Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea: The Newsletter #5 (Second Week of January 2018)

 

E!TACT! #5
Kamandi Challange #12, The New Age of DC Heroes, The Overlooked: an RPG, 
By Grunion Guy

Kamandi Challenge #12

By Simone, Levitz, Sook, García-López, Thompson, Prado, Mulvihill, Crossley, and Martin

I still don't know what the fuck we were supposed to be solving!

At least when DC did this last time, they set up the DC Challenge as a mystery. True, nobody treated it like a mystery. Every writer just added more bullshit and more characters each month while ignoring the calculator clue that Eli Ellis was responsible for whatever the fuck the mystery was. I can't remember anything about the comic book except that, yes, I solved it before DC did. I noted the Eli Ellis clue that every subsequent writer ignored because Batman is a terrible detective when he has to rely on real people to do his work for him. I think one of the other clues Batman was supposed to decipher had to do with Benjamin Franklin being on the fifty dollar bill.

If your reaction to that last sentence was, "Wait. That's not right!", then congratulations! You're also smarter than DC Challenge's Batman!

But getting back to the Kamandi Challenge, what the fuck is the challenge? What am I supposed to be figuring out? I hope before they reveal the solution, they'll explain the mystery!

They didn't explain the mystery. But I guess the mystery was "Did you know Jack Kirby was Kamandi's father?" and the solution was, "Yep! Jack Kirby was Kamandi's father!" So the final issue was like that moment in Cerebus when Dave Sim sings a Pink Floyd song to his aardvarkian creation while they discuss the importance of the Injury to the Eye motif in comic books destroying the innocence of American children. Except with less misogyny.

Speaking of Cerebus, I sometimes wonder how many people were left reading the monthly book by the end. Probably less than ten thousand, right? That number might even be pretty high. Well, if you weren't one of those who made it to the end, let me explain Dave Sim's concept of the creation of the universe. See, there was this female void and this male not-void. And the female void was super sexy which caused the male not-void to want to fuck it. Now, the female was a void because she was empty of the creative process, being that her only reason for existing was henpecking and nagging the male not-void. But the male not-void was super creative and full of creative juices. Now, the male not-void would have created the best universe in the world with his great male creativity, but he was distracted by the female void, what with her basically being a giant, infinite orifice. And because he spent so much energy trying to please her so that he could fuck her, he didn't get any creative work done and the world suffered for it and became less than perfect. In other words, if you're a male, you should become a celibate hermit so that you can create a six thousand page comic book that doesn't suffer the influence of women. Although being that a good portion of that six thousand pages was all about how women ruin everything, it would seem that women ruined those six thousand pages anyway!

I don't think Kamandi Challenge is going to end as crazily although it begins that way with Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth, resolving some father issues with a godlike father figure cradling a massive phallic object. I hope Jack Kirby's final words to Kamandi aren't, "Don't trust women, boy! Not that there are any left. That's just general advice! What I mean to say is, 'Don't get distracted by your penis.'" Then he chomps down on his cigar and his eyes roll back in his head and he mutters, "Oh yeah. That's good oral fixation."

Oh. I guess Kirby is the anti-Dave Sim. He wants Kamandi to fuck!

Some of you that read up through Dave Sim's "Tangent" before breaking your connection with him might be thinking, "Your explanation about his creation of the world was in Mothers & Daughters. I thought you were going to explain some shit from the end!" And I did! It's just that the Mothers & Daughters creation story basically became Dave Sim's vehicle for explaining The Bible. Instead of one male God, he tells the Genesis story as if it were a back and forth between two Gods, the form and the void, or the male and the female. At least that's how I remember it. I'd reread it but I'm not sure I can muster the energy to slog through that shit again.

The issue ends with Bobo the Chimp saying, "This is what comics are about! I hope you had fun!" Well, fuck you, Bobo. I didn't have fun. This was worse than DC Challenge! Mostly because I hate reading 240 pages of  sucking Jack Kirby's dick metaphors. I'd rather have simply had a bunch of artists draw that.

The New Age of DC Heroes

Around the time Image cropped up causing the people behind the scenes at DC to begin shitting themselves over writer's and artist's rights to the characters they created, DC began thinking up schemes to create as many new characters as possible so they could own all of the ideas. There was that crap about Bloodlines which created nearly no heroes that anybody cared about and then some other shit about a meta-gene which might have had to do with the Legends miniseries. That might not have created new heroes as much as relaunched a few franchises like the Justice League and the Suicide Squad. But I had to add it to make my point because just referencing Bloodlines didn't seem like enough evidence of DC losing their minds about the potential loss of profits in having to acknowledge creator's rights. Plus the Legends thing fits in with this whole "New Age of DC." That's because this new wave of heroes will become extant thanks to the Metal Gene. That's my guess, anyway. I figured I should take a look at these up and coming heroes and judge them by their covers.

DAMAGE

I don't have any issue with Robert Venditti's writing, and I might, in fact, even like it better than most. But I'm not interested in reading a comic book that's probably not a complete rip-off of The Hulk according to DC's lawyers. Nor am I interested in seeing two to three double page spreads of this monster every issue. Here's Tony S. Daniel's quote on the book (which you've all probably read since it's in every issue of DC Comics sold for two or more weeks):

"As I grow personally and as an artist, it feels similar to how Damage is trying to be the best version of himself."

It seems odd to compare yourself to a character that explodes into a monstrous rage an hour each day but I guess it's provided me some insight into Tony's personality. I wonder if once or twice per day, Tony S. Daniel pictures himself in a double splash page? What would that even entail? I've probably had only a half dozen double splash pages in my entire life and they were the kind of double splash pages that I complain about because they would have communicated the exact same message as a regular panel. And, yes, my loss of virginity would be one of those.

Picture me climbing clumsily on top of the lucky woman who was about to obliterate my sexual innocence as I say, "Am I in? Am I...OH GOD YES! Um, sorry."

THE SILENCER

John Romita Jr. is artist on this series so if you hate subtle curves in your art, this might be the book for you. It's written by Dan Abnett who I've never found anything but sufficient. Apparently Romita fell in love with the boring name of this hero and just knew he had to bore audiences on this book. It's also possible I'm misremembering the back of the comic book interview with this "creative" team. If you liked that movie about those hot actors who were a married couple but also spies, you'll probably read this book and say, "What is this shit? It's a total rip off of that movie I love! The one with Lara Croft in it!"

Here's Romita's quote on the book: "That's what I like, something realistic and you add fantastic to it." Imagine how terrible all of his other quotes about this book must have been if that's the one DC went with. "I like real stuff but exciting! Imagine having real sex but with, like, a thumb up your butt! Real but fantastic!"

SIDEWAYS

This book's name was probably based on Kenneth Rocafort's inability to draw a standard comic book panel. This comic book is about Vibe except it's not Vibe at all. He's totally different for some reason. Maybe he's not boring? Although he's taken up the name Sideways, so he's definitely not creative or witty.

Kenneth Rocafort says: "I prefer to let my art speak for itself." Hey! Thanks for the fucking aggressive quote, asshole! "Hey, Kenny! How do you enjoy working on this new series?" "Why don't you look at this, bitch! BLAM!" The "BLAM" is when he shoves one of his drawings in the face of the interviewer. Later, the interviewer realizes she's now suffering from vertigo thanks to Rocafort's haphazard page layout.

THE TERRIFICS

Finally a book I'm excited about! Metamorpho and Plastic Man together?! Which one will be the funny one? Does the comic book have enough room for two funny characters?! Also Mister Terrific and Phantom Girl, for some reason. Plus there's mention of Tom Strong. What now?! Thankfully this is written by Jeff Lemire and drawn by Ivan Reis so I have no horribly judgmental insults to heap upon the creative team.

Ivan Reis: "Readers have never seen a group like this." Maybe Rocafort had the right idea. Maybe the artists should just keep quiet.

THE IMMORTAL MEN

This series sounds interesting except for one aspect: James Tynion IV is writing it. I might add it to my pull list anyway because how much could it cost per month? Jim Lee is on art duty so it'll probably only come out every other month, at best.

How is James Tynion IV going to write characters that have been around for centuries? Is this book going to be about a bunch of Immortal Men having to learn from their new millennial pal, Caden Park? Is he going to teach them about all the different genders which they can't possibly understand, being old and probably white and most likely male (see the "MEN" in the name!). I bet Caden is bisexual.

Jim Lee: "When you create new characters, you can kind of swing for the fences." Why didn't somebody help Jim Lee with his quote. The whole idea of the phrase "to swing for the fences" is that you aren't "kind of" doing something. I'd like to see how he draws this idea. Then maybe I'd understand it! Although I'd probably wonder why he had to scribble on the person kind of swinging for the fence's face.

THE CURSE OF BRIMSTONE

Wasn't Brimstone the big bad dude in Legends that the Suicide Squad had to defeat? Remember, I might read comic books but I don't remember them very well. The most interesting thing about this series is the name. I was intrigued when I read the name and then became less intrigued as I read the concept and then was completely out of intrigue by the time I read Justin Jordan's quote: "He's a character who wants to try and do good with a power that is fundamentally evil." That sounds like somebody trying to make a mountain out of a philosophical mole hill. Unless his power is evil because it only works while keeping people in other nations starving, what does it matter if the power is "fundamentally evil"? Does that even mean anything? Unless, like I said, it has some kind of huge negative repercussion on the world. Because if it does then Brimstone is definitely just a narcissistic douche rationalizing his heroism. But if it's just evil in the sense that it was given to him by the devil, who the fuck cares? All that really means is that the devil is probably kicking himself every time Brimstone helps people using his devilish powers.

Philip Tan: "I love world building, and this project allowed me to create the look." Fucking hell. Will somebody please stop asking the artists what they think?! It's pissing me off because I'm beginning to respect Rocafort's answer!

NEW CHALLENGERS

Somehow, this series isn't being written by Dan DiDio. Everybody knows who the Challengers of the Unknown are and this is more of that. But it's by Scott Snyder! So whoever missed the memo that Snyder's writing isn't as great as we all thought it was (and it was. I think? Remember that thing about me not remembering comics at all?!) will probably be excited for this. Since it's the "New" Challengers, I take it that means the team won't be a blond white guy, a brown haired white guy, another brown haired white guy, a black guy, a red headed woman, and some kind of talking animal.

