LOBO #12: Lobo has been hired to help some intergalactic bad guys recover their drugs and he takes out the other dealers in the process. Fueled by the drugs that got into his system, he fights off a couple of nasty hallucinations before really losing it and decides to go off and kill Hal Jordan.
Why is it when a series is at the very end of its’ road that they start to get good? This book has been limping along since issue #1 and NOW starts to get moving! Cullen Bunn is joined by Frank Barbiere and we finally get a violent, nasty Lobo who is more like the classic bastich and not that metrosexual Czarnarian we had been dealing with. Robson Rocha delivers the usual fine looking artwork, complete with it’s share of blood, guts and semi-naked bodies. Next issue, our hero goes off after Hal Jordan. This should be one heck of an ending.
MARTIAN MANHUNTER #6: The moon of Phobos shoots a beam down into the Earth and reactivates the White Martian weapon. However, they need all of the various pieces of J ‘onn J'onzz in one place and have them enter it. Leo, who is revealed as Ma'alefa'ak, is making certain that the Wessel and Mr. Biscuits are on enters that beam. Wessel uses telekinetic power he never knew he had to overpower the pilots and take over the flying of the plane. On the ground, Pearl turns into her true Martian self but Mould pushes her into the beam and then he too enters. J’onn J'onzz comes together in his true, original form and finds that he has recreated a Martian city. But the other parts of him have managed to separate from him and they plan on reversing the whole situation.
This is one of the wildest, trippiest and amazing titles that DC is currently publishing! Rob Williams is writing a true masterpiece that you just can’t gloss through. You really need to read and pay attention to this book. Yes, I’m sorry to say: YOU ACTUALLY HAVE TO THINK WHILE READING IT! And Eddy Barrows art is amazing! I could not imagine this book without his detailed work. Credit also needs to be given to Eber Ferreira, who provides the inking. This tag-team in the art department just makes this book explode off the page. If you are NOT reading this title, you are truly missing a book that will go down in comic history as a ground breaker.
MIDNIGHTER #6: Midnighter saves his boyfriend from being shot during Thanksgiving dinner and, with a quick kiss, goes off to deal out his own brand of revenge. Then they go off on a “post-apartment attack and remodeling tour” which takes them across the world with Midnighter collecting God Garden Tech and also having quality time with Matt. Matt's Father has been roughed up because of Matt’s association with Midnighter, so Midnighter heads off and starts beating up people to get answers. Later, Midnighter gets attacked by a group in a runaway school bus that jams his fight computer. After almost killing him, Midnighter kills them and they turn into goo. He heads back to Matt’s father’s house, where it looks like dad is dead, leading Matt to stab Midnighter. And that’s when Prometheus arrives…
Steve Orlando, after a weak opening to the book, comes roaring back with a great ending and a major plot twist! Aco’s art was spot on this month, looking really awesome. The art shifts gently between violent fights to warm embraces with ease. The juxtaposition of the violence and the romance makes this issue really work.
NEW SUICIDE SQUAD #14: Although Vic Sage hit the button triggering the team’s neck bombs, but that doesn’t happen because Waller disengaged the bombs before the mission started. While she tells them that Sage is a traitor, they decide to attack her. Deadshot is ready to kill her when she informs them that she reprogrammed the bombs. If she dies, they go boom! They decide to team up to take Sage down. Meanwhile, Sage is meeting with Black Manta and convinces him to work for Sage…to kill Waller.
Sean Ryan and Phillipe Briones turn out another killer issue…literally! I love that Waller is now part of the missions and that leaves Sage back at home with his own plans for the destruction of the team. Ryan’s plot is great and his dialogue if super sharp! Briones art is a perfect fit too and the only other person I could see that would do as great a job with all these characters would be Paul Pelletier. I just want to know when they’re going to drop Mr. J. into this title as a tie in to the upcoming movie.
OMEGA MEN #6: The Omega Men have been captured and Broot is dead. So, the question of the hour that is asked of each of them is: why do the Omega Men need Kyle Rayner? As all are tortured and it looks like Kyle will die because the bomb he carried within him wasn’t really a bomb at all, Doc and Scrapps crash in. Scrapps frees the Omega Men while Kyle frees himself, quoting religious verses all the while. In the end, the Omega Men are seemingly all killed, save for Kalista, who is saved by Kyle. Most importantly: who has the key and can they find the bomb?
