Wonder Woman #6

I can't think of anything sexist to say about this cover so I just won't say anything at all.

The Commentary!
The only things I really want to write are angry, venomous things. I want to poke people with word sticks. I want to tell them that they aren't as wise and kind as they think they are. I want to drown them in vile, bitter, crass statements about their parentage. I want to compare them to things they really wouldn't like being compared to! But what would be the point? Everybody is terrible in their own way but the worst people are the ones who tell others how terrible they are. And why would I want to be one of them? I mean, I am one of them! Just ask Cullen Bunn! But that's a special case. I'm usually not like that! And I'm still not like that but he did post a picture of a guy flipping the bird and directed it at me, so fuck him. He gets to be my punching bag. I mean, not really. It's more of an idealized Cullen Bunn who is my punching bag! I don't really care what the real one is up to. I just like having this effigy to kick around every now and then.

Aside from having these angry feelings that I don't really know what to do with, I suppose I have a Wonder Woman comic book to read. Boy, I sure hope Greg Rucka pisses me off somehow!

This issue is about a bunch of birds spying on Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor as they get checked out by the US Government after landing an invisible plane on a crowded beach. Wonder Woman winds up in a jail cell not kicking everybody in the face because she seems to have something called patience. Steve is too busy telling his dead friend's wife that her husband is dead to get Wonder Woman out of prison. The wife, Maya, responds by talking nonsense.

Ugh. In other words, throw more corpses on the pile as you chase some elusive "meaning" to make every new death count for...whatever. How about giving him some dignity by letting his death have meaning in that he died doing what he thought was right? How is that not enough? Why ask Steve and countless others to risk their lives simply so you can have the satisfaction of meaning?

Barbara Ann Minerva comes to visit Wonder Woman because a comic book where nobody understands the main character will quickly grow tiresome. The last thing I need is for this comic book to go the Doctor Fate route where it spends twelve issues with the main character struggling with the whole concept of who he is. I can't read a Wonder Woman comic book where she and Steve just say their names to each other over and over again. So Barbara knows the language of the Amazons and she's able to converse with Wonder Woman. She discovers that Diana was visited by a the Greek Gods the night before and they gave her super powers. She only believes Diana when Diana tears the cell's bars from the floor and ceiling. I guess the next chapter will be twenty pages of Diana taking English classes.

This issue not only proved that Diana is patient and kind, it proved that I am neither of those things. I was bored and angry while reading this. This is the kind of comic book where fans will gush about a few scenes of Nicola's fantastic art which are so super adorable that you can't say a bad word about them. Like when Diana is getting her picture taken with the police officer. Or Diana's face when the god's visit her in the cell. Hell, this entire issue could have just been Nicola's art and Greg Rucka could have fucked the hell off for all I cared. This thing is beautiful. But the story? Totally boring. Unless you love bureaucracy and placing soldiers on pedestals.

Ranking!
+0. Look, I know I'm probably in the minority. I'm sure everybody is jerking themselves off all over Greg Rucka's fantastic run of Wonder Woman. But am I not allowed to be completely wrong about at least one comic book? Can I not have this one to fucking hate no matter how good it might be? It's also possible my mood these days isn't great for my judgment. I think I would have enjoyed this more if Wonder Woman had punched every fucking cop in the face and shit in their hats.

Green Lanterns #6

The Commentary!
Current mood: I hate everybody. EV.ER.EE.BOD.EE.

Mood Friday Night: Drunk and singing Karaoke. That's pretty much the opposite of how I feel right now. And before you think, "Yeah, I get it, Tess! The world is full of pricks and assholes!", realize that you--the person agreeing with me?--I hate you too. Friday night I was singing "Be My Lover" by Alice Cooper and "Shame on You" by the Indigo Girls and "Eastbound and Down" by Jerry Reed and "Randy Scouse Git" by The Monkees and "Don't Let Me Get Me" by Pink. Tonight? Fuck it all. I'm going back into my shell and just read comic books and try to make some stupid jokes. I apologize beforehand to Sam Humphries since a lot of them will probably be at the expense of the work he did. Although, can it really be called work when you're obviously not doing the job you were paid to do? Exhibit A:

I think Sam mixed up the job descriptions of "Comic Book Writer" and "Novelist".

With all of this first person narration, might I suggest possibly going into a Young Adult Novel career path, Sam? When you were scripting this, you did know an artist was going to be doing some of the work for you, right? This feels like I'm reading the novelization of Green Lanterns #6!

I usually hate spoilers but I'm going to count all of the Narration Boxes in this comic book right now even though that means I'll see some images that might spoil the story. Although, will I? Really? From the looks of this page, the story is all in the words! The art is just parsley to make the...you know what? I actually don't know what parsley on a plate of food is for.

Ninety-one Narration Boxes and seventy panels. That ratio is way, way off. But there's good news too! As I was counting the panels and boxes, I noticed after about ten pages, the Narration Boxes mostly stopped for eight pages. Holy shit! Eight pages of Sam Humphries doing the job he was hired to do! I suppose he was also hired to write Narration Boxes. Some people like that shit! Sometimes, people sit down at a steak restaurant and actually say things like, "I would like a steak well done! I would like you to completely ruin the steak you are about to serve me by drying it out completely and making it extra crunchy and tough to chew! Also, could you sprinkle extra parsley around it?"