Scott Snyder's quote about this book was so good that the blurb about the comic is just a repeat of Snyder's quote. But Andy Kubert's quote doesn't disappoint (if you realize that by "doesn't disappoint," I mean that it totally does and that's what I expect from artists): "I am so excited to do science fiction, dinosaurs and all kinds of things like that." So fucking Andy Kubert is excited to, like, um...I don't know...draw?

THE UNEXPECTED

This is written by Steve Orlando so I kind of have to give it a chance. Until I read something by Steve Orlando that is the physical equivalent of Orlando pissing in my face, he'll get my money. Here's a quote from the comic book's description: "It centers in on something we all face every day, wrestling with our pasts and the compromises we've made." I'm glad I'm not a friend of whoever wrote that quote. I hope I'm not friends with anybody who identifies with that quote. Who the fuck is spending every day wrestling with their past and the compromises they made?! Fucking dramatic assholes, I suspect.

Ryan Sook's quote was fine. Thank you, Ryan, for a passable quote by an artist.

So that's that! I look forward to reading two of the New Age of DC Comics comics! Or would that simply be "New Age of DC comics"? It's hard to tell when the DC should have the word comics following it as a proper or improper noun. Was improper the right term there? I don't really fucking care.

And Now...A Game!

The Overlooked

A Roller Playing Game based on the HBO series The Leftovers.

If I'm not allowed to base a Roller Playing game on somebody else's Intellectual Property then pretend I never said it was based on what I said it was based on, even if I'm allowed to do it because this is technically a work of parody. It's not really but I write so poorly that it would be hard for any lawyer to argue that it wasn't parody because everybody in the court room will be laughing at my terrible style and constant incorrect use of big words.

The Premise

It's been three years since two percent of the population disappeared in the blink of an eye. No wait! It's been five years because that makes it significantly different than the television show. And instead of two percent, it was three percent! Everybody has tried to get on with their lives by somehow trying to forget the horror of that day but while also being constantly reminded of that day every single day. That's the whole conflict in the Roller Playing Game! How does your Fantasyer deal with what happened?! How does your Character deal with all of the other broken people trying to deal with what happened?! Will you ever figure out what happened? Can you ever get your life back on track? How many dogs will you kill?

Character Creation

Don't think up a name for your character just yet! The first order of business is to determine if your Character wasn't overlooked! Roll Percentile Dice. If you roll a one, a two or a three, your Character disappeared on the Day of the Disappearance! You win because you don't have to deal with all of the other pain in the butt people going crazy! Congratulations! I suppose if that isn't satisfactory, you can try rolling up another Character. In this case, your new Character is closely related to the Character who disappeared. You should probably make up a story about how messed up your new Character is due to not having as much good luck as their vanished loved one.

            If your Character didn't vanish, you can name it now. You can decide yourself what gender it is and what kind of sex it likes. According to Tumblr, those are the most important attributes of a person after their name. Also race! Don't forget to not be a white heterosexual male because that's totally boring and probably evil. Oh! Unless you want to be an evil Character! There's plenty of room for those in this game! Remember that thing about shooting dogs? Probably only a white man would do that!

            Using those Percentile Dice, roll on the following chart to determine your family:

            01-10   Single, No Children   

            11-20   Married, One Child   

            21-30   Single, One Child       

            31-40   Married, Two Children         

            41-50   Single, Two Children 

            51-60   Re-married, Two Children    

            61-70   Widowed, One Child 

            71-80   Widowed, Two Children       

            81-90   Divorced, Three Children     

            91-96   Remarried, d6 Children        

            97-98   Pre-teen (Roll for family type)          

            99-00   Teen (Roll for family type)     

Next, roll for each member of your family to see how many members of the family you just discovered you had vanished on the Day of Disappearance! If you roll a 50 or less, the person vanished! I know that math doesn't match the math of only three percent of people vanishing from the face of the Earth but you don't want to Roller Play a Character who hasn't been affected by a disappearance, do you? I mean, I'll still make it interesting because remember how screwed up everybody was in that one town where nobody vanished? I mean the hypothetical town and hypothetical situation that I just made up while winking at you and poking you with my elbow and whispering so any lawyers in the room couldn't hear me. Add fifteen to each subsequent roll if a family member vanished in a previous roll. So if you have to roll three times and two of your family members vanished in the first two rolls, the third roll is at +30. See? That makes it hard for you to wind up like that one Character whose boobies you always got to see who was super into playing the role of a victim. Remember how she used to have hookers shoot her in the chest while listening to Slayer?! Normally I would have begun that by saying "Spoiler warning!" but if I say that here, it could be used against me in a copyright court of law. It's better if everybody just thinks I made that up just now.  

            If none of your family members vanished, you should roll on the following chart because you really should have been personally affected in some way. Otherwise you may as well play the Roller Playing Game "Nothing Particularly Unusual Has Ever Happened." And why would you play that when it would just be a simulation of your typical Saturday night!

            Person in Your Life Who Vanished  

            01-10   Your mother  

            11-20   Your father    

            21-30   The person you were doing it to.       

            31-40   The babysitter you were probably doing it to   

            41-50   Your best friend        

            51-60   Your nemesis 

            61-70   Your spiritual advisor (like a priest or rabbit or yoga instructor)      

            71-80   The taxi driver of a cab you were in           

            81-90   Your favorite celebrity         

            91-100 A person who was just about to murder you

Flaws

Each Character has a number of flaws that will help you to Roller Play them as they try to discover the mystery of the vanishing or just try to deal with their insecurities based on not having been taken too. Roll about five times on the following chart and hope that you can handle all of the psychological baggage that comes with being a troubled survivor obsessed with their own tragedy!

            01-03   Only attracted to people who lost somebody on the Day of Disappearance because they probably won't be as hurt when you dump them.    

            04-06   You believe dogs...I mean cats...are turning into people and taking over America.

            07-09   You hate your stupid family but keep pretending that you love them for some reason that I could never figure out.

            10-12   Your mother died the day before while you were doing smack in the bathroom which led to intense guilt about being the child of a rock star.         

            13-15   You can never relax because you're constantly annoyed by crickets and charlatans.  

            16-18   You were a star of a YouTube series and the only member of the cast who wasn't taken.

            19-21   You constantly masturbate because that's what you were doing when it happened and you're afraid if you don't keep picking at the pork pie, you'll wind up being taken.  

            22-24   You've joined a cult. See the Cult Creation section.           

            25-27   Voices in your head keep telling you to do things that are never mentioned at all!   

            28-30   Life is apparently meaningless so you've lost all inhibitions and engage in reckless behavior.      

            31-33   You were in an accident due to people disappearing and are now in a coma.    

            34-36   A doctor who was operating on you vanished while holding one of your kidneys and you really want it back.    

            37-39   You smoke just like every other person who can't cope with their life, especially without the constant unconditional love of a dog.  

            40-42   You hate your stupid family and don't keep pretending you love them, instead faking your own secondary vanishing.     

            43-45   You kill dogs on sight. I mean cats! Whichever, I guess.      

            46-48   You believe if you don't appropriate every culture you can think of, the world will end.          

            49-51   You pay prostitutes to shoot you while you wear a Kevlar vest and listen to Lionel Richie's "Dancing on the Ceiling."         

            52-54   You've invented a Roller Playing game called "Nothing Particularly Unusual Has Ever Happened" so you can feel normal.    

            55-57   You keep yelling at your television...I mean, at other people...that it's all meaningless and they really should just get over it already.    

            58-60   You constantly rain on other people's parades and even got a job that helps you hurt them because you hate yourself and your life and your really nice boobies.          

            61-63   You died and came back to life and now you think you're God but you're really just a jerk.   

            64-66   You worship an old lion that was able to get a whole bunch of boners because why not? Nothing makes sense anymore! 

            67-69   You think the people who vanished are the lucky ones because remember how much you can't stand your family?

            70-72   If you lost nobody, you only date people who lost multiple family members because you're sure to blow up that relationship easy!      

            73-75   Your father was a pedophile. This isn't as funny as you might expect. Or at all even. 

            76-78   One time you buried a bird in a box for three days and it survived and what the heck was that about anyway?!      

            79-81   You spent the last five years on top of a thirty foot tall pillar just to get away from your religious spouse.

            82-84   You pay strangers to spank you with an oar and shout the first name of your favorite fat comedian. 

            85-87   I'm glad they eventually explained the goat guy.         

            88-90   You obsess over minute details because big picture thinking makes you want to commit suicide.          

            91-93   You can't stop obsessing over your own problems and no longer have any empathy for other people. I think every character has this one.          

            94-96   Were there any cats in the series? I don't remember there being any cats! 

            97-99   You can't let other people believe the vanished ones were taken by the Rapture because what does that say about you if they were? Sinner! 

            100      Somebody left a baby on your porch and you feel better now because caring for something helpless gives your life meaning. But just wait until you lose it and you once again have to face how life is as meaningless as Lily was to the show.

Special Powers

Some people in this post-meaning world have been given special powers for some reason. Maybe they're not really special powers at all! Maybe they're frauds or there is some kind of scientific mumbo-jumbo behind it all. Who can tell?! It's not like anything matters anymore anyway. Just roll on the following chart, take your stupid special power, and consider yourself lucky! Or burdened, more likely!

            01-96   No special power! Ha ha!

            97        You can see through the disguises of dogs! Those sneaky mutts! You should probably kill them all!           

            98        You can't die! I don't know why you can't. It's not like it's ever explained in the show that this may or may not be based on!        

            99        You can hug people's pain away! This might just be a great big lie. But even if it is, it's a big hit with people of the gender you want to do it to!  

            100      You can tell people's future by making them do kindergarten art projects. This power is probably fake too. But play it as if it's real!