Leave it to Tom King and Barnaby Bagenda to give us more of one of the most underrated titles out there. This book is so far from what the original OMEGA MEN series was from back in 1983. While the names are the same, the story, the action and the politics are way different. And, while the original series was awesome, especially because it featured Keith Giffen’s art, this new series is so ridiculously deep that it’s not funny! It’s about oppression, religion, and divine intervention. Oh yeah: required reading, especially now that it has been saved from cancellation at six issues.
RED HOOD/ARSENAL #6: It looks like the Joker’s Daughter has killed off Arsenal and the Hero Manifesto is not happy about it. But it turns out that he was only shot in the head with a paintball containing blood and brains, so that allows him to take out Suzie Su. Later, Joker’s Daughter shows up with a chainsaw on a plane…literally… containing Jason Todd, After a battle, she escapes, leaving Jason bewildered. Eventually, all three turn up to battle the remainder of the Hero Manifesto and that results in a team-up. Jason gets a text about an attack going on in Gotham and that leads the trio into the Robin War.
So how does Joker’s Daughter know about the upcoming Robin War? Maybe she read PREVIEWS! And what’s with trying to make her the NEW Harley Quinn? Seriously-she’s crazy and is teaming up with the good guys? It’s all from the creative minds and pens of Scott Lobdell and Denis Medri and it was the usual shenanigans from Roy and Jason.
ROBIN, SON OF BATMAN #6: In the past, we get the story of how Damian ended up with Goliath after killing his mother and family on a quest for the Scepter of Kings. Today, Talia takes power in Bialya and Damian quizzes her on how she could kill him. Later, Maya shows him that Batman is dead and they make up, with her telling him the R on his chest is for “redemption”. In the end, Maya ends up with Ravi, Damian frees Goliath and heads to Gotham to take part in the Robin War, after he tells Talia that he will be watching her if she decides to cross the line again.
Patrick Gleason does a beautiful job concluding this arc. It look wonderful, truly touches at the heart on several occasions and is just a great ending to a great story. I’m curious to see where Gleason takes us next with the ROBIN WAR story. But this book does a killer job of turning Maya into her own character and poises her for a future book, I’m sure.
SECRET SIX #8: After a brief history lesson, we see that Black Alice has stolen everyone’s powers and is using them against them. Then the Children of Arion, who claim to be the one true Atlanteans, saying the only way to keep the magic people from trying to kill Alice is to find and destroy the Alabaster Columns. Catman, Blake, Strix, Porcelain, the Ventriloquist and Etrigan have their game of mini golf interrupted by one of the Children of Arion, who tells the same story. Later, they get transported under the sea to gather the stones and run into Aquaman, which leads to a fight between Catman and himself. In the process, one of the stones is destroyed and our heroes seemingly drowned in the process. Some of the Children of Arion note this and decide there are others who can help them. And they transform into sea creatures and swim away.
Gail Simone continues to write a truly gang-up story that goes into so many different directions it is sometimes hard to figure out what the real book is all about. Now, I’m not complaining about that, as I actually find this whole thing totally fascinating and engaging. Add in Dale Eaglesham’s amazing art and this book is so much one of my current favorites. This book is just such a wild ride. I mean, we have this whole collection of B Grade heroes and villains, brought together and bonding in such a way that you can’t help but love it.
SINESTRO #17: Sinestro and Black Adam fight the Pale Bishop and the Bishop fights back by implanting images into Adam’s mind. So Sinestro gives him a yellow ring and makes him part of the Sinestro Corps. Meanwhile, Wonder Woman joins into the battle going on in outer space. When Sinestro and Black Adam arrives, Sinestro tries to convince her that he has turned into a good guy now, but all she is concerned about is how the Paling is coming to feed on fear.
Cullen Bunn continues to up his game on this cook, which is a great thing considering how really disappointing this series has been so far. But the killer here, in a very bad way, is the art. The first 10 pages are by Brad Walker, with Drew Hennessy inking. The next five pages are by Neil Edwards and Trevor Scott. The last five pages are by Szymon Kudranski. This is just such a visual mess that the story fell down because of it. That’s too bad because Bunn really has managed to turn around his work on this book. And maybe, with him leaving AQUAMAN, he can concentrate on making this the best book he can.
STARFIRE #6: We flashback to Sol Gomez and his former girlfriend Maria. That brings us into Starfire fighting with Soren Hook, who she touches and gains his horrible past as part of her memories. Sol ends up in the hospital while Soren ends up being sedated so the cops can figure out who he is. Later, a bounty hunter named Kragg shows up and comes after Kori. They battle, she incapacitates him and takes him away. Oh yeah: Grayson has arrived too.