So the pictures did spoil the story for me! I haven't read the comic book yet but I know Jessica finally makes a construct, Simon breaks his arm in the fight, the teddy bear present is saved, Jessica's sister is safe, the Bohemian Guardian flashes his new Magenta Ring, and Dex-Starr successfully plants the Rage Seed in the Hell Well. So, you know, do I really need to read the comic book now? I figure all that Narration Boxing probably just makes sure I know that Jess sort of overcomes her anxiety to help Simon and Simon sort of overcomes his manliness to accept help, and they begin to trust each other. Right?

How dare you identify with the term "dork" in an adorable way?! You are no dork. You've never been a dork. You've never dealt with being an actual dork. Actual dorks got wedgies. Actual dorks got swirlies. Actual dorks came home from school with busted lips and black eyes and torn clothing on a constant fucking basis. Stop thinking it's so cute to be "such a nerd!" or "a total dork!" or "like, so geeky!" Fuck you.

Some people might be thinking, "How do you know those things never happened to her, Tess?!" Yeah, I don't. But, you know, she's a fictional character so I'm betting she probably did have those experiences, just so it all makes sense. But the thing that nobody really wants to talk about is that being a dork, or a nerd, or a geek isn't really about your hobbies. It isn't about being ostracized by the popular kids because you play Dungeons and Dragons or read science fiction or bury your face in comic books. It's actually about appearance. You're in elementary school or junior high or high school and you're ugly or fat? You're probably going to be picked on incessantly by assholes. But because you were picked on for shit you couldn't change about yourself (and why should you want to, or be constantly told you should want to change anyway?), you escaped from reality however you could. Back when words like dork, nerd, and geek weren't proud labels to wear on your lapel, they read comic books. They played Dungeons and Dragons. They lost themselves in science fiction. They weren't nerds, dorks, and geeks because they liked those things. They liked those things to get away from being constantly aware that everybody fucking hated them based solely on their looks. Can you maybe understand why some dorks, nerds, and geeks are so angry now that their escapes have gone mainstream and everybody has decided they themselves are dorks, nerds, and geeks now? I don't mean they're mad because other people like the shit they like. I mean they're angry because they still get picked on and still don't fit in because of their appearance. And what's worse? If any of them try to express how they feel, they get ridiculed by holier-than-thou assholes and told that they don't have a reason to be hurt or angry.

The inside cover of Chris Ware's Jimmy Corrigan, The Smartest Kid on Earth has a number of heartbreaking bits that get to the essential core of being a nerd. One of the bits is a questionnaire and begins with "1. You are a. male. b. female. If b, you may stop. Put down your booklet. All others continue." The following goes on to describe in painstaking detail the experience of being a male nerd. Does the first question erase the experience of female nerds? Of course not. Get the fuck out of here. But by including that first question, Chris Ware is speaking to the heart of what it felt like to be a male nerd during a time when nerd hobbies were not mainstream and, I think, is a bit of a prophetic sense of what we have seen in things like Gamer Gate and the Manosphere. In some way, male nerds feel that women can never experience what it feels like to be ostracized by others. In some weird partitioned logic, they somehow think women cannot have had the same experiences that they had when younger. But reading through the rest of the questionnaire in the inside cover of Jimmy Corrigan, nothing stands out as being a purely male experience. Without that first question, the list isn't gendered at all. Here are two examples:

"6. The presence of members of the opposite and/or attractive sex makes you feel
a. weird.
b. awful.
c. terrified.
d. hopeless.
e. like killing yourself.

7. The possibility of finding social and/or personal contact with members of the opposite and/or attractive sex is
a. laughable.
b. incomprehensible.
c. all you ever think about.
d. a, b, and c.
e. a, b, c, and d."

These questions are experiences both unpopular and bullied males and females can identify with. And even though the first question asks females to put down the questionnaire, the questions are still posed in a way that doesn't exclude anyone based on gender. Although, I suppose, the "attractive sex" bit means "female"? And it's totally asked in a heteronormative way! But, you know what, ignore that bullshit. This is about specifics and cries of "erasure" only broaden discussion when sometimes (most of the time?) things need to get specific. Which brings me back to the fucked up angry male nerds who believe they're the only ones who have ever felt the way they've felt. So like the beginning of Chris Ware's quiz which seems to state females won't understand this kind of social isolation, they believe they're still being left behind by a culture that has accepted their escapes but still will not accept them.