Cult Creation

After an event that seems to indicate the world ended (although suddenly losing two percent of the world's population doesn't seem like a bad thing, right? (I mean three percent!)), a lot of people lose faith in whatever crazy but accepted system of belief was barely keeping them tethered to sanity by providing a buffer against the possibility that nothing matters and we live in a careless and chaotic universe that doesn't have a special place in it for mankind. Since the old beliefs didn't stop masses of people from simply disappearing, maybe a new system of beliefs can help staunch the existentialism that's begun leaking in at the corners. That's where Cults come in! If you joined a Cult in Character Creation, welcome! You're about to learn your new rules to live by! This section should also be used by the Game Master to come up with some adversaries that aren't dogs or half-naked people.      

            First, come up with a name! This is easy. Just pick an adjective or an adverb and stick it in front of a noun or phrase. You should probably choose words that make people feel terrible. A good name might be The Penitent Fragment or the Sheepish Shred or The Regretful Oddment or The Conscience-Stricken Scrap. You can probably come up with one of your own since I'm running out of synonyms for The Guilty Remnant.         

            Second, you need to come up with some wacky rules. I suppose I could make another chart for those but they'd all be variations on what kind of clothing to wear and how to do your hair and make-up. Then the last rule would probably be about the conditions under which all the members would kill themselves. Your Game Master can figure that stuff out for themselves!

Random Encounter Table

Life is all about conflict! And in Roller Playing Games, that conflict is usually violent. But this is a special kind of Roller Playing Game! You don't get experience points for killing things. You just get more and more depressed every time you have an interaction with somebody until you feel like you can't go on with the charade anymore. This table will help drive Characters closer and closer to the brink!

            01-05   Labrador Retriever  

            06-10   Cocker Spaniel          

            11-15   German Shepherd     

            16-20   Poodle

            21-25   St. Bernard    

            26-30   Doberman Pinscher   

            31-35   Corgi  

            36-40   Greyhound     

            41-45   Australian Shepherd  

            46-50   Bloodhound    

            51-55   Cult Member 

            56-60   Guy with no pants on

            61-65   Truly happy person   

            66-70   Religious person        

            71-75   Dog hunter     

            76-80   Prostitute       

            81-85   Woman with no top on          

            86-90   God. Maybe.  

            91-100 A hallucination

Some Starter Adventure Ideas

Adventure #1: Somebody asks you if you're happy. Let the tragedy of your existence begin!

Adventure #2: Your teenager's best friend keeps walking around the house in their underwear and you really want to do it to them. Let the tragedy of your existence begin!

Adventure #3: Your best friend's parent keeps staring at you as you walk around their house practically naked. Let the tragedy of your existence begin!

Adventure #4: You live in a town where nobody vanished and everybody thinks your town is special. Let the tragedy of your existence begin!

Adventure #5: The cult in your town, Doggy Daycare Disaster, has been putting fireworks in unscooped dog dirt. Let the tragedy of your existence begin!

Adventure #6: Your father set all the National Geographics in the library on fire. Let the tragedy of your existence begin!

Adventure #7: You begin hallucinating. Or do you? Who can tell?! Let the tragedy of your existence begin!

Adventure #8: Have you seen any cats since the Day of Disappearance? Let the tragedy of your existence begin!

Adventure #9: Just let the tragedy of your existence begin already!

The Goal!

The goal of the game is to become satisfied with your life. I suppose I could make up some rule about how you accomplish that but who do you think I am? Some kind of Enlightened Master of Life?! I'm just as scared and anxious as everybody else!

    

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #33 (Early July, 1992)

Is this some kind of Kristallnacht subtext?

You can tell I'm a heterosexual male who's spent too many hours of my life in strip clubs because my first attempt at spelling "Kristallnacht" was "Krystalnacht".

For those young people who don't know anything about Kristallnacht (or just the superficial stuff), might I recommend the Wikipedia page on it or the local library and not trying to learn more about it via YouTube. But that's just me because I like to know more about reality and less about other whackjob's versions of reality as seen through being "red-pilled", the worst-named process in the history of the worrrrrrllldddd oh shit-well-don't-forget-to-look-up-Kristallnacht-because-I'm-being-dragged-away-by-a-tangentAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

If one were to watch The Matrix with the realization of what being "red-pilled" meant in today's (or a not-so-long-ago vernacular, anyway), one would think that taking the red pill meant that you didn't want to know reality and would rather have your mind poisoned so that you'd be angry and fighting phantoms on the daily. So you'd watch the movie and realize that Neo's life at the beginning of the movie was reality. But by being red-pilled, he started to see imaginary enemies all around him, made-up by the angry assholes who convinced him to take the pill in the first place. He spirals into delusion and madness which eventually winds up in a mass killing. The woman stranger sitting by me when I first saw The Matrix in theaters when it was released, a woman I often make fun of because of her reaction, may have been more right than I knew when she gasped and said, "The trench coat and the shooting! It's like Columbine!" Being red-pilled isn't about understanding the world at all. It's about being driven crazy by stupid bullshit until you eventually break and kill other people and yourself because you couldn't find joy in reality. You could only find joy in anger and resentment.

Oh, I got here because I looked at the cover which says "JEW" backwards on the broken window of a high-end shop. I'm sure there's also some kind of pogrom or holocaust reading of The Matrix as well but I'm not going to look for it right now. After this, I have to re-read Steinbeck's To a God Unknown which I read about a month ago was left thinking, "Wait. What?" I think I have a bit of a grasp on it but I need to read it again with the half-formed ideas from the first read (actually second since I read it about 30 years ago).

Oh, so now Gotham has a jewel thief to deal with too?

If you own jewels and you learn that somebody has been going around stealing people's jewels while not harming them or destroying their property or kicking their dog, then you're not now living in fear. Thinking somebody might steal your jewels, one small percentage of your outrageous wealth, isn't fear, you soft, smelly pieces of fucking diaper fruit. You can't report on a jewel thief and claim people are living in fear when some other guy has been, for way more than just two weeks, killing elderly people. I guess if you're over 63 and you have a massive pile of jewels in your home, you now find yourself spending way more money each week on Depends than before. But that's about it! Don't fucking bung up my television programming by declaring rich people are living in fear because they might lose what amounts to pocket change. I'll tell you what I really think: rich people actually should be living in fear! Every fucking day of their lives should be ruined by the worry that the masses are going to relearn how to build guillotines.

Batman doesn't give a shit about a burglar (except that maybe his dick twitches at the hope it's Catwoman); he's busy not being able to stop Mr. Lime the Old People Killer. He's so frustrated that he's smashed up the entire Batcave. Or maybe Bruce Wayne smashed it up because he's so scared of his jewels being stolen.

The attitude you can show to your boss when you can't be fired because you know his deepest secrets.

I bet Alfred has a massive Henry Hoover but he's painted a bat cowl on it.

The Batsignal is just Gordon needing Batman's help to stop rich people being robbed. Batman tells him to fuck off because he's busy trying to deal with crime that actually matters. He suggests Gordon contact The Cavalier since that guy seems like the type who would love to beat up a non-violent criminal and later be showered with adulation from rich folks. Gordon's all, "Okay. Sorry I bothered you but you know the police are really only here to protect rich people's property. I get that's not what Batman's about. You must not be a rich guy, I guess."

The Cavalier is currently busy telling criminals that drugs are bad and to not do drugs after he's beaten the shit out of them. I don't know about you but I'd rather let some people in Gotham do drugs than worry about people who do drugs getting fucking destroyed by some fop with a thin mustache in a bandanna. I know it's not an either/or situation but also if there wasn't a guy beating people up, I still wouldn't care about people doing drugs. Now I'm thinking there should have been an '80s anti-crack campaign that could have had Marie Antoinette saying, "Let them do coke."

The burglar who probably isn't The Cavalier, I'm totally sure of it, works for an evil man named Randolph Salt. I know he's evil because James Robinson spent several narration boxes describing how some people are evil and then other people are, like, really super evil! And Randolph Salt is one of those super evil types. Also he's basically white he's so pale which means he's not full of life's passionate juices. He's a dry, husk of a man. But he has something that the burglar wants and will only give it to him after he does one more major burglary. I hope it's not WayneTech or Bruce Wayne's mansion!

Oh yeah! I'd forgotten how the last issue ended because my brain had to process so much Objectivist bullshit in the interim! Cavalier had saved that super pale woman from killing herself. Could she be a relation of Randolph Salt, a man so evil that he drove her to suicide? And now is he working for him to earn her safety? I don't know because I stopped reading the comic book to write all of this speculation!

While The Cavalier obsesses over the woman he found and subsequently politely kidnapped, I guess, The Batman thinks he's figured out Mr. Lime's next victim!

Mr. Lime decided to just start shooting people now because there were too many variables in setting fires and hits-and-runs so Batman's a little more focused on events like these.

Batman hangs upside down over the stage like, um, a kid on a jungle gym is probably the best way to describe it. He's ready to stop Mr. Lime's faster-than-sound rifle bullet before it hits its so-fucking-old target. Nobody notices him up with the lights even though his cape hangs down about twelve feet. I guess it just looks like more stage curtains.

This motherfucker's talking about Batman Returns (in theaters now (back then!)!), isn't he?! Let him die, Bruce!

Batman notices the podium is ticking and he swoops down to save the old guy before it explodes. In the explosion, a piece of debris nails Batman in the base of the skull. He notices Ameche, the actor, is okay but Batman struggles to get up. Oh fuck. He'd better go to the hospital or he's going to go the way of Bob Saget and thousands of people's elderly grandfathers who fell off of ladders and were all, "No, no! I'm all right! Just a little Easter egg on the old noggin'!"

While Batman shivers and can't see straight and tries not to vomit on the old guy, the burglar begins their final burglary before Randolph Salt will give them whatever the burglar seems to need from them. Probably Ellen the Suicidal Pale Girl's freedom. While trying to steal the massive gem from a museum, he slips, falls, and sets off all the alarms. By the time he gets to the roof, the cops are there with spotlights. They light up his face and his whole life turns to shit because he fell in love with the wrong suicidal woman.

I mean, maybe don't wear your hero mask to your crime?

Nobody knew who the fuck you were, dude. You get arrested? You probably don't kill your career as The Cavalier if you leave the mask at home. But I guess this is the kind of shoddy planning you'd get from a guy named The Cavalier! Now the big dumb idiot is going to have to fight Batman. Luckily, Batman's had a recent head injury so the battle should be fairly even!

