Martian Manhunter: American Secrets #2 (October 1992)

I don't know why each cover has Martian Manhunter looking ominous with a cheesecake white woman but I have the same theories you do.

If our theory stands, that this series is about white supremacy in America (the big secret that's totally not a secret but so many people want to either deny it or embrace it so much that we have the most racist president in American history at the helm right now (and that's fucking saying a lot!)) then Martian Manhunter represents Black Americans. This isn't just a hypothesis that he's the other and a minority and so his experience might reflect that of Black Americans (especially those who can pass (reading homework: Passing by Nella Larsen)); Gerard Jones made it plain last issue although he has a lizard-head say it: "Our people have a spiritual kinship with the negro. We're all exiled people." At first, this got me worried because it felt like Jones was comparing the invaders to Blacks, playing off the white fear as seen in The X-Files and, um, American history. But the lizard-heads control the police and have taken over the suburbs (I know! We haven't quite gotten there yet but it's heavily implied!), so the bad guys must be a white supremacist America. Therefore, the covers depict the white supremacist fear of the Black man. The first cover shows a woman frightened of him. The second cover shows a woman seemingly nervous but intrigued. The final issue shows a satisfied woman smoking a cigarette. I think you get the picture!

Martian Manhunter is now tooling around with the DC Universe equivalent of Elvis Presley, well known for making Black music more palatable to a mainstream audience. Is he just a symbol, an indication of how times are changing as the generations move forward? Is little Patty Marie part of it, adding an even younger generation to the group fleeing a white supremacist America? Remember, this was written in 1992 when things seemed to be improving after they were definitely not improving in the '80s due to a swinging of the pendulum in reaction to the '70s when people of all sorts — Black, white, gay, straight, all the other stuff — were mixing in disco clubs. One of my other wacky hypotheses is that disco was killed on purpose to disrupt this mixing of cultures and peoples. Yeah, I blame the death of disco on Reagan! You might be thinking, "Wasn't the death of disco a good thing?" to which I reply by putting Gloria Gaynor on the Hi-Fi and dancing like Napoleon Dynamite.

This issue begins with a Chris Ware panel followed by a Daniel Clowes panel followed by a Harvey Pekar panel. Have I mentioned how much Eduardo Barreto has killed on the art of this series? Well, I'm mentioning it now.

The days when an American car's front seat was as spacious as a twin bed.

The following two pages feel like the opening shots of Blue Velvet as we see the fleeing trio take their first steps into the quiet night of the suburbs. Surely, as Prelvis points out as they enter, this must be heaven. Compared to the loud, lively city, the stillness and quiet seems like paradise. Nothing terrible can be hiding in a place so clean and pure!

I have no theories regarding this cheesecake lawn mower calendar. I just like tits.

A family of four discover Jones and his new friends standing around trying to come up with a plan. The daughter recognizes Prelvis and mentions it to her dad who does not say, "Keep that pelvis far from thee!" He says, "Oh, how nice. And that's the little girl from the game show! Why don't you all come in to our lovely home where we will not eat your faces and blow up your heads. No sirree!"

Detective Jones lies to the family that he's trying to keep these two famous people safe from mobsters. The father is all, "Why, that sounds awful!" Meanwhile the mother is all:

Prelvis believes Mr. Keene, the editor of Nuts Magazine, lives in the suburbs. The pipe smoking father isn't too keen on Mr. Keene living there being that Nuts Magazine seems like a subversive type of rag. But he mentions anybody is welcome in the suburbs if they fit in. Obviously he fits in because he fired the cartoonist who put too many lizard heads into the satire magazine. I guess making fun of celebrities and politicians is okay as long as you don't expose them for the lizard-heads they truly are. Oh, just for the record, this vanilla nuclear family are white. I don't know if they're lizard heads yet. But if they're living in the suburbs and sticking their noses into the business of any strangers walking around town (actually confronting people was how they had to do it in the '50s because they didn't have Nextdoor), they're almost certainly white supremacists. I mean lizard heads.

I don't actually think Mr. Keene of Nuts Magazine has anything to do with the lizards because he's corrupting the youth. He would be seen as the enemy of the white supremacist status quo, just as the Beatnik and the Juvenile Delinquent and the minorities. He probably fired the cartoonist for his own safety; Mr. Keene's lampooning of the status quo the lizard heads want to maintain for their own safety can only work if you don't outright mention the lizard heads exist. Knowing they exist, and mentioning it to anybody, as we've seen, is dangerous.

Oh, um, okay. The lizard heads might also be pedophiles.

From Gerard Jones' Wikipedia entry: "... in April 2018 Jones changed his plea to 'guilty', admitting that the police had found 'numerous electronic devices containing tens of thousands of images and hundreds of videos of child pornography' in his home." I post that quote because it boggles the mind. He titled this series "American Secrets" and what could be a bigger secret than this? Tens of thousands?! That means Gerard Jones was living in a completely different America than many, probably most, of us. He knew about an America that most people don't even like to consider. He navigated the backroads of this secret America to such a degree that he could come to possess tens of thousands of images and videos before anybody even suspected him. Jones. Fogle. Epstein. Trump. Across the pond, you had Savile and Glitter. People around them who ignore it or facilitate it. I used to think a lot of accusations of pedophilia were just outlandish attacks to make people look like the worst monster you can possibly make them. And I think a lot of the world does too because they just don't know it exists because they don't think about it or look for it or experience it. Which makes me think that the people who are most accusatory of others do so because they know the world exists. And why do they know that world exists? When so many others can't even contemplate it? Because they've experienced it?

I saw a great post on Bluesky about the revelation of all the notes to Epstein for his 50th birthday that read something like, "Everybody got Epstein the same thing for his birthday: corroborating evidence." If I post Trump's message to Epstein, will I get in trouble? I feel it should be plastered everywhere, just in case some people haven't seen it.

I mean, really, how are people defending this chud?

The father of the suburban family acts weird and suspicious in ways that weren't already weird and suspicious, like living in the suburbs and smoking a pipe and knowing the exact name of his daughter's lipstick. Now he's mumbling, "Prize-to-be! Prize-to-be! Prize-to-be!" That's the phrase little Patty Marie was supposed to say on The Big Question for some reason. A kind of Mandalorian Candidate thing?

I know what I typed!

Oh, sure. Mr. Keene is the neighborhood pervert!

Why does Suburban Dad and Mom want to keep so many things away from the minds of their young kids? The daughter isn't supposed to wear Pink Passion lipstick or wear anything too grown-up. The son isn't supposed to read monster comics or eat candy. Both keep loads of secrets from their parents because they know their parents won't approve. And that's the main fear of these suburban parents who are also probably lizard-headed, Christian, white supremacists: their kids will learn about reality and they'll like it better than the racist, Christian irreality of their parents.

I'm not one to argue with right wing conservative types because their arguments about most things don't reside within the bounds of our reality. I definitely won't argue with them if they bring up the word "woke" because what they mean by woke is "reality" and they're simply anti-reality. Anything that defies the way they want the world to be is woke. The problem is that the world is the way the world is and just wanting it to be different doesn't make it so. You can legislate irreality all you want, as Trump and his cronies are doing, but it won't stick. It can't stick. You can't make it illegal to see a painting of an orange when you're looking at a painting of an orange. Most of the people who are "anti-woke" simply want their team to win or want the other people punished. But the "other team" simply wants to live life. It's not a debate. It's one side trying to get along and the other side throwing rocks at them and gaslighting them. They believe "the left" corrupt and brainwash the youth when they're actually just showing their corrupted and brainwashed kids the truth of the world. And when you get truth over illusion, most people generally want truth. Also because we have way more fun over here in reality. When the only joy you have is being angry at somebody else, it's a stupid fucking way to live.

Prelvis doesn't answer, "Oh, they're just like everybody else!"

Prelvis's answer is, "We'll they're . . . they're . . . they're . . . colored!" He's never had to think about what they're like as people before because he just sees them as something to steal from. Maybe. I don't know Prelvis that well. I'm presuming that he's a lot like the real Elvis!

The mother pops in to tell her son that it's not polite to discuss Black people. Um, what? I don't even know how to parse that! I guess as a white supremacist, she doesn't want to hear things she finds disgusting? "You don't talk about that in polite society!" should be saved for things like fucking dog carcasses and sniffing your own farts. I'm actually pro one of those but I'd like to retain some mystery and not tell you which one.

In the morning, Jones sees an article about how the singer Eddie Notanalien has killed himself in his hotel room in Las Vegas. All the holistic pieces of the puzzle (meaning absolutely every single thing Jones can remember about the last week) swirl around in his head before he decides he needs to speak with Nuts Magazine's Mr. Keene. He easily finds his home in the repetitive suburbs because his house is the only one blasting jazz. It's a good thing HOAs didn't exist in the '50s. Probably because vigilante justice and the Ku Klux Klan did.

Oh, just to be clear: I'm against HOAs and the Ku Klux Klan and some vigilante justice. I say "some" because some people help to create a world where massacres are inevitable and sometimes the massacre comes back at them and when that happens, I don't shed a fucking tear. There are thousands of aphorisms created by mankind over the years about this kind of justice because we all accept it as natural but the one that comes to mind immediately is "Live by the sword, die by the sword."

Keene doesn't seriously answer any of Jones' questions about lizards and his cartoonists who keep submitting lizard head comics. He only gets serious about one thing: being shut up by the House Unamerican Activities Committee.

I think Keene is Jewish so this is another example of the white supremacy status quo trying to shut up other voices.

While they discuss America strapping on hefty boots to step on the people they don't like's necks, a Lizard Dog crashes through the door and attacks them. Martian Manhunter kills it although he should have killed the little kid who let it off the leash. Keep your animals in check, people! Soon after the lizard dog dies, Suburban Dad wanders in off the street and pulls a massive flamethrower out of his briefcase. How would he know Detective Jones' weakness is fire unless . . . oh my God! He's a lizard head!