Generally, I point out that these angry white males arming themselves for war are idiots who are throwing away the greatest privilege of being a white male. As a white male, you are born, from day one, being nothing but the name given to you by your parents. You are an individual. You don't have to fight for rights. You don't have to answer questions about where you're from. You don't have to worry about being a slut or a prude. You're just fucking you, and that's all. When somebody makes fun of white males or attacks white males, most white males don't think, "Fuck you! You're talking about me, aren't you?!" Most white males think "That's right! White males do do that shit!" without ever thinking they're included in the generalization. Because, even if they are, why should they care?! You're not losing anything by being made fun of! The privilege of being born an individual and only an individual can't be taken away by somebody talking about a group of people which--Hey!--you happen to be part of. Angry white males are idiots throwing away the greatest gift they were ever given: the right to not give a shit what anybody says about white males!

Generally, I point out those things. Generally. But sometimes, I empathize with those white males. Sometimes I think it's strange that suddenly white males can't have emotional problems where they express how they've been shit on simply because white males aren't allowed to feel powerless and hurt and upset. At least, not as a group. Which I totally agree with! But when a white male, as an individual, tries to express any of their loneliness or isolation or anger at the way they've been treated--again, as an individual!--they're shit on and ridiculed and told they aren't allowed to feel those things. Because, you know, that's a cool thing to do to a person.

I know, I know. Everybody lacking reading comprehension and wanting to scream about their own issues can just reply "man tears" to this post. Like I fucking care! You think I feel emotions?! Fuck that. Life crushed the emotions out of me by the time I was thirty-five. And, when you get right down to it, I don't actually give a shit how badly white male nerds are treated. I've been to Magic the Gathering Tournaments. Most of those guys are dicks.

Oh! That was a joke with a lot of truth behind it but it sort of makes the point I was going for in a weird way. There was this one guy who I played in a tournament who I knew from a sealed deck league that I used to play in the back of a comic book shop in Campbell, California. I was in my early twenties at the time and he must have been in his forties, maybe older. He was fat, balding, and had a goofy eye that stared in the other direction. He carried a briefcase full of Magic cards. He was the kind of guy who probably would read the inside cover of Jimmy Corrigan and weep uncontrollably. He was a nerd. A dork. A geek. And I fucking loved this guy. He was nice. He was generous. He was fun to play. He was interested when you played combinations he never would have considered. We just happened to draw against each other in the first round at a tournament in San Jose. I beat him with one of my weird, no creature decks and he was polite and cool and wished me luck in the rest of the tournament. He's one of the guys who I empathize with, caught up in what is a predominantly white male nerd outlet full of aggressive, sexist assholes who would cheat in every game they played if given the chance.

Ugh. Anyway. Enough about white males. Fuck those guys, amirite?!

So, back to the Green Lanterns...hey! Look! Jessica Cruz overcomes her anxiety and saves Simon's life! What a surprise!

Good cat! I can't not scan a picture of Dex-Starr being a good cat! Aww! Destroy the world like a good kitty! Who's a big man?! Yes, yes. Who's a big man?!

Jess destroys the Hell Well but not before Dex-Starr plants the rage seed. So Red Dawn will continue as planned as Simon and Jess bond over Jessica's newfound ability to make constructs. I mean, she only made like this flowery thing which any preschooler probably could have made. But it was enough to let the Green Lanterns think they saved the Earth!

Simon and Jessica hug which, I think, means they're forming a cohesive unit now. This is also about the time the Narration Boxes end! Because they don't have to think separate thoughts now. They're united! Let's give Sam Humphries the credit for that being the way the narrative was designed, shall we? Let's not pretend it's just something I observed and made more out of than it actually is. He's a professional writer! This is the kind of thing they do! Okay, yes. I'm more than a professional comic book reader. I'm a Grandmaster! But that doesn't mean what I read into a book is more than what is actually there! That would be insulting to Sam! And I'm not reading comic books to be insulting to Sam Humphries! I read comic books to be insulting to Cullen Bunn!

That would actually be a pretty small pizza.

The part without Narration Boxes? The part where Simon and Jessica become friendly towards each other? I like that part! A lot! I like it as much as I hate the parts that are all Narration! You know what? I think I like it more! That might mean this comic could get a positive ranking before I'm done! As long as Sam Humphries doesn't do something that I'm totally biased against before this ends.

Simon and Jess head back to Simon's sister's place to deliver his nephews present and run into the Bohemain Guardian. This Guardian isn't actually one of the Bohemian Guardians from the last Green Lantern run. This guy is even more bohemian than they were! He's so bohemian he's rogue! He's Rami the Rogue Guardian! You thought the Qwardians were insane?! Well, they've got nothing on Rami! He did what even they couldn't do! What's that?! Um, uh, just a second while I turn the page to find out!

Oh. Is that all? Who fucking cares?!

I still think it would have been better if it were the Magenta Ring and could only be used by little girls. But a ring anybody can use? Is that really so different from every other Spectrum Ring in existence? It doesn't really sound that special. I mean, if G'nort can wield a green ring, who can't wield one?!

The epilogue to "Rage Planet" has Bleez thinking about how she can't let Atrocitus know how much she wants to be free from Red Lanterning while Atrocitus thinks, "There's something different about Bleez!" Because, God forbid, a character ever keep anything secret from another character. It's like taking Stan Lee's theory about fights ending in a draw to its extreme. Bleez needs to fool Atrocitus! But Atrocitus can't be written as being fooled by anybody so he has to show, through Narration Boxing, that he has his doubts about the person lying to him! Ugh.