Batman knows he should be home getting a nice massage from Alfred but he's going after this non-violent thief who even the cops identified as committing the recent burglary crime spree because Batman can't stand being fooled. Batman's about to get himself killed from a swollen brain because his widdle bitty feewings were hurt when he was lied to by The Cavalier. On the other side of the chase, The Cavalier's just happy to have his adrenaline pumping. Motherfudging stuntmen, amirite?!

I'm publishing this post before the Watershed so I had to tone down some of my bloody swears. I was talking about the American watershed which doesn't exist but also where the simple word "bloody" isn't a stupid swear word. Not that American broadcasting doesn't care about airing adult material! They totally fucking care because they suck which is why I watch so much British television. But if America had to acknowledge a watershed, it would be from 10 PM to 6 AM. But, again, even at those hours, prudes gonna prude to the FCC by letters and emails.

The Cavalier throws a knife at Batman that disables his one-man Batcopter which crashes to the . . . what? Oh yeah! You want to see Batman's stupid solo copter? Or is it cute and adorable? I'm struggling as to how masculine or feminine I should be about the copter. Part of me is all, "OH MY GOD IT'S FUCKING ADORABLE! Why didn't Bruce paint it pink? Why isn't there a cute little chibi bat mascot on it?!" And the other half is all, "So stupid. It's totally stupid. How lame. Not cool at all. See how I'm not smiling even more than when I usually don't smile? I'm a fucking guy, man. I can't enjoy stuff. So stupid."

It's like a high chair for a big bat daddy.

The Batcopter may also be a flying toilet. Bats is definitely using it as a disabled vehicle here being that he can't swing on a rope without crashing through an apartment window.

Okay, so The Cavalier causes Batman's copter to crash but then Batman can't make his muscles work and he's about to die in the fiery wreckage. So The Cavalier, bewildered at Batman's inability to do anything cool, drags him from the fire and points out that he could have left him to die or killed him himself. So maybe take that into consideration maybe for when he's feeling better and winds up kicking the living shit out of him. Maybe go a little easy on him, you know?

Ellen tells The Cavalier to flee but he's all, "I have to get your ownership papers so we can fuck! It's totally worth maybe getting beaten by Batman and thrown in Blackgate!" And Ellen's lady place is all, "Whoosh!"

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #33 Rating: A. Was this entire series this good? Okay, minus the single issue "Family" by Hudnall which was just kind of bland. But James Robinson and Matt Wagner and Tim Sale? This is some great shit!

A Poem

The bar is my altar; the bartender priest.
The drinks my communion; self-loathing, my mass.
The rickety stool serves as singular pew.
The padded edge of the bar my head's kneeler.
The choir are patrons; their hymns pick-up lines.
Then later the john, a confessional stall,
Where redemption comes in waves.

— Grunion Guy

Ditko's World: Static #1 (May 1986)

I'm not smart enough to understand this, am I?

I don't know if I've ever read anything by Steve Ditko but my brain tells me I'm a fan of his simply because my favorite series of all-time is Peter Milligan's Shade the Changing Man, a character invented by Steve Ditko. And I only picked that series up when the first issue dropped because Shade had been on Ostrander's Suicide Squad. So if we work backward from Milligan's comic, my fave, to Ostrander's comic, my mainstream DC fave, and back to Ditko's Shade, I would probably find it mediocre! I'm just using mathematical graphs to produce logical results, you know. Or, and let's assume this is really the case, I would fucking hate it because Objectivism can kiss my puckered butthole. Now, I don't know for sure that Ditko's Shade the Changing Man had any Objectivist bullshit in it, especially since it was scripted by Michael Fleisher. I have to assume that Ditko's art and plotting of the story didn't hide any of Rand's idiotic version of nihilist existentialism in it.

But this comic? I'm fucking scared, man. Do I want to read a comic book written and drawn by Steve Ditko? Didn't I get enough slop philosophy splattered across my brain when I read Rand's Anthem and when my friend Soy Rakelson in high school used to try to gotcha debate me every chance he got? He was always derailed by my answer to his set-up debate question because it was never what he thought I would say and then he had to throw out his argument script. Like the time he asked me, "Do you think animals have souls?" And I answered, "Dude, I don't even think humans have souls." And he just looked at me like a dog that had his ball fake thrown one too many times and said, "Hunh," before ending the discussion. I don't want to paint Soy as a guy who followed Objectivism or even knew who Rand was in high school but he was definitely the kind of guy who would have celebrated her ideas if he'd ever read them. Has he read them? Let me check his Goodreads!

Soy seems to have rated (but not reviewed, the lazy bugger) every book he wants people to know he's read and one of those was Atlas Shrugged. But he only gave it three stars so I'm going to have to assume that he loves the selfish ideology but hated the way it was written. Maybe I should give him the benefit of the doubt and believe he outgrew his weird white whine views of the world and his constant need to debate dumb shit as he called himself the Defender of Western Civilization (which, admittedly, sounds really fucking bad in the current climate and, I'm hoping, he doesn't do anymore. I'd ask him but he disappeared in 2016 from social media when Trump got elected, probably because he didn't want to have to defend Trump but he also pretty much was on board with President Flopsweat).

Notice I just ignored the cover? You did? Cool! It's weird, right? Am I going to elaborate? Maybe later? Anyway, I am now going to attempt to read my first Steve Ditko comic book which I picked up at a garage sale for one dollar last weekend.

Stac Rae is an anagram of Caesar (with a leftover 'T'). This might not be notable because of the extra 'T' if not for Shade's name being Rac Shade, an anagram of Caesar (with a leftover "H" and "D").

I generally don't debate with people because communication is a sucker's game. The bit Ditko writes in the panel above is a good example of what I find so frustrating with talking to people. It sounds like Ditko and I agree: justice has become corrupted and generally ignored! But I've got a feeling we probably differ on our ideas of justice and what kinds of "justice" are being ignored. I have a feeling Ditko thinks more people should be killed for petty crimes while I think nobody should be killed for any crimes. At least not by the state, anyway! I'm not as ideologically pure as Jesus when it comes to redemption so if somebody wants to get vengeance, who am I to be all, "Don't throw that stone, you sinner," or whatever He said. Also, I've got no problem with somebody like John Wick or Daenerys Targaryen slaughtering hundreds or thousands of people because somebody killed their cute little fuzzy and/or scaly buddy. I get it, man. I get it.

Those heads on the front cover? They're allegorical representations of people in, and I'm going out on a quite sturdy limb with this assumption, an Objectivist view. You have the wishy-washy loser who society coddles, keeping him from ever achieving the greatness he could muster if he were forced to do it on his own. The happy one represents the Objectivist who sees things clearly. The angry one is the real bad guy, the Communist who celebrates the capitalist failure of others because he wants everybody to be equal. The hero is the optimist uplifting the downtrodden by not helping them at all but also not celebrating because they're too busy making that sweet, sweet capitalist cash by their own blood, sweat, and tears and with no help of anybody at all. And don't try to mention how much help they've gotten in ways that aren't even abstract but absolutely tangible, like born to people of average or better means, or being raised in a neighborhood that's properly taken care of by local or state government using taxes, or going to schools who are well-funded because they're in the right neighborhoods, or standing on the backs of all the scientists and philosophers and inventors who came before them. If some poor piece of shit didn't want to be a poor piece of shit from birth to death, maybe he should have squirted out from between the legs of some rich lady, you know? Idiot.

Oh, I mention them because they get an occasional comic strip throughout this comic book.

If you think this is profound and enlightening then you may have taken four or five serious blows to the head while growing up.

Most people can only argue philosophy in general terms like Ditko here because when you get down to the nitty-gritty details of reality, and actually have to speak on real subjects and how these ideas would play out in the society you live in, the philosophy doesn't hold any water. Ditko's arguing with Theoretical Strawmen here and tuning it, as best he can, to the idea of selling products in a capitalist society. So a four-times concussed adult reading this might think, "Yeah! I agree! If you sell Twinkies filled with shit, you deserve to fail! I don't want my taxes going to support your Shit Twinkies business!" But what's Objectivism is really saying is, "Oh? You were born poor from generations of poor people who had their wealth stolen from them and now you want the government to give you a hand out? No sir! I started a business with the money I received as an inheritance when my grandparents died so why don't you? Oh, too lazy, I bet!"

Okay, sure, I'm sort of doing the same thing there. Painting a general situation that portrays the world in the way that I see it. But I'm just arguing soft generalizations with soft generalizations! We can all play that shit. But at least I didn't write a book called Anthem that was lacking any kind of detail to support my points, simply labeling certain things as bad and then saying, "The society was based on this thing which I called bad earlier so that means the society was bad even if I didn't give any proofs or reasons for why or how that thing was bad. Also the main character who does everthing on his own actually winds up living in a house built by previous generations full of books and knowledge from other people who learns about pronouns only through these ancient books (after the woman he's with comprehends them better than he does) and suddenly proclaims that he did it all himself!" Sorry! I'm really just repeating my Anthem review now!

Back to the main story, Stac Rae works as an assistant to a Doctor Ed Serch who works at the Quest Research Lab. The story begins as the Doctor is being kidnapped by some men working for a mysterious The General. Stac and the Doctor's daughter Fera are currently on their way to the lab discussing, I don't know, Objectivism, probably.

Even Rand would understand this trope where the argument made by the guy is logical and the argument made by the gal is silly and irrational.

The ownership of the suit, Stac admits, belongs to the doctor. So when Stac admonishes Fera that the suit isn't hers to take or, that by taking it, she's somehow taken control of Stac's life and actions, he's admitting that it wasn't his to take either. So why does his theft of the suit trump Fera's theft of the suit when it belongs to neither of them? Why is she taking control of his life when she takes the suit but he isn't taking control of her life and actions (trying to keep Stac and the public safe from the dangers of an experimental suit) when he takes the suit? This is the problem with Objectivism. All arguments basically come down to "I want to do something and it isn't right if somebody or some government says I can't do it" (or the opposite where they don't want to do something, like mask, but other people and/or the government are admonishing them to do it for the greater good). Objectivism's main tenant is "Fuck the greater good. I gots to gets mine!"