Did that sound like I was really surprised? Because I was no matter how many times previous to this I pointed out he was probably a lizard head.

This is the exact center of not just this issue but the entire story so it's probably pretty important.

The central image in the exact center of this story concerns a white man burning the shit out of green Martian in broad daylight in a normal neighborhood. Is that meaningful? Am I simply asking that question because it is meaningful but I want you to suss out why? Am I asking the question instead of explaining why it's meaningful because I'm fucking lazy? Is it because I don't know? Is it because I'm only halfway through this issue and I've already written too many fucking words about this comic book? It's almost certainly one of those.

The double spread page after the climactic moment begins the denouement and downfall of the lizard heads when Prelvis and Patty Marie come screeching up in Prelvis's pink Cadillac and run Suburban Dad's ass down. The rebellion has officially begun! They are fighting back against the lizard heads who believe they have a right to force everybody to acknowledge their rights and superiority! If violence controls, violence can also redeem, motherfuckers!

Don't tell Jesus I said that!

Keene helps Jones and company escape which pisses off the lizard heads.

I don't know what Keene's deal with the lizard heads is. He gets to keep publishing comics satirizing normal life as long as he doesn't get too serious about it?

Martian Manhunter shapeshifts into the persona of The Colonel, Prelvis's manager, to get him a gig in Las Vegas as they investigate who these lizard heads really are. They've got a few names, a few business associates, and Cuba as leads, plus Martian Manhunter's ability to holistically follow the evidence.

Meanwhile, Patty Marie meets Leave it to Skeeter star, Whitey Beaver.

Knowing this was written by Gerard Jones makes it that much more horrible.

Skeeter isn't an actual lizard head; he's just a kid who profits on lizard heads running the show. Yeah, once again, I'm not specifically talking about the comic book. But I've got to get this shit read already so I'm not going to go on about it! You're smart! You probably already know everything I'm going to say already!

Jones runs into a lizard head FBI Agent after leaving the meeting with the mobster who's interested in putting Prelvis in all the teenage diner jukeboxes. Oh! So I guess Phil wasn't a lizard head at all. He was just working for Cuba and the singer who compared themselves to negros was maybe just a Commie or a Cuban working for the mob. The lizards (or, you know, status quo whites) are trying to stop all of this degenerate "art" from corrupting their kids. Maybe I've thought too much about it too fast and now I'm lost in the intricacy of the plot as I tried to outguess Gerard Jones at every turn!

He finishes the conversation saying America should be "free for those who are advanced enough to appreciate it."

Leaving the white supremacy aside for a moment, Gerard Jones is undoubtedly making the point that the people in power have used any means to try to destroy those living lives outside of the status quo. Anything that might cause children to think different thoughts than their parents must be destroyed by any means. So the House of Unamerican Activities Committees. The Hayes Code. The Comics Code Authority. If they approve of your life, they will leave you alone. If they disapprove, they will destroy you. The lizard heads, I mean!

After all that, I still don't know where Skeeter falls into it. Is he a lizard head? Is he just an example of how the youth will be corrupted without the lizard heads to keep everything in check? Is he just a little fucking bastard with too much fame and money to know any better? Is he Gerard Jones' self-insert character? I don't know!

Locked up in their room in the casino, Prelvis points out that the comic book Keene gave them contains a story where the Justice Society battle lizard aliens. And in the copyright blurb, it states that the likenesses of the Justice Society are used with permission from the Justice Society through their licensing representative, Melvin Keene. More Keene. More lizards. And more intrigue as a strange man enters the room and tells them they need to talk.

Goddammit. I was tricked into reading a Justice Society comic book!

Martian Manhunter: American Secrets #2 Rating: B+. Either I'm too stupid to fully understand it (plausible) or the story has gotten a bit too convoluted. Hopefully the mobsters will wind up helping Detective Jones so I can breathe a sigh of relief that I did understand the comic book. As it stands, the lizard heads are the cops, the FBI, the white flight families of suburbia. They're all the people who want to hold power and crush American culture into the bland, boring one that they live. Comic book writers and artists are subversive. Black Americans are subversive. Rock and roll is subversive. Beatniks and their God-awful poetry are subversive. Commies, homosexuals, criminals . . . all of the usual culprits brought up by those who believe America should only be available to white Christian conservatives. Just the worst kind of people who can't be happy living the life they want to lead because they're so angry that other people are living differently. Dudes! It's so easy! Stop giving such a shit about how much other people are enjoying America just because they're enjoying it differently than you want them to! Stop fearing everything different and just fucking get on with your own thing!

Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea: The Newsletter #3 (Last Week of December, 2017)

E!TACT! #3
Happy New Year!
By Grunion Guy

I'm currently sat here writing a New Year's missive that may never be seen because of my possibly suspended TinyLetter account. What did I do to trigger their Abuse Prevention Robot? Who the fuck knows but that robot must have some serious PTSD if commenting on comic books made it shit the Internet. I wonder if writing a story where I actually describe torturing the Abuse Prevention Robot will trigger the Abuse Prevention Robot for Preventing Abuse of the Abuse Prevention Robot?

So you'll probably get this next year sometime (probably right on top of the Newsletter I wrote last Thursday (and possibly even before that if just that last issue was flagged?)) when a human being finally pulls their hungover face out of a pool of office Christmas party vomit and reads the multiple joking emails I sent twelve hours after they refused to send out my letter and thinks, "Oh? Did we have work we were supposed to be doing?" It's also possible that criticizing TinyLetter in the TinyLetter Newsletter will trigger the Abuse Prevention Robot. If that's the case, fuck this shit. I'll be flushing it down the toilet like most of the rest of the year.

Not that the year's been bad. Not on a personal level, anyway. Obviously everything else has been the death knell of everything else. Do not ask for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for the bell that tolls for whomever the fucking thing is tolling for. This is the year that the phrase "dumpster fire" became so apt a description of everything that people have become angry with people overusing the phrase "dumpster fire." This is the year that holding a beer became the national pastime. It's the year when the people in charge took an existentialist dump on all the God-fearing meaning freaks who support those nihilistic bastards. I don't have any place in my heart for either the GOP or the Christians who can't stop supporting them but at least the GOP aren't pretending that anything means anything anymore. And as an existentialist atheist, I kind of have to approve. Not in their subsequent behavior after embracing the chaotic meaningless of everything, of course! But at least they aren't pretending to believe in the Christian lie anymore. I mean, sure, that's all they're actually doing is pretending to believe in it! But the only people believing that bullshit are the Christians who are still lying to themselves that an all-loving God created this dumpster fire of a universe. More like the universe was a meaningless black empty void of nothingness and some other god we've never heard of was all, "This is fucking depressing, what?" And our God was all, "Hold my beer!"

No matter how angry I am at what's become of America, I'm still just sitting here playing my fiddle. Aren't we all? We rage against the dying of the light but it's not like it's accomplishing anything. For too long, I guess, we've just kept out heads down believing that good will overcome evil while evil put in the work of infiltrating the government at local and state levels until they could get a corporate stranglehold on democracy. There's a Yeats' poem I'd quote here if I wasn't sick to fucking death of it. So instead of quoting that, I'll quote Ralph Waldo Emerson (even if the quote doesn't fit what I'm talking about. It's still fucking great): "Things are in the saddle and ride mankind."

Okay, that has nothing to do with what I was talking about. Maybe if we replace "things" (which is easy to replace because it's basically the equivalent of a Mad-Libs blank space) with "Fucking assholes who are personally enriching themselves and their political donors at the expense of everything that's good in the world" and "mankind" with "your mom."

These bastards who embrace the meaningless of it all have finally decided to cash the blank check their rabid supporters wrote them. They've ridden a wave of unborn babies, xenophobic declarations, and lackluster gun laws straight into the final square on The Game of Life board while the rest of us are fruitlessly hoping we land on the "Win the Lottery" square before we wind up gathered together in the poor farm. What we learned this year is that it doesn't pay to live your life in a way that lessens the hurt we do to others. This year, we've learned it's all about running down whomever we can to make sure we get ours. And if your balls happen to suddenly pop out of your pants to rest on the chins of those you've trampled on the way up the ladder of power and riches, why, that's just icing on the cake.

Happy New Year, Motherfuckers.

Grunion Guy

 

Martian Manhunter: American Secrets #1 (September 1992)

Content Warning: I will likely be discussing Gerard Jones' conviction of terrible crimes and also debasing your mother. Not at the same time, of course! I'm not the worst monster! Jones is!

The Non-Certified Spouse called me racist the other day as I was eating this candy:

It was delicious!

I pointed out that as a more or less white male, if I were only fucking white women, I wouldn't be apt to disambiguate certain lovers as "white". It seems obvious that if I'm calling some of my lovers "white lovers" than I must have other lovers who would be considered non-white. But then because I can't stand to be correct about anything, I pointed out, against myself, that just because a white man fucks a non-white lover, it doesn't mean they can't still be racist! It's just a variant of "I have Black friends!" Then the Non-Certified Spouse responded, "Oh, I didn't even notice the name of the candy!"

Anyways, Gerard Jones was convicted of possessing and distributing images of child sexual abuse. I just thought we should clear that up at the start so I can say, unequivocally, that I am super against that! Like you might be thinking, "Yeah! I'm totally against that too!" But then I'd say, "But not as against it as I am!" Then you'd look at me quizzically and I'd point to my t-shirt that reads, "I'm super against possessing and distributing images of child sexual abuse!" Then you'd back away a bit and say, "That's an oddly specific shirt to wear." And I'd be all, "Oh, you wouldn't wear it? What are you? Just kind of against it?" After that, I'm assuming we'd never be friends again and I'd be okay with that because why wouldn't you proclaim how against this shit you were? Seems suspicious!