Meanwhile, a new Red Entity is incubating inside the Earth. When it's time to have a big crossover event, it will be born and Red Dawn will be splashed across the covers of all of the Green Lantern comic books (and maybe more, if the Green Lanterns editor gives out enough handjobs and fingerbangs to the other editors).

The Ranking!
+1. But it's a tentative plus one! That's why I used a period! Oh, and also? I think I'm over hating everybody. Reading comic books for the win!

Hal Jordan and the Green Lantern Corps #4

Good thing I know this comic book will never be valuable or I'd be pissed that my comic book store sold me one with a tear on the cover.

The Review!
John Stewart used to be one of my favorite Green Lanterns. But now he's just a stereotype of a Marine. If something from his past informs one of his decisions, you can bet it will now be something from his time in the military. It's not like he had a life other than the few years he spent in the military. None of that shit matters. I guess at least he's not completely second guessing every single one of his decisions because every time he makes a decision, somebody (or whole planets) die. I think I disliked that John Stewart even more than the one that only seems to have military life in his past. The John Stewart I liked was the one who used his brains to solve problems. Hal used his will. Guy used his bravado. And John used his brains. Now, John uses the shit he learned in the military. Ugh. I'm so sick of this John.

Anyway, that was just the end of this issue. John is all, "My military training is telling me to do this one thing. Although my time as a Marine is telling me to do this other thing!" He eventually settles on doing the thing he learned as a Marine while in the military. Um, but like I said, that was just the end of the issue! Some other stuff happens as well.

Soranik cuts open Hal Jordan for some reason. It's possible she was super horny and knew Earthlings sometimes did this thing called "Playing Doctor" and she fucked it all up. I mean, it might have made her come but I don't think Hal particularly enjoyed it. I don't know why else she would have cut him open. Maybe she took out his Fear Gland?

Guy Gardner has been captured and is now hanging out with Sinestro and Administer Lash. He's naked and getting drunk. I think Guy's attitude is probably why Sinestro can't put him in the Fear Machine. Guy might break it with his cynicism and his naked dong.

Personally, I don't understand what motivates Sinestro. Why does he want to bring order to the universe? Isn't the universe already ordered in its own way? I suppose I've just never understood the need to control my environment and the people around me. I'm the kind of person who can take a hit of LSD while walking around a crowded amusement park and have the time of my life. Control? Fuck control. Just let life wash over me and I'm satisfied with whatever happens. I mean, as long as I don't die or get injured or don't go without getting laid for too long. The only time I get upset that the world around me isn't doing what I expect it to do is when technology decides it doesn't want to submit to my will anymore. Hey, you stupid near-robot machines! Who fucking programmed you?! Us humans! Get it through your microprocessor already! I'm the boss! When I say "Print," you say "How high?!" You don't say, "Cannot find printer." You do not say, forever, "Job spooling." You do not leave me in a limbo where I wait for Goddamned ever while the printed piece of paper I asked for never fucking appears! I will throw you through the wall, you hunk of junk!

Hmm, maybe I should project my feelings when my laptop won't wirelessly communicate with my printer onto Sinestro and just realize that's the kind of frustration he deals with on a constant basis when the universe and the people in it don't act exactly how he expects them to act. I think maybe I understand him now! Boy, what a dick. I know I hate myself when I get pissed at technology. Usually because I wind up nearly breaking a foot on a file cabinet. I should probably hang a punching bag by the printer to save me from self-inflicted injuries.

Ranking!
0. This issue felt really light on plot developments. It felt less like the story advanced and more like a bunch of people eventually reached a decision due to events from last issue. This was kind of a characters stroking their chins issue. Plus Guy was naked. I didn't need to see that.

New Super-man #3

In China, Dragons aren't mythological creatures of wonder. They're fucking pests.

The Review!
I haven't read this issue yet but based on how much joy Issues #1 and #2 gave me, I'm just going to go ahead and say this issue was also terrific. If you aren't buying New Super-man, you have made a poor decision in your life. Not quite as poor a decision as letting your first boyfriend touch you under the underwear. Although that's probably always going to be a poor decision and just something you need to get out of the way so you can have the confidence to approach the boy you really want to be touching you under the underwear. Sometimes it's just best to have a close friend be the first and call it "Playing Doctor" for some reason. If that's what you think doctors do, I have news for you: you were molested in the doctor's office.

The Non-Comic Book Stuff
I just got done watching the finale of Big Brother and I'm going to spoil it for you if you haven't watched it yet. Nicole won. I'm super happy about Nicole winning not just because I think she's fucking adorable and a kick ass snake. I also think it's important that she beat a man in a vote by her peers. One of the huge problems with Big Brother is when the final two contestants are a man and a woman. The game is complex and takes a lot of skills to successfully navigate to the end. Women and men generally have different ways of doing this which winds up being a problem because the way men win at the game is perceived as the "right" way to win a competitive game and the work a woman does is usually downplayed. I'm glad a jury finally didn't automatically assume the guy played harder and took more chances.