Fera and Stac return to the lab to find the Doctor missing. But Fera doesn't suspect anything while Stac's Static-Sense is going crazy that something isn't right. A note left by the Doctor says he'll call. But even though Stac is suspicious, he can't find any proof that anything is actually out of the ordinary. Until The General calls and says, "Don't you dare try to find the Doctor! Don't call the police! We'll release him when we're done with him!" Then The General hangs up and is all, "Well, that settles that. They now know you've been kidnapped but won't do anything about it because I threatened your life as opposed to them not knowing you were kidnapped and probably wouldn't have thought much about it for a few hours, at least."

No! Not a power luster! *gasp*

It's hilarious how certain "ideologies" (in quotes because I'm actually discussing anti-ideologies) turn a person's brain into chunky gravy. Stac's entire thought process derives from believing some foundational idea and just processing everything through a veneer of the sweaty logic. "He didn't ask for money but everybody wants money so he must want the main thing that makes money which is the idea person behind it all which is how everything is produced — a smart person who definitely hasn't stolen anybody else's ideas — which means he's not capable of creating things so he must be trying to destroy things which means he wants easy power and money which means he's a DEMONrat! I mean a member of Buy Luxury Mansions! I mean a friend of hiLIARy! I mean a POWER LUSTER!" It's like they hear some shit ideology via a Rand book or FOX News which slides a cheese grater into their skull and every time they try to think, the grater jiggles up and down a bit and they just get dumber.

The General kidnapped the Doctor because The General has a sick weapon. You might think I'm being stupid but it's actually The General who's being stupid because he's really into anthropomorphizing deadly laser weapons. The first time he said it, I thought he was joking. But then he repeated it and instead of thinking he was some hack who thought his joke was so funny he had to repeat it until somebody acknowledged it, I decided he was completely insane.

Oh wait. I forgot the Doctor was totally into this sick weapon thing. Maybe that's just the way they say something is broken in their world.

The Doctor has a micro-specializer back at the lab so The General sends one of his henchmen to grab it. Of course it's a ruse! He knows that Stac will see the need for the tool as a call for help from Static! But now he just has to convince the most irrational woman in the world to give him the suit!

"Can't you see the logic? You're stopping me from making a decision by making your own decision and that isn't fair to me and my decisions!"

I can't wait for another "Heads" strip so I can learn why I should be so angry at taxes!

The Doctor decides to start curing the weapon while he waits for Stac to save him. Luckily, he finds several things wrong with it that The General broke himself to know whether the Doctor was being truthful. This leads the Doctor to think, "He's a master at being clever and counteracting the clever." Fuck, man, that's either the most clever thing I've ever read or the most counter-clever thing! I'm going to put it in my Bluesky bio!

I guess Fera gives in to Stac because he follows the henchman back to The General's secret lair and he's got the suit with him. While he looks for a way inside, the Doctor learns, with the Specializer he thought he didn't need, that many of the parts in the gun are defective. If he'd just done the obvious work, the gun wouldn't have worked anyway. But now he's going to have to fix it up completely, killing millions! Maybe. Or just, like, one really irritating squirrel? It's not like the Doctor knows what The General's plans for the weapon are. He might even be serious about sending the Doctor home after the sick weapon is cured! Just because some guy calls himself The General, has half of his brain showing through his skull, and kidnaps scientists while threatening the scientist's daughter with death, it doesn't intrinsically mean he's up to no good. He's just being productive!

By the time Static saves the Doctor, The General has amscrayed with the ungay. But Static knows how to find the information: torture and possibly killing! It's for justice and not because he just likes torturing and killing. And even if he did, isn't it his right to do those things?

I wish the Heads were here to tell me what to think about this.

Static catches up to The General who attempts to murder Static with his newly healed gun. He fails and Static manages to turn the gun on him, ripping him in half. Static figures without the gun and their leader, his followers will just sit around unthinkingly and collect welfare. Evil but not as evil as stealing gold from wealthy people using violence. Static collects the gun and takes it back to the Doctor who will make it sick again so the world will be safe from, well, one single threat. Hooray for free will and hard work or something!

Like whether or not to put an "e" in judgment.

The denouement portrays a scene where the Doctor wonders if he shouldn't destroy the suit because, like the gun, it could be used to commit unspeakable acts of evil. But Stac, who really, really, really fucking loves wearing the suit, tries to convince him that things aren't evil and you can't stop a new-born baby from turning evil so why not just let him keep the suit? He makes sure to throw in, as a major point of his argument, "Do gun triggers pull fingers?" Oh, wow, man! I thought Steve Ditko must be some kind of genius for all the work he's done in comics but it turns out he's just another 2nd Amendment chud with the most boring, cliché arguments that they all spew because they think in bumper stickers.

The story ends with Stac asking Fera why she's so sad and she's all, "Because I fucking listened to you and went against my beliefs, you asshole!" THE END!

But that's only ten pages! Still more to come! But first, next time in Static:

Five philosophies: 1. Objectivism; 2. A Terrible Philosophy; 3. Another Wrong One; 4. A Truly Despicable One Full of Empathy; 5. Socialism (Super Wrong).

After a one page comic strip featuring the Comic Kid who teaches us that emotion is built on logic and experience and aren't just feelings that can be fucked (is that what he said? I don't know. I didn't pay much attention to it because I distrust everything Ditko writes at the moment), the second story begins: "The Exploding Room". This one was drawn by Steve Ditko but the dialogue is by Robin Snyder. I don't know anything about Robin Snyder so I'm not going to celebrate yet.

Whew. Good thing I didn't celebrate. "The Exploding Room" was an eight page shit episode of The Twilight Zone about a hitman whose method of killing is blowing people up. As he goes about his day blowing somebody up, his path is almost crossed by a black cat, he breaks a mirror, and the man he does the job for doesn't give him the bonus he promised. What kind of idiot pays a hitman to blow somebody up and then doesn't pay them their full wage after? I guess he wanted to get blown up because that's what happens. But he survives for enough time after blowing out of the building to land at the feet of the Blow Up Hitman and express a dying curse that the hitman wind up exploding forever! And, for some reason, that's what happens. The guy falls asleep that night and just dreams of blowing up over and over again. Then the story ends and we're left to wonder if it was one night of bad dreams or he somehow entered The Mediocre Twilight Zone!

The final five page story, "Shag and the Uglies", makes absolutely zero sense. But a guy does push down a hot chick twice after she tries to slap him around. So that's cool! Or is it the opposite of cool? I'm so confused by how terrible the story was! The thrust of the story was that Jay (or "Shag" when he transforms) works security for some television variety hour. A guy in an ugly mask attacks the hot singer. Shag stops the attack but the guy gets away. Then Jay and his pals get together and go, "Let's be like Sherlock Holmes and solve this case!" And I guess they figure out who the attacker is but it doesn't fucking matter because he tries to attack the singer in studio again and is caught. So, um, what?

Yay! They figured out it was this guy before they caught him doing the same thing he was doing when they didn't know who he was! They're smart and it didn't matter at all! Hooray!

Ditko's World: Static #1 Rating: D+. I did not like it at all. What a waste of one dollar!

Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea: The Newsletter #4 (First Week of January 2018)

 

E!TACT! #4
Introduction, Batman #37, Justice League #35, The Wild Storm #10, and Other Assorted Bullshit
By Grunion Guy

Introduction

I'm a few weeks behind in my comic book reading because I've been rereading the Xanth novels (I believe I stopped reading them when I was too embarrassed to purchase The Color of Her Panties). And before you start in on the criticism of my reading choices, I assure you that I have a lot to say about these things that might assuage my seeming arrested development in literature choices! Somebody should use the Xanth novels for a master class on the male gaze in fiction and pop culture. It boggles my mind, with the kind of chauvinistic world view espoused by the novel, that A Spell for Chameleon received the Best Novel of the Year from the British Fantasy Society. Of course, that mind is being boggled from 2017 and as an adult. The book is forty years old and it shows. I can't help but wonder how much this book influenced my perception of the world when I read it (I think I was around twelve (I did not read it the year it came out so your math on my age is wrong. But not by much, actually)). Did I begin to mistrust my mother due to the influence of this series or was that really just based on her ever increasing bizarre behavior caused by my sister's spiral into teenage hormonal chaos? It's hard to say. But when somebody refers to "the male gaze," it isn't just about female superheroes in revealing clothing. I'll get more into it in a future post. Until then: comic books!

Batman #37

by King, Mann, and Bellaire

People exist on the Internet who claim to know good stories but then shit all over Tom King's Batman. It's nice when a review site hates on Tom King's Batman because then I know that review site is run by idiots. I should go back and review that issue where Catwoman wins a sword fight against Talia al Ghul because didn't that just set a lot of people's underpants on fire. It's like they think they're the most genius reviewer in the world by saying obvious things like "Tom King is shit because he wrote an inexperienced sword fighter beating one of the greatest sword fighters in the world." When I read criticism like that, I tend to think the person has low self-esteem and desperately needs to prove how smart they are. Because, yeah, duh! Of course Talia would have cut out Selina's heart in a few quick thrusts. But since she didn't, perhaps you should consider why Tom King wrote it that way. It's strange that people jump to the conclusion that the guy who wrote The Sheriff of Babylon would make such an amateur mistake as that. When a writer has shown their chops, you fucking trust that writer. Then you read that story and the only conclusion you can come to is that Talia wasn't trying to beat Selina. She was just baiting her for information and feeling her out. If Batman's going to marry her, Talia is going to want to know something about Damian's step-mother. At the end of the issue, Talia mentions to Batman how she approves of Selina, or how she likes her, or something. It's been a bit since I read it. Because that was the real point of the drawn out fight with Selina. To find out who this woman that Batman seems to love is.

Yes, I'm talking about the critics over at Weird Science. I sometimes read their reviews so I can shake my head in wonder at their incompetency. The other problems they had with that issue were why the Justice League wasn't waiting to battle Batman when he left the city and how they were all going to cross the desert again on just one horse. Unless it was two horses. I can't remember because who fucking cares about that kind of shit?! That's just the stuff you pick apart because you, for some reason, don't like Tom King. I mean, to be fair, I'd do it to a Scott Lobdell script!