Really? That’s it? We quick wrap the story from last issue, drop in an intergalactic bounty hunter, and then pop Dick Grayson into the picture. A 20 page story we could have had tell us this in about 4 pages. Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti wrote it while the amazing Emanuela Lupacchino drew it.
SUPERMAN #46: Superman continues to fight at Mythbrawl, growing more into his role with each bout. After the match, Clark and Haemosu go to an Old God bar to find out info on Apolaki. After talking to some of Apolaki's ex-girlfriends, one of them sends him to see Yurei, where he finds out that Hordr is siphoning energy from people and making clones. Superman has to fight a fully powered sand clone of himself, which leads to Jimmy taking a full heat vision blast. This leads to Hordr_Root daring Superman to hurt him back.
Well, it’s nice to see that Gene Luen Yang has managed to mine Superman’s past and dig up the sand Superman. The first time I saw this was in the classic 9 issue Superman run beginning with issue #233, where he no longer had to fear Kryptonite and had to deal with a sand duplicate that came from the dimension of Quarm Asand. Anyway-a classic story the obviously played a role in Yang’s creating this clone. The story was fun and I especially like Clark getting a little more of an attitude as of late. Also nice is Howard Porter’s art that I like better than John Romita Jr.’s work on this title.
SUPERMAN LOIS AND CLARK #2: After beginning with a lengthy flashback to back when the Whites were first on our Earth and Clark was battling Shockwave in Chicago. In the present day, the government is investigating the crash of the Excalibur and wondering what has happened to Hank Henshaw. Over at school, Jon White gets into trouble and that leads to Lois having to come to pick him up. On the way home, mysterious Men in Black, who may or may not be Intergang, chase them. Superman shows up and helps dispatch the bad guys without Jon noticing. In the end, someone is looking for the Oblivion Stone and that is probably going to bring them to Earth. story, but until I learn more about it, I can't say I really care in that department. My interest lies squarely with Lois, Clark and Jon.
Wow! THIS is truly CLASSIC SUPERMAN! Dan Jurgens and Lee Weeks gives us a great story! And I will be honest, I truly had my doubts about this series when it was first announced, just as I had issues when the CONVERGENCE mini-series appeared. But Jurgens style and sense of history helps make these characters and this story work so well. And Weeks may be at the best spot in his career!
SUPERMAN WONDER WOMAN #23: Superman has put an offer on the table to Parasite, which he accepts, while Wonder Woman doesn’t trust the villain. Meanwhile, Vandal Savage talks with Angelo Bend, who admits he is going to have to his father. Parasite, Superman and Wonder Woman make their way into Bend's lair and end up battling Atomic Skull, Live Wire, and Major Disaster. Parasite saves the day, but Wonder Woman is captured and becomes a battery for our villains.
Can we get a Parasite solo book after he turns out to be the hero here? Peter J. Tomasi’s story is fun and concentrates on action and not the romance issue. That, in itself, makes this book so much better than it used to be. And, as a long time fan of Doug Mahnke’s art, this just makes me smile with every single page.
TEEN TITANS #13: In the Metropolis Armory Ward, our heroes are battling Dr. Psycho, who is receiving almost as much punishment as he is dishing out, thanks to Raven. At the same time, Manchester Black is teaming up with Despero, who actually is Chimera is disguise. This leads to a face turn for Manchester’s team, but they all get taken out by Alpha Centurion.
What? I mean…WHAT!? What was this? As far as I’m concerned, it was a twenty-page waste of my time! Will Pfeifer’s story, which was building so nicely since Scott Lobdell left the book, totally fell flat here. Actually, fell flat is an understatement! It took everything that had been built upon at this point and threw it away to give us…Alpha Centurian? Well, I guess that means Doomed will be next in this book. And having three artists in the form of Ricken, Paolo Pantalena, and Noel Rodriguez just means that a book that was already later was thrown together quickly. A total disappointment.
TELOS #2: Telos goes to Colu and gets arrested so he can hopefully find the rebel leader in prison. A flashback tells his origin story and it is revealed that he was Arak Son of Thunder and how he made a deal with Brainiac to spare his people. Once in prison, he meets with rebel leader Techne, along with Captain K-Rot, Steath and Captain Comet. Techne was created by the Tyrants from Brainiac’s DNA to fight against him. Using Steath's cloaking power, they make their way to the data core and Captain Comet gets information about the Psions. But Computo's forces are arrive and that includes the arrival of…Validus.