On the way to the comic book store, I was listening to my Shuffle and I made note of these lyrics that I really loved by the Indigo Girls in "All That We Let In": "Dust in our eyes our own boots kicked up". That's...that's just a great fucking line. Another line I love that I heard today was this one from Frank Black and the Catholics "All My Ghosts": "If I could live to be several hundred. I could take a walk and really wander, really wander." It's a bit of what I was getting at in a previous commentary about how I'm nostalgic for my twenties. If we could live longer, we could really fucking take some shit in without feeling rushed. That's how my twenties felt. Like I could live to be several hundred. And what did I do during those year? I really wandered. I really fucking wandered. Part of where I wandered was China and New Super-man takes place in China and that's the segue, folks!

The Commentary!
At the end of the last issue, Kenan revealed he was New Super-man on Chinese national news. Since it's a communist country, that probably means they don't have live television, right? Doesn't that shit have to be censored before the masses are ready for it? Maybe China isn't that communist. When I was there, I even went to places they called Free Markets. Unless, and I don't want this to sound racist but it's just the facts of how things went, they were saying "Flea Market". You can see how maybe the Chinese think America is a shithole when we brag about our Flea Market society, right?! Again, that's not racist! It's just the way words and accents work! I was there! I heard people describe a place that looked like a flea market as a free market and I didn't know which they were actually saying it was! I also saw row after row of dog and cat skins hanging from bars so if you want to get mad at anybody, get mad a culture that thinks that's okay!

Why do Laney's cheeks need glasses?

Kenan also announces on live television that he leads The Justice League of China. I bet the Chinese government really wished they had some kind of delay on live television now, don't they?! Because calling your superhero group "The Justice League" is sure to bring unwanted American attention to your country. Batman is probably already trying to invest! Oh wait. That's an example of wanted attention! Unwanted attention would be like some guy across the subway trying to look up your skirt. I mean, if the guy wasn't totally cute and shit and you weren't trying to let him get a peek. I don't want to assume anything of the imaginary people I just put into an imaginary situation that doesn't mean anything at all to anybody!

One group that gets a bit pissed at the Justice League of China thing is The Great Ten. They're all, "Whoa whoa whoa! Nobody is going to Peking pay attention to us now! I mean Beijing pay attention to us now! Although that doesn't quite sound sweary enough without the hard 'K' sound."

Laney Lan is so freaking cute that I'm forgetting all of the other comic book females I've had crushes on. I mean, seriously, I can't remember any of them! Not even Vampire Tig!

Hee hee! He called him "Tubby"!

I think if you're on a superhero team with a tubby person, you're allowed to call them Tubby. It's either that or give them the nickname "Tiny" which really isn't any different from constantly reminding them that they're actually big fatties. Seems rude!

There's actually a lot of name calling in this comic book which I find refreshing. I've had it up to my eyeballs with people declaring that they'd rather be kind than smart and then go on to prove, with their actions and Twitter feeds, that they aren't kind at all! And hardly ever smart anyway (which is probably why they desperately want to be seen as kind! It's nice to think, "I can't think of anything witty to say to smart alecks so I'm going to declare I'm kind and don't want to be smart if it means being witty!")! I'm glad to see people who don't really like each other actually calling each other dope and tubby and doof and moron!

Meanwhile, Kenan's dad's Book Club is all, "We have to finish our books now! That's code, remember? We aren't actually a book club! We're revolutionaries!" I read a bit of a book today when I was eating lunch at Hot Lips pizza. They had the book of Pippin in their little library and I read the chapter with the grandmother who was played by Irene Ryan in the original version. That's Granny from The Beverly Hillbillies for young people who don't know about geniuses before their time. Every few months, I wind up on Youtube just to hear her live performance of "No Time At All". It's fucking great. Do yourself a favor. You can also watch the Martha Raye clip if you want to see it performed and have better audio quality. But, come on, Granny!

Bat-man and the others take Sunbeam to The Crab Shell, an underwater prison to house criminal meta-humans. I hope the warden is Chinese Aqua-man! That sounds like an Aqua-man I can get behind. Not in a gay way!

One of the villains in the prison is another Super-man! This must not only be a place where they keep criminals but also dissidents, troublemakers, and super powered experiments that went wrong! Also aliens! Because Starro is in The Crab Shell! I can't believe it! Starro! I bet he's being experimented on to figure out how to create mass mind control to keep the public from enjoying Western and democratic ideas.

Later, after Dr. Omen yells at and punishes Kenan with some kind of Kryptonite Spray Gun, Deilan (Wonder-Woman!) decides to give Kenan a chance and has a cute conversation with him.

Oh man. If Wonder-Woman calls him dummy one more time, I might forget about Laney Lan completely.

Bat-man joins them and lets them in on some detective work he's been doing. By checking out the previous two people almost kidnapped by supervillains, he has figured out who will be next. He has also determined that the victims are all private investors in The Ministry of Self-Reliance. That's ironic, amirite?! Anyway, the three decide to do some private investigations without telling Doctor Omen because the stuff they're investigating is stuff that Doctor Omen obviously doesn't want them knowing. It looks like The Justice League of China has already gone off the communist rails!