I think part of the reason people don't like his Batman is because he avoids Narration Boxing. King stays almost completely out of the character's heads. So of course readers who have spent years knowing the exact motive of the character because the writer gives it to you in the modern day thought bubbles have their comprehension crippled when the author avoids doing it. And yet it makes a much better reading experience to not have the author hold your hand and spit on his finger and shove it up your ass as he wanks you off. I mean, that sounds like a pretty good experience too! But not while I'm reading.

The fact that the Weird Science blog loves Scott Lobdell so much makes my point, I believe. They love the finger in the ass wank job Lobdell gives. And he gives it hard, month after month!

While I'm on the subject of Batman, I should share KB's reply to Issue #2's Newsletter and my rant on James Tynion IV's Detective Comics #970. You'll notice KB thinks he's smarter than me. And, well, he isn't! I was going to type "Well, he is!" right there but my ego said, "NO YOU STUPID FUCKER! YOU'RE THE GENIUS!" Anyway, KB always has great insights into comic books. It's almost like he takes their pop culture importance way more seriously than I do! He hardly ever says things like, "I would fuck Tom King in the butthole if I ever accidentally stalked him home from a con!"

KB writes: "Thank you for sparing us the damage of reading Tynion IV's writing. I remember a time I thought he was a scrappy up-and-coming writer and I looked forward to his work. But whatever mojo he once had, he seems to have lost it."

Me: "Yeah. I remember when we thought he was going to do some good shit and then he made Talon undead. That comic was threatening to be interesting for an issue or two until he went in that direction."

KB: "It sounds like we run into the problem of, superhero comics can be a terrible place to explore the ills of society at large. The misogyny that's baked into our society is one thing; a guy protecting Gotham from everything that could destroy it because he's the only one who can is another. This is not to say that the Kates and Dicks and so forth don't do a good job, but we all know goddamn well that most of Gotham's survival is because of doings at the Batcave (and maybe 10% because the Court of Owls operates behind the scenes to keep their town profitable).

And also, let's go back to Why Batman Doesn't Kill The Joker: for all the ink spilled about how Batman is afraid to cross the line, the much simpler reality is, Batman doesn't see himself as an authority unto himself. Ultimately he submits to a system that has the power to incarcerate and, if desired, execute the Joker at any time. Batman operates to stop threats and keep Gotham safe (citizens and cops alike); beyond that he isn't interested in power. He works for the law; he isn't the law.

So if you're looking for a comic book analogue to power-drunk myopic sexist jerks, don't turn to the guy who built his life around using all his resources to keep law-abiding citizens safe AND make sure even criminals have their day in court (and, if they're willing to go straight, a job at WayneTech upon release)."

Me: "I could have come up with these insights if I'd wanted to! I mean, I love these points you've made. But you forget, in Tynion's world, Batman is an older white heterosexual male. So he's not as good a guy as you think he is! That's the end of my argument. That's just how it works. I don't have anything else to say because I already sound like an old, bitter, resentful white heterosexual male! But I'm not! I'm middle-aged!"

KB: "And delving into the real world, ain't it funny how morons on the Left dwelled and dwelled on Hillary's "corruption" -- 100% of which turns out to have been lies pushed by Republicans / Russians / Stein / Sanders -- while they barely paid attention to Trump's? I bet Tynion IV has a Jill Stein bumper sticker."

Me: "Whoa whoa whoa! Some of my Newsletter recipients might be Jill Stein fans! You can't say things like this! We're trying to make this a safe place for people who don't understand how stupid their political stances are! If you voted for Jill Stein, I'm not judging you! At least not openly! I mean, if we met in public and you mentioned you voted for her, I probably wouldn't be able to hide the disgust on my face! But you can't see my face in these newsletters, so totally believe me when I say I'm not making that face at all!"

I hope you bought all of that! It would be easier to pass off as the truth if I weren't so judgmental while reading every single stupid comic book I've ever read. I even mocked that Death Talks About AIDS comic from the 90s!

And now back to Batman #37! Just give me a moment to read it and see if I have any smarter than KB thoughts to share!

Nothing screams "METAL!" like everything this picture isn't.

I'm only a few pages in but I think I can understand why so many comic book reviewer nerds hate Tom King's Batman: IT'S SO FUCKING ADORABLE! I suppose this is the kind of thing they call "fan service" which, I mean, is that a bad thing? Because I'm being serviced like crazy here with how cute and adorable Superman and Batman and Catwoman and Lois are at the fair! I would think that "fan service" would be when the idiotic writer decides to make Batman and Superman punch each other in the face for fifteen pages...again! That shit is old! That's the shit that serviced my grandad's needs! Not that my grandfather was a grown man-baby stuck in a state of arrested development who could only find solace in the pages of a four color funny book! He was a war hero! I mean, he was in World War II. I mean, not like, fighting or anything. He had the sweet gig of chauffeuring for the army chaplain. Although he did introduce me to comic books, in a way. He used to drive around Santa Clara collecting newspapers for recycling. Whenever he got comic books in the stacks, he'd throw them in a box and store them in the garage. Those were the first comic books I read! Things like Hulk and Sgt. Fury, Agent of SHIELD. You know, shit!

Lobo! This comic book just got three times better!

This comic book has made me laugh about once per page.

Maybe that's my entire review? No wait! I have a good review: "If you really like to be entertained but you're a huge nerd who thinks they like whimsical things because you have a terrible drama student sense of humor but you actually hate real whimsy, you should avoid this comic book because it won't entertain you. It will just make you mad. You will be all, 'Why isn't Batman detectivating?! Why isn't Superman punching an alien in the dick?! What is with all this on-panel time with their love interests?! Gross!' But if you're super cool like me (the kind of cool that almost never leaves you as the wallflower at an orgy), this comic book could be your new best orgy partner!"

That review might sound confusing but it's actually one of my most comprehensible! Plus it has a little bit of Browningesque dramatic monologue!

Justice League #35

By Priest and Woods

Priest takes the style he used in Deathstork where he tells bite-sized morsels of story in one to three page chapters and applies it to the Justice League. By using this style, he seems to carve out more room to tell tales featuring ensemble casts where everybody gets a decent chunk of time describing their current problems and motivations. It fits really well around a group as large as the Justice League, a group that has so many marquee name talents. Like King's Batman, he's really concentrating on the characters and letting the plot resolve around the space he's made for the characters. It's so much better than just shoving every member of the cast into every scene and just making sure they each get one snarky line in combat.

Although it's probably too different for people who do blogs named after a movie from the 1980s. Was that reference too subtle? Probably if you write for that blog!

Although I do have one slight issue that has plagued my enjoyment of comic books for a long time. The story seems to be setting up one of those situations where the heroes become hated by civilians. I noticed that right off the bat because the story was called "The People vs. Justice League." I just want my heroes to be heroic, you know? I hope one of the new Metal heroes will be a hero that goes around killing people who get angry at heroes. His name could be Negative Reinforcement.

The Wild Storm #10

By Ellis, Hunt, and Buccellato

This comic series magnifies the main problem I have with comic books (as does Tom King's current maxi-series, Mister Miracle): a well thought out and deliberate story that is well worth your time and effort to really study closely suffers in the medium. This is a 24 chapter story which the reader must read in monthly installments. I'll be damned if I keep anything close to a reasonable amount of retention on the subtleties of the plot over that kind of time. If I were reading a novel and set it down for one month before picking it up to read again, I'd almost certainly start the danged thing over. Every scene, I need to strain to remember who the fuck each character is and what organization they work for and who runs that organization and whether or not I've come to determine if they're a mostly good or a mostly bad group. I suppose if you were a huge fan of the Wildstorm universe previous to this, it would be easier. But my knowledge of the Wildstorm universe amounts to the characters in The Authority (and maybe Stormwatch, since, well, you know), Grifter has red hair and hangs laundry on his face, and Zealot doesn't know how to apply her makeup. So you'd understand if I'm a bit confused by much of it.

But that hasn't decreased my enjoyment of this series (I mean, I don't think it has? Regarding Mister Miracle, I've been keeping each issue stashed in my bookcase so I can reread the entire series straight through when it's finished)! I appreciate writers who don't just treat their comic book writing gig as a chance to vomit up an action sequence every month tied together by ideas that wouldn't even pass for good Young Adult Fan Fiction. I want to read a story that's either been planned from the beginning or, at least, written to the end before being used for the comic (the difference being, if you can't quite parse my statement, a planned story is written based on an outline where the writer knows exactly what they want to happen and the journey the characters will travel to get to the end. A story written to the end can be the writer just seeing where it goes as they write it but know how it finishes before using it as a professional piece of writing so that they can revise and tweak it so that the character arc matters in some way. As opposed to...oh, let me just pick a random writer...Scott Lobdell who obviously writes a twenty page story every month that goes wherever his mind takes him and then begins a new twenty page story when it's time to write the next month's script which may follow the story from the previous issue in only the shallowest of paths). The thing is, I want a story to have a point. I want a story to say something. And, generally, when you're just writing to fill pages and collect a check, you're as blank as Hugh Grant at the beginning of About a Boy.

Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea was meant to be a reminder of each story from month to month. But I grew bored with that "book report with dick jokes in" style. So now I'm doing this. Anyway, another good issue that kept the story moving along. I think. Who is Bendix again?!

That was a joke! Of course I know who Bendix is! It's Kenesha/Savant that I have no past knowledge of! I keep thinking she's Angie when she's on-panel! Is that racist?!

Other Bullshit

The top of my stack has a few books that will probably wind up being blog entries: Metal #4, Michael Cray #3, and Doomsday's Cock #2. If that burns me out on talking about comics, maybe the next Newsletter will be about Piers Anthony's chauvinistic Xanth series.

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #32 (Late June 1992)

Shit about to go down! Batman finally faces a guy with a knife!

I wonder if this is the story about the first time Batman had to fight a guy with a knife? More likely it's about his first time facing the League of Assassins or Kobra or a bunch of guys with knives and kanji tattoos that read stuff like "This side up" and "impotent white guy" (so like Kobra or the League but more local and more lame). I'm suggesting Batman will be fighting a gang or an organization because the title is "Blades" and not "Blade". Although that might just be so Marvel doesn't get all up in their ass crack with lawyers. I could glance at the covers of the next two issues but I want to be surprised! Also, I'm already looking at the cover of the second issue in the story (because of the way stacks work) and it's no help.

