan to buck the fuck up and fight for what's his. I also notice that, not having a hair cut in about nine months, I've got The Penguin's hair and hairline. Maybe if I gained forty pounds, lost about ten inches of height, and shaved off the sideburns, I could go as The Penguin for Halloween! Gaining the weight would be nice because I could blame it on the costume! But I'm not sure how to lose the height. Jump off the roof a few times?

The Penguin's plan to help the city is to destroy the bridges so that the Arkham Residential Leaders can't flee and must fight to protect their new real estate. Bane's plan to help the city is to maim Professor Pyg and the rest of the loonies. For some reason, he just has to have Gotham. I suppose that's motive enough for his attack on the city. But what's the underlying reason for the conquest? Why does he need to be the sole authority? Why Gotham? What happens once he takes control? Does he just kill, maim, and burn through all the resources until he's the sole authority of a burning pile of rubble and corpses? I don't believe he actually knows what he's going to do. This is just a super powered tantrum. His sole motive is to win or knock the playing board and pieces from the table so that nobody else can.

Arkham War #1 Rating: Villains Month may have delivered quite a few misses but I'm enjoying Forever Evil and I'm enjoying this more! I don't need super dark comics with lots of angst-ridden fisticuffs. Dark humor with the Arkham Asylum inmates though? Oh yes. Definitely yes. Peter Tomasi really knows how to write to the characters instead of just sticking cyphers in costumes and forcing them into exciting plots. The Scarecrow makes sense. Bane makes sense. The Penguin makes fucking sense! At times I feel like I can't entirely explain why a certain comic book series isn't working for me. Sure, I can attack the writer's mother's womb for the horrible disaster it brought forth into the world but sometimes I just can't place my finger on why the writer is such a disaster. Seeing how well Tomasi sculpts a script and story to the characters, now I can see precisely why Ann Nocenti is so horrible with Catwoman. It's because she doesn't know the character and, judging by interviews I've read from her about Green Arrow and Catwoman, she doesn't seem to care that she doesn't know the character! She thinks boiling historical characters down to a couple of bullet points means understanding the character. And she claims to over-research her subjects. Well, that I believe by all the bullshit lingo she adds to any story, half of which she uses incorrectly. But I don't believe she over-researches the characters she writes. But I kind of get that, as well. She wants to bring her own unique spin to the character and not be influenced by past writers. I get it. But I don't agree with it. Not in the comic book format where the characters aren't their costumes! They are an amalgamation of all that written history. You can't just fucking ignore that and then get excited when you decide to give Catwoman a cat. As if she's never had a cat before!

Superman Loves Wonder Woman #1

Anybody else wish they'd just gone straight to Wonder Woman/Batman?

By the looks of the fold-out cover (which you can see entirely by picking up any DC comic from last month and looking at the advert for this issue), Brian Azzarello's Wonder Woman is finally going to be incorporated into The New 52. The only hint that Wonder Woman doesn't take place on a parallel Earth has been one panel in Teen Titans where it's suggested that Lennox is Wonder Girl's father. Other than that, Azzarello has been given a free pass to not have to deal with editorial. Lucky!

I have no idea what this comic book is going to be about. Will it be about how two full time crime fighters try to balance their love life? No, that's the theme of Batman/Superman. I hope it isn't full of drama and characters pouting because a certain someone isn't paying enough attention to a different certain someone. I just hope there are some sex scenes involving the Lasso and Krypto. And Bizarro.

I just glanced at the cover to check the rating on this comic book: Teen. Which means Superman can have sex but Wonder Woman can't. But it might not matter anyway since Clark was raised a good boy and was probably taught that sex before marriage is bad. Wonder Woman was probably taught that sex was a wonderful way to express love and joy between two women and that marriage was a vile institution that relegated a woman to a secondary character in the story of her husband's life. So as you can see, these two were made for each other.

I believe this issue is beginning in the middle of one of Clark's sex dreams.