Dr. Zheng, the third investor that Bat-man has decided will be the next victim, has also realized that he's probably the next victim. So he's ready when three people with super powers show up at his door. He unleashes a water hydra on them! That's the worst kind! Water hyrdras are almost always deadly poisonous! Or so I've heard. Or possibly made up in my head after reading three paragraphs in a fifties encyclopedia on cottonmouths.

And then it happens. The panel which put the third exclamation point on the statement "I love this comic book!!" Three is the most you can have as an adult. As a teenager, you can use as many as you want because you don't know any better. But as an adult? Three exclamation points are permitted for things that are super duper cool. And this comic book, due to the following panel, has just exceeded super duper cool status.

It's almost as if this comic book were written for an audience of me!

I want to take a moment to say the use of dialogue and Narration Boxes in this comic book is a good mix. The dialogue is all well done and sounds like some young adults getting to know each other. And the Narration Boxes? They're just the right amount of letting the reader inside Kenan's head. Especially when you have a character who is, like Kenan, a bit of a dick. We need to see a little bit more humanity than he might overtly show to his comrades. We also, at times, need to see a little bit more of how much of a dick he is but which he chooses not to share with his comrades. But the bottom line? This is just really well-written shit. And I love the art, too. It fits the content perfectly.

That should be part of the review part, right?! Bah! I don't have an editor telling me how to "improve" things and, in the end, just destroying my soul. So fuck it! It stays where it is!

The water hydra isn't any simple, regular, run-of-the-mill water hydra. It's actually Xiangliu, a serpent older than civilization! Um, what the fuck is a marine biologist doing with it?

While the Justice League of China defeat Xiangliu, The Freedom Fighters of China grab Doctor Zheng. And by "Freedom Fighters of China," I mean "Book Club of China," right? Probably? The members of the Freedom Fighters are Blue Condor, Flying Dragon General, and Ghost Woman. The issue ends with them threatening to suffocate Super-man with Blue Condor's powers if they don't let them go with Zheng. What do they want with Zheng? I'm sure he hasn't read the book they're currently discussing!

Ranking!
+3!!! Because this is my favorite Rebirth title so far!

Superwomans #2

The Plot!
A Metropolis protected by a Superwoman needs a nemesis on par with the Lex Luthor of a Metropolis protected by a Superman. And that's what we get in Superwomans #2! Lex's sister Lena Luthor is revealed to be the brain behind the recent attacks on all Lex Luthor's properties. With her troop of Bizarronesses, she's captured her brother and seemingly killed one of the Superwomans. She's also been conducting torturous experiments on the super villains in the prison, probably so she would be able to fit her Bizarronesses with powers like shape shifting and turning people to sand. They obviously don't like being henchwomen though because one of them asks Lana Lang for help aboard Lex's gigantic Battlepenis.

The Theme!
I think the theme is to be nice to your siblings even if you're a sociopathic megalomaniac because you never know if your sibling is also a sociopathic megalomaniac! Is that a theme or a moral?! Maybe the actual theme has something to do with how a society who holds profit above compassion and empathy winds up failing to take care of the people incarcerated by federal (and probably state?) law. Not that a sufficiently dark and terrible government wouldn't experiment on its prisoners in gruesome and terrible ways! I mean, historically, I'm sure there's at least one country out there who did some kind of Scheisse like that. But at least we can assume that a government body won't be super terrible because it's run by people who theoretically can be voted out of office if they fail their constituents by turning prisons into factories which pump out violent criminals instead of trying to rehabilitate convicts. But if you leave it up to a private firm, the only thing they care about is what cuts into their profits! And also the private corporation might be run by a sociopath whose sister is also a sociopath who wants to get revenge on her brother by creating an army of super soldiers from technology gained by torturing the prisoners in the privately funded prison! How many times have we seen that story on 60 Minutes?! Probably a lot, right?

The Review!
Phil Jimenez once again packs a lot of words into this issue. What does he think he's doing?! He does know he gets paid the same amount if he just scripts a bunch of double splash pages full of sound effects, right?! Doesn't he know he can spend the first four or five pages just repeating what happened in the previous issue?! Then he can waste another four or five pages of script with a fist fight! Is he stupid?! Not writing is way easier than writing! I wonder if Brian Michael Bendis looks at a Phil Jimenez script and just shakes his head in disbelief before writing, "Pages 1-3: Spider-man swinging around city. Maybe he sees like a cat or something. Or an old lady through a window getting out of a shower. Page 4-5: Double splash page of Spider-man on ledge of building with head in his hands. Page 6-9: Old lady on phone with friend. Leave room for big ass speech bubbles because I have this great bit I'm writing about a lady who thinks she was peeped by Spider-man. Totally hilarious. I will probably get laid at the next con just for this one bit."

Ranking!
+1! Mostly because there is just so much story! Totally worth $2.99! You can't find better value for your money than this comic book! If you judge your value by penny per word.