Before we get to the comic book, I need to scan the inside cover advert because, hoo boy, guys. GUYS.

Intriguing! I didn't think I was into watching hot women take shits until just now.

I've often said that every single fucking company in the world needs a Department of Cynicism so that they don't wind up making hilarious errors like this advert for Catwoman: Defiant. Every department would just be a room full of the most clever and observant men and women that exist in every friend group (you're all thinking of somebody right now!) sitting around playing video games or Dungeons & Dragons. Every time the company comes up with an idea that's going to go out in the public, just slip it under the door. They'll pass it around and within a few minutes, you'll know if you accidentally just marketed a Fleshlight to toddlers.

I mean, that advert is super hot though. I can see why whoever okayed it was all, "PRINT IT!", without looking too closely because they just wanted to begin masturbating as soon as their office door was closed.

The issue begins (I mean after the Catwoman's ropy shit advert) with Batman investigating the scene of a long gun assassination.

Batman's smarter than I am so I'm not going to question "Bullets fired from a long-range rifle meant food left uneaten." I guess if somebody broke in with a pistol and shot them, they'd have finished their breakfast?

Mr. Lime, the assassin, can't be the focus of this book because a long-range rifle isn't a blade. Wait. Let me check something. Hmm, yeah, okay. Yep! The OED backs me up on this!

The OED is the Oxford English Dictionary, just in case that was a mystery to you. I feel like everybody knows that but then everybody I know also has a degree in literature so it's worth it to feel like I'm overexplaining. I hate to leave in an "IYKYK" moment. Whenever I see anybody take the time to write "If You Know, You Know" or the acronym, I get angry because I'm all, "You have time to explain! Stop gatekeeping your trivial information! Let me be somebody who knows!"

Let's contemplate an assassin that would take the name Mr. Lime. Is it because he fires bullets into people's coconuts? IYKYK!

You don't have to tell me I'm a hypocrite! I've known that for decades longer than you have!

As we, the readers, learn more about Mr. Coconut in the main panels of the book, long, vertical side panels on each page tell the story of a fop vigilante getting all dressed up like Porthos to make his Gotham debut.

I've never read The Three Musketeers but I have played the text adventure game about it which, luckily, managed to keep the memory of the novel alive! But I couldn't remember the names of any of the four Three Musketeers so I checked IMDB.

Normally, this caption would read, "Nice! Milla Jovovich is in this!" And then my dick would find out where it's streaming. But instead, this caption reads, "Second woman on the cast is just 'Blonde'. Fucking Patriarchy."

I'm sure Helen George was labeled as "Blonde" simply because the cast is probably listed in the order they appear on-screen? I wish IMDB had notations under each actors name in IMDB that read "Shows tits" or "Shows Dick (flaccid)". I think the only person with "Shows Butthole" would be Anne Heche in Psycho.

Batman begins his analysis of Mr. Lime with "The world is overpopulated. That is a fact." Since he's only thinking, nobody standing around him (meaning Alfred) mutters, "Nice. A billionaire hoarding resources that could be used to alleviate the issues with current overpopulation, making the current population actually sustainable, complaining about other people existing. Not a great look, Master Brood."

Bruce doesn't actually express an opinion on overpopulation other than labeling the population being too much over an unspecified number a fact. He's just coming to grips with Mr. Lime's reasons for killing, scrawling them down in his little Bat Notebook. Mr. Lime only kills people over the age of 63. He kills them in a variety of ways: rifle, slit throats, forcing cars over cliffs, hit and run. I guess he mails the police after to explain that any random death of an old person in Gotham was his doing. Or maybe he's just reading the obituaries and taking credit for when old people die? I bet it's some fourteen year old on some local Gamma World Bulletin Board dialing in and leaving cryptic, poorly spelled confessions in forum threads about turning toasters into explosives (in-game, of course! With flow charts and dice rolls and advantages for having certain mutations).

Later that night, The Fop makes his debut as he stops a mugging.

His actual name will probably be something like the Swashbuckler or the Devilish Dandy of Gotham.

His name is The Cavalier which I have to applaud for the various meanings that can be applied to it (probably not this one though: "an adherent of Charles I of England"). But to my credit, Merriam-Webster's online definition for its use as an adjective to mean "aristocratic" contains the example, "portrayed the plantation owner as a cavalier fop". His attitude as well as his dress speaks to his moniker. He acts as if he's filming a dramatic scene as he battles the muggers. By the time the police arrive, they're basically standing and applauding, throwing roses and hiding boners. Batman's going to hate that they love this guy!

Gordon wonders if this new vigilante will be trouble, especially since Batman's mind has been consumed with Mr. Lime. Gordon can't understand it because Gordon doesn't know Batman is secretly a young boy still nursing the wound of his parents' murder by a violent criminal. Gordon can't see that Mr. Lime represents every pain, every confusing thought, every grieving second of Batman's life. Is that why he's Mr. Lime? Because the lime's acidity burns when it gets in old wounds?

By the way, sometimes I get distracted while reading and reviewing a comic book. Most of the time, there isn't any external evidence to my having wandered off to fuck around on the Internet or play some video games or take a nap. But I just got distracted and there's physical proof of it. Here you go:

I'm so subtle!

Batman stops by Gordon's office to pick up police files on Mr. Lime. While he's there, Gordon points out that the people of Gotham really love this Cavalier guy. Batman's all, "If they love him so much, why don't they take him out behind the school and get him pregnant. Also, I'm not mad. Please don't print in the newspaper that I got mad."

Man, writing is easy when you just steal other people's jokes! No wonder ChatGTP can write so much so quickly!

Also, Batman really is mad. I think his eye was twitching when Gordon told him about the lovable scamp, The Cavalier. It's hard to know for sure because you can't depict with absolute certainty an eye twitching in a comic book panel.

Batman's notepad's getting a little scary when he starts sounding like Rorschach. Lines like, "But I'll win. I must. No more killings, Lime. No more tears. Too sad. Too sad." I guess it's not as poetic as a dead dog with his head caved in but Batman's new to this journaling thing.

Eventually, Batman "accidentally" runs into The Cavalier.

Oh, Batman! Remember this line 19 years from now when you finally learn about the Court of Owls!

I love how Scott Snyder's creation of The Court of Owls technically didn't retcon anything. We can always surmise while reading earlier issues that they've been in the shadows controlling things. And anything that does conflict with past events isn't a fault of Snyder's story; it's the fault of The New 52!

Batman pulls a card out of the authoritarian playbook (something he's often wont to do being, you know, a billionaire) and "allows" The Cavalier to remain in Gotham playing vigilante. But he only allows it because The Cavalier reminds him of the last happy moment of his life: sitting in a dark movie theater with his mother and father watching Zorro. The Cavalier does his cavalier thing and pretends to be gracious while also threatening Batman with a future battle of swords. Batman doesn't respond because Batman is simply thinking, "Um, like, yeah I'm way better at swords than you, you douche."

The Cavalier's secret identity is revealed to the reader: Hudson Pyle, stuntman. His plan was to make a name for himself as The Cavalier only to later reveal his identity when he became super popular. Then he'd easily get movie roles instead of just stunt jobs. But now that he's got a taste of saving people on the streets, he's not sure he wants to reveal his identity and move on to movies. He's considering giving that up to become Gotham's favorite crime fighter.

Batman probably already knows all that, or at least would know all of that if he wasn't so obsessed with the old person killer. This time, he set fire to a care facility for the elderly. Batman and the firefighters manage to save all but one person by the time the fire gets too out of control to safely enter the building. But Batman enters anyway! He's got to save the old person! Which he, of course, manages. Everybody at the scene begins to think, "Hey! Maybe this Batman isn't so bad. Would The Fop have gone in there under those conditions? Smiling and cocky and full of swagger? Surely not! But Batman? That guy doesn't care if he lives or dies! That's who I want to save me in a certain death situation!"

The issue ends with The Cavalier watching the fire from across the city, admitting to himself he would have been useless even if he had been there. Some things are better left for Batman; some things better left for The Cavalier. There's room enough for both in Gotham, thinks the Court of Owls, probably. But as he's contemplating his place in Gotham, he sees somebody jump from a nearby bridge! He swings in to save her on his Cavalierope only to find she didn't want to be saved. I mean, sure, at the moment. But she'll probably be grateful later.

Is this vampire Barbara Gordon?

Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #32 Rating: A. What kind of rating were you expecting from a James Robinson/Tim Sale jam? It lives up to the credits on the cover. I don't know why Catwoman decided to take a shit on it.

Lex Luthor: The Unauthorized Biography (July 1989)

The world was a better place when people accepted this person could be Superman's most dangerous enemy.

Once upon a time, Lex Luthor was fat and bald and had lost a hand to Krypto-cancer. He was the epitome of the greedy CEO who was shtupping his secretary, Scrooging his employees, and kicking every dog he could find. Being the worst person in the world wasn't about being athletic or having special powers or being charming or good-looking. Once upon a time, we knew who was the real enemy to truth, justice, and the American Way. Somewhere along the way, people forgot this piece of shit was the antithesis of everything good and they decided to elect him president.

I'm not talking about that time Lex Luthor was elected president of the United States of America in the DC Universe! I'm talking about Trump! But I don't want to talk about him anymore. This isn't going to be a review about that bloated, idiotic turd of a human being who's currently murdering fishermen off the coasts of Venezuela because he's the most unloved person who ever lived but the one who needs love and approval the most (which he gets from sociopaths). It's just that the use of gold for the cover font and the profile picture of an arrogant piece of shit made me think of that old fuck's dumb book from so many decades ago. But that's it! We're done with that now! No more mention of that piece of shit because we're here to have fun!

If I start a conversation with you by saying "Mister" and it's followed by anything other than "Big Dick", it means I don't want to fuck you.

Contrariwise, if I begin a conversation with you by saying, "Miss" or "Missus", it means I'm already about to jizz in my pants.