True story: I've seen at least two people out here in Portland wearing shirts and/or hats that had anti-pedophile messages. And while I appreciate the message, it's really confusing to see somebody wearing a hat that reads, "I kill pedophiles!" and, for a quick second, think you're proclaiming to be one! I know, I know! That's on me and my lack of reading comprehension! But, you know, it's still a fucking weird thing to wear. The guy wearing the shirt was even bolder in that the picture on the shirt was of a person being lynched. Don't worry! It was stick figure art so it wasn't graphic. But, I mean, it's kind of the first thing you see and even when the message later clears it up a bit that the person being hanged was a pedophile, it doesn't suddenly make my revulsion go away. "Oh, cool, you're a creepy weirdo making everybody uncomfortable who is against pedophilia! Good to know!"

This issue begins, like all horror films of the '50s, with a beatnik and an alien. The main difference is that the beatnik has just been shot. In the '50s, the beatnik was screwing your daughter, smoking herb, dressing against the conventions of the status quo, and laying down some righteous non-rhyming lines of poetry to wake your suburban ass the hell up. And that was scary because who wants to think about how their normal lives are actually hurting so many other people?! It's like that Japanese movie, Best Wishes to All! You know your way of life hurts others but why should you care? Maybe they should have thought about that before they got hurt because they chose not to hurt others so they could get what they desire like everybody else? And who wants a crummy old Beatnik spoken-poetrying criticisms right into your stupid face?! So rude!

By the way, Best Wishes to All might be the best critique of elite liberals who perpetuate a status quo that they benefit from even though it hurts so many others that I've ever seen. If that's what it's about. Maybe I'm wrong? Probably not though. I'm so smart my brain hurts all the time!

What? Maybe I should go get what checked out? I'm changing the subject now! Ow!

Oh yeah! Stickin' it to the man right up until his last breath!

The police rush up and do not beat the shit out of John Jones as he cradles a dying man in his arms because he's cosplaying as a white man and cops would never suspect a white man with a short haircut to have murdered a beatnik. Plus John flashes his detective badge and is all, "I'm from Denver. I'm here for the Forensics Convention. I'll go investigate this immediately!" And the cops are all, "Okay, man, sure, whatever. I guess you like paper work! We'll stay with the body and see if there might be some minorities to beat up."

A witness points out that the man was being chased from Le Chat Noir, a café, by two women. John reacts suspiciously with "Women, huh?" I don't know why that eyewitness evidence makes such an impression on him but he chooses to get involved. Maybe he's horny?

Gerard Jones makes sure the reader thinks they're watching an episode of The Twilight Zone. Everybody's lonely and they're all strangers. At least, that's how John Jones sees it since he's lonely and the strangest stranger. He also seems to think everybody is cold and they're all trying to get warm. Is that because he's always cold since fire will kill him? Or is he just paranoid being around humans because he knows how much they love fire?

This is the bottom half of the page. The top half was where Jones really obsessed over strangers, loneliness, and fire.

After Jones sits done, he's hassled by a Beatnik who recognizes a kindred, outsider spirit. He reads either a parody of Howl or the version of Howl written by the Ginsberg from the DC Universe. Was this guy just trying to pass off a poorer version of Howl as his own poetry? Or did Gerard Jones just want us to recognize Howl without having to get clearance for using it (and also because Howl uses the word "negro" in the first few lines which this guy is paraphrasing and maybe DC was all, "Um, nope")? I can't help but feel that Howl contains the basic theme of Gerard Jones' story now. Thousands of American lives destroyed by the status quo, by the suburbs, by the scared and easily intimidated, by the overbearing cops and inconsiderate laws, the nearly impossible to follow for some social expectations, by poverty, by racism, by Martians, by, well, you know, America?

What are these upstanding, non-Juvenile Delinquent crewcuts doing in a jazz café?! Aside from the good work of bullying people into being "normal".

John Jones loses interest in the murder because now he's interested in this new quiz program, The Big Question. If a big lunkheaded crewcut could answer the big question on The Big Question, it can't be that hard, right? Although why, other than curiosity, Jones gives a shit about it, I don't know. But he does because he heads back to the cops and the dead body. They ask him if he learned anything and he says, "Nothing. But more importantly, what's The Big Question?" And the cops get super excited and tell him all about it. The corpse does not say, "Hey, man! Dead body here! Can I get a little justice?" Because it's dead.

John Jones heads back to the hotel where he's staying for the Forensics Conference where the bellboy offers to get him a prostitute. He refuses because he's rather get stuck into a nice glass of milk and The Big Question. But before it even gets started, he turns it off to meditate. About not being lonely!

Meanwhile, a conversation in a nearby room proves John's point about loneliness.

Finding no comfort in his Martian meditation with Rachel and Jake screaming away downstairs, John decides to eat some Oreos, drink his milk, and watch the end of The Big Question. He's curious about why humans enjoy trivia so he decides he'll check out a taping of the show the next day. That's the day the current champion might get to answer the big question! John hasn't thought about the murdered Beatnik once all night.

Of course The Big Question is rigged because television wants to make sure it keeps kicking the ass of the movies. So when Detective John Jones shows up on set, everybody freaks the fuck out.

Somebody near the scene of a crime mentioned your show?! Maybe Martian Manhunter should have taken the alias Dirk Gently.

Martian Manhunter running a holistic detective agency isn't that far-fetched since he's telepathic. Even if he's not outright reading people's minds, he's probably more attuned to the connections between things. If Batman had forgotten all about the murder because somebody mentioned a quiz show and then became obsessed with the quiz show only to figure out that the quiz show was connected to the murder, I'd purchase a ticket to New York, head down to DC's office building, and burn it to the fucking ground. But if Martian Manhunter figures this connection out through telepathy and vibes? Well, that's kind of what he does!

So Jones hangs out to watch the show and is treated to seeing the champion go off script during the taping.

Goddamn! Who's sponsoring this show?! ConSec?

The director explains to everybody in the studio that the champion's head exploding was just a technical illusion. That's a good enough explanation for what happened because nobody wants to believe that they just witnessed a woman's head explode. Plus, Miss Joy, the champion, seemingly steps out from backstage and re-enters the booth! Only this time, she chooses horticulture like a person who wants to keep living. But before she answers The Big Question, she goes full on Body Snatcher on Martian Manhunter.

Don't worry! I'll get a They Live! reference in here somewhere!

Apparently the people running The Big Question are shape-shifters trying to take over the world! Or, at the very least, the world of game shows. But this creature that can see John when he's invisible who could also take the form of the recently dead champion has a lot in common with Martian Manhunter! Except they seem to be evil so let me guess: white Martian? It also explains what happened at the café. A Beatnik who could somehow see the aliens in their true forms (because Beatniks, man, are like in touch with The Real, dig?) realized two women at the café were aliens. So they chased him out of the café and shot him with, I don't know, laser eyes, I guess? Then they shifted into two macho crewcuts and headed back into the café where they basically shit on their cover right into John's brain.

Later at a local diner, Phil, one of the alien crew at The Big Question and Eddie, an alien singer, discuss how they're aliens. And they also prove me wrong about my speculation as to why Gerard Jones didn't quote Howl correctly.

Did I mention this was taking place in the '50s or did I just allude to it?

Will John feel more lonely learning that there are aliens doing exactly what he's doing on Earth? Pretending to be human? Why haven't they exposed themselves to him? Why don't they want to befriend another alien fooling humans the exact same way they are? I mean, obviously not the exact same way because that's the whole point of this story, probably! "Look at how J'onn J'onzz lies to the human race! Look at him pretending to be something he's not! He's manipulating them, gaslighting them, using them for his own gain and comfort!" But then we get to see how terrible aliens take advantage of the same power and skill set. Afterward, we go, "Oh, okay! J'onn is one of the good ones!"

No wait! Dammit! That isn't the conclusion I meant to come up with! Um, I think I'd better keep reading to find out what Gerard Jones' point is! Because I'm sure it's not that!

John Jones, Detective, saunters into the diner to ask Phil some questions. Turns out Jones remembers seeing Phil at Le Chat Noire as well as The Big Question. And when you're a holistic detective, there are no coincidences.

Phil's just fired Eddie. Eddie leaves in a huff, threatening to do some weird alien revenge shit, as Phil's new talent, Perkins Preston (not an alien), arrives with some information that Jones will find interesting: he seems to believe that some people in this world are actually lizards! He learned this from a guy in Times Square handing out pamphlets which, since this is the '50s, must be where David Icke learned about it. Jones, knowing he's basically one of these lizard people, believes this kid. There's a secret in America and Martian Manhunter is going to discover those American secrets!

Jones, knowing his investigative methods don't make any Earth sense (but they might make Martian sense!), heads to Times Square to find the guy with the lizard pamphlets. The man's a cartoonist who used to work for Nuts Magazine but was fired for drawing too many lizards in the marginalia. While he's picking up some Nuts Magazines for evidence, Jones discovers Earth pornography.

I guess weirdoes don't read this because they'll see that all the naked women have lizard heads.

On the way back to the hotel, tired from a night of Martian investigating, Martian Manhunter learns about Hydrox cookies and capitalism.

"What's wrong wit' chyu dat you don't know dis shit? You an alien or sumpin?"

The next day, Jones attends the Forensics Conference where he learns all about how police will one day investigate crime using nothing but science! Jones tells the other guests at the conference how he's been investigating the Beatnik murder but not by following evidence at all. Instead he's been using anti-science by following hunches and references and comic books and lizard-headed people. Most of the other conference goers laugh it off but some guy named Swift is all, "Where are you staying so that I can send somebody to murder you tonight? I mean so we can discuss the dead Beatnik?" And Jones is all, "Here's my hotel and room number!" As a Martian, he's quite naïve when it comes to Earth customs like lying about your contact information and hiring assassins.