Red Hood and the Outlaws #2

Sure they do! It's "θείος"! They probably just don't use it often. And they almost certainly don't use the idiom you're referring to.

The Commentary!
• This issue begins with Roy Harper wearing a dress. I think. I'm pretty sure it's Roy Harper. Red hair. Bow. Way too many fucking Narration Boxes hovering about his head.

Yeah, yeah. Definitely Roy Harper.

• Oh! I'm starting to understand why Scott Lobdell was picked to do Red Hood and the Outlaws for Rebirth! He probably still had a bunch of scripts left over from the initial series which he's just recycling for this series. I mean, how different really will Artemis be from Roy Harper?! And with Starfire's constant confusion about Earth culture, she's almost exactly like Bizarro!

• Artemis learns that warriors don't choose their weapons because their weapons choose them. Is that how it works? Is that why so many soldiers rush off to battle weaponless because no weapon ever spoke to them because they weren't insane? Maybe that's a Sun Tzu piece of wisdom! It's just stupid enough to sound like ancient wisdom. Judging by her appearance last issue, the weapon that chooses her is an insanely large and unwieldy battle axe.

• Artemis is an Amazon who worships Egyptian gods and she never thought it was weird. I wonder if Scott Lobdell accidentally researched the wrong Pantheon and just decided to go with it. Why should he let all the new information he learned go to waste? Better yet, I wonder if he didn't even notice until the editor said something? He probably wrote the dialogue between Artemis and Nephthys about the bow of Ra thinking he was nailing the whole Amazon thing. Then his editor was all, "Dude. You're using Egyptian gods. Amazons are Greek!" So then Lobdell was all, "Oh! I'll fix that with a Narration Box! 'The origin of my name is Greek. But the gods I worshipped were Egyptian.'" Is that better?!" And the editor was all, "Really? You like the double 'P' version of worshiped? Whatever. Just hand in the script."

• I wonder if Lobdell would ever admit that what I just supposed was true? It probably totally is, right?! Boy, what a fuck-up!

• Artemis is trying to get the same weapon that Jason Todd is trying to steal for Black Mask. It's probably the Bow of Ra. Unless it's the Mace of Incredible Size. Or the Lance Beyond All Normal Proportions. Or the Galactic Cannon of Ultimate Girth.

• Black Mask stands off to the side to applaud Jason Todd when he gets the upper hand. But that only lasts long enough for Black Mask to assure Jason Todd that the Bow of Ra isn't what he wants at all. He wants some kind of genetics technology (in other words, Bizarro!). Good thing everybody is so free with their information! Artemis is telling Todd all about the Bow of Ra. Black Mask is telling Todd all about the technology (you know, Bizarro!). How else could Jay make a decision if he didn't have all of this information? Good thing he was trained by Batman that it isn't enough to know your enemy, you have to really, really know your enemy! That's some good advice, right there!

• Artemis realizes Jason isn't trying to hurt her because she knew everything there was to know about battle straight out of her mother's vagina. She might be exaggerating because it took her until sixteen to realize that your weapon chooses you! Anyway, she decides she should work with Red Hood to blow his cover. He joins up with her and they turn on The Black Mask. So his undercover work is already over? I guess it's just changed because that's how Lobdell's stories work. His stories begin with a premise and then, in the next issue, he carefully wads up that premise and throws it at the wastebasket (and misses, of course) because he thought up a different premise he'd rather pursue. Obviously he had to think up a way to get Todd and Artemis working together. So he may have meant to use the Black Mask premise for just the initial issue. I'll give Lobdell the benefit of the doubt this time.

How is Red Hood impressing Black Mask now? "I always wanted an heir with morals who would turn on me the first chance he got! You're getting a raise, boy!"

• To follow Black Mask, Artemis throws Jason at the helicopter and then leaps after. As Jason crawls into the train car being stolen by Black Mask's helicopter, they have a barely comprehensible conversation.

She needs to figure out a better way to treat her metaphors?

• Artemis's metaphors are as good as they're going to get since they're being written by Scott Lobdell. They're awful and you can tell he's going to use them constantly as part of Artemis's personality. "You comparing yourself to me is like a weaker thing comparing itself to a stronger thing!"

• After Todd and Artemis stop bickering in just that way that gets fangenders underwear frothing but is actually terrible dialogue, Red Hood tells Artemis to call Mjolnir because the genetic technology in the train car with them is Bizarro. I hope he also gets out his book of antonyms or things are going to get confusing really quick!

Ranking: 0.

Batgirl and the Birds of Prey #2

Commissioner Gordon is an honorary Bird.

The Commentary!
• This issue begins with Commissioner Gordon and Batgirl escorting Santo to a safehouse, both for his own protection and for an enjoyable afternoon of Good Cop, Bad Cop (also known as Mustached Cop, Fat Cop to everybody in the precinct). Black Canary and Huntress are riding motorcycles and trying to distract Santo's gang so they can't follow Gordon to the safe house where they'll be keeping Santo until he tells them everything he knows about Fake Oracle. Batgirl is riding with her dad which seems awfully dangerous if she cares about her secret identity. If she farts, he'll know who she is for sure! No way he hasn't smelled her farts locked up in a car on long road trips for most of his life. Although, let's face it, Commissioner Gordon definitely already knows Batgirl is his daughter.