The police tape (a VHS tape because this was written in 1989, like eight generations and a billion mass shootings ago) contains a police interview with suspected murderer Clark Kent. Sure, we as readers know Clark Kent didn't actually kill anybody. But we as readers also know cops are terrible at their jobs and mostly solve cases using racism, gut instinct, and Magic 8 Balls. You'd think cops would do real investigative work when trying to solve murders because they love overtime pay so much. But they really only love overtime pay when it comes with doing basically nothing. Which is how they solve murders so, um, win-win, I guess? For cops, I mean! It's always lose-lose-lose-lose-die-lose-die-die-lose-lose-lose for the public when dealing with cops. The only way to win with a cop is not to play (I mean don't call their dumb shooting dogs loving asses. They're just going to make any situation worse. If I were being hunted by a Predator, I'd call Domino's delivery before I called a cop. And I hate Domino's pizza!).

"Your Honor, look how quiet this guy is! I rest my case!"

That bit depicted in the previous panels wasn't on the tape that Luthor received! That bit was behind the one-way mirror which the reader gets to be privy to because we're not watching the tape with Luthor; we've gone back to the original moment the tape was made. It's pretty complex story telling; you probably wouldn't understand it. Especially when the cops show Clark Kent a photograph of the guy he's supposed to have murdered and the perspective enters the picture and now we're even further back in time from the opening to when Peter wakes up after sleeping in a prophetic way (the way he'll wind up dying). This is more complicated than Memento, probably. I mean from what I've heard. I saw that in the theaters but it was like, um, hey? I think you got your reels mixed up?

Ha ha! I just lied again! This is from my Nice Alice and Death Rock Memento review from when I used to do movie reviews way back in the '00s when we actually still owned the No Apologies Press URL (thanks for existing, Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, so I could easily find this!):

"Well, I liked how he was basically a blank slate, personality-wise. He was an Everyman. He represented the way we all live our lives: in a desperate search for truth, for something solid to believe in. His life is a list of facts and categorizations. If he writes something down, it becomes the truth. We live our lives with contradictions and shifting perceptions. Black and white rarely exist for us. We have memories that we sometimes doubt. He has a line written on a photograph. Objective proof of the way his life is. At the end of the movie, his truth starts to waver, starts to become uncertain and ungrounded. The center of his life is falling apart. The center that is the fact that his wife was murdered and he is looking to avenge her death. And the end of the movie is actually the beginning of the timeline. So we see him at a weak moment, his facts betraying him, his memories unsure. At the beginning of the movie, he was completely sure of his reality. Everything was neatly stated, filed, categorized on his skin and photographs. But this certainty in his truth only comes, as we observe during the movie, by his own manipulation of facts and his own exploitation of his faulty memory. He plants so-called truths on his photographs and skin that will drive him toward a fulfilling reality: the killing of the man who killed his wife. And as we see, it doesn't really matter who that man is because Leonard has conditioned himself the way they try to condition Sammy to remember which blocks to pick up by electrocuting certain ones. Leonard is conditioned to hunt for his wife's murderer. That's all he knows how to do. He's an automaton at this point. And even when he's presented with proof that he has killed someone before that he thought was his wife's murderer (the picture of him pointing at the space on his chest where he'll tattoo the fact his job is done), he burns it and proceeds to set up Teddy as the guy he's looking for. The final proof that he's not really looking for the murderer is at the end, when he closes his eyes to see if the world goes away. He pictures himself in bed with his wife with the blank space on his chest tattooed with 'I have done it.' He doesn't want revenge. He wants his wife back. That's when he'll finally get the tattoo on his chest that lets him know his quest is over."

The guy in the photo's name is Peter Sands. He's a has-been reporter down on his luck. No job. No money. Divorced wife to whom he owes alimony. Oh, he's also a massive drunk. Exactly the sort of person Clark Kent would murder.

Desperate, Peter calls up every publisher he's ever worked with looking for an advance on any story he can make up in the moment. But nobody wants him because of that massive drunk thing I mentioned. Coincidentally, while getting turned down by every publisher he calls, one publisher who hasn't heard how drunk Peter constantly is, calls him fishing for an interesting book. On the spot, Peter decides he's going to do an unauthorized biography of Lex Luthor, not realizing it's going to get him murdered by Clark Kent later.

Please! I put a moratorium on mentioning that doddering racist, lady!

I don't know why Trump was ever famous but, as you can see, even in 1989, people knew he was the real world equivalent to Lex Luthor. I mean in the greedy and being a dick and a criminal department and not in the super genius inventor department. Definitely in the hating people who are actual heroes department because he's the most delusional narcissist in the world department and thinks all the accolades should go to him department.

Am I using "department" too much?

Back to the terrible police investigation by the usual terrible police who don't know how to do investigations, they've got some really damning evidence based on their bias and some wild speculation based on various works of fiction they've seen (not read. Cops don't read).

Oh come on! He could have written that for plenty of other reasons! Like the guy who shot him asked as Sands was dying, "Which reporter at The Daily Planet would Lois Lane never fuck?"

Back to the past, Peter Sands begins researching Lex Luthor starting with Lex's autobiography, Simply Brilliant. It's probably a good place to start if you read it carefully because no way Lex Luthor can't help bragging about any murders he did if you read between the lines and gather the subtext of things he's saying. Or he simply wrote stuff like, "I murdered X. Of course, I mean that in the metaphorical sense. Of course, I mean THAT in the metaphorical sense. Because I really did murder him. Literally double metaphorically, if you see what I'm saying. Look, I killed him and nobody can arrest me because I used to fuck young girls with them on this rich pedophile's island."

You're at an AC/DC concert?

Meanwhile, back in the present, the cops whine at Clark that he's being rude and making their jobs so fucking difficult.

"Look, you either confess now or you confess after we've held you in this room for 72 hours distorting everything you tell us and promising you that if you sign a confession, you can go home."

Clark knows he didn't kill this guy literally but may have killed him metaphorically (but not metaphorically metaphorically like how Lex killed that guy I made up). You see, Peter Sands invited Clark Kent to his house not for help on his book but for help on finding Superman. Peter explained his life was in danger from Lex Luthor and the killers on his payroll because Peter had found out too many true things about Lex. But Clark is all, "Whoa whoa whoa! Why do you think I, not Superman, would know how to get in touch with Superman, a man who is famously not me? Because if he were me, I could save your life right now but he's not me and my secret identity is super important (not Superman important! Ha ha!) so I can't just save your life right now, being that I'm not him, I mean. Let me leave you alone for a few hours while I pretend to go look for Superman because it's really difficult to get in touch with a guy who you totally aren't." So Clark leaves Peter's apartment and then Peter is murdered and begins writing, "Clark Kent is obviously not Superman or else he could have saved my life", on the floor with his own blood. But he dies after just writing Clark's full name.

After finishing Lex Luthor's autobiography, Peter Sands begins investigating anybody who's still alive who knew Lex when he was younger. That comes out to one person: an elementary school teacher. He doesn't get suspicious that only one person in all of Luthor's life is still alive; he waits until she explains that he probably got kids beaten up by grown men and possibly killed his parents. Then he begins investigating everybody tied to Lex's parents' life insurance policy and, hoo-boy, it sure looks like Lex murdered his parents! That's when he gets a phone call from a mysterious stranger who is all, "Stop investigating or we'll kill you. Unless you already figured out Lex killed his parents. Then we're just going to kill you anyway. Good day!"

Back at police headquarters in the present, the cops continue to act as if the first person they brought in for questioning is the murderer because, man, it's tough having to bring in more people. Also a waste of time when you can just frame whomever you first grab off the street.

Clark knows he's partly responsible for Sands' death so I hope they give him a polygraph!

Peter Sands, before he was killed by Luthor's men, decided he wasn't afraid of being killed by Luthor's men and continued his investigation. He remembered he knew a guy who worked for Luthor in the '60s who was also a Vietnam War Veteran and also a heavy drinker. So he tricks him into telling all of his secrets for a few beers while one of Luthor's men sits nearby listening. After the meeting, Luthor's guy runs down Peter's friend in the street, killing him. The police aren't investigating that murder because, I'm assuming, he was a Black guy? And probably because he was a Vietnam Vet? And, being 1989, maybe he was gay? Any reason so the police could convince themselves they don't have to care about that murder because they believe nobody else does either. Some of you are too young to remember Reagan's America but it sucked. It wasn't as bad as Trump's America, but it was full of vile, despicable people who were only governing for certain people. Yeah, sounds familiar, right? It's the kind of leadership that makes me drop friends and stop talking with family who continue to support it. Just vile people supporting other vile people for the most selfish and irrational reasons.

Only fifteen pages left so it might be time to summarize the rest of the story in the end of review bit, right? I mean, I don't want to spoil the ending where Lex Luthor heaves his horrendous form atop the woman who brought him the Clark Kent snuff film.

Gross.

Lex Luthor: The Unauthorized Biography Rating: B. Okay, fine, Clark Kent wasn't killed on-camera by cops. He was saved at the last minute by one of Lex Luthor's lawyers so that Clark would owe him a favor. I thought for sure Clark Kent would come to his own defense by pointing out that the dying man wrote Clark's name with his non-dominant hand as you can plainly see without even knowing which of Peter Sands' hands was dominant because he's wearing a watch on the hand that scrawled Clark's name. Am I a better detective than the Metropolis police detectives? Yes, of course I am. Cops are terrible detectives. Instead, we learn the murder weapon was found and the prints on the blade were from a convicted felon who had fallen out with Donald Trump. So Trump had him framed for the murder and attempted framing of Clark Kent. Plus Lex Trumpthor probably had all the people Sands interviewed killed. In the end, Lex Luthor has gotten away with everything because he's a genius and Superman's a huge pusshole who was manipulated by a Lexcorps-made earthquake in Tokyo. Luthor controlled the whole thing! See, I had to stop calling him Trump as soon as I began talking about his genius plans to manipulate everyone. Trump only manipulates dimwits and fucknuggets whom he either has serious dirt on (probably Epstein-island related) or they're just so dumb and greedy, and their dad hated them so much, that they'll pretend to believe any piece of dog vomit that drips from Trump's dog butthole of a mouth. Was that a mixed metaphor? I hope not! My credibility as a proper writer could be shattered!