Clark and Diana (that would be Superman and Wonder Woman to the less knowledgeable comic book fans out there. Don't feel bad if you didn't catch their secret identities. I'm a professional and you really shouldn't compare your mundane, average skill sets to those of professionals) are actually out in the Atlantic stopping a hurricane. Superman should probably be careful before the Parliament of Weather points out that he's screwing with the natural order of things and ruining the world. Although it's probably not a natural hurricane since when Superman dives down to trespass on Aquaman's turf, he discovers something glowing red at the source of the hurricane. He says, "Oh, no." Just like that. With a comma and a period. It sounds like it's not something good but his delivery lacks the emotion of it being something actually dangerous. It's like coming home one night to find the door to your apartment unlocked and suddenly remembering your mother was in town to visit. "Oh, no."

Here's my speculation for the source of the hurricane although it won't be revealed until after a flashback: one of Supergirl's Kryptonian Sunstone Vibrators.

The flashback to earlier takes place at the Ace of Clubs in Metropolis and involves Clark Kent discussing Catclarkropolis Clarkcatropolis business decisions with Cat Grant.

I've had pretty good blog success hating on Scott Lobdell!

I couldn't quite remember the name of Cat and Clark's blog, so I asked Lord Google. As noted above with my strike-thru, I had it backwards at first. And Lord Google was no help in notifying me that I had it backwards except in the passive-aggressive way he returned no hits for my search. So I switched to looking up "Cat Grant" and "Clark Kent" and "blog" and found a number of sites with reviews of Superman #WhateverNumberTheSuggestionForTheWebsiteWasIn. Now I didn't take a very good sample, but it seems like there are people who actually like Scott Lobdell's run on Superman. Fucking heathens.

So Clark and Cat are--I mean, they actually said things like his plots were okay! I only have one question to ask those bloggers: have you ever read anything that was written well ever in your life ever ever?! If you're reading this blog, that's a strike against you already! I was flabbergasted in much the same way when I found people actually enjoyed Rob Liefeld's art. Some things are subjective opinions but Rob Liefeld not being good at the art and Scott Lobdell not being good at the writing are objective facts! I have pleaded with fans of Liefeld to write an essay taking one work of his and pointing out why it's good with precise details as opposed to sweeping generalizations like "his art is kinetic." I now ask Scott Lobdell fans to please do the same. Try to convince me that he's not horrible! Anybody?

Anyway, Clark needs to scoop up some scoops so that Clarkcatropolis will finally begin getting some traffic.

Speaking of websites and getting traffic, I'd really like to hear from some readers how they found this blog and what they enjoy about it. I should probably make a separate post for that but I also probably won't because I'm fucking busy with shit and stuff. Writing sentences like that doesn't just happen without any time and effort put in! I pick and choose my words very, very, very carefully! It's like fuckin' poetry, bitches. So send me an Anonymous Message via the Anonymous Message Button wherever the fuck that is and tell me how you found this site and what you like about it. Don't tell me what you dislike about it because I can't handle that kind of fucking criticism and it'll send me into a downward spiral of hopelessness and despair where I question everything I've ever done with my life and why am I even bothering to try anything anymore? In the meantime, I'll keep reading comic books and hoping that DC's quality picks up about 34%.

Elsewhere, Batman is snapping one off into a Batcumrag.

Wonder Woman is busy sparring with somebody named Hessia. I might be familiar with her if I'd ever read any Wonder Woman comic book ever besides Azzarello's run. I'm not sure how I was really a DC Kid growing up when I never really read Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman. Hell, I don't think I really read Green Lantern or The Flash either! What the fuck was I reading then? Although I did get some Batman since he couldn't help starring in every other comic book series DC published. And my first favorite series was Batman and the Outsiders, so I guess I stretched the truth a bit when I used the word "never."

Hessia is an Amazon that left Paradise Island years ago and has aged since leaving. Diana's fairly certain that won't happen to her though since her father was Zeus. What Diana is really concerned about is that her mother and the other Amazons are still slithering about Paradise Island as snakes because of Hera. And Hera can't change them back now that she's getting along with Diana because Hera has become mortal. I'm glad to see Diana at least paying some cursory attention to that situation since it's kind of been put on the back burner over in her comic book.