Shit! They've even got lizard-headed dogs!

I once worked with a woman named April who nicknamed Sassy the Social Butterfly simply because I'm the most charming piece of shit anybody's ever met. One night we were out cleaning floors of various 7-Elevens when I brought up David Icke's lizard people. She got really quiet and stared at me for some time before quietly asking, "You know about the lizard people?" What I'm saying is that I could have been killed! Luckily, April wasn't a lizard person; she was just merely terrified of them. Whew! Sassy escapes death once again!

I would think running around New York with your lizard heads out leading a couple of lizard dogs around on leashes killing people who have heard of the lizard-headed ones might be more dangerous to your secret than just letting Martian Manhunter continue his investigation while spreading misinformation that he's pretending to be a detective from Denver with a history of schizophrenia! How have these idiots kept their secret for this long when they can't resist blowing up women's heads, shooting Beatniks on the street, and destroying hotel rooms to murder some nosy investigator?

During the fight, the television is smashed and a fire starts. The lizard guys realize quickly that the fire weakens Jones. Martian Manhunter flees before they can get the upper hand, smashing through several floors of the hotel and seeing some titties on the way.

Is Black Canary fucking Clark Kent?!

The next day, Jones begins investigating for real. He sneaks around Phil's office, the one guy he knows is in on the conspiracy, and hears some mobsters give him the order to fill all the jukeboxes in town with teenage singers. He's got to wipe everything else, even Frank Sinatra! Hoo boy! That's big news and directly from, um, Cuba! Oh no! The Juvenile Delinquents with their rock music and their horny crotches are being controlled by the Communists! This is huge! Except it's not, um, lizard people huge. But I guess the lizard people are controlling the media which is being used to control the teenagers which is being used to turn them against the status quo.

Oh man. I thought it was bad when I guessed the theme of this comic might be about seeing how Martian Manhunter is one of the good minorities. But now it's even worse because isn't this a bit, um, Jews Control Everything? I'm getting scared, guys. Hold me?

Jones confronts Phil and he spontaneously combusts. At least that's what it would look like to a detective who isn't investigating in a holistic way! Phil was probably murdered by the lizards for saying too much about Cuba to a non-lizard head! Preston Presley (or whatever his fake DC Elvis name is) runs into the office screaming about how the lizard people are all over the building. Jones points out that there's not easy way out of New York because the cops are corrupt. Preston, being the king of rock and roll Juvenile Delinquents, says, "Duh!" But Prelvis has an idea! They can take his pink Cadillac and escape! Time for the climactic chase scene!

Patty Marie was on The Big Question Junior. We saw her briefly in a previous scan. I think her mother slash agent was a lizard head.

Prelvis manages to evade the cops and the trio head over one of the bridges to escape the city. Prelvis sees a sign for "Leavitzville" and claims, "That's where we can go to be safe! The suburbs!" Oh man! The naivete of people in the '50s! Just this night I was listening to Rush's Subdivisions and thinking about how crazy it is that so many people think of the suburbs as some idyllic setting. Even The Monkees saw how terrible it was! But as they drive into the suburbs thinking that they're going to find safety, I breathe a sigh of relief because I now know that Gerard Jones isn't writing a story about how some minorities are good or how the Jews control everything. This story is about critiquing white supremacy in America! Hallelujah!

Oh, sorry! I know some of you hate when comic books have messages that point out that the things you believe are the things bad people believe. But you know, y'all also think that somehow that's a new thing and hasn't always been the case. Probably because you're all so fucking stupid!

Martian Manhunter: American Secrets #1 Rating: A. This comic books gets an A but it was close, man! If my reading comprehension hadn't kicked in at the last moment due to Gerard Jones slapping me in the face with the white supremacy theme by having Martian Manhunter escape into the destination for all the white flight motherfuckers of the '50s, I would have been all, "This comic book gets a D+ for making me uncomfortable with some of its messaging!" Of course, I could still be wrong! There are two more issues left and for all I know, Gerard Jones might end with some kind of message proclaiming age of consent laws are the true subjugation of freedom. Oh yeah, and your mom likes her toes sucked!

Hmm, I've got to work on my debasing people's moms material.

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #30 (May 1992)

Oh no. Is Batman going to punch a pinhead in the pussy this issue?

I know using the word "pussy" sounds vulgar and immature but I'm just trying to be anatomically correct! If I were to say Batman was going to punch somebody in the vagina, we'd have to assume there was a little bit of non-consensual fisting happening and I'm not okay with that! I mean, I'm also not okay with Batman punching a pinhead in the pussy but that's why I typed "Oh no" first!

If Batman winds up beating the shit out of a bunch of deformed circus freaks, he's going to lose a little bit of my respect. But not a lot because it would be ableist of him to refuse to beat the shit out of somebody just because they're living with a birth defect or some other abnormal condition. I mean if they were attacking him first, of course! I don't think Batman should punch a guy without a lower jaw bone in the upper jaw bone just to prove that he believes in equality. I will say this though: if Batman does get into a huge brawl with Two-Face and his new friends, I might give Matt Wagner some side-eye because he probably came up with this story on the sole premise of getting to draw Batman battling a mob of circus freaks. And the idea probably made him chuckle!

I'm doing a lot of speculation which isn't fair to Matt Wagner. I have no idea how he came up with this story. I'm sure it was in an intellectual way and not at all in a degrading or toxic way that involved drinking with his old college frat buddies while reminiscing about how they helped out with the Special Olympics while mocking the athletes the entire time. I only mention that because I knew this guy, Soy Rakelson, who was in a fraternity that did that. But I don't think Soy was ever, "Do you think Batman can take on all of these athletes at the same time?", like Matt Wagner must have done to come up with this story.

Previously, Batman has been captured by Two-Face and strapped to the front of a blimp. Two-Face doesn't quite call Batman "Secret-Face" but he may as well have. He plans on dumping Batman's dead and unmasked body on the top of the Gotham State Building where the dirigible will refuel before flying to the island that will become Deformed Nation. Two-Face leave him for the time being to deal with Sexy Space Pirate Lady's boyfriend.

Yeah, he's not dead. I forget fictional media loves to play this sort of trick with tranquilizer guns.

If Batman winds up fighting all of these characters, I'm just going to stop writing about the comic book and spend my time scanning every single panel where he punches one in the face.

I don't know why Two-Face didn't kill Wren earlier when he's just going to kill him in a few hours. I guess he's got some real estate business to clear up for Two-Face. In the meantime, Wren learns the truth about Sexy Space Pirate Lady and why she was working for Two-Face.

Damn! She was clean shaven not even six hours ago!

I'm not going to say Sexy Space Pirate Lady looks even hotter with a beard. But I will say she looks a little bit like Lobo and, well, if I think that makes her hotter, just shut the fuck up and deal with it, okay? Seriously, though, how does her having a full beard change how fucking hot she is? I wouldn't even ask her to shave it if she were my girlfriend because shaving is a pain in the ass. The main reason I usually have a beard (other than the sideburns and goat-strip which I almost never shave) is because I'm fucking lazy and I own my own business so nobody can tell me to fucking shave if I don't want to. Shaving sucks. And it must really suck if you grow a full, lush beard in less than half a day! It took me until about fifty to where I have to shave at least once a week if I want to stay looking smooth and sexy. Yeah, once a week and even that's too much for me! I guess I'm blessed by my not-too-hairy Spanish DNA.

While Wren's deciding whether or not he's into thick facial hair on the hottest woman who has ever shown any sexual interest in him, Batman makes his escape.

Why the zebras? Was it ever explained?! Do I even want to know?

Do you think Alfred has ever casually brought up the dangers of Batman having acid in his glove? "You know, sir, you do punch a lot of people in the face. Are you positive it can't accidentally trigger?" Probably not because Batman would just respond, "Shut the fuck up, Alfred."

Sexy Space Pirate Lady explains that her facial hair does indeed grow so fast that it's not worth removing, especially since she'd only be doing that for the acceptance of the shit status quo males of the world. Wren seems to be one of them because he's terrified of her even though she's still so fucking sexy (although far less piratey and spacey).

I just realized I'm not attracted to her because she looks like Lobo; I'm attracted to her because she looks like me in my twenties!

Of course I mean her face and not her body. Holy shit if I had her body in my twenties? You'd have gone blind if anybody ever shown a UV light on me I'd have had so many dicks pumping their love cream onto me!

Batman sneaks off, does a little investigating, and determines the location where Two-Face and his gang are hiding out. I thought they were all in the blimp's hangar but I guess not. He still has time to save Wren since Wren, after rejecting Sexy Space Pirate Lady, is tossed in a cell with D'urberville. Just think! He probably could have gone to live on an island with Sexy Space Pirate Lady if he just hadn't been so besotted with status quo ideas of femininity and gender! Dude should have listened to his dick that was almost certainly screaming, "What beard? What's a beard? Why are we running from her?! Get me back in that warm moist comfortable cave where I can throw up again!"

In th cell, knowing that Two-Face will eventually kill Wren, D'urberville feels comfortable exposing the secret that allowed him to be blackmailed.

Oh gross.

I'm truly disappointed by D'urberville's deformity. It didn't have to be a massive cock hanging from his chest but it could have been so much more than this. If I had two massive hands sticking out of my stomach, I'd at least put some Mickey Mouse gloves on them. I don't know how he's been hiding those things all this time. I guess he tucks him down the front of his pants but that's just going to cause a whole other problem! Plus, how much damage can two extra hands do to your reputation in upper crust society? Surely everybody's hiding some mutation caused by inbreeding.