So, this issue was better than the last one. But that didn’t have to go far to achieve that. Carlo Pagulayan and Igor Vitorino handle the art and their work is nice and clean. Jeff King writes a good story that ties in bits out of THRESHOLD and the Legion of Super Heroes, besides the obvious CONVERGENCE tie ins. But it still had a bunch of really weird plot holes in the form of unresolved questions. Why is Captain Comet here? How is it that Techne knows Telos? And why do Captain K-Rot sound like Rocket Racoon?
TITANS HUNT #2: Once clean Roy Harper has completely fallen off the wagon and sees a ninja jump onto his truck, leading him to spin out and whip out his bows and arrows. The police arrive and try to arrest him under normal means but have to resort to tasering him. Gnarrk has started to revert to his old caveman self, complete with drawing cave paintings and deciding it was time to go out and hunt. Mal and a very pregnant Bumblebee see a strange shadow in pictures of him accepting his Gold Star award. Meanwhile, Dick Grayson is doing some detective work in the Batcave regarding the Atlanteans and Lilith, who he dreamed about in the last issue; not to mention the box he has with the lungs of an Atlantean in it. Dick heads out to find Garth, which results in the two of them fighting. That’s when a heavily armed Donna Troy shows up.
Well, this ends up being a nice surprise title, as is the SUPERMAN LOIS AND CLARK. Dan Abnett and Stephan Segovia gives us a title that is full of bits and pieces of the rich history that was the Teen Titans. Let’s do a little roll call here: we have seen Roy Harper (not to be confused with the current Arsenal), Lilith (didn’t she die in GRADUATION DAY?), Garth (didn’t he die in BLACKEST NIGHT), Donna Troy (didn’t she die in GRADUATION DAY?), Mal, Karen, and Gnarrk (wasn’t he supposed to be dead?). We have yet to see the OTHER Dick Grayson, the OTHER Wally West, the OTHER Hank Hall, Don Hall (he died in CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS, but CRISIS never happened thanks to CONVERGENCE, so…), Tula (she died in CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS, but…), and Duela Dent (she died in COUNTDOWN). This has been far more fun than I expected, so here’s hoping that this mini-series ties up some loose ends and gives us a REAL Titans title!
WE ARE ROBIN #6: Izzy, Riko and Duke are battling a Talon and are losing quite badly, which causes Izzy to pull out a gun. Not that being an unofficial part of the Batman world and having a gun isn’t bad enough, all of this is happening on television, so everyone can see who these kids are. Luckily, Dre and Dax are watching television and that gets them to act as the cavalry after Duke and Riko distract Izzy long enough to keep her from pulling the trigger. Alfred/Nest arrives with a militarized vehicle that opens fire and takes down Talon with beanbags, giving the team a chance to get into the vehicle. Once they are in a safe place, he turns them loose and insists that they need to start wearing masks.
Here we are: six issues in and I’m still having mixed emotions about this series. In concept, it’s pretty cool. But I’m not totally sold on these characters. Lee Bermejo is a great artist, as seen by his covers on this and his work on SUICIDERS, where he also wrote a killer story. But these characters…I’m just not loving them. This is kind of ready THE OUTSIDERS meets THE WARRIORS as young teens. They’re street kids playing vigilante. No thanks…we have enough of those now running around the DC Universe. Oh…I am also not a huge fan of Jorge Corona’s art. It’s just that I look at these awesome Bermejo covers and get inside and…just not the same!
WONDER WOMAN #46: Since Diana hasn’t been the all-killing God of War she should be, it’s causing issues with the cosmic balance of things and, specifically the causing damage to Eirene: the Goddess of Peace. Zeke arrives in the midst of it all and Eirene takes Diana on a worldwide tour to show how her lack of war is making people weak and keeping them from rising up against their oppressors. This doesn’t totally make sense to Diana and leads to a battle between the two. Zeke ends up using his powers to bring Ares, Apollo, and Donna Troy, who has become Fate, back to life. All ends happily, except for Aegis who is subject to Eirene’s revenge.
I really want Brian Azzarello back on this book! While David Finch’ art looks wonderful, as usual, I haven’t quite figured out what is going on with his wife Meredith’ story telling. Just when things seem like they’re going into a sensible direction, it all falls apart. We get half a book about the horrors or war versus the good things that war does and then it becomes a fight book, with a good portion of the supporting cast showing up in time to change the results of the battle and bring the story to an end. It just seems that this story was way to disjointed from the very beginning.