Most of Tony S. Daniel's artwork so far in The New 52 has left me less than impressed. But this issue looks really good. Overall I'm impressed with way more panels than I'm disappointed with! I think that's a pretty big compliment coming from this blog!

Back to the present, Wonder Woman is busy rescuing what looks like a military transport jet that was busy minding its own business and crashing into the hurricane and then, immediately after that, into the ocean. As she's saving it, Tony S. Daniel decides he needs some big splash pages to show Wonder Woman clinging to the bottom of the plane. Yeah, well, okay! She looks good doing that! And then Superman comes crashing up out of the ocean and straight through the plane. Judging by this occurrence, I suspect his "Oh, no." should have had a little more "OH HOLY FUCKING GOD NO!" added to it.

Wonder Woman saves the pilots, handing them over to Superman to take to land since he's much faster and a better flyer and they're less likely to grope him as he rescues them. While Superman is gone, Wonder Woman is knocked out by, I think, the plane exploding and she drops down into the ocean. It's also possibly that whatever punched Superman into the sky crashed through the plane or threw a whale at it. Or the plane was struck by lightning. I suppose, just like life, answers aren't always as clear as we think they should be. Thanks for that reminder, Tony and Charles! I almost forgot and was thinking I had a purpose!

The story returns to earlier that day while Clark and Diana are having a dinner date out on Diana's balcony in London. It's here we get the first relationship drama of the series! Wonder Woman wants everybody to know that she's bagged Superman but Superman doesn't like being in the public eye. So he wants to keep their relationship a secret.

Which is why Clark took her on a date to one of Lois's parties over in an issue of Superman? Because the best way to keep it secret that Clark Kent is dating Diana 'Wonder Woman' Prince is to bring her as your date to a party filled with journalists! It's a good thing Hector Hammond was fucking with everybody's minds that night. Clark must have had second thoughts afterwards and spun the date as a mass hallucination to go along with all the other weird shit that was being said and done at that party.

And all Clark gave Diana was a stupid plant that needs cooking oil instead of water.

Meanwhile, somebody mailed a clip of Superman and Wonder Woman smooching to the offices of Clarkcatropolis.com. But Cat Grant has forgotten how to read non-electronic mail, so it just winds up in the stack to never be read. Or to be a major plot point many issues down the line.

And then it becomes clear how the plane blew up! It was fired upon by the KNM Naddodor, the ship that the pilots of the crashing plane were radioing for help. They came to the conclusion that the plane was being brought down by the jerko super-heroes that were actually trying to rescue it. That's understandable! Especially considering, in the eyes of the ship's crew, their missiles just blew up the fucking pilots as well. You know, you can't spell military without collateral damage!

Wonder Woman climbs onto the battleship, rips out some turrets, and chastises the crew. And then the thing under the ocean that was not one of Supergirl's Kryptonian Sunstone Vibrators appears on the deck of the ship with Wonder Woman.

Oh, no.

Wonder Woman, having grown up with strange and massive mythological creatures, decides to attack Doomsday. And while she may have been trained by War to fight, she never learned how to not get her skull crushed when a massive, super-strong beast manages to grab her head with its rock hard fingers. Whoops! The relationship may have just come to an end!

Superman Loves Wonder Woman #1 Rating: I have an open slot at #7 and that's where I'm beginning this comic book. Fuck all you naysayers and hatesayers and nayhaters and such! Superman and Wonder Woman kissing and being a couple may have been a gimmick when it first happened. Hell, there was no "may have" about it! It absolutely was a gimmick since nearly nothing had come of their relationship after that. Maybe that scene in Khandaq where Batman tells them to get a room. But not much more than that. But now after having read this issue? I'm all for it! I'm a fan! Keep this shit up! And Doomsday?! Really? I don't know but I thought that reveal was pretty cool. That's why I like being spoiler-free (as well as child-free but that doesn't really have anything to do with this, does it?)! And I enjoy being a hypocrite by spoiling every issue of The New 52 every month! Although, to be fair, I don't spoil anything before the book is on the rack. And if you read just one of my commentaries, you pretty much know that I'm not hiding anything! So I'm sorry for spoiling that one comic book when you first discovered this site and read through the first commentary. But I'm not sorry for spoiling any other books because you have a fucking brain with which to interpret evidence!