Batman arrives a bit too late to see D'urberville's goodies. He finishes cutting through the bars on their cell's window just as Romulus and Remus enter the cell to kill off their prisoners. Batman kicks their asses without any qualms because even if they're extra tall albino twins, they're just a couple of average henchmen in Gotham. It's not until he's grabbed from behind and turns to find Two-Face's new entourage that he hesitates to commit violence.

They would have respected you more if you broke some of their arms!

Batman has already forgotten the lesson he learned in the latest (at the time) annual for Legends of the Dark Knight! If he's going to walk the path of violence, he has to absolutely commit to violence! But without murder, of course! He couldn't even kill Hitler, the big softie!

Just because he refused to punch a pinhead in the pussy, Batman, once again, finds himself at the mercy of Two-Face. At least this time, Two-Face explains the Yin-Yang symbol and the zebras. It's so underwhelming that I almost didn't mention it. But I know if I were a lonely loser on the Internet who still reads actual blog posts instead of 17-minute-too-long 20 minute YouTube videos and dozens of pre-selected short videos, then I'd want to learn why Two-Face stole the things he did. Well, here it is: the Yin-Yang sculpture will be the crest of Two-Face's Deformed Nation while the zebras are its mascots. Yeah, I don't know why. Are zebras deformed horses? Is that something I've never learned until now?

Two-Face flips his coin to find out if Batman should die or Wren should die. Wren loses the flip and is taken aboard the blimp while Batman remains on the ground tied up. A few minutes later, Batman is once again joined by Wren.

If only he hadn't been so constrained by society's gender norms!

Batman tried to save Wren's life and take his place but Two-Face wouldn't be swayed away from his coin's decision. At least Wren fucked up Bruce Wayne's sweet island deal so Batman doesn't feel too badly about his death. He spares a single, sad synopsis of Wren's life before rushing off to stop Two-Face once and for all.

Batman just roasted half of the Internet.

Batman, being the handsome, dashing, has-everything Bruce Wayne, crashes through the windshield of the blimp to stop Harvey creating a Utopia for those society has ostracized for no other reason than they unsettle members of that society. Two-Face points out that his mission is honorable and just. But Batman is all, "Yeah, but you killed some plastic surgeons and a criminal real estate guy! Surely I have to ruin this for everyone because you didn't go about it just right!"

Luckily for Batman, he's not the only one who doesn't think Two-Face went about this the correct way.

For some reason, this reminds me of Boxing Helena.

In Boxing Helena, Jennifer Lynch tells the story of a man who obsesses over a beautiful woman. He kidnaps her, cuts off her limbs, and places her on a pedestal, literally turning her into the object of his love. But in the end, when she's rescued, the men who discover her are horrified by her appearance. The man who turned her into an object became the only man who could only love her for who she was. But freed from his captivity, Helena had become nothing more than a pitiable object in their eyes. This story isn't that. But something about the way Two-Face has viewed the freaks as reflections of his own torment speaks to me in the same way Boxing Helena did. He treated them superficially, as objects themselves. They are deformed therefore they must be unhappy. But he never bothered to actually learn anything about them. By assuming they needed to be rescued from the hell of society, he took away their agency. But what can anybody expect from a guy who thinks zebras are mocked by horses?

Two-Face severely damages the dirigible when he fires the gun and it crash lands just outside Gotham where a circus has recently been set up (it was mentioned earlier but I didn't think it was important!). Two-Face makes a run for it and Batman give chase although he acknowledges he must hurry and help the wounded. But he also respects that these people can take care of themselves! Two-Face enters the circus and runs right into one of the performers: The Man with 2-Faces!

This guy's had sex four times?! What am I doing wrong?!

Heh, I'm being naïve and silly! Just because this guy has four kids doesn't mean he's had sex four times. He may have only had sex once or twice and gotten twins or quadruplets! My masculinity isn't threatened by that at all!

Harvey may have the gun to this guy's head but I don't think he's allowed to shoot him because the coin came up heads and that's the good side. But it doesn't really matter because Batman catches up to him, disarms him, and says, "Enough." And I guess that's all it takes to stop Two-Face because he's back in Arkham by the next page!

The story ends with Bruce saying to Alfred, "You know, I'm a lot like Two-Face!" And Alfred saying, "But you don't murder." And Bruce saying, "Hmm. Yeah. Well." Then there's a shot of the clock that hides the Batcave that opens using the time his parents were murdered and some talk about fate and I guess what goes unspoken is how one reacts to the fate that befalls you. You can go crazy, listen to a coin, and murder people on a fairly regular basis. Or you can go crazy, dress up like a bat, and try to prevent murders. A little Yin, a little Yang. A little black, a little white.

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #30 Rating: A+. I think this might be my favorite Batman story. It's definitely my favorite Two-Face story. Matt Wagner not only tells an intriguing story loaded with lovely Batman and Two-Face appropriate themes but he also draws the everloving shit out of it. It's beautiful! And the panel and page layouts are often inspired! Just an absolute joy to read. Man, am I going to have to buy every issue of Grendel now?!

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #29 (April 1992)

Batman's gonna do a sexy little dance for us now.

I absolutely remember how excited I was to purchase both this run of comics and Shadow of the Bat. I don't even know what it was about them that lit a fire in me since I'd never really read many Batman books. I didn't even begin picking up Legends of the Dark Knight until it had been going for two years. And I don't think I continued to buy either series past the end of 1992! And yet this series went until 2007! Not that I was buying comic books in 2007. Or 2006. Or 2005. Or 2004, really. I stopped buying comic books in March of 2004, the month the final of issue of Cerebus was published. It just felt like a good time to stop, especially since I was, at the ripe old age of 32, having trouble remembering all the story arcs of the many different books I bought each month. By that time, I think I was mostly reading Marvel, Vertigo, and independent titles even though I'd been a DC fan for most of my life. It just seemed all of my favorite writers were suddenly doing Marvel books and my loyalty had long since gone over from individual characters to the writers themselves.

But none of that has anything to do with Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight unless it does! Because by 1992, maybe I understood that the writers were the absolute most important part of the comic book equation for me (yes, even more than the artists) and the reason I was so excited to pick up this book was seeing Matt Wagner's name on it (also the artist so, you know, art is important too, I guess?). That could also explain why I was excited for Shadow of the Bat as well since Alan Grant was doing that book. So there you go! I do know why I picked up these books! I knew I could trust myself to ramble my way to an understanding. It's how I come to all of my conclusions about life, like how the moon landing was faked, Bigfoot is actually extra-dimensional (unless he's from the kingdoms of the Inner Earth), and all royalty from the bloodline of Charlemagne are lizard people.

This issue begins with introductions of all of Two-Face's new friends. I'm going to let the scan be my commentary on it or else you're not going to respect me in the morning.

It's not that if I comment, I'll be insulting. It's that I'd wind up labeling which ones I want to fuck and why.

Okay, fine. 1, 3, 6, 7, 10, 12, 14, and 15. Oh, and obviously 16! I may despise the overly lawful who use violence as a means to control the populace but, come on, he'd be a great fuck, no?

Now, I'd rather not apologize to David Finch for the way I mocked his ending of the first issue of The Dark Knight at the beginning of The New 52. Don't get me wrong! I won't and never will! Two-Face declaring for no reason at all the he is "One-Face now" was a massive misplay on his part and an even massiver misplay on his editors' part. Because what I think David Finch was going for was that Harvey Dent was no longer part of Two-Face at that moment. He was trying to make Two-Face scarier by having him lose his conscience. What else would he call himself if one of his faces was suddenly gone? Well, you know, One-Face. But that's fucking stupid because we all have one face. His declaration wasn't grand! It was normal! It was boring. "Oh no! You only have one face now? So, congratulations, I guess?" I blame the editors more than Finch because they should have been all, "Okay, look, I get what you're trying to do here. But that's certainly not the way to do it. This is possibly the most ridiculous thing a Batman villain has ever said in the entire history of Batman villains saying ridiculous things. Work on it, my dude." I imagine everybody in the DC offices calls each other "my dude", especially Gail Simone. But she says it sarcastically and in a way that totally hurts your feelings, like maybe she doesn't actually think you've got any dudeness in you at all?

Anyway, I bring this up because Matt Wagner, in a way, beat David Finch to the whole "One-Face" declaration. I said I was worried about something like this happening in Wagner's first issue simply because he named this story "Faces". But then there was a moment I willfully ignored last issue where Two-Face calls a guy who's directing some workers to place a sculpture in the exact right place "Precision-Face". Well, guess what? Two-Face has found a One-Face this issue. I brought up David Finch and how he made a mistake doing it. I bring up Matt Wagner doing it because it works.

Aww! Sweet little One-Face!

Just for the record and for the curious: no, I would not fuck One-Face. Christ. Get off the Internet, you sickos.

I really enjoy pretending that the people reading my blog are more sick and perverse than I am! Or maybe I'm not pretending? Y'all are fucking gross, right?

Two-Face's wonderful dream of a world where he and his deformed friends can live without judgment by those who have been subject to a narrow belief of beauty has to do with the island he's trying to buy out from under Bruce Wayne. Assuming that all of the "sideshow freaks" he's gathered together have come of their own free will, Two-Face might be the hero of this story. But according to Batman's research, he believes some of these people were taken against their will. I guess that's enough for Batman to shut this whole scheme down without having to admit to himself that it's because he wants that fucking island for himself.

Batman's currently trying to keep the next possible plastic surgeon safe from being murdered. The next possible victim is a doctor who has a twin brother which is right up Two-Face's compulsive alley. The Gotham Police tail the men when they're about town and Batman has decided to break into the surgeon's home to investigate for danger.

It's practically just like reading Grendel!

