Comics!
So, I was sick on Wednesday and Thursday. Friday became the day to buy comic books this week. Sadly, this caused me to miss out on Punisher #11. I picked up my first Punisher comic ever last week, Punishermax #1. Was looking forward to jumping into the main story. Frank Castle as a zombie/monster/whatever seems like as good a place to start as any. I’ll hunt one down sometime next week. What I picked up:
Everything ahead could contain potential spoilers.
Solid story, kept me interested. Fabian Nicieza is building Azrael’s character, which is fine. I guess it kind of bugs me that Mike Lane appears to jumps into the superhero role so easily, outsmarting The White Ghost, generally kicking ass. This isn’t a big drawback, just would be nice to have a little more inner monologue. I did like the two flashbacks in the beginning and how they played into the rest of the story. Also, Huntress.
This, to me, is comic book simplicity. And Kelley Jones’ Batman is a sight to behold. It’s nothing spectacular, but it does it’s job well.
Chris Yost finishes his Huntress/Man-Bat story this week. Good stuff, twist ending. I liked the idea of a priest forced to endure all of the shit that Gotham City piles on him finally snapping and believing that God is telling him to murder people. The fact that we didn’t get an awesome new crazy priest villain out of this storyline disappointed me a bit, because that’s where I thought it was going. Still good.
I’m a sucker for these recent past/present team up type things because I’m a bit of a history nerd. I started on Brave and the Bold at #28 and Barry Allen fighting during WWII was pretty sweet. So of course I thought all the flashbacks to the 60s and how the death of Bobby Kennedy impacted the movement was pretty sweet. The Geek’s character and how he views the present vs. the past is extremely well done. Just a great story as a whole.
This is 4 bucks this week, kind of hard to justify it. The Terra/Geo-Force thing was kind of boring at this point. I’ve seen a lot of very similar Blackest Night stories. It’s pretty much: OH MY GOD YOU WERE DEAD NOW YOU’RE WALKING AROUND and YOU ARE MY SISTER AS WELL SO WOW. I’m also not sure why this is the specific issue where we find a Black Lantern fighting against their orders or whatever. Then the Katana and her dead family thing is again the same as every increasingly mundane Blackest Night encounter so far. I guess if you really care about Katana and know her backstory it’s something worth reading. I probably won’t buy Outsiders again until I hear some positive reviews.
This is my first Hellblazer comic. I’ve been falling into the trap of buying only the main Marvel/DC stuff. Last week I bought Supergod #1 and Criminal: The Sinners Part One in order to step outside the box. This week, I grabbed Hellblazer because it was the beginning of a new story arc. I like Colonel Saab’s character and how he’s become some sort of demon. John Constantine is the typical enjoyable anti-hero. A solid book.
Another of my attempts to start buying comics without Marvel or DC on the cover. This one has 4 pages of Dinosaurus and then the rest is build up to:
A. The sequid invasion of earth. (Don’t ask me, I’ve got no clue what it is either)
B. Invincible’s girlfriend is pregnant
There’s a good moment where Invincible’s girlfriend’s dad starts going on about virginity at length. This is followed by a great couple of panels where Invincible is sitting on the couch with a perfect look of terror on his face. The art by Ryan Ottley is superb in this issue.
I felt like this was one of the more underwhelming things I picked up this week. Maybe I just need to understand the series as a whole more.
I thoroughly enjoyed this, Electro as a man of the people was excellent. I’m a little confused as to the meaning of The Gauntlet. The only hint at it is on the 2nd page that Electro some guy who speaks in red thought bubbles has assembled some villains. Then there is no mention of this for the rest of the issue. The issue is solid, but the only thing that actually seems relevant to how it was advertised in the first place is that Electro is present. The second feature’s art is pretty awesome, by JM Ken Niimura.
Now that I realize that Electro is just part of The Gauntlet rather than in control of it. This storyline has got me thinking of the Batman Hush storyline, some villain somehow manipulating some of Spidey’s most well known villains. The Gauntlet must be a 3 - part story arc for each villain (The list appears to be Rhino, Lizard - Man, Mysterio, Sand - Man, Kraven’s wife and daughter, and Electro) every month. That seems pretty awesome.
Dark Reign The List Amazing Spider - Man
A really excellent “Good guys win - bad guys lose” story. Peter Parker gets to deliver a heroic speech to the Iron Patriot at the end. Good stuff. Interested to see how it plays into the rest of Dark Reign.
I think I mentioned that I’m a bit of a history nerd earlier. This is positively glorious. It’s the Marvel universe taking place in 1602. Just buy it.
This appears to be the conclusion of a story arc, but I still love it. I dunno, maybe I’ll get tired of Deadpool being hilariously insane. Right now I’m just eating it up.
Bruce Banner is cool. This isn’t the greatest book on the market right now, the art style probably isn’t for everyone. The story is mostly just waiting around for Bruce Banner to become The Hulk again so Skaar and The Hulk can have an awesome battle. But Bruce Banner is cool, so everything is OK.
I thought this issue was really good. Jim Rhodes standing up for what he believes in, the appearance of Ares. Also, a clone of Jim Rhodes. Because why not?
That’s all I bought.
The Noob’s favourite character of the week:
Colonel Saab Burke earns this… honor? Whatever.
Sure, this was a week involving the dismembered zombie head of Deadpool, Peter Parker being awesome in Dark Reign The List, “King’s Pin” (what is a King’s Pin anyways?), The Geek, and Bruce Banner.
The beast pictured above is a former British Colonel who lives in colonized India. He enjoys talking to a large picture of Queen Victoria and raping and murdering young Indian girls. After he killed a girl way back when, some mystic Indian man put a curse on him. It’s to be assumed that he was put in some sort of limbo. Flash forward to present - day India. He’s murdered thirteen Indian girls recently and crossed paths with John Constantine, promised a “real beauty” if he can eliminate Constantine.