The Gordons don't make any sense. Why has Jim stopped driving to turn and shoot people in a moving vehicle and what the fuck is Babs talking about?! Is she saying she would have avoided shooting out a woman's tire?! Sexist!

• Black Canary takes care of the rest of the gang members by screaming all of their cars out of commission. I like how sound waves have the craziest properties in comic books. Either that or her Canary Cry is something totally different than just a really loud shout. Maybe she's belching up some kind of plasma?

• The Trying-To-Be-Witty Caption appended onto the Location Caption at the start of each scene is still a terrible, horrible, awful thing in this issue. It's almost enough to make me rethink reading every comic book by DC Comics. Here's the second one this issue after the Location Caption of "GCPD Safe House": "Safe is in the name. Definitely nothing horrible will happen here." As if my life wasn't already overflowing with existential dread, now I have to worry about reading the next one of those captions when the scene changes! It's almost as bad as when I'm sweeping a floor at work and some idiot with an IQ less than average says, "Missed a spot!" Another idiotic joke that you never, ever need to make to somebody cleaning a floor in public? That thing where you pretend to slip when you see a wet floor sign. Eventually my reaction will stop being one of intense inner hatred and I will wind up punching somebody in their stupid, smug face.

• Tonight at work as I was going to my van to get a bag full of free deli food for a clerk at a 7-Eleven to rummage around in for himself, a guy outside the 7-Eleven was looking at a car in the parking lot and asked, "Is that your car?" And I said, "No." So he said, "What kind of car is it?" And I said, "I don't know. It's not my car." So he said, "Is it a Lexus?" I stopped talking to him at that point. He was looking right at the fucking car. Cars almost always have the name of the stupid car somewhere on the car. Stop asking me. What do I look like, Lord Google? Man, I came so close to punching that guy in his stupid, smug face.

• Does health insurance pay for anger management classes?

• Forget my hatred for regular people in the real world because I think I'm also beginning to hate all of the fictional people in the fictional world of this comic book.

Black Canary is parodying the theme to Green Acres? Hate her. Batgirl is calling a place with a petting zoo a dump? Hate her.

• I'm still not completely sure if a place with lions and tigers wandering about freely actually constitutes a petting zoo.

• I wonder what happened to Condom? I kind of miss that guy! I wonder if I had a stroke in the last year? It's possible, considering how angry I get at everything everybody does.

• Commissioner Gordon decides to have a talk with Batgirl about Fenice and Fake Oracle but Batgirl gets super defensive when he says he thinks it would be a good idea for the cops to help and maybe Batman too. She's all, "You don't think women can do this?!" And he's all, "What?" And she's all, "You're a sexist pig, Da...mn you!" And he's all, "What the fuck are you talking about?!" And she's all, "How dare you offer to help with your man hands and your other man parts!" And he's all, "You know what? Forget it! Do whatever you want! What do I care if you get yourself killed?!"

• The Birds of Prey leave Gordon to watch over Santo while they run off to the Clock Tower to do some research. That's when they get a visit from Batman. Now Batgirl can tell off her surrogate dad too! She'll prove to them both that Batgirl is just as good as any Bat- or Non-Bat-man!

Stop being so understanding, Bruce! How the hell is a girl supposed to have Daddy Issues if her surrogate daddy is a decent guy?!

• The only thing anybody knows so far about Fake Oracle is that he or she is not The Riddler. Last issue, Fake Oracle sent the worst text clue ever. This time? A shitty riddle! "How many birds does it take to track down an Oracle? Zero. Birds can't type. LOL". That is terrible. First off, the riddle doesn't make any sense. Why would birds be tracking down an oracle? If you're going to set up that kind of premise, you need to anchor the answer in mythology. You can't have the answer be about birds not being able to type when typing isn't even part of the premise of the question! The entire riddle is flawed! It certainly doesn't deserve a LOL tagged to the end!

• The Birds track Oracle's message to a server farm which doesn't really help, does it? It's not like Fake Oracle is going to be hosted in the cloud. Although the last time there was a Fake Oracle, it absolutely was hosted in the cloud because it was a rogue AI. But this one is just a terrible clue giver who sets a trap at the server farm which the Birds fall for. But first Batgirl manages to get some information from the servers. And nobody blows up at all!

• Meanwhile, Oracle locates Santo and lets Fenice know the location. Fenice sends her team of meta-humans to kill him. I don't recognize any of the meta-humans except for Asp since he was in the last issue. But I guess they're all snake-themed. So besides Asp, there is Naga and a version of Copperhead and Black Mamba. Or just Black Snake. Black Mamba in Red Sweat Pants? Whatever. It's the Snake Patrol! They'll probably get beat up by the Birds next issue. Because birds always beat snakes! It's like a natural law.

Ranking: 0.