After a night out celebrating his birthday, the plastic surgeon comes back to his second home which Batman has thoroughly searched. He sits down to relax with a cigar and a brandy but he doesn't get much relaxing done because the cigar blows his face off. Batman, spying on him from the window, seems shocked because he thoroughly searched the humidor! Is the humidor that thing in the toilet that cleans off your butt when you've had a messy poo?

Ha ha! Just kidding! I know what a humidor is! It's that thing that Batman searched thoroughly!

Batman, so angry that this guy died on his watch, punches a hole in the wall. He then tapes a $500 bill to the hole and moves a painting over it to pay for the damage. Jim Gordon finds it because he notices the unfaded part of the wall where the painting obviously had been hung previously. He then asks Batman why he moved the painting, understanding exactly what happened much quicker than I pieced it out (it took me forever to figure out what the fuck Jim and Batman were talking about!). Batman's answer is basically, "I didn't want a dirty fucking Gotham cop finding and stealing the money!"

It turns out, the surgeon was poisoned with some poison that loosened his bowels so that methane leaked up into his esophagus. Lighting the cigar caused it to ignite and blow his face off. I'm surprised the guy wanted to smoke a cigar and drink some brandy when he must have smelled his own shit breath. If your breath starts smelling like shit, you should probably go immediately to the hospital. Unless you just ate some shit. Then, you know, carry on, I guess.

While Two-Face plans his perfect community with One-Face, one of his sneaky freaks brings him some information he just learned about the guy who currently owns the island that everybody wants. He broke into the guy's house and spied on him as he got undressed for bed.

I bet D'urberville has a tail! Or a cock so large he'd be allowed at the "One of us!" table.

Later Bruce Wayne meets D'urberville at the First Gotham Bank and buys the island, with witnesses and a ten million dollar down payment to boot! Wren is there and signs the forms as a witness to the transaction. But since he's now Team Two-Face, he probably signed the witness statement as Ben Dover.

Batman can't figure out which plastic surgeon might be killed next because he has no hard evidence of any of them living a "double life", which seems to be the ones Two-Face has been after. Alfred tells him to trust his instincts although I wish Alfred had told Bruce to flip a coin. That seems like the kind of joke Alfred would make. Maybe he normally would but Batman has been so on edge with failing to save any of the plastic surgeons so far that he might have actually taken a shot at Alfred for being snarky.

Batman follows a guy who lives on Second Avenue since it's the only real clue he has. Two nights after the last murder, Batman follows the guy to a seedy motel where he's meeting a prostitute. Evidence of a double life! Or an addiction to sex workers. Or having a fun secret little sexy roleplay with his wife. But I'm sure it was none of those things since I'm not the world's greatest detective. I'm sure Batman already thought of all of those things.

I wish he would have waited to gas them after two or three panels of dick sucking.

Sexy Space Pirate Lady breaks into D'urberville's apartment and threatens to expose his secret tail or massive cock (which appear to be located on his chest as he instinctively tries to hide whatever's there when Sexy Space Pirate Lady steps out of his closet) if he doesn't renege on the deal with Bruce Wayne and sell the island for one dollar to her real estate cousin (who is actually the Anton Ecole, the no-legged man. Apparently having a massive cock or hideous tail hanging off your right pectoral is so embarrassing that fifty million dollars isn't enough to salve the humiliation. So D'urberville agrees to her terms.

Bruce expects to get his down payment back but Wren gives the information on the payment to Two-Face's real estate man. Then, for being a good boy and doing the unethical thing, Sexy Space Pirate Lady pays him a visit. And Batman doesn't gas them before we get to see some side boob and butt!

Wren definitely jizzed in his pants in panel eight.

Sexy Space Pirate Lady also seems to think that "couch" is how you say "penis" in English.

Bruce confronts D'urberville and D'urberville willingly admits that he's being blackmailed by the other buyer. He hopes that Bruce will just let it go so he doesn't have to explain how his life is going to be ruined. D'urberville tells Bruce the name of the other buyer is Count Enance and Bruce is all, "Countenance! As in face!" Yeah, so? What does that matter? God, Batman's constantly grasping at straws!

Realizing that Two-Face is the other buyer, Batman puts all the other pieces together. A dirigible was stolen the night Batman saved the plastic surgeon from his prostitute. So it looks like every step of the way, Batman was involved in trying to stop the distraction. I mean, the distraction was murder so obviously that was what he should have been doing rather than saving a giant Yin-Yang symbol, two zebras, and a dirigible. But having learned of the island and the zeppelin, Batman realizes Two-Face will use it to take all of his kidnapped deformed friends to this island. Batman heads off to investigate the blimp and discovers some zebra poo and a crying baby. Except the crying baby turns out to be a full grown but deformed man who grabs him while some of Two-Face's other thugs sneak up on him and knock him out. That image on the cover? That's Batman strapped to the front of the dirigible!

Also, Wren gets shot in the gut by Sexy Space Pirate Lady when he can't leave well enough alone and goes after her for a second fuck. You'd think Two-Face would have allowed two fucks! Oh! Maybe he did! I guess they really did fuck on their first date. That would explain why he needed to be shot trying to get laid a third time. That's a huge Two-Face no-no.

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #29 Rating: A. Matt Wagner writes an intriguing Two-Face story! It feels like a Batman story I'd never read before which is really hard to do (especially since I have read this exact story before back in 1992!). Great art. Spectacular Matt Wagner panel layouts. Some sexy naked lady shots. And a Batman that isn't too overconfident or too powerful. He's not making mistakes but Two-Face is absolutely outwitting Batman the whole way. Probably because Two-Face's ultimate goal isn't really a crime! He's just setting up what he calls "Deformed Nation." Of course Batman would think Two-Face murdering plastic surgeons was the main crime. Why wouldn't he want a bunch of plastic surgeons dead? I haven't even been disfigured and I'm pretty sympathetic to the idea!

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #28 (March 1992)

My Legends of the Dark Knight collection beginning with #28 because Matt Wagner.

I'm absolutely positive that I picked this series up because Matt Wagner did this story in it. But I continued to collect this series because I really loved the conceit. A complete story about Batman told every three to four months. This might be what you expect as well from Batman or Detective Comics, you might be thinking. But did those have beautiful covers that told you the name of the story right up front on every issue so that you knew, right from the start, which story was ongoing? The art direction on the covers of this series was probably half of the reason I continued to collect it. I think maybe Shadow of the Bat was similar which is why I also collected that for some time, possibly because it began with a story by Alan Grant. I think that series actually put on each cover how long the story would go so you knew how long you'd be skipping it if you saw Scott Lobdell or Cullen Bunn were writing it that month. Not that those two ever wrote it (I think?) but I couldn't think of any names of writers from 1992 whose DC work I couldn't stand. I was fairly easy to please back then so I'm not surprised.

Matt Wagner, of course, was responsible for Grendel and Mage. I read my friend's copies of both of those around 1990 or 1991, I think. I won't say which of my friends that was because all of his passwords were Grendel and might still be. I wonder if I can log into his Apple TV?

I don't think this story is called "Faces" because Two-Face grabs Batman at some point and yells, "I'm Two-Face no longer! You can call me Faces now!" Yes, David Finch, that was a shot at you when you created the dumbest moment ever in the DC Universe. Congratulations! You're the worst!

Matt Wagner begins this issue with some new Two-Face lore as he sits in a cell in Arkham and masturbates.

He can't come until the coin allows it.

Harvey Dent escapes Arkham at 2:22 AM as some kind of clue to Batman that he's Two-Face again although the fact he strangled the guard to escape was a pretty good clue itself. Batman begins the hunt for Two-Face. Instead of searching for Two-Face constantly though, Batman does the smart thing and looks for him at times when Two-Face might be active: two days after his escape; two weeks after his escape; two months after his escape. But Batman can't find him. So after giving up because I guess 22 days or 22 weeks or 22 months don't mean anything, Batman attends a fancy dress party held by the Gotham French Consulate exactly two years after Two-Face escaped. That's probably significant, right? Even though 24 months isn't. Or 104 weeks. Or however many days are in two years which, importantly, aren't 222 of them.

Bruce Wayne is dressed as Inspector Javert from Les Misérables because that's the most Batman character ever.

Bruce might also be dressed as Napoleon but that doesn't make as much sense so forget I even mentioned it as a possibility. One of the reasons he's at the fancy dress party is because he wants to buy a French Guiana island from a rich friend of his attending the party. The guy somehow acquired it but can afford to maintain it. Bruce's rich friend is dressed as albino Julius Caesar. He sells the island to Bruce for 30 million and now Bruce Wayne owns another island. The ginger real estate agent, Wren, is told to finalize the paperwork for the deal as Javert and Caesar rush off to find some dames to shag. But Wren doesn't immediately finalize the paperwork. Instead, he comes in his pants cause a sexy lady winks at him. So maybe Bruce doesn't own another island!

Do you think Two-Face is in the Charlie Brown costume? "I'm Two-Face no longer! You can call me Sad Face now!"

Coincidentally, the sexy space pirate has come to the party with her cousin who's a really big real estate investor. Before sexy space pirate lady can manipulate Wren (unless simply getting the information out of him that the owner is selling to Bruce Wayne?), somebody screams! What's really suspicious is that the scream doesn't interrupt the information passed on to sexy space pirate lady; the scream interrupts the kiss that almost happens afterward! Like it was a *GASP* perfectly timed plan!

Due to emergencies like this being possible, you shouldn't be allowed to go to a fancy dress party as Donald Duck if you're a fucking doctor. Ridiculous!