Action Comics #24

Why is this cover so stupid?

Is it wrong for me to wish a massive kidney stone on Scott Lobdell? What's the upper limit of bodily harm you can wish on another person without seeming like an asshole? Is there one? Or is the limit on wishing harm on another person based on the actions of the other person? So back in World War Whichever One Had the Nazis, it was probably okay to walk around wishing Hitler would stub his toe or something. You know, as long as you weren't in Germany. And if you were in Germany, as long as you made your wish quietly in your head to yourself. But if comic books were the world, then Scott Lobdell would be Hitler, right? That's a fair comparison, isn't it? From that analogy, you can extrapolate for yourself to who DC's audience would be and how every Wednesday we're shoved into a gas chamber.

I just asked my friend Doom Bunny the Robot if the preceding text was too offensive and he responded with "lol" and "delightfully offensive," so I think it's okay.

Speaking of things, I just sat through the most pandering, awful, ridiculous episode of Bones from Season Eight. It was the one where they have all the Squints trying to identify cold case corpses in the basement of the Smithsonian. And they happen upon a homeless guy and it turns out he was wounded in the September 11th attack on the Pentagon and died from his injuries ten days later but not before saving a bunch of people from the rubble. And everybody was crying and getting angry and being super upset. Really? Seriously? Is that how Americans are supposed to feel about the attack? Well I'm going to be the first honest person in America. Right now. Here it goes:

I was not fucking traumatized by September 11th, 2001. Well, I wasn't. And I think this constant pandering to America's Sadness is childish bullshit. It's self-indulgent and it really makes us look like assholes. As if we're the only country that has ever suffered any kind of horrendous tragedy. It's always about us, isn't it, America? Let's ride this sadness out for another fifty years, if possible!

Anyway, I think the only things that traumatize me are when pets die or when I'm in junior high and my crush tells me she doesn't like being stared at. Good thing neither of those things will ever happen again since I've made that deal with Pet Satan and killed all my crushes!

The important part of this picture is in the red box under "Part Two."

Scott Lobdell is gone! Hooray! Now just get this stupid psi-war story over with and flush out the stink of him. Let's just start over, can we? Can Psycho Pirate just erase everybody's memory of the Scott Lobdell months? Although I am disappointed that we're never going to find out what kind of incredible, never-before-seen-in-comic-books story Lobdell had cooked up for Issue #25!

I should probably discuss the comic book though. Let's just forget that Scott Lobdell ever existed, shall we? See how easy it is to forget things? I don't have to bask in the trauma of Lobdell forever! I can choose to let it go. I can choose happiness and bliss over sadness and anger and unadulterated despair.

Psycho Pirate decides he wants to team up with Superman. He's going to save the world and he offers to show Superman what he's saving the world from: The Queen Bee's psychic prisoners he calls "The Swarm."

Here's a bunch of exposition tying up all the previous plots so that I don't have to do it.

Psycho Pirate has brought Superman along because he needs to drain Supe's mind to have the power to free the rest of The Twenty. Superman, for some reason, doesn't want to go along with the plan. So they wind up battling inside Superman's brain in old Grant Morrison Action Comic pages. And then the battle heads back even further to the farm in Smallville.

It's the Lana Lang Mind Zombie! Look out!

Psycho Pirate then takes Superman all the way back to when he was a baby and Krypton was falling apart around him. Psycho Pirate is just about to finish Superman off when Electric Blue Lois shows up to zap him in the ass. You see, Lois has been infected with The Twenty Psychic Virus. And it seems to have turned her into Electric Superman.

Action Comics #24 Rating: +3 Ranking simply because Scott Lobdell didn't write it. Plus there wasn't a fucking stupid World of Krypton story in the back even though I was expecting more of H'el's alternate timeline on Krypton bullshit. I can't say I'm really enjoying this Psi-War plot but at least Lobdell is gone and hopefully Mike Johnson (or whoever takes over after this story is done) will do a much better job when he begins writing stories based on his own ideas.