Since this murder took place exactly two years after Two-Face escaped Arkham, and also because the murder weapon was acid eating away somebody's face, Batman believes this was caused by Two-Face. But he believes it was just a distraction! If I had just been murdered by Two-Face, I'd hope that people wouldn't think of my murder as a distraction but think of it as a fucking murder. A crime has just been committed, Batman! How is "murder" a "distraction"?! Batman's as bad as the Democrats! They claim every authoritarian act by Trump or the Republicans is a distraction that shouldn't be dealt with because it's pulling them away from the real issue. But the real issue is always something they're not fucking dealing with either! Enough with calling things a distraction! They're all fucking problems! Solve them all, you lazy bastards!

I mean, obviously if they're not solving problems, it's because they don't see them as problems. They just pretend they can't actually do anything unless people vote harder, allowing them to kick the can down the road while hoping the voting doesn't happen to the degree that would force them to do the job people expect them to do. Notice how when the Democrats control congress, they still can't do anything because there's always a few of them that go rogue? That's intended! No matter how hard you vote, and no matter how many democrats win seats in Congress, they'll always have just the right number of rogue elements in the party to keep them from getting anything done.

Back to Batman, now that he knows Two-Face has finally come out of hiding enough to cause a distraction, Batman thinks about what kind of double sided crime Two-Face might actually be committing.

Okay, sure, but what the fuck is Two-Face going to do with a gigantic Yin-Yang symbol?

Batman is correct but he doesn't manage to stop Two-Face and his gang (Romulus, Remus, and Snake-eyes). If the murder at the fancy dress party really was committed by Two-Face as a distraction, it was a stupid plan because without the Masque of the Red Death happening, Batman never would have figured out something was happening and almost stop him. Logically, that means the murder was meant to get Batman's attention so that Batman would try to interrupt him. That's exactly the kind of stupid shit Gotham villains do because they're all obsessive compulsive and have to flaunt their crimes in Batman's face.

The murder pretty much ended the vibe at the party so it breaks up. Wren gets mouth lucky with the sexy space pirate lady and they agree to meet up again in two days to maybe get other body parts lucky. But the next day, Wren is visited by a man with a red cloth covering half of his face. He's speaking in the same French accent of sexy space pirate lady and he wants to offer more money for the island than Bruce Wayne did. Wren begins to believe he was used which is a thought he should have had sixteen hours earlier when a beautiful half-naked lady was coming on to him so strongly. If she really wanted Wren, she would have put a hand down the front of his pants before the night ended and not just thrown him a pity kiss.

That's like the number one sign that a lady likes you: she puts her hand down your pants. If she doesn't do that, she's probably not serious about fucking you and almost certainly using you for your business acumen. You might as well learn that lesson as quickly as possible, young guys reading this who maybe shouldn't be reading this because I write about super adult stuff like women putting their hands down the front of men's trousers or using them for their real estate contacts.

Oh! Another way to know if a woman is into you is if you're at the ice skating rink and she keeps throwing herself across your back and squishing her boobies up on you and laughing at all the stupid nerdy virgin shit you say. I definitely didn't have any business expertise at fifteen that that young lady would have been manipulating me for so she probably totally wanted me. Although nothing happened but that's because I didn't say, "Do you want to leave the rink and go out front behind a bush so we can take our pants off?" Man, that would have been a great closing line! Totally would have got that deal done!

Wren decides to alert Bruce to the counter-offer because he's a good real estate agent trying to get his 10% fee as high as possible.

It's not hand down the front of your trousers but an extra two million commission isn't so bad!

I don't actually know how real estate agents make money so if I'm wrong and you know how it really works, smarty pants, replace all of the stuff I got wrong with how it actually works instead of complaining about it.

The next evening, Wren has sex with sexy space pirate lady on top of a skyscraper. I think. Maybe they just kiss again because she has to leave for Paris in the morning.

Judging the outrageously different covers of these two books, I'd say she did not fuck him at all.

I don't remember Matt Wagner drawing such magnificent breasts in Mage or Grendel.

I don't know if this is important or not but her cousin is missing both of his legs. Plus he's American so he couldn't have been the guy with the French accent who tried to outbid Bruce Wayne on the island. That guy also had a red cloth covering half his face but I don't think that's any more important than the guy missing both his legs. Lots of people love to cover half of their face when they do business.

Batman's at a loss for how to find Two-Face after he got away with a massive Yin-Yang symbol. Sure, Batman hurt his arm so badly that night that he couldn't give chase to Romulus and Remus riding away on the cart carrying the Yin-Yang sculpture. It was probably to fast for his Batmobile to follow. Or maybe too easily lost in a side alley. Or perhaps, since neither of those suppositions are true, Batman just doesn't care like he used to.

Having no other clues other than that a plastic surgeon was killed on the night Two-Face committed his crime, Batman checks out all the other plastic surgeons in Gotham to find one that may be the next likely victim. He finds one celebrating his 22nd anniversary by going to the opera. Sure, it seems unlikely that Two-Face would know about a plastic surgeon that was having his 22nd wedding anniversary two days after he killed the plastic surgeon on the 2nd anniversary of his escape from Arkham. But then this was probably all planned from his cell in Arkham via whatever means inmates had in 1992 of discovering information. Does Arkham have a communal computer with a Prodigy connection and the Mozilla browser?

Anyway, Batman's hunch was right because the plastic surgeon is shot in the middle of the opera. Batman hunts down the assassin instead of leaving immediately to find Two-Face's real crime since isn't this probably a distraction too?

See?! Forget the murder! Two fucking zebras were stolen!

What's the assassin going to say? "Some unknown clown paid me to kill some socialite jerk"? That's every fucking day of the week ending in "day" in Gotham!

So what could Two-Face be planning? He's stolen a Yin-Yang symbol and two zebras. The link in common are the colors: black and white. Black and white. Black. White. OH MY GOD! Two-Face is going to start a race war!

Under torture, the assassin tells Batman that he met Two-Face in France. I'll pretend, for this comic book's sake, that torture actually does provide accurate information. Especially since the man in the red cloth mask meets up with Wren that same night and finds that he's willing to work to get this man the island if he pays him 25% of the total sale. A-ha! So my 10% was probably pretty close, no?! The man leave's Wren's place in a limousine suspiciously like the limousine of sexy space pirate lady's cousin! Plus the man with the mask spoke with a French accent! Plus the man in the mask with the French accent meets up later with Two-Face and takes off her mask and, I mean, I think it's a her and I think it's sexy space pirate lady. It makes sense, right?

The issue ends with Batman learning Two-Face has a link to France. France once owned the island that Bruce is trying to buy. A mystery French person is also trying to buy the island and that person works for Two-Face. Plus the woman who is probably the mystery French person has been manipulating the real estate agent so that Two-Face can ensure that he winds up with the island. But for what reason? To store his Yin-Yang symbol and his two zebras? Or to make it a home for all of his very bestest friends in the world?

Two-Face's very bestest friends in the world.

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #28 Rating: A. Has Two-Face become a defender of the deformed and misbegotten? Is that why killing plastic surgeons isn't just a distraction at all but a necessary evil in his war against those who would enforce a certain standard of beauty? Is Two-Face the real hero in this story?! It feels like maybe stealing the things that have to do with the number two might be the actual distractions. Two-Face wants to buy an island for his misfit friends! A Utopia where nobody will ever treat them poorly! A place where they can hang out with their two zebra friends and shout "One of us!" all day long! Oh, plus I just love Matt Wagner's art. It feels so effortless and looks so good!

Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea: The Newsletter #2 (Third Week of December, 2017)

E!TACT! #2
Detective Comics, Justice League of America, Suicide Squad, Action Comics, and Other Assorted Bullshit
By Grunion Guy

Batman Detective Comics #970
by Tynion IV, Bennett, Regla, Loerzer, Jaime, and Wright

I only included the "Batman" part of the title because it's right there on the cover even though Batman is hardly ever in this comic book anymore. Now, I don't mind Batman not being in Detective Comics. But if they're going to stick "Batman" right on the title, I sort of expect him to be a major player. In reality, they should replace "Batman" with "Tumblr's" because Tynion IV seems to be writing this comic book to a quite specific audience.

Following that statement, I feel I need to add this paragraph that doesn't actually need to exist. But people have forgotten that they don't need to exist in a constant state of defensiveness (like the one I'm in right now which is causing me to write this paragraph to defend against the people in a constant state of defensiveness (it's like our current ability to engage in any kind of social dialogue has become a monstrous Ouroboros)). But being that we're all constantly feeling attacked, I can understand that a simple statement of observed reality (such as "Tynion IV is writing to a Tumblr audience") can be construed as judgment. Believe me, I'm not judging the book on its content. By all means, let Detective Comics be about the younger generation trying to fix the older generation's mistakes while uplifting minority viewpoints and calling out bullshit like authoritarianism and ableist memes extant within Batman (and other comic book) tropes. But please, at the very least, make it fucking interesting! It just seems like Tynion IV is incapable of that last bit.

This comic book is simply boring. I suppose if you can't get enough of the Tim Drake/Stephanie Cluemeister drama, you've probably rubbed this comic book against your genitals a half dozen times since it came out. But for those of us who want a compelling story that doesn't rely on the old mainstay of "Batman is bad and everybody thinks so" crutches, it's disappointing. If you want moving and entertaining stories that include all that "Tumblr audience" stuff that everybody probably believes I'm rebelling against because I wrote that line that caused me to write that other paragraph and they're never going to believe the other paragraph over their initial reaction to that one line, tune in to Brooklyn 99 or watch Master of None on Netflix. The writers of those shows are giving us a glimpse into the future. Whenever people complain of a piece of pop culture pandering to a certain audience, it's usually because they're having a difficult time dealing with the transitional phase between "shows with all white and/or male concerns" and "shows that take all perspectives into account." And that response is only amplified when the writing is terrible (or even mediocre. Like in Detective Comics). But the writers of Brooklyn 99 and Master of None (and I'm sure many other shows that I either haven't seen or aren't thinking about right now) develop shows that seem to exist in the post-transitional realm. These are shows that exemplify how stories can exist in a realm where all kinds of people exist. And they do it naturally because that world is just fucking natural (at least to the people living in the bubbles which aren't actually the anomaly bubbles but the bubbles of exemplary social conditions). I'm certain stodgy people who often find themselves saying things like "I'm not [insert difference]-ist!" probably couldn't sit through those shows either. But fucking hell what I wouldn't give for James Tynion IV to write something even half as good as those shows. I might be up for his Detective Comics at that point.

As a final aside (because I mentioned Brooklyn 99), I wanted to mention how I've been rewatching Deadwood and there's that part where Wild Bill is helping Bullock and Star build their shop when two guys stop by to talk to Bill. As I was watching the first guy critique Wild Bill's acting ability, I yelled out, "It's Hitchcock!" I'm so happy that Hitchcock lived in Deadwood and that he didn't seem too far off from his modern version.

As for the story itself, I suppose I could try to push my way past my own boredom to see what Tynion is trying to do. He seems to be examining the problems of Batman as an authoritarian forcing his own beliefs upon not only the social system he feels somehow responsible for but for the "family" he's taken under his wing as well. He is, literally, the Patriarch and Tynion's stories so far have been to expose his weaknesses and failings. Just because he's a white male of the previous generation, it doesn't mean he knows everything and it doesn't make everything he does okay. As a white male of the current generation, Tim Drake is struggling not to fall into the same patterns of patriarchal abuse of the system. He wants to do things differently but he's been failing because his need to control everything mirrors Batman's way exactly. But it isn't just Batman's authoritarian technique that's the main problem.

Enter Anarky. Here, we have another white male who knows best how things should be. It's the complete opposite of the way Batman wants to control Gotham but it's still just another white guy telling everybody how they should live their lives. Caught between these two men (Red Robin and Anarky) is Steph. Not only is she struggling with these two men telling her how she should be, she's also living under the shadow of her supervillain father. She has tried to find her own sense of agency by rebelling against her dad's ways (as we saw in the interminable Batman Eternal) only to later lose that agency in her relationship with Tim (who is so smart, how can he not constantly tell her what to do?!). Rebelling against Batman and the others when Tim seems to have died, she manages to find herself in Anarky's clutches. Eventually Steph will realize that these men never fucking listen to her and she'll figure out her own thing. Maybe. It's hard to hope that it will happen because she's been lost for so long.

The B Story between Cassie and Clayface is more compelling but it's hard to get emotionally invested when Cassie is reduced to speaking in her pidgin language.

The C Story about Kate dealing with her father and Batman I mostly already discussed in that part about Steph, Red Robin, and Anarky. Just replace all the proper nouns.

As for the Victim Syndicate and the city turning on Batman (can I call it "turning on Batman" when they always seem to hate him all the time now anyway?), I'd rather not write about it because I'll hurt my neck falling asleep at the keyboard.

Justice League of America #20

By Orlando, Petrus, and Hi-fi

I haven't mentioned this in quite some time but did y'all know Lobo was in this book? He's right on the cover this issue so I can't imagine anybody passed it by on the shelves. The most typical reaction was probably "HOLY FUCK! A COMIC BOOK WITH LOBO?! I JUST RUINED MY UNDERWEAR IN A SEX WAY, THE SPECIFIC WAY BEING DEPENDENT ON THE GENITALIA INSIDE MY PANTS! EITHER WAY, I'M NOW ALL GOOEY! I THINK. WOMEN GOO TOO, RIGHT?! I HAVE TOO HAD SEXUAL RELATIONS WITH A WOMAN!" That might not have been the most typical reaction unless you're also a closeted virgin who shouts crazy shit in the middle of your comic book shop.

This issue ends another story arc about a villain attacking a super group directly instead of the super group stopping a super villain from doing harm. I suppose Prometheus's plan was to turn everybody against the Justice League of America. And, I suppose as well, attacking a super group and endangering regular people during the attack is a good way to enact that plan. But Prometheus fucks up because this Justice League of America, from the beginning, has stated that they're the Everyperson's Justice League (at least Every Person from America, I guess)! So the civilians don't buy it (even though it seemed like they were buying it last issue) and they help the Justice League to save the day. Because ordinary people are strong as hell!

The story concludes with Lobo exposing Killer Frost's murder of a Null soldier in the last story arc. Instead of everybody going, "Wait. Why are we judging Frost when the person who got us to judge Frost is a well known genocider?! Why are we letting him off the hook?! I guess until he murders his first person while being part of the team, everything is peachy?", they go, "Oh no! Killer Frost! You've completely messed up your life and it's probably our fault for trusting you!" Killer Frost responds by saying, "No, no. It's my fault. Don't everybody get all up in my face with hugs and compassion. I'll take responsibility for my actions and ruin my life to prove that I'm remorseful." And then the JLA goes, "Whew. I can't wait until she's gone so I can stop feeling bad about myself."

The epilogue begins another story about a villain whose only plan is to attack a superhero (this time, it's The Ray's turn). Remember when villains didn't want to come into conflict with heroes?! I mean, I think there was a day like that. It's hard to say when people like The Riddler were constantly leaving clues so that Batman would eventually find him and punch him near to death. That's a fucking weird fetish, Riddler. But, you know, at least The Riddler wasn't just walking up to the Batcave, ringing the doorbell and calling Batman a cunt to his face when he answered. Like all these other villains do these days.

Suicide Squad #31

by Williams, Bagenda, Leisten, and Lucas

Ha ha ha! Hoo boy. That's some hilarious Narration Boxing from Harley Quinn. I don't think anybody has really died in the Squad since New 52 Suicide Squad #18 when Yo Yo was killed. Unless it was when Light was killed? I mean Lime. No wait. That was definitely earlier. Anyway, the people who have died in this comic book recently haven't really. Captain Boomerang. Reverse Flash. Even Rick Flag is simply in the Phantom Zone! I suppose it's good that Harley was the team member to have this thought because she's crazy. She might actually think there's been an extra person on each mission who has died.

Rick Flag Senior Senior dies this issue. I mean, he shouldn't die since he's in The Phantom Zone where time doesn't work. But he dies anyway. Maybe because he's simply in the foyer of The Phantom Zone? Anyway, his death doesn't matter because who the fuck cares about the Suicide Squad from two or three generations ago?! The only one that matters is the one from one or two generations ago! Shit, this one I'm reading now barely matters more than the original one I've never cared about.

Next issue, the Suicide Squad have to run down Karin who is driving a space station into the sun. So I guess the mission isn't an emergency or anything. It'll take her a few months to get there. And I'm sure the Squad has a faster ship than a fucking ginormous space station. Although does size matter in space? Since there's no atmospheric friction, does something being bigger help it to accelerate faster? I never claimed to be a scientist! Or smart even!

Action Comics #993

by Jurgens, Prado, and Hi-fi

Last issue, Dan Jurgens found a way to, once again, bring Booster Gold back into the DC Universe. How much extra money does Dan Jurgens get whenever Booster Gold appears in a comic book? Do "Created by" credits come with a monetary reward?

Last issue, Superman used The Flash's Cosmic Treadmill to go back in time so he could observe Krypton's destruction. I guess the Cosmic Treadmill also allows the user to travel through space? Or did Superman do that separately? Did he account for the amount of time it would take him to fly from Earth to Krypton before running back in time? I only ask that question because we all know Superman isn't as smart as Batman. He might not even be as smart as Hawkman.

I actually feel bad for saying that. I can't believe I'm about to apologize to a fictional character. I'm sorry, Superman. Nobody is as dumb as Hawkman. Except maybe Green Arrow. Although that's only in a figurative sense. And since I'm now speaking figuratively, I should probably point out that Aquaman is pretty dumb too.

Booster Gold joins Superman on a Krypton from an Elseworld's book (or should I say Elsewhen book?! Ha ha! Time travel humor that I totally didn't steal from this issue's Booster Gold since I actually stole it from the one person in every time travel movie who has to say, in response to "Where are we?", "Don't you mean . . . when are we?!"). The main difference on this Krypton is that  Zod and Jor-el are the best of friends. Like super best friends. It's so different and weird! How do writers come up with this stuff?!

Things get crazy on Krypton before Booster Gold ends the comic book by dropping the shoe off the other foot: he reminds Superman that he's powerless on Krypton! Oh man! What a jaw dropping last line! What a crazy twist reveal! I most definitely was not ardently screaming at the comic book the entire time I was reading it about how Superman would be powerless on Krypton so why was he being so stupid going back there and also this whole thing has reminded me of Scott Lobdell's Superman time travel to Krypton barf party so I might be a little bit crazy right now and have forgotten how to put together an understandable sentence. What I'm saying is: what a twist!

Other Assorted Bullshit

I still have a few comics that I'll probably read but that's quite fucking enough already, right? I've already passed my total word count record from the first issue: 2465 words. Is that a lot of words? That's probably two thousand, four hundred, and fifty words past TL;DR.

Judging by my weekly schedule of doing the things I need to do to maintain my existence, this newsletter will most likely go out on Thursday, Friday, or Saturday. So I've narrowed it down to less than half the possible days of the week!

If you have the inclination, I believe you can reply directly to these Newsletters and I'll get them. I'll respond to all replies that don't make me think "I don't have time for these stupid questions that I was told don't actually exist but they fucking do! They totally fucking exist! Just like monsters! And drunk fathers who abandon their children to the harsh verities of existence?! Why didn't anybody tell me the truth as a child?!" So join the conversation! And if you want to converse with other followers of this Newsletter, let me know if it's okay to publish your email and a name you'd like to be called that isn't "Fucking degenerate."